Thursday, March 14, 2024

I Like #327

 It feels terrible to realize it's been an entire month since my last I like post.  Tons has happened and of course I've arrived at Thursday morning with no time for a long backlog.  So I'll just say there are lots of overdue posts about all kinds of things, including art things, craft things, construction things, and garden things.  

A few highlights since the last post and I'm recommitting to getting my weekly posts up going forward.  Becky and the kids came up for a wonderful weekend in February during which we played lots of games and had lots of fun but also becky helped me build three garden beds using the repurposed materials from my old porch roof they tore down.  They won't actually live on my patio like this, but this was when we were building them.  I still have to dig them in at their final home (so they're level) and then fill them and plant, but there's been too much going on.






One of my house plants sent out this beautiful orange flower.

And I haven't done any gardening at all, but I have one tulip and one daffodil.  They looked so lonely compared to everyone else who had clumps but I was happy anyway. 








I recovered an old brown chair I got at a garage sale a few years ago to fit better in my new dark puprle bedroom.  The chair used to be covered with this funny brown and cream floral velvet.  I actually really loved it, it had a sort of 70s vibe that made me think fondly of my grandma.  But the dog had chewed up some of the brown and it didn't really go with the new bedroom where I love the dark purple but really wnated a pop of something super bright.

I pulled a piece of bright blue cordouroy from my stash (thanks Mary!) and just traced the cushions and made new covers.  It's not the best recovering job, but 








I don't have a good picture of it in its new home, but I'll try to get one for next week.

I also made a bunch of doo-dads for the Albuquerque Fiber Arts Fiesta fundraiser.  I think I'd shared some of them before but I can't remember.  




And finally of course we have to have the pups.  They're doing great.  Blue has moved into bed with me and Spooky so now we're even more snuggly at night (i.e. crowded) but it's ok.

They love "helping" fold the clean laundry.


I hope there are good things in your life and for more, click over to LeeAnna's!






Thursday, February 15, 2024

I like #326

 Not much is happening on the crafty front lately, almost everything is focused on work and construction and mud.  However, there's good stuff anyway.

Last Thursday I went to the annual College of Medicine Alumni Association Gala, its the one big fancy work event each year.  This year they let us take home the centerpieces so it was exciting to have fun flowers in the wet cold snowy rainy winter!


On Saturday they demoed the backyard for the new concrete for the porch.  Unfortunately it's been really wet and rainy so we had a giant giant mud pit for a few days straight out the backdoor.  I was constantly sweeping, the bed and sofa were full of dirt, and it was just a giant mess.  I had to put on muck boots to get into the studio.  But then it dried up enough to pour the concrete and by yesterday evening the dogs were allowed on it, so now even though there's still tons of mud at least the dogs don't go straight from it into the house.  I spent two hours cleaning floors last night and it is (at least temporarily) so much better.  







I'm very excited about the concrete, it's nice and bigger than my old porch footprint.  And I learned I can move my fence, so I'm not even sad anymore about losing garden space.  


While they were tearing up the old concrete on Saturday Blue and Spooky and I went out for a nice hike.  It was good to get outside and not be at the hourse during the noisiest of the demo, this whole process has been super stressful for the dogs anyway.




I did do one small sewing project this weekend, I made my annual donation quilt for the SAQA spotlight auction.  It's inspired by a kelp forest.  The quilts are very small, 6x8 matted down to 4.5 x 6.5.  Because the quilts are matted, 3/4" all the way around doesn't show, and they recommend you use a flat finishing (i.e. not a bulky binding or facing. Mine has some dimensional elements on it so I was careful to make sure those didn't go into the area where it would be matted.  This is the quilt, it looks kind of funny as is, but once matted it will look more like the second picture below.






And I'm still having fun putting together outfits with lots of handknits.  In the summer when it's hot I wear the same basic stuff, but in the winter it's fun to dig stuff out of my closet and do things a little more put together. Lots of times I even start with the shawl and handknit socks and then do the outfit.



For Valentine's Day!



This was today's, ignore the dumb face.





I hope thereare nice things in your life this week!  Click over to LeeAnna's for more!

