Knitting in a foreign language

And so it is October, the weather is getting colder, and I'm knitting again.

I've started Susan Pandorf's 'Evenstar' shawl. And I blame Martha. (Martha carries the blame for many beautiful and wondrous things that are in my life, so I'm sure she'll shoulder this one too).

Lace-knitting without a multitude of reapeats is a challenge on its own. To do lace-knitting, where the pattern is written in a foreign language adds a new dimension to the challenge (and yes, to me English is a foreign language). There are some of her abbreviations that I can simply not wrap my head around, and have spent quite some time on Ravelry and google to try and find out what they were.

Thank God for YouTube, and generous people who share how to do things. Seeing a stitch is essential when you cannot understand the written directions.

ANYway, the Evenstar shawl is well started, using silk-thread (from Blue Moon Fiber arts for which the pattern is written), in a lovely variegated blue. Silk isn't very forgiving to knit, and since the project has just been started, it isn't in any way blocked yet. I hope you can still see a bit of the loveliness.

The pink thread (you can see it clearly on the small picture to the right), is a life-line. Amazing concept when knitting lace in the round :-) And again, thank god for YouTube :-)

And yes, I know one usually doesn't blame someone for that which is good, but since many of the good things Martha has brought into my life are quite addictive, I think that blame is a good word :-)

Here comes the Sun(flowers) 11

After loads of double Sunflowers, with and without the home-made middle bit, it's time to return to a single one. BUT with a fussy-cut / printed centre.

And yes. It works. Sort of.
The outer triangles are not the perfect green for this combination, BUT, it will work well enough, when seen with the others ... I hope.
I'll have to see what else I've got on the shelves that would work for fussy-printing.

That extra bit for the Sunflower

I've had a question : That extra bit for the Sunflower, the 'small outer-triangle, large inner-triangle combo' thingie. How have you drafted it.

Easy-peasy.

Use 2 sheets of freezer-paper.
From the 6" Sunflower collection, print a sheet of Outer Triangles
From the 12" Sunflower collection, print a sheet of Inner Triangles

Make sure your sheet of freezer-paper is big enough to yield 16 bits. I just printed on a Letter size (8.5 x 11") piece of freezer-paper. That got me too many bits, but that's ok.

Cut out 16 of each shape leaving the Seam Allowance in place.

On the 12" Sunflower Inner Triangle bits, cut away the bottom (curved) seam allowance.

Iron the outer-triangle bits on top of the inner-triangle bits (see picture on the right)

You can leave the seam-allowance on your templates, or you can cut them away. It all depends on how you prefer to prepare a block with freezer-paper rather than Inklingo.

I chose to leave the seam-allowance on. That way, I can place the composite templates right up to each other, and know I have the seam-allowance in place.

If you do that, you - again - have two options :
Draft the stiching-line on the fabric-piece, or not draft the stitching-line.
If the rest of your Sunflowe is prepared with Inklingo, you do not need a stitching-line, because there are stitching-lines on every piece it is going to be joined to. Just peel off the paper and you're ready to roll.


BUT, some of you might want a stitching-line anyway, in spite of it being unneccesary. I would suggest that you draft that before peeling off the freezer-paper.
I would further suggest, that you place your ruler so the 0.25" mark is just outside of the paper. Just. Not visibly away from it, just ... just outside.
When you draft your stitching-line (using a fine-line pencil), it will be placed right :-)
Click on the picture (right) to see it in a larger size, you will be able to see what I mean.

... but really, you don't need that stitching-line. You have perfectly good stitching-lines on the other pieces, and since you've used Inklingo to prepare everything (including the templates for this bit), it will all fit together nicely.

Here comes the Sun(flowers) 10

Green inner diamond. Check.
Homemade middle bit. Check.
.... hmmmm .....
Other than me thinking that the fabric I have chosen for the outer (large) diamonds, is not really suitable for this, I like it.
Maybe one could use the fabric better ?That'll be the next one to try.

... hanging on the wall

(sung to the tune of "Ten Green Bottles")
9 Sunflowers, hanging on the wall
9 Sunflowers, hanging on the wall ...

