At Craft Night the other night, I decided to do some paper folding.I wanted to sew, but work is hard and I didn’t feel like jumping up and down. Also, it is hard to hear other people when I am on the other side of the room from the computer. Paper folding was a good solution.
I decided after attending the Fair the other day that I wanted to enter some rings or wreaths into the paper category. I have three rings already and I’d like to follow what someone else did and make a chain of them. I was thinking my theme could be seasons, but I may need to make more than just one more since I think I already glued the first 3 together, so I would have no way to link them.
I can make one ring in a little over an hour. I have a pack of 50 sheets of paper I bought in Japantown a long time ago, but I don’t have enough left to 1) make rings of all one color and 2) make 3-4 more rings. Maybe I’ll buy a 500 pack** and make a set of rainbow rings.
Thanksgiving Mette Ring – June 2024
I looked up my tutorial for Mette Rings and started another ring.
It looks strange at the top, because I haven’t connected it to the rest of the pieces. I am kind of waiting to see if I want to link it with the others.
I also have to think of an overall design.
**N. B. : Obviously, you should shop at local quilt shops and small businesses. However, if you are too busy or can’t find what you need there, I use Amazon affiliate links and may be paid for your purchase of an item when you click on an item’s link in my post. There is no additional cost to you for clicking or purchasing items I recommend. I appreciate your clicks and purchases as it helps support this blog.
I have shown some of the green scrap blocks I have been making in the May Donations blocks post. I am sure you have seen the other blocks and quilts in different colors I have made in other posts.
My scraps start out in a pile on my cutting table. I have talked a little about the processing of scraps that I do. After I cut the pieces I need for future projects, I cut strips and then leave whatever is left and large enough as is. The goal is to not have too many scraps, but the scrap drawers do fill up.
Rainbow Cart Double – 16 x 10.8 x 26.5 inches
I store my scraps in a cart with rainbow drawers**. This is very handy, because it makes sorting scraps and finding scraps easy. Also, it looks nice. It is on the small side as my workroom is not very large. The drawers can fill up quickly and my process is to work on a drawer that is getting to be too full. I know it is too full when I start to have trouble opening it.
Green is the most recent drawer I have been trying to clear out. I was surprised to find how many green scraps I had. I can really think what I have made with so much green. I made some green donation quilts early on when I had the idea of Color Strip blocks and quilts. Maybe I only made one quilt when I first started? I don’t remember.
Anyway, I have a lot of green scraps and I am getting down to the odd shapes. I have made about 50 green strip and chunk blocks, but the strips don’t last forever. Eventually, I need to make some improv tops with the weird shapes, like I am still working on with the grey and black improv tops. I am at that point, probably with the green. I am still eeking out a block or two, but they are becoming more chunky and less strippy.
Green scrap drawer – June 2024
My drawer looks like this. I position the drawer I am working with by my sewing machine so I can grab some pinned pieces as leaders and enders while I work on other projects.
In the photo, I have added some arrows to help you navigate. The blue arrow in the upper right shows pieces that I have sewn, but are not yet pinned to any other pieces. They have already been trimmed and are ready to be pinned to something else.
In the bottom right pile, those are larger pieces that I have pinned together or pieces that probably not going to be used in a green donation quilt, like two triangles that will make a half square triangle and be added to the HST quilt I have in the back of my mind.
The purple arrow, bottom left, also shows pieces that have been pinned together. These are pieces that are generally smaller. They can also be the first two pieces I am sewing together. They will be added to something later. The small pieces get lost easily, so I like to keep them were I can see them.
The area with no arrow on the top left is a pile of pieces that are not yet attached to anything. I can use these to sew to something else.
It seems to take forever to clean out one of these drawers. I haven’t even made a new green quilt yet, though I am still sewing. Soon!
I find that sewing small pieces into larger chunks makes them easier to use. My scraps are really small. What I consider to be yardage, others consider to be scraps. You have to decide what constitutes scraps for you and work out a system that works. These drawers work great for me. I probably couldn’t tolerate more scraps than I have and scraps make great leaders and enders.
**N. B. : Obviously, you should shop at local quilt shops and small businesses. However, if you are too busy or can’t find what you need there, I use Amazon affiliate links and may be paid for your purchase of an item when you click on an item’s link in my post. There is no additional cost to you for clicking or purchasing items I recommend. I appreciate your clicks and purchases as it helps support this blog.
I spent some time last week finding fabrics for my last group of Pantone blocks.
I don’t have any greens as dark as Deep Forest, so in the end, I just chose a black.
Most of the others I selected from older fabrics that I haven’t even looked at in awhile. I have one more fabric to select, but I have already cut the 4.5 inch squares. I have also started to make the blocks and will show those soon.
This was an easy pouch which would make a quick gift for a little girl as a small purse. I am not sure what else it could be used for.
This is a pouch for the Pink Project. As I said before, this is a Sotak Handmade pattern. I thought it went together well.
