Letters "E" and "F"

I didn't do any work on the embroidery sampler yesterday, but had time to work on it some more today.  I was able to complete two more letters today.  Good thing I have lots of time to spend on this, because the satin stitch take a lot of time to look right.  

Here is the letter "E" done in almost all satin stitch with some stem stitch.  I went ahead and outlined the letter in a backstitch to give it some even definition.  

This is the letter "F", all done in stem stitch.  (Sorry for the poor pictures, the lighting is not so good where I am at currently).

Finally, I thought you would like to see the whole sampler of all the completed letters to see how the color choice is beginning to come together.  

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Daisychain ABC Sampler - "B" "C" "D"

Yes indeed, I had some sitting time today, and was able to knock out three more letters in this sampler.  The letter "B" and "D" were fairly simple if only because of the type stitch and limit of two colors.  The letter "C", though took more time because of the wider spectrum of colors.

See for yourself...

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Daisychain ABC Sampler "A"

My package arrived from my husband, and it is the Daisychain ABC sampler that I posted about a couple of weeks ago.  While sitting (my mom is in a skilled nursing / rehab center with a long struggle to get to a recovery to come home) today, I was able to complete the first letter in this sampler.  I worked on and completed the letter "A".

The curved yellow was done in a chain stitch, the yellow center is french knots, and the petals are done in a satin stitch.  The pattern gave instructions for each stitch, and the designer stated that the satin stitch takes practice to look right.  I agree.  It seemed like each petal took longer and longer to do, to get the stitch to look good.

I am so linear in my thinking, that I just naturally (for me anyhow) started with the letter "A".  And, I then started on the letter "B".  But as I am writing this, I thought, I could do the letters randomly making it a little more interesting.  Nah, my nature isn't going to let me do that, so you will be seeing them done in order.  Sigh.

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Spotty Hen Stitching Done

Here is the completed top done.  I managed to do all the stitching of the wool pieces using the blanket stitch, then using some stem stitching for bits of hay around the nesting eggs, and button eyes.

Here is a close up of the mama hen,  looking over her little chick.

Here is a close up of the nest with the hay holding the eggs.  Nice touch on the look of the eggs.

When I get back home, I will be sandwiching the batting and backing doing some stitch in the ditch and then get the binding on to totally complete this little wallhanging.  

I am going to be staying out of town longer than expected, by about 13 days, so my wonderful husband is shipping me another stitching project to work on during the long days of sitting.

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Spotty Hen Start

A few posts back, I did a post about doing a felt fabric combo little wall hanging called "Spotty Hen".  I got the background fabric sewn, the felt pieces cut out and placed, and thread picked out ready to hand stitch down at some point in time.

I knew I would have an opportunity to do some hand working these last few days, so here is a sneak peek of some of the first hand stitching I have accomplished.

It is going faster than I originally thought it would, especially with all the little pieces involved.  I like how it is coming along, and will be working on it this next week, as I am out of town and not in front of a sewing machine.  

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Polo Top

Once again, I am using a Stretch and Sew pattern to make myself another top.  Remember yesterday I wanted to make a polo shirt.  Well there is a pattern for such a thing in the pattern line-up.  This one is older, but still works just like new.

This is the easy installment of the front placket, which is what is needed to make it into a polo shirt.  This fabric is a soft "tee shirt" knit print of red ship anchors, and turquoise ship steering wheels, and is from an older Rachel Ashwell of Shabby Chic line. 

Here is the finished shirt.

And here is a peek of me modeling the shirt.  Nailed it, Love it!

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Change of Venue

Today, I worked on a totally different sewing venue.  Clothes making.  Before I was a quilter, I was a seamstress, making all kinds of clothing, from down coats, rodeo queen outfits, bridesmaids dresses, and all kinds of alterations and tailoring.  That was then when I needed some extra income to stay at home with my boys before they started grade school.

I decided to try my hand at making me a blouse because I have lost about 40 pounds and things in my closet are not fitting too well.  I have altered some of my clothes, but some of them can't be altered down anymore, without completely taking them apart and resizing the pieces.  If I am going to do that I might as well start from scratch and make something new.  Right?  And another reason, I wanted to do this, is I still indeed to lose another 23-30 pounds, so all I need are a couple of items to hold me over, then I can get new clothes.   I know, everyone says they are going to lose more weight and never do, but I give myself 6 months to lose more and then I will be happy where I end up at, and will work on getting a new wardrobe at that time.  Maybe around Christmas?

