Since the Last Time I Saw You

Hello there! I'm sorry for my extended absence. It turns out that handmaking all Christmas gifts and then driving from Oklahoma City to Upstate New York (straight through) is both time-consuming and tiring. But I'm back now. And happy new year to you all!

I just love paperwhites. That's been a major event of the last few weeks is that the ones I bought from the farmer's market are blooming. And have to be continually re-staked because they are so tall!

Also in the past couple of weeks we spent New Year's Eve here at the house with a couple of friends, playing cards. The fire actually refrained from smoking and it was a cozy and lovely evening. We even had a potluck dinner between the 4 of us. ("Company chicken", toffee candy similar to 7-layer bars, and my favorite broccoli soup)

And finally, I'm happy to finally be able to reveal some of the Christmas gifts which kept me so busy throughout December. (Not pictured, I made several of Liesl's gorgeous little boats and 4 pair of Toasty Mitts.)

Perhaps the largest project was this throw quilt for my parents. It was actually completely finished (I am notorious for giving unfinished gifts, as perhaps are most crafters) and the largest quilt I've totally finished to date. I think it looks very nice in their living room so I'm happy that it got done, even if I had to go through 2 walking feet to get it there (I think the first one was just poorly made -- it only managed to quilt 3 potholders and half of this quilt before breaking).

Here I am wearing the hat I made for my husband's step father, Howard. I hope it fits him better than it fits me!

Snowmen from this pattern (found via 2MayBoys and the Trim the Tree swap). I love these little guys!

Sewing Overtime

Well, the Christmas gifts box went out the door this morning and most of the cards went yesterday. I still have a few more cards, one more batch of cookies (so far I've made these (with peach lavender jam from the summer), these, and these, all of which are quite tasty although the caramel didn't set up), and a few more gifts which I plan to carry on the plane to finish up but I felt this afternoon like I had a bit of time to sew some more on my Mystery Quilt.

I've been asked what a Mystery Quilt is and this seems like as good a time as any to explain a bit. So Bonnie Hunter posts these "hints" on her blog every Friday (basic quilt elements to put together, such as 120 half-pink-half-brown half square triangle blocks at 3.5 inches) and we all follow along blindly until we get to the last step (the past mysteries have had about 7 steps and we're now on 4) where we see what in the world it is that we're making! I know that it'll be a full-size quilt in pink, green, chocolate, cream, and red, but that's absolutely it so far.

Jessica (whose blog I found the mystery through) and I are muddling through together. Having someone to discuss with does make it a ton of fun. But I've been too busy with holiday preparations just now to get much done.

The photos above are, at top, my single 8.5-inch "neutral" block (I'm to make 60 of them but I haven't quite figured out the tricks to sewing onto a paper foundation with my machine), in the middle, 142 of 172 2-inch wide pink-and-green strips, and, on the bottom, most of the 120 pink-and-brown half square triangles (they're not actually to be pinwheels necessarily, I just like arranging them and admiring them as pinwheels). I've not even started on the 120 green-and-neural 2-inch strips and matching 2-inch green blocks. At least I've made a bit of progress though.

Holiday Shopping

I can't show a lot of what I'm purchasing or working on for holiday gifts just yet but I can show the fun little things I found at Ikea! (Which, by the way, was having a sale (at least the one in Red Hook was) on all holiday merchandise, in case you're interested.)

There were lots of wonderful wrapping papers but I picked this one because it reminds me of a fair isle sweater and that's something I'm very into at the moment. And, of course, I had to buy the (look Aryn, I'm going to call them the right name!) REINDEER ornaments (I kept saying "moose" in the store). I think they'll make some lovely gift tags. Now to find the time to get some things wrapped and in the mail!

Many Small Changes

This is a photo of our living room from last January, shortly after we'd purchased the house. All of the furniture shown was left behind in the house and has all now found new homes.

And now with our furniture. And my Christmas-Card-and-Mystery-Quilt-making mess on the table. It still needs paint and (the rest of the) curtains. And I'd like to recover that sofa. But I'm excited about the progress. Especially that the squashed-Smurf-colored shag carpet is gone.

