Tag Archives: Spring has sprung

Mar20

Leafing out

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Ah, I love a day without outside commitments. Mr Fixit was working overtime so I was able to indulge my desire for a morning of solitary book reading and tea drinking, followed by an afternoon of quilting.

This quilt top had been pieced and the zippers sewn on (for trees) and I had fused some contrast fabrics to Heat n Bond for leaves. The freehand leaf-cutting was unexciting but I had Netflix to make it more interesting.

Today I sprinkled leaves randomly and peeled off backing and ironed until I felt there were enough. I have some left in case I want to add more.

I pieced a backing out of scraps from the front and large chunks of some of the other fabrics left over from making the top. Above photo is after I pin-basted.

I started with my walking foot and did some “stitch in the ditch” quilting along the verticals, avoiding the trees. Bear in mind that I excel in slapdashery and the stitching sometimes wavered from the ditch!

After switching to the darning/free motion foot, and dropping the feed dogs, I changed the thread and added some quilting to the sun, and then started on the leaves.

By this stage the family was all home and I needed to take a break and cook beans for dinner. As I write this, the pressure cooker is going nuts because sometimes bean water clogs the valve and then you get a sudden gush of steam as the pressure releases. I’ve cleaned bean muck off the stove and it should be OK now!

It’s been a beautiful sunny day and I feel a teeny bit guilty for not having gone for a walk or anything else close to exercise. But I’ve really enjoyed my day so far, so guilt be gone!

Next update will hopefully be a finished wall quilt.

Apr14

Scrappy Sunday

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I have been having a very colourful time, working on Part 2 of the Creative Crochet Workshop’s Scrapsrific Rainbow Blanket CAL. The above motif will be a 12″ square. The last two rounds were added this week. I have realised that doing a crochet-along like this is very good for the discipline of weaving in your ends. You can’t proceed any further until Part 3 comes out, so often there’s a waiting period between finishing one part and the release of the next part.

The other squares for Part 2 are four 6″ squares. I made the two flowery ones different colours, but the rainbow ones are the same. I like the fact that the rainbow squares incorporate all ten colours in the blanket.

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What’s your weekend been like? Yesterday I was working, and we had another sale where the discounts were a bit bigger than usual, and we were reeeeeeally busy. It made the day go faster, at least, and customers were mostly happy because of the savings (except for a couple of grumblers who thought that the 53% should have been off literally everything – they obviously didn’t read the small print in the mailer)!

Today Tai Chi Man loaded up the prunings from the last couple of days yardwork. He had to cut some dead wood out of the cherry and apricot trees (much to the chagrin of the ants who were inhabiting the hollow branch of the cherry) and so today he took another 260kg of yard waste to the landfill. That’s nearly 700kg of stuff that’s been cleared off our property (of nearly half an acre) in the last couple of weeks.

The grass is greening up, there are more violets in the lawn every year, which is wonderful, we have daffodils and forsythia flowering, and even one of my Christmas cacti is pink and pretty, obviously deciding to be an Easter cactus instead.

The purple dishcloths have been flowing off my hook. I am on my fourth now. I think that may be the last one. When that’s done, I’d like to start another scrappy colourful project which I can work on when I have done my CAL pieces for the week. I have so much DK yarn, mostly Stylecraft Special DK, which would look lovely actually made into something useful. Do you have a favourite scrappy project? If so, comment and let me know what it is.

It’s been a good day of housework, tea at our favourite tea shop, stocking up at Costco, and going to the gym. I set up vegan mac ‘n cheese to bake while we were at the gym (can you believe my 20 year old son still complains when I put broccoli in it?!) so we’ve had a satisfying dinner too. All feels right with the world!

Apr21

FO: Scuba baby blanket

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FO: Scuba baby blanket

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I called this the Scuba blanket purely because that’s the colourway of the Red Heart Super Saver Ombre, but now that it’s finished and has been adorned with an appliqued orange elephant perhaps it deserves a better name. The “Mandarin Pachyderm” blanket, maybe? Here’s a link to my Ravelry project page so you can see which patterns I referenced.

I started this after my shopping spree at Michaels last Thursday with a plan to get the blanket done in nine days. Crocheting is uncomfortable, even left handed, so I’ve had to pace myself, but I think it’s big enough to be a respectable baby blanket. I did measure it when it was laid out for the photo but can’t remember both dimensions now, and it’s currently in the washer. The length is 33 inches. The little elephant applique is made with some Stylecraft Special Aran in the colour Spice from my stash.

I’m going to schedule this to publish tomorrow. I don’t think that my friend (who’s having the baby) reads my blog, but I’d rather not risk it. The baby shower is tomorrow so once it’s underway my blog post can be released to the world!

Another friend knitted a matching hat, plus she sewed a gift bag made from vinyl (oilcloth) which will make a practical gift as it can be used for so many things.

I am adding an elephant lovey to the bag that I made some time ago. I have been waiting for the opportunity to give it to someone. Hmmm, I seem to have an elephant theme going on.

I added to my button stash this week.

Found these at a dollar store for $2.75 a pack. Way cheaper than the same brand at the store where I work!

Spring has finally arrived here. Yesterday was a glorious day during which I abandoned the To Do list, changed into a strappy top and denim shorts, and set myself up on the back deck in the sunshine with a book, an iPad, tea, the Herrschner’s paper catalogue and notebook and pen.

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I haven’t ordered more yarn…yet! I do have a few tabs open on my laptop though, as I’m thinking of buying some Premier Wool-free Sock Yarn and getting back into sock knitting, or even sock crocheting. And thinking ahead to my international travel in the summer, having a couple of small skeins of thin yarn with lots of yardage will take up less space in the backpack!

Well, I’d better get that blanket into the dryer. Have a great weekend!