UFO, I'm coming for you.

Over the past three weeks, I've been working on my unfinished objects. I'm killing them off, one by one. 13 out of 41 are done (although I don't thing everything in my unfinished box is on that list--I may need to do a little revising--still it's close enough).

Some of them have turned out cute. Some of them, not as cute. But, the most important part of this process is that they are done and I can either give them away (even if it's to the thrift store) or start using them or realizing that I'm not going to use them. Such is the way of the things I make. I'm pretty sure that Aubrey does not like the dress I finished for her.

Anyway, here's the list as it looks so far.

Spray paint frames
Tree tote bag
Pettycoat skirt
Ampersand
Yellow rosette pillow
Patches on jeans
Long blue tank refashion
Box purse
Let out Citrus halter
Sew pom pom on poncho
Crochet tan bag
Blue and brown crochet hoodie
White floaty scarf
Pink shirt refashion
Wrap around vest refashion
Crochet fingerless gloves
Repair pink and grey hair flower
Hexagon quilt
Thanksgiving wall hanging
Rehang crochet butterfly in kitchen
Garden quilt
Grandkid silhouettes
Gold sweater
Yellow flower/pink flower/pink felted flower/purple headband/pink cuff
Curtains
Green knitted buckets
Painted linen skirt
Blue serving stand
Braided rug
Mom's messenger bag
Santa Claus wall hanging
Repair grey and pink hair flower
Grandma Jensen quilt--blues and purples
Crochet beaded bag
Butterfly embroidery
Wool scarf
Cross stitch Noah's Ark
Blue and Pink diamond quilt
Orange and green diamond quilt
Mom's Christmas present albums
Bag embroidery

Now to the good stuff. Pictures.

I've started a new blog: Come follow my crafting adventures on my new blog. Find me at: creativeirony.com.

Project Progress: Hexagon Quilt

Quick post to show you my progress.

Maybe I'm half way done? I'm not sure. I'm thinking I might want to do a few rounds around the outside to make it bigger anyway, so who really knows.

I'm just happy it appears to be getting bigger. Maybe I'll finish in time for Christmas. Darn. Now that I've said that, it sounds like a goal or something.

Midterm grades came out last week. I have an A- in my public speaking class (it will go up, we do a semester long test, and the best score out of three counts, so once I take it the final time, I think I will have an A in the bag) and an A in my Organizational Effectiveness class. I have to watch that one, because I'm at the point where I'm starting to be highly UNmotivated to do my assignments. Always dangerous territory.

I've started a new blog: Come follow my crafting adventures on my new blog. Find me at: creativeirony.com.

Project Progress: Hexagon Quilt

Yes, another week has come and gone and all I've managed to post is another update on my quilt.

It's not that I haven't been doing other crafty stuff. I have. It's just super-secret-crafty stuff that I can't share yet, because it's super-secret. I haven't done any super-secret stuff in a while and it is KILLING me not to share.

I clearly need to do more crafting, so I can share more on the blog and save my arteries.


However, I still have been sewing my fingers to the bone on my hexagon quilt. There hasn't been actual blood yet, but I have stabbed myself a few times, and I get a lot of hand cramps. I try to just shake it off and keep going. David and I had an argument the other day after I'd been sewing for hours and watching Vanity Fair. I got a case of the hand trembles. I said it was because I was getting a migraine and need chocolate, and he said it was because I'd been doing too much close and delicate work with my hands. No one won, because our arguments are more like mild disagreements, and we both go away thinking we are right and rolling our eyes in our heads at each other. Except, if David is reading this, I never, ever roll my eyes at you, not even in my head, because you are the best man in the entire universe and I love you and respect your opinion and you might have been right about my hand trembles and I love you. Smooches. (I know know you just rolled your eyes at me! Ha! Caught you!)

So, here's the progress I've made on my quilt so far:

It's getting bigger! I'm thinking I might be half of the way done by now. Maybe? We shall see. I'd like to step it up this week, but we'll see. If school and laundry and birthdays and zoo trips and Primary programs and Halloween costumes didn't keep getting in my way, I could get a lot more done. Not that those things aren't important, but it's impossible to look at elephants and hand sew. Just saying.

