Unproductive

Have you ever had a day that absolutely nothing got done?  This past few days has been like that for me.

I have absolutely nothing new to show you.  I have been so unproductive.  And I can't even tell you that there was a reason.  Excuses?  Yeah, I could probably share some of those.  But it wouldn't help.

Any of you live in the midwest?  I'm in Ohio, and we've been hit with our crazy 2 days of cold, 2 days of warm, 1 day of hot enough to fry an egg, and back to chilly outside.  Popsicles one day, hot cocoa the next!

I guess the big thaw got me outside more than usual.  And then I wonder: will I sew in the summer?  I can't leave the little ones outside without supervision.  And I definitely want them outside as much as possible.

They love being outside.  My fair-skinned (or "almost translucent" as my big sister would say) Sprout loves being outside - he goes to the door often, trying to figure out the magic of the doorknob.

And Sunshine?  She LOVES the sunshine.  More than watching television.  (For that I am grateful!)

And Spunky?  Well, lets just say he's just discovered the attraction of digging in dirt.  I know you are probably wondering how he could make it to 5 years old without knowing how fun dirt is, right?  I'm not sure.  Actually, he was never really big on being outside.  He'd rather "do art".  Or watch t.v.

So that's me in a nutshell.  Unproductive, but real.  Didn't even get any farther on my purple project.  I really need to finish that purple bag!  Yesterday actually used a plastic bag from the thrift store to carry my keys, wallet, notebook, phone, and tape measure.  (I was shopping for a table of a specific size).  Maybe next week it'll be different.  I certainly hope so.  There are so many creations just waiting to be brought to life, and I'm looking forward to sharing them with you!

:) Caren

A Quick Patch

My 5 year old Spunky ripped up these nice jeans - you know, the kind that actually will fit for the next year (I bought them big) - so what's a mommy to do?  I made my own patch! (I know, you're shocked, right?)

Lucky for me, he loves my "stuff".  So I asked him what he wanted on his patch, and unsurprisingly, a robot was requested.

Isn't this the cutest little thing?!!  I was going through Sprout's clothes - he has been looking like a stuffed sausage lately and I finally figured out that he needed to go up a size.  He's 14 months old, and I just went through all of his clothes, put away all of the 18 mo stuff and got out the 24 mo clothes.  It amazes me that his 2.5 yr old sister and he are now wearing the same size.  But I digress...

The point of all that was to say that the little robot was on an 18 mo t-shirt, and it was so cute I decided to use it for the patch.  Then there was another little hole in the jeans, and I just made a "kind of round patch" (again, Spunky's request).

The robot was reverse-appliqued onto some recycled jeans, then to make it a bit more "worn" looking I sewed the whole thing on top of yet another piece of denim (this time I used the wrong side of the denim for accent).

I stitched the zig-zag part on my machine, but then when it came time to put the patch on the pants I ended up hand-sewing it on.  See the little green stitches?  Yep, silly thing wouldn't fit in my machine.  Go figure.

He likes how I patched them up.  Great!  So do I.  An hour or so and I was done - just in time to eat homemade "frozen Kool-Aid on a plastic fork" (aka - popsicles)!

Have a great week!
:) Caren

Purple In Process

After five weeks of Alien Landscaping, thought I'd switch gears and make a little something for myself.  I really crave color right now.  Bright, loud, pretty color.  So I'm making a little bag/purse thingie.  Any of you ever start a project without a pattern?  That's what I'm doing.

I got some strips of these beauties and stitched them together, cut them up and re-assembled them - a bit wonky.  It'll be the lining.  I love that the lining will be beautiful and chaotic.  Much like my life some times!

The outside is going to be much more placid, but with huge pops of color.  I LOVE the purples (or whatever fancy schmancy name the designer gave it) in the Terrain collection.  So I'm using some of that.  (Just figured out that this picture isn't great, but it gives you an idea, anyway).

That embroidered detail is the top of the outside pocket.  It is an interlaced backstitch - Spunky looked through my embroidery books and helped me pick out which stitch to use.  Yes, he's my little creative helper.

Here's what he made today on "Drawing with Spunky" (his make-believe tv show).  Yep, he's been side-tracked off aliens - now he's drawing monsters.  At least he's feeling better - that strep was awful!

I'll update you on my Purple project when it's finished.  From our home to yours, be blessed!

:) Caren

Modern Mini Challenge - Viewers Choice

Hi all, and thanks for such sweet comments on my Alien Landscape 2012 mini quilt!  There's some fun happening over at Ellison Lane Quilts right now, as Jennifer and her team had to sort through 245(!) entries to whittle it down to the top  few for the "Viewers Choice" picks.

