Next WIP - Dino Quilt

Well, I'm back at my sewing machine again!

Man I love it. I wish I had more time to be there. After a full days work and then relaxing at home, by the time I'm really and relaxed and the little ones in bed, by pregnant hormonal self wants to climb early into bed too (and on some nights I do just that!)

I have managed to finish my next quilt top.
Using cute DINO PUNK material, I started on my first HST quilt.



I do wish I had enough material patches to complete one more row along the top. But it'll have to do.
Next will be to find a cute backing material for the reverse side and then i'll start the quilting process.

Hope you like it :)

x

Finally finished!

Looking back at my last post, that was 1st October. Where I first stated that I started this quilt... Yes, so long ago, yet it's not a big quilt. A quilt for a baby!

Well, the number one reason for the long slow progress has been that I am now pregnant :) and have had pregnancy fatigue constantly since then! Yes, I don't tell a lie, the tiredness has been inconvenient... But on the other hand it's been sweet paradise to have so many early nights and fulfilled sleep! Bliss! 

Even though I'm expecting (a girl due in June) ... This sweet baby blanket has been in work for some close friends who are expecting their first child next month. (Also a girl) 

Here are the stages that have taken place since my last post. 

I am working on a quilt, a baby quilt.

 

Each pinwheel block consists of 4 smaller blocks sewn together. So I had to account for seam allowance from the smallest block. 

I needed for each full pinwheel block, 4 solid whites and 4 patterned.

 

Cutting - … urgh! What felt like millions! (in reality was only 280) 

I'm still trying to channel the “happy place” where quilters go to get into the rhythm of cutting and cutting and cutting. If such a place exists. 

 

Then it was to pin the little blighters to make the quarter of each pinwheel. 

Now I could see it coming together … ;D

 

 

Then – was to sew the little pinwheels into actual pinwheels.

 

Think about the centre points here for a minute. You've got folded on folded pieces of fabric. My sewing machine definitely needed a new needle before starting this project (and probably also needs one again now) We got there in the end. After a few tough points when making these little pinwheels. Happy to report no dropped stitches or broken needles though!

 

Then the point was to make it random (easier said than done) 

Excuse all the bad pictures – you can tell I've been working on it in the evening times in different rooms in the house, with multitude of lighting effects and silly Instagram filters. 

 

 Then, to sew the blocks together

I caved and went to the local haberdashery to search for fabric for the reverse, which truth is - one of my favourite places, it's just a place I can spend money in VERY easily! It's easier to go whe I have a definite project in mind, otherwise I just buy everything!

So, reverse side material bought. From the same material collection, but in a colour that was not in the mix on the front of the quilt.

The lady recommended a border as well, I had not thought about adding a border other than the binding, but when she folded it over to show me, it instantly gave it a "finished" feel. Looked great! Great idea.

Once the border was added, I realized that I did not want a binding. I searched online for hints and tips to do the "pillowcase method" and found a great tutorial from red pepper quilts. 

And here - finally ... 4.5 months later... 

I've made a start...

I've made a start on another baby quilt. I'm finding it so hard to resist fabrics at the moment, as for the first time in forever I want to stash stash stash! Normally with other crafts I try to buy stuff project by project - otherwise I'll end up with an overloaded stash like I did with beads. But this time, stashing fabric feels SO RIGHT! yeah baby!

I really love patchwork, and I have seen loads of blocks that I want to do. For now however, I'll be practicing my squares patchwork aligning with lush little off cuts or small patchwork packets. 

I've been cutting tonight, whilst watching "Prison break" for the 3rd time. There's not much on tv in the evenings at the moment so I've hit the DVD collection.

so, squares are cut. Actually - that's a lie. SOME of the squares are cut. I still need to do lots more white and I want to go shopping for a solid colour to add in, maybe a pink. 

What do you think?

Hopefully I'll continue to make progress on it over thus upcoming bank holiday weekend. 

Love to you all

x 

My lesson learnt today: ALWAYS HAVE SPARE ROTARY CUTTER BLADES. (Yes, I need to buy some blades ASAP too!)

  

Cloudy Day - Beginners Crochet Baby Blanket

I finally finished this baby blanket!

Link to my ravely project page

 

TUTORIAL - on how to make a granny square

TUTORIAL - on how to join granny squares

INSPIRATION - on how I edged the blanket

(all external links are tried and trusted by me)

I started it way back in November last year, and it was always the plan that it was going to be plain blue with white clouds. In January I had finished the main blue blanket and was struggling to successfully make clouds that I liked. I tried many ways to crochet the clouds initially, and even though they ended up being correct and looking like they were meant to, I just was not happy with them. So, because of this, the blanket lost momentum and I had to put it away.

