What it takes

Quilting! Took me almost 40 years to find a hobby that completely feels like me when I'm doing it.

Mostly just to remind myself how many steps are involved in making a quilt:
1. Design: finding a pattern the inspires me; choosing a colour scheme that I adore. Or drawing my own design in a graph paper sketchbook.
2. Fabric shopping: one of my favourite parts of this whole process; matching the inspiration fabric with complimentary components for the entire design.
3. Readying the fabric: sometimes I wash it first and then iron it; other times I only iron it with spray starch to get that big factory crease out of the middle, and any other fold lines or wrinkles. Starched fabric is easier to cut and handle sometimes than pre-washed fabric. Ironing, always ironing: so much ironing in quilting!
4. Cut: following the pattern or generating a basic block -- or improvising -- to make all the pieces that are required to form the quilt top. (I stick to basic patterns, but one small quilt required way more than 100 squares.)
5. Piece: sew together the cut pieces into a block or strip or other design element. Iron tiny seams to make pieces flat for ease of combining into blocks. Then sew all blocks or strips together to make the entire quilt top. More ironing.
6. Border: measure the quilt and calculate the border material needed. So much math in quilting. From the design stage to the very end. Math! And much more ironing in border stage too. Some people like to do double borders, but that means you have to do this entire step twice.
7. Backing: pick a fabric for the backing. Options: buy the extra-wide fabric so it covers the entire quilt back; piece large swaths of the same material to make a complete back; add an interesting element to the back covering that echoes the front design; piece large fabric sections; complete another quilt for the back so that it becomes a reversible project.
8. Sandwich: place the front, batting, and backing together, smooth it all down carefully, trying to avoid bulges and wrinkles.
9. Baste: special, large, curved safety pins work well for basting a quilt sandwich together. basting is crucial to avoid slippage, which causes warps, bulges, wrinkles. You can also thread baste by hand or machine, if it's a smaller project.
10. Quilt: the word "quilting" refers to the process of securing the layers together. I use machine quilting. Free-motion quilting is fun. I think I'll stick to mostly straight line quilting for my next couple projects.
11. Bind: step 11? So many steps! Cut and iron (more ironing!) binding fabric, and attach it to the quilt: by "attach" I mean sew it on all the way around once, mitre the corners, then sew around again to attach it on the other side of the quilt. Some people hand stitch the second step, but I use matchy thread and machine stitch both times. Sometimes I buy double bias binding tape for this step. Next project, though, gets a fancy binding.
12. Wash: I try to use very secure stitching for usable quilts, so I wash them in the machine with hot water and hope that they hold up.
13. Dry: use pretty hot temperature because I like the crinkly look it gives the quilt.
14. Iron (optional): if it's a very crinkly quilt, probably doesn't need a final ironing, but a little touch-up can make it look nice if it's going to be a present.
15. Photograph and archive on Instagram.
16. Gift to a friend.
Phew! And each step requires a whole bunch of little steps, of course. No wonder it takes me so long to make one lap quilt.

It's all new to me

This afternoon, my D. and I went to a local paint-your-own ceramics studio. I had tried this crafty pastime when I was a kid, thanks to my mom's interest in it, but I hadn't pursued it, and I haven't tried it since. At this franchise place, you don't have to clean the greenware, which was tedious, and the bisque is fired once, ready for painting. You draw the design on with pencil, or trace with graphite paper, and then you paint, paint, paint. I tried an octopus on a salad plate. Then they dip-glaze for you, which was another tedious task back in the old days when I first tried ceramics because you had to paint on the glaze. My D. did a cereal bowl. We get to go back on Saturday and pick up our creations. We could stay in the place and draw and paint all afternoon, no rushing; it was pleasant and creative, and it was fun to concentrate on something that wasn't related to work. The studio is called Crock-A-Doodle.

This outing is another adventure in my year of trying new things, which started in January with my first karaoke outing. Now I am a complete karaoke addict, and will probably go tonight, if I can drag my D. with me: they have it at a pizza restaurant right around the corner, how convenient is that!? I've included a pic of me at a karaoke night out, singing Pink's "So What" song. I can't sing well, but I really get into the songs! I'm enjoying 'raoke so much that I even bought karaoke games for our home Xbox 360 system. That's great fun too.


