Knowing When to Throw In The Towel (or bag)

Months ago, my sister-in-law asked me to make a doll's nappy (diaper) bag for my 2½ year old niece. She hasn't been able to find one for her in Australia. I picked up fabric for it ages ago, but with lacking sewjo and nerves about re-sizing a bag pattern when I've only made one bag it's taken me too long to get around to starting.

Skipped stitches because my machine didn't like using a denim needle
when sewing denim...

This was the week, and up until the last hour of yesterday afternoon it was going swimmingly. I'm making Sew Sweetness' Velocity Girl bag. I've made it before, in fact I took it out for its photoshoot last Memorial Day! And when my sister-in-law saw it she told me that with a flap it and a little bigger it would look just like the expensive real-life diaper bags that were all the rage. So when she requested a doll version for Grace, I thought, well I'll just make a scaled down version of Velocity Girl, add a flap - how hard can it be!??

And the answer is not that hard, there's some maths and counting, but Sara's pattern is so well written that it actually makes putting it all together still really easy when you're taking your little added extras into account. A fact I'm now eternally grateful for, because I find bags really difficult to keep a hold of in my head. It's their 3D-ness. I can't quite grasp the why, until twenty steps later I'm like, 'OHHHHHHH, that's really frickin' clever!!'.

Fighting the Pins

Anyway, the balls up. I made all the various panels and pockets, and added piping (a first - yay!) and it went grand. Then, I started to assemble them, into a bag form. It was when I was adding the second outer wall that I realised I was using half the recommended seam allowance, cos I'd gotten kinda cocky with how well it was going. Part of me was like, well, it would be a pain to unpick and it's fine so far, so maybe we'll just go with it.

Offending Hole

But, no. I missed the underneath layer in three spots, and one was a whopper. I was so cross. Grumpy for well over an hour. That feeling of wanting to break a piece of china, or maybe kick a wall... Grrrr. But, a rant at Paul, a stomp around the supermarket, dinner, Dr Who, and a walk all improved my mood. As did, surprisingly, turning the offending item right side out. It needs to be unpicked, and sewn with the correct seam allowance. But it's shaping up to be really cute when done right, so it will be worth it.

Mollified by the Cute

But it won't be worth it today. Or for the next week. Too much frustration. It's time to metaphorically throw it at the wall. Wait for pay day, grab some Joann's vouchers, take Sara's instagram advice of yesterday and buy some Clover Wonder Clips. So that instead of bending my lovely quilting pins, and trying to figure why I can't push one through, only to discover I've created a small groove in my thumbnail, I can just clip and unclip, and not curse.

Let's Not Forget the Hole of Shame

Last night, after I'd ranted and stomped and walked it out, I had 45 minutes and so I continued the calm with a little bit of English paper piecing. I've been cutting one square from every scrap of the Farmer's Wife Quilt that's large enough, and I'm beginning to sew them together. There's no plan to the colours, and I'm finding the outcome very cottage-y cosy.

This post is getting unwieldy now, but one more picture and a couple of links. The Deep in the Heart of Texas Roadtrip QAL kicks off on Sunday, June 1st. Melissa has cutting directions and the quilt layout up on her blog as of yesterday. Today I got out the fabrics I've chosen for this quilt. I bought a lot of Lazy Day charm and mini-charm packs (one of my oldest friends is having a baby, and I panicked earlier in the year) which were going spare, but which I think on a navy background are going to make a lovely Texas. I've only bought a few extra half yards for the city blocks so far, but this morning I ordered a few more colours for variety. I'm excited to get going and will check in once a week with my progress, and links if you're following along :)

Have a good weekend y'all, x

(did you see what I did there!??!?)

A Brief Check In

I've been starting lots of things, but bringing very few to completion. I did get to quilt some blocks this week and I'd forgotten how lovely quilting is, how tactile and pleasing to see the texture grow.

This is a block I made for Sarah Elizabeth at no hats in the house, and her #opgivewarmth project. She posted an awesome colour palette for this month, and this block was hard to send off yesterday.

We're off to the airport this morning. Ireland is beckoning for the next couple of weeks. We need to apply for our new visas, make this move to Houston fully legit. Fingers crossed, everything goes to plan. Looking forward to seeing all the family and friends for the first time this year!

I'm hoping this break helps me figure out what's been holding me back the last couple of months. So hopeful for returning refreshed and renewed, I need my motivation and happy back.

