random sewing

welll, i started a new site, and i never really update it, so here is a random post back on this one.

today i got to several sewing projects i had put aside for a looong time.
(first i ran errands and went to the fabric store)
i bought a marking pencil (for marking on dark fabrics.
i bought an awesome pattern to make a purse. (i've pretty much only owned one boring black purse ever.)
i bought interfacing - the iron on kind, for the t-shirt quilt i've been hoping to make sometime.
and... a red zipper.
and some red quilt binding.

then i came home and worked on this red skirt. it was originally a red linen dress. so it does wrinkle a lot. anyway, the top was too tight, and the only time i wore it, i wore a sweater over it. anyway... so i loved the pockets, and decided to take this random stretchy elastic and make a waist band. it's dark blue, and like 3 inches wide i think. (i know you're hoping for pictures, maybe later.)
then i had some bias tape in the same blue, so i edged the top of the pockets, which makes them stand out better. oh and i put in a new zipper. i hand sewed it in, which worked well. it was only like a 6 inch zipper. anyway... i just have to add two clasp things at the top of the waist band and it will totally be done. hooray!!

then i'm working on a quilt, and i had to piece together the batting to make it the right size, so i quickly whip stitched it. depending on the time i have... i may try to do a little hand quilting. i have not yet decided what to put for the back fabric.

then... a while ago i got a dress for free..i liked the shape but it had some stains and i wasn't sure if i liked the fabric. anyway, so a bit ago i took it apart to make a pattern off of it. i also had some very soft thin jersey (t-shirt) material in a pretty aubergine color. i had originally bought the fabric for a shirt, but never ended up making it. anyway, i sewed up the dress tonight. it does need some finishing, but it went together pretty quickly. i know i need a surger probably, sewing with knits is so hard. i've really only done it a few times with little sucess. anyway, the dress is okay...but some parts of the side seams puckered. so i may re sew them. it was really good practice though!

i also have had a pair of pj pants i love, but they just had a drawstring, no elastic. today i finally added some elastic, and i love them so much more now! they are just more comfy.

in other news, my computer is dead. (i'm on the laptop now). It was having some issues a while ago, and mike fixed it, and then last night it said to reload firefox, so while trying to do that, it kept giving me error messages. so i turned it off, because of course it would be back to normal today. except it isn't. it just gave me an error message.

sooo.. sad times. but it's good for me to spend time away from the computer. i have two hard drives, but who knows...

anyway.. i have recently been listening to a free podcast from itunes... (well, you can get it from them) called Never Not Knitting. It's a woman who talks about what she is knitting, and also sometimes has stories from other people. i've only listened to 3 episodes but i really like it. and at the end there's a cute song sung and played by her husband about how she's always knitting, and none of the housework gets done, etc. i love it because it's based on real life, but you can tell it's exaggerated. (like certain upsidedown cat songs) and mainly you can tell that they really like each other, and have a happy home.
anyway... i haven't searched very hard, but i was happy to find a story based podcast instead of video or like pdf style. because i want to hear about knitting. anyway... today while sewing (with the trusty laptop) i listened to this american life, and bbc radio 7 (which is now radio 4 or something) dramas of agatha christie and bertie wooster. the only problem with the bbc ones is you have to stay tuned for the next episode, and today it would have been nice to hear the whole story. but maybe i will remember/make time to go back and listen when the next episode is up.

anyway. it was really nice to have a productive day/weekend after feeling like nothing has been getting done.
i'm still in the midst of too many projects, but at least today i got further/finished a few.
i do hope to be posting more, with photos someday...
and yeah. someday it would be really nice to buy a new scanner.
okay i guess that is it... for now.

thinking ahead.

i love reading about sewing clothes. I have mentioned them before, but i especially love Green Apples and Colette. I am inspired this year to take part in something called Self Stitched September... which basically means every day of September you wear something you made yourself (and post a picture on your blog). As of yet, I'm sure i have not made enough outfits for a whole month. Plus I will be working (in Scrubs a lot of the days - I guess i could make my own scrub tops!). But i think i will try anyway, even if it's not every day. Also this inspires me to finish some dresses i have planned, and perhaps help me to start thinking about non-dress items i could sew.

