Jellicle Cat Finished

Sometime in February I picked up this cross stitch cat again.

I worked on it a few minutes in every evening while I watched TV.

Below the cross stitch is finished and ready for the back stitch embellishments.

Black back stitching finished.

On to the white back stitches.

All finished and labeled.

I looked for a title in TS Eliot's book of poetry about cats.

The musical Cats was based on the poems.

The Jellicle Cats were the fancy ones.

I thought it was appropriate for this colorful cat.

Below is a pattern for my next sewing projects.

I talked to granddaughter Ava and she chose the sleeveless version of the dress.

Below are the fabric choices. 

She liked the blue with pink flowers, pink check, pink and teal stripe, and the teal and pink

shells. She wants all the different fabrics in one dress but I think the flowers and checks will be one dress and the stripe and shells will be another.

We plan to see our Memphis grands on Easter.

Dresses and a couple of other things should be ready by then.

These are blooming in my back yard.

How is your week?

The Week in Review

I finished my wall hanging this week. But first a little yard art. We found this birdhouse at a local shop. We have Bluebirds in a birdhouse on our back fence and hope another pair will choose this new house.

We had some landscaping done in our front yard.

Hopefully the dry creek will help with water flow when it rains.

Mr. M will add new sod in the next few weeks.

Yesterday we checked on mom's house and picked these daffodils.

Our area has had water problems since the ice and snow in February.

Fortunately the water was working at the house.

The cat cross stitch in the photo is almost finished.

Check back next week to see.

This week I finished the wall hanging.

I'm calling it Lullaby in Birdland. That is not exactly the song title but I like it.

I sewed around the shapes with black thread for a raw edge appliqué effect.

The shapes were pre-cut with fusible stuff on the backs.

Stitching around them left my needle sticky.

I used my fabric for the background, backing, and binding.

I quilted wavy lines across the background sort of like a musical staff.

The binding went on great. I added corners for hanging and a label.

Not shown is a loop I added to the middle of the back for hanging.

The fusible shapes came from Connecting Threads.

After Mr. M cuts the dowel and I write the label this will hang in the playroom.

Happy sewing, y'all!

 

A lot has been accomplished in the past two weeks!

My Small World flimsy is finished. It has backing and batting pin basted,  ready to be hand quilted.

But I had two tops waiting to be quilted and bound and my brain wanted them off the To-Do list.

Above and below is Parlor Tricks lap quilt.

I bought the fabric and pattern from Victoria Findley Wolf's NYC fabric store.

I had a fun adventure finding my way to her store and Gotham Quilts when I visited my daughter.

Making the quilt was a learning experience in how to sew partial seams.

I was pleased with the results but couldn't decide how to quilt it.

The quilting is plain but I think it works.

The next finish was Scrap Dance Minuet.

I followed instructions from Carole @mycarolinahome.

I had some fat quarters I wanted to use together.

I went with a green solid for sashing instead of white.

I backed it with Minky Dots because I plan to give it away and people like snuggly quilts.

Tomorrow our quilt group is having a virtual meeting on Zoom.

I am sharing both finishes in our Show & Tell segment.

Thought this pose looked more like our real times together.

Oh, and then I was straightening up in my sewing space and came across a kit.

It looked like a quick finish. Just iron on the pieces and sew around the edges.

Will be a wall hanging soon.

I have been cross stitching in the evenings to participate in February Embroidery Month.

Pat Sloan had a cute mug rug pattern for free on her blog.

I had to try to reproduce it with things I had on hand.

We had ice and snow here in the Deep South for a week and I never left the house.

Happy sewing!

 

My Small World Flimsy Finished!

This week I finished the flimsy (top) of My Small World quilt.

I made some changes to the hills in the far left bottom section.

The Dresden hill was the only one I did not change.

The hexagon hill was made from cheater fabric.

The rainbow hill was done by appliqué instead of sewing pieces on the curve.

The crown hill was also done by appliqué. 

I looked at all the small pieces that were to be sewn together and knew I was not precise enough

to do it correctly.

