No Idle hands here

FMQ (free motion quilting) a large quilt on a home sewing machine

I’m new to making videos and putting them up on youtube. But hey, the only way to learn how to do it – is to do it. I’m sure I will get better at zooming in on my actual work, but for now, you can see me in action on a large quilt.

I follow other blogs and am very impressed with FMQ that people are doing, but rarely do you see them working on a large quilt. It’s fun to practice on something small, but here you have a chance to see how I deal with the big bulky quilt, stopping, moving, readjusting.

While taking Angela Waters Quilting feathers she showed a wonderful new tool to me. The Grip & stitch. These replace those quilting gloves that I find hard to use. What a difference these make. I really feel like I have control now, with a lot more experience, my FMQ will shine.

Urban nine patch Quilt

When I start a large project, like a quilt, I like to work through and finish it. I’ll have knitting on the side and maybe some easy dresses for the granddaughter. Not so with this project. There have been serious interruptions.This is the urban nine patch block, designed by Jenny Pedigo, using her wonderful quick curve ruler. The sewing and quilting worlds are full of gadgets, gizmos and tools of the trade. Sure, I’ve bought some that really weren’t worth it, but others like this ruler are wonderful.Jenny is so busy designing patterns to go with this ruler, I haven’t even tried to create my own yet.My colors tend to be brighter, more jewel tone. I had bought a few of these fabrics with my friend Becky in Orange County. I was looking for something different. This is what we in the quilting world call low volume. With a punch of color in the reds and green.

On Flicker there was a quilt along group. Although they finished their quilts long ago, it gave me some good ideas about the layout. I love the blocks on point rather than on edge. I love how when put together this way, bright bold green circles emerge.I had a few fabrics at home to add to the mix but that was it. I didn’t want to run out and buy a lot more. Sometimes being forced to use fewer fabrics makes the quilt much more interesting and less scrappy looking. Actually I did have to buy more of the background fabric, luckily I got the end of the bolt at Sew Modern and yes I bought one more of the peach colored fabrics as well.

Now for the border, I guess you can’t take the scrappy out of the quilter after all.The three fabrics that didn’t go into the border are the background, the inner squares and the dark green. There was some creative engineering to get the corners to fit. But hey, it’s fabric and it’s a quilt, so I made it work.

I finished the top a few months ago, other projects and a not very helpful sewing machine got in the way. I’ve finished a baby quilt and the Chuppah as well as sewing clothes and other items. So it is high time that I start working again on this quilt.

Teasdale shawl KAL (knitalong)

Along with my real life knitters, I belong to a group on Facebook. Although I’ve yet to meet most of these people IRL, we have become good online friends. Recently Marne mentioned this lovely shawl she found on Ravelry, The Teasdale.

I immediately suggested a KAL, turns out it was just the two of us, we did what you do in KALs, share pictures advice and recommendations.This is called deep stash diving, I had bought this skein 3 years ago at the CogKnitive knitting retreat in Tehachapi, CA. I seem to recall that I bought the yarn on sale and yes, this is a color I use often.For this shawl you knit an intricate lace border and add the body of the shawl latter. A new way of shawl knitting for me. Most patterns start you either at the top, and knit down – so you begin with a few stitches and gradually the rows get longer.

Or the opposite, you cast on the largest number of stitches and decrease as you go. Then there is the option of knitting the body and picking up stitches to create an interesting border.

A wonderful thing about Ravelry is that you can see how others have knit a project. There were complaints here about a bump, one intrepid knitter figured out a different way to knit the body portion. I am following her instructions.

This is what lace knitting looks like, all scrunched up and very unlace like. Until you block it.Blocking means wetting the knit shawl, and stretching it to it’s limits. This is made from 100% wool, which means it is very resilient and will hold the blocked shape for a long time. Of course when washed it needs to be blocked again.

I am using foam blocks, easy to stick pins into as well as blocking wires – a wonderful invention that makes the job so much easier, otherwise it would be many more pins, like one on each point.Done! You can see how lovely open and lacy it is, and oh – hi there owls and bird!Here is one way to wear it, yes, a lot of the lace is hidden, but it looks very pretty around the neck.A shawl pin is a wonderful option, allows you to see more of the lace.Corrina Ferguson is a very creative designer. She came up with some new ways (to me at least) to manipulate knitting. Knitting is basically the knit and purl stitch as well as leaving spaces or knitting stitches together. What is fascinating is the many ways one can do this and come up with new designs. I love the center vine with leaves on either side.Finally, view from the back. Lovely.