 I encourage you, even if you have not participated in this challenge, please go over and vote for the minis that strike a chord in your heart.  My mini was not chosen, but when you see the ones that are up for voting, you'll see why.  They are simply AMAZING.  I confess that even though there were some incredible minis, I chose my favorites in a hot second!

And lastly, I was really hoping to show you pictures of my kiddos taking the aliens for adventures in this post. Unfortunately, our house has been hit by strep, so no one really feels like playing at the moment.  I'll get pics when everyone is better, but for now, here's my favorite - Sprout investigating my freshly-basted mini background.

**Update: the winners have been chosen.  They're totally worth checking out, so click here to see the lucky (and amazingly talented) winners!

Until next time, be blessed!
:) Caren

Alien Landscape 2012

Today I am entering my “Alien Landscape 2012” mini-quilt into the Modern Mini Challenge going on over at Ellison Lane Quilts.  I have spent the past 5 weeks working on this mini-quilt, and it is finally finished (and my kiddos are super excited that they can finally play with it!)

Alien Landscape 2012 was an idea I had after working on a quiet book for my children.  After watching Spunky (my 5 year old boy) play (at full-volume) with the book I realized that I would either need to rename it, or make something different for him.  Then I read about this challenge on Ellison Lane’s blog and decided this would be the perfect opportunity to try something new (and challenge myself!)

My goal for the mini was to have a functional playscape that would be fun to play with but also be bold and interesting as a wall hanging.  So flat aliens that fit into pockets was the way to go!

This space car has a license plate - Google Translate didn't have any alien dialects, so I used Russian instead.  It says “Hebrews 11:3”, which says “By faith we understand that the universe was created by God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.”  That includes aliens, right?!!

Here you can see the house.  It is also a pocket, ready for aliens to come and go as they wish.  I wanted to make all of the lines in the mini a bit wonky, thinking that their gravity probably wouldn't be the same as ours.  (Side note: I had a bunch of fun playing with new embroidery stitches – I especially like that trellis!)

 This is “Salien” (short for Sunburst Alien). Spunky thought that this one was too fat to fit in the space ship, so he said we should make a "skinnier" one.  Funny thing is that now that I've made that change, he still wants to use this one.  What can I say – he’s 5!

Here is the back of the quilt – can you see the quilting?  It’s what Spunky asked me for – a spirally dotted line through the universe.  This is the ONLY stitching that I did through the entire quilt.  All of the other stitching was done after it was quilted – I added all of the appliques, pockets and other elements by hand on the front side.

Oh, by the way, I guess I didn't mention yet that the space ship actually unbuttons from the front so you can send the little aliens on adventures throughout the galaxies on the back!  And yet another moment of truth – this is the first spaceship I made.  I wasn't completely happy with it, so I made another one.  But when I showed it to Spunky, he had already made his mind up that he liked this one – something about the colors, trims, french knots… I don’t know, but again my first draft is now the “final” – kids just don’t care about perfection. They want “real”!

Here’s a closeup of the binding.  Its my first time doing mitered corners, and I was going to put in a slick rod pocket , but again, on the “get real” meter, that was a dud .  This is for a young child.  He needs to be able to hang it – preferably by himself!  So big loops fit the bill.  I’m actually quite impressed with the binding – the mitered corners look excellent, and all of the stitching is invisible (I did it all by hand – if I did it by machine it’d look terrible – I don’t do straight lines very well!).

Here’s the trio: Cyclopalien, Peanut Alien, and Salien the Skinny.  These guys look pretty inviting, right? "Come play with us!!!" (More pictures of this project are at my Flickr photostream.)

Here’s a closeup of the wonky water tower-satelite dish-house. This project took five weeks for a reason.  All of my embroidery and other details were done by hand.  I’m not saying that to toot my own horn, folks, I like to do hand stitching, I just wanted to show you the details.  It’s such a great thing to have something to give to a child.  My children are going to know that mommy made this, by hand, with tons of love and it is totally unique.  Maybe I should sign it.  Hmmm.  That’s probably not a bad idea…

The aliens were all made with wool felt, so they’re super soft, but they have a layer of Peltex inside, so they are stiff-ish (like spongy cardboard).  The alien designs, above, were made on a recycled t-shirt with fabric pen.  I like that they’re all unique, and all of them have some simple embroidery stitches.  (I’m teaching Spunky some basic embroidery, so I guess I could call this an “educational” mini-quilt – think that’s a stretch?  *ha!*).

Ta- Da!  All ready for play!  

:) Caren

PS – want more details?  They’re below.  If you get bored with such info, you can stop reading right here - have a great day!

DETAILS

Name:  Alien Landscape 2012 by cadamsCREATIONS

Finished Size: approximately 24”x 24”

Quilting: Spiral pattern done by hand with DMC embroidery floss (3 strands).

