Big Quilt

As you might have gathered I am not an accomplished quilter. I do only easy and VERY easy quilts and even they have plenty of mistakes to show that they were handmade.

I have managed to produce five quilts since I started blogging and actually five quilts per se and none of them have stayed in the house. They have been thrown together for special occasions for special people. I admit that I have fancied them all and been a very bad elf coveting my gifts to others.

So I made this quilt - I won't tell you as yet why it was made other than I really wanted to have a quilt staying put in this house. Due to circumstances I have not made the "dedication patch" for it either. It will be used in the little bedroom, which is under re-decorating and will be showed later, when finished.  All this won't stop me having a tah-dah moment though and show to you what I have made. All sorts of things are planned for this room and I will show the bits, when I have made them and in the end show the whole room. Here the quilt is shown on our bed.

I really, really like this one. It is the largest one to date I have made and although it took some time to make, it was not that difficult. The pattern you can see in it is my own design, but I would guess that it might be a traditional pattern anyway, having a name. I just don't know the name as I am not that well versed in quilt matters.
The reverse is red and the binding polka dot.

So indulge me and see my quilt from many different angles!
The centre of the quilt:

My two favourite fabrics in this quilt (although I like all of them A LOT and I absolutely adore the owls above). I was planning to quilt it in the groove, but decided that I liked the top stitching. Certainly not the tradition, but I don't care.

Other colours

Happy heap

Baby Yogi

I go to a yoga class weekly and this winter one of the ladies gave birth to an adorable little princess K. The Yoga teacher was collecting money to give something to the newcomer and asked me if I was up to making the baby a present as it would be nicer to give a unique gift.

I think that it is a hoot sewing baby things, because so little goes so long. We agreed that I would make one of those baby sleeping bag dresses, as they are handy. I was very sure that I had a pattern for those somewhere, but alas no. So I got to the Ottobre site and had a look through their back catalogue. Luckily there was one in 5/2006. I had thought of making an apple green one, as the project started before the baby was born. I had eyed a lovely jersey for it, but when the pattern arrived, it said to use cotton fleece outside. That was not widely available and at this point I luckily knew that we had a princess and went for fuchsia. I still made the lining of the said apple green jersey and comforted myself with the fact that if the Mum really hated the colour, she could use it inside out, and nobody would probably notice.

Because the sewing of the sleeping bag was just so easy I felt as if I had cheated, so decided that we needed to give a bit more. I looked in the same magazine and found a pattern for this.

I used a thrifted XL ladies' cardigan as the main material and the skirt bit is Marimekko jersey from my stash. The little princess goes to mums&babies yoga class and has reportedly been admired in her personal yoga gear.

Dresses galore

I bought red "kivet" fabric from marimmekko in Finland last summer. (Yes, I know, mad picture, but hey. I am not great at taking these "in the mirror" images). I had a dress of sorts in my mind for the autumn and winter. Well, it never happened. Then just before the red nose day I got my act together and made it, so I wore it for Elf son's delight on the red nose day.  I found a new pattern and the length is just right to be used as a dress or a tunic. I rather liked this new addition to my wardrobe and as I had managed to get my paws on MORE marimekko fabric, this time black, grey and white "unikko" I decided to make another. The fabric was provided by my aunt who came for a visit and brought not only this, but another piece as well AND some lovely hand towels AND a lovely bracelet from aarikka with their trademark wooden beads.  This has been used to distraction, especially with my black and white dress.

I decided to change the pattern just a bit and drop the sleeves. I absolutely loved how it came out. This dress has been used just as an everyday dress, to a wedding breakfast and to a garden party where the Queen was the guest of honour by just changing what I wear with it and the accessories.  Good going for a dress I would say. Thank-you Auntie A!

A summer without a green garment wasn't going to feel right and as I was on the roll and devastated by the fact that I ONLY had two of these tunic dresses I made a third one, this time from white polka dots on olive/lime background.

Because I live in the cool Northern England, I often wear a t-shirt under the dress, either with short or long sleeves. I have practically lived in these three garments since they were made. I force myself once in a while into something else for a day or two to convince my environment that there is indeed more than the three dresses in my wardrobe. I don't really know why, because who cares even if I only had three garments I really liked. Actually I quite like the idea having only few clothes, using them until they die and then getting/making new ones. Most of us use only 20% of our wardrobe regularly, I read somewhere.

Fairy Wings and such

Here is a NEW project. Elf Son was invited to a birthday party of a friend's daughter and you know the rest of the story. I don't like giving plastic and handily had time enough to make something for the princess.

The bag I made for another little girl here was still a viable idea and reports that the said item is appreciated were heard, so I made one of those as the main present.

I don't use any patterns, just sketch what I want to embroider free hand with an indelible marker and then consequently embroider something else! (This is how it seems to go every time).

 This time I did not want to fill the bag with writing materials and such, because this is a very different princess from the other one. She loves dressing-up. I thought that a pair of home made fairy wings might just be the ticket.

I used just normal dress net double and sew the edges together, I then put some wire around the edges and finished off with pink lace. I chose to use elastic around the shoulders for the fastening. This was sewn into a cotton bit in the middle of the wings and I used fliseline to make it a bit stiffer. I decorated with craft "jewels" on both sides, so the wings don't have a "back side". Have you helped any little faeries to get wings?