Some of the binding was a bit fiddly, but not annoyingly so.
Petunia Pouch – zipper open
One of the good things about this pouch is the size zipper it needs. It needs either a 6 or 8 inch zipper, which I don’t use that often, though I have several waiting for projects. I am sad that the only zipper I had of the right size and closest to the color of the fabric was orchid. I suppose I could have cut down a longer zipper. Maybe I’ll do that next time.
I have to say that looking through all of my pinks and using them is really fun. I had forgotten about this Monaluna print (is that designer still around?). I like the sunbursts a lot and the pink is kind of a petal pink.
Petunia Pouch – back
I am not sure the handle would stand up to carrying around heavy things. I sewed over the handles a couple of times to try and reinforce them.
This was the last bag for this year’s Pink Project. I’ll see about making some more pouches for next year. I need to make a large tote as I don’t have one of the organization’s bags to put all the pouches in. I have many tote patterns and it will be fun to look through them and choose one.
I finally finished all the blocks for the Green & Grey Diagonal 9 Patch.
I haven’t started piecing the blocks together, but at least I have all of the blocks. I have spent the past week fiddling with the placement of the blocks.
There is quite a lot of yellow-green, more than I expected. I think I kind of clumped it together. Where the yellow-greens are not in a block together, I am trying to spread them out.
My work spends a week every year giving back to the community. We raise money, work on projects and do a walk around campus to help those in the community. The company has provided over 180,000 volunteer hours in the last ten years. I was excited to be able to participate in three events this year.
Hygiene Kits
One thing I did was put together hygiene kits. You get a bag and you fill it with soap, shampoo, hand sanitizer, toothbrushes, etc. That is the easy part. The hard part is what to write in a card that will sound supportive and non-judgemental. I spent most of that hour working on the two cards. Filling the two bags took me about 5 minutes.
I used some construction paper to make the card and then I traced a stencil of the star as a start to the card. I added some additional decorations to try and make it look nicer.
Fleece for ‘No Sew Blankets’
Fleece for ‘No Sew Blankets’
Tying ‘No Sew Blankets’
The other project was ‘No Sew Blankets’. I really wanted to sew them, but I was a good girl and followed the directions. We had fun. I wasn’t with a group for this project so I was assigned to help another department and we worked together really well. We were able to finish two 96 in x 55 in blankets that will be donated to Bay Area Cancer Connections. BACC helps women with breast and ovarian cancer. I know how to make these blankets now so I can see making a few on my own, perhaps in a smaller size.
All of the activities were coordinated by Hands On Bay Area, an organization that connects organizations that need help with companies and organizations that want to help.
Children’s Walk
For the first time I walked with everyone on the Children’s Walk. It was kind of slow because there were so many people, but I was with a group so we just chatted while we sauntered.
It was a beautiful day in the neighborhood, so a good day for walking. I was glad to be able to help.
We had an extended Sew Day again over the weekend. I took Friday off to work on the Oxbow Tote. There was supposed to be a ‘workshop’, but those of us working on the project just worked at our own pace.
Everyone else was working on things I would have rather worked on. I really should have brought some piecing and just done that.
Cyndi’s medallion
Cyndi has been finishing up projects lately. She brought the pieces of this medallion top and was able to get all the rest of the borders on.
I have to say that I couldn’t see where this was going before all the borders were sewn on, but finished the design is really good. It all comes together. Even the heavy red part in the center works within the whole design.
Gerre’s Chain Link #1
Gerre’s Chain Link #2
Gerre’s Chain Link #3
MaryC helped Gerre work on a quilt for a friend’s daughter who graduated. The pattern is Chain Link from Amy Smart, Diary of a Quilter. I have seen this quilt before, but never up close or in process and I was interested to see that it is a good use of a charm pack (or 2?). The two of them working together made good progress.
I think it must have been pre-cut weekend. ;0
Maria’s blocks
Maria was doing some blocks with a jelly roll, which she arranged in a fun and interesting way. On point the design is so fun and cheerful.
Maria is always thinking outside the box and making interesting quilts. She brings something new every week and I am so impressed with what she comes up with. I kind of want to make these blocks and do something similar.
All in all, despite my bad mood, it was a fun two days.
I spent the Sew Days over the weekend working on the Oxbow Tote, which is the sort of group project instigated by Sue S. This project is not going well for me. I have to ask if all of my bag projects start out this way and then I get over the drama or if this is particularly annoying this time?
First, I didn’t have enough fabric in the correct orientation to make the large size. I needed more width to make two main exterior panels. That was irritating, but I decided that the regular size would be fine. It wasn’t what I was planning so I had to do a mind shift.
Then, I had to do the worst part of this bag, after cutting, which was quilting. It took me a whole day to quilt the main panels. Fortunately, I was entertained by Tim and Julie and the rest of the quilt gang. I was only in a moderately bad mood when I finished instead of completely miserable and submerging my head in a vat of chocolate.