Batting: Warm & Natural Quilt Batting

Background Piecing: Crazy quilt style, done by machine.

Appliques: Big house (pocket), space car (pocket), two wonky houses.

Extras: Space ship made from quilting cottons and Peltex with ric rac and embroidered details.  Aliens made of wool felt, recycled t-shirt, and Peltex – hand drawn and embroidered.

Quilt Back: quilting cotton, one continuous piece (galaxies theme).

Binding: 7/8” pre-made double-fold quilt binding, sewn by hand.  Hanging loops made from tiny double fold bias tape in orange.

Wanted to share my top five "NEW" things I did during this project:

1. I researched color theories.  I am not a quilter, and choosing the colors was actually the hardest part of my design process.  Learned a BUNCH, though!

Sprout (12 months old) was intrigued by the fabric.

2. I researched "crazy quilting".  I knew I wanted the background fabric to be "haphazard", so I heard about crazy quilting and decided that I could give it a shot.  My kids loved the background fabric!

3. I researched binding and mitered corners.  When I began this project, I was clueless as to how folks got those pretty, sharp corners.  But now that I've done 8 of them I feel like I have a good handle on them!

4. I used Peltex for the first time!  It's really fun stuff, and easy to sew through.

5. I scoured my embroidery books for new stitches to learn.  I ended up doing too many to describe here, but it was a great learning experience.

A Note to Jennifer:

I appreciate your work on putting this challenge together, and for answering my many questions about it!  I feel like I learned so much during this past 5 weeks - it's been like an online class experience, but since I don't like school, I'll add that it was FUN FUN FUN!!!  So from the bottom of my heart, THANK YOU!!!  

:) Caren

Learning New Things

I am working on my project for the "Modern Mini Challenge" over at Ellison Lane Quilts.  Jennifer has been doing a blog series on Mini's so we can find our inspiration - there are some wonderfully talented folks out there in blog-land!

This is my first "quilt".  However, as you may be aware, I am a free spirit when it comes to design, so I have to admit that my mini will be functional.  Not as in "it hangs on the wall and looks pretty" kind of functional, but as in a "hey, that's way cool - what do you mean it hangs on the wall?!!" kind of functional.  Confused yet?

OK, I'll reveal a little bit about my project on this post, but I want to wait until it's done to reveal the whole shebang (mainly because it's not finished yet!).  Prior to being sidetracked into this challenge, I was working on a "Quiet Book" for my children.  So every page had "something to do".  That bled over into this quilt a little bit.  

These adorable aliens can go INTO the house and space ship.  Yep, those bits are not just for looks, they are actually pockets!  Yay for keeping kids busy!!!  

(Speaking of keeping kids busy, has anyone seen my third alien?  I think someone toddled off with it....)

I admit I am no professional.  I am probably going to be crazy enough to try to make another one of the space ships.  I learned a bunch while doing this one.  First off, I learned how to make buttonholes with my new (to me) sewing machine!

Not excellent, but it'll do for the kiddos.  (Thread snapped in the middle of sewing.  grrrr.)

I had some fun trying to figure out exactly how to make the space ship.  I added the ric rac with itty bitty French knots to add a bit of color.  I like how it turned out!

I also got to "play" with Peltex.  It's really neat stuff (of course - it's made by Pellon!).  It is a thick stabilizer with heat-activated adhesive on both sides.  It makes the aliens (and space ship) sort of stiff but flexible - like spongy cardboard!

Typically, after I put something together I look at it and think of all the embroidered bits I can add.  I was not sure about the Peltex, because it is so thick.  However, it was surprisingly simple to sew through - even by hand!  

Here are some of my house windows.  My original design has a porch, too, but I'm working on that.  I love that I can sit and do a bunch of hand-embroidered details on this project.  Makes it relaxing, fun, and doesn't feel alien to me (ha!).

I only have until March 5th to finish it up, but I'd better get cracking - especially if I want to re-do the space ship with all of my new found knowledge!

Modern Mini Challenge

I'm entering the The Modern Mini Challenge over at Ellison Lane Quilts.

In Jennifer's own words: "The Modern Mini Challenge is a 5 week series that kicks off with some seriously inspiring work from some super talented bloggers. Spark your creativity with ideas and inspiration from some amazing mini quilts and mug rugs."  Want to join me?  Check it out at Ellison Lane Quilts.


Yep.  I'm going to do it.  I'm working on a mini right now.  And I'm going to finish it.  And I'm going to enter it.  And I just might win (stranger things HAVE happened).  I love a challenge!  And I'm doing this to prove to myself that I can.  And I will.  


I'm going to do it. 


I'm putting it in writing - you all will hold me to my word, won't you?  

Thanks - you're the best!!!!
 :) Caren