fabric fancy

I have a shelf in the corner of my living room that holds my vinyl and cds and movies.  I made the shelf about 10 or 15 years ago and though it is functional — it has dividers for keeping my vinyl upright — it is actually a bit of a mess.  I’ve been debating painting the whole thing, which would mean sanding it, which I didn’t want to deal with right now.  I decided to make curtains to cover the front and hide the mess.  I couldn’t think of buying any more fabric but didn’t really have anything in my stash (huge though it is) that worked, so I decided to make my own with fabric paint and some natural cotton that I inherited several yards of.

I call my decorating style “Victorian Mod” because I combine vintage pieces from my grandmother with pop & modern art elements, so I thought I would take a Victorian element and blow it up to give it that modern edge.  I decided to go with the look of rattan weave because a) it’s easy to do with painter’s tape and b) it reminds me of some funky wallpaper/linens I remember from the 70s.  Plus it’s just awesome.

This was so easy to lay out, though I wish I had figured out the measurements a bit more carefully so that the sides of the octagons were equal.  I cut the fabric roughly to size first, then laid it on my dining room table on a piece of tarp, then taped off the pattern.

I used my quilter’s ruler to measure the horizontal and vertical lines then eye-balled the diagonals.  Once I had it all taped off, I used acrylic paint mixed with textile medium and a 99-cent roller to paint on the color.

I pulled off the tape almost immediately because I was so impatient, then hung the fabric over a laundry rack to dry.

So awesome!

Now I actually want to paint the shelf because I think the fabric would look better paired with paint instead of the wood. I’m not entirely sure what color to paint it.  Just off-white?  Pale blue?  Taupe?  I won’t get around to it for months, so I’ve got plenty of time to decide.  Now I just need to make cozies for my tiny tv and stereo…

I love love love this fabric.

*Note: I realize my pictures have been completely sub-par lately.  Is it me?  My camera?  We’ll work on improving the quality.

 

 

 

christmas prezzies 2

This morning I read a couple of articles and blog posts about New Year’s resolutions and one writer noted that even if you don’t completely follow through on them, resolutions are a good way to reconnect with your dreams and goals.  I tend to set these kinds of goals at my birthday instead of in January as a cold winter month when my energy is at its lowest never seems like a good time to take up a new project.

This year I am making an exception because there are two things I really want to accomplish.  The first is to start running again.  I’ve been saying I want to do this for months but enough lollygagging!  I have developed what we call “dissertation ass” from sitting at my computer all day and all night, and if I want to stay fit as I move into my forties, I need to get off it!  Not to mention that yoga will be a lot easier if I lose the extra pounds I have gained over the past couple of years.

The other goal you may want to join in on.  This is to finish one UFO every month, starting in January.  I inherited a couple of quilt tops from my grandmother five or six years ago and I had intended to complete them for my mom, my aunts, and my uncle.  I finished the one for my mom and gave it to her for Christmas a couple of years ago, but the other three are just sitting in a drawer.  The time has come to finish these and send them to their new homes where they can be enjoyed.  There are several other items on The List that should take me through the middle of the year at least.   If you are also planning to tackle your UFOs this year, let me know and we can encourage each other.  The first thing I’m going to finish is the quilt for my aunt Ruth, so check in on January 31st to see how I’ve done.  Of course, I have all sorts of other plans like finishing my dissertation and going on the job market, but these are things that will happen, so I don’t need to make resolutions to see them through.

My niece wanted a new bedroom curtain for Christmas.  I lined this with flannel drapery liner to keep the chill out of her cold Gloucester home.  I worried that it was a bit too sweet for my 15-year-old niece, but she seems to like it.  I used a reverse-appliqué technique for the letters, similar to my office curtain.

 

before/after

*A warning that my pictures aren’t very good today but hopefully, they will give you the gist. 

My friend Erin is a massage therapist and doula who works out of a space in Albany.  Some of her clients worry about privacy (there’s another house 10 feet away) so she has to have curtains.  Someone kindly gave her heavy dark green curtains but though they were functional, they were making her unhappy.  Too dark, too oppressive.

(And I personally thought the tab tops with button detail were too eighties for words.)

We worked out a curtain-for-shiatsu exchange and went fabric shopping together.  She picked out a celery green cotton and an Asian-themed accent print.  I confess that as I was making them, I worried about how they would look with the muddy brick colored walls (inherited from the previous occupant), but once I saw them in the room, I was really amazed with how great they looked.

The translucent cotton is airy and open, while the green light cast by the sun shining through creates a soothing atmosphere.  With each panel pushed back slightly to let in the sun, the room truly has a zen feel.

I’m very much looking forward to my next massage in this relaxing space.

