Brothers out there with sisters, peep it Years and years you try to keep them a secret

I was privileged to make baby quilts for a set of boy/girl twins,  The parents don't have a genetic history of multiple births nor were they on fertility treatment so this was a complete shock!  Both parents did great especially mom who had to deal with hyperemesis gravidarum for the entire 9 months.

As the babies grew bigger and had less and less space in utero, the mother kept comparing the fetuses to monkeys as they were kicking and wiggling constantly.  I stumbled across the most apropos fabric at a quilter's estate sale.  It had pairs of monkeys hugging each other which was perfect for the girl but there was too much pink for the boy. I really prefer making gender-specific quilts for babies. The other problem is that there was only a 1/2 yard which was not enough and since it was an older print, impossible to find online.

I gave up and eventually found 2 different but coordinating jungle panels but THEN a couple of weeks later, went to a sale at Fabric Place Basement (awesome all-purpose fabric store with locations in Virginia and Massachusetts) to peruse their $2.99 sales table/. The sale had only first-quality LQS level brands but just older, discontinued designs.  In any case, they had slightly over a yard of  the monkey print.  I also discovered there was a coordinating print of pairs of bears.  

I wanted to have both pairs of animals in both quilts so I cut the stripes to have both monkeys and bears in both quilts but the alternating strips to be pink in the girl's print and blue in the boy's.  I had just enough of a 30's print of white elephants on an orange background in my stash for the borders.

Oh, but love grows where my Rosemary goes And nobody knows like me

Hey look me over, rate me a 10.  Philip my glass and I'll chug it down again

I have pictures of the babies on their respective quilts but parents who came of age during the Internet era are very cautious about allowing pictures of their minor children to be posted online.  I think this is very wise.

And Granddad, light up the place And if you pull my card, you pull the ace And if you ask me, turn up the bass And if you play defender, I could be your hyper space so

My parents have loved to play the board game Sequence with their many grandchildren for decades (oldest one is well into the 30s and youngest just turned 18).  So much so that I wanted to make a quilt for years but could never find playing card fabric that depicted each and every playing card without being overlapped AND would be a proper proportion.  

Just before the COVID lockdown occurred back in March 2020, I found a pattern on Ravelry that depicted the playing cards in Tunisian crochet.  I had never tried this technique and this was a BIG project so I gave myself a huge completion window for my father's 80th which occurs in February 2023 but ended up giving it to both my parents this Christmas.

There were some changes.  The crocheted card designs are drastically simplified as compared to real playing cards. The  wild card space in each corner was changed to a NY Yankees logo as my mother has been a fan all her life despite moving to Boston for college at 18 and remaining there the rest of her life.

Finally I changed the border to reflect the family surname rather than the word sequence plus the treatment of the jack card.

This was the first post;COVID Christnas we celebrated with everyone.  My brother's family flew in from Australia and the oldest grandchild just had twins a couple of months ago.  

Brothers out there with sisters, peep it Years and years you try to keep her a secret

In celebration of a successful formal recruitment at the wearers' school, I am finally posting pictures of a joint order.  Apparently at this university, the Chi Omegas do a lot of functions with the Sigma Chis.  So much so that the ΣX boys are little brothers and the ΧΩ girls are the big sisters.

This is much different than in my day.  While my sorority definitely tended to pair with certain fraternities at my university, it was not a formal joining.  We were free to affiliate as individual members of fraternities as Little Sisters. Favorite guys of our sorority were called Keymen rather than Little Brothers. 

In any case, the Chi Omega is a Sigma Chi Big to a specific Sigma Chi and he is correspondingly the Chi Omega Little to her.  ΧΩ colors are red and yellow and ΣX colors are cobalt blue and yellow.  I assumed they would want yellow as one of the colors as it ties in with both of their groups but they decided to eliminate yellow entirely and go with each of their other colors ie the red and cobalt.  They also wanted the big/little relationship embroidered on the sleeve.  My machine does not have that capability so the embroidery was done by hand using a running stitch.

