Amanda & her boyfriend will be here in a few hours (i'm hoping they'll arrive early evening, if not, i'm a little screwed..) and I must convert my 2nd bedroom from a sewing room to guest room again.
I thought this would be a good time to post about what a challenge this often is.
This is what the room looks like right now:
Here is the futon where they will sleep tonight. There are lots of quilts on the futon, but none are the kind you can sleep with yet. on the left side (next to the ironing board which is just out of the picture) there is a pile of clean-but-waiting-to-be-ironed fabric. It's been there about 3 weeks. I iron a few pieces whenever I have time. Underneath the futon is fabric for a bag that I started to make and ran out of time for, and a pile of fabric pieces that I dumped out of a rubbermaid bucket so I could use the bucket for last weekend's retreat. the cardboard box, though it says "step into shape," is definitely NOT an exercise machine (hahaha), it's full of fabric that I shipped home from Chicago when I visitied my parents in the fall.
Now on to the other side of the room. most of the "clean" floor space will be taken up by the futon when it is in bed form. On the back of the chair hangs my pile of freshly-ironed-but-not-yet-folded-or-sorted fabric. The blue bin holds all of the fabric from Sandra's grandma that I decided to add to my own stash (oh.. 100+ yards, I'm guessing) with the T-shirt quilt pieces on top of that. Here, let's go to the close-up shot:
It would be so much easier to put notes on the photos over at flickr.. maybe that's what I'll do. Anyway, in the corner there are 2 rubbermaid bins which used to go on the shelf, but somehow they don't exactly fit anymore. on top of that is the quilted bag which holds the fabric for Theresa's garden quilt, and it all balances precariously on top of a wooden box of japanese quilting magazines (what else?). The large cardboard box with Japanese writing on it was a package I received from Mrs. K. for my birthday, full of sewing notions, kimono silks, and a full kimono/hapi set (ahhh, a blog post i had ment to write but never got around to). the tiny cardboard box is a care package of fabric that I was planning to send to Kome's grandma, but again, the time to complete the project has escaped me. The tower of fabric balancing on the cardboard box is all part of the Wonder Quilt, still in UFO form. It had been in the blue bin, but got "relocated" to make room for the new stash.
2008-02-16
The state of my sewing room
2007-02-17
Satisfaction Saturday
After a good night sleep I was feeling a lot more calm about the whole project, and my patience (and perfectionism) had been renewed.
I ripped out a few ugly seams and took my time to piece the rest of the curves. I'm very please with the results, and Costas likes it too.
2007-02-16
Work in Progress Friday
This Friday, it's all about fans.
I love the fan block. When I first started to get really interested in quilting in high school, my little sister brought me a "Grandmother's fan" pattern back from her school fieldtrip as a souvenir. Of course I was way too inexperienced to try it then, but that's my first memory of the pattern. I have a great Japanese quilt book (Pathwork & Quilting, Vol 10. ) that focuses on only 3 patterns-- fans, hexagons, and orange peels. The pattern that I'm using for these blocks came from this book.
I enjoy the look of pieced curves, and after doing a bunch, I'm not that bad at them. But tonight for some reason I just couldn't get it right. Almost every single block has some wrinkle or pucker and they're driving me mad. I'm only making 8 blocks too and it's terrible to be so frustrated when I'm only half way through 8 blocks... but I will soldier on. I've got all the insides pieced, just need to attach them to the background corners. (all machine pieced, btw).
I think I need to stop for a while and pick them back up in the morning. Costas just called up that Psych is on. that's a good excuse to stop sewing. Hopefully I'll have better luck tomorrow.
2007-02-11
Turning, Turning
Wow, I don't know what to say after such a full weekend. I need to let my thoughts settle a bit I guess, but I've got the time now and some fresh pictures, so I wanted to post anyway.
When I got to the Berkley Lions Hall at 10 yesterday, it was already more than full, and people were tracing away. The 3rd step of the project (first two were to piece blocks and put on border at home) was to trace a skewed square over each seam intersection. That took me more than an hour. Next, cut out (with scissors) along your drawn lines. You are left with little spacer squares of all of your fabrics, and the pattern says to make a border out of them, but I haven't decided if that's the route I'll take yet. After that, rotate each block a quarter turn.
Voila! stars appear! Before cutting, we put the tops on flannel backed vinyl table cloths, that way they would stay put as we rearranged them. After cutting, I took a break for lunch (the ladies were totally impressed with my fasolakia and the cranberry bliss bars), then spent the rest of the afternoon piecing.
I got all the rows pieced, but had to pack up before I could put them all together. Amanda's play started at 8 and I wanted time to bum around campus before then, so I left Berkley at 4pm. I really really love my quilt group. The ladies are so much fun. I know I should cut back on extra spending, but classes are too good to pass up. They are such wonderful social events, don't you think?
The last 24 hours at Smith were very satisfying for my soul. I've gotten to the point where a visit to campus really makes me feel re-affirmed as a woman. Amanda is a phenomenal woman to talk with, and I'm happy to see she's enjoying Smith as much as I did. Sometimes it's such a shock to learn that we have such similar outlooks on things, but we came about them in completely different ways. It's nice to feel close to another woman in my family.
Costas just got home from the grocery store and he's making dinner tonight. Lucky me. This weekend has been wonderful all around.
Posts
