Cathedral Window pillow WIP

I've been having great fun figuring out how to do cathedral window blocks so I can make a pillow for a friend who needs more fun cushions on her couch. It's definitely a learning curve, although the process itself isn't hard, it just has about a million steps. I've discovered that it's the points that make or break it, so I'll have to be more careful with those mitres next time I try it - which I think I will. I'm using this tutorial at House of a la Mode.

A question for experienced quilters about templates - I've been using a thin cardboard one to form the blocks, it's just a big 15" square that you use with an iron to mitre corners and fold over the edges evenly. The cardboard hasn't really held its shape all that well with the heat of the iron, and I think it's partially the reason why my corners weren't perfectly mitred. What would you recommend instead? Can you iron template plastic?

SMS MBOM September

Ack, it's been a bit quiet around here lately! I think I'm suffering a bit from having so many things to do I don't know where to start and consequently don't do anything - my instinctive reaction to stress and not exactly the best way to cope with it! So instead of painting the rooms I've painted a side table and instead of tackling larger sewing projects I've done another Sew Mama Sew MBOM block and some stuffed animal sleeping bags (photos when finished). And no, none are indicative of starting small and working my along that way - they're all avoidance behaviour! As is Pinterest, Instagram and the internet in general...

Source: ravelry.com via Hazelnuts on Pinterest

This was a super-challenging block for me as I've never done triangles before and the instructions were a bit vague when it came to piecing the angles together. After a few false starts and unripped seams I got there! Though oddly, the top and bottom strips are too small - I'm sure I cut them right, but something happened somewhere so I'll have to cut longer strips and do that bit over.



And all three blocks so far



I'm generally not a huge fan of quilts with random blocks (I'd be hopeless in many bees for this reason), but so far I think I'll like it, and I guess given that there will only be 12 blocks in it I'll duplicate a few of my favourites to make it a good size. I like the scrappy wonky block the best but who knows what blocks are to come! If we're going to be covering a variety of techniques then I'm guessing there will be a circle and some curves (eek! might have to investigate this Curve Master foot), some stacking and cutting...a dresden plate or something like that? What do you think is still to come?

My next big adventure

Half way through a cathedral window block, originally uploaded by Hazelnutgirl.

I'm starting on a cathedral window pillow for a friend. Precision ironing takes time but it's quite satisfying!

Organic baby

I've finally finished up the quilt for baby Oliver



The fabrics are all by Mona Luna and come from Stitchbird - I also completely copied her quilt with the same fabrics. Why mess with perfection?

This is the first time I've sewn with organic cottons and they were very nice. The texture is more like sheeting, which means they don't quite behave like regular quilting cottons being a bit crisper and more densely-woven.

I made a huge mistake when I pre-washed them though and did my usual routine of "treat 'em mean" by putting them through a hot wash and the dryer, and then a hot iron. Well it turns out that when it comes to Mona Luna's organics treating them mean doesn't keep 'em keen, it makes them shrink a bit and fade along creases! Ahhh! As Lyndy found out for me subsequently, they recommend a cold wash - so let me be a terrible warning for you all. It didn't ruin them exactly, but the bears look a bit faded in places and I couldn't quite squeeze out 7 squares from each metric FQ one some so there is more duplication than I'd have liked.

I used a wool batting for the first time and while I like the loftiness and warmth it has, it doesn't have the drape I'm used to with cotton and, combined with the crisper cotton fabrics, is quite stiff. But that might be the batting itself, perhaps if I went for something more expensive than Spotlight's version it might be nicer?



I do love it and the crazy brightness though, and I couldn't resist getting a bit extra of the Swedish Forest one with all the animals for me. Not sure what I'll do with it though! And Lyndy, you should try and get in some of the Woodland Party print to go with the others, it's gorgeous!

My Web

I just updated Firefox and it had this fun little quizzy thing when it restarted that promised to 'visualise my web' and what the hell, I don't have much else to do tonight! If you click on this link to it you can see what each symbol represents, but they're pretty self-explanatory I'd say



Two things they got wrong: I am not in the U.S.A (Statue of Liberty) and I have no idea why they thought I was (perhaps in their little world they think the whole world wishes they were?) and I'm most definitely not the life of the party (party blower). But otherwise, yeah not bad!

Ooops

I seem to have forgotten to blog recently! No real reason other than having a guest over the weekend (who was using my computer in the spare room) and generally just not having things to blog about. I've been working on a quilt for a friend's new baby, but there hasn't been a huge amount of craftiness going on recently. But hey, this isn't just a crafty blog, even if it seems to be, so how about some pretty photos?

When our guest arrived on Friday morning I took him out for a walk along the harbour edge to stave off jetlag, and we found a whole bunch of kina shells (sea urchins) that someone had collected and eaten and the spines had all fallen off subsequently. Personally I wouldn't eat them, they look like snot, but the outsides, well they're just gorgeous

And the insides of the shells are pretty cool too

Hopefully regular programming will resume soon, although there is the small matter of two rooms to be painted...

My new sewing box

My sewing box situation was rather dire up until a few weeks ago, a couple of old biscuit tins and a cardboard box for my spools of thread to replace my old larger box that had finally given up the ghost. I never had what I wanted with me and it was a pain carrying two boxes around with things spilling out of them and everything all jumbled. I've always wanted one of those lovely wooden expanding sewing boxes, some of them stand on long legs so that everything is just where you want it. But they're rare and expensive and probably more suited to delicate ladies doing embroideries in their sitting rooms than being carried back and forth between the spare room and the kitchen table! The ones available from sewing shops are useless and hideously over-priced. So one day when I was in a big hardware store (Mitre10 Mega for those Antipodeans) I had a brainwave and went looking at tool boxes. Something big with lots of compartments was what I was after. And what did I find? Cherry red, expandable and pretty much perfect for $30, I present to you:

I love that the lids lift up so I can have all the frequently-needed stuff right there

And it expands out for all the other less frequently used things

I have great plans to make up cute dividers etc., which will probably come to naught, but it works well as it is. The only drawbacks are that my pincushions are too big to fit in the top trays and that the trays in general are fairly shallow, so no big objects. But I can make a new pincushion (oh the hardship!) and put the bulky objects somewhere else.

I'm a happy (and semi-organised) camper.