I've started a new blog: Come follow my crafting adventures on my new blog. Find me at: creativeirony.com.

Project Progress: Hexagon Quilt

Well, I had a little bit more time to work on the quilt this week. Actually, I think I spent about 8 hours working on it, but this thing is slooooooooooooooowwwwwwww.

It's growing though. Look!

And just so you can remember what it looked like before, here's what it looked like the last time I showed it to you.

It's bigger right? RIGHT?

Well, it's a little bit bigger, and I did make a ton of hexagons last week.

And just 'cause I like to, here's a pic of the newest section.

I was afraid I was going to run out of scraps, so I added a few more fabrics to the mix. I think they blend in nicely. I wish I had some more aqua options, but alas, I do not. I'm really tempted to go and buy a few fat quarters, but it's fun to be able to say I did it all from scraps. Perhaps I will sacrifice a cotton shirt or something.

I've started a new blog: Come follow my crafting adventures on my new blog. Find me at: creativeirony.com.

Project Progress: Hexagon Quilt

I miss summer. I had so much time during the summer. Oooooodles and oooodles of time! Now it's all gone. Xander's birthday was last week and he's getting baptized on Saturday and Griffin's birthday is next week, so you can see what I mean.

I've been recording my first speech this week for my college class. I finished yesterday and I'm going to post it to the blog next week. Then you can see how, um, silly I am. In person. Or rather, on video. It was really hard to stop doing takes (I did two non-filmed practices, two filmed and very kid-interrupted filmed takes and one final take). I could have probably done 20 takes and still not have been happy.

Still, last weekend I found some time to work on hexagons. I made a lot of hexagons. I figured out I'll probably need around 475, or maybe more. Depending on how distracted I am and how long I've been doing them (the more I do in a row the faster I get), they take me between 4-8 minutes to do. So, let's say 6 minutes on average. That's 47.6 hours on hexagons. Roughly. I'm just happy I don't have to put it all in as one long work week. It's a nice break from school.

So, here's the stack I got done this week. Aren't they so pretty?There are about 150 hexagons in these stacks. I can't wait to sew them into my top!

I'm thinking that if I get my coursework done quickly today that I might start a dress. Maybe. I found some of the feet for my Bernina at my mom's house! Not the regular 1/4" foot (I believe that has disappeared into the dark abyss and joined that planet floating out in space somewhere made up entirely of mother's objects lost by their children), but one that I think will work for most regular sewing. At least one that will work until I buy a new one!

I've started a new blog: Come follow my crafting adventures on my new blog. Find me at: creativeirony.com.

Tutorial: Quilt Top Paper Piecing Style

If you remember, I've been working on a new quilt. It's a hexagon quilt, and I'm trying out paper piecing. This is all new to me. I've been enjoying it, although it's a crazy amount of work.

There are several ways to piece a quilt this way. In one way, you baste through the paper, and then later take the basting out. In the way I'm doing, I'm tacking down the corners, and then removing the templates so I can reuse them, and I don't take the basting out.

If you're interested in my method (for those of you who don't think I should be committed for attempting a project this time consuming), here's what I'm doing. I think this would be stunning to do smaller and frame to hang as a piece of art.

I printed my templates from this website.

Step One:
Cut and print a template. After a few uses, my corners started to get a little questionable, so I used some shiny tape just over the corners (if you do them along the whole edge, the template doesn't stick to the fabric as well). Cut a square of fabric a little more than 1/4" bigger around each edge of the template.

Step Two:
Fold over one edge and finger press.

Step Three:
Insert the needle with a smallish knot tied on the end of the thread into the fold. Pull through. You can see my needle in the above photo ready to be pulled through the fabric.

Step Four:
Fold over the next edge (I work counter-clockwise) and finger press. This is the hardest part to get lined up. You can sort of tell where your template should go by lining it up with your previous finger fold from step two. This will hide your knot, which appeals to my sense of neatness, although it's probably really unnecessary.

Step Five:
Back tack (I'm not really sure if back tacking is necessary, but I'm paranoid, so I do it--it does seem to help the hexagons keep their shape a bit better). To back tack, insert your needle a tiny bit behind where your thread is already coming out of your fabric, make sure you are catching all your layers of fabric, then come out again, close to your original thread, and pull through. My needle in this photo is all poised to back tack. I just need to pull it to complete the back tack.

