Crafty Projects

 Group Quilt Project

Our stitching group decided to construct a wall-hanging sized quilt with a Canadian theme and donate the quilt to the local Canadian Women’s Club. They are selling raffle tickets to raise funds for their supported charities and will select the lucky winner on Mother's Day.

How did it work? We each made 1 or 2 large blocks using the Canadian Maple Leaf done in paper piecing with 2 sections of small squares on both sides of the central leaf block. Some of the group also put together the 9-block pattern of even smaller squares that form the block border around the edge.

My contributions were the bright pink large block plus the autumn yellow border blocks. I might have shared a photo of my large block already. The two ladies in the photo are 2 of the 4 remaining in our group from the time I joined. Everyone else has left (boo hoo). However, I heard a rumor that one of my friends who left might actually return fairly soon. Hope so!

A couple of the ladies put it together, added batting and backing. The back continues the Canadian theme: a cute print of polar bears, moose, etc. The layered piece was then machine quilted by the lady on the left.

As far as MY “garden” quilt goes, I have finally started cutting and stitching. I bought this fabric oh so long ago but just never found the time.

Bottle holders

Whenever you fill a water bottle with chilled water from our dispenser, condensation immediately forms on the outside of the bottle and then drips all over everything. In addition, when I am out and about or on a tour often I must carry water and it doesn’t really fit in my purse so I was stuck carrying it in my hand. What’s the solution?  I made 2 water bottle carriers. Found all the hardware at Toko Maju- the haberdashery shop in Pasar Mayestik. I already had the fabric- Bali batiks. With the hardware, these can be worn cross body or on the shoulder and I am now hands free when I need to be. The carriers are insulated and also act as a coaster. This keeps the water cooler longer and prevents all the drips. Yeah!  The blue one goes with almost everything due to the multicolor print. The black one goes with everything else.

My Latest Shawl

What a project. I bought 2 skeins of a very soft cobweb lace/100% merino wool. So what to do with it? Lots of searching and more searching and I finally found the pattern I wanted to use.  At least 9 start overs later and I was finally making some progress. This yarn slips right off of most knitting needles so it was really tough. Then counting everything. I’m still not sure the pattern was 100% correct, but what should I expect for free?

I didn’t knit constantly on it so it took me 3 months to complete  the shawl. The next step was to block it. A friend in our group loaned me her “blocking kit.” It consists of a whole bunch of dense foam blocks that interlock and form a base. There is a set of heavy wires that can be slid down the edges of a piece and then you use blocking pins to correctly stretch the natural fiber knitted item to the size it is supposed to be. I'm not sure how this system would work with acrylic yarns. Here's the shawl soaking in special wool soap. No need to rinse!

 Properly blocked.

The finished project which might actually have a use here, if, say, the AC is too high! Light as a feather.