Finally crossed off my list!

This is the apron from my to-do list:
I finally finished it and I am really happy with how it turned out. I made the bias- tape myself and it looks very good :)



The photos are terrible though...it's just been really cold and not very sunny.

This is an apron I made two years ago. It was made for a friend's son as a Christmas present but that year we didn't exchange gifts because they went abroad and we didn't meet up before they went, so I put it in the closet and forgot about it. But I recently found it and decided to let my son Tryggvi have it. He really loves Cars, especially Lightning McQueen.


It is not as well made as my new apron, but it is fun and he likes it.
We both wore our aprons the other day when we made these:
Some were decorated with spiderwebs, other were aliens-themed:


And a few were just plain old messy:
I always think they look the best that way ;)

I knitted this hat on Wednesday and Tryggvi wore it to kindergarten on Thursday. I took this photo on the way home on Thursday, but since then I have added a fleece lining and some ties. I also made him fleece lined mittens that he took to kindergarten today (but forgot to snap a photo first) and now it's snowing:)

Not perfect - but I love it!

I started this Christmas tablecloth in 2008 and finished piecing the top in October that year.


It is a really beautiful design by Guðný Valgerður Ingvarsdóttir and made with wonderful fabrics that I got from Bot.is



I never finished it because I didn't like how it went together, and actually thought that I was no good at piecing...until I found out that my sewing machine doesn't always start with the needle in the middle, sometimes it is 1/8th of an inch to the side, and that can make all the difference when putting together a quilt!
It has imperfections (see above photo) but I decided to finish it anyway. It was my first big piecing project and now it has also been my first machine quilting project. I had machine quilted around all the red stars and two flowers when I was comfortable with my machine quilting, so I picked up all the stitches and did them all again!

I absolutely love it and I do hope that the imperfections are not too obvious...now I can't wait until Christmas to show it off!

Drawstring car sack

Here is a little sack that I made for my boy to keep his cars in:I made it from the legs of a pair of jeans that had been turned into shorts and a cool car fabric I found at Virka, the local quilt shop. The "T" is just sewed on with raw edges. I'm hoping it will look cool once the edges start to fray. It has a lining with the car fabric as well and the drawstring is simply 3 long strips folded lengthwise with right side out and braided together.
Tryggvi loves it so... Mission accomplished!

First attempt

This is my first attempt at free-motion machine quilting:
It is one of five flowers in a Christmas tablecloth I made two years ago, but I never finished it because I wasn't sure how to quilt it. Now I have been teaching myself how to machine quilt and I decided to stitch in the ditch. It was really hard, until I got myself a pair of quilting gloves.
These seams have all been removed now because I was sewing too small stitches, very often went out of the "ditch" and I do not like this multicolored thread on this piece since the white on the red background and the dark on the light background makes it look sloppy.
I will show you the final quilted tabletopper when it is finished :)

Blog hopper

Check out this cool Fall-O-Ween blog hop. First off is the Icelandic Gudrun with a fun Hannoween tablerunner. I love her Quilt-as-you-go method. I used it once on the runner I talked about here. And it was so easy, I made another one ;)

Woollen sweaters

This one I made this spring for my boy:I would have taken a better picture, but before I was able to, it go ruined in the washing machine :-(
So then I made him a new one, and this time from the Icelandic un-spun wool, Lopi, because it is warmer for the winter:
And here is the one I made for my teenager:
With a nice hood:
And finally a picture of the scarf that I made for my husband's friend's birthday:This, along with my last post, covers everything that I have made in the 7 months that I was blog-lazy.

Status

Let's check the status of my old to-do list...hopefully it will not be too embarrassing...

• An Apron that my mother got me fabric for a few weeks ago. Still not finished...
  
• Pyjamas for my boy. Still not finished...
  
• A baby cap from Debbie Bliss Silk yarn. Finished, and a pair of baby mary-janes to go with it:
• Cathedral Window Quilt. Not even tried the method...
  
