A shop-hop finish!

This year I had a goal to finish at least one           old shop-hop                                                                                                                                                   Here in Washington we have a yearly event called a Shop-Hop.                                                      

Where 20-30 stores, along the I5 corridor and west side of the sound, all participate in picking a theme.

Each store makes a pattern to that theme 

which draws in quilters for miles around, even internationally!

We have two weeks, 

to gather in groups of excited revelers, to visit all the shops we can get to, 

gather the patterns and any extra fabric we may "need" 

get lunch and eventually, put together a quilt.

Don't try this in one day!     

It's loads of fun and we gather together to take turns driving  the rout.

Sometimes we go for the day sometimes we do more, It's an arduous journey 

that takes you from Bremerton to Vancouver on the east side to Port Townsend    

Lots of beautiful scenery and lots of yummy, yummy fabric!   

This is my completed 2022 Shop-hop top

I didn't get to all the shops in this one so 

I made up some of the blocks myself      

                                                                                                          And here's my sewing space after a couple days of fooling around

It's bound to get worse I've two more sets of blocks to get to!                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 

Gold work update and some sewing stuff

Here Mr. Snail has gotten his body                                   antennae to come

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      I'm working on the stems now.                                                                                                                                                                        It's very slow going mostly because working the stems is fiddly.                                                                                                               More fiddly than clumping them all together, as you can hide some mistakes in the mash potatoes.                                                                                                                                                                             You can't hide a single strand of Purl Purl when it's all alone.        It's lumpy af all by it's self.

And any mistakes are going to trumpet their ick everywhere                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        Doesn't look so bad this way

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       The bottom of the stem didn't look thick enough                                                                                                                                                             I added some more smooth Purl, cut small and threaded at an angle                                                                                                                                 Which gives the lower half more definition and makes the stem look more able to hold up the rest of the assembly.                                                                                                                                                                    I will all add gold sequin berries at intervals and I'm wondering               if I should add some smaller leaves or would that make it too busy?                                                                                                                                That's a ponder for later.

I have also been working on a bunch of old shop hops                                                                                                                                                       On tap right now is the 2022 featuring homestead type imagery                                                                                                                                       canning jars and labels, pick-nick baskets, pies etc.

                                                                                                                                                                        The blocks are mostly done,                                                                                                                       just the hand work to finish up on a few of them,                                                                                        I will give the blocks a lattice setting,                                                                                                     then use up as much of the rest of the fabric as I can in multiple borders                        

                                                                                     Gearing up for this years Rainbow scrap challenge                                                                                      sorting out the scrap bags, I need to make that yellow one bigger.                                                      I also need to make an orange and a teal bag, those two are way to small now                                                                                                                              And how is it I end up with all that blue?                 As a rule I don't use all that much in the way of blue, yet that bag is always over full to falling over.                                                                            I don't understand.                        

                                                                                    The state of my sewing space has become a bit on the Idea laden side                                                                                                                                          I keep wondering if I should clean or leave it                                                                                                The new studio is coming along and will probably be ready to move into after the first of the year.                                                                                        So clean or pack up? Leave it until I have to move it?                                                                                                                                                                As none of it is especially in the way,                   it's just cramped, 

                                                                                                                           or do I preemptively start moving to storage, I.E. the garage,                        the things I know I don't need now?                                                                                                                                                                                                  Do the lazy bit and leave it make some room                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              I'm Feeling                                                                                                                         Meh right now, though I do see the efficacy of doing a bit of a tidy.                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

Goldwork on damask

 I have embarked on this goldwork adventure

the way I embark on most of my adventures

by doing the research, buying a bunch of books,

These are two of my favorites

 

watching a bunch of videos and pictures, 

inhaling the the knowledge within, 

And then trying out the techniques, 

through small projects and kits 

that is to say 

enthusiastically jumping in with both feet

SO far, so good

Gerry's Block

It was past time for my own project

So I took an old Embroidery Idea I used for the 

False gold Round Robin with Crazy Quilting International

In which we used all the cheep left over christmas ribbon, 

gold lame and what-not we could find. 

This was the block I did for Gerry Kruger,^  somewhere around 2012

re translated that block for this project and

Working from the goldwork masterclass book

Using actual tools and techniques this time

I am coming up with much better results

outlined in gold passing thread the pomegranate and leaf 

looks much better It's such a tiny detail but it adds so much

Mr.Snail got his Shell using 1 strand of  a 3 strand 

silk wool, I don't know which brand 

this is a remnant that has been kicking around 

for a decade or more.

I needle wove it separately with a simple stumpwork Detached Buttonhole  stitch

Then tacked it down around the batting shape and stuffed it a little more

12 Point Star

Here she is!

The star quilt is done.

She is 98"x 96" Squarish

In spite of the tension snafu at the beginning that had to be picked out 

and the timing going wonky on the last yard of quilting, 

Necessitating the need for an emergency visit to the vac&sew

with a 4 day wait whilst the machine got fixed 

My Husband started to call it the Quilt of the damned as 

Every damned thing kept happening with it!

In spite of part of the back looking quite awful from the picking 

and some truly terrible decisions in design at the beginning 

It looks quite nice on the bed.

 

A Goldwork start

Today I start a goldwork journey

We will be following some of the instructions in

"A Gold work master class" by Alison Cole

Starting with the basics, stretching your base layer of muslin fabric on a frame.

then pinning and stretching your main fabric over that, baste it to the muslin.

Marking the back and basting stitch the outline through the layers.

add your underlayment of padding,many different types!