Picture is a bit dark, they are brighter in real life, but they are up there on the wall, brightening my play-room every day. And I think this is a case, where more is more. Don't you ?
And I've been looking into background-fabrics. A (little) while back, I ordered some F/4s and found what I believe is 'that perfect blue' for setting them. Sadly, it is a batik from ... ooooh ... 2005 (? I think), and I thought it was no longer available anywhere in the world.
So, I asked on a list, and someone found it at the Blue Bamboo on-line shop ... only - sadly - it turned out to be sold out. At the Hingeley Road quiltshop, all but a F/4 was sold out too.
SO, Google didn't return any useable results; quiltshops.com didn't return any useable results; eBay didn't return any useable results.
So this is my last ditch effort. The fabric is an (ancient) Hoffman batik; E137 Sea Breeze, and looks like this :

The above is a F/8 of the fabric, and the dark splashes are coppery, not really brown or red. Anyone ? I need (at least) 3.5 yards.

Only 100 days to Christmas !

Ladies (and gentlemen), I have an announcement : This year, Christmas day will be December 25th.
Yes. I know it is shocking news, and that it takes you completely unprepared.

There is worse : December 25th is only 100 days away.

If you want a stress-free (or just stress-reduced) Christmas, this is the perfect time to start doing what you can do in advance.

If you are planning to make hand-made Christmas-gifts this year, you are too late.
Sorry, but there it is. It will take (at least) twice as long as you think it will, and you will not have the time to work 8 hours a day on those projects for the next 3 months.
Face it !
Pick one of the Christmas-Present-Projects you have already started. Yes. Just one ! Focus on that. Take it all the way to the finishing line. Once that project is finished is time enough to pick up and focus on the next one.

Procrastination is a fine art, but it ain't fine if it stresses you out.

Here comes the Sun(flowers) 9

SO, double Sunflowers with or without the hand-made middle bit work for me.

But there is still a bit of 'shaking up' I can do.

Sunflower # 8 is - and this is one of the small ironies of life - not green enough :-)
And there is (at least) one placement of green I haven't tried yet.
So that's what is being tried this week : Green inner diamonds.

Do I like it ?
Well ... the inner Sunflower seems almost a separate flower, and I'm not sure I like that.
The centre 'spokes' stand out very clearly, and I think I like that.
I will try to mix 'green inner diamonds' with 'home-made middle-bit' and see if that works better.

That aside, yes, I like the block ... but then, I have liked all of my Sunflowers so far :-) And yes, I can see the 'faults' of a block and still love it. Lesson learned from Dear Jane :-)

On to the next one !

I have fabric !

The Dear Jane collection from Windham.
Lovely, lovely fabrics. Just the kind of cotton-therapy that one needs on a day like this.
And yes. I do remember.
All too well.
But I don't feel the need to add my voice to the throng. Read your newspaper today, or watch the many, many memorial-programs on your telly.
Then go hug the stuffing out of someone you love, and do something which makes you happy.
I'm patting fabric today :-)

Here comes the Sun(flowers) 8

SO, I liked the double Sunflower with 'homemade' middle sort-of diamonds (made from 6" outer triangles and 12" inner triangles), and decided to make another one. This one.

In conjunction with the other Sunflowers I've made (so far), the outer diamonds are very, very bright (and light), and the block sort-of stands out, but in and of itself, it is a great-looking block (at least to my eyes).

There must be something in the water

... there really must be. Something in the water. Or the air. Whatever.
Because these colours turn up everywhere :-)
We had some freinds over for dinner yesterday, and she had scrounged up some of the last flowers in the garden. A perfect match for my Sunflowers :-)

Here comes the Sun(flowers) 7

Results on Sunflowers so far :
I like the double Sunflower.
I do not like having a big 'empty space' in the middle, the kind I get when I do a 'single Sunflower' in the 12" size.
I like it that there isn't too much green in the flowers.
What about making the outer triangle on the 6" sunflower and the inner triangle on the 12" sunflower of the same fabric ... and then aligning them ... and then doing away with the seam, by making my own 'middle diamond' template.
Done :

And frankly, even though there isn't quite enough contrast in there, I think this is very close to 'That Perfect Sunflower' ... at least in the double sunflower category. Never fear, though, I'm going to plod on and continue to experiment with this block for a while to come.

