Sunday, December 7, 2008

Print your own fabric

I was hanging out on flickr and someone had this lovely fabric posted



Isn't it super cute?!

Anyways it seems someone designed it and you can have custom fabrics made from

http://www.spoonflower.com/

I went over to check it out and yup that's right you can have your own fabric made though this website, I think that's pretty neat. Too bad I'm not that creative. Just posting this to let people know. ^_^

Friday, December 5, 2008

String Quilt Four Blocks Made

I started this the night I wrote a blog about it a few days ago.

I thought this was a perfect way to use my scraps. So I started with 6x6 in muslin and I planned on cutting it down to 5.5x5.5.



So you start off by just sewing two scrap fabric strings together.

Then you iron and then you sew another scrap fabric on both sides



Here is a picture of it being ironed after sewing a piece on both sides

So you keep doing this till you fill out all the muslin. Which actually took longer than I thought it would. I really didn't plan out these blocks, just whatever I pulled out of my scrap stash was added. Some of my strings were too long and so I had to cut them but then it was a prefect size to be added to another block.



Here it is befor I cut it. Looks really wonky. When I read the website they said the best string quilts are the ones that aren't planned and just done as people go, I wasn't too sure about that but okay I decided to cut to see how it goes.



Here is my four blocks right now. It actually did turn out pretty good. I actually over estimated the amount of scraps I have so this will be all for now till I create more scraps to make string quilt blocks out of.

I actually think this was an excellent way to use scraps that are string like. ^_^

Tuesday, December 2, 2008

String Quilt

I don't know if anyone else has heard of this... though I suspect they have since I'm usually the last person on the planet to know about stuff (or at least that's how it feels sometimes).

It seems the string quilt is a big deal these days. I found a tutorial about it here http://quilting.about.com/od/quiltpatternsprojects/ss/string_piecing.htm

It seems pretty simple. I'm going to try it out and let you guys know about. ^_^

Monday, December 1, 2008

Pac Man Pillows

I'm actually trying to make the whole set but this is what I have so far. ^_^



They turned out pretty cute. My blue will is going to look up and my red one is going to look down. ^_^

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

beloga - really not your grandmother's sewing maching and not even your mother's for that matter!

Man I'm really obsessed with sewing machines right now. Look what I found! The sewing machine of the future, seriously doesn't it look like it belongs in star trek?

Good thing they aren't in production yet, I might want this over the hello kitty one!

I wonder what the price will be for this. Though I think this was designed for fashion people more than quilters. ;-)



belOga comes with a big "O", and an even bigger circular touch-screen which replaces the usual scheme of buttons and controls. This sewing machine concept was designed by Kristine Brückner, an industrial design graduate from the Munich's University of Applied Sciences with an impressive portfolio.
Apart from its less than ordinary shape, the belOga makes sewing more fun. By laying in a spool of thread the machine automatically conducts the thread through the machine - all you have to do is put the thread through the needle to get started. The centre display allows you to see what the stitch will look like in advance, this means less unpleasant stitching surprises. You can even enjoy the inner life of the belOga through two little lenses on the side of the body.Kristine notes that the belOga is not yet in production, so feel free to drop her a message (male.diven@gmx.de) if you know anyone who is not afraid to spice up the backstage of fashion!

www.core77.com/blog/object_culture/beloga_not_your_grandm...

Saturday, November 22, 2008

Thread Tension - Janome Problem

When I bought my Janome, I was so excited I started using it right away. BUT the thread tension was weird. It didn't show up right at all. In fact I have to keep my tension for the upper part of my machine at close to 0! I didn't want to complain about it because it's suppose to be a better machine than my brother and I thought eventually it will somehow fix itself.



See it's been like this since I have gotten it. I did all the things I "knew" like
1. re-threaded the top thread - didn't help
2. re-threaded the bobbin thread - didn't help
3. changed the needle - didn't help
4. re-did the bobbin -didn't help

I'm sure there are other things you can do that I didn't think of or knew but these were the things that usually "fixed" my brother.

Well it worked when I had it set to 0 so I just lived with it.

Now after looking at the Hello Kitty comments it seems that people that bought the Hello Kitty sewing machine also had a thread problem! And it's a Janome too!

Anyways in the comments they actually said how to fix that problem! Lucky me. ^_^



So here is my plate and I'm suppose to take it off.



I'm lucky that my plate is only held down by one screw. I'm sure that's like everyone else. ;-)



So you're suppose to take the bobbin out with the bobbin holder.



