Saturday, September 19, 2015

Friday Night Sew-in Fail

Unfortunately life got in the way of my plans for a night of solo sewing yesterday.  We are in the middle of having all the flooring replaced in our main floor and nothing seems to be going as planned.  My house is a complete disaster!  I finally wrapped up everything I needed to take care of and hit the sewing room by 9 pm.  My plan was to come up with a layout and get my Quatrefoil center together. I laid out all the blocks on the sewing room floor, rearranged about twenty times and came up this:


I decided to make one more move and switched the light block on the left end of row five with the second block in row six and decided I was happy with it. I carefully picked up block by block and sewed the rows and then laid them out on a bed to keep them straight.  I'm not sure how I managed it, but I ended up with this:


Granted, this picture is upside down (best angle I could get), but I completely screwed up my planned layout.  I somehow managed to flip a couple of blocks and/or rows. I ended up with too many light ones along one side, but it's not bad enough to warrant ripping them out.  That's what I'm telling myself, anyway.  Two borders and it's off to the quilter.  

Being scrappy can be really challenging some days!

Wednesday, September 16, 2015

Truman Lake Hook-in

It was a beautiful fall-like weekend for this year's Truman Lake Hook-in and Patty and her staff at Saltbox Primitive Woolens put on an absolutely wonderful event as usual!  We missed a few of the "regular" vendors but were excited to see a few new ones this year. The rug show seemed a bit small...but it never even occurred to me or my friends to bring rugs (duh!).  We definitely won't forget next year! Nonetheless, there were quite a few rugs on display (and one wool applique piece).


I was particularly drawn to this piece.  So simple but it really catches your eye.  This would be a perfect pattern for using up leftover strips (and I have a few of those around here)!


The yarn shop from Columbia was there. Their booth was very tempting...but the prices on most of the yarn were a bit shocking....$30 to $50 per skein!


They were demonstrating a cool weaving technique on these very simple looms that were basically just a bunch of nails around a shape - rectangle, triangle or square. The piece is woven and then because of the way the yarn is interlocked it can be pulled right off the frame and stitched to other pieces to make things. She was making a jacket but it could be used for blankets and other things.




It was very cool...but I don't need another hobby!  I also don't need any more rug patterns but found a couple that I really liked that other ladies were working on.  This one is a Saltbox Primitive pattern:


I really loved the hooking in this one - it's a 4 and the shading is gorgeous.  I'm not sure who the designer is - I was so caught up in admiring the hooking that I forgot to ask!


I am still making progress on the pineapple.  I am hoping to have it finished before Sally Kallin's class in November so I can at least say that I finished one project before starting yet another.

Switching gears a bit - it's time for the September Friday Night Sew-in!  After a week or so of living in a dusty, noisy construction zone I am looking forward to retreating to the sewing room!

Sign up for this Friday's Sew-in here!