Welcome Home, Sajan!

Margaret is now a mommy! Sajan came home from Nepal in July and the whole family just couldn't be more thrilled. I wanted to make a quilt that would wrap him up in something as warm as a welcoming hug, as colorful as green grass and blue sky. I found some fabrics with pulltoys and kites and frogs and all sorts of things little boys love. And I found this super-fun strip-quilt pattern from the Quilts of Valor site. Quilts of Valor is an amazing group that creates and sends handmade quilts to comfort our wounded soldiers. They have a network of piecers, seamstresses, longarm operators, and quilters all over the country and they are also very generous in sharing their patterns. If you have a chance, check their site out and if you have a few dollars send them their way; they are doing very important work.

For this quilt you simply sew strips of fabric together in a 1,2,3,4,5 pattern, repeat the strips several times, and when you get to the end you sew the top and bottom together so that you end up with a big fabric tube.

Then you turn the tube and carefully cut strips the other way... so that you end up with a bunch of fabric "rings." By carefully "unsewing" the rings in order (between 1,2, then 2, 3, then 3,4, etc...), you end up with a bunch of strips that form a diagonal pattern of blocks. So clever, eh? Who thinks these things up!?

I am lucky to have a big porch and on the day i needed to make the quilt "sandwich" I was lucky to have a dry, sunny day with no wind! I pin a king-sized sheet right to the deck, and then I have plenty of room to smooth out and pin the layers. I had run out of acrylic "basting" spray, so i did it the old-fashioned way with a million safety pins.

For the backing I used this gorgeous vintage fabric I had on hand - I'd been saving it for something special and was so happy it blended perfectly with the colors in the quilt top.

Welcome, Sajan!
We are so glad you are here!

Bento Box Pillows for Mom

This was a quickie project for my mom, who made a gorgeous amazing quilt and had fabric left over to play with. I have been meaning to try the Bento Box pattern so she let me have at it.


This pattern is super-easy and fun... IF you have a rotary cutter and mat. If you don't... well... the cutting might be laborious. Of course, once you've gotten a rotary cutter & mat, any other type of cutting is going to seem archaic and laborious anyway, so just go get these amazing tools and watch a whole new world of sewing fun open up for you. No, I do not work for Olfa or Fiskars, but I welcome sponsorship invitations or kickbacks, haha! (I have no shame I have a ginormous student loan to pay off after all ;-) ]


I made my own pillow forms. I am always floored at how expensive pre-made pillow forms are, and since I always have yardage of neutral-hued cottons on hand, why not spend a few extra minutes whipping up my own? You can purchase by-the-bag fiberfill economically at Joann Fabrics (if you get on their mailing list they send great coupons every month) and stock up for occasions just such as this.

The decorative pillows are actually pillow CASES - I like to make them with a simple envelope closure in the back so you can take them off easily for washing & put them back on just as easily. If you want to get fancy you can use a button or toggle or other such closure but if you've made the envelope with enough overlap you probably don't need it.

Aren't they cute? I think this pattern translates well to traditional "country" fabrics like this just as well as more modern applications. I especially like how it looks when used for whole quilts - here is a gorgeous example, and here's another. I can't wait to make a full-sized quilt with this pattern!

new year, new (tree of) life

Well, better late than never! I just finished this set of quilted “Tree of Life” pillows as a wedding gift for my sister and her new husband, who actually got married last summer (!yes! i'm a little behind!). I started them several months ago, and then my sewing machine got all wonky and I had to put it aside for a while. I even borrowed another sister’s sewing machine, to which I promptly gave bad juju; hers started wonking up also. Feh!

Today I got my sewing machine out, twiddled with the knobs a bit and Voila! It works. I don’t know how or why and hardly care. But the Tree of Life pillows are done for New Year’s, which is fitting since in many cultures the Tree of Life motif is associated with new year celebrations. In Russia and in Turkey, for example, when Christmas trees were banned due to their religious affiliations, people loopholed the beloved custom into their culture by calling them New Year’s trees. In Vietnam, where the new year is rung in in the spring, the New Year tree or cây nêu is planted as part of the festivities. Or so says Wikipedia. Which totally means it must be true. ;-)

Probably the best-known of the Tree of Life symbologies is the Celtic version. The ancient Celts believed all living things were spiritual, mystical beings, not simply “natural resources” to be used for our own profit. In particular, the Celts believed trees were a source of great wisdom and that aligning oneself with the trees would allow you to walk between worlds -- the upper and lower worlds, that is. Trees, they believed, brought blessings from the gods. The imagery of the Tree of Life is often depicted as intertwined with its surroundings; and indeed the tree is perhaps the best symbol of this interconnectedness of all things; the roots reach far down into the earth for sustenance, and bring it up into “this world” to provide sustenance to other beings – oxygen for us to breathe, leaves and fruit for us and other beings. The leaves returning to the earth provide sustenance once again. With the image of the tree we are reminded of our own mortality, and interconnectedness with others.