This is my naked sewing machine! It was kind of dusty so I blew it out with my compressed air (that stuff you use to clean keyboards).



So here is my bobbin with it's bobbin holder.



Anyways in the comments (for the hello kitty sewing machine) it said to pull at the thread while it's in the bobbin hold. So it's suppose to have a nice tug. Not too loose or too tight.

It turns out that mine was really really loose. I had not problem tugging at all.



So to fix it all you have to do is take a little screw driver and for me I needed to tighten that screw between where my bobbin thread enters the bobbin holder and where it exits it.

BOOM that totally fixed my problem! Now I can have my top tread tension at 4 and have my stitches come out right. Sweet.

Anyways this really helped me and I thought if I blogged about it, it might help other people. ^_^

Thanks a bunch!

Friday, November 21, 2008

Priceless

I was just surfing around the web and I came across this one quote and I thought I would share it. I didn't write this at all. Someday I hope to write something this inspiring though. *new goal for the check list*

--------------------------------------------------

A well known speaker started off his seminar
by holding up a $20 bill. In the room of 300,
he asked, Who would like this $20 bill?

Hands started going up. He said, I am
going to give this $20 to one of you but
first, let me do this. He proceeded to
crumple the dollar bill up.

He then asked, Who still wants it?
Still the hands were up in the air.

Well, he replied, what if I do this?
And he dropped it on the ground and started
to grind it into the floor with his shoe.
He picked it up, now all crumpled and dirty.
Now who still wants it?
Still the hands went into the air.

My friends, you have all learned a very
valuable lesson. No matter what I did to
the money, you still wanted it because it did
not decrease in value. It was still worth $20.

Many times in our lives, we are dropped,
crumpled, and ground into the dirt by the
decisions we make and the circumstances that
come our way. We feel as though we are worthless.

But no matter what has happened or what will
happen, you will never lose your value. Dirty
or clean, crumpled or finely creased,
You are still priceless — Unknown

---------------------------------------------------------

I think sometimes I forget that. With Holidays around the coner I think this is a great message to have be out there.

Thursday, November 20, 2008

OoooOOooo another sewing machine

Man I want this sewing machine!



It's only 109.99 bucks at target.com - www.target.com/Hello-Kitty-Sewing-Machine-Green/dp/B000B8...

But I just bought a sewing machine and a Janome too to boot!

This is totally a horrible habit to have... collecting sew machine.... I don't need it.. I just want to horde it...

I already told myself that I need to save up for a long arm or an embroidery sew machine. Okay I'll just have to live without this.

If anyone else is in the market for a cute traveling sewing machine this one got really good reviews and it's a janome... really you can't go wrong.

Monday, November 10, 2008

Maga Man Quilt

I made Patrick a Maga Man Wall Quilt.

Here it is.

Megaman Quilt

It turned out pretty well. I sort of want him to request more things because this was pretty fun to make. ^_^

Monday, October 20, 2008

Patrick's favorite at the Quilt Show

Patrick and I went to the quilt show again on Saturday.

Patrick wanted to look at all the quilts in display... I remember last year I went around but I got super tired about half way through, since I was by myself I just gave up and went home. This time Patrick was with me and we went through all the quilts on display. There were a lot of quilts on display. It was probably 2 hours just to walk through them.

They were amazing! I haven't figured out what my favorites where that will probably be another, but Patrick is a simple person and very patriotic and so he knew right away this one will be his favorite.



I didn't think much of this quilt at first but there are a lot of details in it that makes you proud to be an American. ^_^

Friday, October 17, 2008

Crazy Tattoo

I was hanging out at Cute Overload dot com and one of the things was this crazy tattoo.

I thought it was interesting. Well here goes.



Isn't that funny!? Little kids must want to connect the dots all the time. ^_^

Thursday, October 16, 2008

Quilt show

Quilt show quilt show quilt show quilt show... going to the quilt show.

----------- UPDATE ------------------

Went to the quilt show! So I took a longish lunch from 2pm to 3:30 to go to the quilt show.... sorry no pictures!

I will tell you I bought a Janome 720 - I wanted a little sewing machine to travel with, because it's kind of a hassel to pack up mine then go to Holly's (even though I love going there!) and set it up again. Only to pack it up and set it up again at home. Lots of work! Okay maybe I'm just lazy.

