Zelda's Fancy Hat: Lazy Daisies and Orange Lavender

From the manner in which a woman draws her thread at every stitch of her needlework, any other woman can surmise her thoughts. –Honore de Balzac

I admit it. I'm a dirty rotten horse pattern thief. Before I sent the pattern for Zelda's Fancy Hat to JaiCi after she won it in my giveaway, I made a copy of it so I could make one too. It was too cute and I couldn't resist. Crabapple Hill, I'll be sending you a check for $8 with my sincerest apologies {but I'm not paying for shipping}.

And in the interest of full disclosure, I totally swiped the copyrighted image of the hat from your site with my nifty snipping tool so I could post a picture of the finished project as I was confessing my crime. I wanted evidence to support my desperate actions.

Have I mentioned before that I really like hand work? Sewing the binding on a quilt is one of my favorite parts for two reasons. First, it means that all the hard work is about to pay off in a big way with a finished project. And second, I enjoy it because the hand stitching is very soothing to me. There is something about the rhythm and feel of it that I just love. I also like to include, if possible, a bit of handwork on each of my quilts; a small little embroidered something, somewhere in there. It adds a bit more of me to the quilt.

For the past two weeks, I have worked solely on hand stitching projects. The majority of that time was spent on the embroidered 'chore' blocks for my Woman's Work quilt. After I finished those, I wasn't ready to put my needle and embroidery floss away, so I worked on Zelda's Hat for a bit. I got all my pieces cut out and then got down to business the fun stuff.

I picked the orange 'lavender' to work on first because I love to do French knots. It took me forever to figure them out and now that I've got it down and don't have to look at an instruction sheet to do each one, I wanted to do a few more. This block fit the bill. The black fabric is left over from the Stephenie Meyer quilt. I love the swirls in it. It was so perfect for that quilt. I also used a bit of it in one of the blocks I did in the New Moon Charity Quilt and again in one of the blocks in the Eclipse Give-to-Win quilt. [Editor's Note: I realize that my Twilight obsession is a little over-the-top. It keeps popping up in random places, but hey, I'm a package deal .] It is a great black-on-black fabric. I bought everything the shop had and tried to find more on-line, but wasn't able to find any anywhere. I'm down to the last little bits of it. This is some of the extra backing fabric that was cut off after the quilting was done. It is hard to get a good photograph of it; I tweaked it a bit so you could see the swirls, which makes the orange 'lavender' look a bit washed out.

I was on a roll, so I knocked out a few lazy daisies too. Here's the a hat brim section with pretty crazy orange lazy daisies.

And part of the hat with more lazy daisies in a variety of bright and cheerful colors.

The pattern calls for Weeks Dye Works floss, but at $2.10 a skein, I decided to use their DMC conversion chart and pull colors from my considerable floss collection, which came in at 25₵ a skein. They list three {or sometimes two or occasionaly four} DMC colors as substitutes for each of their hand-dyed colors. They suggested using short lengths of each color to perhaps replicate the variation in color of their hand-dyed floss, or maybe choosing just one of the colors listed as a substitute. But with such pretty colors I couldn't bear to leave any of the colors out {even when there were four}, so I decided to use one strand of each of the three colors called for {the pattern calls for two strands, but I figured three strands wouldn't hurt} and make a pseudo-variegated thread. That way I wouldn't have to sacrifice any of the pretty colors. The pattern calls for 10 Weeks Dye Works colors, which translates to 29 DMC colors. I had all but three of the colors. You do the math. I knew my Floss Collection would be useful.

The pattern also instructs you to sew the whole hat together, back it with muslin {which is doesn't have you get enough of; you need ¾ of a yard not ½ a yard} and then do the embroidery. I've sort of developed my own system for embroidery, though. It's a system that I like, so I'm doing Zelda's Hat my own way. I don't use embroidery hoops; I put a piece of woven fusible interfacing on the back and then do the embroidery work. I leave a little bit of extra fabric in the seam allowance and then trim the block down when I've finished. I'm careful about not pulling my stitches too tight and the interfacing helps to prevent shrinkage, so my blocks turn out nicely even without a hoop. I'm going to do all the embroidery on these blocks and then I'll sew them together and back them with muslin when I've finished.

Considering that I discovered the mistake in yardage on the pattern with the muslin and the extra thought I've put into how best to make this; deciding how to use the pretty DMC floss to its best advantage and fiddling with the flawed assembly process, perhaps I'll send a pattern correction and an invoice for $17.00 to Crabapple Hill. That should make us just about even.