My machine and I

You who read this blog on a regular basis will know that I like hand-work.
Any kind of hand-work really.
With a preference for what my freind Diane in NY calls 'DLS' (Dinky Little Sh ... Stuff).
BUT, I do have a sewing-machine. As a matter of fact, I have 3. I have a hand-crank, that DH salvaged from a dump, took home, gave some TLC and now it purrs on like nobody's business.
Then there is the Viking / Husquarna. It was top-of-the-line 22 years ago, it isn't anymore, but it still goes strong.
Finally, there is the tiny Janome, which is what I tend to use mostly. It is small, doesn't have a zillion different stitches, but it works.
... most of the time.

Now. I like my machines well enough. Yes. All of them. And in broad general, they are not too averse to me. We're not like BFF, or intimate in any way (remember my hand-work preference), but ... generally we can work together well enough.
And then, one day, we couldn't.
The little one just stopped. Wouldn't budge.
And, after some work, I understood perfectly why :

Exhibit A (on your right) shows the compact used-to-be-fluff I picked out of the spool-house. Using tweezers. It was stuck fast and really hard.
There is nothing fluffy about it. The spool is there to show just how much there actually was.

After I had carefully lifted all of that from the spool-house, I 'stole' DHs canned air, and gave it a good blow-through as well.
And now the little Janome purrs on again, and harmony has been re-established in the little home.

The moral of the story :
Clean your machine.
If you are on intimate terms with yours, you probably know already, and don't need my reminder, if you are more like me, and not all that close with your machine, now would - probably - be a good time to get out the tweezers, the canned air, a bit of patience, and get the fluff out of the spool-house :-)

I blame the Van (aka : Sunflowers 6)

.... or "Here Comes the Sun(flowers) 6"
A young couple down the street have bought a "new" van / car / whatever that kind of vehicle is called. Actually, it is bordering on antique. It is most definitely a vintage car. An around 1968 vintage. For a long time, I thought it was a prop for a movie but nope, it's an original and they love it.

The paint-job and the stickers, are originals, and while it has never been to Woodstock, it definitely wanted to be. So ... this is where I put the blame for the Sunflower of the Week.



See the similarities ?











And then a few notes on this week's Sunflower :
The double Sunflowers I've made so far have had the outer triangles on the 6" bits and the inner triangles on the 12" bits, staggered, so the point of the 6" diamond was in the middle of the 12" triangle (no, diamonds are not 6" and triangles are not 12", but .... you know what I mean, and if you don't this whole post will probably be gibberish anyway). This time, I have aligned them. Outside triangles on the 6"-block-circle, and Inner triangles on the 12"-block-circle have been aligned.

And apart from the fact, that it looks terrifyingly 68'ish in the colours I have chosen (and I blame the constant presence of 'the van' just outside our house for those colours), I like the alignment. I really do. Another thing to experiment with. I also think that the dark green around the edge makes it a lot less garish than it could have been.
And isn't it great, that I seem to be doing one Sunflower every week :-) My own personal Block-Of-the-Week challenge. Leaves me room to experiment with other stuff too, and still feel like I'm advancing on the Sunflower project. Feels good, actually :-)

And, just for the record, I like my 'hippie Sunflower' a lot :-D

It's Blackberry time

Not the electronic device. The edible sort.

DH, DSon and DSon's freind have been picking blackberries, and had a lovely afternoon turning the berries into preserve and squash / syrup (for diluting with water and drinking ... soft-drink, you know).
And here are the pictures to prove it :


Setting out (some of the) containers for the preserve / jam.












The almost boiling cauldron












Cleaning the edges of the glass with a cloth dipped in boiling water.












Putting on the lid (deep concentration)








The first 4 glasses. More were made. I think we ended up with 12 liters of squash/syrup/juice and about 20 glasses of jam / preserve. DS's freind is going to take about half home. DH has enough blackberries picked to make another batch the same size.

... DD and I will enjoy consuming them.

