Tag Archives: Celtic Solstice

Update on February Plans and this week’s POA, week 7, 2019

Good morning my friends,

It was a productive week.

For quilting:

Celtic Solstice – Goal for February is to have this bound and labeled.

Celtic Solstice
2/9/19
Binding in process

Good Fortune – Goal is to finish Clue 2 and start on Clue 3. I normally work on this on Sunday’s with a friend and yesterday was our guild’s workshop so we didn’t get together. Next Sunday I will be out of town so the next time I will be getting together at Tova’s will be Sunday, 2/24. You’ll be happy to know that I did finish Clue 2. and all I need to do is to start on Clue 3. Which I’ll be able to do when we next get together.

Good Fortune Mystery Quilt
Clue Two
Finished
2/3/19

Provence – Goal is to piece the border. – not yet done… And with the next 2 weekends filled with activities, not sure if I’ll be able to get this done.

For Knitting:

January Socks – Finished one sock!

January Socks
just one
2/5/19
Honey Bees Dance
by Helen Stewart

February Sock – I’m working on Mercury socks by Kim McKenzie/Drotrar using Hypnotic Yarn’s Grinchmas. I love the colorway but the yarn is too plum for socks for me. I would probably love a hat or gloves with this yarn. While it’s cold now, it doesn’t get cold often enough in Los Angeles to warrant making a lot of wool plump socks. The yarn is 80% SW Merino, 20% Nylon and at first my knitting friend who is much more accomplished than I thought it might be the 80/20 blend that I don’t like. But after a few days thought that that’s probably not it as I’ve been knitting with similar yarn compositions in the past. So then we realized that there are only 400 yards in this 100 grams and I’ve been knitting with yardage around 430’s and up. Which is why this particular yarn is plumper than the yarn I normally work with. The yarn is lovely, don’t get me wrong, just not something I want to use in socks again. Anyway, I’m almost through the foot and will be working on the heel before the weeks ends.

Jacob’s Weasley Sweater – This sweater is in time out. I can’t even talk about it at the moment.

Featherweight cardigan – I am finished blending out yarn 1 on one sleeve. I have to work on blending out yarn 1 on the second sleeve and finish blending it out of the body. Then I’ll be working solely with yarn 2 for a little bit while I think about when to blend in yarn 3. I’ll get a picture once Yarn 1 is blended out completely. Right now there are so many yarn bits hanging out it’s difficult to try on let alone to take a pic with it.

For Cross Stitching:

Mama’s Bukid- Goal is to finish column 1 and 2 on page 3 and 6.

Mama’s Bukid
2/10/19
almost done with columns 1 and 2 on pages 3 and 6

Gamer – Goal is to finish page 6. I have about 2 more columns to do so I’m pretty close to this goal. I just need to finish my goal for Mama’s Bukid, then I can work on this project. The only thing is that I am out of town this coming weekend so I will not be able to stitch a lot. I think that that is okay but it does mean I have to rush, which I hate doing. 🙂

Snowman – Goal is to finish stitching the perimeter of this WIP. I have worked on this a bit and I have about 1 side left to finish in order to have the perimeter completely stitched on this project. This is my traveling piece so I’ll be working on this a lot this weekend.

This coming weekend I’ll be out of town so I may not be able to get a post out. I plan to not visit any shops (quilt shops, yarn shops, needlepoint shops) as I need to not spend money on anything other than food and gas and possibly parking, if necessary. My daughter was just accepted to Boston University and I need to watch my pennies. Of course, we’re still waiting to hear back in regards to her financial aid package and depending on what they give her will determine whether she will go there or not. Instead, the daughter and I will be visiting San Francisco State just in case the financial aid package at BU is unacceptable.

Keep crafting and love on!

xoxo,

Melanie

Posted by Melanie. Categories: 2019 Plans, Cross Stitch, Knitting, Quilting. Tags: 2019 goals, Celtic Solstice, Celtic Solstice Mystery Quilt, featherweight cardigan, gamer nouveau, Good Fortune, honey bee dance socks, jacob's weasley sweater, mama's bukid, Provence, snowman cross stitch. 1 Comment

Feb. ’19

Saturday Musings, quilt on!

My major project over the next couple weeks is this skirt:

Delphine Skirt
by Tilly and the Buttons

I hope it’s cute on me. But if it’s not – well, I am taking this opportunity to practice sewing. It’s fun and right now I have the pieces cut up. Tomorrow, I plan to cut some interface for the band and to start sewing all the pieces together. Oh and I need to buy a zipper. So we’ll see how far I get tomorrow. I’ve been wanting to sew skirts for a long time and I hope that this will help me learn to do more.

