Off the Clock

I have spent so much time in the sewing room in the last few months that I need to come up for air.  A quick inventory shows that since the beginning of November I have: Finished the "Zen" quilt for stepson Finished the "Algonquin" quilt Made a wheelchair lap quilt for MIL Made a lap quilt for bestie Made pajama pants for daughter, son-in-law and 3 granddaughters Altered and embellished 3 t-shirts for 3 granddaughters Made knit pants for me Made "Dragonflies" quilt for middle granddaughter Phew! But I had the opportunity to get these gifts to the family and I can report back that it was all a complete success!  The jammer pants all fit well.  The lengths were perfect on all three.  I will add an inch or two to the rise for the smaller two if I make them again.  I just think they would be a bit more comfortable with a bit more room to bend over without them pulling down.  Daughter's fit perfectly and she says son-in-law's did as well.  For f...

 It's been almost three years since I finished the quilt for Granddaughter 1 , so I thought it was time to get one going for GD 2.  The girls currently share a bedroom and there's a good chance 2 of the 3 girls always will, so I thought it would make sense to use the same Irish Chain pattern and coordinating colours so that they will go together without being identical.  GD1's main colour was purple (#4 in the above pic), and I'm going with pink (#7) for GD2 and I'll use blue for GD3 when I finally get around to hers.  You may recognize fabrics #1, #2, and #3 from the first quilt, and #6 is very close to a previous fabric.  I really like the idea of using some of the same fabrics as it shows continuity between the quilts.  I'm not sure I will be able to do that with the third one but I will jump off that bridge when I get there. I'm pleased with how my points line up The quilt top assembled Quilt sandwiched and pinned I've never really kept track of the ...

  After making all the jammer pants  for the kids I thought that the granddaughters should have tops to go with theirs.  I don't have fabric in the stash to make plain white tees but I managed to find some at the grocery store.  Unfortunately they only had larger sizes, so I bought two 2-packs of girls size small, the smallest they had.   I initially had the idea of appliqueing a heart onto the front of the tees in the cheetah print from the jammie bottoms.  I went ahead and cut them out, sewed the border with a coverstitch from the Pfaff (I think it was #31), then sewed it down to the tee.   Then I thought that if they are all the same size then they need a way to tell them apart, so I embroidered round patches with their initial in them.  I used the last scraps of the pink flannel for this, having to sew a few pieces together to be able to hold it in the embroidery hoop!  At first I was going to sew it to the front of the shoulder...

  This is a Lutterloh pattern 249 from supplement 282.  When  I made this pattern last  I made some adjustments to the pants, but of course now I couldn't remember if I had actually made the adjustments to the pattern or just thought about it. Also, that was three years ago so my body may have changed.  So I decided I need to make another trial pair before cutting into the nice charcoal plaid in my stash.  I found this red plaid ponte in my stash that I figured would do the trick.  The print is asymmetrical so right off the bat I knew it was going to be a bit of a challenge to line up the print.  I managed to get the horizontal lines pretty much perfect but I've ended up with a slant across one of the legs.  At first I thought I managed to twist the pattern on the fabric trying to line up the print or that the print was printed at a bit of an angle.     It turns out I had mistakenly drawn the grain line running parallel to...

 Years ago I made daughter and son-in-law each a pair of flannel jammie pants.  His were black with white skulls and hers were pink with white skulls.  They loved them so much that they still wear them even though they are quite worn out.  Being that we are in the middle of a pandemic lockdown I can't go shopping for flannel so I decided to raid the stash and make them each a pair with what I had on hand. I did his first with a navy flannel with snowflakes on it.  I know he likes pockets in his so I used the Lutterloh jammy pattern for the pockets.  In hindsight they may not be big enough.  I think I will add a patch phone pocket on the side.  NOTE: for future pants use bag pockets in the side seams; they work better for him.  I used Simplicity 1605 in medium for him, with elastic waist set for 38" and an inseam of 33".  His hips are 41" (for future reference). For daughter I used a pink and black cheetah print on a white background....

I've managed to get caught up on finishing some quilts and starting new ones this year. First up is the quilt above intended for stepson's wedding. Life got very busy after I started it and then I thought perhaps they would get it for their first anniversary. Well that didn't happen either but it was only two months late for their second anniversary! It was all worthwhile as they love both it.  DIL is into new-age things and had her own meditation room, so along with the nature theme of the fabrics I thought "Zen" would be an appropriate name for this quilt.      Once I finished up with Zen I made a point of finishing the quilt for the trailer that I had worked on when Thor was so sick.  I initially wanted to name it after Thor but then decided I don't need to name it after him to feel his connection to it.  Being that I will use this quilt camping along with the theme of the fabrics and embroidery I thought "Algonquin" would be appropriate.  ...

Folded edges in front, zigzagged behind  Along with the pandemic 2020 has had devestating effects on our family.  My mother-in-law was hospitalized early this year and my father-in-law passed away shortly afterward.  Now my mother-in-law is in a long term care home.  Most of her personal support has been done by my sister-in-law who is doing her personal shopping among many other things.  Being in long term care means all her possessions (including clothing) needs to be labeled.  This is where I come in. I made a first batch on fabric stretched across the hoop of my embroidery machine.  I then folded all four sides under and topstitched.  They were fussy, time consuming, not very professional and the stabilizer made them stiff which would not be comfortable against the skin. The second batch I made with twill tape.  I was able to stretch them across the hoop without using any stabilizer.  This was much better.  The problem with twil...