Baa Ram Ewe

I'm in the middle of several small projects. I finished up my two June blocks for the Toes in the Sand BOM. I am really enjoying that. Fabric choice makes such a difference and i feel I am getting my money's worth from both the ruler and the pattern.

I'm in the middle of my June Woodland Sampler cross stitch. I need to take a picture when I get done. It is a firefly this month. It is cute. I have to use the metallic floss again. I'm not looking forward to that; it was a nightmare in the February block.

Saturday I went to the Iowa Sheep and Wool Festival. I had so much fun. There were a ton of vendors for yarn, roving, spinning wheels and all sorts of good stuff. There were sheep to look at and pet. They did a great job with signage of the different varieties of sheep. I picked up yarn from Esther Purl again and already crocheted up half of it into a scarf. I didn't get the hank wound into a ball again, but this time I was wiser and watched a youtube video. Supposedly you undo the hank and if you position it over your knees you can unwrap it nicely. It worked pretty slick. The scarf is just treble crochets.I wanted something airy for the fall.

The festival had sheep dog trials which I found very entertaining to watch. I sat through several of them. Some of the dogs were in training so they would get distracted easily, but you could see the ones who had done it a while and knew what they were doing. So on that note, here is a clip from Babe.

Productive weekend

Does anybody else notice that they are now pronouncing the word 'weekend' like Dame Maggie Smith? "What is a weekend?"

I had a very productive Memorial Day weekend. I finished off the two May blocks for Toes in the Sand and 99% of a quilt top. I only have pictures for the BOM blocks. The recommendation is pressing seams open. It is EXHAUSTING and more than once my fingers got a little singed. I am not a fan. The blocks turned out well. I again swapped colours out. There are a lot meeting seams and some of the triangle points are a good bit shy of 1/4". I've thought about ironing on interfacing as a bit of stability and then sewing the blocks with the background. Has anybody done that before? Recommendations?

Ugh!

Another friend of mine found out she has cancer. Two friends in less than a year. Healthy, going about their daily lives, young women. This time I made a pillow instead of a quilt. It is summer and she has to go in for both chemo and radiation. I thought something serviceable would be good.

I like the way it turned out. I used heavy duty top stitching thread to stitch in the ditch. It turned out ok, but it wasn't what I had expected. I lengthened my stitch length, but the effect wasn't what I imagined. I think I was hoping for more a shashiko effect. I want one of those so badly. I wish one of my LQS would rent that out as well like a long arm. The pillow needs to be sat on so it fills out the corners and the back doesn't bulge. I hope with use it all falls into place.

May gnome

I got nothing to say.

Snow in May

Des Moines received 7 inches of snow over two days. Two days in May. This is what I awoke to this morning.

I had picked up a silk and wool blend at the yarn show in March and figured I would get a head start on next winter. Little did I know that I could use what I made with this extended winter. I love my cowl. I turned into a mobius strip so it is all twisty and interesting. I used a pattern from Fiber Flux that is essentially blocks of single, double and treble crochets. It was a good pattern to jump back into crochet. I have enough length to be able to wear it long or wrap it twice so it is tighter around my neck.

So here are a couple pictures my friend Emily took. It was windy and I was cold but they get the point across. 

Yet another Block of the Month

I still haven't finished the 2011 Block of the Month, but went with the Toes in the Sand block of the month. I signed up through my local quilt shop. I'm switching out some fabrics because it seems too blue. It uses a special ruler which works pretty well. I haven't used a triangle ruler before, so getting the little notches cut was a little weird.

I thought my seams matched up pretty well. This was my bulkiest seam and it came together pretty well for both blocks.

 Let's see if I can keep up with this one!

Slight miscalculation

The first week of the Spring Sampler came out and there were two eggs in a nest. I figured that since they were unhatched eggs, over the next 5 weeks the eggs would hatch. Well, this week's came out and there are no hatching eggs. Oops.

This has kind of messed up my plan, but I am going to go with it. See my plan was to have the egg hatching on the far right and to be the sort of 'anchor' to the rest of the craziness going on. I decided to stitch the other 4 images randomly without the prescribed frames. Well, sorta randomly. I did make sure that I would have enough space. The pattern called for an 11" square so I upgraded to 15". I also divided up the fabric into 5 rows to give a framework. It was a bit weird to just sew wherever and not have set intervals. I sewed little bits of every image so I wouldn't lose my nerve and want to space them out appropriately.

So for week 2, I am going to drop a teapot design and repeat the eggs from week 1. If week 3 doesn't have eggs, then I really am in trouble. The April angry bunny turned out well. I added a couple raindrops over his head where the antlers should have been. I think the Woodland Sampler is shaping up very nicely. February is my favourite.