I did a bit of unplanned crafting today. I took my daughter to a school tour to see if it’s one of the places she might attend for college. It was not as far as I had thought and we spent about 30 minutes when she decided it wasn’t the right place for her. So we returned home much sooner than I had thought and was able to get some things done.

1st, I was able to get part of my sleeve done on my featherweight cardigan. I am having some yarn management issues as I transition from yarn 1 to yarn 2 so I finished yarn 1’s part on sleeve 1 and now just need to do the same on sleeve 2. Then I can continue on the body and get to the point where I start adding yarn 3. I love how it’s turning out and I’m sorry I cannot get a very good picture of it. Here’s the last time I was able to take a pick:

Then I was able to work on Mama’s Bukid. My goal for February is column 1 and 2 and I’ve been stitching 1 box per day. So today’s the 9th and since I was a little behind I stitched both box 8 and box 9. I have 3 more boxes and I will be done with column 1 and 2 for the month. I don’t really like stitching on Mama’s Bukid but it’s my focus WIP for this year. I’ve discovered since I started stitching more that I like to stitch 18 or 25 count. As Gamer is on 18 and A Stitch In Time is on 25. Mama’s Bukid is on 14 count and I feel like it’s so big. I need to use 4 flosses to get the right coverage I like. But I’m persisting and I’m on track to get this done this year.

And Finally, as of this moment of writing, I measured the perimeter of Celtic Solstice and pulled fabric from the stash bins to start cutting for the binding. I hope to cut and piece the binding tonight before I move on to my next project.

And since I pulled fabric and went through the bins in my closet, I started looking at the projects that I’ve got going. I’m going to 2 retreats at the end of March. It just kind of happened. One of the retreats is with a friend and we will be up in the mountains in a cabin. We’re both excited for that one as it sounds really nice to be up in the mountains near LA in spring. This one runs Monday through Thursday and the second retreat is near Santa Maria, CA the following Saturday through Monday. I will be taking my work laptop and I hope they have internet in the mountains so I can stay connected and take care of anything if necessary. So I looked at some longstanding WIPs and I’m starting to plan which projects I will take with me. I’ve got 2 quilts ready to be quilted and those are not going to go with me to the retreat. The 3rd quilt I’ve been working on, Provence, will probably be done before the retreats and will be in the quilting queue with the others. So I have to look at what I will take. I am still working on my Civil War Diary quilt but I generally only do a block or two at a time. My computer crashed a couple of months ago and I still haven’t re-installed EQ7 so I can print more of the block instructions. But I think I have 2 blocks printed and ready to use from the last time I printed block instructions. And I’ve got Area One Mystery Quilt from 2012. I have quite a few blocks finished from previous retreats and that will be a good #1 project. I also have Bonnie’s Good Fortune quilt that I can continue working on. So that’s 3 projects. I pulled a Glam Clam quilt that I started a few years ago and I don’t think it ever made it onto the blog. I also pulled “Dancing with the Stars” which is an old Linda Ballard pattern I started at a class I took with her at PIQF many years ago. I love how my quilts are slowly getting done and I’m starting to go into my old WIPs. At some point, I’ll be going through my new fabric and making stuff with them. I took this opportunity to pet some of them. 🙂 I have quite a few that I purchased specifically to make skirts or to make bags. So, one of these days, I will jump on that. But I currently have 2 totes in process so I want to finish those before I start any new bags.

Happy crafting friends!

I will go back to my cutting table and start cutting the pieces for my binding.

Happy quilting!

Hugs,

Melanie

Posted by Melanie. Categories: Cross Stitch, Knitting, Quilting. Tags: Celtic Solstice, delphine skirt, featherweight cardigan, mama's bukid, Provence, quilt queue, retreats, sewing. Leave a comment

Jan. ’19

Monday, POA, Week 4, 2019

I really rocked it and was able to get the inner parts of Celtic Solstice all quilted up. Now I’m all ready to quilt the borders. Except that I’m busy for the next 2 weeks. The next time I have the time to tackle the borders will be Saturday, Feb. 2. So I’m putting it on the calendar. This is the reason why it takes so long for me to quilt a quilt. I need to have a full day to get into the mindset to do something. And with such a big quilt, every bit of quilting is hard work. It is exhausting. But I made another step of progress and I’m almost done!

