Still going

I'm still working on my doctor who stitch along. I just finished the seventh doctor. The stitch along ended on July 31st, but I'm still moving along at a slow but steady pace.

Four down!

Still working on my doctor who stitch along.  I have four complete, only eight more to go!  Then to make them into a quilt. Working slowly stiching while watching TV. 

I've been making dresses for my three year old. I've only done one so far, but I have the fabric for three more.  I made it with knit fabrics, like a t-shirt, the fabric stretches.  I made it long sleeve, and it's been too warm for her to wear it, so I only have the pictures of her trying it on, but I think she likes it.

I'm also working on a space invaders pixel quilt, so I have a lot to do.  Now that summer is over, maybe I'll have some time to finish them.

Free Motion Quilting

Our friends are having a baby, and I decided to make a quilt for the new little one.  This is the first quilt that I made specifically to give away as a present.  All my quilts have still been paper piecing, and most of them came from Fandom in Stitches, so I looked to their free patterns to figure out what I wanted to make.  At first I thought since it's a girl, and her sisters like the Disney Princesses that I could make a princess quilt.  But I couldn't figure out which ones would be best.  Instead I went with the always classic Sesame Street.  It was an easy decision of Elmo and Cookie Monster.

I started the quilt top in February, and the baby is due in July.  I figured, no problemo, just two blocks and assemble, I could have it done by the beginning of June, plenty of time to get it quilted and finished.  However, time seemed to slip away, and all of a sudden it's the middle of  June and I still don't have the quilt top done.

I finally finished assembling the quilt top, but there is no time to take it in to get quilted, so I'll have to learn how to quilt and do it myself.  Lucky for me, my mother has been quilting for years, so she can show me all the ins and out of how to get it done.

 After a lesson, I decide to do a meandering pattern with loops, it's a pretty simple pattern, I can "make it up" as I go.  I took a video of me doing the quilting, it's not terribly interesting, but you can see the meandering and the loops.  When quilting, it's important to try to keep moving the quilt through the machine the same speed to keep the stitches the same length.  I think it turned out pretty good.

Here is a close up of the quilting.  The picture didn't really come out well, but you can see the meander and the loops.

I'm no longer under the thumb of big quilt, charging me an arm and a leg to quilt my quilts.  I can do it myself now.

I'm already thinking about my next quilt, and what pattern I'll be using for it.  It's a half finished space invaders pixel quilt.  I put it on the back burner because I wanted to finish this one before the baby is born.  For the record, it was finished in time.  I even made this blog post before the baby was born, but I had to wait to post it until after they got the quilt.  

And here it is.. complete

The IT Cross Stitched

More Cross Stitching!  

While I was checking etsy and craftsy for my next cross stitch project, I found a free pattern for Roy and Moss from The IT Crowd on the internet on dorkstitch.com (Dork Stitch).  If you haven't seen The IT Crowd, then go to netflix right now and put it in your instant queue.  If you don't have a subscription to netflix, then subscribe, and put it in your queue to watch next.

I didn't add all the embellishments on it because the Doctor Who Stitch Along started, however, I think the final product turned out pretty well.  

I also found instructions on how to frame a cross stitch on instructables.com.  

Have you tried turning it off and on again?

Doctor Who?

More needlecraft!

I played around with cross stitch, but now one of my favorite quilting websites, Fandom in Stitches, is having a Doctor Who Stitch Along!  We'll be stitching 12 blocks, and then putting them all together into a quilt, one block per week.

After searching the google machine for instructions on everything having to do with embroidery, including how to transfer a pattern, how to stitch, how to start and end a thread, I started in on the first Doctor, William Hartnell.  He performed Doctor Who from 1963 - 1966.

I was hoping to get someone else to join me on the stitch along, and Sara decided she'll give it a try too.  Now we're going to have two Doctor Who quilts at the end of the project, but having too many quilts is a problem I can deal with.  For the record her first block is much nicer than mine.  However, I'm not worried, because when I learn something new, I can see my early attempts being sloppy, but I learn from each block and get a little better.

I have to say embroidery seems easier, and more free form than cross stitching.  I think I'll be switching over to doing more embroidery in the future.  

The designer for this block recommended two strand split stitch, so that's what I used.  It took me about three to four hours in total.  The next block is the second Doctor, Patrick Troughton, and the designer for that one recommends three strand back stitch, so that'll be how I'll be doing my second block.

TV Cozy

A few years ago I saw something on the internet that I just had to have, and I'm not sure why, because it's not really practical for anything.  But it looked simple to make and it was when I was starting and was looking for unique projects.

It's a TV Cozy!  I made it by taking a picture of a TV station that had the test pattern running, and then holding my phone up to the fabric choices at JoAnne Fabrics to get matching colors.  Back when I made it my TV was sitting on a TV stand, like most TVs in the world.  Once I had a toddler in the house who was at the age of not listening, and had a TV within her reach, I came up with a cunning plan of attaching the TV to the wall.  But this has the consequence of making my TV cozy unusable, since there was a bracket behind the TV.

The toddler just turned three, and we had a party.  I always wanted to fix the cozy, and with a simple clip clip, and a little sew sew, I can once again hide my TV.

Cross Stitch

So I was looking for something to do while I'm watching TV since my other crafts require me to "hide out" in the basement / crafting room. I tried knitting a while back, and I just didn't seem to enjoy it at all. Maybe I'll try crocheting someday, but not today! Today I decided to give cross stitching a try. I ordered one of the few non girly starter cross stitch kits from Amazon, a robot.  The directions were pretty bad, but luckily Sara and Google have done it before and they could help me with the basics.



 It was pretty easy, and didn't require much thinking. This is something that can be done while watching TV.  I already downloaded a pattern from the Internet based on the IT crowd, and maybe after I finish it I'll design my own pattern next.

We already decided that the wall on the stairs to the attic is the perfect place to put my completed cross stitch projects.