Dye Dog #2 - Two'fer!

 So what is Dye Dog #2 - Two'fer you ask!  Well, I decided to use up the other two fabrics and any leftover from the Dye Dog #2 for the backing of my piece.  So, I started just doing some patchwork of pieces and adding some other shibori fabric (I used some pink shibori in the original piece in the strips).  

This was one of the layouts I played with.

 

Another layout...actually, I flipped the piece!  I had started this piece horizontal then I decided to change to vertical, which looks so much better.

But then the more I played with it, the more I decided to make a 2nd quilt piece!  Why waste this on the back of the quilt!  This is my favorite layout, so far. 

I can see LOTS of hand work on this one too!!!!  

So this is my DYE DOG #2 - Two'fer!

Dye Dog Progress

I'm working away on handwork on my dye dog #2!  This is the best part, as far as I'm concerned.  I just love any type of hand work.  It's so relaxing to me...even if I have to 'unrip' at times...who me!...it's still a fun process to do.

These are pieces of ultra suede that I had leftover from other projects!

In addition to some of the embroidery work, I had to add beads, right!  I played around with different colors of beads (hence, the 'unripping') but decided on turquoise beads, which look very pale here but they are a pretty shade and match the turquoise in the quilt.

Here is the side panel finished with beading and stitching.  I'm happy with how it turned out.

I am making progress...now to do hand stitching around the tree!  We don't have a target date so I don't feel that pressure, which I don't care for!  We have enough pressure in our lives.  HA HA

Again, I'm using a turquoise thread.  It's Lana Madera, color 3875 and only using one strand.

On a side note, I'm working on the ribbing of my lace top!  Woohoo!  And should be starting on the sleeves next week...depends on which mood I'm in...to knit or hand stitch!

Dye Dog #2 Progress

 

I've been working off and on the design for dye dog #2 this past week.

And started on quilting the piece!

Makes it easy to quilt...just follow the lines!  HA

Didn't do any fancy free motion work.  

I had to color in some of the black lines with a black micro pen.

I traced the stencil of the tree on back of fusible web then cut out the tree in black fabric.

And now it's handwork to get busy with!

Once I finish with the square embroidery, I'll be adding black beads (I think!) around the circles.  I plan on doing some stab stitching on the main piece...but that could also change.  I'm busy the rest of this week, so might not get to the hand work until next week.  

Hope to finish up the body on my knitted lace...I have about 2 more inches of the body then ribbing...THEN I can start on the sleeves!  Well, Easter is a long way off, right!  It will be finished by then...fingers crossed!

Washi Paper Making

 I found this YouTube on 'A Movable Feast' blog.  I've followed her for quite sometime and always fascinated with some of her posts.  Lots of her posts are about textile, weaving, papers, Japanese influenced.  I thought this  video was so interesting and wanted to share with my readers!  Enjoy!

Grandma's Quilt is ALL DONE!!!

 

The binding fabric worked great.  I used the machine to sew the binding on.  I wasn't going to hand sew the binding.  Don't forget this is just a project I want

 

finished.  It's nothing my kids are going to say "WOW, LOOK WHAT MUM MADE".  HA

It's more of an emotional tie to myself because I recognize the quilts I made with so many of the pieces of fabric.  And this was a pattern I started back in 2000!!!!  Bob keeps saying "it doesn't look like your work".  Well, it did back in 2000 but he's right...I don't do this type of quilts anymore.

The backing is actually an old sheet that I dyed with Tea Bags!  Yep...in fact, there are some areas were I left the tea bags in the water and it looks like the backing is stained.  Well, it is...but with the tea bag!  It really is more pink than anything but I can't get the color correct on my pictures.  Not sure why pink!

Both the pic above and this one are showing the hand quilting I did back in 2000!!!

This is the back of the quilt...see how pink it is!  Who knew!

Closeup of some blocks and the hand quilting!  

This is a true scrap quilt for sure.  Nothing goes together but I have memories of so many of the fabric scraps!

All Finished!!!  Whew!!!

So now, it's back to the Dye Dog #2!!!  So glad to have this project/homework behind me!  HA

Dye Dog #2 Progress

 Before I get into my post...I had lunch with my BFF, Carol, on Tuesday...and come to find out Thursday she tested positive for Covid!  She didn't get sick with fever, sore throat until Wednesday but I'm hibernating until next Tuesday just to be safe and not infect anyone.  I don't think I'll get it but better be safe than sorry.

Of course I have a few ideas on my Dye Dog #2....hard to control my mind!  I see so many different ideas and go back and forth, but, I think that's just what the process is or should be, right!  I should have turned this pic of one of the dye dog fabrics.  

Just reminds me of branches of a tree.

So out came my tree stencil which I used a few years ago.  You can read that post here.

Ran the stencil through copy machine

traced tree onto fusible web

I really like the look of the tree on Kay's dye dog piece.  

So next up is deciding on the rest of the arrangement.  The piece on the left is another one of the 'dye dog' pieces.  This 3rd piece is quite light BUT I have an idea there as well...maybe using thickened dyes to enhance the black in the fabric.

Worse case, I'll use this 3rd piece as backing for the quilt.

I'm also looking at using some of this ultra suede I have.  Putting 1/8" of the pink in between black fabric looks pretty good.

Hard to tell but that 'reddish' strip is actually the same pink you see here. I have plans for doing quite a bit of hand work too.    I didn't have any solid black fabric so I ordered some from JoAnn's (with my gift card, Susan!).  They had cotton sateen on sale for $7.99 and free shipping...can't beat that with a stick, right!

So this is where I'm at with my dye dog project.  And before you know it, I'll have changed my mind and will have come up with an entirely different design!  Just the way my mind works!  

