More of My Journal

In one of the signatures of the journal I'm making I've included this greeting card. I gather it was intended to be a birthday card of sorts. The message inside simply says "Wicked Cool." Works for me! The yellow in the card nicely echoes the yellow on my journal pages. That was a happy bit of serendipity.


What I needed however, was a way to cover up the business graphics on the back of the card. Some of it was trimmed away when I shortened the card to make it fit but I really didn't want all that other stuff showing.

My solution was to take a used Color Catcher sheet - conveniently dyed to a shade of blue that works with the blue-gray on my journal pages - and make a sort of pocket or built-in sachet out of it.

First I stamped the words onto the Color Catcher, then trapped some dried rosemary from my own garden between the folded sheet. It's all stitched down to the greeting card, and the rick rack was added last to sort of dress it up.

I've got a couple more pages I can show you after I get them photographed. I don't consider them done exactly but at least they have been embellished a bit. It may be years before this particular journal is completely filled up. ;- )

First Steps in Making a Journal

I signed up for Carole Brungar's journal making class after I saw the journal QuiltDivaJulie made during her time in the class. While I was waiting for the right watercolor paper to arrive I brewed up some teas and tried them out on sample paper to see what colors I would get from them.

This happens to be the blueberry tea. I also brewed rose hip, peach, and China mountain green. Oddly enough, the China green tea produced a very yellow hue. I had a blast brushing and spattering it onto the paper.

It's more yellow in person than in the photo. Below is the other side of the paper dyed almost exclusively with the blueberry tea. It's sort of a brown-gray in person, partly because I used a layer of the rose hip tea in some areas.

I also soaked this bit of ribbon in the blueberry tea. It was stark white before its bath.

I've torn the big sheet of watercolor paper into strips for pages and have begun to embellish the pages. Turns out that making a journal is not like making a quilt, at least for me. I tend to start a quilt and keep working on it until I reach a solid stopping point. With this journal I've been doing a little bit at a time and then I have to leave it until the next day or so. Granted, I only have a vague idea of what I want to accomplish with it and the whole thing is a new experience for me. All the bits and pieces under consideration are taking up valuable real estate in the studio however. I've got to figure out a way to get more done or get more sewing in or something. There's altogether too much chocolate being consumed out of frustration!

Picking Up Where We Left Off

Between family visiting and getting lost in a couple of good books it's been a whole week since my last post. Sorry about that! Hope no one has been holding their breath (but I rather doubt it!).

So when my plan for Patience Corner blocks was foiled by my own mistake I had these piles of rectangles to work with.



I decided to try the obvious first.

And I actually quite liked it. Especially since I know so little about the recipient of this quilt. She's going to turn 12, she likes animals and nature and music and the color red. That's all I know besides what part of the country she lives in. So a simple quilt is probably the safest.

Of course I could only lay out half of the quilt top at a time on my design wall. And the trick was to distribute the various red prints as randomly but evenly as possible.


I pin little pieces of paper with the row number to the left-most block in each row when I'm assembling a top like this and then stick to adding new blocks to the right side until I reach the end of the row. I also like to work on at least four rows at a time so I can chain piece. In the picture above I have four rows pretty well along and had started the fifth. The "blocks" in this quilt are set 10 x 10. Since the blocks will finish at 6 x 8 inches that gives me a quilt top that measures 60 x 80 inches. At least that part worked out well!

Here you can see the music print that turned out to be sashing and a few of the red prints.


Oh, and I ran out of the original music print before I had quite enough blocks. Fortunately I had something very similar in my stash and was able to incorporate it throughout the quilt top. You may be able to find it in the picture below.

I have to say that I wasn't really thrilled with this while it was on the design wall. It did give me a chance to get to know my new sewing machine a bit but it just isn't the kind of quilt I generally like to make. Once I threw the flimsy onto a twin bed, however, I like it much better.


I'm not going to quilt it right away since it's not to be gifted until December but I can see that this will make up into a wonderfully cheerful, cozy quilt. And I'm confident the new machine will do a good job with the quilting. In the meantime, I have a journal project that is taking over the studio. I'll show you that the next time!

