continuing education

I've bought a good bit of knit fabric this year,

some for clothes for girls,

but even more for clothes for me.

The trouble is - I haven't wanted to waste my 'good' fabric making clothes for the size I am,

because, you know, as soon as I have a nice wardrobe, I'll suddenly lose weight

and I won't have nice clothes anymore.

I finally convinced myself that that's just foolishness.

In the unlikely event that my fears come true,

well, surely I can buy more great fabric...
And in the meantime, I can wear nice, flattering clothes.

I spent a good chunk of the day yesterday 

designing a dress, drawing up the pattern, and sewing a muslin.

I started with a jammie top that fits well (in some places)

and a dress that has a flattering gathered bit under the bust

and sort of combined the two.

In the event that it actually fit properly

(as I was certain it would ~ it's that darn overconfidence thing, which is so silly, because when does anything fit me the first time?)

I took the time to make it properly, as well. 

Needless to say, it didn't fit well

and now I'm stuck not quite knowing what to do next.

Basically,

I've been doing what my kids do - charging ahead without the really having the knowledge necessary

 to ensure a successful outcome.

(speaking of - Josiah just came in asking if he could make the recipe he just made up..)

Granted, there is value to learning by failure,

but there is also value in taking advantage of other people's knowledge.

I have laid out for myself a course of study.

And while my nature is to want to buy all of these books at once,

I am going to limit myself to one at a time,

learning from each

before moving on to the next on the list.

(with the exception of the fitting book, which I once borrowed from the library and decided it was worth owning,

and can be using in conjunction with the other books in my 'class')

I probably should to try to get them on inter library loan,

but the whole not knowing when/if I'll even get a particular book

coupled with not being able to keep ILL books very long

has me leaning towards just buying them.

 I'm going to start with

then move onto

.

This is the fitting book that will used throughout the course,

It's great because it shows pictures of fit problems and explains how to fix them.

Although, ultimately, what I want to do is be able to address these issues during the pattern making stage,

so I don't even have fit problems.

Pipe dream?
Maybe.

The following books are more textbooky and focus on actually making your patterns.

(which the Cal Patch book above does also, but her clothing doesn't seem to be as fitted as I prefer. Being less textbookish, though, I figured it'd be a better place to begin as I am rather slow in learning new things...)

They are both highly recommended by sweet Florence who is an impeccable seamstress, and a bit of a perfectionist, too.

I may also buy this DVD, and if I'm still having fit issues after all of the above, maybe this book, 

which I've seen mentioned several times on various sewing blogs.

If I need to take things up a notch, 

as on optional addition to my class, I'll add

.

And of course, I still need to learn how to take better pictures, too....

gone wild

Josiah's pumpkin flowers

One day

when we still lived in Fort Smith

and only had a tiny yard to maintain,

Tyler - not wanting to mow the grass,

made up a song.

"How do you know 

that a blade of grass won't grow into a tree?

A great big tree..."

A blade of grass won't grow into a tree,

but what looks like a blade of grass at 2 inches tall,

just might.

He waits as long as he can stand it every spring to begin mowing for the season

because I'm always sad to see the wildflowers disappear.

For various reasons,

Tyler hasn't stayed quite on top of the mowing like he usually does.

And you know what?

I've loved it!

Now, I do appreciate the grass in front of the house kept reasonably short

(it's actually mostly grass ~ the rest of our land though, is far more weedy)

and if the grass/wildflowers in the back get fairly tall,

I don't mind paths being mowed 

to make getting around a bit easier

(I actually asked him to mow a small section a few weeks ago, when it bothered my burn to have to step very high)

but I have just been so thrilled to discover all the varieties of flowers

we have

right outside our door.

even when they're spent, they're pretty!

Since they are usually mowed down before they flower,

the only grass dwelling wildflowers I knew we had were the little bitty early spring ones.
(well, and honeysuckle and passion flower. okay, and elderflowers)

I walk around and wonder why one earth people are so eager to use weedkiller. 

okay, so these aren't flowers....

So many times this spring & summer I've thought that I'd love to catalog them, and figure out just how many different species we have.

Of course, it would require actively looking for them on a regular basis - some don't have a long season at all.

