Monday Musings – Creative Inspiration and a New Shawl

Hi my blogger friends!  I have missed you.  I feel like the last few months have been all about work and travel with limited time for creating in between.  Although I’ve had less time to create I’ve certainly had a lot of time to ponder future projects.  My family and I just returned from a trip to the Southern Caribbean island of Bonaire.  It may be an island you have never heard of as it is less developed then the more popular islands and the land itself is pretty arid and desert-like.  Those of us who go there however, go for the water and sea life.  Bonaire never disappoints.  My mind is spinning from all the variations of blue we came across in the sky and sea contrasted with the bright colors over the rest of the island.  No sewing machine meant no quilt or bag making but I did find time to do some hand stitching and I finished a lace shawl that has been in the works for awhile.

Ravelry: Windspiel pattern by Nicole Eitzinger.

 

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The importance of blocking a knit garment is never as obvious as when making lace.  The pre-blocked version is shown below.  Considering the conditions I was knitting in (on the beach surrounded by sea and sand) this knit benefitted from the washing that took place with my blocking as well.

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Before signing off I have to share some of the pictures from our trip.  Expect to see a lot of blues, oranges and mustards in my future makings.

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Lastly I have to share some amazing local paintings I discovered by the artist Alejandra Riquelme.  Although I don’t think I would make these into quilts (though they are begging to be imagined that way) I would love to interpret some of my own pictures onto quilts in this fashion.  Inspiring!!

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9L4A0608Blessings and I hope you have a wonderful week.

 

Hillary

Monday Musings-Creative Inspiration . . . Home

Do you have a place you consider “home”?  Even though I have spent most of my life moving from one locale to the next “home” in many regards is my parent’s house on a lake outside of Seattle.  It is the place I finished high school and came for respite during undergrad and medical school.  Because of work and family obligations, my trips here are less frequent then I would like. My beautiful mother has created a home filled to the brim with new and old finds and handmade treasures.  It always stirs my creativity.

For example, how cool is this old steamer trunk and the Singer sewing machines she has made a hobby of refurbishing?

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Or this lace she has crocheted and these old family quilts?

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When visiting, I also get to see the handmade things I’ve sent my parents over the years.   Some of them are pretty forgettable but others like my DS Addition Hope Valley Quilt shine in the way my mother presents it.

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By far the best part of coming “home” is just spending time with my mom and dad and exposing my kids to this beautiful environment. (The picture is of my mother on the far right with my kids, my niece and I hiking in the nearby Federation Forest.)

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I hope you too find joy and inspiration in coming “home”.

Hillary

Monday Musings-Creative Inspiration and Another Bag

It’s official, I’m obsessed with all things text.  Interesting letters and numbers, dynamic fonts and text covered fabric have got me dreaming lately.  Letters have come front and center in my new bag design and I am making up a new quilt with some newspaper print, something new to me.  It may have been our recent visit to the Newseum in Washington DC, a geat museum that focuses on the history and impact of newspapers, television and all other news avenues in our lives.  Bear with me, this obsession could last a bit.  (The picture above is my daughter perusing the museum on our trip.)

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By the way, did you know the & symbol is called an ampersand?  I found that out today as I was looking for symbols for my new bag which I ended up drawing myself.  Once again, I used recycled leather for the side stripes and handles, linen for the body, felted wool for the front symbol which I hand sewed on and a favorite Carolyn Friedlander cotton for the lining.  Look for my free pattern/tutorial soon.

 

Hillary

Monday Musings-Creative Inspiration Plus a New Quilt

Yea, yea, I know it’s not Monday here yet BUT it’s 109 degrees out and I just got done wrestling a king sized quilt through my little machine.  And it has to be Monday somewhere already right? 😉

My creative inspiration this week and almost every week in regards to quilting is Denyse Schmidt.  I have all of her books, several patterns AND three of her quilts from Sarita before she stopped selling them.  I count myself very lucky.  My fave of the three is this baby circular quilt.  It is front and center in my sewing room and keeps me warm draped over my legs on cool days.

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This weekend I decided to quilt up my Plus/Minus Quilt and looked to Denyse and this quilt for guidance. I decided to home machine quilt it in the concentric circles I so love in her baby quilt and I was guided by her color scheme to add similar colors in the binding. I used a linen for the back and an ikea canvas for the binding.

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As painful as it was to quilt this baby, I really love it especially the binding and the simple back.  I hope you are find a ton of creative inspiration this week.  I would love to know and see what is inspiring you.

Hillary

Monday Musings-Creative Inspiration

Is this Rothko begging to transform into a quilt or what?  . . . I’m finding nonstop inspiration for quilt design in modern art lately. On our recent DC trip I was looking forward to seeing the modern art portion of the National Gallery of Art only to discover that the museum is closed for extensive renovation over the next several years!  (SFMOMA is also down until who knows when undergoing a complete rebuild-they’re killing me.). In any case, I was fortunate to stumble across a few modern jewels in the old National Gallery. I’m imagining creatively dyed fabric with large color panels. What is inspiring your creativity? #mondaymusings

Monday Musings-Creative Inspiration

I’ve decided to mix it up a bit and from now on will try to concentrate every Monday on something that inspires and spurs my own creativity.  Somedays that may be travel photos, others it could be lovely flowers or a combination of crazy colors and most certainly it will be the creative work of others.  My inspiration this week comes from artists like this man I stumbled upon at the National Gallery of Art in DC who in turn is exploring the art of several generations past. How lucky are we to have others to inspire us?!  #mondaymusings

Monday Musings

While my work schedule is not traditional, Mondays still mean the end of the weekend, the start of the kids’ school schedule and back to homework for us. I often muse about previous vacations and places I would rather be. Are their places you dream about on your Mondays? (Feeling rather patriotic as we show our kids Washington DC and surrounding area)

Monday Musings

While my work schedule is not traditional, Mondays still mean the end of the weekend, the start of the kids’ school schedule and back to homework for us. I often muse about previous vacations and places I would rather be. Are their places you dream about on your Mondays? (My Mother’s Day was spent working-financially supporting my family, folding laundry and helping the kids with big school projects.  A perfect Mother’s Day Trifecta?  Hmm, no but definitely representative of this mothering job of mine which I wouldn’t exchange for all the money in the world.  The picture is of my son on a recent weekend hiking in Pt. Reyes National Seashore, California.)

A fun present to both my mother and I yesterday was to have my Mother’s Day Bag picked as a weekly fave on Craft Magazine online.  Haley has generously featured several of my handmade goods on this blog.  Such an honor.

Check the blog post here:

CRAFT Flickr Pool Weekly Roundup | MAKE: Craft.

Haley’s nifty personal blog is here:

The Zen of Making | Brooklyn-based DIY from a gal in granny glassesThe Zen of Making | Brooklyn-based DIY from a gal in granny glasses.

Monday Musings

While my work schedule is not traditional, Mondays still mean the end of the weekend, the start of the kids’ school schedule and back to homework for us. I often muse about previous vacations and places I would rather be. Are their places you dream about on your Mondays? (Just back from a great conference with other women physicians.  A highlight was an 8 mile hike in the Sonoran desert among the Saguaro Cacti in bloom. Tucson, Arizona)

Monday Musings

While my work schedule is not traditional, Mondays still mean the end of the weekend, the start of the kids’ school schedule and back to homework for us. I often muse about previous vacations and places I would rather be. Are their places you dream about on your Mondays? (Stairwell, The Vatican Museum, Vatican City)