Friday Tip

Work on more than one project at a time.  

My friend Regina taught me to work on more than one project at a time.  She taught me that as it relates to knitting but it applies to any medium.

If you are like me you were raised to finish one project before starting another so it was a hard habit to break.   It is true that is take a little longer to finish but I’m so much happier.

Sometimes I’m stuck.  Sometimes I’m out of the fabric I need and don’t want to go to the store.  Sometimes I’m just bored.  Sometimes I need a break from a project even when it is something I love.  I love being able to put away a quilt and have some knitting or a small quilt waiting for some attention.

I usually have a quilt or two in the works as well as a knitting project.  Since I changed to this way of thinkingI get more done and am much more creative.

A few months back I was working on this hexagon quilt.  Cutting all the triangles was very time consuming, which I was prepared for, but as I pieced it together  it wasn’t working.  The centers didn’t connect the way they were supposed to, the strips didn’t fit together correctly either.  I was so frustrated!

MM-hexigon-web

 

I couldn’t even look at it any more.  I folded it up and sat down with this Noro scarf I’d been knitting.  It was perfect to get the quilt out of my head for a while, until I could face ordering more fabric and starting again.

Noro-scarf

What about you? Do like to finish a project before you start a new one or are you a multi-tasker?

Sara’s quilt

I’m making a couple of quilts for my sister Sara.  She wanted me to use this clean, modern line of fabrics by Michael Miller.  Although they aren’t colors I seek out normally, I love them!  They have been fun to work with. The fabric is a little heavier than I normally use in a baby quilt,it is more like decorator fabric. It softened up beautifully when it was washed, however and if this is a well used quilt, it will be that much more durable.

 

mm-fabric-bekko

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The patterns are large and I wanted to employ them in the best way possible.  I started by planning it with this Six Squares pattern but we wanted to use four different colors and the six squares didn’t allow me to use all the fabrics. So then I designed another quilt using more and smaller squares, using this and this as my inspiration, but no matter how I worked the design the squares were just too small.  So back to the drawing board, literally.  I went back to the Six Squares design and reworked it with eight squares.  It was just right.

I actually ended up making this quilt three times.  I made it in a lap size so I could work out all the bugs.  Then I made it in a baby size but didn’t notice the mistake with the orange square until it was already quilted and bound and I was taking pictures of it.  Ugh!!

sara's-quilt-mistake

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I don’t understand it.  I looked at that quilt top for hours while I bound it.  I went over it every inch of it cutting all the tiny threads.  I held it up in a mirror after each block was sewn.  I guess I stopped looking at the design as a whole and just focused on the smaller pieces, until it was too late.

Luckily I cut out two of everything so that I could make a second quilt and Voilà!  Here is the finished product.

sara's-quilt

 

I’m really proud of it and can’t wait to mail it off.

What I learned?
Look at the pattern as a whole and not just the smaller pieces.