Thursday, February 8, 2024

I Like #325

 Welcome to another week of things to like.  They started demo in the backyard this week which is exciting and a bit messy.  They got the old porch torn down and garden fence removed, and sadly two of my garden beds disassembled.  We're playing it by ear with the weather regarding the next steps which are demoing out the old concrete and pouring the new.





I made curtains this weekend for two doorless closets in my small bedroom.  I used this rough weave raw silk that Georgia gave me.  To spruce it up a little I decided to include some trim from my stash.  The one room has pale brown and blue sheers, and I was excited to have just enough of this blue and white trim for an accent.  The other room has a roman shade made out of the fabric in the top of the second picture.  I auditioned several different ribbons/trims, and decided to go for the gold and pink combo.




I also dyed a bunch of sort of medium weight silk that has an interesting Jacquard-type weave.  I used Dharma's procion dyes and an acid method.  It dulled the sheen a bit but the color came out perfect.  It's to make curtains for my new purple bedroom.



I had only one outfit selfie this week, but the bright colors were fun.







And some pups to brighten your day!






Click over to LeeAnna's for more things to like.



Thursday, February 1, 2024

I Like #324

 Welcome to February!  After missing a couple of weeks (at this point I don't even remember why), I'm back with things to like.  

I've had lots of construction happening at my house the last several weeks, and while it's not done, it's at the stage where things are looking so much better. I've been able to start hanging back up are (which is great since it means getting it off the floor), and was able to clean up my studio enough to unload some rolls of fabric from the car.  

Currently I'm really really loving the dark purple  paint I picked for my bedroom.  It's hard to photograph, but it feels so cozy and bold in person.



During the construction, the contractor found three of Spooky's missing balls, he's been thrilled to have them back.



As part of moving things back in, I gave all my plants a bath last Sunday when it was warm.  I love my plants, but I did destash about 8 to friends and colleagues. I had lots of duplicates and really need to recapture some space.  The ones I gave away were mostly small euphorbia, aloe, and pothos.  



Not much blooming right now except my amaryllis which I rescued as a bulb from a post-Christmas clearance bin at walmart.




The pups are doing ok, they got in another small fight last night, triggered by dog chaos in a neighbors yard.  No severe injuries, but Blue's ear was injured again.  They were fine by this morning, cuddled up on the bed together as normal.

After some extremely cold weeks, and then a couple weeks of solid gray rain, it's finally been nice this week.  I've been enjoying pairing up my hand knits shawls with fun outfits and handknit socks.  Sorry about the backgrounds, it's either the work bathroom or the garage.





I did get a chance to blog about a couple of new quilts from late last year this week, click here and here to see them!




Hope you all are finding some things to like!  Click over to LeeAnna's for more!









Monday, January 29, 2024

New Quilt-Hondo Valley Iris

 This is a piece I started last fall, intended to be another in my smocked series.  It was made from an old slip that I've had since my college days (now more than 20 years ago).  I don't think I've ever worn it since college, which is a long time to keep something in your closet you don't wear.

Anyway, I first cut it into two pieces and painted it.  I was originally going to use the two pieces as the front/back of the quilt, but the pieces were fairly small for a smocked quilt since the smocking eats up a lot of area so I decided it would be a diptych and both painted pieces would be "fronts." Evidently I didn't take pictures from the painting or quilting steps.  

After quilting, I finished the edges with some purple fuzzy yarn from my stash and then set them aside to finish over the Christmas break at my mom's.  I decided to leave them sort of skirt-shaped; I wasn't sure what that would do to the smocking, but I didn't want to square them up and lose even more fabric.

The first smocking pattern I tried was this lattice pattern, I'd been wanting to try it for a while, but unfortunately, it didn't work well with the small piece of quilted fabric.  I think for small quilts, it really does help for the smocking pattern to have left-right symmetry so that the side pleats hang evenly on both sides.



  I settled for this plainer pattern and I think it worked much better.  

Here's the finished diptych, I like how the irregular shape made the two pieces nest nicely with one another when hanging.  The purple and green color scheme reminded me of the wonderful iris at the Hondo Valley Iris Farm, so that's what it's named!  The Hondo Valley is the very last thing you drive through going home to my parent's in New Mexico.  If you're ever headed to Ruidoso in the spring/early summer, it's definitely worth a stop.

Hondo Valley Iris, c. Shannon Conley, 2024, 20" x 28" x 2"