Hopefully when september rolls around I will remember that I decided to do it. ha.

ps: I was running out of yarn for the sweater i'm making for my cousin, and I ordered more, and it arrived today, and the color is perfect, thank goodness, and I'm going to try to knit a lot on my 4 day weekend! pictures when i'm done!

liquid knitting

if you like knitting or experimental things, you may appreciate this fluid sculpture video

lists

i often write lists...sometimes they help...sometimes they just hang out and then i recycle them several months later. but this year i'm sort of trying to finish stuff i've started without starting too many new projects in the meantime. so... this is what i'm trying to work on:
knitting- i've been stuck on 3 projects for a while...getting unstuck in one, though i think i've made some mistakes..but i guess i'll just keep on going (cables are hard to remember what row you're on). after i finish this project i plan to keep knitting my cousin's sweater! yay! it will be done some day.

sewing- lots of projects and i think of new ones everyday...but i'm currently cutting out fabric for a project that will be in place of Upsidedown Cat shirts...i hope it will be awesome! also making some projects to sell...and since one of the shops mentioned they like clothes for grown ups, i'm reinventing some things that have been in my closet for a while...or fabric i've been wondering what to do with. right now i have plans for a dress i'm adding stuff to, a sweatshirt made from combining an old sweatshirt i barely ever wore and this crazy lime green/black patterned material i've been trying to figure out what to do with. also...i have a dress someone gave me that i could use the fabric for something cool...not sure what, maybe a skirt, and i was thinking of making pillows with these vintage cloth napkins...but now i'm thinking i'll try to make a bag. because i reallllllly like it when i make stuff that is useful...and i'd rather not waste the stuffing for the pillows. haha. plus if i'm making art to try to sell and stuff i maybe should just keep practicing sewing and making clothes cuz i want to be good at that someday and do internships and make things for friends. yep.

i'm writing a song for a project...so i've been trying to figure that out. it's a little tricky because i'm not writing it for me, really, but in a way it's turned out to still be very "me".

um...yeah. i'm reading "A girl from Yamhill" which is Beverly Cleary's autobiography. (the first half). I've read the second half more often, so it's interesting to think of Portland back in the depression and to connect things from her life to things in her books. There are some people (cough cough, my boyfriend) who think it's bad to read kids book as an older person...BUT...i say that kids books are really important in life, and beverly cleary began writing them because she'd grown up wanting to read books about real kids, like ones you could relate to. So, i love reading her autobiographies and thinking also about sewing and knitting in those days. plus, you never know when i will write my own kids book or illustrate one- i've always thought about it, and i love looking at picture books for the art. and of course i always love books like The Zuchinni Warriors... any book that makes football fun for a totally non-sports girl is cool. But that's because it's about way more than football...i totally regret not going to hear Gordon Korman's talk at the library a few years back...

hmm, this blog is totally random now. but i still kind of assume that like 5 people read it? haha.
anyway... i guess i will go cut some fabric or something.

Places and Blogs I like to look at

Now that this blog is about crafts:
here are some things about that... DIY Screenprinting at The Pull This is so awesome for bands and people who want to learn to screenprint!

How did I find out about this? at The Handmade in Portland blog I've seen off and on, but forget about for some reason.

As I'm a hopeful "I'll make all my own clothes someday" sewer, I also read
Green Apples and I look at
Colette Patterns and dream about interning/sewing dresses for myself. I just bought the Macaron pattern, and also love their first Men's shirt pattern...
Also PDX Seamsters is amazing, I want to take classes/volunteer when I at least get some kind of job. They also have bands play there while you sew sometimes, and i'd love to someday play a show there!

For Knitting, I love this idea and sometimes check in to see the progress she has made Family Trunk Project
Also, Where would we be without Knitty . There are lots of interesting projects I'd like to make someday.
This one is so cool! (i hope i make it before i get to old to wear something like that. haha. though in different colors it could be calmer.

Maybe I'll do this again sometime, but lastly i'll mention
Gluten Free Girl which maybe isn't crafty, but is a good resource if you have issues with gluten or have a gluten free boyfriend/family members/or are party planning.

also... what have i been doing?
-updating my new website
-making presents still
-looking for work/internships
-sending my songs to radio stations (like the kid's hour on KNRK and stuff!)
and trying to find radio stations in other countries/towns that might be into playing my songs.
and... yeah.
-i'm also coming up with a really awesome upsidedown cat merch project that will kind of be in place of band shirts, and will have multiple uses... i just have to plan it all out right. i get so excited about new projects i put other projects on hold. i need to stop doing it. so i'm trying (and sort of failing) to finish up other projects first meanwhile do time sensitive birthday projects, christmas albums etc.
-I want to work on valentines and my new upsidedown cat project, but i know i have to finish/get farther on some knitting projects first.

