I hope everyone had a great week and you are enjoying this rainy and windy weather here in Southwestern Ontario! To wile away the time this week and I am laughing at this..... I was able to complete and square a quilt for a customer, teach a little, guide a little, make some items for an upcoming craft show, bake a little, visit with family and friends at the St Jacob's market and finish a quilt challenge mini quilt. The only thing, I could not fit in was exercise and some pattern designs. I will hope for better luck next week in these departments! It was a great time despite the crazy weather to get to work. I'm sharing some pics below of my projects this week except the Challenge Quilt as I cannot show it to you until January..so please stay tuned on that one. Have a great weekend, Happy Halloween and please don't eat too much of the sweet stuff, you are already sweet enough!!
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It would be remiss of me if I did not share a pumpkin block on the week of Halloween, so here goes. The block shown, is a mini block and was actually made into a coaster with felt on the back of it. You could use this block and make it into a mini quilt or read more to see other ideas. It's a quick project, Here's how to do it:
Other ideas: Hee, hee, hee, Wishing you a safe and Happy Halloween! Last week on Tuesday, I had appliquéd my shapes to a snippet background that was fused on top of a foundation cotton fabric layer and batting and backing and I had started to thread paint. The thread painting is now complete, see below pics The next step is quilting and beading (centre only) and it will be ready to be sent for a Challenge I am involved with. I will take final photos and share them in January after this little piece is judged.
Next week will be a whole different Tool or Technique, keep following me for a new learning experience every week. Thanks so much for your continued interest in Tool and Technique Tuesday! Today was a scheduled day of pseudo teaching with my sister Alison and a good friend Linda. Between power sewing, some "reverse stitching", directional issues, lots of laughs and sharing of funny stories, we managed to complete 6 mini totes between the 3 of us. Some suggested uses for this tote: A handy tote for toys for children, craft supplies, sewing tools, a gift exchange for a quilting friend and a tote for hexies. We even tried a grown up and "quilty selfie" (who knew they even existed?) I think we invented it!! By the end of this day, I can say that we were very productive, we learned from some rather funny mistakes, and best of all had a better sense of wellbeing because of it. Happy Monday, Share your knowledge with friends!
My sister and her partner have a HUGE garden and she gave me a lovely Australian squash. Thank you Alison and Brian! I cook a lot of large pot or slow cooker items because they are nutritious, comforting and easy to have stewing while sewing, not to mention the aromatic effects in the house. So I thought on this chilly Sunday, I would share with you my recipe for squash soup. My husband keeps telling me it's yummy and better than any he has tasted in a restaurant. Robin's Squash Soup Recipe Ingredients: One Australian or winter squash Approximately 6-8 cups of vegetable or chicken stock 2 large celery stocks chopped 2 large carrots chopped 1 large onion chopped 1 tsp of powdered or fresh ginger (taste as it cooks to see if you like more) 1/2 tsp of celery seed or celery salt 1 tsp of minced fresh garlic 1 Tbsp of brown sugar 1 Tbsp of maple syrup (also taste as it cooks to see if more is needed) 1 TBSP olive oil 1/2 Tsp of Salt 1/2 Tsp of Pepper How to make it: Cut squash, removed seeds and skin, chop it into chunks and place it in a large pot. Add the remaining ingredients and stew it for 2-3 hours until all vegetables are very soft. You may need to add more liquid as it stews, chicken stock will work (you want the liquid to cover the squash). Once all veggies are soft, turn the heat off and let it cool slightly to puree in a blender. Return to pot to heat, serve with crumbles of bacon, a drizzle of maple syrup, fresh chives or croutons. This recipe freezes nicely as well. I hope you enjoy it too! This week was one of those weeks where I got lots done but I felt like I was taking 2 steps forward and one sideways!
I hope you had a productive week and have a great weekend. Happy Friday!