Here’s the deal, as much as I love this shawl, I have a number of shawls in this colorway. So this one is going into my gift pile. You never know, you may be the lucky recipient of this one of these days.

Best News ever!

My version of Diane Von Furstenberg wrap dress.

All done, this was a fun project.I had a lot of fun making this dress. I did make a few changes. I modified the top so it wouldn’t have any pleats. I did make a ‘muslim’ out of leftover knit fabric, it worked out fine. My pictures – no so much which is why I didn’t include one here.

Have I mentioned how much I love my serger? I have a Juki MO-655, it is a 5 thread, which means when I am sewing woven fabrics, and I know exactly what I’m doing (like a simple skirt) I can sew the seam and finished edge at one time on the serger.Here I am using the 4 thread option, which simply reinforces the served edge with another row of stitches. It is stronger than the 3 thread version. It’s the light blue thread, I was too lazy to change the color. One draw back of this machine is that I have to thread the needle on my own. Not easy! Juki now has the air threading mechanism as well – my next serger.

This fabric was interesting to work with, it is a knit, but because of the vinyl polka dots – it doesn’t have a lot of give. It also has a lot more body – and can hold it’s own nicely. Word of advice! Because of the polka dots, I ironed this on the wool setting and always used a press cloth. In my case, it’s a piece of silk organza. Those dots would melt otherwise. Also, when pinning the pieces together, those dots got in the way, pins didn’t want to go through them. So the serger was perfect, I did some top stitching on the sewing machine. One again, because of the dots the inner facing didn’t want to lie flat. Not sure DVF has top stitching on her dresses, but hey, this is a knock-off, it has to work for me. Looking cute from the back.I did put a snap where the V meets, I like the extra assurance that it won’t gape open as I go about my day.

The necklace is a perfect match, I made it a few years ago, out of a mixture of beads I had around. Couldn’t find a more perfect fit.

So now I have my own DVF wrap dress, one like no other, unless she decides to use this fabric as well.

Wilshire Blvd. Temple

To anyone in LA, get thee to The Los Angeles Conservancy and sign up for the tour of the Wilshire Blvd Temple on Sunday April 27. This is going to be an amazing tour and yes, there still are tickets available.

I went for my volunteer training and got a peek, not enough time to really absorb the beauty of this building, but here are highlights – just so you’ll come.This is a side view of the building (built in 1929), I never even got the front view, we were hustled around the building. There is a wonderful dome, I do have a picture of the interior of the dome.The whole structure was retrofitted and improved. The original look of the building is the same. although there is new landscaping around it.This is the Piness Auditorium, I only snapped a few images, if you think this is impressive, wait till you see the sanctuary.Detail of decoration on the wall, sorry the images are fuzzy, this is all the more reason to come and see for yourself.Are you getting the sense that something spectacular awaits in the main sanctuary? An incredible round room that seats 1700 people.

The dais, the Torahs are in the lighted room, and the organ is behind.

Looking straight up at the top of the dome. All this was disintegrating and falling down, they actually had tarps so that nothing would fall on the congregants heads. I had to translate the Shema, being the only Hebrew speaker in the bunch. Listen Israel, God is our Lord, God is one.

That is the high priest Aaron atop some wonderful stained glass. The mural that encircles the whole room was painted by Hugo Balin, he was a set designer for Warner Bros. who then moved on to painting many wonderful murals in important buildings in Los Angeles. Warner Bros – as in the actual brothers paid for this mural when the Temple was being built. This was the Temple of the stars. Here we see the sad moment where the Romans are looting the Menorah after destroying the Temple.The memorial wall is new, designed by artist Lita Albequerque.There are many more plans for more improvement, at the moment they already have a lot of interesting art.Since I am always looking for the unusual and the mundane, I looked down at the floor in the hallways (probably high grade linoleum). A simple tessellating design, now look up at the air grates:Yup, same design. I have no idea if this is old or new. Maybe a combination. I just find it extremely thoughtful when designs repeat in different materials and when they have a dialog with one another.

So there is a small taste, I hope to get more pictures on the day of the tour and I’ll have more information both of the building of the Temple and the wonderful restoration job. I hope to see some of you there.

Diane Von Furstenberg Knockoff

The moment I saw the DVF dress show, I knew I had to knock off this dress. Actually I already have.

I had bought this cotton jersey print at Joann’s on a whim. I have quite a large library of patterns and I made this cute little wrap dress.