Dissing ms Aloi

Have you read ms Aloi's rant about we who knit, stitch and blog ?
Well ... just in case you haven't, follow the link.
I would have liked to comment directly to ms Aloi on the HuffPost site, but frankly, giving HuffPost free access to all my information, including my address-book, is not something I want to do. Instead, I'm doing the next-best thing. I am writing my very own counter-rant on my own, crafty blog.

- - -

When I cut out a new pattern for sewing, I use my great-aunt's scissors. She was a seamstress, and kept both herself, her (unmarried) younger sister and their mother well provided for all her adult life by plying the needle and keeping the upper crust of her town well and fashionably dressed.
I have my mother's pincushion displayed in pride of place; she was a prolific writer in her scholarly field, and brought up a large brood of children, most of whom were not 'by her belly'.
I have my aunt's sewing-box and a good deal of her knitting-needles; she too was a tough, self-reliant female, who spent her life educating young mothers.

Coming from a line of bad-ass women, who did not need empty posturing to make themselves heard or seen, has - I must admit - given me a less than tolerant view of people (disregarding gender), who out of hand dismiss the lives of these women and the way they chose to express themselves at the end of the day.

I am a pastor, a university teacher, hold a ph.d. in a seriously scary scholarly subject, am the mother of two teens, and a wife, freind, neighbour and counsellor as well. I do not waste my time making perfunctory and juvenile statements about immaterial subjects (like super-heroes or vampires), I spend the time I call my own, by creating things that are beautiful to my eyes, and sharing them with my freinds all over the world.

I can wrap myself in one of my aunt's beautiful lace shawls, knitted in the evenings after long days of work, or lay out my mother's embroidered place-mats, or fold my great-aunt's beautiful, monogrammed white-work napkins, that are only used on special occasions, and when I do, I feel a deep connection to these women, just as I do when I cut out a pattern, put a pin in the pin-cushion or cast on a new pair of socks on my aunt's pins.

If you, ms Aloi, consider yourself a feminist, consider too, that being female and being a feminist, is not about being male. It is not about just turning the tables and showing male superheroes posing like female ones. It is about finding a voice. A voice and a place where you, as a woman, can be you, and are empowered.

Your voice - sadly - seems scornful, juvenile, narrow-minded and ignorant, just as you seem to be basing your evaluation of female worth on whether or not a given female is buying into the male way of expression. I do not need to reduce my life and my opinions in that way.

... and 'ignorant' ?
'The Killing' is not originally Swedish, it is originally Danish. And yes, there is a difference. I know the two countries are very close in many, many ways (just think of the myriad of wars that have been fought between them), but they are still not identical. Try looking both up on Google Maps or Wikipedia.

... and Jane Austen is one of the most brilliant authors of any age, whose elegant prose continues to run little circles around her readers, disregarding the subject-matter; it boggles my mind to think you can praise Buffy the Vampire Slayer and True Blood and not recognize the wicked, subversive brilliance behind a statement like this:
"The advantages of natural folly in a beautiful girl have been already set forth by the capital pen of a sister author; and to her treatment of the subject I will only add, in justice to men, that though to the larger and more trifling part of the sex, imbecility in females is a great enhancement of their personal charms, there is a portion of them too reasonable and too well informed themselves to desire anything more in women than ignorance."
J. Austen "Northanger Abbey" chapter 14

Here comes the Sun(flowers) 5

SO, circular 4-patch in the centre, version 2. There is no green in the centre, and still the block reads 'too green' to my eyes.
And I think I have broken the 'code' on when I think a block is 'too green' : When the inner and outer triangle on the pieces for the 12" block are too alike, the block reads as 'too green' for me. Strange but true.
Well. At least I now know what to avoid :-)

And then Paula asked if these blocks will go into a big quilt. Well ... depends :-) Right now, I enjoy making them. I am trying to stick to a sort-of colourway (green for all outer triangles, pink-orange-yellow mostly for the inner bits, and in the fullness of time, I think (but haven't decided firmly yet), that they will be set on various blue backgrounds. How big the quilt will end up, all depends on how long I think it is fun to make them, experiment with colourplacement and the like. So : Yes, Paula, they will end up in a quilt ... eventually :-) But when and how big no-one knows.

On to the next one.

