Finally another finish

It looks like I am a deadline person. I have been working on this children's quilt before Christmas already, and now as the sewing group spring exhibition is getting close, I finished it in just two nights.



Originally I stopped because I ran out of the flannel I used for backing, and then came Christmas with all the busy chores. New projects seemed more interesting in the new year, and so the quilt stayed in the plastic bag.

Last night I took my special Fiskars scissors with a spring, and cut the seam allowances of this flannel rag quilt.


This morning I put it in the washing machine, brushed it and took it out to dry.

This is the right side. The blocks are machine quilted before joined together, there are three layers of flannel, and a thin wadding in the middle of the squares.

I hope the strong wind will make the quilt very soft.

Vintage Thingies 21 - Tray Mats

Today is The day again, time to show and tell about our vintage thingies. If you have something old and nice you could show, click here and link your blog to the list Suzanne is hosting every Thursday. Even if you don't intend to join in, her blog is worth seeing. Suzanne is showing some real vintage treasures from the dump! Very inspiring.




My vintage treasures are once again textiles from my family. This tray mat is originally from my great-grandmother Amanda; it is her monogram AH in the middle. They used to have big trays those days, and nice mats were sewn for them. I imagine the cups and saucers stayed better in place when there was fabric underneath.

This other tray mat is decorated with cross stitch.

Here is a detail:

I brushed the fringes after wash when they were still wet and got them all untangled and nice.

This last picture is a little doily used between the plates when they were in the cupboard. It has a stain in it, and I don't know how to try to remove it.

This was all from my cupboard this week. Go over to Coloradolady for links to lots of other blogs with vintage thingies.

New Easter Traditions - Palm Sunday

This is our Easter bunny, a fat brown hare enjoying the sunflower seeds the birds and squirrels have dropped on the ground from the bird feeder above. This fellow is too lazy to bring any eggs. Our Easter chocolate eggs are hidden in the house by mother. If you look at the state of our lawn you will see why this is the way things are done in Finland!

On Sunday we had again some little visitors at our door, dressed as kind and friendly witches. They asked for permission and then said their blessing for the coming year, waving the decorated willow branch. They then gave me the branch and I gave them some chocolate eggs in return. The little baskets are for the eggs.

This is a very strange combination of the Greek Orthodox religious tradition and pagan beliefs. In Eastern Finland, Greek Orthodox children used to visit their grandparents and godparents early in the morning of Palm Sunday and leave them the decorated willows which had been blessed in the church, and collect their payment on Easter Sunday. The payment was a real egg, or even a meal, sometimes some money.

In Western Finland on the other hand, it was believed that witches and evil were very strong on Easter Saturday (when Christ was in his grave), and they moved around making their tricks so the cows would not start giving milk when the weather was warm again. Young people might move in the area dressed as witches and go in the stables, cut hair from the animals and bring it their own family's stable, thus bringing luck home and causing harm to the neighbours. DH's grandmother strongly believed this was possible to do.

Nowadays these two, quite opposite traditions of blessing and cursing are combined, maybe to make a substitute to Halloween trick or treating. Every year there is a discussion in the newspapers about this, and every year young mothers help their little ones with the branches and dresses. I could very well live without this new tradition, but I do prepare myself for the visits and sometimes find the little kids quite charming.

Here are my branches from last Sunday. I will keep them dry, because Mr. K is allergic to the pollen of willow and birch.

Last week I went to a charity shop which had moved to a new location. Everything was nicely put in place like in a normal shop, it was fresh and clean and nice. I bought some pillowcases for 30 c a piece, and some table cloths and curtains for 1 € or 2 €. Two pillowcases are this much fabric:

I bought some cotton fabrics from a fabric shop to match the colours, and made these two aprons - they still need the pockets sewn on - and some bags I will show later when they are finished.

Next I will need to concentrate on my children's flannel rag quilt for the sewing group exhibition. I have been working in the group on my swap projects and other items I have sent away so I need to finish something new for the show. I was sewing the flannel quilt before Christmas and run out of one fabric. I bought and washed the fabric but didn't start that project again. Luckily I know where it is; all I need to do is pick it up and see what can be done.

