Make-A-List Monday 12-28-15

Tags

cats, Make-A-List Monday, Oregon, Portland, sewing, travel, Wood Memorial Park

Another shot of Wood Memorial Park in Portland, OR

(Make-A-List Monday is an idea that I borrowed from Sarah Craig over at Confessions of a Fabric Addict and I thank her for inspiring me to try it!)

Busy week!

How did I do on my goals?

1.  Make food gifts.

Done, though I also decided to cut back on the number of things I gifted.  There were so many sweets around that it seemed a little bit excessive to make more as gifts.  (It’s currently three days after Xmas and we’ve still got cake, Sticky Toffee Pudding, and various types of candy in the house, so I think I made the right choice.)

2.  Make two final sewn gifts. 

Done!  Used the leftover fabric from the famous cycling jacket to make a new messenger bag for my partner.

As you can see, the cats are quite excited about the project.

I used this tutorial and sized the bag up a bit.  Partner wanted no internal pockets, just the one under the flap on the front, and a little bit of hook-and-loop tape as a fastener.  Quick and easy.  Love the lining fabric–that was from the stash.

I’m a little bit tempted to make one for me with all those cool pockets she has in the tutorial (read:  OH LOOK A SHINY OBJECT).

I also made a fabric box to hold a bag of homemade granola to give to my mother.  Forgot to get a picture of that one–hey, I finished it at 9:00 p.m. on Xmas eve, and I was very ready for bed by that point–but here’s a picture of the other homemade gifts I made.  The only one you haven’t seen before is the trash bag on the left, which was for my honey’s new car.  I really need to make one of these for me!

3.  Figure out walking feet and darning feet so that Santa can bring them for me.

Done, but not actually until today!  I realized a couple of days before Xmas that I had everybody else’s presents underway except for mine.  😛

I wasn’t at all sure what kind to get for my machine, but Sewing Parts Online offered a reasonably-priced walking foot and darning foot that are guaranteed to fit.  Sold.

4.  After Xmas, make muslin of the Willara tunic.

Done!  Actually, I’ve got the muslin done AND the final version about halfway there.  There were complications–do I even need to say that at this point?–but I really like it so far.

Okay, goals for this week:

1.  Finish the Willara tunic.  I still need to bind the neckline, hand sew the armholes (it’s a long story), and hem the sleeves.
2.  Make fabric box #3 for the Finish-Along.
3.  Make my sewing weights for the Finish-Along.
4.  Make my windowsill pads for the Finish-Along.
5.  Do end-of-year blog posts (this will be a bigger job than it should be because I am a very large dork and have managed to mess up the photos on most of my old posts, so I’m going to have to sort that out first).  😦

This is probably too much, but I’ll see what I can do.

Have a great week, everybody!

STH

ETA:  I have linked this post up at Finish It Up Friday (yeah, it’s on Monday–just roll with it, is my advice) at crazy mom quilts.

Sunday Sevens 12-27-15

Tags

cats, cooking, Cool Cottons, Oregon, Oregon Zoo, Portland, recipe, Sunday Sevens, travel, Wood Memorial Park

Thanks go to Natalie at Threads and Bobbins for coming up with Sunday Sevens, a sort-of-weekly series in which we share some pictures of what we’ve been up to.

Here’s what’s been happening here over the last couple of weeks.

It has been COLD and occasionally snowy here–a real winter, as opposed to what we had last year–and the whole family has been enjoying sitting by the fire in the mornings.

(Not shown:  the wrestling match that followed this sweet moment by about 30 seconds.)

Last weekend, we were in Portland so that my partner could do the Solstice Ride on Saturday night–13 1/2 hours of cold, rain, and wind on brightly lit and decorated bikes.  I expected him to sleep through most of Sunday after all that hard work, but he got up and went to lunch with me, and then we took a walk through another one of Portland’s amazing parks, Wood Memorial.

It looks a bit soggy here, because by that point, there had been 19 straight days of rain in the area.

That evening, we went to the ZooLights event at the Oregon Zoo.  Spectacular, but so crowded, cold, and wet!

On Monday morning, we headed to Cool Cottons to use my gift certificate from my mother.  SO MANY BEAUTIFUL THINGS–we especially loved all the sciencey fabrics!–but I had my heart set on dark, intensely colored fabric for a dress.  The one on the left is for a shirt for my honey.

Another gift–my partner’s sister knitted us socks and cowls.  These are mine; his are a beautiful blue heathery wool.

I tried my hand at making a traditional Christmas cake this year (a.k.a., fruitcake).  Verdict:  partner loved it and said it gave him flashbacks to childhood Christmases spent at his grandparents’ house in Scotland.  Personally, it was too much concentrated sugar for me; as dried fruit desserts go, I much preferred the Ecclefechan Tart I made for Thanksgiving.

The other new recipe I tried for Xmas dinner was Yorkshire Pudding, a special request from my honey.  They were easy to make and tasty, but I did manage to set off several smoke alarms in the house in the process of making them, and then had to clean the oven the next day.

Hmmm . . . not sure that one will get made again. 

We’ve had such a fun couple of weeks here, I’m a bit sorry to say goodbye to the Xmas season.  Time to finish up the last few projects of 2015, though, and look ahead to the new year.

STH

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