This past week, I eventually got round to thinking about this again - needing a newborn present for my new 2nd cousin Ben, it would be perfect! All that was missing was the clouds. Kicking myself up the rear, I went to a local fabric shop and bought an offcut of lovely soft fleece. Lucky that it was there as an offcut, as I knew I had to be really fussy about it. It could not fray or lose fluff at the cut edges. (a lesson I learnt the hard way recently with another fabric)

After cutting the clouds into curvy soft cartoon-y shapes. They were hand sewn on in the evenings.
Now, finsihed, freahly wahsed and ready to be packed to be sent to Ben.

I hope that you like it too! ♥

Blogtoberfest Day #11 - oh poop!

I made a mistake on the star blanket... Like 3 rows back... It was in one if those places where it would be so noticeable and could jeopardise the star shape! It had to be unpicked.

I'm now in the process of redoing all my days work on it.

How frustrating!

Blogtoberfest Day #9 - There's never just one right answer ...

Don't you think?
When it comes to creativity and definite colour combinations, so many can be right - so which one is the correct one?!

I knew that my next crochet project would start asap, I had such a good time making the blanket, that I wanted to get started on making a star afghan blanket for another Christmas present. This time for my 2 year old nephew. He can use it as a rug, a rag, playmat, something to snuggle in - whatever! One thing I knew is that it had to be a cool shape, and since I'm getting good at granny squares, after a search on Ravelry, I found a free GRANNY STAR blanket pattern! Perfect :)

I asked my sister-in-law what colour his bedroom is - light blue and red, with a hint of lime green.
Wow, what a colour combo. I had thought that red, white, light blue and mid blue would be great, and I'd drop the green.

When I went shopping though - I stuck with the same yarn type as I had for my previous project - and they didn't have a mid blue - they had a royal blue, which was too strong, and a navy blue - which was cool, but I really wanted light blue and I think it was also too strong. One or the other, so I stuck with the light blue.

Well, then - once I got them home - I had doubts.
Had I picked the right colours? Such a bold red and a pastel soft blue?
Should I have got the navy instead?

So many possibilities, none of them are necessarily wrong.
I went to my experts (The craft pimp forum - click here for the colour discussion), and everyone had fab ideas! All of them liked the colour combo already - but there were suggestions on adding an extra darker blue in and some not!

I decided really to be reasonable with myself and not just run out and buy more wool, but to start the pale blue and see what it was like in the piece before making any decisions!

Do you come into troubles like this? When there's no definite correct answer, everything is right but which is the best? Tell me I'm not alone!

Blogtoberfest Day #7 - Crochet Baby Blanket - FINISHED!

Yay!

It's finished!

Super happy with this, my first ever crochet project! Other than the fact I ran out of wool just this weekend, I got off my bum and bought some more today to finish it, and it's DONE!

It's definitely smaller than I had thought it would be, but it is just for a moses basket, which will do just fine.

So, remember; even if you have never done a certain craft before - You can with determination (and a lot of youtube videos) figure out how to do something.

HERE is the link for actually HOW I learnt how to do a granny square
HERE is the link for how I learnt how to join the squares together.
HERE is the pinterest pin of where I got the idea of how to edge the blanket.

If you're curious as to what wool and how much wool it took to make it etc ... check out my RAVELRY PROJECT PAGE :)

Blogtoberfest Day #4 - What's going on... ?

I have never ever before fancied picking up a crochet needle until recently. It's that darn pinterest again... So many tutorials and amazing projects to see.

When I was younger, I was too impatient with knitting and was happier with a needle and thread. So even though I've been in awe of many handmade crochet goodies, I've just looked on with admire and respect.

So, what on earth happened to get me to pick up a hook and get creating? A new niece, that's what!

My new niece is due in January, and I want make something for her. Since I have a beautiful sewing machine, I seriously thought about making a quilt. I received a handmade quilt for my little man when he was born earlier this year (made collectively by the peeps at Craft Pimp ) and it's so treasured, really precious to me. But I don't really have enough time to be downstairs in the hobby room. I wanted something that I could do in the evenings after the dude is in bed. After many YouTube videos and scouring pinterest for tutorials, I managed to make some granny squares successfully. In cute green and lilac, edged with white, it's going to be a baby blanket that they can use in the Moses basket.

It's not quite finished yet... But will be soon!
Here's a sneak peek.