More Christmas Presents!

I made a few more handmade items for Christmas this year.  Nothing too crazy, though, and I actually forgot to take pictures of a few things, which really sucks!

Elizabeth and I swapped mini quilts and sewing machine covers for Christmas.  I've only made a couple mini quilts ever, and they've always been for me, but I love the idea of them because sometimes the thought of making a huge quilt is just exhausting.

I broke into my stash of Mendocino to make this Round n Round mini.  I've been hoarding this fabric for years and it's been passed back and forth between me and my mom.  Currently, it's in my possession, and my mom and I decided if I ever have a kid the baby room should be Mendocino-themed.  I love that idea, especially now that I have Heather Ross Prints and can order the Swimming Sisters print off of Spoonflower.

I quilted this mini with light blue Aurifil in perpendicular straight lines.  I was unsure about this at first but I really like the subtle movement and I love the little boxes it creates--some mermaids and fish are framed!

I backed the mini in Art Gallery Oval Elements and made little hangers so Elizabeth can put it on her wall!  I used a coordinate from Bonnie and Camille's Happy-Go-Lucky for the binding, which was perfect.

I had never made a sewing machine cover before, so this was a first and was a little scary.  I decided to go with the "quilt" version, which isn't as structured as other sewing machine covers.

I had an idea in my head about how I wanted to make this: I originally wanted to use the Thimble Blossoms Mini Spools pattern to make five spools across the front and a rainbow dresden on the back.  But I did the math wrong (unsurprisingly) and ended up with three spools on the front and two on the back.  Oh well.

I used some fun fabrics from my stash for the spools.  I thought I had gray faux-bois fabric in there somewhere, but I couldn't find it for the life of me!  So white faux-bois it was.

I quilted it with white Aurifil in straight lines, which is functional and doesn't take a lot away from it.  I didn't want it to be overwhelming--this is something that needs to fit into Elizabeth's sewing room fairly easily!  It's definitely not a statement piece.

Sigh--the backing.  I agonized over this for hours--what to use?!  I've had this Melody Miller Viewmasters print in my stash for well over a year, after spending too much on it on Etsy.  The colors went with the spools pretty well and the linen substrate will hold up pretty well, too.

I used the Motif Madness print from Rashida Coleman-Hale's Tsuru line as the binding, which I made extra wide just for fun, and I threw in some aqua and red from Oliver + S's City Weekend line for the ties.  That's it on my machine above.  Hmm, maybe it looks too good and I should've kept it...

I also made Kelby a Gather cowl (pattern by Tin Can Knits; Ravelry notes here), a mini iPad case and a box bag, but I completely spaced on taking pictures of those.  That's what happens when you procrastinate and rush through!

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Project 3: Simplicity 2215, View D, and Cake!

There's so much on my mind right now, both good and bad, and I want to turn a lot of it into blog posts but then I think, who would read that?  I sometimes wonder if I wouldn't benefit from a few girlfriends to just bounce ideas off of.  Nick doesn't care about pattern sizing or blogs; he doesn't notice if I paint my nails or if my hair dries weird.  I know one person shouldn't be everything to another, but that's where we are right now, and the boundaries are slowly disappearing.  (You don't even want to know what we talk about after work.)

So anyway, it was a long weekend, and I gotta say, not a terribly exciting one.  It was cold this weekend, so our hibernation plans were mostly achieved.  However, Saturday proved productive, once we actually got out of bed and out of the apartment: we managed to buy $130 worth of groceries (good lord) as well as some slightly-needed kitchen items.  When we got home and unpacked our food and fun things, I immediately thought of how nice it will be to someday have room for casserole dishes and espresso makers, for loaf pans and pitchers, and how we won't have to have these things spill over into the living room and onto the stove because there simply isn't space.  I hope that by this time next year I can stand next to Nick in our kitchen and not have to contort myself around him to get to the fridge or close a cabinet before I can open the oven.