Anyways the Janome is soooo neat! It was twice as much as my brother (that I got at Costco). I can totally see the quilty difference. Don't get me wrong my first sewing machine with always have a place in my heart.

I think my Janome is staying at home and my brother is going traveling with me instead. ^_^

I also got a new cutting board.

I didn't get any fabric or look at all the quilts on display!! Definitly going back on Saturday to do that.

Friday, August 15, 2008

New books... sort of

After being so annoyed with Quiltigami (see last post). I decided to get another flower quilting book because I think it would be neat. I think I just need more direction or something. After reading a few reviews about other flower quilting books, I got this book Folded Flowers: Fabric Origami with a Twist of Silk Ribbon It's gotten pretty good reviews so we will see how it goes.

All in all there aren't very many fabric flower making books.

Just because you can't buy just one book at amazon (you need over $25 to get free shipping) I also got Quiltmaking Tips And Techniques: Over 1,000 Creative Ideas To Make Your Quiltmaking Quicker, Easier And A Lot More Fun which should be a good read. Though I have a lot of quilt books that give me tips... this one got a lot of good reviews and I don't think I know 1000 tips for quilting so this should be fun and interesting read. ^_^

When the books come in 1-2 weeks from now I'll write about them... hopefully. ;-)

Thursday, August 14, 2008

Quiltagami

I got a new book this weekend called Quiltagami.

I was so excited because all the quilts looked soooo cool. I could use my asian fabrics for this!!

It's basically using fabric as paper and make origami from it.

So I tried to make a simple flower and after failing twice I finally came out with this one.

It's super tiny and it took me about an hour to make. Lots of ironing and no sewing at all yet. So this is just ironed as I folded to keep it's shape and I still don't think it's that cute at all.



Yeah I'm not sure if I'm going to go through with making an Quiltagami. ^_^

Sunday, August 10, 2008

not a walking foot

I have always used a walking foot to quilt my quilts. I thought that was the way it was suppose to be.

Then while I was reading modern quilt workbook I wanted to try to quilt the quilt that Lynn made.

It didn't work when I was using my walking foot. I have always used the walking foot why doesn't it work I thought to myself.

Then I just flipped through one of the many quilting books I had and they said you need to use a darning foot for free motion quilting.

Darning foot? What's a darning foot...

I looked around my stuff and I found it. I had it all this time. I put it on to my machine.





Then I started quilting with my darning foot. I have never used this foot before... so here is the first attempt. I tried to do the quilting from the book, it's pretty bad but not horrible I thinks... then I tried to do a loopies and then I tried writing my name. It was pretty fun but not very good.



Hopefully in a month or two or three. I can show another sample of way better quilting.

I think a darning foot is amazing. I love how there is a spring that helps me with make sure I'm going the right amount every time I move the quilt. It's fun to watch it bounce while I'm quilting. ^_^

There was no real point to this post other than point out how silly I was and how great a darning foot is.

Thursday, August 7, 2008

My take

I couldn't really find a good picture of a 16x16 black mage for Final Fantasy. So I did the best I could.

Here is what I came up with.



I showed it to some other people and they were like what a cute smurf...

Wednesday, August 6, 2008

Finally!

Finally done with it. I think it turned out pretty good. ^_^

Sunday, August 3, 2008

uh oh

So I finished piecing it. it took about 3 hours... not so bad for quilting 256 1.5 squares together. ^_^

I was already to quilt it and guess what... I can't find my bobby pins... *sad face*


Friday, August 1, 2008

Etsy

During comic con a bunch of people asked my brother if he sold his hand made stuff online. He said no. I told him he could probably sell it on etsy. He asked how it worked. To be honest I didn't know.

Anyways I thought I would try to sell something on esty so I could tell him about it. I thought and thought... during these times I don't feel very smart because I really couldn't come up with anything!

Then I was inspired... I like to quilt and I like vidoe games... I'll quilt a video game character and try to sell it.

Some people have already done that... darn not the first person with this idea, but their items are all plain colors and mine will be from what ever is in my stash and the only solid color I have in my stash is black.

Well we will see how it turns out. I'll post a picture as soon as I can! ^_^

Wednesday, July 30, 2008

Doh

Okay I know I'm super lame about posting. I just back from comic con, and I think I have an idea for something, but I don't want to say it yet because it might not work out that well... so I'll keep it hush hush till I have it all worked out. ^_^

Btw it's 1.50 cheese cake day at the Cheesecake Factory! ^_^

Monday, June 30, 2008

Shop Hop - Lots of pictures

Saturday

Me and Patrick got up at around 9 am to start this shop hop. Patrick had a meeting to go to at 5 pm so we had to be done at 4:30, but if that didn't happen we might have been able to do this in one day.