Ok today's Wednesday Wonder is not a block but it is made with squares of fabric :) Some of you may have made this cute little fabric basket already, but I have not made it yet and recently came across a way to make it and so I thought I would share the method. You can store your sewing supplies, craft supplies, nail polish, pretty soaps, halloween treats or give it to someone as a gift filled with Christmas goodies. It can be made in any size you like and I have already decided that I want to make more of them for sure! Step 1- Determine what fabric you would like for the lining and for the outside, cut lining and outside into a square 10", 12", etc as you like (a rectangle will not work). Cut 2 squares- 1 of lining and one of outside. Cut the same for batting Step 2- Lay the outside fabric right side up on the batting and iron it, lay your lining fabric right side down to the outside fabric- see pics below Step 3- Pin a 3" gap on one side and sew 1/4" all the way around the square, leaving the gap open and clip corners just up to the stitching Step 4- Turn to the right side and poke out corners, press and slip stitch the gap. Step 5- Quilt the quilt sandwich as desired, I quilted mine echoing the outside edges using a walking foot around and around until the square sandwich was filed with echo stitching Step 6- Fold your square in half with your lining showing on the outside, in the folded corners draw a mark 2" vertically from the fold along the sewn edge on each side and 2"inches horizontally from the sewn edge onto the fold. Use a frixion or erasable marking pen- draw a line from the 2" vertical line and the 2" horizontal line on an angle and sew from the finished edge on this line towards the folded edge. See below: Step 7-Do you remember those origami boxes we made in school with little phrases on them? This project now reminds me of this. Now grab the top centers of your rectangle and pulling toward you fold a rectangle again, measure the same and mark and sew as you did in step 6- refer carefully to my pictures below Step 8- Turn your project to the right side and poke corners gently, you will notice the corners are open on the inside and you can either slip stitch these closed and against the lining or keep them open for pens, rotary cutter etc.
Step 9- Turn your inside corners out to the outside fabric and sew a button on the point to make flaps, fill it with all your "stuff" and enjoy!- refer to picture I promised last tuesday to expand on the snippet background and show you my thread painted sun flower that I will be adding to the green background. So last week I explained how I fused the snippets of fabric with Heat n'bond Lite. This week I drew a picture of the sunflower I wanted from a photograph onto freezer paper- x2. One is for layout and one is to be cut out for appliqué pieces- see pics below The above is a rough drawn pic based on my sisters photograph from her veggie garden. I then cut one of the drawing pieces out roughly, keeping the other one for reference and layout- These are drawn on the dull side of freezer paper with a sharpie marker and ironed shiny side down to the right side of the corresponding fabric. To save time the leaves are cut out of one piece of fabric as they will be thread painted to look realistic I then fused, lightweight fusible web to the wrong side of the fabric and cut all pieces out accurately, removing the paper backing from the fusible web and I removed the freezer paper only once all pieces were cut out and ready to layout on my background. See below, it looks a bit unrealistic at this point, but will look better as I complete the thread painting First make a quilt sandwich, with a backing and batting and 505 spray or pin baste my layers together. Once I am sure my quilt sandwich will not shift, I start to thread paint with a free motion (darning foot) and feed dogs on my machine lowered and stitch length at zero. I use decorative embroidery threads with sheen and variegated to get a realistic look. I also use machingers gloves and move the fabric. I start with outlining each petal with a thread colour slightly darker that the petals. I use Microtex needles 70 or 80 depending on the thickness of the thread. I then thread paint within the petals with a straight stitch and a back and forth movement in the direction of the petals. It takes some practise, but its so much fun to do! I spent approximately 2 hours thread painting and the project is not yet complete, I will post the completed project next Tuesday along with a new Tuesday project. I promise it will look better than it does right now. Thanks for your interest in Tool and Technique Tuesday! Recently, I was watching a video about The City Quilter (a quilt shop in New York City ) and they made a comment about young girls coming into the shop as a "skipped generation". I know with the educational system as it is, we cannot rely on it to teach them any domestic arts. I feel that as a result not only domestic arts suffer, but so does art in general. Just my humble opinion. Since my 2 girls were about 8 years old, I have been trying my best to insure they: 1) know how to sew and 2) are motivated to sew. This weekend, I had the pleasure and honour to assist my daughter with her OCAD University (Ontario College of Art and Design) thesis project involving her study of changing domestic arts and it's affect on relationships. Mallory's above art quilt was first printed on fabric and then some elements were removed to actually tell more of the story. The bodies of the lady and girl are heavily thread painted and the aprons are stuffed to emphasize domesticity. The picture above does not show the detail. There is an abundance of quilting and thread painting on the piece and I am happy to say that Mallory only needed some guidance, she clearly has a grasp of her machine and sewing skills learned a few years back. If you have a creative skill, I encourage you to share with someone from the "skipped generation". Happy Monday :) See thread painting detail below: |
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