• The sewing weekend Quilt. Not finished yet, but now that I know how to do free motion quilting on my sewing machnie, I am re-encouraged to finish it :D
  
• The set for my baby girl. Finished. It is the one in the picture from my last post, but here is a picture of her wearing it when it is not too large on her:
• Knitting needle case. Finished:I have also knitted 3 woollen sweaters, a Newton Heath scarf and sewn a crayon roll from this tutorial:

I'll show you the knitted stuff in my next post :)

Extatic!!!

I had almost given up on Quilting because I have never been able to free-motion quilt with my machine, and that is something that I really want to try.I have followed every instructions and tips I have found, both online and with the sewing machnie manual but it always turned out tangled on the back side like this:
Today I was trying once again; cleaned my machine, changed the needle, put in the darning foot according to the instructions, but down the feed dogs, switched the stitch length to 0 and started, but no matter what tension I used, it always turned out like the above picture :( So I decided to take the machine to the repair shop to check if there was something wrong with it that was causing this. The repairman checked it out and it took him less than a minute to figure out what was wrong. The foot was supposed to be in the middle position...and it didn't say so in the instructions!

I am so happy to finally have this working, so now I can start practicing free motion quilting.
This is my first test:
I wrote on it how my sewing machine was set for this to work, and then I am going to keep it so that I won't forget how to do this :D

I haven't posted here for 7 months now and not even looked at other blogs since my baby girl was born on June 17th...but I think I'm back on track :)
Here's a picture of my sweet baby girl when she was 4 days old:

Öskudagur/ash wednesday

Pics

Here is a picture of the mittens í made for Mr. T:
And this is the table topper I made with the fun G.E quilt as you go method:

And I had some leftover fabric so I decided to do a mini version:

My teenager did not approve of the photos I took of her wearing the dress I made, so I will post better ones later.

Happy valentines day :)

A new look

My polka-dotted background was a little too much so I decided to go for a more clean look.
That way, when I have some photos to share, they will not be overwhelmed with the red-white-dotted background...although I love red polkadot fabric!

I have not been making much these past few months that I can share now, I made woolen mittens and socks for my two-year-old and tried a new quilting method, at least new for me, and made a table-topper. I also made a dress for my 12 year old girl. I'll have to take some pictures to share, but not now because I'm not at home...

Remember my To-Do list from my last post? Which was for ever ago... :

• An Apron that my mother got me fabric for a few weeks ago. I just got the matching thread yesterday, so it's all set :D Still not finished...
  
• Pyjamas for my baby boy (Mr.T) from a fabric that my mom found in her stash, she bought it over 20 years ago to make something for my brother and it's really nice, green with bunnies and purple toadstools. Not even started...he got a few pairs of pyjamas for his 2nd birthday and for christmas.
  
• Woolen socks for Mr. T for winter. Check, as well as a pair of matching mittens :)
  
• A baby cap from Debbie Bliss Silk yarn...mmmm...A few of my friends are expecting and I would like to make silk baby caps for their babies :) Not started and all the babies born...I think I'll just make this one for my girl that I'm expecting in June :)
  
• Ohh, and I really would like to make a Cathedral Window Quilt since I found this great tutorial. I'm planning on starting out with a pencil case or a pillow cover and see if I like doing it before I make a whole throw. This has been put lower on the list as I've added other items to it that I wish to finish sooner:
  
• I still have to finish the Quilt I started at the Reykjanes sewing weekend. I finally finished handsewing the flowers on it, so now I just need to sew the borders on and quilt it.
  
• I just bought yarn for a beautiful set to knit for the girl I am expecting (yes, it's a girl and I'm so excited)
• I also want to make a case for my knitting needles to have them all organized.
  

So this is what is next on my list...actually I am finishing to knit a little baby blanket that I started when I was pregnant with Mr.T...he is now 2 years old, but I never finished it because he got so many blankets as gifts. But now I'm going to finish it for his little sister and then I can start making her beautiful baby-set.

However, I suspect that I will get distracted by all the amazing projects from

Celebrate the boy

As a mother of a 2 year old boy I must say I LOVE it!!! Why aren't there more hours in each day that can be used only for sewing or knitting?!?!?!

Go check it out: