New Year Creativity

There’s something about the start of a new year that always brings me a sense of excitement! A fresh start, 365 days of possibilities, new adventures, unexplored ideas, and the list goes on! This is what I worked on and finished in the first two days of this year.

 

This ruffled scarf was a lot of fun to knit, and I loved the yarn! It had a chenille edge, so it gave the finished scarf a little more weight. I bought the yarn at Michael’s, and I used a YouTube video tutorial for the kntting technique. I’ve been knitting for a few years, but not consistenly and nothing more than knitting and purling. One of my 2014 goals is to learn more about knitting, and do it more often. We have a great yarn shop in San Luis Obispo called Nordic Mart. The owner is part of our Central Coast Modern Quilting Friendship Group, and she is absolutely lovely! She has assured me that she can teach me how to knit like a pro!

I also got in a bit of sewing on New Year’s day. It was mug rug madness around here!

Suzanne at Notes from the Patch, did a tutorial on how to use a Bernina circular attachment to make these cute mug rugs. I called her shop and ordered one. I immediately became obsessed with busting my stash and sewing up a bunch of these for gifts! If you don’t know what a mug rug is, it’s like having a personal little placemat for your cuppa whatever you’re drinking, with room for a cookie or two.

I need to get a shower and head down to my sewing room. I’ll be cutting my fabrics for the Alison Glass Feathers Quilt Along. I have three fabric bundles pulled, and I still haven’t decided which one to use! I never make the same quilt twice, but I may have to break that pattern with this quilt along! I’ll get some pictures of the bundles and post them a bit later today.

Christmas Sewing

I thought it would be a great idea to sew up some zippered pouches to give as Christmas gifts this year. Easy enough, right? Well, I’ve always struggled with word problems, and written pattern instructions are just word problems to me. I get lost, dazed and confused very easily! That’s why I have to use patterns that have lots of pictures, or I’ll find online tutorials that have lots of pictures. Even then, I can make anything a lot harder than it has to be! I started my Christmas pouch sewing with this cute little kit that I got at Strawberry Patches during the shop hop of 2011. Nothing like waiting a while, eh? The tutorial on Suzanne’s blog was easy to follow, and I was very pleased with the results!

 

Next, I decided that I was ready for the Open Wide Zippered Pouch on Noodlehead’s blog. Here’s where my struggles with word problems come in. I missed a particular step, and consequently got stuck, struggled, ripped stitches, and re-sewed a few times. Few, as in, IT TOOK ME ALL DAY to do my first pouch! It’s really not so hard, if you don’t miss a step or three. I was determined to plow through, and I finished this one before I quit for the evening. The seed packet fabric is called Sewing Seeds Catalog from Quilting Treasures. The red zig zag fabric is from the Mama Said Sew line by Sweetwater for Moda. 

 

On Sunday evening, I decided to try making another one. I am very happy to say that I got it done in about 2 hours! That is a huge improvement! It had a lot to do with realizing that I’d skipped some important steps in the directions the first time. 😉  I’d have probably been done sooner, but I was watching Miracle on 34th Street while I sewed. 

 

All of the fabrics except for the pink Essex  linen, which I purchased at Birch Fabrics, came from Strawberry Patches. After I do a couple of hours of quilting today, I’m going to cut out some more pouches, and make them assembly line style. I may actually get zippy at this by Christmas!