I also have been attending English Country Dancing with a few friends, which is the type featured in those movie adaptations of all those Jane Austen novels. It's really fun, and two hours per session for only $6 each time we go. I go with a fellow Austen aficionado and a couple others whom we've managed to hook. The music is so sweet and the people are so nice, and the dance figures are great fun.


For the first time, I went to see a famous sci fi writer at a bookstore. I heard Robert Sawyer talk about the future, and that was amazing. I went to a food & drink fest in Hamilton with a fellow foodie, and after I thought, why have I never gone to one of those before? It was really fun and TASTY!


I made a new friend too, tried some new cooking recipes, went to a cooking party at the neighbour's house, mixed a couple new cocktail recipes, tried chocolate beer (delicious!), attended a webinar, went to a PhD defense, hosted a potluck lunch at work, started a facebook group page for the journal, learned some new Google online apps ... this list is getting long! Yay! New things!


It all started with a friend encouraging me to try karaoke, and thanks to her I have rediscovered what it means to enjoy living, to have a passion for something outside myself, to share enthusiasm about life's little joys with other people.


About a year before that first karaoke outing, I actually asked a friend of mine in all seriousness if it were possible for a human to die of boredom. Thank goodness my joie de vivre resurfaced in time to avoid death by disuse.

She's crafty

A new business opened nearby: paint-your-own ceramic dishes, called "Crock a Doodle". I am stoked to go there and try it out, and maybe organize a party with the ladies too. I used to wax crafty now and then, but in my year of trying new things, I've actually let the crafts lapse. I miss the creative process. Although I've been trying to write, I don't usually feel particularly creative during that slog: writing is HARD. I like crafts because of the relatively short period of time needed to get a result, a finished product. And, most of the crafts I've tried are nowhere near as difficult as writing; and the resulting product can sometimes turn into a gift. I made some holiday banners one year that were a big hit; the tote bags were also winners. So satisfying.

I already know which design I'm going to apply to a plate (or platter, if I get ambitious): an octopus. I saw an antique plate with a cephalopod on it, and now I must have one. Cephalopod designs on pottery is an ancient tradition: witness this Minoan vase (right). I can't afford the $700 version of the antique plate that I saw online, so I'm getting my crafty juices flowing again, and thanks to this new business in University Plaza in Dundas, I'm going to make one myself, for myself (no gifting this time). My design will be based on this antique print, but I'm sure the end result will resemble a five-year-old's art project, although that might look great on a platter too.
I only tried ceramics when I was a kid, with my mom, who went to classes and made many ceramic items, a very cool cookie jar among them, if I remember correctly. This activity will also count as a new thing for my 2010, since I really don't remember what it was like from when I was 12 years old.
A craft that I know I like and have done a bit is beadwork, from kits. I want to do more of that too, but I think that will have to remain a late-fall/winter activity. A summer activity that I could do in my nice cool basement is some more sewing. I definitely want to make a few throw pillows, since mine are getting pretty tired, and the last time I washed the covers, they got all pilly and I'm too lazy to pick the pills or cut them off. I also want to finally make a skirt from the piece of fabric that's been hanging in my closet for the past two or three years = LAME. If I make that darn skirt, then I could justify going to the fabric store and buying some more fabric for the next project. One Fabricland store is near a large farmer's market on Ottawa St. and an outlet eyeglasses place, which would be three errands in one trip to the east end. I like that idea; road trip soon.
My relaxing vacation has been going very well; so relaxing that I have read an entire novel and finished singing all the career mode disks on my karaoke game, and have not picked up one project. Ahhhh, my kind of vacation. I think I should be independently wealthy so that I could just relax all the time, instead of working or housekeeping or worrying or making lists. I had a list in mind when I started this vacation almost two weeks ago, but it dissolved. I am a major list-maker (lists, lists, lists always forming in my mind, swirling around, causing me anxiety), but that's a topic for another blog, another day.
Must go now, have one list-item that I must do before we head to Niagara Falls for the weekend = laundry!