Q is for Qrazy (and Quilt)

At the end of last summer I stumbled upon an Instagram feed of a crafting/sewing woman in Scandinavia. In one post she was making quilted squares of fabric from old scraps. It looked very easy. See her post here.  I thought "if you connected a lot of those squares together you could make a quilt". And so began my journey into making my first quilt, something that I never dreamed I would try. That first post discovery led me to countless other IG feeds, blogs, and YouTube video tutorials. I jumped in headfirst not really knowing what I was getting into. It turned into quite a crafting sojourn, that lasted over FOUR MONTHS, but I finally finished my first quilt. It was not always easy but I am VERY satisfied with the end result...and I have a new hobby that I adore. 

So here are a few snapshots of the process (with the finished quilt at the end)...

The traditional way of quilting is to create a top of various fabric pieces in some sort of pleasing pattern, then you sandwich it on top of batting and a backing piece of fabric. After that you quilt this big and cumbersome thing which is not easy. But back int he 1980's a technique became very popular where you sew various quilted blocks together piece by piece. This is a lot easier to manage on a domestic sewing machine. That's where I started, I began amassing these 8" by 8" squares made out of all kinds of fabric, anything I could find, old material I had in the back of closets, old clothes, old jeans, pillow cases, sheets, you name it. I got Scott to give me old clothes of his and I even started looking for old clothes at yard sales, anything was fair game to use. I then supplemented it all with fabrics I bought online and at places like the Sag Harbor Five & Dime and Walmart. 

Here are few samples, I ended up needing NINETY-NINE squares (!) altogether. 

As you can see, I decided to go with a nautical them, aside from basic hues of blue and green, I incorporated lighthouses, anchors, whales, sharks, sailors, mermen, all things I'm obsessed with. Not to mention that I do live in Sag Harbor, an old whaling town. 

This part of the process took the longest. I averaged an hour to an hour and a half when sewing each square depending on how intricate the pieces of fabric were. You can do the math to figure out how long it took me to get to 99! How satisfying to see that final stack of squares it was. 

In my research, practically everywhere said that to sew all the squares together you need what's called a 'walking foot' attachment for your sewing machine. Basically, it pulls the fabric thru the machine not only from the bottom but from the TOP as well. This is what they look like...

The problem is that my vintage Kenmore is so old it took a LOT of hunting to track down the right resource that carried one that would fit my machine. After many dead ends, I found a vendor on eBay that had the right foot. It was not cheap, about $60, but it was ABSOLUTELY worth every penny. It made the sewing way, way easier to maneuver. 

Before I started connecting the squares, I needed to layout all of them in order to find the most pleasing layout. I wanted to spread out various fabrics and colors so that patterns weren't repeated too close to one another. I did this on the floor of my bedroom on top of an old sheet, it was the only space big enough to lay it all out. 

I numbered the rows and pinned Post-It notes to them so that everything was organized when I finally started sewing. Having this picture helped also. 

You start by connecting one row of squares horizontally. I had 11 rows. 

Then you connect all the rows together starting from the middle rows and working out from there, first the top rows, then the bottom ones. This is how it looked from the back, you can see the quilting of the fabric pieces thru the batting. 

The next stage is to add the backing fabric. I didn't want to piece together more rows of fabric so I discovered that many people use bed sheets for this. Purists don't like this solution for some reason but it's a lifesaver, saving money and time. I had a hard time finding the right pattern of sheet. I found this one on Kmart.com. I liked it because it was blue, sort of modern, and the pattern would hide a lot of sins in case my stitches turned out wonky. It turned out great on the latter point. If I had to do it all over again, I would choose a cotton sheet (this one was a synthetic), but it's fine. It's very soft. 

In an ideal world I have a huge work table to lay out these big pieces to pin the backing fabric to the top and batting. I have no such thing. YouTube rescued me again.  There were a few videos on how to attach the backing on a very small table. It's not easy but I managed. I did it on the kitchen counter, the only place with a large surface. I didn't want to do it on the floor to save my knees and back, besides, I didn't want to put my lovely creation on the floor to get dirty. 

The pinning took an entire afternoon, there were over a hundred curved safety pins in all. 

Trying to sew this big thing on my sewing machine was the one thing I feared the most. I had nightmares about how to do this. Again, the internet taught me that it could be done. You roll up each side and persevere. It's like wrestling an alligator but it's possible. All it takes is patience. Thank God for the walking foot and my good ol' Kenmore, that thing is built like a tank. It worked like a champ. 

Next was adding the binding. I had found a nice fabric for cheap online, I think it was from Joanne's, a blue pattern that looked like an old bandana. You have to cut several long strips and attach them end to end on the bias, another process I learned from YouTube. 

Here's the quilt without the binding folded up. 

And here are the binding strips. 

Sewing the binding took another whole afternoon. After all that, here's the--drumroll please--finished piece. I'm super pleased with how it turned out. It's not perfect by a long shot, very 'hamishe' like everything I make, but you learn that quilting forgives a lot of sins. You don't see little imperfections, you're just left with the cozy comfy end product. 

