Tidying And Piecing Enjoyment

I have a print out of this sign posted on the door to my sewing room. I have been so, so, sorely tempted to follow its advice. My most recent post on real quilting was as long ago as mid-January. But take heart and persist as I did. Farther along in this post I report some interesting piecing efforts, all the sweeter since I have a freer space to work in. Gretchen Rubin, happiness guru, reports that one of the secrets of adulthood is that "Outer Order Contributes to Inner Calm".

Lately I have been alternating between tidying and producing. Declutter – sort –  pack to giveaway – whip out some burp cloths. Declutter – sort – pack to give away – whip out some burp cloths. Repeat as required. Then do some quilt piecing! My Piddle Twiddle and Resolve post on 2/1/18 was about my efforts to de-clutter my sewing room and donate items to my guild's upcoming fundraiser, our annual silent auction. I am happy to report progress on that front with the following before and after photos.

The butcher block wood on those double countertops is now visible and cleared of  junk. The surfaces are not pristine but they are a definite improvement.

The contents on the left side of my closet no longer tumbles out at my feet and clobbers me in the face when I slide open the door.

I asked my husband to repurpose two white button drawer pulls as hanging  hooks for my tape measures. Who wants to roll those up every time and store them in a drawer? Now they can be draped in a consistent location, not over a chair, not over a railing, not over my shoulder where I cannot find them. I had bought a modernistic white towel holder that never worked right; it held the towel next to the wall, left a damp spot, and the towel did not dry. It was re-purposed as a perfect holder in the corner for corralling my yardsticks. My husband was very happy to add this feature because now he will know for certain where to find my yardsticks to borrow one when he needs it – and he will not have to venture very far into my sewing room to fetch it. And they do not fall over with every slight breeze or inadvertent bump.

And the donations to my quilt guild's silent auction? I have five banker's boxes full thus far. There intentionally are no photos of the contents lest I see something and change my mind about giving it away.

So with tidying behind me for the moment and my warm up burp cloth projects documented in my last two posts on 2/8/18 and 2/12/18, I am moving back to my first love, piecing. My prior post on this quilt top that involves curved piecing was on 1/10/18. This week, here was my design wall as I played with the arrangement of the pieces and added the smallest elements, the quarter circles at two diagonal corners of each block. One block unit is outlined in red in the photo. 

I developed a method for keeping the pieces where I intended relative to each other as I transported them from the design wall to my sewing machine and ironing board. I numbered them and took a backup picture with my cell phone. 

I pressed into service a set of specialty pins I had recently purchased at the Road2CA quilt show, post for 1/25/18. They were perfect for this use. The only feedback I might have for the manufacturer is perhaps to have numbers on both sides of the pin head, not only on one side.

Assuring I had the optimal direction for pressing each seam was a challenge, even with the help of the pattern instructions; it required some pauses for thought along the way. But was worth it. Look at how those points meet and now smooth those curves lie. 

By the end I was feeling pretty confident about my growing curved piecing skills. I was however glad that the corner quarter circle pieces, the smallest elements with the tightest curve were the last to be seamed since they were the most difficult to ease in smoothly. They fit in at the far left of the next photo.

Here is the top assembled and pressed back up on my design wall. The bumps at the lower right are an illusion since the top is not smoothed thoroughly against the flannel for every square inch.

This was a good week. I kept telling myself, "Diane, eyes on the prize". My 2018 goal again? Maximize enjoyment, minimize guilt. I am enjoying working in my tidied my sewing space and have alleviated that guilt that needles at me from looking at a mess. I have alleviated guilt from overbuying by giving some products to a good cause. I am happy I have become comfortable with curved piecing and enjoy doing it. I am enjoying successfully using a new tool I bought and need not feel guilty about it being an impulse purchase. This top may be blue but I am not. 

I am considering naming this quilt Wheels and Webs since I see both shapes in the pattern. I am not fond of spiders though, so I may reconsider. One exception is that spider webs with dew on them are awfully pretty. They do have a graceful shape. See the resemblance within parts of the quilt top?  Maybe other readers will have an opinion; sharing this post now with Let's Bee Social #217. 

Ten More Burp Cloths for Grandson

In my previous post I made six burp cloths for my grandson due to arrive in April. Yesterday and today I made ten more. I just love pairing the colors and patterns of flannel. I also like to explain my choices. It must be the engineer in me beating down the artist – logical left brain striving to dominate artistic right brain. That's OK as long as I am having fun doing it.

Houndstooth screams boy to me. I thought the curvy scrolls were a nice softener and their bold blue prevents them from being feminine.

A seaside village print gave off a male nautical vibe to me. I paired it with the white and pale blue dots because the varying size circles reminded me of bubbles within the foam of ocean waves. As a bonus the white seemed to accentuate the borders on the houses.

