The weather in this province is enough to drive you nuts this year.  First we had snow in April and now rain all weekend and cold.  This is the first time I can remember having to turn the furnace on in May.  The trailer opened last weekend, and this weekend I spent Saturday and Sunday inside with heater running,   I did get to watch the 3^rd season of Game of Thrones.  That is one of the things I love about the trailer, I choose a series and on Friday and Saturday night after 8:00 pm I watch the series and knit or crochet or sew.   I finally finished 3 dress potholders for a lady on one of the quilting blogs who doesn’t crochet. 

 

 

 I do like crocheting these dresses but don’t really want any for me.  I am working on a knitted circular sweater for me just like the child size ones I made.  I’ve also decided that my goal for this Summer is to finish the hexagon quilt I’ve been working on.  I like it as I can carry the individual hexagons around with me, and work on putting them together on the weekend.  Of course I’ll work on some other projects that I have on the go.

A little knitting

Tuesday seems like a great day , the trailer opens this Friday and next weekend is a long weekend.  The weather is beautiful right now with temperatures in the 70’s, even the tulips are in bloom.  I’ve decided that the rest of this year will be finishing up projects I have going and not starting new ones, or if I start a new one then it will only be to use up my stash of yarn or material.   This past week I put the quilting aside, and did some knitting.  A friend was knitting this pattern which was free at http://www.elann.com/commerce.web/product_search_results.aspx?keyword=pinwheel%20sweater .

I really loved the look of it, and have tons of knitting worsted yarn laying around, so I knitted up 2 child size sweaters. 

Here they are on 2 dolls I have, they would fit a  2 or 3 year old.  The first picture is not too bad, unfortunately the second one the colors are slightly off as I took them with a flash.

 

 

I would love to make the adult one in the colors shown on the elann site, but for now I’ve started and adult size one with some yarn I have on hand.  At lunch hours right now I am crocheting a dress potholder for a fellow quilt blogger that doesn’t crochet. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



Spring is here

April 25, 2013 Thursday

We are finally getting spring like weather, the question is will we get any Tulips this year.  This is what are Tulips looked like on April 14,2013

 

The plants are still alive but no flowers yet.

 

I ended up making another 2 mug rugs.

 

I love doing paper pieced hexagons, or anything hand sewed as they are so easy to carry with me in my backpack to work.  I should make one more of these so I have a set of 4. Another thing on my todo list.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I also have diamonds that I paper piece, here is one of the miniature blankets I’m working on,  I just need to hand quilt it now. This was a fun blanket to make, altho I had to rip out a few blocks, as our new puppy decide she didn't like a few of them and chewed them.  My fault tho I shouldn't of left it in a place where she could get it.

I jopined a group on yahoo a month ago called smallquilttalk.  I love this group each month they have a mini quilt to work on, by doing them I learn so much.  I did these 3 mini quilts for the April month one.  After doing them i can see where I really need to take more time in making sure the blocks go together right, with this small of work when things don't match it really shows.

 

 

I also finished a minature scrappy quilt for my dolls.

Just took quick pics of theses blankets this morning before leaving for work.

Only 2 more weekends before the tailer park opens, then I get to go and spend my weekends in the country.  I so am looking forward to sitting around the camp fire and chatting with friends, and doing some hand sewing.

 

 

 

Spring is finally here

It has been such a long winter, at times I wondered if spring would ever get here. This week is the first week that I have felt there is hope that Summer is comming.  Its a sunny day and not too cold, and the snow is nearly all gone.  I've been busy this last month with starting a new job, ok not really a new job but had some  responsibilities added. I have been quilting every night, I've discoverd minature quilts and my newest interest is mug rugs.  Here is a mug rug I just made from some hexies that I had left over from one of the minature quilts I was working on.  the minature quilt is finished and pinned but is waiting to be hand quilted.  I decided the mug rug would have no right side or wrong side, so each side has 19 hexies.  I then put batting in between and sewed them together.

 

 As you can see I keep my pens and pencils in a cup on my desk at work. 

March already!  The snow is finally starting to melt.  I shouldn’t complain about it, I love living in a country where we have the four seasons Each season has its good points, it just seems winter lasts longer than the others.  I’ve been busy working on miniature quilts, I am really enjoying doing them.  When I started doing miniature quilts  I thought they would go much quicker than full size quilts do,  but they take a long time to make.  The miniatures I am making are mostly done with hand sewing, so I can carry it around with me and work on it when ever I get a few minutes.  The one I have been working on is one made of Hexagons.  I love the look of scrap quilts, and have been making this one with hexagons.  I wanted it to be big enough to be a bed quilt for my 18” doll. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This quilt did take me awhile to do, first I had to cut out the paper templates, then baste the material around the hexagons, then I needed to sew all the hexagons together.  I then added the orange border which has become my favorite material, I used it in the easystreet project and decided to border this quilt with it, I then finished the quilt by hand quilting it and adding the white binding.I really like the quilt and am thinking about doing a large quilt like it, but right now I am working on 2 other miniature quilts one using the starburst and one doing blocks. 