My alternate method was to first cut four semi circles from light green fabrics.

Largest below.

Second and third below.

Fourth semi circle is a cute plaid.

Next I cut out the pointy parts on double sided fusible.

It took some measuring to get them the correct size.

Below shows the fusible pieces on the fabric semi circles.

I changed my thread from off white to black.

I thought the contrast looked better on this hill.

Below is the reverse side of the hill.

I started with the largest row.

The second row was sewn on top of the largest row.

The third row was sewn on top of the second row.

Then the plaid was sewn on last.

I cut out the center to reduce the bulk for later quilting.

I tried to get a variety of small bits of fabric for the points.

The last part was to appliqué the block in place on the flimsy.

Another in progress photo.

Finished top featuring the first sections.

The last sections together at last.

The whole world with variations by Janice.

It hasn't been pressed so some seams are not flat.

The next step is making the quilt sandwich and hand quilting it.

I'm surprised I finally finished this top.

If I were doing it again (and I'm not), I would start on the sky to make it more continuous.

The pattern has some errors. I tried to find corrections but had trouble since the pattern came out first in a magazine and then as a booklet. I cannot recommend it to a beginner.

It was fun and I'm glad I did it.

What about you? Any finishes?

 

So Close to Finished

My Small World quilt is so close to finished.

Only two hills (the most complicated ones) left to make.

I took photos of my alternate process for making the overlapping half circles

on one of the buildings. 

I wanted to make these without fusing or hand sewing.

The photos are in reverse order.

Below is the finished block.

Below shows temporary stitching anchoring the half circles.

I used a machine blanket stitch as the finishing stitch.

Instead of fusing or hand sewing I lengthened the stitch and sewed 

on the fold line. Then I pulled one thread to gather the fabric.

I finger pressed the excess down, then pinned the shape in place.

Below is one half circle gathered and ready to place on the block.

I traced the shape on card stock and added a quarter inch on the straight side.

I drew around the shape on the back of the fabric, then cut out the shape, adding

a quarter inch on the curved side as I cut.

Now I have to work on those hills.

See you next week.

Sky sections done

This past week I started on the final two sky sections of My Small World.

Looking back it would have been better to do all the sky first to get a more consistent look.

Below are the finished sky sections.

I decided to use blocks of green as foundation pieces for the to-be-added hills.

Another change - I'm not doing the embroidered blocks.

Instead I fussy cut an Eiffel Tower from fabric and a New York City street map showing

the part of the Upper West Side where our daughter's family lives. 

Here is an in-progress photo of the final section.

Check the photo above.

I decided to swap the very top around so the dark blue is on the left side.

Trying out sky pieces.

The back of the hill section.

Look at all the seams!

Hope I'm not too late to join the Peacock Party.

See you next week end.

 

Holiday books and such

Some of the books I ordered for Christmas didn't come in time to be mailed in the Christmas box.

One book still hasn't arrive. When I checked the shipping, it was listed as waiting for pick up in Illinois 

Since November 29!

May never see it. Oh, well, there are other books.

Sent the books and calendar above to Ava.

The puppy book was Joey's. I remember reading it many times.

The other two books are easy readers and the calendar was added

because of a comment Ava made when we visited after Christmas.

She said she needed another calendar because she finished the Advent calendar.

I thought she might like to write on a calendar and baby bunnies are so cute.

I sent the boys these. Liam is into Bad Kitty. I ordered the newest Bad Kitty book for Christmas but

it wasn't published until late December. The Cat Klub is similar to Bad Kitty so I thought he might like it.

For David I bought the Scooby Doo - he likes scary stories. The missing mitten book is included because

both boys lost mittens in the snow. Anatole the mouse book is a favorite of mine and features a cat and a mouse. The very small Teeny Tiny Woman book is one David and I read together in the summer.

Here is Liam enjoying one of the new books.

Love my reading grandson.

And last of all - the stack of books I checked out before Christmas.

I finished the last one yesterday. Six books in four weeks.

Not bad.

I rediscovered some favorite authors in this stack.

What are you reading?