Our plan was to go north then south.

Remember you can click on any of the pictures to enlarge it! ^_^

Always Quilting

Our first stop was Always Quilting. Was this place hard to find! I drove all around 43rd and 42nd street a couple of times before Patrick saw the sign pointing to the back of one of the shopping centers.

I liked how open this place was, it had a lot of fabric but didn't seem packed. It was kind to just look around. Patrick helped me out pick out this fabric.



I got 2 yards of this.

I think it's pretty cute, so I thought okay maybe I'll get musical fabrics from every shop I go to. Well I was planning to get some fabric everywhere, we will see how wayward I got as you read through this blog.

I really liked how they put their charms on a latch, so you could stick it on your phone or anything really.

What I found to be a little annoying was the checking out, since it was shop hop there was a lot of people and we all wanted to check out at the same time, it was so slow, they do their check out through their website which makes it super slow. But we made it though, and I really like the fabric we got.

We were finally able to go on our way.

Melody's Yardage so far - 2

Laurel Leaf

Now Laurel Leaf was packed, in fact all those people that were in line with us in Always Quilting were there too! We hoped we wouldn't be caught in the rush through the whole experience. *crosses fingers*

So Laurel Leaf was the opposite of Always Quilting, it was small and packed full of fabric but very very friendly.

The Asian fabric caught my eye. I wanted it! I knew I wanted musical fabric but so what now I want Asian fabric!

This is what I got.



I got a yard each of this.

The top fabric you don't think much of it, until you pull it out all the way. I didn't even know till the person cutting my fabric showed me. So lovely.



This was super fast, me and Patrick were in and out in no time. From Always quilting we thought that we wouldn't make it through a lot of shops if checking out was so slow but I guess it was just them.

Melody's Yardage so far - 5

Eddies Quilting Bee

Of course we knew this one since we were there on opening day. It was okay, I wasn't impressed with their Asian section but I found a cute musical pattern.

This is what I got.



I got 1 yard of this.

I like it, it matches the fabric I got at Always Quilting.

Melody's Yardage so far - 6

The Granary

Of course I know the Granary it was the first quilt shop I ever went to and got all the stuff I needed to start to quilt with. I love this place, though I don't visit it as often as I should.

I went to the sales rack and found some wonderful fabric. I really love it so I got the whole bolt!



The whole bolt was about 5 yards.... I know that's a lot! But it was on sale so I only spent like 30 dollars on it... that's good right?

With their charm we got a set of sewing needles which was pretty nice. Also there was homemade cookies... ummmmmmmmm.

Melody's Yardage so far - 11

Golden State Sewing Center

Then we went to Golden State Sewing Center, we almost got lost, that was fun, I mean seriously the San Thomas Expressway around this area was kind of weird.

Anyways they were having a special 30 retro fat quarter for 22ish bucks. That was such a good deal I got it! Here is what it looks like.



Here is it all laid out.



So this is 7.5 yards.

This place had a great Asian fabric selection. It was hard to pick just one... so I got two...



I got a yard each.

Also with the charm they gave us a fat quarter each, this is what I picked out.



So this is .5 of a yard.

I really liked how friendly everyone was here, granted every quilt shop is friendly, I just thought they were friendlier.

Melody's Yardage so far - 21

Judy's Sewing Center

So this was the first one that was kind of far away being in Scott's Vally, the 17 was kind of windy. By the way I was the one driving, not Patrick! ^_^

This place was super friendly too and I got 2 fat quarters. Here is the fabric I picked out to get and the fat quarters I picked out.



I got a yard of the red fabric. For some reason during this day I was very attracted to red.

Melody's Yardage so far - 22.5

Round Robin

Round Robin was fun too, there was fresh strawberries. What I remember from that was when we went the people that were suppose to stamp our passport where eating and they sort of embarrassed about it but they joked around about it, one of them said "and today we are going to show you how to eat a salad and pizza", so funny.

Anyways this place also had a good selection of Asian fabrics, I got a green one.



I got a yard of this.

Melody's Yardage so far - 23.5

San Jose Museum of Quilts

Then we drove back up north to cover east San Joseish. First we went to the Quilt Museum, we were pretty crunch for time so we just got our stamp and charm and left. I want to go back there some day to check out though.

