Working on My Black and White Quilt

I took a moment this morning to snap a couple of photos of my black and white quilt. The sun is actually shining today and the quilt was just begging for my attention!

The quilt is officially half way done now.  It measures 70″ by 45″, once it’s done it will be a 70″x90″. There are 54 hand quilted squares there! (and that means 54 more to do, oooh).

I am still really liking the quilt as you go method for joining the squares .  With this technique you never have to have more than one block’s width rolled up under the arm of your sewing machine.  (the blocks are hand quilted, but pieced together by machine). I also love that it is pieced together so that it is patchwork on the front and back, too.  To be honest, I am feeling a bit intimidated with the amount of work left to do.  Each of these blocks takes me 45 minutes to an hour to quilt (I’m slow, but getting better!).  I even toyed with the idea of machine quilting some of the squares just to keep motivated and get some of it done quickly, but a friend told me, “Don’t do it! you’ll never forgive yourself”.  I laughed, but I thought about it and she was right.  I just know I’ll be proud of it when I’m done and know that I put so much effort into it, and didn’t compromise my plan.

Right now I just want it done so I can snuggle up under it.

Dave’s Killer Bread on TV, and something I made!

Drew Carney (from PDX channel 8 local news) was out visiting the “Breadquarters” for Dave’s Killer Bread early this morning. I’m a huge fan of Dave and his bread. It’s the best bread in Portland. Healthy and organic, local to Portland, and unbelievably sinfully delicious! But don’t take my word for it, you might think I’m biased having a handful of friends and family proudly working for the company. Take a look at Dave’s facebook and you can see what everyone else is saying. Honestly, once you’ve had this bread, you’ll never look at bread the same way again.

Anyway, when I heard that the bakery would be on the news this morning I borrowed a television from my mom and set my alarm for 5am. It was fun to see the segments throughout the news showing different parts of the bakery, and a few familiar faces (Hi Zac!), but what got me personally quite excited was right at the end. Dave and Drew were talking and standing by a table covered in the different kinds of killer bread, including one of my favorites, Good Seed:

And right on top was Good Seed, a stuffed version of the lovable logo I made as a gift for Dave from our little group.

Yes, I felt silly taking a photo of a television, but I was really excited!

I had made a set of Good Seed for myself last summer and had them sitting out as an xmas fireplace decoration this last December:

A friend of mine mentioned that Dave would love them. It thought it was a great idea, and something personal I could do to show my appreciation for Dave.  He’s an inspirational person, and the opportunities this company has given to people I care a lot about has changed our lives so much.  I started right away on a second set of good seed to give.

They’re a simple stuffie, made from fleece. I embroidered the faces and ended up doing a lot of hand sewing on these guys.  They were just one of those projects that I totally underestimated how long it would take (and completely forgot how much time I spent on the first set).  Something I thought I could knock out in just a couple of hours ended up taking close to ten hours over the course of a week!  Turning those tiny limbs right side out and getting them smoothly stuffed, and then getting everything stitched together was rough.  Totally worth it, though.  Their sweet smiling faces just brighten the day, I think, I was just so proud to see that Dave liked them enough to include them in their interview this morning.  Thanks!

Happy New Year!

I’ve been keeping up with ton of great craft blogs lately, and I’ve noticed a quite a few new posts sharing crafty goals for the new year. I love the idea, so I thought I’d share some of my own.
We’ll see how I do!

1. Finish my black and white quilt
I’ve been working on this one for a couple of months now. I’m about a third of the way through it now, and I can’t wait to have it done. I’ve been hand quilting the blocks, which is a first for me!

2. Post new tutorials online
I love sharing project how-to’s as much as I enjoy reading them.  I’ll give myself the goal of ten new tutorials for 2010.

3. Get my supplies better organized.
I’m looking at you, giant basket of buttons! And yes, even the as-of-yet unpacked boxes marked “misc.” tucked away in the attic.

4. Continue with Social Crafting
I have so enjoyed going to local meetups, crafternoons, and craft and cocktails around town this last year, so I’m going to pledge to keep my attendance up and make sure I get to at least one event a month. (I’ll look forward to seeing you all!)

5. Participate in some Craft swaps on Craftster
I’d like to complete 5 swaps this year, so I’ll keep my eye on the swap board for all the newest swaps!

I might just check out swap-bot, too.

6. Fill my closet with more handmade fashion essentials
Ideally, I’d love a wardrobe of all handmade items, but for the year I’m going to aim for a minimum of five of each of these items:

• Sweatshirts/Hoodies
• Long sleeve tees
• Tees and tanks
• Dresses
• Fitted jackets / vests
• Coats/capes / wraps
• Skirts
• Undies
• Accessories (hats, scarves, legwarmers, etc.)

