Improvizing
There is a window in our living room that had been calling for a quilt curtain for years. We have two windows along the front of our home and one on the back wall that looks out into a little alley. It’s all by itself next to our sofa, it felt like it needed something special. I knew I wanted to make a quilt curtain but I didn’t really know how to go about making one and I knew it would take a lot of hard to justify time. But after some much needed spring cleaning and replacing our Ikea sofa cover and getting a vintage rug from Etsy the can of worms called for the curtain. I rummaged through my stash of fabrics, and tried to lay out a design in illustrator but that was a little overwhelming calculating seam allowances and such, so I thought I’d just improvise something. I started with the bars. Cutting rectangles and sewing straight lines is always a great place to start. Then I started to play around a bit, figured out how to cut some triangles and finally started just sewing little scraps together and getting the hang of it.
When I look at the final piece I can see the little phases of learning I went through. I can see where certain fabrics ran out and new ones took their place. It made the process feel really surprising and fun. It made me want to continue loosening up and playing around, more improvising. I especially love the border which was made with pieced together leftover bits of fabric. I lined the curtain with some cotton batting and used the piece of an old curtain for the back. It’s pretty great because that window is drafty and the heaviness of the lining tends to block the leaking air.
I have a few more sewing projects that I’m going make during the Summer. I want to make another curtain for Elliott’s room, a quilted shirt and some shorts from the perfect gingham linen table cloth I found a while back at the thrift store.
I want to get my family in on the “jazzing” too (Soul reference). I told Elliott we should play around making fun marks on some sheets of paper and then work them into a collage. I want more things with our hearts and fingerprints all over them to hang in our home.
It’s taken me a long time to hang up things that I’ve made around my own house, but it’s feeling really good. Here’s a painting I kept from my first art show that’s in our bedroom and the painting of our cat Igby that’s in our living room. In a world of slop it’s nice to have some hand made treasures around.
Things Worth Sharing
The Quilters Watching this movie during the making of my quilt curtain was really nice. Their creations are amazing!
Perry Q Pumpinog One of the great things about going to church is that it opens up our social circles to include folks we wouldn’t normally run into. Our friend Jim from church has kids my age and is a fascinating human. His wife passed away when his girls were young. She was a very talented knitwear designer and all around creative powerhouse. She wrote this story for her girls and Jim published it for her posthumously hoping that other folks would enjoy this really delightful tale. I’m so glad he did because it’s great! Even if you don’t order the book, read the about the author bio, it’s very touching.
Vintage Primo’Gi ceramics I love these vintage ceramics that I read about in an A Thing or Two newsletter a while back.
Here are more Beautiful Ceramics.
Peeping this Painting the Ordinary Class.
We bought Elliott this Slushy Cup that works surprisingly well and diy Flip Books.
I’m also enjoying this Spencerian Script book and this fountain pen.
I’ve been using this greek yogurt pizza dough to make little frozen pizzas for myself. It’s been great. I double the recipe, replace half the ap flour with whole wheat flour. Divide the dough into 8 pieces, top with toppings, freeze on a sheet pan and then transfer them to a bag and separate them with wax paper.
This faux-tisseri chicken recipe is the best roast chicken recipe I’ve ever made, and I have tried a lot.
Thinking I need a subscription to the Vermont Country Store catalogue.
I loved this little Joyride episode.
My Shop: phillycornerstore.bigcartel.com
E-mail: halestormenator@gmail.com