HighFiber: decorating

Showing posts with label decorating. Show all posts

Monday, July 5, 2021

Finally!

The loom is actually in use for weaving!

I'm using 1 1/2" wide bias strips of quilting cotton for weft. That takes a lot of washing, ironing and cutting, but this will give my body something different to do for a break from knitting, and we do need some throw rugs.

Speaking of knitting, I picked up the Brioche Shawl Feathers shawl again, now that the Kevät is done. The first two rows I worked after starting up again were easy, as if I hadn't put it down for nearly eight weeks. Then I hit the br4sts_dec and couldn't remember how to do it. It was frustrating, because I had struggled to learn it when I first had to do it, but then it was almost automatic. It was a little easier to learn to do the second time, but I had to resort to watching the YouTube video again. It isn't the first thing in this video. She had to get into the row a bit, but then it gets complicated:

Soon she had me on my way again. Here you can see the decrease made to the right of the needles and more needing to be made just to the left.

The rest of the rows were easy, and soon I was working the I-cord bind-off. (The pattern recommends a slightly larger needle for this BO.

The marker is where the right end of my lifeline is fastened. I'm not taking it out until I'm done with the BO. Here's the video of the BO, although I finish each set with SSK, rather than K,sl,psso.

You may remember from last week that I had taken the curtains in the fiber studio down so I could add tabs to go over the planned curtain rod above the window. The tension rod I was using kept falling down whenever I raised or lowered the shade. Friday we pulled out the trundle, then the day bed, and installed the curtain rod, with much moaning and gnashing of teeth. (It wasn't easy to get in behind the day bed.) We finally got it up, and I added the tabs to the top of the curtains, fastening them by sewing a button onto each tab. This is working much better.

The fiber studio is much tidier, but I still have a pile of "pressing business" on the floor.

All this fabric is left over from other projects. It's been washed and dried. Now it needs to be ironed and cut into 1 1/2" bias strips for weaving.

Our chard has been enjoying the hot weather. We harvested some on Saturday.

It was tasty, stems chopped and sautéed with mushrooms and peppers, with the leaves thrown in at the end.

I'm happy the loom is finally functional. I'm happy to be binding off the Brioche Shawl Feathers Shawl. I'm happy to have the fiber studio straightened out and the curtains up. Finally!

Where's my blog: If you have been following my blog and want to continue following, I recommend you go here and sign up to follow.

What's on my needles: Brioche Shawl Feathers shawl.

What's on my sewing machine: Now that the curtains are done, the cover is back on the machine. It was great for sewing all those buttons on!

What's in my hoop: Still the Whole Cloth Quilt. Actually a little more progress this week.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: "The Dolls' Request." The dolls are enjoying the summer weather.

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Finished The Rose Code by Kate Quinn. Very interesting story. Very well written. Just starting Florence Grace by Tracy Rees.

What's in my wine glass: Primi Soli Sangiovese. I love this one! DH says it's because it's actually from grapes grown in Italy.

What's my tip of the week: When you're busy doing any kind of repetitive activity, schedule breaks, so your body can do something else for a while. You'll be glad you did. (Or, more likely, you'll be sorry you didn't!)

Where's my book: Mariah: Stories from the Doll's Storybook is available from Amazon worldwide. Also available from BookBaby, Barnes & Noble and other booksellers. Royalties go to support pediatric cancer research and treatment. The three stories in the book first appeared in the blog and they are reproduced with few changes. The stories (and links to them) are Being Little, Besties, and Distraction.

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.

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Monday, June 21, 2021

High on Fiber

I made a lot of progress on the Kevät sweater this week. Bind-off done, just the sleeves, weaving in and blocking to do.

The sleeves won't take too long. It's mostly just ribbing.

Because the pattern recommended a stretchy bind-off, I used this bind-off method.

Along with that, I decided to warp my loom for some rugs. I had what I thought was plenty of thread for warp, some in cotton and some in linen. Four partial spools had been given to me for free. I figured out how much warp I would need for three rugs and wound the thread, one after the other, onto my warping board.

Oops! I had enough for 180 ends, but I needed 244, so not nearly enough. I think it might be enough for two rugs, though, so I used my ball winder to remove it all from my warping board.

