Sewing + Cooking

Today I decided to get down to business. I cleaned. I finished my quilt top. I put the laundry away. I saw my bag of “off to goodwill” clothes and rummaged through it. I have 4 or 5 tops– the same exact top, but different colors and stripes– that are just too short from all that laundry shrinking. I’ve worn them to death and yet I was sad to put them in the bag. So I thought, what the heck, I’ll make myself a hand-me-up shirt a la Betz White.

 

I added a section of one to the bottom of another. I repeated with a second two shirts (above). It was much easier the second time. I don’t always take the time to do something twice, but lately I have been, and it’s working out for me. All I did was turn the main shirt inside out, match the raw/cut edge of the wrong side to the main shirt  wrong-side hem, sew, flip inside out, and resew the  right side bottom hem of the main shirt (encasing the raw edge). Super easy. And now I don’t have to buy new shirts, nor worry about my unintentional midriff shirts. Seriously, what’s wrong with clothing manufacturers?

 

After that, I made some chicken tikka masala.  Did you know there are no Indian food restaurants in Bozeman? And no Thai places.  And just so-so Mexican food.  So when I saw Nancy’s post, I was inpsired. But even more inspiring was finding the already made sauce in the ethnic aisle of the grocery store. It was pretty good for not having been made from scratch. Thank goodness for shortcuts.

Friday I will be posting my patchwork swap makings (I just can’t wait any more!) and also giving away a second batch of scraps, and possibly something else.  Stay tuned!

Friday Decompression + Shop Update

This week has left me feeling tired, tired, tired. Working in the afternoons does this weird thing where I’m constantly thinking of how I have to go to work, and therefore don’t get a lot done. There has been lots of knitting torn out to be crocheted, and vice versa. But, I think some fun things have been created. I’m going to try to take them to the boutique next week once I’m done with some freelance work etc.

 

I also added some brooches to the shop. I really loved making these at one time in my life, and think I would like to start making them again. I just love wearing them on my coats and sweaters, and now I have an even better selection of fabric, buttons and yarns. I also put a few things on sale- the cake hats, scarf/muffler, etc.  It’s getting colder!

Hope everyone is having a lovely friday, and happy weekend for that matter.

And Erin, your swap package was sent yesterday (so, fingers crossed, it might get there tomorrow according to the post lady).

Patchwork Swap Received!

I came home to the telltale sign of fun mail: the key in the mailbox. Which means, you get to open the bigger box! (Damn, I love not having to walk a mile to the post office to retrieve packages). I was super excited to open my box because I knew it was from my swap parnter Emily! Here are my spoils:

 

A cute halloween quilt with embroidered pumpkin. I’m hanging this on the inside of our door to look at each day.

 

And scraps! I love the scraps she chose, very pretty and totally my taste. I also got a kick out of the beaded devil. Something about it is just perfect. When I was showing Paul my goodies, he asked if any of them were fabrics I already had. None of them were (isn’t that kind of crazy when you think about it?) but some of them were fabrics I wish I had purchased. Doing this swap made me realize how much fabric I already have. I really should not buy any more, even if I DO have a project in mind. Except clothing, maybe clothing would be all right.  Anyway, I know I’ll be able to incorporate these pieces into some fun little things.

I really enjoyed making my package for Erin, but I don’t want to show off my patchwork item till she recieves it. And that means I need to ride on over to the post office this week! Once she gets it, I’m also going to do a giveaway with roughly the same scrap fabrics I sent her, so keep an eye out!

I had a lot of fun. I hope everyone else is having fun too. If you’re in the swap, still reading, and have a blog, please post links to your patchwork swap recieved posts in the comments so we can all share in the fun.

Whoooo’s in the Halloween spirit?

Sorry, I had to.

I finished my halloween garland today. It was a relatively simple project idea formed  while I was in the Martha Stewart Crafts section of Michael’s. I first saw the owl stamp on someone’s blog (can’t remember where, but they recieved it in a swap). I walked all the way around Michael’s with the itch to buy something, then wandered my way back to the MSC section in a daze because I wanted to make something halloweeny, but not disposable.  Here’s what I did:

First, I sewed some fabric flags  that were slightly larger than the stamp. (With wrong sides facing, fold a piece of fabric twice as wide as the stamp plus two inches or so in half. Sew up one long and one short side. Turn inside out, press). I made twelve. I painted the foam stamp with acrylic paint and stamped each flag.

(Tip: Start with white paint, then orange, then black. It’ll just be easier!)

After that, I trimmed all of the flags to the same height with my rotary cutter. As you can see, I’m in the middle of some other projects which I had to push out of the way.

I pinned each flag into the fold of a double wide bias tape, spacing them about 2 1/2″ from each other. I sewed a straight line for the length of the tape, making sure to catch all of the layers, and voila! A garland!

Although I intended to hang it the wall somewhere, it looked best on the couch with its other handmade friends. Now I have a halloween decoration that’s not just junk I’ll throw away after this month is over. Plus, I busted some of my stash. Mission accomplished.

Yum.

Cooking seems to have hijacked this week’s posts. It’s not that I’m not crafting- but I’m working up a lot of submissions so I can’t really show them off. Also, I actually did that wonderful little thing called meal planning this week, which is why I actually have good food to make each night. When I actually have time to think about what I want to buy and make, this can be a good thing– because, for instance, I can use tonight’s leftover roasted asparagus in tomorrow’s quiche. Although living with Paul does mean that sometimes there are no leftovers. I asked him if he didn’t like leftovers beacause it seems like I’m the only one who eats them, and I actually try to make enough for two meals so I don’t have to eat sandwiches for lunch every day. He replied that he just usually ate everything and there were never leftovers. Men.

