I am so easily distracted!

Thursday night is knit night and this week I wanted to go but didn’t have an easily portable project (I’m working on an afghan, but it needs a new color each row and I don’t like to schlep my box of yarn around). It struck me though, that I could cut up some newly discarded army undershirts of my husband’s and swatch some lace patterns. Perfect!

First, a little back story. When I started the Army Wife series of aprons (now to include other textile forms) I wanted to express the feeling of unravelling with a knitted piece. This is me trying to work out the increases to shape the piece.

But it was just a trapezoid and lacked the graceful curve of subsequent aprons. Looking at the growing series together, the trapezoid stuck out like a sore thumb. So I ripped the stitches out and started over. I was still stuck on leaving the bottom edge unfinished to show the unravelling and so the second try was knit sideways, lengthening and shortening the rows.

Blech! I set this one aside because I ran out of shirts, and wanted to use hubby’s post Iraq throw-aways. I am hoping that because of the different water and detergents there, the tan color will be a different shade. Those shirts are still in a footlocker on a ship.

Still, this is ugly. The apron needs some femininity. I decided that what it needs is a lace edge. Luckily, hubby purged his brown shirts that went with the old BDUs (as opposed to the tan shirts that are worn with the current ACUs and new Multi Cam), so fast forward to Thursday night when I decided to swatch in brown while I wait for the other tan Tees.

First try was a the simple Feather and Fan pattern. I’ve had great success with it in scarves, but the T shirt yarn knits up dense and the laciness was lost, even when I went up several needle sizes.

What I needed was something with more holes. How about crochet? That’s pretty holey.

I kinda like that, but I’d rather make the lace border and then fill in the rest of the knit apron shape than make the apron shape first (which I’ve proven is difficult for me) and then add on a crochet border later. I know it doesn’t make a lot of sense, but it’s how my brain works. I’m much more visual than mathematical.

I searched Ravelry for bottom up, curved shawls with simple lace borders. Knitting lace from charts scares me, but I found one that had symbols I knew and just jumped right in. Hey, it’s not so hard! This looks good, but I wonder if there’s an even holey-er I could try?

Knowing I could tackle the pattern, I dropped the money to pay for a downloadable pattern and tried something a little fancier. It ended up not being any holey-er, but since it’s wider I think it fills the apron nicely and will make for a prettier piece overall. My plan now is to knit the lace part in brown and fill in the rest of the apron body with tan. If I need more tan, hopefully the footlocker will arrive by then.

I’m torn though, finish up my Twelve by Twelve metamorphosis piece, or my invitational piece, or keep running with this lace momentum? Squirrel!

I am one of the lucky who have a dedicated studio space and a door with which to hide it from the world. But I traded it in six months ago for the opportunity to host a foreign exchange student. It was totally worth it, but now that our student has returned to her permanent home, and our post holiday visitors have left, it’s time to reclaim my sewing space!

Here it is as a bedroom. What can’t be seen is the closet that is 2/3 empty for the use of our temporary teen.

All the “stuff” moved to my bedroom. Here it is, but with all the fabric bins already removed.

The space behind the “design wall,” and the space under the window was filled with bins of fabric. Luckily I had the room to myself as hubby was deployed during most of the time the bedroom was serving dual duty, so I could be as messy as I could tolerate.

In progress, the guest room futon is back to sofa-mode, and the stuff is moving back in.

I took some time to organize and purge my magazines and ephemera on the book case.

The BIG DEAL: a purged and tidy fabric stash! I have learned to accept that I will always have a large amount of supplies to schlep wherever we go, but I think that confining it to just one closet is a good nod to practicality.

Here’s the other side of the same closet. I’ve arranged everything so I’m no longer pulling heavy stuff down every time I need something.

With half of my stuff in the bedroom and half in the “studio” room for nearly a week, I was going crazy, so I set aside all my in-progress projects and finished the move. My cutting table isn’t ideal, but it’s what works in this room. I hope to decrease the piles of stuff on the futon soon!

Ahhhh, my sewing machine in it’s rightful place.

And I forgot just how huge our bedroom is when it’s not filled with bins of fabric and a sewing machine!

Now, back to work as I have several looming deadlines, and now I have a dedicated space in which to reach them.

No Crafturday post today. I’ve been in Art Quilt mode but don’t have anything ready to show and haven’t had time for any crafty diversions. BUT… the current issue of Quilting Arts (Feb/March 2012) magazine arrived in my mailbox yesterday and it includes a lovely Q&A with all of us members of Twelve by Twelve!

It’s been non-stop sight-seeing and beach-bumming here since mid-December. I’ve actually got a bit of a tan now! But, alas, there’s not much actual quilting or art making going on. I took today to work on one of my in-progress pieces though.

I was on a roll with sewing tiny bits together and my bin of red scraps didn’t look too daunting after using what I needed for the “real” project, so I took a bit of a detour and sewed ALL my red scraps together.

I cut brick shapes that will eventually be a sibling to this quilt top which I made from neutral scraps about nine moths ago. The photo above shows today’s work in the center red pile, plus the few neutral bricks left over from the Achromatic quilt top, and purple and blue bricks previously sewn at a Saturday Bee. The crazy thing is that both the blue bin and the black and white bin have refilled with scraps enough to make as many bricks as the red pile! I think they must multiply in the dark. My green and my yellow bins are almost overflowing. I may need to take a big detour soon and whip them into tidy piles of bricks. For now though, the red scrap bin is empty of scraps. Ahhhhhh.

This project has been sitting on my sewing table for probably two years, and for no good reason either!

It’s the Julie Tasche and it called to me as a sister to my beloved Multi Tasker Tote. I had some fabric on hand that I didn’t know what I wanted to do with when I bought it, but looked perfect for the Julie.

My first stumbling block though was the elastic and stopper thingies for the pockets. I found a source for the elastic cord, but I would have to buy it by the bajillion foot spool. The local retailer only carried black and white, and was out of white. I waited several months for it to come in. While waiting, I searched for stoppers and came up, again, with boring black or white. At least those were in stock, so I settled and bought white.

I wasn’t sure about the base of the bag, so I mulled over some pink leather I had and mulled having the base continue up the sides and inch. The mulling lasted a few months.

Meanwhile, I went to Quilt Hawaii and learned about Texture Magic in my Threadology class. So, I came back and Texture Magic-ed two pockets. Then I started assembling the parts. But, I didn’t like all the different fabrics for the pockets and I didn’t like the orientation of the handles, so I set the project aside until I could take them off and rearrange. Being a low-priority project, that added more moths.

Luckily, I did some traveling off-island and not only found while elastic cord, but many colored stopper thingies. I stocked up (thank you Mood)! But I was still too busy with other projects to get back to the Julie Tasche.

Finally, a few weeks ago, I decided I just needed to finish the bag. It’s not like it was hard to sew or anything, and at least now I had all the supplies. The pink leather base looked wrong, so I switched to denim from an old pair of jeans. I opted not to alter the pattern, and hey, it looks great. I left my contrasty Texture Magic pockets as-is but flopped the striped center pockets so the stripes became the lining (ah, much better!). I changed the straps so that instead of each one starting on one side of the bag and ending on the other, each strap stays on it’s own side of the bag. This makes it hang “right” for me when I put the straps over my shoulder. I love the turquoise stopper thingies on the elastic cord. Now, I just need an outfit to coordinate with my bag so I can start wearing it.

It’s customary in Hawai’i to give lei on special occasions. The event could be a birthday, a graduation, congratulations on a job well done, or a welcome to the islands. Normally, lei are flowers, but sometimes they are made of shells, candy, origami lucky stars, or paper blossoms. My sister and her family arrive today, and while she and my BIL will be bedecked in flowers and kukui nuts, I figured she wouldn’t appreciate candy for her young kids, and conversely, the kids wouldn’t appreciate the fresh flowers.

So I got crafting. I’m definitely NOT the first to make this kind of lei. Elementary school teachers have been helping kids churn these out by the dozens every May for Lei Day. They make theirs from construction paper, but I used double sided scrapbooking paper for a fancier look. I really wanted aloha prints, but my stupid craft store which used to have them no longer carries such regional stuff, and I wasn’t willing to drive all over the island looking for hibiscus patterned paper. But, I digress. I used two punches to cut out about 40 flowers from three different papers.

After punching out the flowers, cut about 6 regular drinking straws into 3/4 inch bits. Cut a piece of string about 60″ long and thread it onto a large needle. Tie a knot about 6 inches from the end of the string. Poke the needle through the center of a flower to thread it onto the string. Add a straw section, then another flower, then a straw section, and so on until you’ve used up all the flowers. Tie another knot after the last flower. Put a straw bit on both tail ends of the string (as spacers) and tie the ends together with a square knot. If desired you can cover this plain knot with a little bow or puff of curly ribbon. Plastic pony beads instead of straw sections looks really nice too, but remember to punch out about twice as many flowers.

Place lei over the head of a deserving kid and give them a big hug and kiss. Aloha!

The next two themes for work I want to, or have been invited to, do are metamorphosis and rituals. Immediately these words brought to mind the works of Joseph Campbell and I set about re-reading “The Hero With a Thousand Faces.” Reacquainting myself with the book didn’t significantly change what I already had in mind for the projects, but it did get me thinking about books which have stayed with me over the years. I’ve always been a voracious reader, even when family life and the diminished brain cells of motherhood have kept me from actually reading, I still love the idea of being able to read. This, combined with so many end of the year/new year lists in blogland, inspired me to make a list, in alphabetical order so as not to give any special preference, of books which, over the decades, I have enjoyed and which have shaped me in one way or another.

“A History of God” by Karen Armstrong

“Clear and Present Danger” and other Tom Clancy novels up to “The Sum of All Fears”

“Guns Germs & Steel” and “Collapse” by Jared Diamond

“Hawaii” by James Mitchner

“Invisible Women” by Margaret C. Harrell

“Oryx and Crake” by Margaret Atwood (I love Atwood!)

“The Betrayal of Liliuokalani” by Helena G. Allen

“The Bourne Identity” by Robert Ludlum

“The Black Stallion” by Walter Farley

“The Coming Plague” by Laurie Garrett

“The Eagle’s Shadow” by Mark Hertsgaard

“The Hero With a Thousand Faces” and “The Power of Myth” by Joseph Campbell

“The Lion The Witch and the Wardrobe” and the rest of The Chronicles of Narnia, by C.S. Lewis

“The Lord of the Rings” by J.R.R. Tolkien

“The Mists of Avalon” by Marion Zimmer Bradley

“The Omnivore’s Dilemma” by Michael Pollan

“The Poisonwood Bible” by Barbara Kingsolver

“The Stand” by Steven King

“Watership Down” by Richard Adams

“Ways of Seeing” by John Berger

“Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” by Robert M. Pirsig

Make what you will of my taste in books. I see something of a pattern in my choices, but I think it alludes to more than is actually there. What books have informed you?

Our beloved exchange student leaves today. She’ll be returning to Germany well equipped for the new school year though. In addition to well honed English skills and a suitcase full of American clothes, I’ve sent her off with a Multi-Tasker Tote bag much like mine which she’s been coveting.

This side has a big velcro-topped pocket in addition to the floral lined ones that are part of the original pattern.

I love this side in which I kept the integrity of the uniform blouse front. On my tote the button front is purely decorative. On this tote, I lined it so that the zipper can open to an actual pocket!

There are so many pockets on this tote it’s crazy! My hubby’s favorite is the pen pocket that normally lives on the uniform sleeve. I moved it to the tote interior along with a patch pocket and a flap pocket from the blouse front. And there’s a little loop to clip things on to too.

And, here’s the bag in situ as a fabulous beach tote.

Look what Santa brought for the kids!

I love this silly Hawaii themed fabric and decided it would be perfect for little bags for the kids.

Everyone got Circle Zip Earbud Pouches. The tutorial from Dog Under My Desk was easy to follow and I think the pouches are cute and practical. I’m putting a few on my list to make for myself (excellent use for mushroomy fabric methinks) in a few sizes perhaps.

The girls got Pleated Pouches made from the Skip to My Lou tutorial. Again, this was a very nice, easy to follow tutorial. I’d definitely use it again as I think the pouch is quite handsome. One change I would make would be to add a little interfacing to the top band fabric for a little more structure. I also added wooden beads to the zipper pulls.

I bought this cool house fabric because it was on sale and had houses. I bought it online, so what I did not realize was that it appears to have come with strings attached. I’m not using it to make up cute dresses for a little girls’ boutique, or coin purses galore for an Etsy shop, but there is a small chance that it will find it’s way into one of my art quilts which could, potentially, be sold one day.

I’m not going to worry myself too much about this as the chances that someone’s lawyers will track me down in 10 years is pretty darn slim. And, in digging into some of the related issues blogged about in the last five years or so, this all appears to be more bark than bite. But why then print the disclaimer at all?

All things tech and cool blog Boing Boing delved into the issue here in ’06. Fabric-centric blog True-Up followed here the same year. A rather vitriolic post about another designer is here, covering ’05 to ’09. I thought this had all blown over, but now there’s been a more recent episode that sounds very odd. I understand not wanting Crafter A to pass off handbags (or whatever) made from a pattern by Designer B’s pattern as his/her own, I sort of get not wanting to flood the market with things made from Designer B’s pattern when the designer would rather have more people buy the pattern directly and make the item themselves, and I understand the separate issue of designers using older textiles as inspiration (with a fuzzy line between inspiration and appropriation), but trying to restrict how Crafter A uses Designer B’s fabric in Crafter A’s creations is beyond me.

And what are we to do about these fabrics with restrictions? Not buy them (hard to identify them when buying online), segregate them in our stash (totally not practical), return them (not possible), not use them (such a sad waste of fabric)?

I do not want to stir up a hornet’s nest. This is just me thinking out loud about the strings attached to my new fabric.