Once I was done with that I was able to fine cut the pattern pieces. They are not square, so I rough cut the pieces to allow for shrinkage and, then, quilted them. After that step, I felt like I had some success. I put the cross body strap together as well as the side loops that will hold that strap.
I have more to do, but feel I am over the hump for now.
I finally started the Petunia Pouch and it is a fairly easy project so far.
I don’t have a lot of experience with Sotak Handmade patterns. I have made 2-3 projects from her patterns. I watch her reels on IG and am so impressed with how easy the projects look.
Petunia Pouch in process
I found this one to be easy, so far as well AND the zipper looks good.
One thing is putting binding on everything. It is a pain, but it makes all the edges look good.
I forgot to post this I Spy back in March. As I have said before, I love making these I Spy pouches. I like both the fabrics I used, but together they are a bit much. ;-).
It is still useful and is now keeping acrylic pattern templates together.
After finishing the Retreat Bag on Friday, I have FINALLY finished all of the projects in the Crafty Gemini Organizer Club.
This club started in the 2018, so it has been awhile in the making. I really did pretty well with the first few projects. The last three were the ones that took me longer than I thought they should. Still, life gets in the way.
I have so much more experience now with bags. I suspect that Vanessa, of Crafty Gemini, does as well and she would make these projects differently if she were designing the club again.
I haven’t used all of the projects. For some reason, I was saving them until all were done. I don’t know what that was about, but I am going to put them into circulation.
I keep looking at the Zip Away Organizer and thinking that the construction is similar to the Day Trip Wallet from Sew Sweetness. The Day Trip Wallet is a project I have been putting off because of the tight curves required in the construction.
These are the projects in gallery form. I don’t have all of the projects anymore.
Roadtrip Bag – front
Zip Away Organizer – open
Crafty Gemini Sewing Machine Mat
4 Zip Organizer: closed
All Rolled Up tote with handles: open
Ultimate Project Bag – interior – with Road Trip bag
Crafty Gemini Retreat Bag -full interior (finished)
I am not sure which ones I will make again. I think I will make the Project Bag again, but with some modifications. I am finding project bags to be very useful. Not only do they use up fabric, but they keep all the pieces and parts of smaller projects together.
I won’t make the Road Trip bag again, though I like the size. It is very similar to the I Spy pouches from Sew Sweetness and I like the I Spy pattern better. I like making a window of the vinyl and not having it in a seam that needs to be turned. Of course, I have better vinyl now. I do like the leash on the Road trip bag, but I don’t like it next to the zipper. In fairness, I could have put it on the wrong side.
Remember a couple of months ago when my Oliso started blurping black gunk? Well, fortunately, that didn’t happen again, but the switch to turn the steam on and off did break. That meant almost no steam. There was some residual steam from the water in the tank being hot, but no real steam . 🙁
I contacted them again and this time they wanted me to send a video of the problem. I guess this is the era we live in now. I know I sound like an old fogey, but really. My description was good. NO STEAM.
Another new Oliso
Fortunately, the issue was verified very quickly and I got another new Oliso.
I think I have said that I love that the Olisos don’t stand up, that they sit flat on the ironing board. It isn’t enough to get me to buy another Oliso. I think I have sent four of them back. I didn’t have to pay for the postage, mostly, but it is inconvenient.
Now I have been using the new Oliso and it smells like a new iron. I hope I am not breathing something toxic. 🙁
As you know, I don’t quilt much. I really enjoy the collaborative effort of making a top and allowing someone else to quilt it. Thus, the quilts below are mostly tops, but I will include a finished quilt once someone else finishes it for the group.
WIPs are projects on which I am working. This means that I am past the cutting out of pieces stage, some sewing has taken place.
Green & Grey Diagonal 9 Patch – I am making blocks. I have about two dozen left to make before I can assemble
La Passacaglia – I am working on the border, but need to work more and harder.
Cut Out & Stopped
EPPic Bag – I need to make a cover/ main exterior piece for this bag. I was thinking of a Pineapple block, but haven’t gotten back to it yet. I am also kind of scared of this pattern. I know what to expect from Sew sweetness patterns, but this is a new designer to me.
Hildegarde Notions Trunk – I just cut it out, but will wait a bit before I start working on it
Still UFOs
I still have UFOs. Who doesn’t, after all? A project in the ‘UFO’ category means I am stalled, it hasn’t been worked on in awhile or it is waiting its turn to be worked on. The list is a lot shorter and the projects are newer, for the most part.
I am annoyed that some of these are still UFOs. I have to give myself credit for completing some of them last year.
Rose Petrillo bag – I found the pieces for this bag cut out, but not sewn.
Superbloom tote using Hindsight fabric – not started. I did pull the fabric, supplies and found a photo I plan to use as inspiration that others posted, so I am one step closer.
Handbag Sampler – I found the blocks! I found them in a bin I thought I had thoroughly searched! I also found the fabrics carefully stored together. Hooray!!