What she asked of me at the end of the day Caligula would have blushed "Oh, you've been in the house too long" she said And I naturally fled

So like many of us over the last 24 months I have spent a LOT of time at home.  I was so bored that I learned how to crochet.

I had seen the African Flower hexagon technique that was used to make an owl.  I used a J 5.25 mm hook and worsted weight yarn of various colors  Once I learned the stitches, it was amazingly easy.  I knew the hexagons were large but had no idea I would end up with a HUGE stuffed animal.

I then decided to make the same pattern using Kappa colors of dark and light blue since our mascot is an owl.  I did not want such a huge owl so used a much skinnier fiber and smaller hook.  This time I used a 1.5 mm hook and  #10 crochet thread.

What a size difference the hook and fiber make!  I found it much harder to crochet with this thread and tiny hook as opposed to the yarn and larger hook.

Here are the 2 owls together.  They don't match at all but I wanted to show their proportions.

I have decided that I am officially hooked!

Well, just plug me in just like I was Eddie Harris You're eating crazy cheese like you would think I'm from Paris

 So I had a request to make a pillow from a particular outfit that a little child loved but outgrew.  It was a long sleeved sequined t shirt and coordinated velvet leggings.  The sequin design was pretty cool as when sequins were all overlapping downward like roof shingles, this Eiffel Tower appeared.

When you run your hand over the sequins so they overlap from bottom to top, a heart appears complete with the phrase Love Paris.

I used the front of the shirt for one side of the pillow and the back to be the base for a big monogram L.  The letter was cut from the leggings and stitched with a variegated thread to make it pop from the t shirt color.  I also used the leggings to make all the piping.

This will be a delightful addition to a girly-girl bedroom!

Too much drama all around Distractions booming in sensuround

Yet another t shirt quilt but this time for a kid who marches to her own drummer.  Most of the t shirt quilts are set in a grid format but I was allowed to think outside the box. I made a gigantic outline of the state of Vermont and made sure all the garments could fit within the state.  Once the state was cut, I appliqued it on the background with binding tape as it was too thick to hem the edges.  I had designed a Commonwealth of Virginia quilt a couple of years ago but I was able to make a narrow hem without involving binding as Virginia was made from quilting cottons, not garment textiles backed with interfacing/

The recipient was very active in plays and musicals in high school.  She also attended Governor's School, a very prestigious opportunity for high school students.  Before she lived in Vermont, she lived in Virginia and I was able to dig up a shirt from her FCPS elementary school.

As most of you know, Vermont is a VERY cold state, especially in the area where the recipient calls home.  So not only did she have a cozy high school scarf to add to her quilt....

but also an old ski cap!

The recipient has now relocated to a warmer state (smart girl! :) ) for college and is now a member of Chi Omega at George Mason University.

Rules in the office they don't need to imply I hate having to wear my shirt and tie

This was a wonderful project to memorialize a family member.  I had 12 ties belonging to a father of 2 women, grandfather to a third.  One of the daughters had saved his ties and wanted small pillows made from them for her sister, her daughter and herself.

Most quilt blocks are square.  The daughter wanted small rectangular pillows so I skewed two of the designs from a 12 x block to a 9 x 15 dimension.  One of the recipient's is named Katie so I immediately thought Katie's Choice would be an ideal pillow for that woman.  The pillow is a modification of  this traditional memory block. 

The next two pillows are exactly the same.  The pattern is called Thousand Pyramids and many quilters showcase their entire stash in a scrap quilt made from this design.  I was easily able to use all 12 ties in each of the pillows

The last pillow is a modification of a Chinese Lantern block.  I have been in the client's house and had a strong sense of her style and color preferences so when I suggested this design, she was delighted right away. You can see from the very first picture that the pillow coordinates with her dining room rug 

quite nicely.

I have created several projects with men's ties over the years.  Although tie fabric tends to be silky, slippery, stretchy and thus needs a good bit of prep work, the sheen just creates such a beautiful finish.