Vacation!

I have been away from blogging, not because I was really on vacation, but because of...

...aka the Shibori Symposium. Many fantastic artists from all over the country descended upon my art center in a frenzy of shibori goodness. As Overseer-of-all-Things-Shibori, my presence was greatly in demand.

Just before that happened, I found a fabulous sheet at a thrift store and whipped up this dress, while Andy was kayaking with a friend...

...I wore it to the opening reception for the shibori show. The bonus of making a dress from a sheet is that it cost me all of $1 and it is a nice poly/cotton wrinkle free blend, so no ironing. But just before I made that dress, I worked on this shirt...

... with the help of Dolores the Dummy. She is new to me but has "seen a few seams" if you know what I mean. She isn't pretty but she is amazingly helpful. (Dolores was named by my friend Nancy, who had her over for a visit before she came to me.) It took me about 5 weeks to make the shirt - not because it was hard, but because I only had the opportunity to work on it for 45 minutes at a time for that long.
And finally, somewhere in there, Andy and I celebrated our 13th wedding anniversary. I took him to see "A Midsummer Night's Dream" at the Guthrie (totally fantastic) and he bought me these charmingly silly shoes as a present.



I can just see them with black tights and cute skirts this fall. Love it! (apologies for crummy pictures. I just didn't feel like photo styling today.)

sneak peaks!

Here's a sneak peak at some new enamels! I just found a source for some thinner copper that I can easily make in to my own shapes! Tra La! Coming soon to my etsy shop.

(I have been dreaming about these for months!)

worlds largest textile garage sale

Our big fundraiser at work is a ginormous garage sale. Tables piled 3 ft high with fabric and yarn and 1000's of tools, gizmos, ufo's patterns and more - all fabric related. It's like Brigadoon - we bring it all in and set it up one day and the next day it's gone. Sounds like fun, huh? So that's why it's been quiet around here. Because just after I got back from ID, then we jumped right in to garage sale mode. We had rotten weather for the drop-off days, but it still turned out great. I got myself a $5 dress form (named Dolores). I spent the weekend fixing her up with some duct tape and darts and now she matches my measurements. I also got a treasure trove of vintage fabric scraps. I am not a fan of little scraps. Never enough to do something with. But this was a bundle with a couple of larger pieces of vintage yardage and a bunch of scraps. Knowing that if I put them in to my fabric bin, I would never do anything with them, I did a little flurry of quilting on Saturday and transformed scraps in to doll quilts. I love them. I posted a few of them to my etsy shop (check them out!) I can just imagine something like this having been a greatly treasured possession when I was a little girl, and I hope someone else will too.

Freezing our $#@%)* off!

First bit of news is that my mini-quilt was not chosen for the show in Brooklyn. Disappointing, but it is part of the online gallery, which is cool.

I got inspired by that one and my hummingbird piece (posted previously) and have created a couple of mini quilts that I will be posting in my etsy shop soon. This is "Bean"


Hand embroidered on pieced cotton and silk, from an illustration I did from a photo of one of my brother-in-law's puppies.

And "Stops Traffic"

New and vintage fabrics, hand-embroidered illustration from a 1960's pattern envelope, vintage buttons.

The good and the bad

As I was reading the "Yarn Harlot"'s post today and laughing to myself, I am thinking a list of the good and bad may help me to get perpective on a less than fantastic day.

Good: Cute sweater created from mediocre $3 thrift store sweater. Wore it to work today.




Bad: (grumble grumble work stuff) I don't want to talk about work, except to say staff changes will equal added stuff to the piles of stuff I already have too much of.

Good: Happy puppy to greet me at the door.

Bad: Worked on a project all day long and still not finished. Was really hoping to finish it.

Good: Designed a new business card and found a deal online that will print some for free. Expires today, so I better finish that up. I will show those off later.

Bad: Stupid snow. Enough today so I will have to shovel in the morning. Hate snow.

Now Showing...

"Mango"
hand embroidered with cotton on hand-dyed silk.
This is my piece in the Textile Center's members show, A Common Thread. My inspiration for this piece was this story about a small South American hummingbird that found itself at the center of much attention at a feeder in Wisconsin.
Click the images to see a larger version.

Gifts reveal!

Time to reveal a few gifts! Here are some things that went out in Christmas packages.






Embroidery kits for my nieces packed with sewing goodies.