Sunday Sermons: Continue in Patience

God’s promises are not always fulfilled as quickly as or in the way we might hope; they come according to His timing and in His ways. –Dieter F. Uchtdorf

Woman's Work: Monday Wash, Tuesday Iron

When it comes to housework the one thing no book of household management can ever tell you is how to begin. Or maybe I mean why. –Katharine Whitehorn, "Nought for Homework," Roundabout, 1962

Section two of Lori's Woman's Work quilt had these three cute embroidered blocks in it. Which took kind of forever. This is all I've worked on for the last ten days. In like every spare minute I've had.

As I was working, I had this brilliant idea to use some art pastels to color in the blocks when I'd finished. I pondered on it and asked a few people what they thought. LadyBug was all for it {she loves 'painting with chalk'}, so I spent an afternoon colorbooking these blocks, all the while worrying that I was completely ruining them and that I was going to hate the result and have to start over again because the chalks have enough oil in them that they won't completely wash out. I still have mixed feelings about these blocks. When I looked at the picture of the blocks above, I had a little remorse for coloring them in. On the other hand, I think I like them better colored in. What do you think?

Monday Wash:

Tuesday Iron:

Friday Clean:

The fabric that I used for these blocks is not solid white. It has a really pretty flower-and-vine pattern printed on it, but after I washed the fabric, the pattern sort of disappeared and you can only see it in the right light. I was hoping that the pastels would help the pattern show up a little better, but it didn't really.

While I was applying the chalk to these blocks I was thinking about the naughty messes that some kids make. I know of some kids who, when they were little, got into a bottle of conditioner their mom left unattended on the kitchen table for 30 seconds while she was putting away some other groceries, and smeared it all over themselves, the couch cushions and the carpet. These same little kids would get into their mom's crafting supplies and pour glitter and embossing powder into the carpets. And pour out whole boxes of oatmeal in the middle of the living room. I've heard other horror stories of kids who get into things they're not supposed to and make the naughtiest messes. And I feel so bad for those mothers.

My Little Bugs never really made naughty messes like that, except for one time. And that one time I did have a naughty mess on my hands was really my own fault. I left my box of art pastels open and on the edge of a folding table in the living room. The temptation was too much and LadyBug reached up with her tiny, cute hands and pulled them off the table, spilling them all over the {impossible to keep clean light tan carpet they've put in every house built since 1996 because it goes with everything} carpet. Once the deed was done, Grasshopper couldn't resist a little play time with mom's fancy craft stuff and so they had a party. It was so hard to be mad at them. First of all, I'd left the chalks where they could get to them, so it really was my own fault. But secondly, LadyBug had a stack of the little chalk squares piled up and was holding them in her two little hands {I have a thing for her hands} in the most adorable way when I found them. We picked the chalks up and put them back in order in their box and really no harm was done. Hearing the horror stories of messes kids get into, I consider myself very lucky.

Anyway, back to the Woman's Work quilt. Section two also included this cute little dustpan, a counterpart to the broom in the first section. The appliqué goes really quickly and I love it. As a side-note, the embroidered 'ridges' in the pan took a little bit longer to do than it took me to appliqué the entire block. It was still really fun to make.

This quilt has nine embroidery-only blocks and I'm really slow at embroidery. However, I have four of those nine finished now and I think I'm going to go back and finish the two other blocks in the section with the paper towels next {I started with the paper towels because they are just so cute, but didn't do that whole section, so now I need to go back and finish it}. One of the blocks left in that section is an embroidery block, so that will push me past the half-way point with the embroidery. After that, the next two sections I'll work on are appliqué blocks, with only a little embroidery in them.

Favourite Things Friday: Dancing With the Stars

It takes an athlete to dance, but an artist to be a dancer. –Shanna LaFleur

I've mentioned before that Dancing With the Stars is one of my favorite things. But this being Favourite Things Friday and all, I thought I'd give it another mention. Because it is fabulous. And it makes me happy.

This is the sixth season I've watched and I find myself wondering why some of the professional dancers always end up with partners who are duds and some seem to always get the most talented stars. All of the professionals are amazingly talented and beautiful dancers. But there are a handful who always have really talented {non-professional} partners and they are always at the head of the pack. One of those dancers is Derek Hough. He seems to always have the most talented star in the group. After thinking about it, I think that it has less to do with the dancing talent of his star partners and more to do with his ability as a teacher.

This season Derek is paired with Jennifer Grey. She's 50, has two pins in her neck and a pinched nerve in her foot, but they always come out on top. They have received the highest judges scores three out of the four weeks in this season and this week they received two 10's on their performance and a total of 56 out of 60 points. None of the other couples even came close.



