Wrapping Up 2012

Like most years this one went by too quickly and held good as well as bad. Let's focus on the good great, though!

I married my wonderful husband. He married me. We got married.
I finally started blogging and have found some awesome peeps to spend online creative time and share the excitement of it all with.
I finished four quilts and started working on my first really really large one.
I made my first dress.
I even made a bunch of curtains!

Here's a mosaic of just a few of my projects.

For 2013 I envision more splendid and amazing things to happen.

Finishing Yoshi.
Finishing my studies.
Making more bloggy friends ... 
... making more quilts ... and clothes ... and tons of bits and bobs ...
... and becoming an aunt!

I can't wait!

Wishing you all a happy 2013 and happy sewing!

Sunday Stash

After all this time I can link up with Fiona's Sunday Stash again. Look at this beauty I got for Christmas, photographed with my shiny new camera, too - a Kona fat quarter bundle going by the enticing name of Grecian Waters.

It's incredibly adorable in all its tininess. This is my first FQ bundle so I was somewhat surprised by just how tiny it is. No taller than my hand! They seem bigger in pictures, no? And might I point out its gorgeous green-blue-aqua-y goodness? My very favourite colours. I'd been eyeing the Poseidon bundle for ages but might like this one even more. It definitely got my head spinning right away.

That's why yesterday evening was spent looking for a cute pattern to go along with it and I stumbled across Max Quilt by LuLu of For the Love Designs first. I'm in love but I don't think my bundle is actually right for it. I've certainly put it on my to-do list, though, already having done some math.

Some Pinterest and Flickr later, I'm 90 per cent sure that my bundle screams for HSTs. Consider this darling quilt by CB Handmade, for instance. With another half yard cut of one of the bundle's colours to pull everything together, perhaps Sage, and starting with 5'' squares I can easily make up a quilt for cosy sofa evenings of 16x18 HSTs.

Who knew I'd be happily dreaming of cutting nearly 300 squares so soon after cutting an exhausting 1020 of them? Haha.

Happy sewing!

Yoshi 7.0

I thought I'd sum up my Yoshi progress with a little collage.

Friday evening a week ago I felt great about my progress (and still do!) if a little sad that I wouldn't be able to take up my work again until early January when we return home. Definitely stay tuned for more Yoshi in 2013!

These are the pixels (and a few spares) still left to work into rows for my quilt top. I've plain forgotten to snap a picture of those pixels already arranged according to the pattern but not sewn into rows. I'm certainly well prepared for my return!

Another coming attraction: the backing. I've not yet worked on it and will have to backorder some black fabric to make up enough pixels for the Yoshi egg. I've also not yet decided how big I want it to be. The pixels for the quilt top are 7.25cm² (unfinished) but I might want to make them smaller for the egg. Now that I'm going to be an aunt I'm even fonder of the idea of adding it to the quilt! This game inspired quilt will have it's own, if not very hidden, Easter egg.

Happy sewing!

Yoshi 6.0

Friday last week I was on a roll. Unstressed roll, never fear. First I made the pillow covers I showed you yesterday, then I returned my attention to Yoshi.

I began by chain-piecing 14 ten-pixel rows of blue sky. That's a lot of sky.

Next I ironed this bunch of rows to add them to those I'd prepared earlier. Here you see one pile of sky-rows and three piles of rows ready to be turned into three quadrants and a bit more.

Then I finished my second quadrant, the middle bottom one. Another foot! And a piece of belly, too.

Next I worked sky to the bottom right grass.

I finished that quadrant last that evening but forgot to snap a picture. D'oh. However, here's proof of quadrants four and five.

He's finally got eyes to look at us. I finally called it a Yoshi day and made up the baby owl for my sister's Christmas gift.


... to be continued ...

Happy sewing!

Yoshi 5.0

On Thursday last week I did sod all for Yoshi and it felt great. Yep, acceptance really freed me. Also, it was a day to socialise. I finally met up with a fellow sewist and blogger and her family who are living close by. We had a lovley chatter, her toddler boy is gorgeous and it was so nice to be out and about and not stuck in the flat all day apart from grocery shopping.

After my return home it was time to take a shower and doll myself up because of more socialising and fun times. My husband and I had a dinner date before attending his school's Christmas concert in the evening. So I donned one of my me-made skirts and off we went. We hadn't had a date in ages and went to a very nice Spanish tapas bar and steak restaurant. We can rarely afford to go out like this, so it was an early Christmas present. It was absolutely lovely and I enjoyed every minute of it.

No pics, I'm afraid, but I'll show you something I finished on Friday morning to spruce up this post.

