In a couple of weeks we will have The Yellow River Jam here in our sweet little village of Porterdale. It is the second annual event. In the morning, there will be a paddling event on the Yellow River, which runs through the center of town, followed by a day of live music. Their tagline is boats, bands, and brews. This year they are adding some artist booths, so I will have a booth there displaying my quilts, and a few other small items. To that end, I have been putting together some chicken pincushions, made from hand dyed, hand woven wool fabrics, and some potholders.
Yesterday, I was supposed to have a tennis match, but instead we all had a rainy day! I was really happy to see the rain we really needed it, and we got 1.2"! Yeah! I keep track of the rain for a newsletter I write for our town, and I hadn't had a rain entry since August 22! So, anyway, I got a whole day of "found time". I spent a lot of that time weaving, then I started making some potholders. This, BTW is a great use of scraps. I especially love working with "sewn together" scraps. These are orphan blocks that can be cut up and used, or leftovers from strip sets, and the like. I use the "sewn together" scraps in conjunction with my smaller than 1 1/2" strip bin, and my 1 3/4" to 2" strip bin. Sometimes I add in from my small triangles, medium bits, small bits, or dig through my large pieces (but smaller than FQs) to find pieces to cut up and use to tie a set of potholders together visually.
I have been working on potholders for a week, or so now, and already had pieced these, but was still working on sewing the binding down. The pair in the upper left hand corner is completely finished.
Yesterday, I pieced these. This morning I chose what I will bind them with, and pinned them with that fabric, to the design wall.
I had already cut a bunch of squares for pincushions, and pinned them together with their beaks, and combs. I like to use red rick rack for the combs. I had a whole stack of the put together.
This week I added the tails. I have hand sewn on beads for eyes.
Now, I just have to stuff them, and sew up their little tummies.
So that is what I have been up to this week. Thanks for stopping by!
I am currently working on making potholders for a fall show, and gifts, so I haven't accomplished much on the quilts that are on my design wall and/or design floor.
Actually, these are last years crop of potholders. I haven't gotten any photos of this years crop yet. I will photograph them when I get some more finished. I have been working on the units for the next row of each though. here is how they stand now. I wrote more about the idea behind the Jacob's Ladder quilt in the previous post, and to see more about the idea behind the strip pieced quilt click here.
I haven't had many large blocks of time for quilting lately, but I have been sewing a bit at the end of every day. The exception is yesterday, when I went to visit my friend Eleanor, and spent the day cutting out a new quilt start. (Well, half of one anyway) More about that in a future post. Last week I turned in the last piece of the very very large run I had been weaving.
Here is what the top of the rug looks like.
That's 22 feet of rug rolled up on that beam. I wove the center of the rug, then wove 2 side borders to bump up the width to almost 15 feet! The finished size of the rug was 19' 10" by 14' 8". I know that seems a bit small given the dimensions I just gave you, but you would be amazed how much it shrinks when you take it off tension.
Later this week I will be starting another rug that will be woven in three 5' by 18' panels. I already have the loom set up for that. Okay, so much for the "day job update".
I have made a fair amount of progress on this quilt. I don't really have a name I like for it yet, so I have been referring to it as "Diamonds".
Only 16 rows left to go, and this quilt will be finished.
I have been planning to start a series of quilts using the Jacob's Ladder block for a long time now. It all started when I was searching for an idea for a quilt for a wedding quilt I needed to make. As I was working on the design for that quilt, I got ideas for so many other quilts. Here is a photo of the first quilt in the series.
I have been looking forward to using this block in a zig zag configuration, and trying a larger scale. The quilt above is made from 6" blocks this next quilt is made form 9" blocks. Here is a photo of my drawing.
At first, I designed the quilt to be larger, but then thought that it is enough of an over all design, and this would be a good opportunity to make a smaller quilt, since most of the quilts I make are pretty large. So, I took a couple row of horizontally, and vertically. I have 3 rows sewn together so far. There will be 10 rows in all.
I decided to use the same fabric all across the row so the pattern would be easier to see. Because of that, I can only use fabric that I have a half yard of.
That is what I have been up to lately. Thanks for stopping by!
