The Life and Projects of An Avid Hobbyist

Sunday, February 8, 2009

I Have Buzzard's Luck*

*Can't kill nothing, and won't nothing die.

I have been totally swamped lately. I rang in the new year on the road and since then, I've gone on several out-of-town business trips, I went to the inauguration and in the 8 day stretch that followed, I clocked 97 billable hours. I haven't unpacked all of the luggage from the trip and I am down to wearing my granny panties 'cuz I haven't done laundry (hey, it may be tmi but at least I'm wearing any at all). At this point, I barely know my own name and my mojo left me.

I took a day to not work, and do some quasi selfish things for me. The selfish part is that it was crafting, and after slogging through datasets and missing variables, the idea of making something with my hands really appealed to me. The un-selfish part is that I am making many items as gifts for up-coming weddings, and babies and like.

While I was in Florida I went to the most Rainbows End Quilt Shoppe. It was huge (reportedly the largest in Florida) and the ladies who worked there were nice and knowledgeable. I wish I had a mega-quilt spot w/parking near my house (I love ya City Quilter but parking is a drag).


While there, I blew the Christmas kitty on lots of great swag and I also got this jelly roll quilt book because at about this time last year, I joined the Moda jelly roll of the month club here. I thought the book would help me tear through the now-huge jelly roll stash.

I picked a pattern in brights-mostly oranges and greens-for a baby quilt. This layout of the square demonstrates how wrong my execution was. There is still a question of exactly where I went wrong. I have been to Acme Fabrics once already for guidance. My failure to execute is hardly their fault.

Wrong Star

I'll go back as soon as I can see straight again and get some major help...again.

Totally defeated, I pulled out some fat quarters and this tutorial to make a small bag for my PSP. Although I am a seasoned sewer, I was a bit dense when it came to the directions. I like the finished product. Oh, how I do love polka-dots.

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Who says polka dots and stripes don't go together?

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At least something worked. ~ksp

2 comments:

Paula, the quilter said...

You're diamonds are not diamonds, if that helps.

Since you are still [noreply-comment@blogger.com] I have saved up your questions to answer in one email.

About the pumpkin embroidery. It is a pattern that is available at Crab-apple Hill Studio. She has a lot of sweet patterns. I really want to get two of the patterns on this page: Hocuspocusville and Over The River.

About the recycling sweater --> yarn. One of the sweaters was a fingering weight in a woman's small. I was able to get yarn from the armholes down. I got 173 gr or 478 yards. The beautiful hand spun that came from an imported New Zealand hand knit sweater resulted in 600 gr or 813 yards.

HTH.
Enjoy the Journey
--paula www.thequilter.blogspot.com

Nik said...

Thanks for the link to the bag tutorial. I've always seen these bags, but never knew how to make them.