My sister-in-law bought this lovely Ink & Spindle print in a sale and I turned it into pillow covers in time for Christmas.

Want to see more of Yoshi? He'll return tomorrow!

... to be continued ...

Happy sewing!

Yoshi 4.0

Last Wednesday my arm was still a bit affected, so I rested it and only cut a few pixels with breaks in between. Nothing to report, really, other than that I'd accepted that in no way on earth I'd be able to make my deadline. Mine because my sister had set me a more distant one. Me-made deadline, me-made stress.

You might recall that the quilt is a gift for an early January birthday. I'd planned to get the piecing and quilting done as well as attach the binding ready for hand sewing before our extended Christmas and New Year's stay in Berlin because I don't have a sewing machine there and wouldn't be home in time to finish and send it off via mail.

Yep, the time frame was narrow enough to begin with. I've come to terms with not making my deadline and am not bothering myself any longer. My sister and I have decided that we can use a few good snaps of what is finished in time, print them, and use those as a kind of voucher come the birthday proper and I'll be back in Berlin for my rescheduled appointment later in January and will take the quilt with me, then.

... to be continued ...

Hope you're still enjoying the holidays!

W.i.P. list

Finished Projects - 2
Owl Christmas Ornaments
Pillow covers - see tomorrow's post

Ongoing Projects - 4
Yoshi quilt
EPP hexies - 32 finished flowers + tons basted
Polaroid blocks Tote - will it ever get made?
EPP parallelograms/stars

Planning Stage - 1
Wedding Anniversary quilt 

Yoshi 3.0

Tuesday morning last week showed that I'd overworked my jabbed arm. It was warm and red and needed some rest. Despite desperately wanting to go on I reminded myself that rushing through things without listening to my body would be stupid, moreso since I'd promised to take better care of myself and not revert to old habits.

Not before I ironed my finished strips, though.

And I worked on the bigger owl ornaments in the evening.

Sorry, but old habits do die hard!

... to be continued ...

Hope you're having a splendid Christmas with family and loved ones!

Yoshi 2.0

Merry (Yoshi) Christmas!

Last Monday noon, after a trip to the docor for a jab, I finally started the Yoshi quilt. First things first - checking the layout, calculating, recalculating, nibbling on a piece of Advent calendar chocolate.

I decided to tackle the 1020(!) pixels and minimise distortion by dividing the image into nine quadrants. You can ignore most of the numbers because I recalculated a bit after taking the pictures. I settled on adding a row to the left, top, and bottom of the original layout, 30 rows across, 34 rows down. This way I can quilt every two pixels and still have an even grid which I wouldn't have with 31 rows across.

Then it was time to do some serious cutting. I mean seriously serious cutting.

In the end, I my back refused to cut everything in one day, let alone one go. Also, my mind craved to get something "real" done. I needed to see results, not just know I'd made progress.

So, over a cuppa, I arranged rows of pixels to sew up.

Chain-pieced them, assidiously ticking them off my layout for orientation.

Did some ironing. (But only one of these piles. Ironing seams can be as annoying as cutting pixels.)

And finally sewed up the lower left quadrant!

And fell in love. Seeing things come together really makes all the effort worthwhile. After day one I had one quadrant and two pieces of grass with black.

As well as a bunch of unironed pixel strips, a slightly achy back, tons of motivation but also some doubt about the feasibility of finishing this quilt until Friday night.

... to be continued ... 

Wishing you all a wonderful Christmas with tons of love!

Christmas Holidays

I'm back. Back in Berlin, back online and back to better health. Thanks so much for your comments and concern. I did take things slow and have recovered nicely.

After my last post I spent a wonderful, relaxing weekend with my husband, my sister, and her partner. Amongst other things we took a leisurely stroll around a handmade Christmas market where we bought delicious marmalade and my sister espied cutesy Christmas tree ornaments. She especially liked the owls, however, didn't really dig the fabrics. Obviously I hatched a plan immediately and rummaged through my stash as soon as they left on Sunday. I came across my Sew Stitchy layer cake which I won in Fiona's giveaway in June. June! Seriously?! Time has hurried along like mad.

I hadn't touched these pretties since making my hexie pouch and a few proved perfect for wintry, not too Christmassy ornaments! I brainstormed with this on my table...

... to finally turn out these.

They're blue and white respectively in back and front. However, I made a third one combining both fabrics.

And it's smaller than the other two... Yep, I'm going to be an aunt come summer. I'm so excited and happy! Can't wait to gift them these little darlings. Here they are all together.

