fiber friday - 2015 recap

Another great year for fiber projects! I tried counting it all up and here is what I recorded and remember (it's quite possible I've left something out!).

Yarn project were bountiful once again! Not quite as many projects as last year, but I nearly doubled my production just in the last three months alone!

When making this list, I was pleasantly surprised at how much sewing I did. Again, December really amped up my numbers as I made gifts for my favorite people.

What an awesome year 2015 was for fiber. I'm looking forward to more fiber friday posts in 2016! Hopefully some of those unfinished projects will move to my "completed" list :) Off to go work on my featherweight cardigan. I'm loving my Brooklyn Tweed Loft yarn and am eager to wear this sweater! Happy knitting and sewing!

To see details about knitting projects, visit my ravelry.com project page.

fiber friday

Wow, I've been knitting a lot this week! I worked furiously on the Glebe Shawl for my mother-in-law. I LOVE this shawl and hope she loves it just as much. Check out the slideshow below or my Ravelry project page.

Before putting it in the mail I took these shots in our yard, which seemed like a lovely, autumnal backdrop for this back-to-school gift.

I also worked one morning on one point of the center star of my Midnight at the Oasis for the QAL. I sewed all 16 triangles together one morning before work. I have most of the triangles cut for the other 3 points, just working on how to organize my supplies. I want them to be handy and easy to grab so that when I'm inspired I can dive in! I saw a brief post on twitter about this idea of daily crafting and how to make it part of the routine. After reading the comments here are my ideas that I will try and implement for achieving my crafting goal this fall!


Craft Night! Choose one night a week where crafting is the goal. I'm leaning toward Thursday but without our fall schedule completely blocked out, it might change.


Break it DownBreaking projects into small tasks helps me feel accomplished. I aim to complete one task each setting. I recently did this with the baby quilt I made.

1. cut all the triangles 
2. arrange the triangles into rows then pin pairs to prep for sewing
3. sew all rows 
4. sew the rows into a top and add border 
5. make small fox for the back and baste the quilt together (quilting prep)
6. machine quilt the top and sew the binding to the front
7. Hand stitch the binding

That was the plan and I actually ended up finishing the whole thing in 5 days. When I completed something quilting I could assess the next step on the list and determine if I had enough time to complete another step.

Find a System
I like to create an assembly line and system to make things go smoothly. When I am sewing half-square triangles or something repetitive I set up the ironing board and sewing table as an L shape at the same height, I can plow through a bunch by chain stitching and eliminating the need to go across the room to iron.

Making a pattern you know is another way to help the process. Of course, I've not been sewing enough lately to want to remake items. Instead I keep trying new patterns. Perhaps this is a good one for me to try out this fall.

Fiber Friday

I finished the winter sea shawl! It's funny because I knit this in the summer in the woods, but I still love it :) it was a fun quick knit and great for working on during our road trip, movies and while listening to podcasts. I am so excited to officially block this when I get home. I did a makeshift blocking since I'm away from home because I wanted it to lay a little more flat for the photos.

 

I'm so close to being done with my whispering pines. After the shawl recovered from surgery I have just 58 more stitches to bind off. That picot binding is tricky for me so I'm taking it slow. Maybe next week I'll have photos! For now here is a photo of me working on the bind off while at Holland Lake. The island just behind me we dubbed "Whispering Pines" :)

In the fabric realm I'm considering joining this Quilt along and making this quilt. I have tons of fun vibrant colors and just need to figure out a good goal and rhythm for regularly working on it.

I cast on my guernsey triangle shawl and will have to give more details later. So far I'm taking it little by little so I do it well. I also need to get yarn for a gift shawl so lots of fun projects on the horizon!

 

 

Fiber Friday - gift edition

The main fiber event of the last 5 days has been a baby quilt for my friend's first baby. We worked together to pick fabrics and a playful pattern that felt like a good blend of our two styles. I cut the triangles months ago but didn't start sewing until last Wednesday.