I hope to start blogging more about my finished projects though, to celebrate their completion and help encourage me to stay focused.

Mario wonder

my pumpkin! Mike's pumpkin.

Pat's costume i knitted.
Bowser, Peach and Mario


I added the brighter pink to my dress and the blue jewel.

Bowser's shell.

I don't really know how long Bowser took to make. but working steadily, a week or so. Peach was made of two dresses i combined, but i made earrings and jewels for my crown and stuff. the gloves were bought. I made the wig, but it was hard to keep it from falling off...still, i'm proud of it! I helped Mario sew the M on his hat.

and here's the song Mario Wonder by The Big Bashed.

recently

parade day

llama feet

wallpaper

damien jurado

kitty

a team at the fadels

driving to the east side

lake oswego

lamp at my grandma's house

sweater i'm making for my cousin.

update i guess...

well... i'm too lazy to upload photos just now.
but the zine symposium was cool, and inspiring. i was very pleased to finally buy some clutch comics, and to get some free comics/zines and to meet a few people. and see prints and crafts and zines and comics.
lately i have been working on a sweater for my cousin. it is going well. i have really done a lot in just a few days but it is thicker yarn i guess. and i'm just working on the back panel so far. it is the brown one at top left. (the book is from the 70s i think)

i am also hoping to finish up a quilt i have been refurbishing these last many weeks for mike. he bought it for $25 at an estate sale and i have whip stitched and blanket stitched around every square as it is old and hand sewn. i think it compliments it well. i'm now in the process of retying it as most of the ties were breaking anyway. i guess i will take some pictures sometime. i have been trying to finish it as he is finally in his new house, for a housewarming present.

um...so.. there are lots of things going on as i am wondering what to do for a job and who i want to be. i would love to work with fabric and things... or do something i already love doing, like printing... but it is hard to know what to do, and i will have to make real money soon. sigh.

but it has been nice to work on projects and quilts and things i have put off from school. i have jeans to cut up for more quilts...and other fabric waiting to be transformed. i have my comic diary from africa still not finished and not erased. and i have a whole list of things i hope to do. so i hope this will be a productive week and that i will be able to clean up and make things and perhaps work on music or organize photos on my computer which is very much needed. and perhaps i will think of a project i could sell, even if it is just occasionally and for fun. i still like the idea of making puppets and more pillowcases and things. my first attempt at etsy was not great, and my lack of sales i guess i took personally, but i think i could be better at it, or go about it in a better way. our reading for our "how to be a real artist" class said to make money as many ways as possible, so that if one thing is slow or doesn't work you will still make money other places. like consigning things, having a part time job, doing custom orders, etsy, etc. so... we'll see. i love makeing things for free... and i find that it's hard to ask for money for my cds. but it would also be good if i got paid a little, especially for big projects. unless it's a gift or something, you know?
anyway... i am excited for where i will go in life, and though i am not always very brave i am trying to be braver this year. trying to just do things and make things and remember that i don't have to just be one thing but can still work with yarn and fabric and printing and crafts and become a better musician and have a job of some sort. and i'm thankful for all my inspiring friends who have been working hard at art or their dreams and trying to make that their work.

jan 2010

Avoir le coeur sur la main

so i've just randomly decided i should collect knitting stories throughout my life... from people. so like... maybe if people have a favorite knitted thing, and who made it, where it came from, etc... why it's important.

so i'll think more about this idea. but knitting is huge in history and with today's comeback i think it will continue to be a part of life.

and it's very true that my great aunt made my special blankie i had when i was a kid, and that it is pretty much in tangles (one time someone laughed at it when i showed it to them) but that i still have it, and hope to learn to knit that pattern someday.

and i'm currently working on my first baby sweater, which is very fun... i know the baby will outgrow it, but i guess it was exciting to realize it could possibly be given to other babies in their family/friends, or even as a hand-me-down at the bridge, which seems awesome. and also my cousin wants me to knit a sweater for her, so i'm excited about that. meanwhile i wish i had enough money and time to knit socks and gloves for alll my friends...but i guess we'll see...

i want to learn more about knitting history, and i see it as part of my family's history and america as well. and you know, norway and almost everywhere.
so, i mean i know there's only so much time in my life, but i hope to spend a fair amount of it knitting, and to become a lot better at it.

even just doing this one baby sweater, i've learned a lot and enjoyed it so much. i'll post pictures when i'm done with it...