The blue elephant with gray teddy on his back and the orange owls flying in between seem to be boyish type creatures. I drew attention to the white dots of the elephant and the gray of the teddies with the gray/white polka dot print. They elephant print and the dots were not from the same line; I chose to pair them on my own.

Here are the selvages from the flannels I used. The houndstooth (top) and gray dots (bottom) were Robert Kaufman, the scrolls (second down) Jason Yenter . I think fabric can be traced to a designer, a studio, a manufacturer, a design number or title. I never quite know which is which so I just try to keep a record by the selvages. The third and fourth selvages are DearStellaDesign and Maywood Studios respectively. The selvage on the elephant print had no lettering, at least not the half-yard I had so its primary source will remain unknown. My google image and word search did not turn up anything either. I realize that bibliographies should contain primary references, but for this fabric, the secondary source will need to remain my flannel sub-stash housed within one of my fabric drawers. 

I took a foray down the primary colored route with this animal-in-campers print. I paired it with an orange to pick up the tiger's stripes, the lion's mane, the giraffe's spots, and the occasional pennant. Hopefully my grandson will be a happy camper. 

I did another pairing of houndstooth and scrolls since I liked the angular with the curvy, this time in a softer, pale blue version.

Here are the selvages for these flannels; again, all pairings are from different sources not of the same fabric line.

Sixteen burp cloths should be enough for now especially since I suspect my son and daughter-in-law still have some more neutral-toned ones held over from baby-boy-to-be's two older sisters. I make no promises about not making more if I should come across some adorable flannel I  simply cannot pass up. My flannel drawer is beginning to look just a tad naked and I will keep my eye out for restocking. Linking up now with Let's Bee Social #216.

First Burp Cloth for Fifth Grandchild

There is a wonderfully illustrated book by Chris Van Allsburg titled The Polar Express.

In it a boy travels to the North Pole on a magical train and receives from Santa the official first gift of Christmas, a bell from the harness of one of the reindeer. Yes, I know that Christmas has passed but that scene conjures up a warm, fuzzy feeling for me.

That same feeling was replicated in my sewing room today. I made burp cloths for my grandson to be, due in April. The first pair I completed, hot off my ironing board, was "the first official burp cloth pair" of many I plan to make for him. I bought the flannel on my recent trip to Road2CA, thinking the gray houndstooth to be quite masculine and the gray toned zoo animals to be somewhat sophisticated without sacrificing the whimsy every baby deserves.

They are both Roger Kaufman fabrics.

Once I was on a roll, I made two other burp cloth pairs as well, one with owls and one with all sorts of critters, polka dots, and zig zags.

The sources for these flannels are given in the selvages.

My previous post I was knee deep in sewing room decluttering and re-organization. I have been refolding fabrics and emptying bins. Some bins have held delightful finds of forgotten and still loved fabrics. Other bins have elicited groans as I realize it is time to pay the piper for all those end of project remnants I deferred dealing with. I have not give up on that entirely but I needed a break. Yes, more procrastination! I convinced myself that another way to make fabric more visible and less cramped is to use some of it up. Besides, burp cloths are my stretching exercise before a real sewing workout. There are instructions on how I make them in my post for June18, 2014. There are two more grandchildren since that post and these burp cloths will be the for the fifth grandchild.

By the way, click on http://polarexpress.wikia.com/wiki/The_First_Gift_of_Christmas if you want to read a quick summary of that first official gift scene from the book. If you'd like to see a clip from the movie The Polar Express, go to this scene on YouTube. Before I go back to burp cloths and de-cluttering, I will procrastinate still more by linking up to Let's Bee Social #215.

Piddle, Twiddle, and Resolve

In mid January, the weekend before leaving for Road2CA, my husband and I went to see a local production of the musical 1776 about the writing of the Declaration of Independence. Early on in the first act John Adams sings the song Piddle Twiddle and Resolve whose chorus goes

             

Although I am not in Philadelphia and all the adjectives in the last line of the chorus do not apply to me, the "piddle, twiddle, and resolve" portion perfectly describes me in my sewing room right now.
My thoughts are as jumbled as my sewing room. After a visit to Road2CA earlier this month, I returned with a suitcase holding a fair number of patterns and tools – eleven patterns and six tools to be exact – and a backpack full of fabrics. I blogged about my purchases (in my previous post) and began to put them away.

Finding a place to fit the fabric was not a problem, well not a major one anyway, since I had recently bought some closet shoe organizers that were just the right width to hold my one-yard length fabrics folded by wrapping around a 6” wide ruler.