Step Six:
To do the next corner, fold down the fabric, again making sure your template is secure into your corner and lined up with your first fold. Once you have it all lined up, finger press it. Then take a small stitch on the corner, making sure to go through all the layers of fabric.

Step Seven.
Back tack.

Step Eight:
Continue around, keeping the template tight and back tacking at each corner. When you get to the last corner, it's going to look like this.

Step Nine:
Pull taut, then tuck corner under, making sure the fold goes all the way to the edge. I use my thumb nail to make sure I get a crisp fold. This is the same method I use for each corner, but it was the easiest to see with this corner.

Step Ten:
Fold down, and tack.

Step Eleven:
Put needle back under first knot. Pull up through fabric.

Step Twelve:
Tie a square knot around string (my mom always helped me remember where I was by saying I should make a rainbow and a smiley face). Cut thread.

The front will look like this:

And the back will look like this:

Then you can pop the template out and carefully press with your iron to keep sharp corners and crisp edges.

I've started a new blog: Come follow my crafting adventures on my new blog. Find me at: creativeirony.com.

Project Progress: Hexagon Quilt

Hey there!

Contrary to any rumors you might have heard (or not, considering I'm just making that up right now), I have not fallen off the end of the earth or taken any voyages into space or moved to Mexico to escape the law.

I haven't posted in forever because my kids started school, and then I started school, and between the two and getting a new routine down, I didn't take any pictures of the projects I was working on. Then I started writing a few posts to explain, but they sounded all strange, so I gave that up, and thought I'd just update once I took some photos.

Which I did yesterday! So hurray! Except that my camera might have died at the end. I'm hoping it's just being a tempental artist, but with my luck since we moved, and it's age (six years seems long for a digital camera), I'm guessing it's surrendered to my heavy use.

Short story: there's a post today. Which I'm going to do a lot more often, now that I'm into my 2nd week full week of school--it's not so bad. If you're curious, I'm taking Public Speaking and Organizational Effectiveness this semester. I go to school all online, so I find it kinda hilarious that I'm taking a public speaking class. Good thing someone had the good sense to invent web cams. Anyway, I'm writing my first speech, which is about crafting! Of course. How could it not be? I might post it here once I'm all the way done.

Onto my new project progress! I've started a hexagon quilt. These things are deadly serious. This is not the type of project to start if you only kinda feel like making a quilt.

I picked out a bunch of fabrics from my stash--mostly scrap-ish ones and fat quarters--I think there are 19 different fabrics. I love these colors. They are so cheerful.

Then, the next step is to make about a billion little hexagons. I did mine by paper piecing, which basically means you wrap a rough cut of the fabric around a piece of cardstock (or paper, but I like cardstock better), tack it down at each corner on the back, and then pop the template out of the middle. It takes a surprisingly long time. My hexagons are 1" hexagons, which is the measurement of one of the sides. Yeah, still doesn't make them too big.

That isn't all the different kinds, but most of them are there.

I've been working in a sort of leap-frog fashion. So, I make six hexagons of each type of fabric (so about 120 hexagons), and then sew the hexagons together. Because I'm too impatient to make all my hexagons and then sew all the seams. Oh, and you whip-stitch the seams together. By hand.

You can see my progress so far in this photo.

And a close up. If you look closely, you can see my tiny stitches.

I'm making a lap quilt, so I would guess I'm about a third of the way done, or close to that. I'm scared to guess how many hours I've already spent on this thing. I really like watching BBC mini-series and hand-sewing. I've watched an embarrassing amount of them so far.

Not that I'm not enjoying myself, mind (do you see what they have done to me already?). I am, tremendously. I might finish this time next year. The BBC might have to ramp up their production of mini-series to keep up. We might have to start resurrecting dead novelists to keep up with the demand for material. But, in the end, I'm going to have a beautiful quilt, and I'll be able to fake an intimate knowledge of Middlemarch. Always good for an English major.

I've started a new blog: Come follow my crafting adventures on my new blog. Find me at: creativeirony.com.