The indian paintbrush we found when we discovered the yarrow - was gone a week later.

passionflower

Just one more thing to love about living out here ~ all the wildflowers.

six things on Saturday

1.

Brandon and Tyler are making excellent progress on their shop/gym/man cave.

They finished the drywall yesterday

and everyone (except me) pitched in a bit to help mud it today.

Of course, the kids pooped out after a short while,

but the menfolk are still going strong.

I've been commissioned to make their dreams come true as far as paint and decor.

I'm excited.

and a little nervous.

My client isn't as great as Nancy was about articulating his wishes ;-)

2.

The girls were having a tea party.

I overheard Lily asking Lexi about school,

"And what grade are you in, little girl?"

"Eighteen!"

"Eighteen? Well, that's good. 

But you still have a hundred more to go."

Cracked me up!

3.

My burn is slowly but surely getting a little bit better every day,

but I gotta tell you,

I'm a bit weary of the whole thing.

I predict 2-3 more weeks of intensive attention;

Tyler says just a few more days.

I hope he's right.

This is one time I would dearly love to be wrong!

My sister brought me some Limu Wednesday as a gift from my mom,

and I think it has really sped up the healing process.

(thanks, Mom!!)

4.

I've been playing 'beat the iron' this afternoon.

Anyone else play that game?

Or am I just extra pathetic?

I wasn't real excited about my current sewing,

like I said yesterday - it's kinda tedious.

So I skipped ahead a bit,

and instead of trimming all 192 blocks at once

(for the 5th time!)

I trimmed just a few,

then I pressed the seam,

then trimmed to prepare for the next seam,

sewed the next seam,

and hurried back to the iron before it shut off.

I can do 8 blocks at a time.

9, and it shuts off before I make it back;

7 is a waste of a trip.

(yes, I could drag the ironing board to the dining room. But I don't want to today.

Besides, 8 is a nice even number.)

5.

Tony and Kacy get to move into military housing next week.

Kacy left with all of their belongings on Wednesday

and had an absolutely awful, horrible, no good, very bad time making it to California.

But she is there now.

So that's good!

The bad news is, they need a new car :-(

And all of their belongings? They're stuck in Tucumacari, New Mexico.

6.

Brandon participated in a work camp this week:

a bunch of teens and youth coaches bought the supplies, 

then painted several houses in the community - for free.

He's a great worker, that one is!

They had a dinner on the last day of camp, but he didn't really want to attend.

I asked if it sounded like torture to him, or if he didn't want us to have to mess with logistics.

(he's way more thoughtful of that kind of thing than most teens.)

He said, "Both."

Then he added,

"I just wanted to do the work. I really don't care about a dinner."

He's a keeper!

paper piecing tip

Foundation paper piecing isn't hard, but it is a little tricky,

because you kind of have to work backwards.

(It's also rather tedious, but I'm hoping the perfection of it makes up for that...)

I was having a little bit of trouble getting my corner pieces in just the right spot,

and since I'd cut my fabric so that I'd have as little waste as possible,

well,

I sorta had to get my fabric in just the right spot.

Every time.

(if my triangle piece of fabric is off even a smidge, I may not end up with enough of a seam allowance for sewing blocks together)

So I enlisted some help.

I got one corner piece on exactly perfectly

(never mind how many tries it took me)

and then

using my sewing glasses and Lily's Crayola light box*

I took one of my fabric pieces and traced the seam line.

Now, all I have to do

is place my foundation paper on the light box and line up the seam lines

then add the fabric that I'm going to sew next - to complete the square.

Then

I take my template fabric away

and I can sew on my line,

 sure that
(provided I didn't move the triangle while picking up the whole shebang and turning it over)
 I'll end up with a perfectly placed corner,

and proper seam allowances

every

single

time.

Clever.

*I'm not sure where she gets it from ;-) but Lily is a little battery miser.

I can't step away from my machine for even a second

(which admittedly usually turns into minutes and even hours...)

without her fussing at me if I left her lightbox turned on.

The boys have saved me from a lecture on more than one occasion. (Whew)

colorful chevrons and painted rocks

It all started with this,

a practice paper-pieced block I made using scraps from T's quilt.

