gingham style

I have been so excited to try to create this look. I've seen some quilts like this online and gingham seems to be everywhere right now.

I envisioned cutting out 3.5 inch squares and piecing sections of the quilt, but then I realized I could piece vertical strips, slice horizontally and then sew the checkered strips together and Bob's your uncle -- gingham. It's baby size at 36 x 48.

Backed once again with my fave Ikea nummern and bound with a vintage floral I found already cut into strips in my Nana's stash. I bound this last night while sitting and visiting with my quilting group Material Girls -- a lovely group of ladies who have been together for many years and invited me to join this spring. Such fun to hang with other quilters!

More Etsy stock! Question: wash/dry for crinkliness or not?

washi party

I have been meaning to try this pattern for quite a while now. I love the way the dress looks, I love the empire-waisted tunic, I love the notch in the neck. I have also had both of these fabrics for a long time (see this post and this post) so it was definitely time for a Washi party around here!

I got invited to a Hawaiian-themed Bunco night, so I decided it was time to break out the pink floral from last year's trip. I had more than 36 hours to make a new dress -- what?! I was a little unsure about starting out with a new, indie pattern with such a tight production schedule. I have been sewing with commercial patterns since I was a kid so I feel like I pretty much know what to expect from them. I have been a little skeptical of some online clothing tutorials and independent patterns I've seen in books -- many of them don't seem all the way thought out. But I decided to take the plunge anyway!

Well, this pattern from Made by Rae was really spectacular! It took quite a while to print and tape together, but once it was ready to go it did not disappoint. Everything fit together perfectly, it ran true to the measurements given in the directions, and those directions were super clear and easy to understand. I don't know when I have ever had something turn out more exactly like I expected! My family are all tired of hearing me sing the praises of the Washi dress pattern -- I am practically stopping people in the street to tell them about it.

The dress is really comfortable and I think it made up really nicely with this pink Hawaiian fabric.

I liked it so much, I immediately hauled out these green skirts and started cutting out a sleeveless tunic. I had plenty of fabric width but the skirts weren't long enough to get the entire length of the back in one piece. So I split the back piece at the high waist and then I was able to use the seam allowance to make a casing for the elastic. (As with the pink dress, I decided not to try tackle shirring on this go-around.) I thought I remembered seeing Rae or another of her followers substitute a casing and elastic, and I was perfectly happy with how that turned out.

The new serger made the insides almost as pretty as the outsides.

So that's the Washi Party at my house. I think both of these babies are going on vacation with me this summer!

scrappy patchwork quilt

Remember when I said I still had lots of 3-inch squares left after this quilt and this quilt? Well, here they are! This scraptastic baby quilt is made from the remaining 192 squares and the beginning of that monster bolt of quilt batting I just bought, now known as the starting capital for my quilt business. 

The quilt is 36 x 48, and I made it by first making 12 4 x 4 squares. It was harder than I thought to put everything together -- I wanted to make it look like a random arrangement  without getting any clumps of colors or patterns. I think it turned out fine, though if I stare too hard at it I can see where the shades grouped up, completely by accident. But I'm pretty sure I didn't get the same fabric two squares in a row though.

How much do I love this backing fabric?! $4.99 a yard from Ikea! The print is really obvious in this distance shot, but it's big enough that it's almost abstract up close. I bought 4 yards and went back for more yesterday, but I couldn't find any more. :(

The binding is a dark navy stripe I scored from the clearance section at M & L. The quilt is a nice light weight for summer -- or life in Southern California!

Another quilt for the stockroom of the future Kitchen Table Workshop Etsy store!

Project 52: Weeks 1 and 2

Since I came up with the idea to do Project 52, I find myself in charge of date nights for the month of July. For week 1 we already had plans to go out to dinner with another couple while both of our teenage daughters were working on a play together. Since I had already planned that date, I'm taking credit for it for date night!

We had a great time with our friends and even spent some of the time talking about things other than the girls! The food at Kentro (one of our favorites) was good and we hung out there for 3 hours! Going out with another couple was a winner.

Week 2 was our anniversary. No pressure. But if I figured out anything from reading about Tiffany's year of dates it was that good dates weren't necessarily fancy or expensive. So I poked around on the internet and found a website that listed places in the OC to play pinball -- one of our favorite pastimes when we were dating up in the Bay Area. The website even listed exactly which machines places had and rated their condition. We ended up at a pizza place in Fullerton with 5 good machines. We had a pizza and some sodas, broke out a roll of quarters and had a fun date. 

Project 52

I stumbled on Project 52: Date Nights on Simply Modern Mom. Tiffany and her husband decided to take on a year-long project to have weekly interesting but low-pressure date nights. Their constraints were a little different from ours -- they have young children to work around, but could have at-home dates once the littles were in bed. We have just the one teen who is often away from home, but there's no having a date night when she's here. We might be able to afford a little more now than when we were in their shoes (grad students with young kids) but we have the same issues of "We are too busy. We can't think of anything to do. The house is a mess. We are tired." Blah, blah, blah.

So, armed with 52 weeks of ideas from Simply Modern Mom and some simple rules:

• Can't do the same thing more than once in the same month. This means going out for dinner can only be the date ONCE a month, instead of being the only thing we can ever think of.
• Take turns being in charge of date nights on a monthly basis. This will relieve us of the endless attempt to reach consensus, which always results in us going to a well-worn restaurant or ordering take-away and watching tv.
• No children allowed. With only 3 people in our family, it always seemed a little mean to go out and do things without Frances. But hey, she's 16 now and goes out and does plenty of stuff without us!

we will undertake this Project 52! 

(We'll leave for another time the topic of why all of the role models I seem to be finding online are under 30 and LDS when I am neither of those things. Talk amongst yourselves.)

nerd alert: pattern organization

After one too many times going through ALL of my patterns (it turns out I have about 100) looking for that ONE that I want (see this post) I decided to implement this pattern organization system I found in a sewing book. Can't remember which one, sorry. The basic idea is to create your own pattern catalog like the ones in the fabric store. The pattern envelopes go in a notebook in clear plastic sleeves and the instructions and pattern guts go in these tidy white envelopes in a bin in the garage. Just like the drawers at the fabric store.

Oh, yes I did. If OCD makes you uncomfortable, you might just want to look away.

But look: the pile went from this to this! (And confession: ironing all those pattern envelopes was very satisfying.)

Now I can just leaf through the notebook when I want to make something. 

Coming soon: crazy quilting action!

patchwork selvage bag

I have had a little Guatamalan cross-body bag that I carried my iPhone and house key in while I walk. It's almost perfect -- but the problem is that it's just a little too small so I can't close the top and on the rare day that I get rained on a little on my walk (Like today. In July. What the what?!) I'm afraid my phone will get wet. So I decided to dip into that ever-growing bag of trimmed selvages and see what I could do. It's basically the same as the one it's replacing, but a little bigger.

Here's the inside. A little snap on the flap that will now close.

And inside here I made a little velcro pocket to keep my key separate from the phone. You can almost see it.

And I have to put this one in too. Chloe is wearing Frances's mini mouse ears hat. Can't you just read her mind? Seriously? A hat? How long do I have to do this?