I'm hoping to have enough when I wind it on again, but shorter. This time I know how much I have of each (by weight) without the heavy cardboard spools included. I know I will need to use it all. I plan to use the linen, which should be stronger, on the outside edges and the cotton in the middle. (I get to have that fun all over again.)

I needed a bathing suit for Pippa for an upcoming story. I had bought some little girls' socks to use. (I picked the socks on the bottom row, center, for the first suit.)

I already had the pattern. All I had to do was figure out the new measurements, which I did, and now the pattern is updated. Here's Pippa in her new suit. (The bow in the front wasn't planned. I accidentally sewed the fold-over-elastic to the right side of that little section that goes at the neck in front. It meant when I sewed the other side of the trim down, it left some rather messy-looking extra stitching showing, so...the bow.)

Here's another angle, showing a bit of the back. Although some small sewing projects are difficult to make because of stitching in a confined area, it wasn't any harder to make than the larger size.

You may remember my new curtains in the workroom.

I'm finding it difficult to close them without pulling down the tension rod that holds them up, so I've decided I need a regular curtain rod (which I already have) with tabs to make the curtain longer. I'm working with the color scheme from this quilt my friend Joanie left me.

The bed quilt we made together is also now in my possession, and it will go on the daybed when we get it set up.

I had used all the curtain fabric I had, but I found this in my stash and think it will coordinate nicely with the quilts. I'll make tabs and use the buttons to embellish where I sew the tabs to the curtain.

We ordered the daybed with trundle, two mattresses for it and a smaller table for the workroom last week. The mattresses have arrived. The 8" top mattress arrived on Wednesday, and we unrolled it and let it expand.

Thursday the 6" trundle mattress arrived. It wasn't quite as heavy, and it took less time to expand. The mattresses both came from Indonesia. As they sucked in the American air after we unrolled them, I could almost hear them say, "Selamat tidur." (Blessed sleep. It's how Indonesians say goodnight when they are off to bed, and not just parting for the night, which would be "Selamat malam.)

The mattress pads arrived the day after we ordered them, and DH picked up the sheets, which I had found at Fred Meyer on sale, when he was there picking up a prescription.

We have some related cuteness this week. Here's our DDIL2 with her Kevät sweater, which she has finished except for one sleeve, weaving in the ends and blocking. She let her niece (one of my honorary grandchildren) try on the sweater.

She's making the full-length version. Mine is the cropped version, although I added an extra pattern repeat, and she added several. I hope to be done in a day or two with mine.

Where's my blog: As you may know, the entity that notifies people when a blog they follow posts will discontinue notifications in July. This motivated me to link my blog to Bloglovin', as I did some time ago with The Doll's Storybook. If you are following my blog want to continue following after July, I recommend you go here and sign up to follow.

What's on my needles: Still the Kevät sweater and the dish mat, with the Brioche Shawl Feathers shawl on hold until I finish the Kevät.

What's on my sewing machine: Tabs for the curtains in workroom.

What's in my hoop: Still the Whole Cloth Quilt. No progress this week.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: Too Big, Too Small. Pippa wonders why she can't borrow clothes from Veronika, if she's willing to let Veronika borrow hers.

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Still listening to The Rose Code by Kate Quinn. Very intriguing story so far.

What's in my wine glass: Charles Shaw Pinot Grigio from Trader Joe's. It's a bit sweet for every day according to my taste, but a nice change.

What's my tip of the week: I may have mentioned before this little trick for measuring butter. Select a measuring cup twice the size you would need to measure your butter. Fill it half full of cold or room temperature water. Spoon the butter into the water until the level reaches twice the amount of butter you want to measure. Pour off the water. Your butter is measured accurately.

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Monday, April 30, 2018

Crayons and Knitting Needles

Mandy's Russian Dress is done.

I posted the pattern here. Several people are making it now. I've change the skirt, originally a swirled skirt. Now it's balanced, but just as full. The pattern has both skirt versions. Here it is from the side:

The back is the same as the green one. Now I've started one in blue for Vroni.

Vintage Stitchers met at Marilyn's, so I'm showing off some of her quilts. Marilyn loves bright, primary colors. Visiting her house is like walking across a sheet of paper with well-ordered crayons posing artistically here and there.

She gave us a tour of her new master bath. It's beautiful, but I couldn't get enough of all the lovely quilts used in decorating her home.

This one used fussy-cut zinnias on a white background for the "plain" blocks in an Irish Chain pattern.

