Villages

When I found this pattern in Love Patchwork and Quilting I thought about my stack of fabric from the Road 15 line from Sweetwater - motifs like houses and trees and road names, what could be better for a quilt with house blocks? And quite boyish as well - perfect for the young man I had in mind.
Once I started making blocks I felt that the grey, blue, green, black palette was a bit flat, so I added some yellow and red from another Sweetwater line, Noteworthy. I was quite happy with my choices as I was working on the quilt, but once I saw the finished quilt at a distance, I thought the red and white looks too pink to be right for a boy's quilt. I added black binding, to toughen it up a bit, but I still fear it's too girlie for a 14 year old boy.
Nah,  I think I'll  keep this one and make a different one for the boy in mind. Luckily I have another eight months to make a new quilt, since I was planning forward for once - it obviously doesn't pay to have too much time!

Mind you, I love this quilt and I'm happy to keep it. It has what has become a recurring theme in my work: houses. The blocks consist of houses made of house patterned fabric, and would you believe it, it's also got an Ikea house fabric as backing - what's not to like? Since the blocks are made of groups of houses, the name gave itself: "Villages". It's quilted with my go to loose loopy, spirally design which makes for a quite soft and drapey quilt - just right for snuggling up with on the sofa during the winter.

My obsession with houses might make me see things a little differently, though: A friend of mine, upon seeing the quilt exclaimed: "Love those big flowers!"

And a bit of stitching

I stitched this sampler a while back from a pattern in Stitchery Magazine. By the time I'd found a frame the right size, I'd mislaid it, but as these things work out, I found it again while I was looking for something else. Of course I'd put a finished cross-stitch sampler in my box of ribbons! I have no idea how it ended up there, but it must have seemed like a good idea at the time... Anyway, once I'd found it, and while I still knew where the frame was, I got the job done and here's the result. I don't know if you can see it clearly, but the poem is by Emily Dickinson.

On a trip to Denmark a few years back I came across this pillow in a shop window and just had to get the kit. I have been stitching a little every now and again since I finished the Emily Peacock pillow, and eventually I crossed the finish line on this one as well. The pattern is from Fru Zippe.

I couldn't resist going for the matchy matchy look on the back and included a zip and flap to match the contrast colours on the front. I might be the only person who notices, but somehow these things give me immense pleasure. I'm funny like that.

A bit of knitting

This winter was not all about sewing. Thanks to Knitty and Ravelry my interest in knitting has been revived these last few years. During my teens I was hardly ever seen without a knitting project in my hands, where I went the knitting went and numerous sweaters were made during lectures at college, waiting for buses, chatting with friends... Somewhere along the way it all stopped, but the skill is still there and my hands luckily remember how to go about it. I fell in love with these Deep in the Forest mittens and especially this version. I used a Schoppelwolle Zauberball in shades of blue for the background and I love the effect of twilight seen through the trees. I tried a different Zauberball first, but the shades of blue were too dark to get the effect I wanted. That one came in handy for my next project, though:

My next project was inspired by various fair isle designs seen online, and somehow the idea of making a Harry Potter-inspired sweater occurred to me. I started charting various ideas: spells and potions, brooms, owls, the sorting hat, a snitch Harry's patronus, wands, glasses and the scar on Harry's forehead. I needed to test all the different borders and knitted them in the round, ending up with a rather long tube, realizing that I had too many borders for a sweater. I stitched the ends of the tube together and ended up with an infinity scarf. It proved to be very difficult to photograph, so here's a small collage of various borders instead. And now that I have tested the borders (and modified some) it can also serve as a pattern to choose borders from, should I ever get round to making that sweater.

I'm easily distracted, though, so there are always new projects tempting me. This book was a great discovery that will provide endless inspiration. The genius of these patterns are that you begin with a few stitches and increase along one side until the scarf is as long and wide as you want it, or until you run out of yarn. No need to worry about gauge and the patterns can be used for any kind of yarn you have. I haven't come all that far on this one yet, but I can tell that it will become a favorite. Eventually.

My Ravelry page is here, by the way.

Looking back

 -or what I did last Christmas...
I thought I'd do a bit of summing up from these months of no blogging. My Christmas sewing was all about panels, it seems. I unearthed this old Santa panel from the depths of my stash and finally got around to doing something about it. I cut it apart and ended up with three items: a quilted cushion:

 A small wallhanging:

 And a larger wallhanging with a bit of a complcated log cabin/star thing going on. I didn't plan this one very well, so I had to wing it and ended up cutting the tips of the star off.

 -But you can always cheat a bit, right? A few strands of embroidery floss later and you wouldn't know if you were galloping past on a big horse...

 The best thing about this was that I got to use that panel that I had been procrastinating about making into something for ever. Yet another example of how you should just get in there and do something - it doesn't take as long as you think!

Proof in point: these fun panels from Laurie Wisbrun got made into cushions as soon as they arrived and it took no more than a Saturday afternoon.

Summer report

Somehow the months have raced on and there has been no blogging. I seem to have drifted along, doing this and that, posted the occasional picture on IG and that may be just what I needed, but I miss having a record of all I've done and what ever I was thinking while I did it. So I think it's about time I got back to a set of routines including a bit of blogging.

Let's begin with what I did during my holidays. I stayed at home this year, and imagined that I didn't do all that much, but looking back I have proof that I wasn't completely idle! A wall quilt, a top for a lap quilt, a shoulder bag, three pouches and a giraffe - not too bad, is it?

If you follow me on IG you will have seen it all before, of course, but there's something to be said for showing it all together - it feels like a result! And if anybody asks me what I did over the holidays, I have my answer ready: "Oh, I made a giraffe"...