"Baa Baa Black Sheep" for my honorary niece to go with a book. (I have to say this is one of my favorite things I made this year.



Super hero capes for the small ones among my nephews. They each got one with their initial on the back.


Miniature "Weasley" sweaters for my sisters and parents to go on the tree.


Rachel's bamboo lace hat. Although she wore this a lot when we were there, we only managed to capture one lousy picture. So you get the hat but not the "get out of my face with that camera" expression.

A Purple Cow

This ornament is a reproduction of a beloved one from mom & dad's Christmas tree. Their dog and cat had a little tree-tipping-rodeo last year and the original purple cow got a little chewed. He was brought to me for rescue/reincarnation as he is a favorite of my youngest sister. Purple Cow was purchased at a church bazaar in the 1960/1970s and sent to my dad as a gift from my grandma. He has been on the tree for as long as I can remember. My new and improved version uses the rhinestone eyes from the original. Since I was making a new Purple Cow, I decided to make a pattern and share it with all of you. You can make your own Purple Cow for your tree with this purple cow pattern.

A tour

What have I been busy doing? Getting ready for my favorite holiday show at Cafe Wren in Luck, WI. This is my 6th year at the show and I think I finally have the display down to an art. This year was a little smaller than some, since I spent the fall busy with wedding activities.



Here's my set up. This is a great show, where I just set up and there is a central check out, so I don't have to table-sit. A huge plus! I brought 52 or so puppets up this year. Andy made me this great stand for them - so cute! - and the rest live under the table until it's time for them to fill in the blanks.



I made a few little tiny needle felted ornaments this year. A bunch of birds plus a penguin and a lobster (and some turtles and sushi...)



And finally enamels! This is the first show I have brought them to. I really think I made some great ones and I hope they go home with lots of people. I took close up photos of all of them if you want a closer look - head over to my flickr.



And since it is a coffee shop where the show is held, I pulled out all of my coffee cup coasters from the etsy shop and brought those along.



I finally managed this year to get a little more organized and not make myself crazy making puppets the last 3 days before the sale. What a nice feeling. I was considering doing more enamels at 10 pm before I drove up to Luck the next morning, but that's another story. The first year I did this show, my prices were too low and I had no idea how many puppets I would need. The organizer called me after the first day and said "you have to bring more!" I spent every day sewing like mad and then jumping in to the car and driving up there with whatever I had finished. It's a nice problem to have, but wow, I never wanted to see a puppet again.

Off to knit a ***** for ***** - gotta get some Christmas presents done!

Beaded Edging

A very simple beaded edge. I used all gold beads and this edging to finish my paisley.

First, thread your needle and tie a knot. Stitch through the back and secure the knot near the edge of your piece.

Now, thread on 3 beads to start. Make a little stitch through the front of the fabric about 1/8-1/4 in from where your thread started. This distance will vary based on how large your beads are. You want the beads to make a nice little loop and not be stretched too far.

Now come up from the back and go back through bead #3. You will have stitched through bead #3 twice now and your thread will be coming out through that bead.

Add 2 beads and repeat: make a stitch through the front of the fabric, come back up through bead #3 etc.

You can change colors if you like and make your edging look a little different by making bead A be something and bead B something else.

Embroidery Stitches - Paisley

The stitches. "Sharon B" does such a fabulous job with her Stitch Dictionary, that I am just going to link you there to see how these stitches are made. I use this stitch dictionary all the time and it is one of my favorite web resources ever.

Backstitch Stitched in brown with a bead added later between each stitch.

Detached Chain - Stitched in darker blue. Grouped in 3's and used alone with a bead added.

Coral Stitch - Stitched in pale blue. I chose this because the knots echoed what I had done with the backstitch and beads. I just learned this stitch and I like it a lot.

All of my embroidery was done with perle cotton. I switch back and forth between that and regular embroidery floss.

Paisley Deconstructed Project

I thought it might be fun to teach you all a bit about this piece, so I have decided to break it down in to steps and show you how it was made. This is really an exercize for me to think about how I work, so that I can teach it better.



So here is step one. Making the paisley. I started with a little piece that I stitched on the sewing machine to use as a base.