7. 100 crafted things
Maybe 100 is too many, but I’m aiming high and counting the little projects, too. I guess that should lead me into another goal to keep track of this one:

8. Keep a record of completed projects
Being prolific in my crafty endeavors and having a horrible memory means that I can never remember what I’ve been doing with my precious time. I’ll start a simple list to keep by my desk, and a folder on my computer to record a photo if I’m feeling ambitious.

9. Master a commercial sewing pattern
I don’t know why this is such a hard one for me! I can’t think of many things I’ve made (that I was happy with) from a store bought pattern. Is it impatience? Inability to adjust properly to my measurements? overcoming my need to “make a few changes”. I don’t know, but I’m going to find a pattern I like, sit down with it and follow the directions beginning to end, and make something good.

10. Set more crafty goals throughout the year
having a tangible list, or a written reminder is a great way to motivated. Have you heard of 43 things? It’s a simple website that allows you to list 43 things you want to do. List whatever you want! Short term goals, like “Kiss in the rain ” (completed by 6320 people) or go big and “become a millionaire” (1,675 people want to do this). You can list your goals, check out what other people want to do, comment or make entries about goals, and even give and receive “cheers” to support good goals. You can read all about how people have completed their goals, and share your own tips and advice on the goals you’ve completed. Check out the Zeitgeist list for recent activity, or swing by my list and give me a cheer. Let me know if you start your own list so I can come and cheer for you, too!

Quick Cashmere Knee Sock Recon

A while ago I thrifted this Cashmere hoodie that was so soft and warm and a lovely grey. Sadly, it was a little small and had a few holes along some of the seams, but I knew it would be great for a recon project. This morning my chilly toes were just calling out for some toasty socks and it clicked, I need some cashmere knee socks!

I snipped off the sleeves and cut some roughly foot shaped pieces from the hood to make the bottom of the sock. The end of the sleeve with the cuff would become the top of the sock.

I lined up the heel of my foot tracing with the seam on the sleeve. The wider toe part of the bottom lined up with the higher part of the sleeve that used to be the top of the shoulder.

Just a quick stitch around, attaching the bottom piece to the sleeve. Repeated for the other sleeve.

Sweet! Cashmere socks for under $5 and in less than 10 minutes.

The seams along the bottom are very subtle.

Glow Hoop Update

I received a lot of great comments and interesting questions from people about my past post on my glow stick hoops. I was delighted to see a link posted to my blog at Hooping.org. I love that site for videos and music suggestions. The glow sticks are a great and cheap way to make a glowing hoop on a tight budget. The lights will glow all night, but there are some downsides. The glow sticks do rattle inside the hoop (although it never bothered me, I guess some people don’t like that), and unfortunately, the glow sticks will have to be removed and disposed of. It’s a small amount of waste but they can’t be recycled. I had a question about the toxicity of the glow sticks and I can tell you that they’re not harmful. I wouldn’t suggest ingesting them, but the chemicals won’t hurt you or the planet any more than household cleaning products. I actually had one break open and it made a big glowing mess on my hands, but I didn’t have any adverse reaction.

Anyway, I would certainly suggest the glow stick hoop for someone who just wants a glowing hoop for a special night or just every once in a while. If you plan on hooping at night often (and you probably will, it’s crazy addictive) an LED hoop is a must. I’m delighted to announce that I have conquered soldering and leds and made myself a couple!

It actually wasn’t that hard, and with all the materials together (including the hoop tubing I had used for the glow stick hoop) it came in under $50 for supplies. It did take me ALL day to make my big blue/green and flashing red hoop. It’s got more than 80 5mm LEDs on it’s length and glows really brightly.

(click above images to see full size)
I haven’t yet come up with a good solution for the battery, though. I used a 9 volt so I’d only need one battery, but it doesn’t fit inside the tubing so I just taped it to the exterior of the hoop with the wires going through a small hole. Before you ask, no, the battery doesn’t effect the hooping at all on the outside of the hoop. I’ve used this hoop for hours and hours now and can’t even tell it’s there. I know a lot of people use AA or AAA sized batteries and put them inside the hoop, but they also use 1 inch tubing or more. I really like the smaller 3/4 inch tubing myself. Having the wires come out of the hoop at the ends I can pull the wires nice and tight and tape them down near the connector to keep the LEDs from rattling inside. Because I’m using the smaller tubing there isn’t enough room to wrap the LEDs in bubblewrap like I’ve seen some people do.
Anyway, I’m silly happy with my LED hoops and I’m sure I’ll be making more.
Here are some long exposure shots and a short video clip with my hoop:

The Earbud Poppy Laundromat tutorial

I’ve posted before about my laundromat projects, but this time I thought I’d bring my camera along with and share a quick one perfect for your next trip to the laundromat. I was inspired by Diana Eng’s book Fashion Geek available on Amazon. I made up my own pattern for my version, but feel free to check out the book (I saw it at my local library and there seem to be a lot of cute projects in there.)

