New finishes

I have many projects just waiting to be finished. It is always so fun to start something new, but when it takes a long time, the enthusiasm fades away and the project finds a place somewhere, usually a bit out of sight, and is forgotten. This box of embroidery floss is a perfect example. I have inherited, received as gift and bought embroidery floss over the years, and tried to keep them in one place.

As you can see, the place is an old shoe box, and my system is not very organized. I was thrilled to find these plastic bobbins online, and when they arrived at the beginning of last year, I started to organize my collection.

It was a very slow project, I found more fun doings, and the floss was forgotten for a year. Then I decided to finish it by working for an hour a day with the floss and bought another box as I could see one box would not get me very far.

Dear daughter spent last week with us, and on Thursday we sat together and organized the bobbins by colour. The DMC colour chart was not useful as I have embroidery floss from several manufacturers. Therefore we decided to use our intuition and just tried to please the eye.

Doesn't is look delicious?

My other finish was this Paper Lanterns quilt designed by Loft Creations. I made the quilt top five years ago, and this year I plan to quilt as many as possible of the tops I have waiting.

My blocks are slightly larger than in the pattern, and I used a dark background to make the lanterns glow in the dark night. This reminds me of a late Summer night when I was about ten years old. My eldest sister was coming home after a year in student exchange in the USA, our parents were meeting her at the airport and they were coming home very late in the night. We hanged paper lanterns in trees and on the washing line to welcome them.

In the photo the binding is only pinned on the backside but today it is sewn, with label and all. Two months of the year are behind, and I have finished two quilts. I hope to finish one again before the end of this month. 

Teal and Aqua?

Teal and aqua are not colors often seen in my stash. Nice colors, but where to find them for this month's Rainbow Scrap Challenge? I decided not to take the definition too literally, and solved my little problem with these blocks:

A closer look will show the bluish, tealish shade in the plaid fabric.

I'm linking with Soscrappy. Go and see the other participants and their use of the color of the month!

Bits of knitting and an old project finished

Some people have cold hands, and some other people can knit, and so I knitted hand warmers for those

two who have such cold hands. Little Miss Purple has grown and she is now Miss Black for the time being.

My old project was this doormat, with layers of worn flannel shirts, wool jumper washed in hot water, and some dark T-shirts under the top layer, a rest bit of quilt backing flannel.

I cut between the stitched lines with my normal scissors, added the binding

and washed the new mat in the machine and dried it in the tumbler.

Soft, thick and lovely. It became a bathroom mat.

Naturally I needed to knit in the evenings, and I decided to use up my yarn rests. I almost had enough for this set, but bought more of the light grey that goes with everything. 

We have lots of snow, so I think more sock knitting is on my list.

New year, new challenge

For the first time in years I have taken a challenge in order to use up my scraps. It is the Rainbow Scrap Challenge hosted by Angela at Soscrappy. This month's color is red, so I searched my 2½" box for reds and found seven sets of five squares.

The whites were in the same box, so sewing the 9-patch blocks didn't take too long.

Here they are, waiting for the February color to be announced.

I think I mentioned my unlucky quilting of a Log Cabin quilt. Anyway, I had a backing that was too small, some machine quilting with serious bumps in the backing, and for once the energy to rip up the quilting that had gone so wrong. I added a row of squares for width and another for length, and so the backing was no longer too small.

Ironing, careful layering and pinning, and I was bale to finish the machine quilting in just two sessions.

Happy end for this quilt top from 2017 and 2019!

My normal evening activity is knitting, and I have been using up rests yarns for small projects like these fingerless mittens in merino wool

and the black ones in alpaca yarn.

A new pair of socks is still on the needles, and I have knitted some simple mittens that went to use already with no time for photo sessions.

 

December

Busy times before Christmas, so I have not found time to take photos and write new blog posts. Socks and mittens have left the house without a photo, but here are some of the newest knittings:

The socks are "just normal socks" but the mittens are both traditional patterns I figured out from originals knitted by my Grandmother in the 1950's. The one on the left I have later found online but the one on the right is so far my own secret.

Here I experimented with a Latvian Braid, which was easy but time consuming.

Baby socks in pink merino wool.

Fabric baskets in coarse linen and Christmas prints and antique crocheted lace.

And finally more fabric baskets, filled with chocolate pralines for some special people.

I wish you all a peaceful holiday season, good health and no stress. See you next year! 

One hundred

Since 2003 I have been sewing dolls for Unicef, not every year, but often enough to remember the tips I have learned from making mistakes. This year has been a very productive one, and my readers must be bored of seeing doll news over and over again instead of more interesting projects. With this doll I have reached the goal I have set a few years ago, she is my Unicef doll number 100!

My first cyclist doll found a home with my sister, and one of her friends liked the idea so much that she wanted to adopt a doll with road rush and tan lines as well. Or maybe she knew someone who would adopt her. Anyway, she asked if I could make such a doll before Christmas, and so I did.

It makes sense to work on more than one doll at a time, so I made this little tonttu girl as well. She will look less Christmas like without her hat, so she can wear the rest of her outfit all year round.

She will soon be at Villa Cooper with the other dolls I have made. I hope many of them will find new homes for Christmas!

 

Same again

My doings seem to be a repeat of the same things over and over. I have been busy doing them so that there was no time to take photos. but here you have almost two months' worth dolls and socks, as usual. Five new dolls are waiting to be taken to Villa Cooper.

A new version of Emil and Ida, the first ones sold in a short time so I hope there are other Astrid Lindgren fans just waiting for their dolls.

For a long time I have been wanting to make a granny doll, and now she is here. I wanted her to have soft pink or salmon colored silky jersey knickers but I didn't have any of that material left. When digging deeper in my stash I found the perfect alternative: leftover bits of Rhovylon jersey, an early technical fiber  recommended for rheumatic people. Granny is very happy with the warm comfort.

A new hobby horse enthusiast, with improved riding pants.

And finally a flower dress girl with burgundy hair. This makes 99 dolls for Unicef  I have made over the years. The next one will be a custom order of a cyclist with tan lines and bruises, I have promised to get her ready for Christmas.

Speaking about custom orders, these three pairs of socks were knitted for a friend and will be Christmas gifts for her friends in the USA.

Small and sweet in alpaca yarn. The color is actually a lovely pale pink but the lightning makes it look almost dirty.

Large in normal sock wool quality.

And extra large and extra warm with the rest of the white yarn together with some grey.

Because I like to use up rest yarns, I knitted these mittens with the remaining grey yarn and a bit of dark red for the Latvian braid at the cuff. I just wanted to try if I can make that.

The rest of the pale pink alpaca yarn was all I needed for this pair of baby socks.

And finally, I had some baby merino wool left over from the chemo hats I knitted two years ago. The pink yarn is now a pair of knee high baby socks.

Number of finishes since my last post: five dolls, five pairs of socks and one pair of mittens. Number of quilts worked on: zero. I meant to be busy with some unfinished projects but got carried away with these instead.