FINISHED PETAL KNOT DRESS AND WIP

The Petal Knot dress is finished and being modeled by its new if somewhat camera shy owner.  Vail spent the night last night and wanted to wear her new dress to school.  Since she didn't bring extra accessories she is wearing the pink bow and pink shoes that were going to be worn with the outfit she had brought from home to wear this morning.  What's a grams to do?? :)

You can't really see the flowers on the apron in the picture.  This is what it looked like before gathering.  I think the flowers turned out really cute.

Since I was waiting for the first visit from the  Terminix guy all afternoon (he turned out to be a no show)  I got Jennifer to help me get my sock monkey all situated on its background and then ironed it on.

I'm going to zigzag around it with dark brown thread.  Then I cut my squares and strips to make 5" squares and got all the strips sewn to make 32 5" squares to go with the other 5" squares I had already cut out.

  Now I'll make those into 16 four patch squares and they will make the outside border on my sock monkey quilt.  I had collected most of the fabric before I bought the pattern so my quilt will be a little different but most all mine are different from the original pattern.  Anyway, if I have time between straightening and packing tomorrow for my trip to TX , I may try to get the top mostly sewn together or atleast get the monkey stitched down and the big squares sewn together.

Wednesday I'll be off to TX by way or Cleveland MS for one night and will not be taking my computer.  So I'll be out of pocket til next week.

FINISHED

Took Vail and Katy to Joanne’s and picked out a couple of pink knits that I thought would be cute nighties.  I asked which one they liked best and they both picked something totally different.  They did stay in the knit family though.  Can you guess who picked what?

I have to say I’ve forgotten everything I ever knew about sewing with knits.  The skirts are barely gathered because they are not much bigger than the bodice but the bodices aren’t stretched out.  Anyway.  They love them so my mistakes don’t matter (except to me:))

SLIGHT OF SINK

What makes a large Sonic cup go from this

to this? (this view also includes a Route 44 size cup--and that is the lid you can barely see.)

The answer --- A new DEEP sink.  The new quartz counter is really nice too.  I'll post more pictures sometime soon.

EVEN OLD MEN SLEEP WITH THEIR TOYS

CAUTION: FUN DAY AHEAD :))

In a little bit I'm off to the Bernina Store for a sewing class.  We are going to be making the Petal Knot Dress from the Portobella Pixie Claire Pattern.  It looks llike this 

and I'm using these four fabrics which top to bottom will be the straps, bodice, skirt, apron, band across the bottom of the apron, more skirt and band around the bottom of the skirt.

I had decided on the way to pick out fabric that I wanted to use blues and yellows.  When I got there and was signing up for the class,etc., the lady said "here is our sample." and it was -- blues and yellows.  They had a large selection to pick from. I think it will be really cute.  See you later.

BACK AT HOME

I'm back from my trip and hope to be at home for at least a week.  There's a lot going on here for the next several days.  New countertops for the kitchen later in the week and some work on my little fish pond.  Hopefully I'll be able to fix the rungs on the ladder going up to the platform and the slide on the swing set.  And .... tomorrow I'm getting a massage .... woo hoo!  My back is definitely looking forward to that.  I'm really hoping to get back in the sewing room and get A LOT of sewing done -- we shall see.

I always love going back to Pennsylvania. It is always so pretty on the farm even though Spring has barely sprung:)

PA BOUND

 My sweet Auntie Lois passed  away this morning so I'm off to my mother's for the duration.  She had been in a wheelchair for a long time and was in a nursing home - before that she lived in an assisted living facility. Mom spent a lot of time with her over the past several years.  I know she will miss their time together.  Auntie Lois was a talented  equestrian.  She spent many hours riding and taught all of us kids how to ride.  Took us to the horseshows -- I have a few ribbons hidden away somewhere. She was a kind and loving lady and we will miss her.

CAN YOUR BRAIN TAKE A VACATION WITHOUT YOU?

I consider myself to be reasonably intelligent.  Then I do something that makes me wonder if my brain and I are in the same town.  Take my sock monkey applique -  here is what the pattern looked like

You trace it onto fusible interfacing.  Iron the interfacing onto the back of the fabric and cut it out.  Place all the different color parts together to make  the monkey and then use the stitch of your choice to attach it to the background.  The pattern was too big to fit on one sheet of 81/2 by 11 page hence the 2 sheets and the dotted lines that show overlap and so on.  I took the thing so literally that I traced the 2 halves of the body separately and peiced them together.  As I was tacking them down with a glue stick and getting ready to start the sewing process, I suddenly realized that I should have pieced the pattern pieces and cut the body out as one piece so I redid it -- except for the tail of course because a tail is supposed to be pieced -- just not the body  -- right?? So I guess the third time was the charm.  I got it all -- including the tail -- as one whole sock monkey body. I've got the scraps to prove it.

I used some of the scraps to try different stitches.  I tried the chicken foot stitch (my name -- kind of a modified blanket stitch.), a blanket stitch and then a zigzag/satin stitch.  You can see I chose the zigzag but once around didn't seem enough so I went over it a second time and I don't like it at all.  Since it will be fairly easy, I'm going to take it all out tomorrow and go back to the drawing board.  I'm going to do either the simple blanket stitch or the zigzag but just once around. I haven't had a whole lot of experience in applique.  Most of mine are done on the embroidery machine.  The ones I've done "free hand" (or whatever the term would be) have been pretty simple shapes for the most part.  I did applique the tree on my family tree quilt but it was a simple zig zag that blended in with the color of the tree trunk  not a true applique stitch.  I do know that the Bernina shop is going to have a class on applique and I'm going to take it  --  maybe twice:))

PLANS FOR THE REST OF THE WEEK

Its monkeys and nightys on tap for this week.  One of the blogs I keep up with, Sew Cindy showed a finished quilt last week that made me remember I have that same pattern hidden away somewhere while I was collecting fabric to make it.  Well, I've collected the fabric but still haven't started the quilt.  So, I dug the stuff out and I'm going to get the top done this week.

I worked on the monkey appliqué tonight but that is a whole other story for another day.  Here it is along with the other fabrics I got for the rest of it. I'll use the red for the first border and then use a combination of the others for the wide outer border.  Don't know if I'll do squares or something else yet.   I might throw in some red minky and white chenille squares or something too.

I also got out the nightgown pattern I had gotten to make some summer nightgowns for the girls and looked through my stash for something to to use with it.    I think I'll be making a trip to JoAnne's or HobLob. But I plan to get those done this week as well.  It's almost Wed. already so I'm going to bed.

ANOTHER FINISH