Posted on 26 Comments

focus on the importing

I received a fabric swap package from Jen in Tokyo today and it’s eerie how perfect it all is in every aspect. I’ve been brainstorming projects and sketching ideas the past few days and so many of these are just PERFECT for things I have planned. Jen, once again you’ve outdone yourself. You have such a knack for picking out things I’ll love. Thank you so much!





Posted on 15 Comments

this same wavelength

I’m feeling the stamp vibe too. I love the look of it so much. So raw and simple. I’ve been wanting to try my hand at carving some stamps for forever but I’ve had no idea what to make. I just had the thought – maybe I could try carving the little icons I drew for the sidebar. (well Tim has just informed me these won’t work. something about good negative and postive space. back to the drawing board)

Posted on 6 Comments

Robopolis

I know you’re not a robot geek like I am but I just had to share this great site I found while look for inspiration for my wee robot. It’s a French site, Robopolis. The Collection link has so many great tin repro robots. My favorites are…

skiing guy (Robot Explorer B-17)

and Neutron Bleu

oh, and to keep it crafty… how about these crocheted robots.

Posted on 14 Comments

hope I don’t get arthritis

ok Amy, I’m kicking off with one of those "I’ll get to it in my golden years" projects. of course it’s from one of my japanese craft magazines. interestingly, it’s from the first of such magazines I bought a year or so ago, and it remains my favorite project. guess you never forget your first japanese craft love.

a patchwork of crocheted knit, fabric and tweed hexagons. looks so flippin cozy!

and of course I’ll have time to make a matching pillow too.

Posted on 60 Comments

Plain Spoken – check!

I finally finished the Plain Spoken quilt I pieced together in February and I have Kim to thank. After seeing her stunning p.s. top for the Modern Quilt-Along I actually turned around and took another look at the quilt that has been hanging over the back of my sewing table chair for 8 months. I just love the bright rich colors Kim used for hers and was wishing I’d gone brighter on mine. Oh, yeah I did. I remember now — I love these colors! Funny thing is I’ve been working on a quilt design to use some of my folky prints and the solid colors I wanted to use were a mustard yellow and a dark dark blue/gray. Oh yeah, those colors are right here. You know when you crave certain foods because your body isn’t getting enough of a certain vitamin or something. That’s what this was like. I never got my mustard/gray fix and was planning new projects to sate that craving. Now I’m all set and can put that other project on the backburner and start working on my quilt for the Modern Quilt-Along, “Book Club“.

The quilting came out ok. Nowhere near as beautiful as the tiny little perfect waves I saw on this same quilt pattern at the FunQuilts studio when I took my class, but ok. It’s so difficult to quilt a big project on a home sewing machine that I’m always happy that it turned out at all. This pattern was funny because as I was yanking and pulling the quilt from side to side trying to make those turns I could feel myself making this crazy face — leaning my head to the side and grinding my top teeth back and forth over my bottom teeth. Too bad I couldn’t set up the camera to capture that for SPT!

Posted on 31 Comments

tie one on- dishtowel apron

Here’s my dishtowel apron for September’s Tie One On. Thanks for coming up with another great theme Amy. I didn’t have any twill tape on hand but I did have a big long piece of soft cotton embroidered lace that I tore off a thrifted sheet years ago. I think it turned out cute and once again proves that if you keep something around long enough it will find it’s destiny.