so i don't talk a lot about knitting on this blog, but i would more if i had a camera to document that type of thing. because i do knit often, and sometimes things get put aside for months, but they either get finished or taken apart and remade into something else.

anyways, i especially love a book i found called "knitting and crocheting your own fashions of the forties" which i have checked out from UW. but i hope someday to find a copy... i mean, it was a time when people knit skirts and dresses and blouses and ties and vests a lot more than they do now.

so... here's to my knitting future, and one of my most favorite things to do is to make things for friends/family that they need/want that i know they will really love. so i guess that's something i naturally do, but also it is my hope to continue doing that. and along with my talk of clothes (from earlier posts), it sure is nice to have something someone made with their own hands, and something someone spent time on and made with love and i'd love to have those silly little pink tags that say "made by grandma with love" to put on stuff i knit. hahaha. but you know, maybe someday.

and yes, i love to knit stuff for people if they know what they want and pay for at least the yarn or more. so let me know if you have an idea. but i feel like with sweaters, and my own projects and an album to finish it may be a while till i had time to really work on anything else...

i don't know if i've talked about this yet, but in french they say "Avoir le coeur sur la main" and it means you're generous (from what i've heard...though now i'm reading stuff and it may also be heart on your sleeve)... but if you're literally translating...(which is often not good to do in languages, ha) it's to have your heart in/on your hand. and i think that's awesome because a lot of how i tell people i love them/appreciate them is by making stuff with my hands...

but we'll talk more about this later!

september already?

i realized i always sort of just comic about the whole day and not 3 specific stories. oh well.

here's everyone else's

zine sine wave

yay for zines. (and giant library cards)
it was fun, and overwhelming in a good way. i barely had money to spend, but i got some free zines, two compilations, a zine about the beach boys and a bobby dylan paper doll for abbi. yay. i'm already excited for next year.

sad news: my watchband finally broke... so i'm thinking of what to do. i've had this watch for sooo long, like 5 years? and it was its second band and so i kind of feel like maybe i should just buy a new watch, cuz it's certainly had a good life, and is all beat up looking.

exciting news: recording is going super well. yay! we added accordion, two guitar parts and a glockenspiel part, so we're almost done with the first song. and lately i've been talking to the few songwriters i know and getting advice and just having conversations about arrangements. it's been really helpful and interesting, cuz i don't know what i'm doing, and it's good to hear lots of opinions and ideas from different people. and yeah, it's been soo fun to record. i'm so thankful it's happening.

today i listened to mixes and worked on getting 3 casio shrinky dink wristbands ready for future selling. i knit 2 today, and had one that i'd knitted earlier, and i sewed the casios on. the PT-80 looks a little sloppy, but the VL-tone and MT-40 look really good. and i'll probably make another MT-45 because i'm keeping the other one cuz i like it.

and i knit more on the baby blanket this weekend, so hopefully i can work on that more. i'm not sure when the baby is due, but maybe soon...

weekend

tomorrow is the zine symposium
hoooray. i went in high school, and barely knew what a zine was... so i'm excited to visit. i wish i had money for zines though.

and i just found out about knittn kitten which is sort of like scrap, where they resell stuff. but it seems to be mainly fabric and yarn and quilts. and they donate money to cats.

and i'm working on a mix tape of random moments i've recorded. and i'm excited cuz i made the covers today and started making tapes.

and i've been re-reading the chapter about beat happening in "this band could be your life" by michael azerrad... it's cool, cuz they just did stuff, and made music, drank tea, stuff like that.

i'm kind of working on too many projects all at once so it's hard to get stuff done:
knit baby blanket
cassettes for friends/fans
embroidered patch (which i hope to sell eventually)
casio wristbands (i've made the shrinky dinks... they look soo good)
a knitted cassette cozy (it's knitted but i need to add the details)
reading two books
researching portland crafters online
learning more about etsy stuff

plus stuff i've started a while ago and need to get back to:
wire bag i was knitting
magnetic calendar
finishing/hand sewing on a sweatshirt, and 2 t-shirts
heat setting 3 pillowcases
making recycled books

and always in the back of my mind waiting to record more, and always thinking about options... and hoping things will go well and that i'll get a few songs done before school starts.

gloves

hooray, i've finished my first big commission (that i can think of, at least...)


