What year is this?

Still here. Still well. Still busy. 

Hello from me and my friends.

Just checking in here. I post photos of stuff I do more frequently on Instagram @aileenbiser

I do some kind of artwork every day, mostly acrylic painting lately. I took a long break from sewing in 2021, mainly because I spent months rearranging, sorting and reorganizing my craft/sewing/art room. I do almost all my hobbies in that room except for crochet or drawing. Crochet is a sit on the couch and watch TV activity and drawing can be done anywhere. 

So I did more crochet in 2021.

Another Project Linus Crochet challenge quilt. Lots of fun new stitches to try out.

And my first attempt at a crochet sweater. This was the practice sweater to test the pattern for fit and shape using an inexpensive acrylic yarn.  I may make it again with a nicer yarn.

And I finally got back to doing some sewing in October and made another Project Linus quilt top. Not sure when I'll finish it.  It's on the To Do list.

 This is the room where it all happens. A place for everything and everything in it's place.

 I do plan to post more often. We'll see how that goes...

Thanks for visiting.

Aileen

Quilting 2020

I know it's March 2021 but it sure feels like 2020 2.0. Nothing has changed and I really haven't done much in the last couple months. So I decided to write a few different post summarizing more of my 2020 craft activities. 

Quilting 2020:

 

I started 2020 finishing a very large queen size quilt. That of course involved lots of sewing, machine quilting separate sections and solving some construction problems because I made the quilt using the Machine Quilting in Sections method as taught by Marti Michell. She has an excellent Craftsy class on the subject that I referenced multiple times.  It was the only way I could achieve my goal because I don't have a sewing machine that can accommodate the machine quilting of something that large.  It was the end of April before I finished and was thrilled to be done and happy with the results.  But by then I was pretty tired of sewing.  It was the third queen size quilt I made in a row. I'd made two in 2019 before I started this on and I needed a break from sewing.

I moved on to other crafts for several months.  After taking a long break I didn't do any more sewing until the annual Project Linus quilt challenge in October.  That is always a fun easy quilt to make and a fundraising event for Project Linus.  The challenge only last about 8 weeks and you receive complete instructions and access to video tutorials if you need them. My problem is I love finishing the quilt tops but take forever to get around to finishing the quilts. I have several quilt tops sitting in my cabinet now just waiting to become real quilts one day.

After I finished the Project Linus quilt top I was ready to finish a Christmas project I'd planned a couple years ago or so.  I have collected a lot of different winter and Christmas themed fabric and planned to make a table runner for a  coffee table out of some blue and white snowflake fabric prints.

 

 

 

I have a list of planned quilt projects that I already have the fabric for.  It's just a matter of deciding what I feel like working on at any given time. But then there are the unplanned projects usually made from leftover fabric pieces that are the remnants of previous completed projects. They end up becoming any number of things. Having just finished three queen size quilts I have a basket full of extra cut fabric pieces and scraps from both the fronts and backs of the quilts. I experimented with some strip piecing ideas and ended up with enough blocks to make another table runner and I have some random small quilt blocks made from leftover project Linus fabric. They may end up being zipper pouches or place mats.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks for reading.

 

Aileen

Other stuff I did in 2019 and 2020

I had on my To Do list last year to write a blog post in Sept, then it became Sept + Oct, then it became Sept + Oct + Nov, etc..... So here I am in February 2020 July 2020 to summarize the last 6 11 months.

More art, lots of art, acrylic painting, watercolor experiments, some sketching, and there was sewing, lots of sewing, cutting, piecing, quilting, bookbinding, gardening, crochet, etc. ...

Here are some photos of my projects and much of my artwork is already posted on Instagram.

Christmas Card Art - Dec 21019

Scrap Queen Bed Quilt - July 2019 (just for the practice)

Queen Bed Quilt - November 2019

Project Linus Challenge quilt top - October 2019

Queen Bed Quilt - April 2020

Project Linus Crochet Challenge - May 2020

Coptic bookbinding - old construction paper - May 2020

Painted Canvas booklet - May 2020

Thanks for reading.
Aileen

End of 2017 Wrap Up

For several weeks in October and November I worked on another Project Linus Mystery Quilt Challenge.  The theme this year was Ethan the Elephant and his travels around the world. Each block represents a different continent or area of the world. You can see more about this challenge at the Project Linus website.

I also worked on a another artwork challenge with the monthly ArtSnacks box:

And designed a Christmas Card and Christmas towel with some artwork my son created and a little Photoshop magic. The towels were printed on cotton canvas fabric at Spoonflower.

 And the cards were printed at Shutterfly.

And with just a little sewing we have cute new Holiday towels.

I found time to sew a couple more fun zipper pouches. They are big enough to hold pencils, pens, markers and small notebooks.

I love the Ghastlie and Sebastion Cat fabric.  I think the grouchy little cat is cute.  I have a skinny 17 year old cat and I've seen that look before. 

Several of the fabrics I used to make this pouch are sample prints of designs I uploaded to Spoonflower.  The solid fabric is from the Grunge Basics by Moda fabric line.

And made a mini traveler's style journal and filled it with homemade mini notebooks that I made using Star Wars themed fabric for the covers.  The secret to using fabric like this for covers is Heat'n Bond Ultra Hold Iron-On Adhesive between a layer of fabric and paper.

Thanks for reading.
Aileen

Plans for 2017

Wait! 
Is it already February? 
No, worse...  
It's almost March!

So much for my 2017 plans.  I just lost two months and I haven't started on my goals yet!
But I did write them.
And I have been doing some random little projects.

How many reading glasses do you have scattered around your house? I got tired of trying to carry one pair around with me just in case I needed to read something so I got multiple pairs to leave in different rooms and made these little eyeglass cases to put them in.

I did manage to take notice of Valentine's Day and finished making a few little Valentine quilted hearts like this.  It could be a coaster or just a decoration.

And I made some little Valentine notebooks that have a fabric cover that is bonded to paper. These little notebooks are 3 1/2" x 5 1/2" with 48 pages.  The covers are stiff enough to hold their shape but flexible and have some give.  They won't fray because the fabric is bonded to a backing paper and you can stuff them in your purse or pocket for random note taking. I'm thinking of doing a blog post just on how I make these little books.

And I finally got around to trying out some new art supplies I got for Christmas. I'm a big fan of watercolor pencils and these muted colors are an interesting change from the typical rainbow colored set.

Thanks for reading. 

Aileen