Here's a look at the border.

The same fabric line, but with different backgrounds were used in this Bear Paw variation.

The bedroom had other lovely quilts on a ladder against the wall, something I would like to do after we move.

The Vintage Stitchers had some great show-and-tell for us. Carol had made a couple of chair covers, basically quilts made as wide as her chairs, so they could protect the chairs without being folded.

They were reversible.

(That's my Spring Flowers quilt on the floor, bottom left.)

As I said, there were two.

And they are reversible.

Several of our members have made the Goodnight, Irene quilt. This is Barbara's. She used a pretty batik for the border.

Diane had been making some bags. She's an avid knitter, and a knitter can never have too many bags.

We had a nice visit, and chatted about how our group got started, back in 2004.

Another quilter had been working on an appliqué quilt, a BOM (block of the month) at a local quilt shop. It was such a lot of hand appliqué that she decided she wanted to hand-quilt it, so she recruited me to teach her. We had met at her quilt guild when I gave a talk about how to make quilts like the ones that are now considered antique. She came to my house for a few lessons, and we decided it would be nice to have a mini group centered around hand work (quilting, appliqué, sewing on binding, etc.). I ran into Barbara and Carol at the Utah Quilt Guild's Quilt Festival that year. They had been at a meeting I attended where I mentioned the group. We were in a booth in the vendors' mall, and we started chatting. They invited a few friends to our first meeting and I invited a few. Several of the original members have moved away (as I will be doing soon), and we've added people. I'm hoping some of them can come to my new place in 2019 for the Sisters Quilt Show/Festival put on by the Stitchin' Post in Sisters.

Spring has finally arrived. I heard my first hummingbird this morning. About 10 years ago, I planted these bulbs (I don't know what they're called) under the big tree in the front of the house.

That spring they came up across the street. on the slope that leads up to another home. Some of our 4-legged gardeners thought they would be more visible there. They get more morning sun, too.

Something is sprouting up in our driveway, though. U-haul boxes. They're pods for moving. You fill them up, and when you're ready, they come and pick them up. They will haul these to Bend to put into storage for us. When we're ready to move into a new home, they will deliver them to us.

Saturday we went to the Utah Democratic State Convention in Salt Lake City. There was a lot of discussion, some inspiring speeches and votes for candidates for various offices. We had one race that will require a primary, but the others were decided right there.

You can't see me, but I'm right down in front, right in front of the podium. What I found stunning was, one candidate decided that another candidate running for the same office was a better choice, so he threw his support to her. There were five candidates for that race, and she won. It will be an uphill battle for all the candidates in November, though. Utah is reliably red.

I sat next to a lady who was crocheting dish clothes. I was working on my Coastal Skies shawl. She said she didn't know how to knit. I saw she was holding her yarn the way I do for Continental-style knitting. I've seen people hold the right needle the way she held her crochet hook. I demonstrated for her how she could knit using the same skills she already knew. I think I may have a convert.

What's on my needles: Still the Coastal Skies, a little more progress made, and the third Russian Dress.

What's on my Featherweight: Put away in its case until I get more packing done.

What's in my hoop: Still the Spring Flowers quilt, but a lot of progress made this week.

What's on my wheel: Stanzi is still in hibernation.

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Finished A Higher Loyalty by Jim Comey. It reads like a good novel, but it also made sense out of a lot of recent history and rang true. Now listening to The Miser of Mayfair by M. C. Beaton. Just getting into it.

What's in my wine glass: Charles Shaw “Two-buck Chuck” Shiraz. DH was busy when it was time for my wine break, so he said just to get one of these. I’m glad that soon I’ll be living where I can buy this very drinkable wine in my local Trader Joe’s, instead of having to smuggle in a supply from out-of-state.

What's my tip of the week: Spring often brings out spiders, whether because they are hatching or because you might be cleaning and moving things around. Except for the few that are poisonous, they are beneficial creatures, but we don't want them taking over the house. They need to go out and find homes of their own. We practice "catch and release." A plastic container or jar can corral your "prey"while you slide a card of piece of paper between the container and the surface they are sitting or hanging around on. Using the card or paper to keep the container closed, you can remove them safely from the house and deposit them outdoors, where they can make a nice home for themselves and find much more to eat. (Most spiders are spinners and weavers. Anyone who makes yarn and does something useful with it is OK in my book.)