 

Tonight I made this tasty(& simple!) apple cranberry pie for dessert. I had asparugus and chicken baking, some cranberries on the stove (to un-dry them), a pie crust thawing and apples being peeled when I got a phone call I’ve been from someone I’d been meaning to contact myself. I must have sounded like a crazed person when I answered and hung up shortly. Hopefully I can explain tomorrow.  But back to the pie: the pie was YUM.  I overestimated the number of apples I needed, so for future reference, 1 gigantor and 1 normal apple are all it takes (& I like to mix the variety for a sweet-tart pie).

 
After dinner I worked on a little project for Halloween. Hopefully I’ll finish it this week so I can show it off.

Snow Day!

We woke up Saturday morning to a big blanket of snow. I was really excited to go outside and run around in it. Although I’m sure that at some point I’ll be sick of it, I didn’t grow up in a snowy area, so snow is still somewhat magical to me. Yay!

 

There’s my shiny new bike. I guess I need some major winter gear in order to ride it when it’s cold. I need to ride it more than I have been!

I spent today working on my sister’s baby quilt. I have one more long row to do, then assembling and basting and the dreaded quilting process. I have been debating on whether to have it professionally quilted, but I’m stubborn (and poor!) and think I want to do it myself.

It’s actually oriented the other way (like if you flipped this photo on it’s side) but this is how it hangs on the wall. I am really loving it. Plus it’s a nice break from my crochet projects!

Tonight I am going to do some cooking. I’m  trying out this recipe, I’ll let you know how it goes. I’ll also post the acorn squash recipe later this week if I have a chance, since people have been asking for it (hi mom!). I ended up tossing the leftover squash and chicken with feta, butter, olive oil and pasta and it was divine!

Crocheted Hats in my Etsy Shop

lindamade.etsy.com

I added several hats to my etsy shop today- some older ones are on sale, and then there are a whole bunch of new ones that I’ve been spending my time on. I’m especially fond of the birthday cake hats (above right)–they’re so fun to make because of all the bobbles and colors.

In other news, check out Diane Gilleand’s latest podcast on the topic of Craft Overload. She interviews several busy crafters (including myself) with some suggestions as to how to prevent craft overload in the first place. Personally, thinking about all of the projects I want to do plus the projects I want to pursue is making me a little dizzy right now. Head over and listen- Diane does a great job editing the shows and I am waiting for the day she’s on NPR.

Hot Stuff: Patchwork Oven Mitts

I picked up some vintage cocktail napkins at a craft swap this summer, and I’d been dreaming of making new hot pads ever since. I finally got my craft room all set up last week, and here’s what happened.

 

I started by determining a layout and piecing a patchwork square that was as large as the napkin. Next, I stitched it together. First I sewed the pieces on the second strip together, then I sewed each strip to the next strip.

This left me with a slightly wonky square, so I squared off the corners.

 Then I layered the pieces like so, starting at the bottom: 3 layers of batting (this was me being paranoid, which worked out well. In the future I’ll use insulation batting.), patchwork square (right side up), cocktail napkin (wrong side up). In between the 2 fabric layers I put the little tab in one corner (to use as a hanger. I started sewing about 2 inches from one corner, continued around the next 3 edges, then sewed about 2 inches into the first edge (leaving an opening).  I trimmed the batting and turned the whole thing inside out. Next, I handsewed the opening shut, then machine stitched the X on the mitt. Voila!

 

I made another, this time with an orange “shrimp cocktail” napkin.

I also made some mitts, which you can see and read about over at the Adorn blog. I love little patchwork projects. They’re a great way to use up fabric scraps, and in the case of kitchen accessories, you’ll get toadmire your handiwork (almost) every day!

Recent Craftiness

Still settling in here…my craft room is coming together, although it needs a lot of organizing. I finally have all of my craft books on one shelf, which is nice! I’m really enjoying Bozeman, although I must confess I haven’t been outside very much (barring my 2 mile walk to the grocery store today. It seems so much farther here than it did in New York, but I needed the exercise).

I wanted to share a little craftiness, since it seems like so long since I’ve posted a project. First up is this cute owl pillow I crocheted before I left New York. He’s made up of several fingering weight yarns, and I had a lot of fun playing with the stripes. Here he is on our futon, with fantastic company (pillows from the Fall ‘07 Adorn).

 

And, while I was at my Mom’s house in Texas, I whipped up a tube for my plastic bags. I wanted to sew on her Bernina since I think that’s the machine I’ll end up getting. It was a breeze! Basically, I sewed a tube with elastic on either end (one end with a very small opening for the bags to come out, one large for the bags to be stuffed into). I sewed the hanging strap down on one side and sewed a snap to the other so that it can hang around the pole in our pantry/closet.  Afterwards, I found this tutorial from Dioramarama, if you’re interested in making your own. Bonus green points for using stash fabric from your mom.

I also took a fabric dyeing class with my mom, and hopefully I’ll be posting some of the results here soon. I wanted to do some overdyeing, but we’ll see if I get around to it.

Inspiration on the Road: Beading

I finally uploaded some of my photos from the trip down here (all out of order, of course!) and wanted to share these two from the Utah Field House of Natural History. Mostly, the place was full of fossils and dinosaurs, which, after seeing all of the shifting layers of earth on the drive down, is now infinitely more interesting to me. But these Native American wares were also hiding out. I love the motifs, especially on the boots.