Naturally because I have a bit of a goal list for the month, I’ve so far only worked on completely different things. Two of them totally new!
The simplest thing on my ginormous To-Do list was to add borders to two finished baby sized tops and send them away for a Linus group to quilt and gift to a child in need. I even had the borders cut.
Sure, the lighting is horrible. But so are the borders! I don’t hate all borders on sight (like some capital-m Modern Quilters seem to), but there’s a time and a place for all things, and these two quilts were not the place for borders, apparently.
Thing was, they weren’t very square and if you have a not-very-square quilt, adding properly sized borders can really help fix a multitude of sins. But they’re just so awful looking! I couldn’t decide if I should take them off or leave them on, and I left them in the end. I figure if the Linus group that gets them really hates them as much as me, they can trim off 2.25″ width to use as binding fabric (and be left with a skinnier border, that maybe wouldn’t look so bad?) or they can rip them off entirely or they can leave them on because maybe some kid somewhere will appreciate it anyway.
Anyway, after I got that done, I went digging through my drawers looking for a needle. I can’t remember what got me looking for one – I don’t think I had anything that needed hand-sewing – but I did and then I found a little embroidery project that I bought a while ago and never got around to making:
An embroidered monkey stuffie from Kiriki Press. They sell a sweet little collection of embroidered stuffie kits. This is one of the simplest ones – you only need to know chain stitch and running or back stitch to do the embroidery. I picked it up because I thought it was cute and because Kiriki is an independant Canadian company (and I want to support Canadian talent) and did I mention it’s cute? I’ve only been working on it a little here and there while watching tv, but then I haven’t watched anything in a few days now, so I’ve set him aside again. I’m determined to finish him this month, though, so to that end, I’m going to link up to &Stitches January finish-along. I have lots of other embroidery projects I could try to finish instead, but I’m feeling this one instead.
I’m also working on some pot-holders out of that Christmas fabric I mentioned a couple days ago. I started out following a pot holder/hot pad tutorial, but I got distracted somewhere along the line and sort of did my own thing and then I thought how very boring it was (just this floral fabric on the front/heat reflective side, all that brown background fabric on the back side) so my brain went back to that original tutorial and thought I’d better add some kind of embellishment to break up the front a little.
So today I headed over to Fabricland and picked up a half metre each of those two crochet lace edgings – grand total of $1.13 – to test against the fabric. Neither matches quite exactly – in brighter lighting, the white is a much purer white than the fabric, which is a creamy yellow-based white and the beige is much too dark. (The beige does match the twill tape loops quite well.) But I have enough to do four hot pads, so I think I might just do two with the white and two with the beige and be done with it whether they match precisely or not.
So that’s what I’m working on! And then I need to get working on my bee blocks and some cat-faces…
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Thanks for joining in the Finish Along! Good Luck with the cute monkey 🙂
Thanks! Shouldn’t be too hard, I just need to, you know, actually work on it!
Oh, that monkey is so cute! And I know what you mean about borders. Sometimes they work, and sometimes they just don’t. But I’m sure the kids who receive those quilts will be super thankful and get lots of snuggle time out of them. 🙂
I kind of love that ridiculous little monkey, it reminds me a little of a stuffie I had when I was a kid that I called Ringo. (Although that one was just plain brown and more like an upright bear than anything else.)
When I was deciding on the borders, I’d tried out a whole bunch of options and those were the ones I liked the best and they actually seemed like they’d work out well. But as soon as I had the first border edge sewn on I was like, “Nope.” One of those cases of things looking okay up close, but terrible with any distance. (Whereas a lot of things you might question up close but turn out to be fine when you stand back a bit.)
I know that the recipients will love them! We are usually our worst critics! Your 2014 is looking super good so far 🙂
I don’t disagree about being our own worst critics (I KNOW I’m terrible for self-criticism), though in this case I don’t even think I’m being over-sensitive to my imagined failures: they really did look better without the borders! Anyway, the place I’ve sent it to can make the decision (and if they take them off, it gives them binding fabric at least, which is mostly why I left them on). And I’m sure they will be loved, regardless of what happens borderwise 😀
Love the monkey! I hope you finish all of your projects!
Thanks! It’s all getting there… the monkey still isn’t done (and it’s such an easy thing to do! I’ve just been lazy about it), but it’s nearly there at least!