Little me in a nice dress

This week Eileen is hosting a meme of bloggers in their nice dresses when they were little. It seems I usually didn't have a new spring dress for Easter like Eileen did. The time for a new dress was end of May, when school ended. - I do remember having had a soft yellow hand knitted wool outfit with a jumper and what you would nowadays call leggings but we called damasks. A cap and mittens may have belonged to the set as well. I remember my mother saying I looked like an Easter chicken, and it made me feel good.

This picture is of me around that same age, maybe five years old. It was taken at a real photographer's studio, and my mother and my three sisters and two brothers are all in it too. I remember the dress I'm wearing, it was light blue and white, knitted by my grandmother I think.

As you see, I was not flashing smiles even then!

If you go to Eileen's blog, you'll find links to other girls playing this game with us, and you can join in, too!

Vintage Thingies Thursday 20 - Cushion Covers

Time for old stuff again! Suzanne is hosting Vintage Thingies Thursday and showing today her special creamers.



Last week, when I did my archaeological digging in my boxes for the ryijy rugs, I found some other cushion covers, made by an earlier generation of women in my family.

This is made in cross-stitch in wool. It has been used, and taken apart to be washed. Maybe I should sew it together again and make a cushion for my home?

Here is a detail. As far as I could see, all stitches are nicely in the same direction! When I was about 10 years old, I made a cushion cover with a rose pattern (painted on the fabric) for my paternal grandmother. My mother was very strict on my stitches, and I wasn't allowed to make any leaps on the reverse to continue with the same colour in another spot. Well, if it is worth sewing by hand, it should be worth sewing well.

These last two cushion covers are crocheted. The dark areas are shadows, I couldn't stretch them quite flat on the snow when I took the pictures.

This was all from my vintage treasures this week. Go over to Suzanne and find who else is playing along this week!

Photo transfer project

In my previous post I showed my photo transfer project. Here you see some more results with the fluid transfer:

And a second attepmt, with text and snow photo combined. Not very successful.

Next I tried a Canon T-shirt transfer sheet. I printed the photo on the sheet and ironed it on my fabric.

I may have ironed too long, because my beautiful white and blue snow looks dirty.

Here is how far I got today, combining three transfered photos and some machine stitching.

The project is not nearly finished yet, but it is starting to be fun.

One more Birthday present

Mr. Kotkarankki says the post office will soon take me under surveillance because I get so many packages from all over the world! This loveliness arrived on Wednesday, but as I was busy being educational with my vintage thingies yesterday, I'm showing it today. This is what Melanie sent me for my birthday. Notice the ric rac!




Inside was this: a set of flower embroidered handkerchiefs, a nice smell for my clothes cabinet and some lovely fabrics in blue.




In the butterfly package was this, bound with a lovely flower bud ribbon. You can click the picture to se the appliqué details.

This lovely big tote bag was made by Melanie, with her sore poor hands! She has just today shown better pictures on her blog here. March seems to be full of birthdays!

I took my new bag naturally to the sewing group last night, and everyone admired it like connoisseurs can do! I was making an apron, and my pattern magazine, fabrics and tools fitted in perfectly. I think I will make a matching little tool bag from the fabrics Melanie sent me.

The sewing group's spring exhibition will be soon. Many of the things I have been sewing there this school year since September have been for swaps or presents. The apron will be finished for the exhibition, but I wanted to do something more. Last year I had this for show, but it is too late to try anything like that starting now ;-).

We made some experiments with photo transfer on fabric in the group.

I continued the work at home - the photocopy, fluid and fabric had to dry together for 24 hours.

I used a mirror reversed copy of an old photo of us kids having a ski holiday in the country. We moved to live in that house all year round some years later, as it is in town really, even if it is by the lake. I hope to make some kind of a collage with this. The paper was finally rinsed with water and rubbed away carefully, leaving the image on the fabric. I will show you later what became of all this.