Any way, I used to make the majority of my clothes from the pattern line, Stretch and Sew, because they came as a master pattern that was traced off on the pattern material "Do-Sew" (I have posted about this earlier) in sizes that fit different areas of one's body.  Not everyone, if anyone, is a perfect size 12, 14 or whatever, that the pattern companies try to make us fit into.

So, for my first test subject, I chose fabric called Tutti Frutti, which is like a seersucker type material, and the pattern I chose is a peasant blouse.  The pattern is for a dress or tunic, but I shortened the pattern to make a blouse, and I chose it to be short sleeved.

This is the fabric, a pink swirl, very summery.

This is the pattern on the fabric after I had traced it onto the "Do-Sew" material.

This is the front placket, and opening where the neck ties will come together when the blouse is completed.

This is a "raglan" type sleeve, as the top of the sleeve is part of the neckline in the blouse.

And here is the final finished product.  I am so happy with it, and it actually fits very comfortably.  

From start to finish, I made it in about three hours, including tracing the pattern.  Now that I have it traced, I should be able to make one in about two hours.  I am planning an out of state trip next week, so I am hoping I can get another one of these made, and a polo shirt.

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Couple More Prairie Primrose Blocks

Yep, just stopping in and showing off a couple more blocks to the massive quilt, Prairie Primrose.

This makes a total of 5 completed, and only 4 more to go, more than half-way done.  Except I looked at all the appliqué work on the corner posts, the corner sashings, aaannndd all around the quilt boarders.  Yikes!!!

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More Prairie Primrose

I spent the last two days, cutting out, doing the placement and stitching of the next two blocks in my UFO BOM Prairie Primrose.  The background of each block is different, as well as the flower design.  Each block will be completely different from each other.  So I have been doing the machine stitching around the pieces with different color thread.  

This is block two.

This is block three.

Close up of block three.

And a picture of the first three blocks.  I used a wheat color thread on the first block, a navy color on the second, and a brick red on the third one.

I thought any of you who do machine appliqué might like to know, I did not use any adhesive produce to hold down the appliqué pieces (like Heat n' Bond, Wonder Under, etc.).  I laid out the whole design with pins and stitch in place.  For years, I have read, been taught, and understood the only way to do machine appliqué is to use one of these type products.  Of course, the underlying reason to use these products, is to hold the design in place so it doesn't move, get distorted, or pucker.    But the draw back in using these products is they cause a stiffness in the overall block, and then as an end result, causing the quilt to be even stiffer and not draping well as all.  Originally, I was going to do the needle turn appliqué  hand technique, thus using freezer paper to cut out the design for the first block.  Since I didn't use one of the adhesive products, I went ahead, without too much thought, and started machine stitching down the pieces.  About half-way through the first block, I realized that the pieces were staying in place just fine without using the products, and the end result is a very soft and supple feeling block.  I am very happy with this result, and most likely not be suing any appliqué adhesive product in the future.  This will be a money saver, as these type products can be quite costly.

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New BOM UFO - Prairie Primrose

Most quilters know who Kim Diehl is, and if you are new to quilting and discover her, you will surely like her and her style.  She combines simple piecing and appliqué to make gorgeous quilts.  

So, to move the story along,  Homestead Hearth was offering a BOM using the pattern Prairie Primrose in Kim's book, Simple Traditions.  I already had the book, so I signed up for the BOM.    

This is a big quilt, 106" X 106", and each block measures 21" square.  See how nice it looks on a bed?  When I saw this, I wanted this on one of my beds in the house.

Initially, I was all gung-ho in working on this BOM, mostly because I wanted to try my hand at "hand turn appliqué".  Big failure!  I am sure I would have gotten better with practice.  Ah, no.  Not.  So, I got busy, and since it wasn't a great success right away, I stuck it in a tub and never thought about it again.  Then, again, I was surfing through Pinterest, and came across several pins of Kim's work, and I remembered that I had all the fabric and pattern to do one of her quilts.  So, I went on a treasure hunt through my tubs of BOM's and projects, and found it all the individual month packets and the first block I worked on.   I knew I would not be doing the hand appliqué on this quilt, so I took out all the handwork I did on block one and redid it on the machine using one of the stitches (blanket stitch) to do all the pieces.  Here is the newly redone block 1.  So much better than the original.  It was so bad, I didn't even want to take a picture.  Pathetic!!!  But after doing this block on the machine, I am excited to work on the other blocks and do this quilt.

Just for information, the fabric used in this BOM is Moda, Kansas Troubles.  Two lines were used, called Bound to the Prairie 2, and Winter Rose.  Beautiful!

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