(which looks really cool on the backside, too)

It was the middle of Spring Break week,

and my school-teacher neighbor friend came over for a visit.

The above quilt block was out on the table,

and she kept admiring it and petting the jewel toned pieces.

I was pointing out the problem with it

(the stitches showed - in the future I'll try newsprint instead of computer paper)

and she said it was beautiful anyways,

and I could just send it over her way if the stitches bothered me all that much...

~

Penny has had a tough time lately.

A really tough time.

The kind of tough times you wouldn't wish on your worst enemy tough time.

Now, I know a quilt doesn't really make anything better,

but I like to think it can make things a little more bearable,

because

for starters, it says somebody cares about you. A lot.

And hello - it's a quilt...

So, about a week before Easter, I decided I was making her a quilt.

why, hello, little grasshopper

I had pinned this quilt recently, and knew right off it would be perfect for Penny.

I keep Kona white on hand

and had several leftover solids from both TJ's quilt and Gramma's, 

so all I had to do was purchase about 6 more to round out the colors a bit.

I wanted mine bigger, so I went with 6" starter squares instead of 5" charms,

which, before shrinkage, made a 66 x 77 inch quilt.

Penny paints rocks.

She does everything from simple words to elaborate flowers spilling all over the place,

and I wanted that to be reflected in the back.

I tried to recall different words that she'd used on her rocks and used those,

and then I added 'friendship' to the mix.

Of course, my favorite 'rock' is the joy rock.

At 1 1/2 hours just for that rock, I was kinda glad I hadn't thought to add embellishments to my rocks until the last one...

Why you shouldn't make a label as part of your quilt.
I didn't quite finish in spring...

I knew I also wanted one big word on the back,

but I wasn't really coming up with anything, so I told Tyler is was his job.

I wanted it to be an affirming word, but not a 'preachy' one.

(like love - it could either be 'you are loved' or 'you need to love'...

(Not that I would put love on a friend's quilt. That could be weird....)

Peace was what he landed on after mulling it over and praying about it for a few days.

Of course - we all know about the problems I had with that...

I really liked the way the quilt I copied my inspiration quilt was quilted, with the pebbling in different colored threads,

but when I started making a list of threads I'd need, I quickly realized that'd be a little cost-prohibitive.

Even if I didn't order my preferred thread...

So I settled on a variegated thread that went with everything.

Only,

I don't really much like variegated thread.

So after I ripped out my error, (quilting with the quilt folded under itself - gah!) the quilt sat...

Now, I was dealing with major knee pain that made it difficult to sew, 

but that wasn't my only issue....

Tyler (who really didn't like my pebbling with variegated thread, 

and had told me that now that the quilt was no longer perfect (thanks to my quilting...) Penny would be more likely to use it) 

asked me if the reason I was dragging my feet on it was because of those horrible pebbles.

(He didn't say that exactly ;-) but he really didn't like that quilting!)

And I realized that 

that was what my problem was,

so I spent 9 more hours ripping out all of my quilting.

The only reason it only took me 9 hours was because I'm really not a good pebbler,

and where I should have had 3 or so lines of stitching right on top of each other, I had 3 or 4 lines right next to each other.

I determined that my only option, if I wanted to quilt with thread that matched each of the 38 different colored solids,

was hand-quilting.

So I went through my perle cottons and matched them up,

then got scraps of all the colors I still needed to match 

and spent an hour and about 12 bucks in Hobby Lobby buying embroidery floss.

Using thread heaven made it almost as nice to sew with as the perle.

When I first started, I averaged about 10 minutes per chevron-half

 to hand quilt (including needle threading and knotting) but by the time I finished, I was down to 7.

There are 84 half chevrons, so I estimate I spent about 11 hours on the hand-quilting.

(which kinda surprises me - I thought it would add up to more...)

I went with Remix again for the binding and several times while hand-sewing it onto the back

I was just so tickled with the perfection of it. 

It just matched so well!

Even with all the problems I encountered,

I loved making this quilt.

I loved using a ton of sizing and having crisp even mostly-matching-up-perfectly seams.

