Dune Done

One of the things I have been doing for the last couple of years, in between sewing projects, is crochet. Lucy, from Attic 24 has so many wonderful crochet blanket patterns. I recently finished my Dune blanket. I am always behind in these crochet alongs since I sew much of the time.

 The two things that drew me to this blanket were the seashell pattern of the crochet and the colors Lucy chose for the yarns. They are all from a day at the beach, and things she saw or collected there.

 I had decided to do the colorwash version of the blanket, but apparently I cannot read. T very top of the colorwash sheet that tells the order of the colors says "make two rows of each color". There are 100 color rows and 4 repeats in this pattern. I made one row of each color. This is also the back of the blanket where you can see the V stitches.

 by the time I was more than half way through, I realized there was a problem. The blanket wasn't as large as it should have been. I did not want to rip out the whole thing, so I had to come up with a solution. The blanket still looked good, and the color arrangement was interesting. What to do?

 So I decided to continue on to the end of the 100 rows, and then go back in reverse color order with the single row of each. It really turned into an accidentally striking pattern.  The V stitches in between the shells were so nice.

 And it worked out perfectly. It is almost the size of my queen size mattress. I haven't figured out how to photograph the entire thing, so you are getting lots of bits.

This is what the back side looks like. Totally different, it's like having two blankets. But here you can see the way the V stitches look on the blanket.
Have a lovely Friday my friends.

I Might Be a Squirrel

Hi there. I have missed you. I have been busy, and traveling and clearly, not here in this space. I must confess, it's partly because I have been busy, and partly because I have been lazy. I have trouble getting around to taking and uploading pictures to blog about, because that's really the point of blogging here.

Right before I left for two weeks in North Carolina to see the the kids and the grand kids, I got this book. Now I just started EPP last year with a sew along with Rachel from Stitched in Color and Jodi from Tales of Cloth. But I wanted to go beyond hexagons and until this book came along, I wasn't sure how that was going to happen.

This book not only made that happen for me, I think it turned me into a squirrel. I wanted to make ALL the quilts. And I wanted to make them NOW! So when I got home, after a week of acclimating to being home, and then doing a craft fair, I started.

 First, I made the honeycomb paper shapes, and began that project. Very close to hexagons, so very easy to stitch. I liked so many of the quilts, I decided to just do some small versions of the panels for the big Seedlings quilt as mini quilts.

 Then, I branched out into the shapes for the peppermint quilt panel. This was a very different shape for me to tackle, but still pretty easy. These are my first few, and I am not sure how many I will do. I have 6 now and 9 might be my limit.

This is a closeup of the Caraway panel. It is the first one to be finished. I hand quilted with Perle cotton on the Caraway plants, and then hand quilted around the rows of plants.

This shot is a little blurry, but it is quilted and bound. I used a chain stitch to embroider the name on it and I think I will do that for all of them. I am not sure how many of these I will make. There are 12 quilts in the book.

So far I am really enjoying this process. I thought about buying the shapes, but decided to make them myself to save some money. It's not hard, but it does take time. I finished the Honeysuckle panel yesterday, but haven't photographed it yet. That will be in my next post.

The one full size quilt I will be making from the book is the Lavender quilt. Hands down, my favorite. I think that one will take me quite some time, but I will take some progress photos for you.
And lest you think I am not squirrely enough, I am also doing some sewing projects, Christmas ornaments, and still crocheting on a blanket.

This is the most recent picture, and it is taken in North Carolina. This is the back side of my Dune blanket from Lucy at Attic 24. I am several more colors deep into it now. I will also do a post on it very soon with more pictures.
So there you have it. I am all over the place, and I still have one more craft fair to do in two weeks!
I will talk to you soon.