Each of the ten compartments holds ten 1-yd pieces comfortably with enough room to grab and remove one fabric length without yanking. The shelves on the right, marked simply with blue masking tape labels, hold longer fabric lengths. About one shelf's worth of one yard pieces remain to be relocated to an additional shoe caddy. I think this will go quite a ways toward freeing up space for other odd-shaped items such as kits, mail order item yet to be sorted, tote bags for guild meetings, etc.

 
This display of fabric and ease of access increases enjoyment, the first half of my goal for 2018, posted 4/4/18, to maximize enjoyment and minimize guilt.

But as I cram my newly purchased patterns into their woefully inadequate storage places among other previously purchased patterns in their unopened plastic ziplock sleeves, I realize they too could use an organizational uplift. Notice I said places, plural, meaning there is more than one semi-random location for my patterns. I have plastic shoe boxes without lids perched on shelves holding those patterns the size of an 8½" x 11" sheet folded in half. Quilt, home decor, and garment patterns are jumbled together.

And for the larger patterns, set on the countertop, I have vertical document file holders where the larger size patterns are tucked in upright, intermixed with patterns printed from the internet, other quilting related ads and flyers, and random miscellanea not necessarily relevant at all to quilting. Also doesn't every organizational system require a pink pig monitor perched on top? (I do not know why he is there.)

Being able to peruse my patterns and be re-inspired would certainly increase my enjoyment. So I ask myself, "Why do I not consolidate and sort them into one adequately sized container? But then I answer myself, "Because I have no counter space to do the sorting." I really should clean off those counter tops. Note to self: the word "should" is a guilt enhancer and should will be stricken from my vocabulary. Clutter free counter tops would minimize guilt, the second half of my 2018 goal. Where do I put the other "stuff"? This is where the "piddle and twiddle" comes in as I page slowly and thoughtfully through these patterns... and then shove them right back where I found them.

My guild is having a silent action, so I distract myself by pulling out fabric that has already been put away neatly in my fat quarter and half-yard drawers so I can convince myself to give some of it away. This of course does nothing to reduce the counter top clutter. It is merely more piddling and twiddling. But I do like looking at my fabric. My upper drawers are fat quarter drawers and my lower ones half-yard drawers. I have a drawer dedicated to flannel half-yards for my burp cloths.

I have a drawer dedicated to panels that I find too hard to resist. These are all my Stacy Iest Hsu dolls and stuffed toys, cloth books, and other juvenile panels. There are also enough novelty inspirations to make enough placemats to deck out the tables at a military mess hall. Perhaps I can pull from these panels for the silent auction and extract enjoyment knowing they will go to a good home.

So far here is my collection to move out. I did not take detailed pictures. I do not want to be held accountable should I chicken out and retrieve some items from these boxes. I should note that none of this came from the countertop.

So I continue to pile and re-pile, piddle and twiddle, the items on the countertops. The obvious solution would be to donate these items to the guild silent auction. But most of this is scraps too small to donate, leftovers from complete projects, or recent purchases I still want to keep. Midway down is a pile of kits, too big to fit in any drawer, but needing a home none the less. A place for everything and everything in its place is my mantra. I need to add some "resolve" to find some places and resolve this mess.

Remember that tidy fabric stack on the right side of my closet a few photos back? The left side of the closet is not nearly so admirable. That sack of polyester stuffing falls out every time I nudge open the  door. I know one big tub holds batting pieces and two hold T-shirts that I resolve some day to make into quilts for my daughter and my younger son.  That resolve is wavering since the T-shirt quilt I did make for the older son has been left home indefinitely, no nostalgia for it in his adult life, now married with wife and children. I suspect that my daughter and younger son have also moved beyond those memories. Sometimes I think it is the mom, not the T-shirt wearer, who hangs on the longest. I am leaning toward abandoning the concept of making two other T-shirt quilts, thus reducing guilt. The other bins? I do not have the foggiest idea what is in them. I am guessing scraps or fabric I no longer love. I resolve to investigate them for silent auction fodder so I can repurpose them as potential space for counter top items I do want to keep.

I once worked with a man who had this sign on his office door. "Everyone brings happiness to this room – some by entering it and some by leaving it." Everybody has there own messes so no one needs to see mine. I hope this post will make others who read it feel less guilty, somewhat empathetic, or perhaps even a bit superior. Notice that although not necessarily constructive, some piddling and twiddling can be fun. Piddling and twiddling will maximize enjoyment. Writing this post is piddling and twiddling. Linking up to Let's Bee Social #214 is also piddling and twiddling of a sort. Resolve will help minimize guilt! I resolve to repurpose my spaces. I resolve to support the auction. I am continuing to focus on my 2018 goal to maximize enjoyment and minimize guilt. 

"Piddle, twiddle, and resolve, not one damn thing do we solve," goes the song. But at the end of the musical, problems were solved. Even Abigail Adams got her pins! If the Continental Congress could do it by piddling and twiddling, so can I.