Box Upcycle

For my last project in January I decided to upcycle a sturdy Target box, a piece of old velvet and a little beaded/quilted piece I neglected to do anything with last year:

I hot glued everything to the top of the box, and covered the raw edges of the velvet with some vintage ribbon:

This I'll use as storage for the threads, embellishments and beads that I use every month for the SCQ project:

Kits

I can spend a lot of cash on individual embellishments, so now and then I like to invest in kits from sellers that I know won't send me crap. Here are two I picked up from one of my favorites, Kits and Giggles on Etsy:

All of these embellishments are vintage, so by using them I'm recycling. The buttons, lace and jewelry bits from this shop are always very nice, too:

From these two kits I also have two very pretty pendants I can make into necklaces, so that's a bonus.

Card Trick Finished

Finished the card trick table topper quilt last night:

The original maker skewed a few of the seams, so as I quilted I had to tuck them here and there to get the patchwork to stay flat, but I'm pretty happy with the results:

The backing is just plain cream muslin:

I think my daughter will like it, too.

Table Topper

I got the card trick quilt top batted and backed with plain muslin:

To take a break from sparkle, to which I am obviously addicted, I'm quilting it with a variegated cotton thread:

So far so good:

February SCQ Block

I've picked out and washed the scarves I want to use for patchwork to make my second block for the silk crazy quilt project in February. The palette will be white, gray, dark pink and red with a bit of multi-color paisley:

I've also gotten out my bag of scrap silk that I've been saving so I can incorporate some of that:

It's tempting to go with a Valentine's Day theme, but I think I'll just see what happens when I start working on it.

Card Trick Top

Last year I purchased this card trick quilt top at the county quilt show:

I've been trying to think of what to do with it, and then I realized it is almost exactly the same size as the top of my daughter's dining room table:

For the last project of January I'm going to turn it into a table topper for her.

Montee Love

Montees, aka rose montees or crystal montees, are one of my favorite elements to use for embellishing quilted projects. These are rhinestones in a pronged setting with two channels on the back that you can thread a needle through while sewing them to fabric. Traditionally they've been used in dress-making, but lately jewelery makers have been using them like beads.

Used sparingly as embellishments they can add a glitzy, gorgeous touch to a project. Here's a detail from a crazy quilt tote I did a few years ago:

For the best effect, I stick with 3 to 6mm montees. I think the larger sizes are distracting and look a little fake, while 2mm montees tend to have too-narrow channels on the backing, and can be difficult for me to sew. I also prefer vintage montees versus new, as the old ones are a bit sturdier and were made with better quality rhinestones.

Quality vintage montees are hard to find. For the silk crazy quilt project I hunted around until I found a seller on Etsy who deals in vintage montees, and purchased three lots from the 1950's from that shop:

I've never seen high-dome gray crystal montees (bottom right), so those were a nice find. The garnet montees (top) are especially pretty, and have crystals with an unusual shape that add extra sparkle:

Stay tuned to see what I do with them. :)

The Buckly Hot Pad

I don't have a quilted hot pad large enough for big casserole dishes, and the old rag-looped pad what I've been using is starting to shred, so I decided to turn this orphan patchwork I purchased from KnJ Studio into one:

I quilted the piece to the batting first with some ombre silver and white cotton Sulky thread. I wanted to add a double layer of Insul-Bright mylar batting to make it super heat-resistant, and hand-quilting through all those layers would have been basically impossible. I then stacked all the batting, added the backing fabric and bound it with some scrap binding leftover from the recycled linen quilt:

I also used a scrap piece from the quilt I made for Katherine last year to back it:

Getting all those layers through my heavy-duty Singer to attach the binding was a challenge, as the piece ended up being about 3/4" thick. I managed to sew it together, but in the process had a bit of buckling at one corner:

In hindsight I probably should have hand-sewed the binding on, or settled for just one layer of Insul-Bright, so lesson learned.

Bear Paws Tote

The bear paws block is rather fragile, so I decided to use it as a decorative rather than a functional piece. Turned out it was exactly the right size to fit on the front of a premade canvas tote:

I didn't want to cut or mess with the block too much, so I simply quilted it onto the tote with a piece of scrap batting under it to give it a little dimension. To cover the raw edges I made a border with burgundy and gold ribbon:

To keep the tote simple I lined it with plain muslin:

Happy to see this old beauty take on new life and purpose.

Writing Update

On the writing front, I've been super busy with work, so I still have to finish writing Twenty-One and get started on Haunted House Style as my first new project for 2020. Work must come first, but as soon as I wrap up my current assignment I'll get back to my own writing.

I don't know if I've ever mentioned this, but my daughter is writing her first novel. She's been working on it for about a year now, and has 40K finished. It sounds a bit like an epic fantasy when she talks about it (which isn't very often) and I'm trying not be nosy. When I was her age I wouldn't show anyone what I was writing, and I still remember the horrible nerves I got the first time I sent a manuscript to someone more famous to read (StarDoc, as it happens.)

If/when she wants me to read the book, I then have to decide if I should. I'd love to, of course, but I may not be the right person to do that. It might be better for her to get feedback from someone who didn't give birth to her. I love her and I want to encourage her, but I'm also Mom.

Bear Paws Block

After soaking the bear paws patchwork block in a mild detergent, I managed to lighten most of the staining and brighten the brown print patches (left side is before, right side is after):

There was a bit of expected shrinkage, and some of the black prints in the outer triangles ran a bit and grayed, but I like the effect.