Hybrid-piecing Hexagons

Hand-piecing hexagons is - for me - the natural way to do it.
Occasionally (rarely, but it happens) I get impatient and feel that I 'need' to move forward faster, and that is when machine-piecing comes into the picture.

BUT, machine-piecing hexagons seems to me to be a cruel and unusual way of doing hexagon-blocks. My sewing-machine and I like each other well enough - most of the time - but we are not on what you might call intimate terms, and me doing inset seams of any kind on the machine is not a sight to be soon forgotten (no matter how fervently you might wish that it was, and that your ears would stop burning)

Hybrid-piecing to the rescue !

Machine-piece the straight, not-inset seams, and then hand-piece the 'troublesome' inset seams. And because that sounds complicated (but isn't) here is a small description, with pictures.

I would like, at this point, to apologize for the quality of the pictures. I am not a professional photographer, and getting clear pictures when doing closeups like this, is - frankly - a bear to do. Know that I did it as well as I could. If you have trouble seeing how a picture could possibly illustrate the point I'm trying to make, double-click on it, and it will open 'on its own' in a (much) larger size.


Lay out your block (in this case, a double GFG-flower). I prefer to lay it out with the back up.
(and yes, eagle-eyed reader, there is a number on one of the hexagons. That is because it is printed from the CD. These hexies have been around for a loooong time)







Machine-piece into what might be called hexagon-strips.

Piece edge to edge (!)







When cutting the pieces apart, trim the thread on both sides, so that no ends 'stick out'. On the picture (right), you can see that one side of the seam has been trimmed, the other hasn't.
Trim them all.

Doing this means, that you can 'open' the seam when hand-piecing the strips together, but it still leaves just (!) enough thread to ensure that the whole seam doesn't unravel on you. If you feel iffy about having only 0.25" of thread-end between you and an unraveling seam, clip the thread a little bit further out, and then, with your needle, unpick one stitch at each end. You can do that while piecing.

If you want to press as you go, this is the point where you press the strips.
It isn't necessary, because the rest of your stitching will be by hand, so you can just leave well alone and press it all when the flower is finished. If you really want to press, press all seams the same way. Yes. Same way. It will work out and will press up a treat in the end.


Once all the strips for the flower has been machine-pieced, the hand-piecing part comes.
Since your pieces have been prepared with Inklingo, use a plain running-stitch.

At corners, take a backstitch, so you get both of two pieces anchored to the same match-mark on the single-piece (click on the picture if you have trouble seeing the back-stitch ... I do). Do not break the thread, but 'pass' from one hexagon to the next until the whole strip has been pieced.
Then move on to the next one.


When all the hexagon-strips have been joined, press your double hexagon flower.

It will press flat a treat, and all the intersections will open beautifully.





Requirements :
One of the (many) Inklingo 60-degree hexagon-collections.
1 flower-centre hexagon
6 inner-flower hexagons
12 outer-flower hexagons

Repeat as desired :-)

Here comes the Sun(flowers) 4

SO. Double Sunflowers look good, but really ... 100 pieces to piece is a bit much sometimes. There has got to be something else I can do with the centre circle.

There is :-)

The collection comes with quarter circles, so ... maybe a circular 4-patch ? Worth a try, at least :-)
And this is the result. I sort-of like it. But I still think that the open space in the centre is too much.
Strangely, this one doesn't seem too green. It 'should', but it doesn't.

On to the next one ! Maybe without green in the centre ?

Barbara Brackman's Civil War Sampler

Over at the Inklingo Sampler-blog, I'm following Barbara Brackman's Civil War sampler, and writing up printing-tables for the blocks. Brackman does hers in the 8" format, I do the ones at the Inklingo Sampler in a 6" format.
Occasionally, a block pops up, which doesn't really agree with me. Or with Inklingo. Either or both.
And one such, was the block for week 30, Peterson's Stars and Strips. Oh, the 'stripes' part is a piece of cake to make with Inklingo, just use the 1" Log Cabin collection, print 3 reds and 3 whites, and you're good.
The part that doesn't sit well with me is the applique'ed, 5-pointed star.
I don't do applique stars. Not if I can help it.
And yes, I have done'em. 5-point, 6-point, 8-point. And I'm not doing any more than I absolutely have to.
So, I didn't stitch the block. Just wrote up the printing-table, and made a link to a web-page with directions on how to make a 5-pointed star.
And then, a few days ago, I realized that the actual quilt, over which Brackman has constructed her block, does have applique'ed stars, but ... it also has a blue border with white stars.
So, here is my version.
It's a 6" block, and is very simple to make. You can make it 8" by adding some more strips, or by using the Inklingo 1" Log Cabin collection rather than the 0.75" collection I've been using for this block. What is important for this one is : red fabric, white fabric, and blue fabric with white stars.