Knitting! And Grandma's Quilt!

 

It's been a busy two weeks...between doctor, dental extraction, eye exam,; blood workup; picking out new glasses; grocery shopping, cleaning, cooking (ok, let's be honest - I used up a lot of leftovers from the freezer lately!  HA) and a few lunches out I've not been at home as much as I would like!  But I'm not complaining...especially about the eating lunches out!  

I still have about 6-8 inches for the body to knit on my 3rd lace top.  I was able to knit this past Sunday watching two football games!  Woohoo!  Once I'm done with the body,  I can start knitting the sleeves, which are 3/4 length...

Closeup of the lace work.  Pro bowl is on this weekend and then Super Bowl next!  I will miss football for sure!  And miss knitting time...I don't sit and watch golf with Bob very often (which will be on in place of football!) so knitting will be while in my sewing room watching shows that I have taped - like I have several, several series with 3-5 shows waiting to be seen!  

I will knit at night if we're watching some program I don't need to watch every scene!  

I've squared Grandma's Quilt so edges are all ready for the binding.

Because this is a true scrap quilt, I looked for some yardage I had to make the binding with.  Remember this is a huge bugger so I need quite a bit. 

And look what I found....actually, it's not that pretty to use for the binding but I have tons of this leftover from Ian's T-shirt quilt.  I used this for the backing and binding strips.  You can see some of that quilt here.  I may pin some of the binding on to see if it's too icky looking!  Then it's back to the fabric stash to see what else I can find.  

I'm making progress on the Dye Dog #2 quilt...well, at least from a design idea!  Hope to post later this week.

Plugging away!

So Grandma's Quilt is progressing!  I finally finished ALL the quilting. 

There is a mixture of hand  and free motion quilting but remember this hand quilting all took place back in 2000 when I was certainly more ambitious!  

  I will be honest....it's not my best work doing the free motion quilting.  Just way to heavy to work with and my heart wasn't it in.  I hate having projects hanging around so I just wanted to finish the quilting!    And I did! 

So, now it's a matter of squaring up this monster so I can add the binding...which I will do by machine.  I'm not putting the effort to hand sew the binding on.  Let's be honest...this quilt is going to be 'finished' and put away somewhere!  I don't see the kids wanting it, other than when I'm gone they may just want it but certainly not now.  Or they can put it in my coffin with me!  Not a bad idea!  

Not sure when I'll get to the binding...yikes...now I have to find enough fabric for that too!  Forgot about that!

My week!

 This past Tuesday I had a tooth extraction! UGH This one hit me hard for some reason...ok, maybe I'm wimping out...as of today, (1/26/2023), it's only been 48 hours!  I'm missing eating real food!  The one plus is the swelling on my left side is taking away the wrinkles in my face!  Honest, it's kinda funny but as I say there's always a plus side to everything!  HA

I honestly haven't done much the afternoon after the removal, nor did I do anything yesterday except lay on the couch in the family room, drinking tea, napping and watching Netflix!  Today, I'm feeling much better (still enjoying the look of no wrinkles on one side of my face!  HA).  I felt like I had wasted two days so kicked myself in the butt and started to work on designing my Dye Dog 2!

I picked out some JoAnn fabric that had some shibori type pattern to it and picked out a pink fabric.  I wanted to have some type of angle blocks using small strips (pink), which I could then embroider somehow.  Really, I thought about cutting this up some more and sewing back together...but I didn't....my mind went another direction.

These are the 'dye dog' fabrics Kay sent me (you can read the post on how this project started here).

Pretty cool  fabrics and the patterns sure can get the old mind working!  Just hope I get my mind working correctly!

So now I'm playing with other colors or fabrics that may work with Kay's 'dye dog'.  

I pulled out some old ultra suede fabric I had.  These are pieces that I painted with black paint.

I have a design in mind but I need to go into my dye work area, which means asking Bob to move his plane from my work table!

I won't have time to do anything until Sunday.  Today I'm going to try and knit before dinner or after.  Tomorrow, I need to go to the grocery store and possibly laundry.  Saturday I'll be headed to the library to put away donation books.  I'm sure there's a playoff football game on Sunday but I might be able to do something or at least get my table set up with my 'idea'!  Fingers crossed!

Grandma's Quilt Progress

 

Yes, I am quilting my little heart out!  I actually keep the quilt under the needle and just shut off the sewing machine and my lights!  This bugger is way to heavy to keep lifting and moving back and forth..plus, if I have 10 min to sew, everything is right there ready to go!  I'm about 75% finished with the free motion quilting...sure seems like I keep finding empty areas!  I accomplished quite a lot of hand quilting back when I first started this bugger.  Can't believe I was hand quilting!  What was I thinking!  HA 

I was trying to look through old photo's to find the picture of my daughter's graduation dress I made her. this is the fabric, I had a small piece in my stash and used it in 'grandma's quilt.....Along with so many old fabrics, which I can remember using the fabrics in other quilts....I was big on applique way back when!  Remember 'Thimbleberries' patterns!  

And this is a pattern I drew up in 1987 to make a quilt for my daughter!  Yes, I still have this paper!  HA

And if you look closely, you'll see some of this floral fabric in grandma's quilt!  Actually, there are enough wide panels of that floral fabric in this quilt!  This was way before batik's!  HA

This is large quilt, 72"x76" and Dawn still has it!  In fact, I did a repair job on this quilt back in spring of 2019! "Waste not, want not"...guess I didn't want for any fabric since I used so many of my fabric pieces in 'grandma's quilt'.  I don't believe I purchased any fabric with the exception of the beige background.  HA  Now to finish 'grandma's quilt' so I can start on my Dye Dog 2!