So Cute

Oliver is almost five months old now, can you believe that? I can't. I'm afraid one day I'll blink and he'll be starting high school. :)

SCQ Block One

Last night I finished the first block for my silk crazy quilt:

I've made plenty of mistakes. I caught the tip of my needles in the silk patches multiple times and snagged them -- one I actually ripped and had to cover with the lace peacock. Silk also frays easily, which I discovered when my seams started popping. But I learned a lot about what not to do while stitching and beading silk.

I probably went a little overboard on the beading, but I was testing out a couple of ideas on how to enhance my rather basic embroidery stitching.

I figured out new ways to bead cretan and feather stitches, which was fun, and played with different threads.

Happy to have the first block done. It has been rather intense, so I'm taking the rest of January to do some other things and give myself a break from the project.

Vintage Treasures

This week I acquired some lovely antique treasures:

These abalone shell buttons are circa 1900, and still on the original card. Here's a bit of button trivia: despite their country of origin nearly all button cards from the late 19th/early 20th century were marked either Haute Nouveaute or Nouveaute; it translates to "newest" or "finest" in fashion. Using French made them seem more oo-la-la, no doubt. Anyway, they'll be embellishing future blocks for my silk crazy quilt.

This wee cloisonne chest contains a lovely surprise.

A silver-plated embossed brass thimble, inscribed with the words "Recordacao De Portugal" (souvenir of Portugal) that fits my thimble finger perfectly.

This hand-pieced bear paws patchwork, circa 1880, has beautiful points and lovely stitching. The fabric is not rotted, so it probably sat in a hope chest somewhere for 140 years. There's a bit of light staining that I'm going to try to soak out, but even if I can't it will be a pleasure to quilt something so well preserved.

Back to Craziness

I think working on Theo's quilt was a good idea; I got a nice beak and I'm ready to finish the first SCQ block. Right now I'm playing with old beads and new findings, and I might add a ribbon flower. Probably another week before it's finished.

Done!

Finished your quilt last night, Theo:

The Sulky gave it a lovely sparkle:

If you're going to hang it I can add a sleeve to the back:

Very happy with how it turned out. :)

Retro Read

During the holidays, which were not the greatest this year, I decided to get a Christmas-themed book to read, and purchased Return to Christmas by Anne Stuart. I just finished it yesterday before packing up the tree and house decorations, which I'll mark as the official end of all the holiday leftovers.

This is a time travel romance, in which a modern woman, Madison Simcoe, is whisked back to Christmas 1947 via a helpful street Santa and an enchanted revolving door at Macy's in NYC. There she meets Johnny Larsen, a window dresser/WWII veteran, who renames her Mollie, allows her to live in the store and feeds and dresses her while he uses her as free labor. He doesn't believe she's a time traveler, but of course romance ensues. Every other Macy's employee either becomes a BFF or arch enemy, including an Italian window dresser (BFF) and a sadistic floorwalker (arch enemy). The story comes to the black moment when Madison/Mollie is returned to her own time, at which point she must decide which world she wants to live in.

Problems, where to start? While it's technically fine, the story details are messy, repetitive and mostly implausible. As a protagonist Madison/Mollie is weepy, caustic, very unlikable and never had my sympathy for more than a second or two. I got zero Christmas cheer from the book, which I think I was supposed to, via all the nostalgic holiday details. The romance is not much of a romance, either. These two verbally spar for most of the book about the same things, and then have sex, which I skimmed through because Madison's supposedly modern attitudes towards sex killed my interest (Johnny hung in there, though.) Honestly, toward the end I was secretly hoping the Italian gal would get him instead of Madison.

Then we have the time travel aspect. Nothing about this story appealed to my nostalgic side, either, but I'm not a shopper and I don't like NYC or Christmas, so I'll blame that on me. A lot happened in 1947 -- the Cold War got started, Anne Frank's diary was first published, Jackie Robinson became the first black MLB player -- but I didn't see any of that in the story. Saw more about 1947's clothes and makeup and hair, which frankly bore me. I saw a lot of wasted opportunity, really.

What I felt while I was reading is that this is a book the author wrote for herself, perhaps to live in a time she obviously loves, but with little to connect the reader to that love or that time. That's fine -- I've written plenty of stories for myself -- but it's important to remember to include the readers when you write for publication. Take them along for the adventure, and show them something they can love.

Almost There

Last weekend I got a lot done with hand quilting Theo's project:

Should be finished in a few days. :)

Oliver's First Book

Being a grandmother for the first time has little joys involved that I think I took for granted as a mother. So I'm always thinking of what I can give to Oliver as "firsts." I did give him the very first quilt, of course. Choosing the first book would be tough -- or so I assumed -- but the first title I thought of was the winner. This happened to be my favorite book when I was a very little girl:

I loved the spotted protagonist because he could do all sorts of neat things with his spots, and I think Oliver will love it just as much when he gets old enough to read the story. Anyway, I inscribed it for him, and read it to him when we visited his parents in their new place last Sunday. Oliver sat on my lap and stared at the pages while I was reading, which at 4-1/2 months old was very cool of him. To reward him for being a good boy we played in his activity chair next:

This was the first book, but certainly not the last -- and it's not about me being a book writer, really. It's more about family. My great-aunt instilled the love of reading in me by giving me books when I was a girl (she even mailed them to me), so I'm simply passing along her gift.