Monday, November 30, 2009

Baby Lumberjack Hat

Hope everyone had a wonderful holiday!

Mine was good despite my mood being a bit subdued due to the many, many December divorce court dates looming over my head. Tomorrow is December date numero uno. Keep your fingers crossed peeps as I will need as many good vibes coming my way as I can get!

The holiday was nice nonetheless. I was on turkey, stuffing and gravy duty so my workload wasn't heinous. In fact, in between basting my bird every half hour, I was able to modify my Crochet Today Lumberjack Hat pattern to fit my niece's little noggin...



How cute is she in that hat???

Yep, worked up this little headgear in a few hours. I used the yarn mandated in the original pattern. Bubble gum pink for the interior lining and a brilliant magenta for the exterior. You can kind of see the exterior color in the pic below...



It was a satisfying and super quick crochet indeed!

Just look at the smiles I was met with after putting it atop her head...



Absolutely melts my heart...

Hey, if you guys are interested in the pattern for this baby sized Lumberjack Hat, just leave me a shout out in my comments. I'm happy to write up the pattern if there seems to be an interest.

Monday, November 16, 2009

Jenny Lee's Quilt

Several months ago, my girl, Jenna, had a brilliant (read "cracked") idea, which she posed to me during our last set of quilting classes at the Sewing Arts Center, while I was under the influence of a divorce induced stooper I might add. This, err, clever conception of hers surrounded our mutual friend, Jenny Lee, and her upcoming nuptials in October. Oh yes, dear reader, you can guess what's coming next...Jenna went on to say that seeing as how we have become such expert quilters (Can you all say coercion?), having recently completed one quilt apiece (you read that correctly...one...quilt...a...piece), that she thought it a splendid idea that we show Jenny just how much we adore her (and her betrothed of course) by making the couple a wedding quilt, a queen size wedding quilt that is. I believe I just stared at her, deer-in-the-headlights like, drool dripping from the corner of my mouth, responding somewhat unintelligibly, "Uh, okay."

Despite my, err, reservations about our collective abilities to tackle such a gigantor project, in hindsight I'm happy to report that Jenna's idea was indeed a masterful one. Not only did we make an awesome heirloom for our beloved Jenny and her man, but Jenna and I found out that we make a pretty darn good quilting team. Before going into the gory details, feast your eyes on the results of our laborious journey...



Oh, and yeah, that would be the Double Irish Chain quilt pattern...I know, we're nuts.

Here are some detail shots...







Now for the gory quilting details!

As it turns out, I rather enjoy cutting PERFECT strips of fabric over and over and over again. Actually, it's kinda meditative. Jenna, on the other hand, doesn't mind chain piecing strip after strip after bloody strip. Oh and pressing? We both are good with a steaming hot iron. Go figure! After having the strips assembled, I sub-cut 'em for more assemblage. This time we both took to our machines for an anal exercise of matching up corners and seams. Once the individual blocks were assembled we both laid them out on the floor and simultaneously gasped at the size of the behemoth we were putting together. I then went back to my machine to assemble the top. Jenna was on iron duty at that point. Once assembled, we tag-teamed the borders and backing, readying ourselves for the homestretch, pinning the layers. Quilt pinned, it was time for Jenna to machine quilt the top (not my favorite portion of the program) and she did a wonderful job I might add. Top quilted, I attached the binding around the entire front edge with my machine. We then put an end to our co-quilting journey by spending a week's worth of lunch hours hold up in one of the cube farm's conference rooms, tacking down the binding to the back of the quilt with needles, thread, thimbles and thousands of hand sewn blind stitches.

Whew, makes me tired just writing all of that! But I gotta tell ya all, it was so worth it. As not only did I have the privilege of spending myriad Sundays in craft with Jenna, but I was able to witness the joy on Jenny's face when we presented her with her gift...



It just doesn't get much better than that...

Monday, November 02, 2009

Holiday Diamond Shawl

I know, I've made tons of these at this point. Nonetheless, here's the latest one...



I am calling this woven and crocheted wonder the Holiday Diamond Shawl for obvious reasons. Methinks I might need a gnome hat to go with it. I see a bit of felting in my future...

Ahem.

What can I say? I am addicted to lap looms, diamond shaped lap looms to be specific. I really should move onto a different shape. After all I have lap looms in various shapes at my disposal: rectangles; squares; tumbling blocks (yes, just like the quilt of the very same name); triangles and hexagons. Ahhhh, so many looms, so little time!

This latest version of my now ubiquitous diamond shawl was woven from many a skein of Jo-Ann Sensations Rainbow Boucle. I had a box of this stuff. Okay, so I have a thing for textured acrylic. Don't judge.

Anyway, I like the way the weave of the fabric just seemingly disappears into a mass of bumpy goodness...



I crocheted all of the diamonds together with some coned black wool that I had laying around and voila, one more diamond shawl gracing the dedicated shawl shelf in my closet.

All in all, a satisfying project, made sweeter by the fact that I used up pretty much all of the stash boucle in the box! Woo Hoo!