As you might recall most of my time this Monday to Friday was dedicated to the Yoshi quilt project. I'll be posting about my progress in chronological order over the next couple of days - my Christmas present to you.

Have a wonderful Christmas, friends!

Some Days Have All the Luck, Some Days Have All the Pain

Negative post ahead, I just can't help it right now.

Today sucks. After vomiting in the night and spending it in only light slumber, I tried for the longest time to get my body to work, hoping I could somehow make it to my big appointment today, but had to give in and see a doctor about severe stomach pains, dizziness, and nausea. I think the stress has made my recently diagnosed gastritis and duodenitis flare up like hell. It's incredibly annoying. I was well prepared and didn't even feel all that stressed. I wanted to be done with it so badly, I cried, but there was no way I could have made it through an hour of public transport, four hours of writing my exam, and another hour travelling back. Ten minutes to the doctor were more than enough.

I'm now on meds, have slept for a couple of hours and try to rest some more before leaving Berlin in the evening. I'm still in pain, though it's much better than five hours ago. I'm annoyed with my body. It didn't catch he bug that struck down my sister earlier this week, yay, but still managed to throw a spanner in my plans, meh. I'm annoyed that everything's being delayed until late January now.

On the upside, it could be worse. I didn't have to go to the hospital. I can still travel back home and cuddle up next to my husband. There's love and tons of good in my life outweighing most that's bothering me. Being in pain and being upset will pass. I'd put a cheerful picture somewhere if I weren't so tired.

Thanks to those who kept their fingers crossed for me today. I promise to slow down a little and take care of my health. I'm positive I'll be back with nicer things to share come Christmas.

Speak soon. x

W.i.P. - Yoshi 1.0

My appointment today went just swell. Thanks so much for keeping your fingers crossed! Think of me again on Thursday between 9am and 1pm UTC+1? Ta.

As I've got a moment to breathe before returning to my notes for Thursday, I thought I'd let you know of my inspiration for the Yoshi quilt. Follow the links to see the original sources.

I aim for a monochrome sky to make the background less busy but will otherwise stick with the pattern. Though I think I'll add another row of pixels to each side. I want the quilt to be really big and wide as M is nearly 2 metres tall and he deserves something that he can properly fit under.

Yoshi

I'm pretty sure that I should have enough fabric to add an egg to the back of the quilt, too. That'll be a cute addition.

Yoshi egg

I think it's time for an updated WIP list!

Finishes since the Move - 2
Viking Baby quilt
Chair cushions for my sister

Ongoing Projects - 4
Yoshi quilt - fabrix ready to be cut up and sewn together
EPP hexies - 32 finished flowers + tons basted
Polaroid blocks Tote - will it ever get made?
EPP parallelograms/stars

Planning Stage - 1
Wedding Anniversary quilt

Wow, it's certainly shrunk a lot. What a pleasant feeling! I already know of a few projects which will enter the stage soon. Stay tuned.

Happy sewing!

Vikings 4.0 - Saying Goodbye (and Hello)

Here’s the promised Viking quilt picture post.

Last time you saw it it looked something like this.

Now, without a gorgeous little baby boy on it, it looks like this.

I badly want to show you the hand quilted details, alas, my camera and the lighting were really bad, so I can only hope that you can make them out properly in the pictures. (I think I'll wish for a new camera for Christmas so you won't have to suffer awful pictures for much longer!)

First, wavy lines in the corners.

Looks much more interesting than before, don't you think?

My good friend Perlendiva suggested that I quilt shields on the squares and echo the waves in the Viking parade print on the orange border. I decided against the waves because I didn’t want to clutter the quilt too much but definitely fell for the shields and quilted four different ones.

Posting the quilt to Finland proved such an ambiguous moment! On the one hand, I was incredibly excited and happy, I love gifting things that took a lot of time and thought. On the other hand, it was tough to part with it. I’d grown so accustomed to seeing it and I feel that it’s my best quilt up to date. To be honest, I still miss it a tiny bit! The hand quilting only made it all the more precious to me. Then again, I know it's being treasured. I can't believe the little one is already 5 weeks old.

Due to time constraints I won’t be gifting handmade this year, but I’m all the more happy to finally start working on my quasi-brother-in-law’s pixelated Yoshi quilt next week. It’ll keep my rotary cutter and sewing machine busy! 

I'm back in Berlin until Thursday evening, having two important appointments. Would you keep your fingers crossed for tomorrow morning between 10 and 11am UTC+1? Cheers.

Have a great week, everybody! 

See the full journey here
Part 1

Part 2
Part 3
Part 4