Crisis vs Opportunity

In contrast to the challenges facing so many Americans these days this is trivial. But it's still frustrating!

I signed up to make a birthday quilt for a young lady in the Wrapped in Hope program through Margaret's Hope Chest. I've had this project in the back of my mind for a while. I recently decided to make Patience Corner blocks using red prints and a white with black music note print. I thought this would be a good project to use to begin to get familiar with my new sewing machine.



She sews faster than Phoebe, that's for sure. In no time at all I had 4.5" strips sewn to 2.5" strips. I cut them into sub-units and added 2.5" strips to one other side.

This is what the finished block should look like:

This is what I ended up with:

I didn't understand what I'd done wrong for what felt like a long time. Eventually it dawned on me that I'd cut the sub-units too long. Great. That might also explain why I ran out of the music print before I expected to. And now I get to decide whether to make these rectangles work somehow or trim them down to the squares they're supposed to be.

Sigh.

Unexpected Purchase

You know how when you go shopping with a friend (or a daughter!) they can talk you into buying something you know you want but wouldn't buy without their encouragement? I blame C~ for what happened to me this week. ;- )

First of all, here's some of the random piecing I'd been doing.

This is Phoebe, the machine they were sewn on.

Turns out I've had Phoebe for 9.5 years. Time flies when you're having fun and getting good results. But this week C~ asked me whether I was aware of the special deal being offered by our local Pfaff dealer. I'd received the flyer but hadn't paid much attention to it because I didn't think I was in the market for a new machine. She filled me in on the details, and the next time I went out on a routine errand I stopped in at the store. The air quality was too poor for me to stay long but I got enough to whet my appetite. Because they know me there and know of my situation the store manager allowed me to take the floor model home overnight for a test drive.

This is the Pfaff Expression 2.0. You may be able to see at a glance that it has a longer arm and much wider throat. There are 3.5 extra inches between the needle and the column. That doesn't sound like much but when you're trying to maneuver a quilt of any size in and around there for quilting it will feel like a lot. This machine finally has the serpentine stitch that I always wished Phoebe had too.

I didn't fall in love right away. That first night I was feeling poorly and didn't realize that I didn't have the even-feed system engaged while I was doing my piecing. Once I figured that out I was much happier with the results. Then the next morning I layered up a sample quilt sandwich and had a go. This machine is capable of faster speed than the poor old Phoebe. Quilting could actually become fun!

All evening long there were discussions amongst my husband, my son, and myself as to which of the four sewing machines in the house I would use to get the $500 trade in credit. Two of the machines are vintage. They belonged to my husband's grandmother and mother respectively. They are quality machines that work but aren't currently up to par. DS has a starter machine he bought with high school graduation money and it has served him well. I wasn't excited at the prospect of trading Phoebe in. So while I tried out the new machine DS tried out Phoebe. By the time I had to return the Expression 2.0 to the store DS had decided that he wouldn't miss his starter sewing machine that much after all!

Because I had a couple of lingering questions about the new machine I took it back to the store the next morning and left the trade-in machine at home. Fortunately at that hour the store was virtually empty and the air quality tolerable. I was able to spend enough time to have my questions answered, my hesitations assuaged, and in the end I made the purchase. DH went back later in the day to turn in the starter machine.

These are the blocks I pieced while trying out the new machine.

I was really glad I had patches at the ready so I had something to practice on. All of these blocks turned out perfectly, in spite of some of the challenges I had. I can't say that I'm head over heels in love with this new machine but I feel confident she will grow on me over time. She is the machine I would have bought when I bought Phoebe if it had been available. All she needs now is a call name. I figure that, too, will come to me over time.

And before you go: I saw this vehicle on the street this week while I was stopped at a light. I was thrilled that this time I actually had my camera with me even though I had to take the picture through my car's window. Isn't it a beauty? Someone has put a lot of time and effort and love into it!