This week I also particularly enjoyed the musical performance by the Goo Goo Dolls. I think their name is hilarious {especially since they are big, dude-y rock stars}, but I also love their music. When I first started watching, the ballroom style dancing to contemporary music was a little hard to get used to, but there is such an artistry to it and now DWTS is just one of my favorite things.

Today's post brought to you by:

The Starry Night Quilt: My Oldest UFO

I often think that the night is more alive and more richly colored than the day. –Vincent Van Gogh

Once upon a time {about nine years ago} my mom, my sister and I started making quilts. We were all actually making the same quilt; each of us did our own version. My mom bought the Starry Night pattern, fabric kit and templates for my sister {a high school graduation gift} and my mom and I each bought our own fabrics {from the $2 fabric table at Wal-Mart}. Then we all set to work. I, with my pregnant-with-LadyBug-belly, would drive up to my mom's, the little bitty Grasshopper in tow and we'd cut and sew and chat and laugh and have a really great time together.

We started out working together, taking turns cutting the fabrics for each other and doing each step together. But I moved at a little bit faster pace, and so pretty soon I got ahead of my mom and sister. To give them a chance to catch up, I started doing all the cutting for every step. Still, I'm not super patient and I worked ahead of them. I was able to get my quilt top finished except for the borders before LadyBug was born. Then my quilt sat for a while. Like probably six years.

In the meantime, my mom had finished the most amazing Christmas sampler quilt and took it to a woman who has her own long-arm quilting business for the royal treatement. I absolutely loved what the quilter, Sue McCarty, did with my mom's quilt. My mom had a second appointment for quilting later that summer, but wasn't sure what she wanted to have Sue quilt for her. So, I asked if I could have that spot and decided to finish up my Starry Night quilt. I only had borders left to do. Pieced saw-tooth borders. And I did not have a ¼" foot. So the borders were wavy. Too wavy for Sue to get the quilt on her table. Fortunately, she had another customer who had brought her quilt early, so she did that woman's quilt in my spot and moved me back to a later date so I could fix my borders.

When I took my quilt back to Sue, I asked her for stitch-in-the-ditch quilting as much as she could. It seems that may have been a waste of her talents {see also, seven awards at the 2010 HMQS}. I was naïve. I really hadn't seen much of what a good free-motion quilter could do. The Starry Night sample quilt at the shop where my mom bought the kit and templates had a stipple all over it, and we thought it was such a waste to spend all that time piecing a quilt and then have the work covered up by a stipple {obviously, I've changed my mind about that }. So, I asked Sue to do stitch-in-the-ditch because in my mind, there were only two kinds of quilting — stippling or stitch-in-the-ditch. Fortunately for me, she didn't strictly adhere to my instructions. She did beautiful feathers in the dark blue borders, the maroon hearts and the dark blue squares in the center, a pretty hearts and swirls in the pink border, and a wave in the grey-blue border around the center. I gave her the template from the quilt pattern for the design that is in the points of the feathered star in the center and asked her to do stars and loops in the lighter blue around the feathered star, because I'd left off the appliqué stars in that part of the quilt. My favorite detail is the compass {I guess that's what you'd call it} she quilted in the pinwheel at the very center of the quilt.

I absolutely love how the quilt turned out. I could stare at the quilting for hours. The only regret I have is wondering what sort of amazing quilting she would have done in the sawtooth borders had I not requested stitch-in-the-ditch . As a side note, I think I'd would like to have Sue quilt my Woman's Work quilt and this time I'll give her carte blanche. I hope I can still afford her — her prices may have gone up .

For all its beautiful quilting, this quilt is still a work in progress. I'd originally intended to make it into a duvet cover. I even have the down comforter and yards and yards of that dark blue fabric to finish it off. This quilt was for our bed and Mr. Bug didn't love it, so I didn't finish it. And it has sat in the bag that I brought it home in from Sue's for three more years. I've debated lots about what to do with it. I've seriously considered binding it and giving it as a gift. But I used a plain white muslin for the back because it is really supposed to be a duvet cover. Winter is coming and I really think this quilt is going to become a big, heavy, warm duvet cover for me to sleep under and stay warm.

I made a long strip to go along the back {I even had Sue stitch-in-the-ditch for me}. It is the top 'flap' of the 'envelope' that the duvet cover makes. I'll bind one edge and put button holes along that edge so that the whole thing buttons nicely closed and the down comforter stays put inside.

With the bulk of the work finished, I could have a whole new bedroom ensemble with not too much more work. You see, I have enough blue fabric to make a bed skirt and I did two king-size pillow sham fronts. And after I make the bed skirt there should be enough blue fabric left to make big fluffy ruffles and backs for the pillow shams.

I think I'll start working on this right after I clean the fridge. I'll leave the ruffles off though.