I loved pressing the seams open and finding the tiny little half square triangles.

I was so pleased with the floral print for the back - it's from Hancocks, but it is so soft and is just perfect for Penny, I think.
My hand-quilting is improving tremendously, to where the back actually looks pretty decent

I was quite thrilled with my first go at applique - until I washed it.

And had to fix it.

And embrace the fray.

But even in that, there is beauty ~ and the quilt may speak to Penny even more...

This one is actually a little tough to let go of.

I hope that she loves it as much as I think she will.

And I hope this quilt will bring at least a  bit of comfort and cheer to my friend 

for many years to come.

linking up with the amazing Amanda Jean's Finish it up Friday

Wednesdays with Gramma

Several months ago

I was talking with my mom,

lamenting the fact that Gramma has all of this family

and yet she spends pretty much all of her time alone.

I've been frustrated by it a lot over the years,

but couldn't ever figure out what I, a homeschooling momma living in a tiny house, an hour and a half away, 

could do about it.

Going to visit weekly, or even monthly wasn't really a realistic plan.

I don't know if it was Mom's idea or mine

(prob'ly hers)

but we cooked up a plan 

that I hoped my siblings would like.

We could all take turns visiting Gramma.

I didn't have to solve the problem on my own!

It's such an easy, great plan, it's ridiculous we haven't been doing it for years.

As soon as I presented them with the idea,

everyone was on board.

(well, one sister needed a little bit of persuading, but everyone else was in immediate agreement)

So

for the past several months,

My 5 in-country siblings (I have 3 brothers and 3 sisters, but one of my brothers lives in Latvia) and I 

have taken turns visiting Gramma every Wednesday.

She has something else to look forward to, and so do we!

It's a win all the way around.

I'm only sorry we didn't start a long time ago.

blew up my bloomin' shorts

16 years old.

Workin' at Western Sizzlin.

Pulled a pan of bakers out a 500 degreee oven where they'd been for the last hour

and set the pan on my arm.

That was a pretty good burn.

17 years old.

Workin' at Shoney's where I met my love.

'Bout lost a whole tray of plates and glasses,

but I didn't;

I steadied the tray with my right hand.

The hand that was holding a full pot of freshly brewed coffee.

Poured that coffee all over my left arm and leg.

Those were some mighty good burns, too.

Not all that long ago, 

hurrying in my own kitchen,

I got a steam burn that I had to ice for 3 hours before I could even consider going to bed

and kept me from hand sewing for a week.

No scar from that one, though, so I guess it's not really worth mentioning.

But it did hurt pretty bad, Pa.

The burn I sustained last night

while wearing these shorts?

Those burns don't have nothin' on this. 

~

A luna chick came after me

and bit me in the butt.

So to speak...

Stickers has a death wish

Tyler added a snail and a sucker fish to the tank about a month ago

in a last ditch effort to keep it.

He bought the aquarium from a yard sale for $5 last summer

and

knowing that I didn't really want one,

carried it around in his van for a few weeks before even telling me he'd bought it.

The nature table was the only place we could put it, so I gave up our nature table to his fish.

Who am I to say "no" to my husband's life long dream of a huge fish tank?

(granted, this particular tank is only 10 gallons...)

I've actually enjoyed the tank

(once all of his tiger fish died - they were just too frantic for my liking)

except that it got green all too quickly.

And the one job that I refuse to do, is clean out a fish tank.

Since Tyler has a kazillion things vying for his attention when he's home,

the fish tank was more often green, to varying degrees, than not.

He was just about to pack up the fish tank

and put it away 'til the new house, and try it again in a different location.

I thought we just needed an algae eater.

(He'd been told that the sucker fish get huge, and that he shouldn't get one,

but when I asked a guy about 'em, he told me they are like goldfish and grow in keeping with their tank.)

So,

in a last ditch effort to keep his tank,

Tyler used his birthday 'fish money' from Jeremiah

and brought home Stickers and Stealth.

And now, our fish tank is sparkling clean.

The only problem is, Stickers likes to leave the tank.

Twice now, I've found him out of the tank, brown,

and several other times I've found him hanging out at the very top of the tank, near the escape hatches...

Silly Stickers.