Follow the link to download a printing-table for the 6" block.

Here comes the Sun(flowers) 3

So, I didn't like the green-ness of the previous Sunflower.
New attempt. Inner triangles of the larger of the two Sunflowers are no longer green, but rather a light yellow. Same general colour-family as the diamonds.

I like that.
I have also begun to audition fabrics for the background, and I like the general idea of 'bright blue', hovering somewhere between cerulean (thank you, 'The Devil Wears Prada' for that term) and cobalt. Time enough to make a decision, though :-)

What I do not like, is the way the inner diamonds look on this one.
Lesson learned here : When making a Double Sunflower, the fabric used for the smaller (inner) diamonds should read as a solid (or almost solid), and not have a busload of interesting bits of pattern.

On to the next one !
I hope you can tell that I'm having fun :-)

Making Patterns

So, I have bitten the bullet and done what I never thought I would do.
I am opening my own (teeny-tiny) shop-corner here on the internet, and am, as of today, now, beginning to sell patterns.

I have also 'opened' the left-hand margin of this blog. On it, you will find links to my shop. Each picture will be a link to the shop-page, and on the shop-page, the head-line for each pattern will take you to the blog-posts that are relevant for the pattern.

I know there is only one pattern for sale right now, but there will be more. In the fullness of time.
Do not, however expect to see it next week or the one after. I not only design and make patterns, I see some in my life too, and one of the recurrent patterns is, that every time I believe I have plenty of time and energy for something, something else happens that throws a spanner in the works, and it all goes to pot.
So don't hold your breath for the next one, just ... keep your fingers crossed.

The first pattern is called Tea Roses.
Size of quilt : 48 x 66"
Uses Inklingo Collection #3 for templates.

The pattern uses 10" squares (actually, it uses a Layer Cake), but can be made with F/16s too, or scraps from your stash.

If you encounter problems with either buying or using the pattern, please contact me :
tildebinger (at) paradis (dot) dk
This is my new shop e-mail, so everything sent to that addy will go directly into a separate folder, and I can deal with it momentarily (if I am awake, at home, and by the computer)

This, first pattern is launched with a sale-price of only 7.50 US $
After August 15th, it will be normally priced, and will set you back 9 US $

IF you are living in Denmark, and buying from there, please use the Danish Kroner option in the shop. Here the price - until August 15th - is 39 kroner.

What you get :

A pdf-file (you need to print it out yourself) containing 12 pages, with fabric- (and other) requirements, notes on how to make the block, Inklingo printing tables, and a lot of words.

Here comes the Sun(flowers) 2

So, the big open space of a 5"+ diameter centre for my 12" sunflower was too much for me.
Which means I'm ready to try something different. Something that will give me more interest in the centre of the block. What about a double Sunflower.
Because, let's face it, where is the fun in stiching a 12" block with 49 pieces (that's without the outside, background, which hasn't been put on yet, and thus does not count), compared to stitchin a 12" block with 97 pieces !
So here it is : Double the Sunflower, Double the fun (! ???)

And lessons learned on this one : Not so much green. I really must reduce the amount of green on these blocks. On to the next one.

Organizing Fabric

I'm a messy quilter (who would have thunk). When I start a new project, I pull fabrics, and audition them. All over the place. They are draped on tables, on floors, on chairs ... everywhere.
Then, as choices are made, they tend to stay where they were.
On tables, on floors, on chairs, everywhere.
And that is how a true mess is born.
This time, with the Sunflowers, I've decided to try a new strategy.
Once a fabric is chosen, it has been put in a box. Many fabrics in one box ! All together now. Yes, it is overflowing, and there are too many fabrics to rest comfortably in it, but they are all together now. I can take out one, put in another, and I can still, at a glance, audition whether or not I think it works with the rest of them. As it looks now, I would say that this grouping has the prospect of a nice, soothing quilt in the general colourway of 'chartreuse and magenta are neutrals' variety.