4 pairs of half-finger wool gloves... and i bought the yarn on july 15th and have worked on them off and on since, and i finished the last one this morning.
i wish my camera was better...

i'm still hoping to start up an etsy site soon... so i should work on more things for that.

and ps: we started recording last night, and it went well and i'm really excited!

casio wristwatch

shrinky dink plus wristband...

i meant to have this be for selling on etsy, but the sharpie ran a little when i sealed it, also i used fingernail polish and so it probably isn't the most permanent coating.
so i decided i should keep it, but if i figure out a better way, i might make some more of a similar idea.

it's probably in the top 20 of favorite stuff i've made...

meow...

i'm thankful for all my best friends i've had throughout the years... but i'm so glad i've been friends with alissa this last year. seriously, what a good time to meet a super encouraging inspiring artist friend. and it's often hard to make good friends, and then some people you just click with...and that's awesome. and getting to know all her other inspiring friends...that's super rad too... hooray!

my grandma still hangs out with friends from kindergarten, and college. and this weekend my dad's sailing with his two best friends from high school/college... so yeah... most of my friends i've had the longest i met in high school, and then just in the last few years...

but i want to have friends for a long time, and i was glad this year that i ran into and reconnected with two best friends where we'd had weird break-ups sort of (mostly my fault..eep). the awkwardness was worth it, just to know we don't hate each other. and it's not like we've hung out much yet, but at least that huge weight is gone, and our friendships are opened back up, so whether we hang out a lot or never, everything just feels better.

and then there's friends i still think of every day, but we just got busy with school and life and never hang out. but i hope we'll be able to hang out eventually...rollerskating. or something. cuz friends are really important... and part of why i'm who i am right now is cuz of being good friends with certain people in my life. they changed what music i listened to, what hobbies i was into....

and a year ago i wouldn't've been posting drawings online... cuz last summer i was like "i suck at drawing." so who knows, maybe next summer, i'll be riding bikes to the IPRC. hehe!

old friends...

i found some old friends in the attic. there were a lot of others, and of a more colorful variety, but i'm not sure if i still have them all.
peaches, kitty, and bunny (he's wearing a teapot cozy that accidentally was shrunk in the wash and became his sweater.)
these are from class a while ago, positive/negative space.

felted watermelon bag for brianne. made out of left over yarn from other projects.

blanket stories

"blanket stories" is a series Marie Watt, one of my teachers from PCC, is working on. several of her pieces are up in the Portland Art Museum this summer as part of the northwest art awards. i think i've talked about them some before, and also have meant to write more about the exhibit...but for now i'll just talk about this blanket.

a while ago, last year? abbi and i decided to make a blanket for Team Fadel... and so we looked through our yarn stashes and i think we bought a few skeins, but most of it we had or got for really cheap. it's done in panels. i think 3, it's been a while since i've seen it. but we each knitted on one at a time. and my mom helped knit for a while on it too. anyways, i don't remember how many weeks/months it took, but it's a cool blanket. the colors turned out fun, and they totally love it. yay! we had a whole ton of green and yellow, so some parts are bigger blocks of those colors.


i have been cleaning my room allllll day. like, i took most things out of it from the floor, and in the closet, and vacuumed under my bed and stuff. and now i'm trying to sort and organize and get rid of things. a lot of it is paper, or "i'll make something with this" types of things... which are hard to get rid of.

but even though the living room floor is still covered with things, i know it's all for the best because i'm finally getting organized and rearranging some stuff to make places for things. we also cleaned out stuff from the basement, so there are some drawers down there where i can store stuff that i know i want to keep, like sculpture projects and things i'll put up when i move out eventually. i've lived in the same house my whole life, and i'm a recycler and a crafty person...so i have a lot of stuff... and i'm saving stuff for certain projects, like i'm collecting black and white patterned fabric for a future quilt, and things like that.

anyways, i meant to scan more things, but my scanner is grumpy and disconnected after 4 scans, and i have to restart my computer when i reconnect it. so i'll post more stuff later. but i'm finding funny drawings from high school and earlier, yay!

one big thing i need to organize is all my drawings from school. i know i don't need to keep every sketch, but i need to sort through it all. and some stuff is probably messy charcoal and pastels. and then i need a file sort of thing for whatever i'm keeping..

hmmm... i just realized i managed to delete everything off my itunes. but it looks like all the song files are on my computer..but i have to import them all back to itunes. crazy. i was worried i'd lost all my music. it's really not a ton of music, not like other people who have days and days of it. but there's some cds on there that i don't have. crazy...and i've lost all my playlists from mixes i made for people.

every other 13

yes, i really do have giant furniture! haha.
um, well, here's the finale, i meant to have it up earlier, but i was trying to do homework. i hope that the music videos from our drawing class will be put online eventually. it was a fun project. a live performance of a music video with just paper silhouettes. everyone did an awesome job, and it felt like we were going to mess up a ton, but we ended up doing well, though we had a ton of props.