As it says under #1 - Stack it. I chose batik fabric for the back, silk dupioni for the front and a little scrap of quilt batting inside. I like using quilt batting or felt as an inside "lining" because it gives you a nice something to stitch in to and then I don't have to go back and figure out a way to finish the edges - they are all stitched already. So stack up your fabrics. Use scraps that are just a bit bigger than you want your finished piece and leave them as rectangles to start. Be sure to put right sides of the fabric together (both should face inside).

#2 Stitch it. You can trace your shape on the lining fabric with a pencil. This will end up on the inside, so you don't have to be very neat. Stitch all the way around your shape with a nice small stitch. You can do this by hand too if you want to.

#3. Cut it out. Cut out around your stitching leaving a tiny little seam allowance - 1/8" or so. If you have a lot of curves, "clip them", by making little cuts through that seam allowance perpendicular (opposite) to your line of stitching. This helps the curves turn smoothly when you turn it right side out.

#4. Make a slit. Probably the trickiest step. You want to cut a nice 1" slit through just the backing fabric. Pull the layers apart and make a little clip. You can then use a seam ripper to slice a little slash through that fabric. This is the opening you will use to...

#5 Turn it right side out. Be patient and this will work great. Use a little crochet hook to help push out corners.

#6 Iron it. Use lots of steam and press everything smooth and flat. You won't be able to iron it later and trust me, it's worth doing this step.

Now you have a finished paisley or whatever ready for stitching. You can quickly stitch up the slash you used to turn the whole thing right side out. I usually do this later when I am sewing on a pin back or whatnot to the back side.

Class samples

I spent the weekend scrounging up and making a few new class samples for a series of classes I have been invited to teach in Idaho in April. I am thrilled that they have invited me. I wanted to expand my beginning embroidery class to include a little bit of bead embroidery too, so I made up these two samples to send off as photos for the class.

A Contest! Sewing Stories

In celebration of discovering my new-old favorite sewing machine, I am going to give away one of these little ornaments...
(your prize will be made up special just for you, so the fabrics won't match this photo exactly)

To enter, just leave a comment about your favorite sewing or crafting tool (sewing machine, thimble, scissors or humble seam ripper? You tell me!) I will randomly draw for a winner on September 24.

I have a new love.

And her name is Singer.

My sewing machine is ailing. It made a horrible strangled noise and quit this afternoon. I had just spent all of a couple of evenings cleaning the lint out, replacing the needle and all of that good stuff. To her credit, she had started to squeak, which is what made me think that I ought to do a good cleaning, so I did perhaps have a little warning. I don't think the problem is anything I did while cleaning (or putting her back together) but I am afraid, judging by the amounts of lint I pulled out, that a big blob of yuck has jammed in some plastic gears someplace I can't get to. This machine and I have a love/hate relationship. I spent a lot of money on her. She has a nifty thread cutter (which stopped working after about a year). She has a wonderful walking foot that makes me smile while making quilts and a buttonhole gizmo that works like a dream. She has an overlock stitch which is super nifty and dozens of fancy embroidery kinds of stitches (which sadly I use next to never). However, she also has a tendency to eat and/or tangle threads at the beginning of whatever you are working on, no matter what you do to prevent it (no, holding the ends doesn't work). She also likes to eat fabric if you get too close to the edge and groan about too many layers of fabric. She is computerized and so you can't get to or see anything. She is a Babylock QC700.

Today I had declared that I was going to work on puppets. It is time to get my butt in gear if I am going to have them ready for holiday show season. I lost a couple of evenings to cleaning the Babylock and Andy is off playing with the boys today, so I made a pot of tea, got out the gingersnap cookies and was ready to cruise through the 60+ puppets that are cut out and waiting for me. Approximately 1/16th in to one puppet Babylock uttered her death cry. (I am pretty sure she's not really dead, but it will cost me to get her revived.) I grumbled some choice words, shoved her under the end table and headed to the basement.

Several years ago, I got a couple of vintage machines as a "payment" for some costuming work I did. I got them home and admired them. Even cleaned up the 1952 Singer (so pretty) and figured out how to thread and wind bobbins. And then promptly put them away. Who needs an old Singer when you have the new fancy expensive machine. HAH! If I had only known! I am completely in love with the Singer. She sews beautifully. Best machine I have ever used. No thread tangling. Sews through layers of fleece like butter. Feed dogs that feed! Perfect tension. Fast - twice what my Baby lock can do! I finished something like 30 puppets just this afternoon. I may make fun of myself later for making all of this fuss, but for now I will just enjoy that new machine buzz.