A bit like a headless chicken

So I haven't figured out my blog reading, posting, and commenting problems. I keep saving things up for when I have a little bit of time and I can sit down with my laptop. But I only turn my laptop on a couple of times a week now, and due to medication I now fall asleep at about 9pm. So I've downloaded blogger to my phone, and I'm going to stop waiting for the "perfect time" because, let's be honest, perfect doesn't exist anywhere in life.

I've been sewing, but I've been doing lots of little bits on lots of different projects. Nothing's finished, but I'm also not getting stuck in a sewing funk, cos I can change it up as often as I like!

Today, I'll show you two blocks I made following a tutorial from Nicole at snips snippets. She shows you how to make two Star Dresdens from 13 charms.

When I started I wanted to make one for me for a scrappy sampler quilt I'm planning, and one to send to Little Island Quilting for her Soy Amado project. It hasn't worked out for this block, it's ended up slightly too large, and there are some knots in the quilting that I'm not sure will last (at least one has come undone already). So I'll turn it into a cushion for our sofa and make a more sturdy and correctly sized block for Little Island Quilting.

I have to say though, that these blocks are so much fun and look really great for not a lot of effort. And it's nice to have something you can make from charms that is so impactful! Nicole's a bit of a genius, I think.

I've been toying with the idea of hand stitching the second Star Dresden down, but it might just end up languishing in the growing queue of things I'm supposed to be hand stitching in the evening.

PS I haven't figure out how to insert the pictures in among the text, but they are: 

- the drunkards paths for my sister's Retro Flowers quilt (I started these last July)

- two rainbow Star Dresdens

- doing dot to dot quilting for the first time (still straight lines)

- and, the quilted, too large, block which will be a cushion.

Maybe future blogger app posts should be picture heavy and word light!

Apple of My Eye Improv (Emilia's Quilt)

So I have two more quilts that I finished in the first half of the year, but that weren't gifted until September that I haven't shown you. Emilia's Quilt is first up.

I knew there was going to be a plethora of babies arriving over the summer to friends and family, so I started making quilts. I had the end of some yardage and a jelly roll of Apple of My Eye, which I think is just so perfect for little girls - not too girly or babyish, possible to be useful for picnics and tea-parties and forts until you're heading off to school! I had bought the fabric originally to make this quilt:

Freya's Quilt

And after doing Stitched in Color's Curves Class at the start of this year, I wanted to try out some improv (no added curves though, as I didn't want to bite off more than I could chew on my first solo improv-ing). All I did was take out the scraps and sort them by relative size and then start laying them out on the couch willy-nilly. There were two larger scraps and I decided they could be the central pieces on either end of the quilt and then I just had to figure out how to use the other pieces to join them together...

It took me just one day to go from scraps to quilt top. I'm not saying it's the most interesting or beautiful quilt top out there, but I had so much fun making it. Once I started I couldn't stop and it came together so quickly! Admittedly, the jelly roll strips helped in keeping the improv quite simple. I just strip pieced in various orientations to break up the quilt top. I also added in three QST blocks, which I just adored. Though they blend in very well with the top and can be hard to pick out (centre bottom in the above picture, staggered placement).

Quilted!

To try and make the QST blocks stand out a bit more I decided to do the quilting along all the seam lines. Which meant that in some areas of the quilt there is a grid and in other areas you get some diagonal lines cutting through - the picture above illustrates it best.

In fact, I'm quite cross with myself. The fact that I knew this would be a gift meant I took minimal photos while making this, and then I ran out of time before giving the gift to Emilia's parents! I wish I had a picture of the back with the quilting showing, it would show up so much better. I think this is a lesson learned.

Finally I backed the quilt in just one piece of fabric, which I can't remember the name of, so here's a weird photo of the quilt hanging off a door that shows it:

And finally, a picture of the finished quilt. Bound in a solid green, from the leftover backing of Freya's Quilt - this quilt really is sort of the full stop to that quilt... I can't tell if that makes sense but I'm going with it!

A small part of me wishes I could go back and put a felt applique 'E' on one of the large squares with blanket stitch all around and have it slightly puffy and stuffed... But I didn't have time for that this summer, nor did the idea really occur to me until after it was gifted! Something to keep in mind for the future.

All in all, I really love this quilt. It feels very happy to me, and girly without being in your face pink. I had a blast making it, and really need to find regular time in the New Year to play with my scraps - so much fun!!

Linking to Thank Goodness It's Finished Friday which is hosted at Quokka Quilts this week :)