ALSO, there will be an interview with me on captain greybeard's radio show this sunday night! yay! (see the post below this...) and an upsidedown cat song, and i suggested some songs for him to play and he's going to play some...so you might even know the bands personally, or be one of them. haha. plus some songs i like by people i don't know.
meowwwwww.

so now i'll just be back to the trois on the troisieme (3 on the 3rd) comics, but who knows maybe i'll do comics randomly more often. i hope so! oh, and the zine they're going in has to be done by next thurs, so i need to figure out the rest of it, cuz it's not all comics... yes! and meow.

yarn and fabric

a friend of my mom's was going through some things and gave us some yarn she wanted to get rid of. i, like most knitters always get excited about yarn, especially free yarn. my mom brought the yarn home and it was exciting to see some yarn styles/brands i've seen at the store and wanted to buy but never get because of how expensive they are, or just because i wouldn't know what to make with them.

then, today, one of my friends said she had 3 bags of yarn and fabric i could look through or have. exciting! who knows what they may contain. later i found out that this same friend is having a yard sale next saturday and i can sell stuff there as long as i bring home whatever doesn't sell.

i knew some of the yarn my mom brought home i would never use, and so we began sorting that out. then i went through the drawer in the hall and pulled out some yarn i knew i would probably never use. and then, my mom went through some stuff in the basement and found a lot of yarn in colors we're not interested in (sea foam green). so i think i will take it all to the yard sale and sell it for pretty cheap and some of it for free.

it is pretty amazing for me to be getting rid of yarn, however my grandmother, who was a crocheter, accepted every skein of yarn she was given. she did chrochet all the time, made blankets for many people, and got through a lot of yarn, but after she passed away, there were still boxes and boxes of yarn in the "yarn barn" in the back yard that we had to go through and get rid of. most of the yarn she used was acrylic yarn. although acrylic yarns are getting softer these days, they still aren't that great to work with. they're more suited to learn to knit with, or make puppet hair with. i have started buying non acrylic yarn mainly, and am trying to decrease my red heart yarn collection, because it's hard to think of what to make with it.

in the bag of yarn from my mom's friend was some purple homespun brand yarn. i had some of the same color of yarn in my stash, also dark purple, and i got more of that yarn from a scarf i got from the clothes pile at ashley and vanessa's b-day party (thanks lindsey and alissa!). i also have some dark blue left over from a project. so this weekend i randomly started chrocheting granny squares in hopes to make a small blanket out of the yarn. i don't know how big it will be, and i also don't love the colors (i'm not a big fan of purple), but maybe someone who likes purple and granny squares would really like it. it's very soft yarn, and i've done all this just this weekend, so it's going fast.

also... fabric-wise, i went through a drawer in my dresser and found 3 pairs of pants i've saved (there are more somewhere else, i know) that have holes in them, so i've stopped wearing them, but have saved to use for fabric. a while ago i made a case for my keyboard out of my high school jeans, cords and blue and black dickies.

i really like the look of it, so i thought about making a quilt. i didn't know if denim was too heavy for a quilt, but i know some of the quilts from gee's bend are made with denim. today i looked denim quilts up and found a lot of quilt patterns that are really interesting. i really like the circle one, but i'm not sure i'd want to do that much sewing (you have to sew down all the curves of the circles to make sure they don't fray...)

but i certainly have this well intended problem where i save things with the hopes to fix them or reinvent them. also, i can't get rid of my favorite pairs of jeans, just like how i can't get rid of my four or five pairs of retired sneakers.

i have two huge skeins of dark green acrylic yarn, and no idea what to do with them, maybe if it was knit loosely enough the yarn would feel softer, but i'm not sure if it's enough for a blanket or not. but i really like blankets and am interested in making more. so far in my life i've knitted two blankets,(both which i finally finished last summer)


i also helped knit a blanket with abbi (and my mom) for our songwriting teacher's family (insert more photos here sometime...)
and made one quilt,


helped make another quilt,
and my mom and i took apart my high school boyfriend's disintegrating quilt, saved the parts that were saveable, and reworked the quilt top and recovered the back of the quilt. i do wonder if it has held up, and if he still uses it.

so yeah, blankets and quilts are awesome and i want to make more, and make them for other people someday... while decreasing my fabric and yarn stashes, because it's easy to just never get things done.