Friday, September 28, 2012

Gentle Progress

My hand is healing well. The external wound is disappearing nicely but the internal healing is apparently going to take some time. Things are still tender and overall my hand is weak. I have been able to do some sewing though. In my last post I mentioned that I could make blocks from patches I've habitually cut from scraps. This first batch is mostly from the prints I used in my Crowns quilt:


The units below were made from squares and half-square triangles that finish at three inches for more six inch blocks for my Parts Department. I haven't found a name for this basic four patch but it is found as a component part of many complex blocks.


I also had some batik patches...


 And I found some quarter-square triangles. I used them to work up this twelve inch Ohio Star block.


By this time I'd pretty much used up my pre-cut patches. At least the ones I was willing to put together into a block! It occurred to me then that sewing blocks together into a top wouldn't be much more difficult than building individual blocks. I found these Shoo Fly blocks in my Parts Drawer that I thought would work together for a lap quilt. I was thinking a vertical strippy set as I put them on the design wall.


By this time I was ready to try some rotary cutting again and since I wasn't satisfied with a few of those blocks I cut new patches and sewed up new blocks.


Now the challenge is to find the right print to use to set the blocks!

Friday, September 14, 2012

Forced Hiatus

I cut my left palm pretty badly a few days ago. Not with a rotary cutter, as you might expect, but with a sharp kitchen knife.  I never have been very good in a kitchen. As the saying goes, I only have a kitchen because it came with the house.


Consequently my sewing activities have been curtailed for a while. I'm beginning to get bored now however, and am wondering whether I could at least piece some pre-cut patches together for blocks like this...


Or maybe I could just sew scraps together for crazy made-fabric blocks or liberated log cabins. In any event it will be long strings of chain piecing, Not sure I trust myself to pick up an iron yet. I don't want to get excited and open the wound accidentally!


Of course, there's a bunch of tedious sorting of papers, etc. that I could do...

Surely that wouldn't speed healing the way more fun activities would though, would it? ;- )

Thursday, September 6, 2012

Late Summer

I had no intention of being absent so long. What can I say? Life got in the way.


I have been working on finishing up another project but I'm not ready to share it yet.


And the question in the back of my mind is, what's next?


I have a wall full of batik parts but no clue what to do with them yet. No particular inspiration either.


There's more to do for the Sketchbook Project. I could catch up my Bead Journal Project. The challenge project for the La Conner Quilt Museum is still in limbo.

Plenty to choose from... just no motivation... yet.

It will come.

Maybe a little retail therapy will help? ;- )