With this, I wish you a very happy married life together, Brenda and Jeff. May your years together be happy and fruitful, may you always remember your interconnectedness with each other and your families.

May you grow together, always.

__________________________________

ps. another set of "Tree of Life" pillows is available in my Etsy shop: click here!

A few short for the upcoming three dog nights...

My foster dog, Dakota, has gone to live with his new forever family! I drove him down to his new home in Portsmouth, NH yesterday and he slept curled up with his head in my hand the whole way down. The lovely young woman who will be Dakota's new best friend has another dog for Dakota to play with and, in fact, her dog is super-shy and the hope is that Dakota will help bring the other dog out of her shell a bit.

It was heartbreaking leaving him there (those eyes! he was just so confused that I wasn't bringing him with me!) but I am confident that he is in capable and loving hands. Dakota is the kind of dog that is trusting and open to new people, and the fact that he bonded so strongly to me after being here for so short a time (he was here for a month, but he decided I was trustworthy after about four minutes) is a great sign that he is able to adapt and form attachments to new people. I, on the other hand, am having a bit of a hard time with it! I sure will miss that goofy, loveable guy. And, you know, now I'll be down by two when we have another "three dog night." Heating oil is coming down in price, that's true, but for me, a couple of dogs on the bed is better than a nice warm quilt or cranking up the furnace. Better for the environment, too, because you can turn that thermostat down a few notches at bedtime.

Adopting a dog is good for the planet! :-) If you're buying what I'm selling, you might want to visit petfinder.com for your next bedwarmer.

In the meantime, (speaking of the quilt option...) Here's what I've got in progress:

"Tree of Life" panels going into a modified log cabin design for pillows.

Strips for the "Pinwheels" version of the Bamboo & Pinwheels design.

You know, the one I couldn't wait to start and so I didn't bother ordering the pattern? Well, the bamboo portion was pretty easy but the pinwheels -- oy vey! I'm just winging it. If I can't get it to look like the picture in the pattern I'm just going to pretend I invented a new design. ;-)

Wedding Quilt

Well, it’s finally done, the quilt I started back in May. It is the “bamboo” version of the “bamboo and pinwheels” quilt that I blogged about last spring. I did most of the work back in May and June, then life got a little crazy and I had to put it aside for a bit while I put other parts of my patchwork life in order. This past week, however, found me happily sandwiching the quilt top to the batting & backing, topstitching along those dark green sashing lines, and attempting my first mitered-corner binding.

It’s definitely homemade. It’s not “square;” each of the mitered corners looks a little different, and there are puckers in some places. I am hoping the recipients will look beyond its imperfections and know that it was made with love.

While I was working on this piece, I was thinking about some of the similarities between relationships and quilts. A good relationship is a blending of two people, just like a quilt is a blending of different fabrics. If the fabrics are too much alike, there isn’t enough contrast. Things can get boring. It’s nice to have someone who can kick your butt if need be, or someone who can be up when you’re feeling down, and vice versa. But if the fabrics are too different, they can clash. The aim is for the parts of the whole to complement each other, play off each other. With a quilt, you start with a couple yards of fabric, you cut them up and put them back together in some creative arrangement that allows each to shine while at the same time making the whole add up to more than just the sum of its parts. A good relationship is like that. (I mean, that's what I've heard. Take all relationship advice from me with a grain of salt, or salt shaker...). Anyhow, that’s what I wish for you, Aaron and Nicole. That you always complement each other and that your differences will only be enough to keep life interesting. But most of all, may your marriage always be like a soft place in which you can find comfort and warmth.

Congratulations on your marriage, Aaron & Nicole.

Love, Auntie Annie

(and my quilt inspector, Dakota.)

"yeah. this one'll do. can I lay on it now?"