Baby Blanket

Trying out a new stitch pattern, and trying to use up yarn that I already have- the white with pink tones is all gone now, and the pink is almost there. Made a border all the way around with the pink, using double crochet stitches.

Baby Blanket

I haven't given up on yarn! I may be working on this big embroidered dragon blanket, and another quilt (bowtie squares), but I have not given up on crocheting! This baby-sized blanket finished off two skeins of yarn, one (yellow) that had been sitting around my apartment for a couple years (lets not talk about this), and the other (multi) that came out of my grandma's basement, and had no matching skeins or tags with it. I had hoped to get my cat to crawl into the laundry basket, one of her favorite spots, and take a nap on it, I even tried luring her with treats, but she just ate them with her back all arched up and hopped out- regardless, you can get an idea for how big it is.

Embroidered Dragon #2

Another dragon drawn by NSNC, interpreted by me. I'm not totally sure I want to continue doing flame like this, but it works alright for this one. It's too oddly shaped to really satin stitch particularly well, and I do want to incorporate a couple shades of red and orange (there are multiple colors here, though it's hard to tell with my camera...). I could attach fabric the way I did with the wings, but I don't really want to do that, I want it to look a little more organic, and not so defined and flat. I do like the way the multi-colored thread worked out for the line along the ridge of the dragon's back and the dragon's horn. I used a slightly lighter brown for the leg and shoulders, and I like the way that turned out looking as well.

Sidenote: Somewhere along the line, either with this dragon or the one previous, I managed to get wunder under glue all over the face of my iron in the process of attaching the wing fabric to the square fabric. This was very annoying, because any time I would heat the iron up, it would start sticking to whatever I was ironing. So I was using a scrap to keep from getting it onto the square, but then it would stick to the scrap, so I'd have to keep unsticking... Anyways, after last using goo-gone on the tape marks from carpet on my grandma's hardwood floors, I decided there was no reason not to use goo-gone on my iron. I started out with the iron cold, and it didn't do much (glue was solid and hard and not sticky when cold); next I turned the iron on to its lowest setting, just enough to warm up the glue- and it worked like a charm! No more sticky iron! All hail goo-gone!

Embroidered Dragon #1

The next phase of my dragon blanket project involves interpreting drawings into embroidery. On this one I chose to use a plaid fabric for the wings, to fill in the space quickly, and provide an interesting pattern. I satin-stitched the sections of the dragon's stomach, and chose to outline the rest of the dragon, to keep it from being too heavy. I also back-stitched around the edge of the wings- they are attached with the glue from Wonder Under, but it is ultimately going to be on a baby blanket, and needs to be able to be washed in a standard washer/dryer, so I decided it would be smart to double ensure that the wings weren't going to peel off. My friend NSNC drew the dragon for this square.

Cross-Stitch Complete!

Yay! All of the dragons for the baby-sized dragon quilt that will be cross-stitched are done (except for the French knot eye on the bottom left purple one- I swear I'll get to it)! The other dragons in the pattern book are a bit too ambitious, or too large for these squares for this project... or else they're the single Asian-style snake dragon with no bordering that would look totally out of place on this project. I finished (mostly) the purple dragon this morning, and started in on the next phase of the project- embroidering dragons based on drawings, with cloth wings appliqued. Pictures soon!

Burda 9802

Today I took one of my "call-in vacation" days because I woke up and really wanted to stay at home and sew and CUT FABRIC, and really did not want to go in to work. SO, I had been sitting on the pattern and fabric for this little dress for a while, and cut it out and put it all together today. Made a couple changes to the pattern- used some twill tape that I had instead of bias tape (the clerk at Joanns the other day and I couldn't figure out what the symbol on the back of the pattern envelope meant. I bought elastic.), and I didn't want to mess around with fabric ruffles, so I raided my trims stash and found some eyelet lace in two sizes, that matched. I couldn't find 3 buttons I liked that matched in my button tin, so I used two that I liked and matched, and a third that looks like a little rose for the top button. I used a water soluble marker to plan the buttonholes, for the first time, and it was pretty successful. Made it easy to see where they were supposed to be- I usually just try to eyeball it with the button next to my needle. They ended up a little bit tight, but I think they'll be ok after washing. This dress is so teeny! I made the 3month size- baby is due around August, I believe, so the weather will match the dress best when she's teeny as well.

I also cut out a whole bunch of quilt square pieces, but didn't get to sewing them. I hand hemmed a hankie that my grandma embroidered. I determined that my rotary cutter was, in fact, quite sharp, by slicing my finger. I started crocheting another baby hat. I had grilled cheese for lunch. And most importantly, my table is now clean again! I put all the scraps and equipment away, IN THE SAME DAY. :)

Pink Blankie

I thought I would crochet less with my new job, but I'm doing pretty good! On the other hand, I watch a lot more TV now. I'm busy catching up on the last decade of popular TV... this blanket may be baby pink, but it watched a lot of the first season of The Sopranos with me. I learned a new stitch pattern for this one, and then worked and watched my shows until it was done.