P.S. To those of you who think OMG, she can afford magnum bottles of Grand Cru wine from Saint Emilion, rest easy. It was a gift from someone of my acquaintance who can afford magnum bottles of Saint Emilion Grand Cru. And I never (never) say no to gifts of wonderful wine. As you can see, I even save the wrapping. It was the first, and will probably be the only, time in my life where a wine of that calibre ever enters my life.

Another one bites the dust

This is a finished quilt-top. Not a finished quilt, but at least it is a finished top.

Project was started in late August 2008, and have been stitched on rarely. Until this May, where it moved to the top of the list, and became my priority project.
The blocks are entirely hand-pieced, but the joining of the blocks is by machine.
For the longest time, I called it 'Rectangular Hexagons', but after the previous quilt was finished and up on the design-wall, and this one went up (while the last blocks were pieced), DH said that it looked like old-fashioned, English Tea Roses, so that's the name.
TeaRoses.

In May, I decided to make an effort to finish this top, before my b'day this year, and I'm proud to see that I met my goal.
Now on to piecing the backing.

Washing fabric

I always wash my fabrics before storing them on my shelves.
Always !

I think I have one JellyRoll that is still wrapped tightly, with the ribbon, that isn't washed, but other than that, all fabric on my shelves are washed. Yes, that includes 5" charms, 10" squares and the other small bits.

Now, washing F/4s and even F/8s is easy. Pop them in the washing-machine with the rest of it, and you're done.
Washing charms, or even the 10" squares, is worse. Popping a small bit of fabric, with nothing but 'loose' sides into the washing-machine, makes for lots and lots of fluff in the load, and might unravel more than one is ready to loose, so, here's what I do :

Using the hottest water I can wring from my tap, and a bit of (mildish) soap, everything is dumped into the hand-wash basin in the bathroom, and left there to soak a bit.
I agitate it lightly, just enough to know I have done it, but as you can see, I have quite a small sink, and there are 40 squares, each 10" now crammed into it.
Rinse - again in water as hot as you can get it - as many times as you need to get all the soap out. On the last rinse, do not drain (!)
Now comes the fun part.
Take off your shoes or socks (or be prepared to have them soaked) and roll up your pants / jeans (again : or be prepared to have them soaked, at least at the hem).

Take the soaking, dripping, running wet squares, one by one, and 'hang' them in your shower. Tiles or glass, either works. My shower has tiles, but I've done this in showers that have glass.

Flatten out the squares as you hang them, so there are no large air-bubble caught between shower-sides and fabrics. Don't obsess ! just ... do it.

And then, when all are plastered to the wall, leave the shower and close the door. Depending on air-humidity, you will be able to pick up almost-dry squares of fabric within a few hours. Some will have fallen on the floor before they were dry enough to store, but that's ok too : Give them a quick run-over with your iron, and they are perfect.

With 'big' pieces like 10" squares, the majority will loosen before they are completely dry. With 5" charms, the majority will stick until they are completely dry.

The beauty of this way of doing things is :
You get your fabric washed.
You don't get fabric that is impossible to iron out.
The majority of shrinking has now happened, AND, whatever nastiness the producer has treated the fabric with, is now out, and even scent-allergics (like yours truly) can handle them without fear of a fit.
And that's the way I do it here in Copenhagen.

Going on

Well I'm progressing slowly, but surely on the Hexagon quilt.
Now two thirds of it is together.

And that's about what I'm getting done ... which is much more than nothing.

Other than that, I'm reading, and leafing through quilt-history books, and listening to music, and doing nothing in particular.

Working hard at wasting the last week of my vacation. Come August 1st, and I need to get back to studying and preparing and taking notes for classes. BUT not yet. Not yet.

Weather is, as can be seen on the picture on the right, rainy. Interspersed with showers of rain. Unless it is drizzling.
Naturally there is the occasional pour-down, but mostly, it's just rain.

