Friday, March 4, 2011

Well, here it is March already...
I've stacked up a big pile (electronically speaking) of photos that I've been meaning to put on here, and just hadn't been feeling up to writing. You would think I'd know better by now. *You* don't need words! Just pictures are fine!
Kidding.

I spent much of January thinking about a post concerning resolutions, which I don't believe in. Everybody knows the truth behind those harbingers of failure... resolutions are just a route to making ourselves feel grumpy about the way we *wish* our lives were going.

So I don't do resolutions.
I do goals.
And if it takes the whole year to achieve that goal, well, it's one less month than it might have taken otherwise. Sound a little cheesy? Yeah, it is. Backfires? Yeah, sometimes. And sometimes my interest in said goal is totally different at the end of the year. As in, no longer a goal. But that's okay too.

One goal for this year is to get friendly with my bread machine... my very first attempt was so dense and dry that I could hardly break it apart to give to the birds. But I'm ready to jump into it again, and early success is always encouraging. These were from a first attempt at the cinnamon roll dough recipe... I meant to try to set it so the dough would start mixing before I woke up, and I'd be able to roll them and bake them after taking the dog out, but the machine started anyway. So I made cinnamon rolls at 1 a.m.
And another goal, a two-parter: get my sweetie to finish the cabinet that will be crowned with this gorgeous lid...
and set it up with stitchy goods. It was meant to go in the room with Annabel Lee, but I think it might have to stay upstairs because I love the tile too much for it to sit where visitors aren't likely to see it. (The tile came from the Grovewood Gallery, the top is quartersawn oak with darker inset, I think it's walnut).

And an old (cough) friend! This damn thing refuses to speak to me and give an indication of what it might want in order to bloom the way it ought to, but I've about had it and will start forcing it to eat its peas any moment. I keep tweaking it and waiting for a response... I think it's destined for some background stitching next. If nothing else, that will make it easier to add additional branch-and-leaf layers.
In the meantime, I've launched into another piece. Trying a different shape, proportionally, with specific imagery and subject matter in mind. We'll see how that works out. There's a fair bit left to be added, but since I sat on the floor with some fabric glue and tacked everything into place last night while chatting with my fantastically awesome sister, I thought I'd share a snapshot with you. This one was started rather seat-of-the-pants, so I didn't get any fusible onto the back of the fabric before I started chopping it up (hence the fabric glue). While I much prefer the pre-fused approach for ease, the glue does a passable job holding all the pieces together until I have a chance to add some thread.

And just to prove that I'm still doing some plain ol' patchwork...
A rather hasty shot of the quilt I made for my aunt as a Christmas gift. I knew going into it that I was taking a risk... Mom doesn't have her own quilt from me yet, so sending one to her sister first could cause a ruckus. Plus, deciding 3 weeks or so before postal deadlines that a lap quilt might be fun is a bit nutty. But it came out okay, and I had it finished and all the ends snipped in time to get it mailed out to the west coast.
The pattern is from an issue of Fons & Porter's Love of Quilting from several years ago... 2004 or 2005 I think, and probably a holiday issue. The pattern is called Pumpkin Patch; I made one while we were still in Virginia, the first one I dyed fabric specifically for. I think I might have added extra rows onto this version to make it more cuddle-friendly for two-- another idea I've been playing with lately. Always seems like we end up fighting over the quilt to try to make it cover both of us all the way to the toes, so I'm thinking I need to make it more long-rectangle shape.
And I'll leave you with the scary thought of what can happen if you give me a bag of marshmallows when I have nothing else to occupy me...
MARSHMALLOW ZOMBIE.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Not sure how I missed that you have a blog too, but I loved reading about what you're working on and look forward to more pictures! One thing is for sure--we need to live closer to each other!
That troublesome tree of yours reminds me of the windswept pine trees up north near our cottage--if you have a look through some of my mom's photos of Canada on facebook, maybe some colors would pop out to you, just a thought.