 

quickie

Just a quick note to say I finished the curtains — yay!  I hope to post pics of them in their new home tomorrow.

I don’t know about you, but things are feeling a little out of control right now.  My friend says it’s spring — the weather’s all crazy and things are bursting out all over and everything’s out of control, not just me.  I feel like one of those people spinning plates in the air and I’ve got a few too many plates so it’s nice to scratch something off my list.

 

curtains & french seams

In a shocking development, I actually did some sewing last night and started work — finally! — on Erin’s curtains.  (Yeah, so they still need to be ironed.)  When I’m joining two pieces of fabric and not planning to line the curtain, I use a French seam and roll the hems so it’s all nice and tidy.

Takes some additional sewing and pressing (lots of pressing!) but it’s worth the extra trouble for a more finished look.  I’m hoping to finish these up tonight as I’ve been promising them for a while now.

I was going to say that curtains are pretty dull to make but let’s call it meditative instead, ok?  Very, very meditative.

 

in which i confess my weakness for tv trash culture

Lately, all of my energy has gone into writing as I try to meet some deadlines.  It’s going extremely well and I’m excited about my progress — not just on the two pieces I’ve been working on but for what it means for the future.  I have come to realize over the past few weeks that it is actually possible for me to finish my dissertation over the next year.  Yes, this is what I’ve been planning all along, but it’s something entirely different to really understand that it’s doable.  By me.  It’s thrilling.

Despite this progress, last week was rough because, as I mentioned before, I am being treated for vertigo (caused by some mysterious disruption in my balance mechanism) by a physical therapist.  She had warned me that it would get worse before it got better as we are overloading my system until it adapts.  She wasn’t kidding — last week was kind of awful.  I’d have vertigo all day while I was writing so by the evening, I was just exhausted and would lie on the couch in a stupor.   But over the weekend, it got noticeably better.  Such a relief!  I was secretly worried that I was going to feel that way for the rest of my life.

Last night was also spent on the couch but only because it was the season premiere of Dancing with the Stars.  I tried to resist the siren song of wacky B-listers and sequins….but I couldn’t.  Just between you, me, and the couple dozen other people who read this blog, I am slightly, well…obsessed with this show.  There, I said it.  It feels good to get that off my chest.  (Listen, it could be so much worse.  I went through a small Beauty and the Geek phase a couple years ago.)

My friend Erin and I finally picked out fabric for her curtains so I tried to start working on these without leaving my post.  It didn’t work too well as it’s surprisingly hard to cut two-yard lengths of fabric from a couch. 

The DWTS celebrities are always a disappointment.  (Why else would they be on the show?)  I may have to root for Steve-O and Li’l Kim (who is a li’l freaky with her plastic surgery, spray-on tan, wig and contact lenses — she makes me a li’l sad ’cause she was probably a real beauty when she was natural but now she looks, as she said herself, like black Barbie).  Steve-O cheerfully announced that he’s a year into rehab, while LK dedicated her dance to the ladies at the Fed Pen where she herself spent a li’l time on a perjury charge.  The judges like to say the show is about people having fun while learning to dance, but what it’s really about is Steve-O and LK trying to cha-cha-cha their way back into the spotlight.  Bring it, B-listers!

 

embracing imperfection — finishing the chair cushion

With the chunky piping, hand-basting the welt to the top seems to be mandatory.  The chunky piping makes it a bit hard to stitch on the machine, even with the basting, but perservere!  You can do it!  I had to sew two pieces together to make a welt long enough to go around my cushion, so before I started sewing, I estimated where the seams would land – I wanted them fairly evenly distributed on either side of the cushion.  Once I got it all basted, I ran it through the machine….um, twice, ’cause I didn’t do a very good job the first time.  The stitches need to be right up against the piping, without actually going through it.  The bottom, however, can be pinned instead of basted, as you don’t have that troublesome piping to contend with.  I stitched the straight side first:

attaching the bottom

 Then pinned the heck out of the curved side:

lots o' pins

I used a 5/8 seam allowance since I had cut my welt so wide (and now that I have my pillow together, I sort of wish I had made the welt even shallower so the cushion would fit in a bit snugger, but c’est la vie).  Once it’s all stitched, rip out the red basting stitch and turn your pillow inside out.  You could iron it if you wanted, but you’re just going to wrinkle it by sitting on it, so why bother?  Stuff in your chair pad and have a seat! 

my office chair

My chair cushion is slightly wonky, but so am I, so I am embracing it’s imperfections.  I made the back cushion a couple of months ago when I moved in (I had tried to recycle my other seat cushion and was not happy with the results, hence the new seat cushion).  Here is the coordinating curtain, using this idea for reverse applique:

work it.

*If you have any questions about any of the steps, please ask!