Thursday, February 26, 2015

Marilyn's Quilt

This is a pretty one in browns.


 I quilted an overall in swirls.



Tuesday, February 24, 2015

Have You Been to Narnia?

When I was a young girl, our parents gave my brother, sister and I books every Christmas.  For a couple of years it was the Chronicles of Narnia.  I remember reading them over and over again.  I would read one in a day and go through them very quickly.  They were so much fun.  
Then when my husband and I had children, we raised them with those stories also.  My granddaughters are getting a good dose of them too.  They are delightful to read and really have much of the Word of God in them, although it can be rather hidden.  But they do relate to our lives. 
The young people in our church decided to have a Narnia night for the whole church.  They worked hard for a couple of weeks on sets, much of which was happening in our shop and driveway.  It was very fun.  Also, the costumes were great.  I got to work on a couple of those for my sons.
This is my son Puddleglum with his fiancee. Queen Prunaprismia.  He went to a thrift store and bought pants and a jacket and other things.  I took the other things and put patches all over his jacket and pants.  That took a lot of free motion quilting skills to do it.  I also made his hat from burlap and peltex.  He added a wire around the brim to keep it flat.  He is the Marshwiggle that has the most sunny dispostition of the Marshwiggles.  He may seem gloomy but he is faithful in believing in Narnia.  Here he's talking to the Queen of the Underworld,
"Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all of those things—trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself. Suppose we have. Then all I can say is that, in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real ones... We're just babies making up a game, if you're right. But four babies playing a game can make a play-world which licks your real world hollow."[7
]
I also made Lord Restamar's costume.  He was one of the 7 lords of Narnia that were sent away by King Miraz during his reign.  He went to a place that was Gold water.  He went for a swim and he died in it a gold man.  King Caspian renamed it Deathwater. 
My son is alive and doing well.  I used gold fabric and he put body paint on to make him all gold.  He did win a prize for his costume.


Here are some of my other children that I did not make costumes for.
Victoria is the giantess baker.  As she is a seamstress, she sewed her own costume and used sheetrockers stilts to walk around on.  She is with my son Chris, who is a foreign fat child doing exercises.  Those were the kind of children that Eustace liked to look at in books. A  talking porcupine, Clara, is sitting on his shoulders.


My daughter Naomi, is Jewel, a unicorn in the Last Battle.  She was always true to Aslan.
 She has Queen Susan (Eloise) sitting on her back.
My son Joe made a nice frame for the horse and the back legs move when she walks.  I think it's pretty amazing.  She won a prize also.


 Here is another of Jewel with another Queen Susan.


And here we have Aslan (Juliet) and Queen Susan.


I hope you enjoyed the time.  Read the books.  They will be fun.

Monday, February 23, 2015

Betty's Quilts

Do you remember Artex paints?  When I was in high school my aunt sold those paints and I bought them.  I painted a lot of things.  I don't think I have one of them anymore. 
 But Betty kept hers. She asked me to sew up some quilts for her from some squares she had painted many years ago.


 She had enough squares to make 2 nice sized quilts with a few squares left over.  Her son and daughter get to have the quilts.


Look at the intricate painting detail.  It was very nicely done.


  She picked out the black for the sashing and borders.  I think they were a nice choice.




Wednesday, February 18, 2015

New Baby Hoodie

I knitted up this hoodie pretty quickly from bottom to top all in one piece.  It's for a baby that was just born, so he doesn't fit it yet.


 Actually, when I had finished the hood and started sewing it together, I realized I hadn't done the garter after the cuff on one of the sleeves, so guess what?  Rip, Rip. Out came most of the sweater.


It is knit with a worsted weight, so it came back together quickly.


 I do like hoodies and this was a very nice pattern.


Wednesday, February 4, 2015

More Little Knits and Crochets

It seems these little items are a great hit with young school girls.  As one daughter is a school teacher and another daughter teaches sewing students, they are always looking for prizes to reward their students at different times.  And these kind of items are hits.
First, we have this turtle.  The shell can even come off of him.
 

 He's not really very small, but is soft and cudddly to squeeze.


 Sometimes turtles need to lay on their backs.


 This is a little bird. I'm not sure about him yet.  Maybe he'd look better on a different color.


 Then there's this granny square owl.  Pretty cute,eh?



 Mr. Elephant


 He's not very small either.



 And Mr. Snail




 You can check out my Ravelry site 
to get to the original source of all these free pattern.