 

 

 

 

 

I love block quilts!! I think it was one of my favorites when I first started looking at quilts.  I will do a miniature quilt and might even make a baby quilt also using the blocks.  Both are paper pieced so I can carry them back and forth with me to work.   I work in a college, so instead of carrying a purse I carry a backpack.  I always have something in my backpack pack to work on.  I’m always afraid that I might be at work one day and the electricity will go out, and I’ll have to sit there with nothing to do. I even keep some hexies in my top drawer just in case. I want to work on the miniatures tonight, but sigh it’s my sister-in-law’s birthday this weekend an I’m knitting  her a decorative scarf and will have to work on that this week.

Monday morning. Another week I’m getting tired of winter.  This is what it looks like living in a city during the winter.

Walking the dogs is the one thing that gets us out during the winter. There are still fun things too, even tho we are getting snow everyday the weather is still on the warm side, so there are alot of snowball fights going on.  Just can't resist making that snowball when hubby is in range.

They are calling for snow for the next 2 weeks, not a lot just a scattering of flurries.

 

 

I look forward to the weekends because I get to sew then, during the work week I find by the time I get home had dinner, I don’t feel like getting out my sewing machine.  This weekend I managed to get this Dresden plate runner finished. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It is the size of a runner but I made it with the intention of hanging it above my bed.   I also finished putting together the other Dresden plates, this will be a lap quilt when it is finished.

 

 

 

I collect dolls and love making things for them.  This is one of my favorite dolls she is 18 inches tall, I knitted her this nightie and she gets the lap quilt I made for her.  

 

 

 

My brother is making me a bed for her I can’t wait, so I’m starting a bedspread for her this will be flying geese randomly spaced through it and the rest will be white.  I cut out some squares for this gees last night, and some 2 ½” squares for another blanket I want to make.

I will look high and low under and over...

 

 

 

 

February 19^th already, the winter is coming to an end.  I have a hate love relationship with February, it is a short month ok one day less does count as a short month, but then there are no holidays in February. Most people have some of kind of holiday, but not here in Quebec we return after New Year’s and the next holiday is Easter, which is not till March 29^th this year.  It has been a long winter, I started a “new” job at the end of January, well I’m still doing the same thing I’ve done for the last 25 years answering to the same boss, but am getting paid more for it. I also had a leg infection for the last month or so, and its finally cleared up with antibiotics. So all in all I did not get a lot of sewing done.

 

 

 

  I did finish some things this weekend, I finally finished the mini quilt that was in the previous post, I also finished a purple mini quilt, and a cushion to go with it. 

 

 

 

I finished 3 cushions, ok well almost finished them,  I just need to stuff them. 

 

 

 

 

 

 I also finished sewing the Dresden plates I’m working on to the background blocks. Will sew them together this weekend or maybe will get a chance during the week to do it.  I’m doing some cross stitch bears on white cotton, ok its 90% cotton.  I bought the material at a second hand store in Ottawa when I was there a few weeks ago.  I’ve cut the material up and am doing the bears in cross stitch on them, when I’m finished enough bears or tired of doing cross stitch I’ll sew them together to make a baby blanket.    I Finally got to my favorite quilt store this Saturday.  It’s on the south shore, and Montreal being an island it means going across a bridge, which can be slow for any reason. Well Saturday was a nice day so we went over, I do love this store it’s not big but has some beautiful material and the ladies that work there are always so friendly.  It’s on an Indian reservation, so I get to look at all the Indian crafts when I am there. Also there is no tax, so I save 15% right off.  I picked up the orange that I need for the border to Bonnie Hunter’s Mystery quilt, some white cotton, because I seem never to have any white material on hand. I have been thinking of doing a wall hanging and maybe trying my hand at applique, so I picked up some blue that looks like water, some blue that looks like sky and some green for trees and a meter of this material that looks like birch trees.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I also want to make a mini quilt using the blocks that are in the purple mini quilt but doing the inner squares in different colors then the outer square in white.  I made the mini quilt using a paper piecing method that I found on the net.  Do you think I could find it again, well I am stubborn and after searching for a few hours, I decided I must of saved it, and of course http://www.quiltime.com/quilts_pdf/ddiamond.pdf I finally found it, the squares are printed at the bottom of this pdf. I now have something on my agenda for this weekend.