Tag: Getting stuck

Posted in colorwork, knitting

Another F.O. Friday

Posted on by Laura Kate

Well, it started out as a bad knitting week. The hat that I cast on the prior week was progressing. But it seemed to be pretty small for an adult hat. After I knit a few inches of the 1 x 1 ribbing, I took a quick measurement. My measurement suggested that it was indeed too small. So I started again, but knit the next larger size. In the bigger size, the ribbing took forever to knit. I rejoiced when I got to the crown. The colorwork was quite fun and I worked quickly to the bind off.

Immediately after I took it off the needle I knew I was in trouble. It was so big! There’s no way that this hat would stay put on my head. Even after washing and drying (I tossed it in a warm dryer to try to shrink it a little,) it was huge.

There ensued a few days of low spirits. (The news cycle, of course, made me feel even worse.) Eventually I stopped moping and tried to solve my problem. My first thought was to cut off the ribbing, pick up the stitches, knitting several together, and work down to the edge. But then I decided to fold the brim in half, folding to the inside and whip stitch it in place. That’s a little better. What if I added a hat band with less stretch in a slightly smaller diameter………..

I found a coordinating color yarn in my stash and cut six lengths. These were crocheted into a chain about 21 inches long. Stretching the chain slightly, I sewed it around the upper part of the ribbing, where a hat band is generally located.

Bingo! Problem solved.

And I have enough variegated yarn left to knit a pair of gloves.

Posted in painting

Sitting on the Fence

Posted on by Laura Kate

……..about the fence.

Today I finished painting the Van Gogh-ish sunflower scene.

Close of up the flowers.

I’m very happy with my work. I also applied a wash of paint on the fabric that will become the fence. But I’m just perplexed about whether the fence works with the rest of the piece. Here it is:

I like the texture – it’s quite true to the real thing. I even like the violet color. It’s the tone of the violet that I’m not sure of. And I don’t think the light tan base color works well with the rest of the palette.

There are a few options:

  1. Start over with new fabric. I have white and a white on white print that might work.
  2. Apply another light wash over this fabric. Since the paints are transparent, a cool shade of blue would blend with the background and make the violet areas look blue-purple.
  3. Stick with what I have and modify the fence color by painting highlights in an opaque paint and stitching texture with thread in colors that fit the palette.
  4. Omit the fence and let the sunflowers float on the background.

What do you think?

Posted in quilting

Slightly Stuck

Posted on by Laura Kate

It’s been a while since I wrote about the state of “stuckness” For me, this means that the project is not flowing very well. Over the last few days, I have been toying with a technique called “Stitch and Flip”. I learned it from a BluPrint.com class on how to piece improvisationally. The instructor is Jacquie Gering.

https://shop.mybluprint.com/quilting/classes/improvisational-piecing-modern-design/35410

Basically, you sew a piece of contrasting fabric across the corner of a square, then flip the piece over to cover the corner. You can cover one, two, three or all four corners of the square. I was struck by how much the finished squares resembled little fish. This drove my desire to give it a try. Here is a sketch of what I envision:

And here are the fabrics I have chosen. The batik is the front half of the fish sewn over corners of two squares. On two more squares I am sewing triangles to represent the belly and tail of the fish.

Then the whole block is assembled. A four by one inch rectangle finishes the block.

I had hoped to easily make a several “schools” of these little fishes, with five or six in each block, ultimately creating an underwater scene on a lap quilt. Cute, Fun – right? But somehow I kept screwing up the assembling. Much ripping, muttering and re-sewing ensued. My completed blocks are not lining up right! I can’t seem to square them properly! In addition, I don’t have enough background fabric to proceed! And of course, the fabric I need is in Hobby Lobby, which is closed indefinitely!!!

So this project is in limbo. I did sketch a few sea turtles, which might get included in this project, if I can figure out how to get them there.

So sadly, I will set the fish aside while I ruminate on the process. It won’t be the first or last time that I got stuck in the middle. Meanwhile my paint order from Dharma Trading has arrived. So I will play with paint until the lightbulb goes off in my brain.