In the meantime, my plan is to work on Provence. The last time I worked on Provence was at the quilt retreat I attended at Thimble Towne in Bakersfield, CA last September. It was the first retreat I attended with fellow guildmates and my crafty friend, Mindy. I finished piecing the inner top and the next step is to piece the border. So, sometime this week I want to press the top, measure appropriately, cut the border, and piece it.

Here’s a pic of Provence as it is currently:

Provence
9/22/18

I currently have a quilting queue. Remember my #MakeNine2019. The 3 quilt projects on my #MakeNine2019 are Celtic Solstice, Have Yourself a Quilty Little Christmas, and Staycation. The top for Quilty Little Christmas has been done for a while. Since Feb, 2017. All the details are on my project page.

Have yourself a quilty little Christmas!
Top is finished! 🙂
2/24/2017

It has been waiting for Celtic Solstice to be finished quilting for a long while. I have the batting and back ready for this thing. It’s been ready for so long I need to pull it out and make sure the back is actually cut. I don’t remember anymore.

I just finished Staycation last weekend at the most recent quilt retreat I attended with my Crafty friend, Karen. We were at Creation Station in Solvang, CA (actually it’s really Buelton, but no one really knows Buelton unless you are from SoCal and Buelton is 2 miles from Solvang. It’s actually the town you are at when you exit the 101 to head into Solvang.) So I still need to prep batting and the back before I quilt this one. I’m planning to do that when I’m finished with Quilty Little Christmas. So I’ll be working on Provence as my current quilty project. That’s quilt #4 that’s almost ready to be finished and then sit in the queue until I’m ready to quilt it.

Happy quilting!

Melanie

Posted by Melanie. Categories: Quilting. Tags: Celtic Solstice, Have Yourself a Quilty Little Christmas!, Provence, quilt queue, staycation quilt. Leave a comment

Jan. ’17

Women’s March

Just a quick post before I head over to the Women’s March this morning. I’ll be there with my daughter and a friend. I’m just a bit excited as I haven’t been to a march/rally in years and never with my daughter. This will be a new experience for us.

In crafty news, knitting continues to be my go to craft on a day to day basis. I’ve worked on the boy’s hat while waiting in the car for various reasons. I’ve worked on my magenta/gray socks. And I am currently trying to get gauge on a sweater. My focus this weekend will be my pink/blue socks:

pink/blue socks
1/17/17

This is how they looked last Tuesday. All I need to do is graft those toes together and then it will be done.

In addition, I want to make project bags. I’ve been wanting to make these for awhile as I’ve been seeing so many cute project bags lately. I’ve been watching a lot of you-tube shows about knitting and quilting lately. I’m drooling over those project bags. I don’t want to spend $20-$40 since I know I have the fabric and supplies to make them myself. Zippers scare me though so I’m going to start with a drawstring bag. I made one years ago… and I found a picture…

1st Drawstring Bag – 10/2013

I figure I’ll start with these and move on to the zippered bags at some point. I am planning on doing some this weekend.

On the quilty end of things, I was able to get the inner top to Celtic Solstice complete. After it was all pieced, I noticed a few of the blocks (block A) turned the wrong way. It’s not hugely noticeable and I’m not going to rip to turn them the right way. This weekend my plan is to take a picture of it and work on the border. It looks like there are supposed to be 3 borders and one of them is a pieced border of chevron units. I believe that we’ve already put together those chevrons in a previous step (I really hope so! If not, I’ll be doing something different.)

On a personal note… more bad news this week. It seems like every time I feel like we’re leveling out and may even have a bit of calm something else happens. I guess in the true sense of things, it’s not really bad. We have our health. We have each other. I have my sewing machine and my fabric. 🙂 and now my yarn. I did have to say no to a request my quilt guild made of me. I felt bad to have to say no but I knew there was no way I was going to be able to help them. I really have to say no more often. I started my gratitude journal again. A year or so ago I was posting a gratitude post every day and at some point it fizzled out. But since I’ve been going through this negative period right now I felt like I needed to jot down things I’m grateful for. Unlike before where I was doing this at the end of the day, I actually am writing my gratitudes as I see them. That way by the end of the day I have a list of things to reflect upon and be grateful for. It is helping. I’m also not posting them online. Maybe I will, I don’t know. I just started a few days ago and I’m keeping things real simple for now. Thanks for everyone who reached out with positive words via comments or emails. They help also!

Well, on to the march! I can’t wait to see all the pussy hats! (btw, I really hate that word. It makes me cringe. But that’s what their being called. At least it’s easier to write than to say!)

~happy marching, ladies!

~Melanie