This time around I’d like to use a few more elements from DVF.I bought this fabric last year at Michael Levine’s Loft. One thing that Michael Levine does is work closely with jobbers. These are the guys that buy out mill ends and such from the many local manufactures. Which means you will see fabric here you won’t see anywhere else, unless it’s already on a garment. It also means you have to wade through piles of junk to find the gems.

They are brilliant at charging $2 a pound, rather than charging by the yard. I can attest that fabric weighs more than you think. I have come out of there having spent a lot more than I intended to. Aside from being a very detailed tropical print on a black background, the fabric has another element. It is overprinted with vinyl polka dots, which shimmer and glimmer as you move. This is a cheep way of accenting fabric rather than covering it with sequins. I don’t know what the fabric is, my guess is some kind of polyester with a little bit of lycra.

I’ve been sitting on it for a while, once I saw the DVF show, that was it, it must become a fabulous DVF style wrap dress.Perfect pattern, it has the collar and the short sleeves. One modification I would like to make, is the pleats at the waistline which give fullness in the breast area. I would like to modify that. DVF dresses don’t have that element. So I will be playing with some cheaper knit to get the front bodice to fit nicely without those pleats.

Spiderman, or how a simple sweatshirt makes a grandson very happy.

The joy, running, jumping and just being Spiderman, life doesn’t get any better. Click on the image, you can see a full screen gallery of the wonderful Spiderman.

The Chuppah part 2

It is finished!!! All sewn and ready to be attached to the poles. The quilting and binding is finished. If this were just a quilt then all that would remain would be the label.The backing used up all the leftover fabric and then some. I had to go buy more fabric for the binding.

I have some very clear ideas about how to affix the ties, but first, it was show off time!Yoch and I are both member of the Los Angeles Modern Quilt Guild and our monthly meeting is held the first Monday of the month. This month was special, a photographer from the LA Times was there to document our quilts. Since we are the first modern quilt guild – we will are part of an article on the whole movement. We were asked to bring our most modern quilt. What better than this joint project. Yoch is describing his color choices and design.Even the back is impressive and the guy blocking me? That is the photographer. He later asked for my name, so I am really hoping that this quilt will be in the article. One can hope right?

Next stage, putting ties in the corners so it can be attached to the poles. I knew it had to be strong, this is one heavy chuppah. Most are not this large or quilted.I cut eight strips, 45″ x 2″, found the middle and ironed in a strong piece of interfacing, then folded it in half and ironed. Next I positioned the reinforced portion on both front and back of quilt in the corner, sewed in place with an x through the middle for extra strength.As you can see here, I sewed the strips across the corner, at this point it looks like there are 4 strips.View from the back, at this point I sewed the two strips of fabric together, so it is stronger and easier to tie.

Now for the test, will they hold the weight of the chuppah?Yes!! It works beautifully. I hung it from my pergola and it’s holding strong. Which means for the duration of the ceremony, it should be fine. Yes, I have some pity on the brothers (my two other sons and Yoch’s two brothers) who will be holding this up. They are strong young men, they should be fine.

Next time I show images will most probably be after the wedding, when I can share this as part of a wonderful celebration.

Twohey’s, best burgers in the San Gabriel Valley

I mentioned Twohey’s as our lunch stop during the yarn crawl. Time to give this 70 year old institution it’s due. The ladies at A stitch in Time directed us here for lunch, Ellen got very excited, she of course had been here and was looking forward to showing us the Googie style architecture. That modern space age, forward looking optimism of the post war years.This is what greeted us on the corner of Atlantic Blvd and Huntington Dr. in Alhambra. An even better surprise awaited us within.This past December, without ever closing for a day, Twohey’s was renovated back to it’s past. After years of sad ‘Marie Calendar’ kind of look, the Googie style is back in force inside as well. Love the orange and Turquoise as well as the wonderful fixtures.Sure modern conveniences like a flat screen TV are there, but it’s all done with a nod to the past.We were greeted at the door with this wonderful floor mat. An easy explanation of how to pronounce the name of the eatery. As well as letting us know, they have been here for 70 years. I’ll get to the Stinko later.The tabletop was redone with new formica, in the wonderful 50 style boomerang pattern.Bernadette, our traveling mascot sits down to lunch. She was good, me on the other hand…I enjoyed the Stinko Burger. It’s funny how 70 years ago a burger with onions and pickles would be considered stinky. Think of all the hot spicy ethnic condiments we load our burgers with today.All of us shared a SMALL plate of onion rings. I’m wondering where they get those massive onions. Either way, that was a great meal. Fuel for the road as we marched on to other yarn stores.