Here I have flat padding, board padding, layered padding, 

lofted padding, sculptured padding and stuffed padding

Each will have a different technique

Here we have started with a couched flat gold filament

Here's what it looks like on the back so far

 Ladybug is in a colored hollow wire and beads

So that happened

Life sucks when the tension is wrong

*Sigh*

This is going to suuuUUuuuck

 

On the bright side I now have a new pet!

What should I call them?

Fribbls maybe, feeling a little like Rimmer right now

They really need a set of googly eyes

the 12 point star

At the beginning of august

 I experimented with a paper piecing block

And took the seminar my quilt guild recommended

Don't one and one make two?

Apparently not.

The stars are all the most flashy fabrics I could find

The centers were the last of the orangy yellow from my daughters quilt

And the between points is all low definition ecru

The only thing I had to buy was the buff color 

That held the whole together, I ran out at our quilt retreat

And forgot to bring it with me

I used  a lot of my scraps and as is usual, barely made a dent

But we keep trying right?

I made enough of them to make a  vEry large quilt

30 whole 12 point stars, and 17 - 4 point stars for the edges 

Now I need to find a back for the quilting

RSC Orange

 goodness I all the kerfuffle with the trees I completely forgot about my RSC! 

I did it but never posted Oopsie-Poopsie.

Here is the Orange for last month

Dark neutrals are on for this month and 

Light  neutrals are for next month

So if your black and brown bins are overflowing these are your months to use them up!

More Paper piecing and a rant about trees

So the paper piecing started with this star

The method is a 'new to me' no waste system

Where you fold your sections and  sew along the fold and not through the paper.

I like this much better as it eliminates the annoying, to me, bits of Paper piecing

The paper waste the ripping and the picking.

I can reuse the initial paper pattern over and over 

instead of spending hours picking whats left out of the back and distorting my stitches

The pattern maybe broken up into more pieces 

but the process, I feel, is more streamlined and easier for me to wrap my brain around.

So far I have 6 full stars and one half star

only 20 more to go!

And it fulfills my RSC Quota (Self inflicted, of course) with the center star! 

I still haven't decided if I want it dens-packed with stars or 

hexie rows with diamonds in between.

I have drafted and cut a pattern for the diamonds bUUT.....We'll see

*Rant incoming*

Poplar #2 and hubs taking photos for the neighbors who weren't home

In other news I have been dealing with another power outage due to tree
fall and trying, yet again, to get the city to take down the danger trees. No one was hurt by this one either, thank goodness, just 'inconvenienced' for a few days by power and cable/internet outage issues, and the neighbor across the street now has to have the roof redone because the tree hit the ridge line, which left trunk limbs on the roof and dropped the tippy top in the backyard. Oy.

and half of it still stands!

We have finally gotten to what, we think, is the correct department to do that. But it was so obscurely hidden in the Snohomish county web page it took ages to find! and it's not like the will just give you the phone number when and if you
get a human being on the phone either. the appropriately named department "Vegetation Management" was hidden at the very bottom of the Street maintenance under several sudinonomous tabs. it's like a state secret or something they don't want you to know!

They usually have a driveway and a bush on either side

Very annoying! But finally, hopefully, taken care of. Though a week after the tree-fall and initial surveyor, we have been informed we are on the "list" for tree removal. Great you got a time line on that? there is this other 80' ft tall poplar that is just as punky (I can stick my finger through the bark!) as the other two that came down, in what I can only describe as "barely enough wind to blow out a birthday candle". Waiting for the #3 to come down on it's own, is not an option. t's bigger than the other two and the only reason they haven't managed to kill someone yet, is by providence alone! 

You know the law of threes.

The power pole down the street about 800 feet

 and oopsie-poosie, does not cut it this time!  Whew!

Anyway I am going to make of myself a pest, until this is resolved, if I have to stay on hold till the next ice age or whatever it takes to get it done!

There rant over, thank you for letting me vent.

Explorations in paper piecing

 This was an experiment in paper piecing

That i liked so much I am contemplating a whole quilt

We will see how well that goes

right now i have cut the pieces for star center 

the triangles and  strips for the rest.

I am still deciding on all hexies 

or hexies with diamond corners 

and should those be solid or pieced. 

Lets see how extra I feel like being

The star Tarot

 Here we go again with another Tarot card

This is the Star, She'snot finished yet but I thought I would post her so far anyway.

She is a more personal card to me My Aunt Rainey gave me this card when I was 7 or 8.

She is the one who taught me to love the cards and gave me my first set.

She sAys she was taught by gypsies, which knowing her just might be true. 

She lived in the same big "C" shaped apartment building, 

3 doors down from Wrigley field, that we did when I was little.

We on the 3rd floor and she on the 2nd. 

I could get to her house by running down the porch stairs and banging on the door.   

when she was home she would let me in and we could talk,

She taught me to make cookies, and it was OK to speak your mind and to be different from everyone else.

She would say "If everyone was the same life would be boring."

The card depicts the north star, sailors and travelers guide in the night sky, in the middle of the 7 sisters constellation. 

A woman on a field of grass and flowers, Pouring water from 2 jugs onto the earth and into a body of water,

She stands on the water and kneels on the land.

She is a calm guide to that balance within oneself, that nourishes the soul. 

She sees both sides and nourishes them both without judgement.

All sewn in DMC 3 strands over satin fabric in satin stitch and rice stitch.

The stars are with 3 strand DMC burnished silver thread.

Any time you use a metallic thread you must be gentile and patient with it or it will turn into the most unmanageable nest of vipers you've ever seen!

I use short lengths, no longer than a foot and a very wide eye needle, this helps to keep knots in the thread and damage to your fabric to a minimum because Metallic threads will shred a fragile fabric.

Make sure you go to the back of your work and bury and wrap the ends otherwise they will wriggle loose.