Step 1

First, get your laundry, your quarters, and your supplies and head off to the laundromat. I like to do my laundry at midnight at the 24 hour laundromat when it’s nice and quiet and empty, but that’s optional. The supplies you’ll need are few and easy to tote along with you.
-Felt in two colors, one for your petals and one for your center circle. Scraps are fine
-Scissors
-Needles, thread (I like to carry a mini sewing kit in a film canister)
-Your headphones / earbuds

-*- Optional -*- hot glue or tacky glue

Step 2

Cut your pieces out of felt. For the petals, cut a strip of felt about 2 inches tall. You don’t really need a pattern to cut the petals, they’re just rectangles with a rounded top. The curve of your thumb should make a perfect template. Trace your shape onto one end of the felt, cut it out, and use that as your guide to cut out 5 more petals for one flower ( 11 more if you want to make two flowers. From here I’ll be describing how to make one flower), all the same size and shape.

Step 3

With your needle threaded you’re now going to stitch the six petals together.

Holding the bottom of the petal (the flat side opposite the curve) fold the flat side in half. Then fold the edges up towards the fold. Push the needle through the four layers, near the edge of the flat side.

See the image below for a step by step. Click the image if you need to see it bigger.

It should look like this once you slide the petal onto the thread and release it:

String the next five petals onto the thread (If you’re making two flowers, string six petals on one thread and six petals on another thread)

Step 4

Time to check in on your laundry if you haven’t done it yet.

Yep, Spin cycle. Once your laundry is in the dryer just tumbling away, we’ve got about 20 minutes to finish this up.

Step 5

Pull the ends of the thread to gather the petals together. Pull it nice and tight and tie a couple of knots to make your flower.

You could call this done if you like, and sew or glue this onto your earbuds now, but I’ve got a few more minutes to kill until folding time.

Cut a small felt circle of your second color of felt and stitch it to the center of the flower with a matching thread. I used a simple blanket stitch.

I still had some extra time, so I added some french knots in a contrasting thread color for a little extra bit of detail. On the other earbud I also added a little green leaf underneath the flower.

Step 6

Attach the flower to your earbuds. I simply sewed around the earbud and through the petals a few times to hold it in place. Alternately you could use glue, or a glue gun would work great. I noticed some open outlets at the laundromat and realized I could’ve brought my hot glue for a quick and easy fix, but this worked just fine.

Step 7

Put on your headphones, turn up the tunes, and get that laundry folded!

Another Lucky Thrifting Find

I get some of the best luck thrifting, but I was still surprised to find this Brother knitting machine for just $8. wow. I had to get it despite the fact that I’m rubbish at knitting and had no clue how one of these were supposed to work. It actually was pretty easy to get the hang of! I looked online and was able to find a manual and get the machine set up pretty easily. I had almost everything I needed, but I was missing a piece that held up the tension thingie so I improvised with some dowel rod. With a little more luck, the machine worked perfectly (except for some learning curve and user error) and I was making up little swatches and stuff in just a couple of hours.

I thought I’d share some basic photos to share what a knitting machine looks like.

The machine consists of around 200 of these “needles” that are just like latch hooks and lay in channels along the “bed” of the machine.

The carriage sits on top of the machine and glides across it with the help of channels along the bed. Now I’ve read a bunch of explanations of how exactly the carriage makes the stitches, but I don’t know how to explain it so we’ll just call it magic. Basically, when you slide the carriage across from one side to the other it lays the yarn across the needles. The new yarn is simultaneously pulled through the loop already on each needle, dropping the first loop below and keeping the new yarn loop on the needle ready for the next row. (yeah, we’ll just call it magic)

This is what it looks like when there are a bunch of stitches on the needles. You can just go back and forth to create stocking stitch, or you can create lacey eyelets or chunky cables by manually moving stitches from one needle to another with the help of these little tools.

using a tool to move a stitch

A stitch moved over one to the right. Running the carriage after this will leave an eyelet for this row and continue knitting as normal on the next row.

The machine is great for me because I have a really hard time keeping track of where I am in a pattern or how many stitches I’ve done. On the bed of the machine the needles are numbered every 5 needles, and on the back of the machine it’s got a row counter that automatically counts each time the carriage goes by.

