Making Progress

After a mid-spring slump in the craft/creativity department, I feel like there's fresh wind in my sails. I resumed knitting this bright shawl, hopefully to finish soon and get to wear once or twice before the summer heat stays for good.


I promised myself a new quilt to spruce up our futon for guests. I figured since they have to sleep on a flat, lumpy futon, at least they can have a pretty quilt to use! Here's my first attempt at a layout for the quilt:

I sewed the strips for these half-square triangles incorrectly, so much of my sewing time lately has actually been un-sewing: ripping fourteen 44" seams and then sewing it all back together the right way is complete drudgery! I'm almost finished, and then I can finish this layout. I'm aiming for a 60x70" quilt.

Each colored triangle is made of 1.5" strips pieced together. I was inspired by this quilt I found on flickr. And why are half-square triangles called triangles when you end up with a square??

Good morning!

I'm slowly starting my day, coffee in hand. I'm thankful for warm spring weather and sunshine, but these make it hard to do my work inside! The kids find it hard to concentrate, too.

As I look out my back window, this is what I see:



Our new deck in progress! The sewing and knitting have paused for a bit while our efforts are here. But not for long! I have some fun shawls I want to finish knitting, and a lace knitting class to finish teaching!

Two more weeks of school - we're pressing on (and praying for rain so we're not tempted to play outside!).

Enjoy your day!

Bloomers!!

Divided skirt. Culottes. Skort. Bloomers. They're all one and the same: a pair of big, loose fitting pants that looks a lot like a skirt. Just the thing for active little girls!

Great for climbing trees!

Or getting down to see nature up close!

Or just sitting around and being cute!

I will add that my daughter selected her own fabric, from the line Gypsy Bandana. There are so many cute prints in this line, but "Sari Blooms" in green was her favorite! The pattern is from www.mariemadelinestudios.com - their Tessa Bloomers which come in a huge range of sizes! This was a FAST, EASY pattern. Really fast, maybe 90 min or less if you have all your stuff organized. I added about 3" to the length for Miss Legs, also I did french seams everywhere I could. All other seams were zigzagged to finish off

I think a pair in white edged in eyelet would be a great pair of "pettipants" for under skirts! A mama-sized pair may be the answer to my cello-playing skirt wardrobe issues.