Patchwork Hearts and Cookies

Well, Valentine's Day is over and I didn't do much for it but I did make heart shaped cookies. 

And I continued working on the heart patchwork project. As usual, these new placemats won't be done on time for this year but I'll have them for next year. I have two more of these heart patchworks to piece, then some quick machine quilting and the binding. That's actually still several hours of work spread over a few more days. That's a lot more satisfying than spending several weeks or months on a project. 

Problem is I have more than enough cut pieces to make four placemats. Do I put the leftovers back into storage for some future project or just sew them all together in some random way an see what happens? Around my house every surface has some size quilt thing on it. I change them out throughout the year and have some made specifically for holidays. I suppose a couple more pink table quilts could be used someplace. But I suspect I'll be itching to move on to something else by the time I finish the heart placemats.

And I finished the bead project I was working on. I ended up choosing pyrite, amazonite, serpentine, turquoise, a copper penny token, and a bone arrowhead for the charms. I added in some jade, goldstone, marble, rhodonite and agate, as well as for interest and more good energy.

This has been a good week. Thanks for reading. 

Aileen

Faux Rocks and Valentines

I haven't had much energy or motivation this past week. The only explanation is it's February. But I did play around with a few things. 

I dabble in polymer clay from time to time. I am by no means any more than a beginner in this medium. I've learned enough to do a few little fun things. One of those fun things is making faux rocks and little hearts. The rocks I'm using as makeshift wall hooks for jewelry and small decorations. The hearts I just like to make and keep in a jar. 

Faux rocks. 

Jar of hearts. 

Valentine's Day will be here and gone probably before I do something for it. But something about holidays makes me think "Oh, Valentine's is coming, I should do something." But what? Maybe heart shape cookies?, a heart shape cake? some sort of decoration, or new placemats? I don't know. It's just a distraction. So I dug through my fabric stash and leftover cut fabric pieces and came up with a pile of pink pieces. Problem is some if this fabric is from the 'pinkish/mauvish' decorating period (1980's) and is just not appealing to me anymore. So I think this is a perfect opportunity for me to try out some fabric paint I have to see if I can 'fix' some of these colors. 

Odds and ends of fabrics in pink shades. Some of these are decades old. Does that make them 'vintage'? I realized looking through this fabric that some of it is very close in color to the 2015 color of the year, Marsala. Maybe that's why I don't like this year's color. Been there, done that.

Red and yellow fabric paint. 

But I got bored with that fabric painting process pretty quick and the painted fabric didn't look that much different than the unpainted fabric. Plus there were too many pieces to do. Instead I decided to cut some new brighter pink squares to mix in with the old colors to even out the overall effect once they are all sewn together. At least that's what I hope will happen. And I organized my stacks while pondering design options. I'll start with a simple heart placemat pattern. 

Neat stacks of squares and triangles, because I don't feel like sewing yet, and a simple square and triangle patchwork pattern.

I also have been washing some scrap of old wool fabric to see how well they full (felt). Again, with Valentine's in my head I'm pondering ideas using the felted wool in something. But I just keep cutting hearts trying to decide what to use them for. 

Red plaid, greys and black washed wool. 

Felted wool hearts.

There is a lot of indecision happening right now and not much crafting. So I decided to finish something I started in December and did complete another earth power bead strand. I just have to decide what gemstone charms to add on the end rings. Decisions, decisions. 

My options for charms - pyrite point, bone arrowhead, amazonite, serpentine, turquoise, Rhodonite, and assorted bone beads and copper charms. 

Thanks for reading. 

Aileen