I worked off of this pattern (with a few changes, leaving out the purl stitches and adding the lacey bit to the center)

and made a swatch that looked like this in about a half an hour

It’s a little strange, because the right side can’t be seen while you’re working, but that’s part of the fun, I think. It wasn’t until I’d bound off this piece that I could see the full pattern.

I really like this machine and I just know I’m going to have a good time getting to know more tips and tricks and how to make some nifty knitted goodies!

I strung some beads

I strung some beads this weekend as my “laundromat project”. I think time waiting for your washers and dryers is best spent with a little project to work on, and this week I made myself a simple necklace.

I quite like it. It’s long enough to slide over my head so it doesn’t have a clasp at the back, but it does have a clasp hanging from the center front to hold the pendant.

Now I can wear my scissors everywhere! They’ve already come in handy a couple of times!

Night Hoops

Some of our hoops, decorated with colorful tape

Last summer I heard about making your own hula hoops. I found out that hoops you find in the toy isle at the store just aren’t that great, and a bigger, heavier hoop can not only make hooping easier, but it’s a lot more fun, too! Since then I’ve spent many hours outside hooping it up, learning some tricks, and surprisingly getting a great workout (and the bruises and sore muscles that can come with it, ha!).
I’ve made quite a few hoops now. I’ve tried a bunch of different sizes and weights to see how they feel. Smaller, lighter ones are great for fast spinning. Bigger, slower hoops are perfect for a relaxing spin. I’ve made most of them out of cheap irrigation tubing I picked up at the Home Depot, but after seeing some cool LED hoops online (starting at $100!) I decided I wanted a glowing hoop, but for cheaper. The cheap tubing I was buying is black and opaque, so I set off again in search of a better tube. I found Pex tubing this week. It’s a white and more transparant kind of tubing intended for potable water. After visiting some home improvement stores for tubing and my friendly neighborhood dollar store to score some glow sticks I just had to wait until it was dark and start spinning light.

Glowing hoops in the grass

Unfortunately, I couldn’t get a picture of the hoops actually spinning, but you’ll just have to trust me, they look really cool. The larger one is for me, and is about 13 feet of tubing and 7 glow necklaces. The smaller one is perfect for my favorite 8 year old and is 10 feet long and has 15 glow bracelets. The glow sticks work great for one night, but I’m planning on running leds through them for more uses.

Here’s a classic tutorial for making your own hoops if you’re interested: http://www.jasonunbound.com/hoops.html

For Portlanders looking for supplies:

The black irrigation tubing for regular hoops I get at the home depot on SE 82nd ave in Clackamas. They have it in rolls of that make about 6-8 adult hoops for around $20. I like the 3/4″ tubing and the grey connectors that fit at 28 cents apiece (you just need one per hoop) note: There’s also 1/2″ tubing that is a lot cheaper, but it just doesn’t work. It’s worse than the cheapie kids’ hoops you’re trying to replace.

These glowing hoops were made from “Pex” tubing. Besides their color difference from the other tubing, it’s also a little bit smaller (even though it’s also called 3/4″ tubing) so you’ll also need different connectors. I found 10 foot lengths of pex at the Lowes out by milwaukee for about $3.50. One of these is perfect for smaller people, but I like having 12-13 feet of length so I picked one up for the kiddo and kept looking. They only had some big rolls of it for around $45, but I wasn’t sure yet how well it would work so I wasn’t ready to invest that much yet. I looked again at the home depot, but in a different isle than my black tubing and found the pex there, too. They had one piece that was cut at 3/4″, but it was only 5 feet long. Luckily, I also found a roll of 25′ for $15.50, which is perfect to make two hoops my size!

Farewell, Paul

Last October I captured some photos of this large caterpillar building it’s cocoon on out back porch. I photoblogged the image on my Aminus3 page http://laupre.aminus3.com/image/2008-10-03.html . I started calling him paul after looking online at photos of moths and guessed he’d be a polyphemus because of his big green body. Since then we’ve waited patiently for our little friend Paul to make an appearance. It was a kind of running joke that he was a great roomate. Never made a mess, was really quiet, that sort of thing. It’d been so long we were starting to wonder if we’d ever see him (and if he did come out if we’d be lucky enough to see him before he flew off.)

Today we spotted him all big and mothy, having emergerd from his cocoon. check him out!

Each of his wings were about 3 inches long, giving him a pretty impressive 6 inch wingspan.

He hung around for a couple of hours and then disappeared, but won’t be forgotten. Farewell, Paul!