This is, to me, one of the most dramatic before-and-afters from our house. Inspired by Patrick's work on that ceiling fan. Believe it or not, it is the very same ceiling fan in both the before and after photos. We just bought a new light kit for it from Home Depot and used some spray paint leftover from painting the kitchen cabinet hinges. And, of course, turned the blades over to their non-rattan side.

Big Progress on a Small Quilt Top

First, I must make a note that those little bits of Double-Wedding Ring in the front left corner are the quilt on the bed underneath my log cabin quilt. I know that they look funny.

Other than that, I'm happy to report more progress on this quilt which I've been piecing since July! It all came to a standstill when I couldn't find my rotary cutter to square up the blocks and has had insane progress made on it since I bought my new favorite cutting tool and found the cutter again last week. Now all of the log cabins are pieced, many of them are attached to one another, and I'm ready to go find a batting and a backing.

This quilt is for the daybed that I've had since I was 10, which has the same quilt to go with it that it has had since even before the bed was given to me. It's really time for a new quilt! We're planning to pick the bed up in Oklahoma at Christmas. It will become a new "sofa" in my craft room / sun porch. With a new quilt. All of this being here to explain why there are odd cut-outs on the corners of the quilt -- it's for a daybed.

I certainly hope that it goes well with my new curtains. But I still haven't painted in the room so I can pick a paint to match both and bring it all together. Must get back to work (and back to cutting pieces for the mystery quilt which I will show here soon).

Thanksgiving Doings

Happy Thanksgiving!

Busy busy over here. But not with what I should be busy with on Thanksgiving.

I wanted to wear my sugarplum pullover for dinner today so I finished working in all the loose ends.

The first snow of the year is falling.

I'm so obsessed with my new cutting tool (and newly rediscovered rotary cutter) that I can't stop working on quilting.

And the first of Mildred Pearce's eggs to be used is being made into dinner rolls by the bread machine.

I hope you have a good one too!

Yet Another Collection

I'm dying to buy this book right now so, to deter myself from making such a large and unnecessary expenditure this close to holiday gift-giving time, I'm looking back at all of my other Blackbird pieces I've stitched over the past 7 years. Blackbird Designs are, by the way, my very favorite of cross-stitch companies and Barb and Alma are the nicest people (I was lucky enough, in about 2004 to get to travel to the cutest store in Mexico, MO for a rug-hooking class that they taught).

This is the inside of that needle book at the top of this post. An old, retired loose feathers pattern. I love how they mix little things like needle books and boxes in with the plain, flat cross-stitch pieces in their designs. They always have great instructions for finishing these little items and its fun to occasionally not just use the stitched pieces for framing or pillows.

My most recent framed cross-stitch project. A new addition to my miniature houses collection, from a Loose Feathers pattern. More miniature houses (with a box of pins for scale) below. I have done 3 of these houses so I guess that this is really becoming a Blackbird Miniature Houses Collection.

I don't remember offhand where the pattern on the left is from (if anyone is interested, email me and I'll dig it out of my old patterns to tell you what it is) and the one on the right is, if I remember correctly, a free download from their site from about 4 years ago. Maybe longer. Time flies.

This one can be found here. I have a series of cross-stitched pieces that I like to hang for each season/holiday. I think I have about 13 of them, mostly stitched between 2003 and 2005. Every place that I live, I find a nice prominent wall, put one nail right in the middle, and rotate out these pieces. I'm starting to want to put two nails in the wall and make a set of complimentary pieces. Yikes.

This one is my marriage sampler. It's from "A Fine Collection". They mentioned in the book how they'd originally stitched the initials of a group of their friends in among the leaves. I loved this idea and we had a tiny wedding so I put the initials of all of the attendees in among the leaves, with my and Patrick's names and the date at the bottom. We came to NYC on the train in December of 2003 after being married in November and I stitched most of this on that 3-day ride.

Also somewhere around here is another half-finished piece which I believe I'm planning to make into a pillow. But it's hiding. Probably with my rotary cutter and the bin pulls for the kitchen drawers. So I'll save it for a later post.

Maybe in the meantime I'll go stitch something else from the Fine Collection book since I've only made one thing from that whole book (and surely I don't need to buy another book until I've made better use of the one I already have!)