Sunday, March 20, 2011

Progress on my witch hat; I'm getting close!

This is the under side of the brim. It now has some hand-dyed lace and a meandering flowery ribbon trim in addition to the wide ribbon that Ingrid gave me at the retreat last fall. I've also added the very large spider web, which is part of a torn doily. An appropriately large spider will eventually be added there.

The cone part of the hat is done, I think. You never know when you'll find something else you want to stick on a CQ project, but it has all the elements I originally planned for it. Yes, I do occasionally have a plan; I just rarely stick to them.

The upper side of the brim now has a little witch girl silkie framed with a hand-dyed lace heart. I just added the words, "Don't make me call the flying monkeys" on a velvet-flocked cotton patch using waste canvas. It gave me some trouble pulling out the threads, but I like how it looks. My next wording project will be adding, "double, double, toil and trouble, fire burn and caldron bubble" on the lace patch. That should be fun.

Here's the little girl silkie upright.

And a meandering chain stitch that helped fill in an awkward area around the lace cirle.

I just added the moon yesterday, using the most perfect moon fabric I've ever run across. It's mottled ivory with a pearlized wash in spots. I found a remnant of it a local fabric store, and bought it because I like to do all cream colored blocks occasionally (they're just fun to work on). When I planned the moon, I was going to use yellow satin, or a gold speckled ivory cotton, then I found this where I'd stashed it after I bought it. It's perfect!
Side note: last night was the night for the super moon, as the media has been calling it, or the super-duper mega-moon-a-rooni, as we've dubbed it around here. Supposedly it was the closest the moon has been or will be to the earth in years. We were all stoked to see it, and guess what? Cloudy skies, no moon visible at all.

And before you get all impressed, I didn't stitch the witch on the moon. She's an applique I purchased at the same store in which I found the moon fabric. They were meant to be together, I guess!

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Two round robins

Beginning with the shared block for Cathy K's For the Birds set:

Connie did the seam in the upper right, and added gold threads to the leafy print. It looks really rich in person! I did the SRE roses, the vine with the goldish buds, and added another stitched element and some beads to Connie's seam.

Here's the block I did. The roses are done in party yarn. It's used similarly to silk ribbon, but has a very different look. The lace on the left seam is some I dyed awhile back, and the colors are absolutely perfect for that seam. The length of the lace was exactly right, too, so apparently I did it with this block in mind.... subconsciously.

Here's all of Cathy's block so far:

I got my Jewels on Black blocks home, and they couldn't be lovelier! Here's the group together, including the one left for me to do, which I've started on.

And the individual blocks. This one done by Wendy F.:

By Meg S.:

By Debbie S.:

By Rita C.:

By Darlene D.:

And my block in progress: