RedFish Yarn

This is 4 ounces of 50/50 silk/merino from RedFish DyeWorks. I got this at Stitches West last fall, and I've been spinning it with my spindles ever since. I used what I call a cheating Navajo-ply method. I take about 6-8 inches of fiber and split it. Spin one half, then spin the other half so that the colors match back on each other when plied. I went through the entire 4 ounces like that and ended up with a lace weight 2-ply that looks like a Navajo 3-ply. I've never seen this else where, so I don't know if it has a proper name. I'll just call it Frances-ply.

Here is my expedient niddy-noddy. Oh, to live in a hotel.

Unemployment Blanket

I got this yarn at Jo-Ann's in early March when I was unemployed.  I wanted to make a blanket, but I was broke.  This yarn (and the crochet hook) cost 22 bucks.

This is god's own acrylic yarn.  I would normally never buy such a thing, but desperate times call for desperate measures.  I used almost all of the yarn I bought.

Shawl

I made a little shoulder cover because it's freezing where I work.  They like to have the a/c on so freaking cold that it's colder inside during the summer than during the winter. 

 This is Knitpicks kid and silk (nice!) with a skein of their alpaca.  I love Knitpicks.

Soul Blossoms II

The epic hand quilting has finished! This is 2 of 3, I will also hand quilt the third one. I quilted square spirals on each square. I free-handed it.

I added ticker tapes here and there.

The back is as neat, or almost as neat (still can't decide) as the front. I made an effort to use every bit of the fabric, and so there are all kinds of little scraps worked in. I love how it looks.

ACU Bags

I also made two urgently needed bags on my epic quilt-cation. I had some heavy cotton fabric from Ikea, and I have 4 ACUs. I got one of my ACU tops and I cut it up and made a computer bag and the purse below.

At first I was really hesitant to cut into my old uniform. I don't know why. But when I was in the Army, I really liked the shoulder pockets because they perfectly fit my iPhone and its bulky charger case. So I took the pocket with my unit patch (yeah, I said "unit"), and built a purse around it (see below), and cut out the back of the ACU to make the front of a perfectly-sized computer bag.

My mom got this amazing sewing machine and I embroidered the camo fabric and the Ikea fabric. How cool! All I had to do was change the threads when the machine told me to.

New purse with perfect phone pocket on the outside.

And a custom epi-pen holder on the inside, also from recycled ACUs. I also recycled the credit card holder from the Kipling bag I used for the last decade.

I like how the little bird peeks out at the front of the purse. So pleased!

Soul Blossoms 1

This is quilt 1 from my epic quilt-making vacation last week. Perhaps ironically, this is actually the third one I made, but the first I finished since the other two will be hand quilted.

This quilt is machine pieced and machine quilted.  I added two squares of 4 each ticker tape squares.  Once I wash this quilt, they will be puckered and neat-o.  They are cut on the bias so they don't unravel.

The overview:

Mobius Scarf

Finished this dog. I began this in August, and it languished once I realized I might not have enough yarn to finish the edging. Then, yesterday I discovered a small left over skein of this very stuff, and finished it last night. The punch line is that I needed not of the other skein; I had plenty to finish the lace edging.

First Jelly Roll

Dare I say it's the first? I'm not sure how much I like working with long strips of fabric instead of fat quarters. Nevertheless, I very much like this little quilt. Below you can see (I hope) how much I quilted this fabric. I did concentric rings radiating out from an off-center position. It's nearly invisible on the front, but it shows better on back:

I wanted some long term projects and machine pieced these in December while visiting San Diego, but here they are all done. I thought I'd make the latest quilt last a bit longer by quilting the hell out of it, but it was done in a week. (2 seasons of Lost, to be specific. The previous quilt took 3 seasons of Lost.)

Below, quilt goodness.

3rd Quilt

I finished a quilt the other day. Since going into suspended animation in March, my craft world has been diminished. Between being locked up and disallowed creativity, or thinking for that matter, and having all most all of my crafty stuff locked away elsewhere, it has been difficult. I began a knitting project, the one shown below this entry, but I've got more edge to trim than yarn, and I just sort of set it aside. I didn't want my first project since returning to be a failure, but I think it might be.

But this quilt pleases me. It's my third, and much bigger than the first two I did. I got 10 fat quarters, and stitched cool rectangles of contrasting fabric to them using my mom's cool sewing machine that does fancy stitches.

Then I hand quilted the whole thing. At first I wanted to do some time-consuming, long-term deal, but once I completed one big rectangle I thought it looked like crap, so I cut it out, and opted for a diagonal with multiple colors and textures of thread.

While more or less parallel, the quilting stitches are at different distances from each other. I really like it. Keep it simple. I finally embroidered the date on a quilt.

Mobius Scarf

Scarf
Originally uploaded by frances.goodman

Started another project without finishing the last. Shame on me. There's probably a DD form for me to fill out for this incident.