Skip to main content

Scrap Play

Over the last month I've been trying to work through some personal stress and unhappiness. I don't want to get into details or have a self-pity party; it's still upsetting to even think about it. It makes it harder to keep trying to reach out to friends, too, as in these times I tend to withdraw and go silent.

Color always helps cheer me up, so last night I hauled out the mask-making scrap bag and started playing with pieces of fabric leftover from some that I made for myself:

I love these colors together. I also have another project I want to use them in, so I needed to play a bit with the colors while I thought about it.

Feather stitching is probably the most meditative stitching I do. For this block I used some ancient rayon embroidery thread that is too old to use for anything practical, and just allowed myself to mindlessly stitch for a while. Once I felt like I'd warmed up, I tried blanket stitch with french knots to make a row of flowers, which turned out a little lopsided but cute.

Lately I've been drawn to buttons as symbols rather than strictly embellishments. This piece is an abstract expression of how I've felt over the last couple of weeks.

Still working on this piece. I haven't been able to use my sparkling threads for weeks while I was working on Oliver's quilt, and they make me happy, so I need to get back to using them.

I don't know what I'll make out of these three pieces. I might not make them into anything. Sometimes it's just enough for me to play so I can forget about my troubles. Need more of that.

Labels:

Comments

nightsmusic said…
I would tell you that I'm here for you whenever you need me. I would also tell you I know exactly how you feel because I too withdraw into myself when things are...less than stellar. I would also tell you that I'm giving you a huge hug from here and I hope you can feel it.

I'd also like to tell you that those squares are wonderful! I love the stitching, rather whimsical. As far as the buttons go, I feel like that all too often anymore :/
July 16, 2020 at 11:33 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Downsizing

This was my fabric stash once I sorted everything -- 22 full bins. I spent a day taking out and boxing up what I could part with, with the goal of trying to reduce it by half, so I'd have 11 bins. I was very strict with myself, and removed everything that for one reason or another I was sure I wouldn't be able to use. This is what I ended up with -- 12 bins of fabric that I'm keeping. It's not quite half, but close enough. Half of what I took out went to a local quilter friend, a school and Goodwill. These four tightly-packed bins will be going to the local quilting guild once I make arrangements with them for a drop-off place. I am relieved and a little sad and now determined to control my impulses to thrift more fabric. I don't want to do this again, so until I use up six bins, I can't for any reason bring any new fabric into the house.
Post a Comment
Read more

In Progress

I promised myself I would show you the good, bad and ugly of my cleaning this year. This is what it looks like when you dump thirty years' worth of stashed fabric on the floor -- and oy, what a pain in the butt to pick up again! This is what it looks like after it's been sorted, folded and placed in containers, which took me about a week. Now the hard part is to downsize my stash by at least half, I think (that's my goal, anyway.) I've already e-mailed the president of the local quilting guild, a local friend who is a quilter, and a public school art teacher I know to see if I can donate some of the excess to them. The rest will go to Goodwill. Already I've reduced my vintage textiles from two bins to one, and my scraps from three bins to one. It's probably the hardest clean-out I've done, which is why I saved it until last. I know I have too much fabric, more than I can use in my lifetime -- but at the same time, I love it. So I have to
Post a Comment
Read more

Other Stashes

Along with clearing out the spare bedroom and tidying my office and our guest bedroom, I decided to reorganize some of my stashes. This is all the yarn I have on hand, sorted by color. It looks like a lot, but lately I've been using up a minimum of half a bin every month, so this is approximately a year's supply. All of my solid color cotton perle thread. I go through a lot of this every year, too. I need a container in which I can fit all of it together, but I haven't found the right one yet. I won't show you all of my fabric -- I'm still reorganizing this stash -- but I went through everything and donated two bins of fabric I won't need to the local quilter's guild.
Post a Comment
Read more