As a coda, I had several squares left over, I had made extra in case the overall design needed adjusting. I  turned three of these into pot holders, Christmas gifts for my nieces and nephew. 

And as a second coda, I took a few of the leftover blocks and made a table runner. I think it's a little thin for the dining room tho. It will look a lot better on the bistro table we use on the front porch next spring. 

60 is the new 40

Yesterday was my Big One: I turned 60. It's hard to believe. It doesn't feel like that many years have passed...but time does fly. It turned out to be a great and memorable day. 

 

We woke up late and had a big breakfast of oatmeal with blueberries and bananas, one of my favorite meals. 

My gift from Scott was this neat metal racoon (my spirit animal) for the yard. See, I call the house "Racoon Hall", so it's a perfect talisman. It's a die-cut piece of metal that you nail into the side of a building, a fence, or a tree. It rusts and ages over time. Not sure where it will be placed just yet, stay tuned. Here's a pic from the maker:

We went back to bed for a long afternoon nap, it was that kind of day...

Afterward, we got cleaned up and had dinner at a beautiful restaurant in East Hampton, 1770 House. It's  in a lovely Inn. 

The room was warm and cozy and very Christmas-y. 

I had the most delicious dinner:

First course was Brussels Sprouts & Granny Smith Apple Salad

Bacon, Golden Raisins, Parmigiano Reggiano, & Lemon-Anchovy Dressing.

My entree was Roasted ‘Painted Hills’ Striploin with

Marrow Emulsion, Sauteed Spinach,  and Pommes Allumettes. 

We has a side of parsnip puree and finished off the meal with a sticky date cake with ice cream and caramel sauce. All of it was simply perfect. 

When we got home there's always something that goes wrong, right? Travis had thrown up in his cage! Scott had to give him a quick bath and we had to rinse off the cage in the backyard with the water hose. Aside from this snafu, it was a terrific day, everything that you could hope for. 

 

A worthwhale project

 We went yard saling (sailing?) last Saturday and we passed a barn sale on a side road. It was mostly junk but I did find this really nice wooden frame for only FIVE BUCKS! Of course, I needed to put some sort of art in it and knowing me, it wasn't long before I did another homage to "Moby-Dick". I stitched a "quilt collage" out of some scraps of fabric I've got in my quilting stash. I just happened to have a pattern of an old schooner of some sort, a whale, and some fabric that looked like ocean waves. With some arty modern stitch lines I'm happy with the result. 

Scott thought it would look good in the hallway next to the basement door. He was right (as usual). 

House of Windsor

We love to scope out yard and garage sales on Saturdays, just drive around and see what goodies we can find. There was one in Bridgehampton that had mostly junk being held by this chatty older lady. Quickly I spotted a Windsor-style bar stool for only $40. I sat down on it and it was very comfy. I sent this pic to Scott who was waiting in the car with Travis. He came and saw it and approved. I snapped it up. 

I've been needing a new one for the kitchen bar, the one I have now was not easy on the butt anymore and was getting worn looking despite the slip covered I sewed for it last year. 

When we got the chair home it was too tall for the bar top, UGH...but then I noticed there were some ridges already cut into the legs at the bottom. What if I tried cutting the legs down along those lines? I was super worried that I'd never be able to make the angled cuts correctly to make the chair sit properly but decided to give it a go. Lo and behold, my jigsaw went through the legs 'like buttah', easy peasy. The angle of the cut was perfect and now the stool is at the right height for the bar. The color of the wood matches nicely with he dining table also. I'm thinking I'll get a seat cushion for it to make sitting on it that much comfier, something I'll probably pick up at Home Goods. 

Paging Donna shillelagh??

We love to take long walks around the village with the dog. And when we do, I usually pick up a branch to be my 'walking stick' (sorta like Barbara Parkins at the end of "Valley of the Dolls"). So one day I thought I'd take one of these comfortable sticks and "tshudge it up" a bit, i.e. sand it, stain it, and polyurethane it so it would look a whole lot better. I'd be making my own shillelagh and I'm not even Irish! LOL So far I have two nice ones, and I'm sure they won't be the last. I've always got my eye out for the next perfect stick to transform.

Feeling my oats

I've taken up quilting (more on that in a future post), and it's caused me to accumulate a ton of fabric scraps. They were too small to use for quilting but too nice to simply throw out, what a waste that would be. So I decided to use them in a craft project. 

We eat a lot of oatmeal in our house and the big oatmeal box seemed like the prefect container to cover with the fabric scraps. I could use it for storage...or something, right?

I broke out my bottle of Mod Podge decoupage glue and covered it from top to bottom overlapping the squares and rectangles in a 'Modrian'-ish pattern. 

I like the way it came out, I'm using it for now as a vase for some dried hydrangea blooms in the kitchen. 

We've already eaten enough oatmeal to furnish another box...I think I'll use that one to store future piles of scraps! 

