I'm sticking with you

In attempt to beef up my sewing prowess, I made a log cabin pillow this evening!


It's a little clumsy, but I'm pretty pleased!


(I ran out of stuffing).

The pattern came from "The Crafter's Companion" and it was easy as pie. I modified the back, since I was taking the easy way out and was just using some polyfil I had laying around. I'm quite pleased, even though it is a little goofy.

Anything Could Happen

After a sublime heat wave here in Middle Tennessee, my mind is wandering to making nice clothes. It must be noted I have attempted 3 shirts in my lifetime, and they all resulted with less that appealing results. The lovely Hazel Evelyn has been sewing up some fantastic clothes, and all I can say is: I'm inspired!

So, if anyone has any basic or easy (I cannot stress this enough) pattern suggestion for spring/summer clothing, send them my way!

My sweater is almost finished, and I'll have pictures soon. With all the stripes comes MASSIVE weaving in of ends, and that's clearly my least favorite part. Let's not talk about all the semi-finished projects I have laying around that just need that final part.

I've been spinning! I dyed this too!

The Decline of Country and Western Civilization

This past weekend, my folks came down to visit and I am happy to say dishcloth creation was put on hold while wedding planning took over. We also went to the Grand Ole Opry at the Ryman Auditorium downtown, which was great, but I digress. When we weren't running around tasting cupcakes or discussing red Gerbera daisies, we thrift stored (hello, DIY center pieces) and hit Nashville's finest used bookstores. I scored bigtime!

I found this one book from 1973 called "Sew Exciting! Sew Simple!" that is right out of that era's vein of feminism that is sort of self-aware and apologetic, and is sort of like, "It's okay to want to sew your husband a terrycloth bathrobe! Women have been doing it for ages!" It's kind of hilarious. I will treasure it forever.


The other, "The Color Book of Embroidery" is sort of a hippy dippy 70s acid trip through embroidery. It does have a primer on smocking (yay!), but some of the projects are downright frightening (think weird elves) and there are creepy baby blankets that are kind of hilarious. This book was a whopping $2.00. The other was 25 cents. Yes. 25 cents. I picked up another for 2 bucks that is aptly titled and "Encyclopedia of Needlework" which I reckon will come in handy (no pun intended).

The peach colored pillowcases in the background were a gift from my aunt. The beautiful crocheted ends! The other was found thrifting this weekend for 69 cents. I intend to make and apron out of it.


Now this book is a certifiable doozy. It's called "Golden Hands : a comprehensive guides to knitting, dressmaking & needlecraft." Oh, the Kaftans! The owls! It has some utterly amazing things. While looking at some Russian Orthodox-esque tapestry designs in this book, my father told me a story of how he loved the movie"Dr. Zhivago" so much (who can blame him?) that he asked my grandmother to make him a tunic shirt much like Omar Shariff's shirt in the movie. Yeah, she did. WITH EMBROIDERY.

That, ladies and gentleman, is what's in my gene pool. I've just got to tap into that well some more.

labour for learning

this weekend. what a mess.

i had a burning desire to make a smock. after some extreme googling and finding some sublime inspiration and tutorials, nothing seemed to come out right.

i did all the measurements as per the instructions which left me with something which my friend elizabeth described as "wizard arms."


no thanks. desmond dekker couldn't even save me.

on the dishcloth front, i have a bunch of granny squares completed and am trying some non-granny-squares (gasp!) crocheted dishcloths, but they're taking too long. i could not even finish a single one during the entirety of the oscars.

oh well.

i could also blame this on the massive misfiring of neurons (or whatever caused my massive banger of a migraine that left me incapacitated and seeking dark spaces all of saturday and most of today). things just aren't right. hopefully tomorrow will be better.

next craft i want to tackle: the embroidering of tea towels.