I love the triangles and the zigzag quilting. I also enjoy the way the colored triangles pop off the light background on the front. When I was searched for a backing I fell in love with the dots especially as it is dark and contrasting. It seemed to pull the whole quilt together and kept this from being too much of a baby quilt and something that he could carry around as he grows up.

A fun part of this project is the challenge to add a fox on the back. She didn't want a thematic quilt but a nod to the woodland theme of the nursery.

I searched around Pinterest and decided to dissect a fox block that I saw repeatedly, so I got out my graph paper and ruler and went to work. He couldn't have turned out any better! And I love that he is peeking out of the corner of the quilt!

When consulting my quilt guru (my mom!) she suggested the little tag for a label. I am the worst at remembering to label gifts so this was a great idea as I was already handstitcheping the fix to the back. I wrote the baby's name on one side (blurred out on this image) and then the date and my name on the back of the tag.

I loved working in this project (despite the limited time I gave myself) and I certainly learned a few things:

• Piecing is fun! I loved making the fox block - perhaps it's time for more piecing?
• Triangles are harder than I remembered, they take lots of brain power and cautious working. Time for a break from triangles!
• I need to practice my hand stitching in a serious way
• I can finally make pretty corners on my quilts thanks to this video tutorial!
• I love using vibrant colors and big sections of black, white, or grey so the colors "pop"
• I like small quilts and have now made 4 quilts about 40"x40" - the perfect lap quilt/wall hanging/baby quilt
• Taking photos is important and sometimes precarious (thanks hubby!)
• 

 

 

 

 

 

Digital Art Project no.1

A colleague and friend of mine is moving away so we decided to put together a book of notes and bible verses for her. To fancy them up I digitized most of them so there was a cohesive look to the book. I broke my project down into 4 steps that I use with most digital project, with examples.

Choose a Size

For this project I chose to make each card 4”x6” because:

1. I could use a photo album to put the cards inside, and she can add photos to it in the future
2. This is a standard size of index card/photo paper for people to make their own cards if desired.
3. I could print 2 cards per 8.5”x11” sheet of paper or 6 from a 12”x12”

Choose a Format

The idea for the cards was for people to share a bible verse and possibly a personalized note to her or about why they chose the verse so I broke it down into these parts:

1. Bible Verse Location (ex: John 3:16)
2. The verse
3. Personal Message
4. Signature

Choose 2 Fonts

Two fonts is a standard in the typography world (at least from my experiences). Typically you choose one with a serif and another without. Free Fonts are easy to find with a simple internet search.

• The Message: I chose my friend’s favorite font (KG Beneath Your Beautiful) for the personalized notes because it looks handwritten. 
• The Verse: Rather than choose a serif I decided to go for clean lines since the other font is rather busy. I simply varied the size of the font for the “title” so that it stood out a bit from the verse.
• Signature: I ended up choosing a third font for the name so it looked like a signature. Breaking all kinds of rules here but it’s good to do it with intention :)

Choose Decorations

I wanted the book to have soft summery colors since it would be given to her in June, also the same month her first baby would be born. Here is the fun part! Pinterest and the internet are your friends here. Ready to get technical? Search for “free water color images” or “free digital scrapbooking art” and that’s it! In browsing you’ll see that there are many different templates and images available for your use. Once you download them, you can copy and paste the images into your document. Since this was a gift and not something I sold or made in mass production, I could use the images for free. The way I put them into my document is to make them an image that does not cause wrapping. In my program it looks like this and I will choose "None" at the bottom of the list which shows the image behind the text:

That way I can size it how I want, change the opacity and then put it behind the text. I try to not have too many words overlap so the image doesn’t take away from the message, but in some cases by making the opacity a low percentage (25% or so) I could make it faded enough to compliment the text. Perhaps a tutorial on this in the future, but hopefully that gets you started.

Here's a screenshot showing each of the elements I chose and the fonts/sizes I used.

So with a few text boxes made 4”x6” and some images layered underneath I was able to create beautiful cards for her book. I could’ve bound them into a mini book or put them in a box but this project seemed best in an album.

I’m excited to share some other digital art I worked on this spring including date night cards, a devotional and an end of the year gift for my students! Happy creating!