A whale of a project

I ran across a cute picture on Pinterest of a stuffed whale doll that someone made and I thought to myself, "I could make that". I've stated my fascination of all things whale in past posts. It has something to do with living in a historic whaling village I guess. 

In any event, I found a pdf of the pattern online and with an old pair of jeans to provide the fabric I got to sewing. It came out pretty cute. I especially love the button eye and the belly detail (made from overstitching the reverse side of the jeans). 

It now sits on a shelf in the bedroom. 

On the radio

 I saw a cute radio/CD player on Nextdoor.com the other week, only 20 bucks. I wanted a CD player for the craft room to play music while I'm sewing & crafting. 

I loved the retro look of it (even tho it's not vintage by a long shot)...but the bright blue color ended up being too much for me. I decided to try painting it. I taped off all the chrome parts with blue painter's tape and got out the black spray paint.

Two coats later it was sleek and black. Much better. It now happily sits on a side table in the craft room and works like a charm.

 

 

Al fresco dining

So I painted the black end table that used to be in my bedroom, the one I replaced with the round white one. It's the same blue paint color as the cane seat chairs I found on the street earlier this summer. Now we can dine 'al fresco' when it's not too hot (I think I dated an Al Fresco once...hmmm)

I shortened an old table runner I had for the dining room table and it looks great on the 'bistro table' as I'm calling it. 

This table is the END

 So trawling, once again, my favorite website Nextdoor.com I found a great looking round table AND IT WAS FREE. A guy who lives in Settlers Landing very near my ex-friend Dean was giving it away. We drove over and picked it up, it was in great condition. He had obviously tried to spray paint it white but had done a lazy job of it, there were some drip marks here and there. So I gave it a good sanding and was happy with the result, it had that worn 'shabby chic' distressed look. 

I was going to leave it like that but Scott said "I think you should distress it some more." I plugged in the palm sander and let him have a go at it. Much to my horror, when I returned he had ruined my subtle finish! It looked like a Dalmation! Who did he think I was, Cruella Deville??

Here is his 'handiwork', YIKES.

So I decided to start from scratch and just paint the thing solid white. I primed it (two coats) and covered it 3 more times with a nice white satin indoor paint. It came out great. 

Now remember, this table replaces the black IKEA number I was using as an end table. I liked that one but I always felt it was a temporary piece I'd use until I found something more substantial and stylish...cut to THIRTEEN YEARS later, I finally found what I was looking for! Here's the black table, I have plans for it, stay tuned for that...

The price is right: $FREE.00

My absolute favorite thing is to get a great find for my favorite price: FREE. As I've mentioned in the previous posts, I like to find things on Craigslist, Nextdoor.com, yard sales, or even driving around the village and spotting stuff that people put by the curb for anyone to take. 

Last summer I got a great stereo system with CD player, tape deck, component, and speakers. The speakers turned out to be way too big and the sound coming from them was scratchy. So I finally bought some bookshelf sized speaker from Amazon and they were the perfect. It took me one whole afternoon to set it up...drilling the holes in the shelves and snaking the wires through the back of them nearly killed me. And it makes such a mess with all the sawdust, etc. But the end result is fantastic. The speaker were only $60 and the sound is awesome. 

Scott spotted these old beach chairs in someone's front yard the other week and he thought they'd make a good project for me. He was right. Just a little spray paint and some sewing did the trick. I used the drop cloth canvas again. I don't know how long they'll stay in good shape as I had to cut the interior tubing to get the canvas on and they're only being held together with wooden dowels and duct tape! But they were FREE so I can't complain, even if they only last one season. 

BEFORE

AFTER

I spotted two wooden chairs about three blocks over the other day. I thought they'd be nice for the porch. All they needed was a little paint, they were very solid and the cane seats were in really good condition. At first I only took one, but on reflection I went back the next day to get the other one. 

Last week I saw that someone was giving away several linen lamp shades on Nextdoor.com. I've been needing a new shade for the lamp on the porch, I didn't need four, but I thought 'what the hell' I'll take the lot. They turned out to be really nice shades complete with linings, they couldn't have been cheap. I tried a couple on the lamp and decided on the this drum shade. The others are stored for now in the basement. 

Coffee table tribulations

 I had a love/hate relationship with my TV room coffee table. I loved the round marble top and how it was a nice graphic counterpoint to the squared off L-shaped dark gray couch. But it was too low. You couldn't put your feet up on it comfortably. 

So I Googled homemade coffee ideas and found one that looked pretty simple to construct. All I would need were some two-by-fours and some brackets. 

First I cut the wood to the sizes I needed, then sanded and treated them with tung oil. 

Then came the brackets. It was a little trickier than I thought but with a few suggestions from Scott (he's got a good construction mind, it's because of his background in visual design), it came together fine. 

All I had to do was position the top with some rubber tabs to hold it in place and boom, instant mid-century looking coffee table! AND it's the right height.