A work in progress.
I’ve been sewing this quilt by hand, very gradually, since 2020.
It started life as a labour of lockdown love and was inspired in part by a hexagon quilt made by @nonasuch.
All the fabric I’ve used is scraps gratefully received from friends and relatives who sew regularly, or old clothes cut up, or charity shop pillow cases. Individually I think some of these fabrics are horrid, but everything looks nice once it’s part of a patchwork quilt.
Now that I’m most of the way through the quilting step this is tantalisingly close to being a finished project - but I expect I’ll still be at it for another year.
Using this quilt pattern: https://www.talesofcloth.com/products/mandolin-quilt
More Stunning Stitches for Crazy Quilts by Kathy Seaman Shaw
Quilter or not you will find something useful and inspiring in this book.
Shaw first offers a section on the basics. These include information on needles, floss, and ribbon widths and choices. Then, clear sketches show how to make stitches with floss embroidery and with ribbon embroidery including little flowers, leaves, etc.. Then she has over 100 pages of photographs and sketches of various combinations of stitches, beads, even small buttons. Plain templates are included.
As a dressmaker, I am thinking of how to use one of these lovely combinations on a garment, Maybe to outline a collar on a blouse? the yoke of a child’s dress? I am pondering possibilities to save time…. use my sewing machine’s many embroidery stitches... try a variegated thread... add silk ribbon via hand embroidery? A little handwork can go a long way.
This is the second book of its kind, and you can find them both here: https://www.ctpub.com/more-stunning-stitches-for-crazy-quilts/
If I know you well enough I would make a baby quilt to celebrate the fact you have made a small human you didn't see this post but anyways
Punch card to show scale of hand stitching on one of the squares -- one panel of seven down, two left. This one was started around 8am and it's about 12 right now but I didn't work steadily on it. I expect to have the other panel down this afternoon and add two more patches to the one at home (which was done yesterday), join the three and start to sew it to the back panel tomorrow. After that ..... hahaha oh god so much quilting but I think I can get it done and slapped in the mail by Saturday?
Earlier this year I was on a search for a woolen scarf and I found a scarf at the airport with a nice pattern but it was polyester. So I uh got some wool and made it myself with some slight changes :) Now I'm back at the airport and I found the same scarf!!
Less than three weeks to Christmas and I haven't knit anything in over five years... so deciding to make something that requires precision out of 100% cotton yarn in a dark color is a great plan right?