Catching up

It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything I’ve been working on. My health has been weird of late, but thankfully I have a new doctor who may be close to figuring out what is causing all my strange pains and what not.

Since I last posted I’ve done a bunch of little projects…

I stitched this up for a friend’s anniversary. She’s very involved with Starbucks and I knew she’d get a kick out of it. I had it framed at Michael’s but I didn’t get a picture of it in the frame. I’ll have to hound her for one.

I finished three of the blocks for the murder mystery quilt. The fourth had reverse applique and I got very hung up on the colors of my trees so I haven’t finished that one yet. I think I finally found some fabric I like, so that’s progress.

I made two of these little needle books inspired by the Crafty Gemini Creates YouTube tutorial. I added the little tab and snap instead of using a button and some elastic. 

I have little pages for tapestry needles with small blocks of Adia I zigzagged on, pages for pins and binding needles, little tabs for clips and safety pins. I am ridiculously proud of these little things.

I also signed up for three swaps: NFL, star blocks, and Harry Potter. I wanted to do some paper piecing patterns for those, and so I needed to teach myself to paper piece.

I made this with the intent of turning it into a wall hanging for a friend’s birthday. He loves rainbows. I’m binding it in the purple print. I initially tried to quilt it in a spiral, but it is much harder to do than it looks like in a YouTube video! I slapped on my BSR and did some meandering that started in the center and spiraled out instead. I also pieced the back together with some scraps and I really like how it turned out.

My sewing machine can also embroider and I took a class recently to learn how the functions work. I made a knitting bag with a pattern I picked up from urban threads.

I ripped apart a shoe bag and then boxed the corners when I sewed the sides back together.

I also put together a freestanding lace TARDIS for my friend’s wedding anniversary. Her theme was Doctor Who. I got the pattern from oesd.

And finally, I’ve been working on some quilts for pulse blocks. I want to send off a finished quilt by September and I think I’m well on my way.

I have big hearts in three shades of every color from the original pride flag. I’m going to intersperse them with paper pieced rainbow blocks.

The pattern is from sew mamma sew. I scaled it down a bit so they would be the same size. I’m not the best with gauging the size of pieces I need yet, so I think I’m going to make templates for all the background pieces and have them cut properly before I start randomly sewing. I have gotten very good with my seam ripper the past few nights.

So while I haven’t had any big finishes, I’ve done a lot of little things. Putting it all together puts it in perspective. I was feeling kind of down on myself for not doing much while feeling poorly, but all things considered, I’m gonna let myself off the hook.

I’m glad to be able to participate in something as important as the quilts for pulse drive. I can’t imagine the horror of being trapped in that club, or the hatred in that sick man’s heart. I am forever grateful that I grew up with a family that wanted me to be happy in my own skin, as my own person, and that they taught me that love was love. To be able to give someone a little bit of comfort with a quilt while improving my own skills in the process is such a blessing.

And on that note, I’m off to make more templates.

N