The Sewing Machine Center

This shop was hard to find also! The map on the shop hop paper was mis-leading. We finally found it, I liked it a lot, we got a little goodie bag of sorts - chips, water, pens and some thread.

I got another Asian print. I got two panels the where 2/3rd big.



So I got 1.3 yards of this.

Melody's Yardage so far - 24.8

Quilts and Things

Okay our last stop for Saturday was Morgen Hill's Quilt and Things. I know I know you want to tell me that we should have just saved this for the next day because it is on the way to the Hollister shop, but Sunday was only from 11 to 4 and I wanted to give us a bit of some wiggle room to make it to all the shops and spend some time there.

I really liked this shop! They had some great fabric on sale. I got all this on sale!



purple/green - 2 yards
Yellow - 1 yard
Blue - 1 yard
Red - 2 yards

Then I got this panel. I got two panels which ended up to be 1.5 yards.



Patrick also won a fat quarter from their spiny thing.



Everyone was super nice and I got this binding clip tool, I bet everyone knows what I'm talking about, it looks pretty cool.

We made it back in San Jose just in time for Patrick's meeting.

Melody's Yardage so far - 31.6

Sunday

Patrick and I got a late start, when I went over to pick him up, he was totally not ready! That's okay but we didn't get to hit the road till 10:45 when we wanted to leave at 9:30. *shakes head*

Homespun Harbor

This I thought was the most out of the way shop in this shop hop but I liked it also. I probably won't come back here until the next shop hop so I got all the fabric that caught my eye.

I love love love the blue Asian fabric. As I was getting it cut a ton of people walking by thought it was really great. I don't know if this picture is doing it it justice. It's really nice.



One yard of the yellow, red, and black.
2 yards of the blue.

As me and Patrick were leaving we ran into Kathy and Paul! How funny is that. They actually planned to finish on Saturday but Kathy had to work but they were going to the same fabric stores as us so we would probably run into them in the future.

Melody's Yardage so far - 36.6

Your Hometown Sewing Center

This shop was huge... but this is the place with the chocolate fountain! Patrick stuck by that for a while. I found some great sale fabric.



One yard of everything.

What was great about this place was the shopping center had a farmers market going on. So me and Patrick got some awesome fruit, kettle corn and a corn on the cob, it was super yummy!

Melody's Yardage so far - 41.6

Back Porch Fabrics

I love this place! I found some awesome fabrics, the people were super nice, it was great.

Here is the fabric I got, I also got some pure black fabric, it's hard to tell on this black table top, but it's there.



One yard of all of these

Then I saw this fabric I thought it would be great to practice my quilting skills, so I got two panels of this.



1.3 yards of this.

Then I saw this on the window. It's great!



I bought the rest of the bolt which was 1.5 yards.

We ran into Kathy and Paul again! But I was paying and ready to get to the next shop.

Melody's Yardage so far - 48.4

The Hand Maden

This shop was pretty small, and I thought it was pretty dark but the lady working there and her mother were very nice.

This pink fabric was just a little over 4 dollars a yard, what a good deal!



One yard of everything except the pink (which I got 2 yards of)

And this shop concluded our shop hop, we got our bracelets and called it a day.

Melody's Yardage so far - 54.4

Final

I tried to fit all the fabric into one plastic bin, didn't fit, but I wanted to show a picture of what I had. So here it is.



This is what about 54.4 yards of fabric look like.... oh well ... now I have a pretty big stash. ^_^

So that concludes my first shop hop. It was great fun... I probably spent too much money but that's okay. ;-)

shop hops

Sorry this weekend was super busy, but I did do the shop hop around the bay this weekend (managed to do 9 on Saturday and 4 on Sunday).

Hopefully I'll have time to blog about it tonight. I got some awesome fabrics.

Saturday, June 21, 2008

bottom right + middle bottom

To get away from seem ripping I decided to sew the bottom right with the middle bottom.

It was a lot faster and easier than seem ripping everything out.



So I'm going to put this together with the bottom left soon. I am working on the top left right now... almost done with that. ^_^

Thursday, June 19, 2008

Woot again left bottom done!

Me and my seem ripper are getting to be good friends, we are almost on a first name bases now. ^_^

well I finally finished bottom left and now I just need to do the 24 top parts of it... oh what fun.. but I am liking how this is turning out.

So here is my bottom left set.