{handstitched week 8} Rejuvenated

My quilt has been rejuvenated, I on the other hand have not. The next round of piecing has made me totally fall in love all over again though.

I have been working a lot of extra hours because I am trying to go on a vacation the week of August 6th and I have not accrued much vaca time. It's only wednesday and I can feel it. BUT! I still have managed to find some time to sew. I am pushing myself to get the top of this quilt pieced before this weekend so that I can baste it on my parent's driveway. Spray basting and apartments really don't do well together. Then, it will be all ready for quilting during my 17 hour car ride.

I have been putting off my other projects from class in order to really power through the quilt. I plan to come back and finish them up in the coming weeks.

Other life exciting news. I get a new cube in my office. Doesn't sound exciting, but it is. I tried to tell my boyfriend about it, only to realize halfway through the story that if you don't work in an office, this is definitely not exciting life news. Hopefully someone will understand my joy! It is near windows. WINDOWS! Do you know how much I crave the sunlight? Granted, I won't be next to a window, but I will be less than 20 feet from a wall of floor to ceiling windows. I have already been gifted a plant by my co worker which I am so excited to probably kill. No, hopefully I won't. It is a cactus. Other than that, it is sewing, work, and sleep. O yea, and I eat, alot. I can multitask.  Hopefully Friday I will have a finished quilt top!

{handstitched week 7} I'm behind

It is official, I have fallen behind. Luckily! So has everyone else. Haha. Being only a week behind, I would like to think I am doing pretty well. I have all of the patchwork complete for my modern medallion quilt, two storm at sea blocks, almost my entire star blossom, and well...haven't made much more progress on the pillow, but it can wait.

Choosing the colors for my patchwork was really hard. It definitely tested my ability to pull fabrics and colors together that were not already part of a line. I went waaaay too bright with my first round of patchwork. After being incredibly disheartened by how bad it looked, I regrouped and went with softer colors. They still provide enough pop, without being overwhelming.

Side note, most of the time pictures tend to mute the true colors of a quilt, hence the reason for photo editing. This is the one time in my life where pictures make a quilt look brighter. The whole thing is actually much more muted in person. Weird.

Anyway, after conquering the patchwork, I was again puzzled by the storm at sea blocks. The problem I discovered was that I had too many options, too many prints I wanted to include, and too many colors to work with. I really should have tried to do the whole quilt from a specific line of fabric. Once I began to simplify the block and the color choices, I was re-energized. This is block number one. All four will be different, so hopefully in the next few days I will have the rest finished for show and tell.

I have also learned during this process, that I am not comfortable with warm colors. I love buying fabric in shades of pinks/reds/oranges, I get freaked out when I use them in quilts. It never looks as perfect, placid, or comforting to me as it would if it were made out of cool colors. I was really trying to break that feeling with this quilt, but it is definitely haunting me a little. 

In my spare time (cause that exists) I have been paper piecing the star blossom that Rachel created. Hers was stretched wall art, but I plan to make 4 (four!?!...eventually) and put them in frames in my living room. Here is the progress on blossom number one. 

And thats all for now. Back to the grind!

{handstitched week 6} an epiphany....and paper piecing my life away

So in my last post, I lied. I haven't done anything creative and blog worthy since then. Why? Because I have been consumed by my handstitching class. Not only is it crazy fun, but it is incredibly fast paced. I was wrestling with the guilt I was feeling for not being a good blogger. I just didn't/don't have time to create new projects while also trying to keep up with my class. I took this class with every intention to give it my all and keep up with the project pace, so that is what I have decided to do. I will continue to post updates about the cool things we make, but I am going to let myself off the hook regarding writing tutorials and new, original projects. The class is only until August, so I don't feel like I am giving up on my blog forever, I just really want to enjoy this class without any extra self induced pressure. I apologize for anyone who will be finding me extremely boring for the next four weeks, BUT I am learning so many interesting skills to incorporate into my future projects. Thanks to everyone for bearing with me, and here is a taste of the latest projects I have been slaving over!

After I finished my embroidery, I went to work on these Sashiko coasters. They were so fun to make and I am totally in love!

Now, I have 3 english paper piecing projects to knock out! Back to basting!

{handstitched week 5} a blogging hiatus

I have been without the power cord to my computer for one entire week. Whaaat! At first I was incredibly dismayed, and then I began to enjoy the internet silence and lack of stimulation. It was a nice breather, however unplanned it may have been. I am sooo happy to have my computer back online now. Here is what I got done while on my internet blackout.

Yep. That's right. It. Is. Done.

O my bananas that took a long time, but I feel so accomplished. I am still pretty behind. Rachel figured we would be. Yesterday and today, I started my Sashiko coasters and they are just flying by compared to the embroidery for the quilt. Hopefully by tomorrow, I will by all caught up and ready to start my English Paper piecing. Now it is time for bed, but stay tuned for some actual 'I have had time to sit at my machine and do things' blogging.

Sewing binge

Yesterday I went on a bit of a sewing binge. I had a whole bunch of bee blocks to do to catch up as apparently it is now July, as well as a block to dream up for the Believe circle of do. Good Stitches. Here are the end results.

Kristen in We Bee Modern admired a quilt that was done by Rita of Red Pepper Quilts and asked us to make blocks that had the same feel using the block on page 162 of 99 Modern Blocks. The block is called Seeing Double. 

For We Bee Modern Too, Jennifer sent us some fabulous fabric and asked us to make a block called Night and Day on page 120 of 99 Modern Blocks. I can't wait to see how the entire quilt turns out. It will be so bright and lovely!

For the month of June, the Believe circle was asked to make a 16.5 inch block with stars. It could have multiple little stars, or one big star like mine. I was planning to have two, but I did not realize how big the star would finish when I started making it. There was obviously a lot of forward thinking. So I went with one big giant star. The quilt is going to be fabulous!

Since July is my month to be the quilter in the Believe circle, I chose a wonky square block. I don't know what the true name of the block is, but I know I like it. I told the ladies to get creative with the size and placement of each of the rings and to use a red/cream/blue color palette. Not 4th of July colors though. More like playful boy colors. Hopefully it will turn out wonderfully!