A day of prayer

Well, in the wake of the horrible happenings in Norway, I've turned off the TV and the radio and all the rest.
I know what happened is horrible. I know it is devastating now, and will continue to be so for the survivors, probably for the rest of their lives.
I know, that thousands of lives are going to be wrecked because of this.

It is beyond words.

I don't want to be caught by a churning TV and endless repetitions of what happened, talked about either in sombre tones, or in the slightly shrill, breathless voices of reporters trying to wring the last drop of drama out of what really isn't a drama, but a tragedy;
instead I've sat down myself to stitch, and to reflect, and to pray.

And I'm halfway there on the hexagon-rectangle TeaRoses.

Very restful colours, and I certainly need those today.

Progressing on the hexagons

Not much progress on any Sunflowers.
BUT, I have some rows together on the rectangular hexagons, or TeaRoses as DH would have it. One third of the top is now together, and they are, even if I say so myself, looking good.

Now, if only the joining of blocks into strips, and the joining of strips into wider strips, wasn't so mind-bogglingly boring, I might be persuaded to work faster, but procrastination lures around every corner, and sometimes even dances right in front of my eyes.
And you know what Oscar Wilde said about temptation. Whoever can resist a temptation, doesn't deserve it.
I am very deserving today.

And just because, here's my kitty basket-case. Most of the cat is rolling over the edges, and bursting out over the top, as dough which raises, but you see, there are some blocks in that basket, and as long as I persist in sitting here, without a quilt laid out for her to rest on, she has to make do.
Basket case.

Here comes the Sun(flowers) 1

Today the sun was - surprisingly - out to play, so I sat me down on the veranda, mug of tea and some stitching at hand.
Sunflowers !

I have been in love with Sunflower quilts ever since I saw a picture of one in 'Lone Stars' (Texas Quilt History book, volume 1), which was - incidentally - my very first quilt-book. And I have wanted to make a Sunflower quilt ever since.

I have had recurring searches, trying to find a pattern or a way to make this easier to construct, but every single pattern seemed to involve about a zillion little bits that needed to be cut terrifyingly precisely, and then curved seams galore, or, applique of curves galore. And frankly, I didn't have the heart or the courage to commit to it.

BUT, then Linda Franz issued two sizes of Sunflower templates (Inklingo), and ... well ... what can I say ... I just had to do it. I have already shown 4 small Sunflower blocks, made with the 6" collection, so here is the first 12" Sunflower.
It is 'plain', not double, just a Sunflower.
And I love it, but ...
... there's always a 'but' with me.
The centre fills too much, and is too uninteresting.
And it's almost too green
And I haven't (yet) decided what to do about the background.

I'll try shaking things up, one parameter at a time, and with any luck, by the time I have stitched 'That Perfect Sunflower' I'll have enough blocks for a quilt.

Field of Flowers Finish

And I have a finished project !
The first one in years. Literally !
"Field of Flowers", which is shown above and to the right. The colours on the above picture are more true to the real thing than is the full picture on the right.

Shown sleeping on the quilt is my - occasionally - cute kitty, Josephine. In my mind (and hers) she's a terminally cute, tiny almost-still kitten. In the parallel universe that everyone else inhabits she's a slightly overweight, middle-aged cat who talks (too) loud, when she's dissatisfied (and she is frequently), hogs the covers at night, terrorizes any new cats that might come under her radar ... BUT, then she lies down on a quilt, rolls into herself and falls asleep, and she's as cute as can be. It isn't just sleeping dogs one should let in peace.
Quilt is made with the Inklingo Drunkard's Path and 6" Sunflower collection, and with oodles of scraps and F/4s (and F/8s and F/16s) from my stash. And if you click on the smaller picture, you'll see it in a larger format, and will be better able to see what it really looks like.

Quilting in Progress

Well ... quilting is sort of in progress.
It is quite difficult to get up from the current project, and go wash hands or something of that order, because when I come back to the machine, this is what is in progress.
Yes, she looks dead cute our kitty, but it does hamper my style and progress, particularly because my backbone seems to be made of marshmallow when it comes to waking up kitties, kiddies and other cute critters.
I did lift her up, and quilting commenced ... eventually.