Saturday, March 16, 2013

Lucky Four 4-Leaf Clovers

#1 & #2 clovers
I was taking my normal morning walk and happened to glance down at a patch of clovers and noticed one that was larger standing out above the rest.  I thought, "What a perfect clover... wait! There are 4 leaves on that clover!"  And just inches away was another one just about as big and proud.  What are the chances of that?  Not one, but two 4-leaf clovers without even searching!  I don't know how many hours I spent as a kid looking through clover patches and never found one.
Look in the very center- #3 clover
About a week and a half later, I found another one a couple blocks down the path by just glancing down again but decided to leave it.  I went back to save it from the lawn mower a couple days later, but was too late.
#4 four-leaf clover with the first two clovers
So, I went back to the original patch where I found the first 2 and... Voila! Another one!  And it only took about 1 minute or less to find.  I don't know whether they are more common than I thought or if I am more uncommonly lucky than I thought.  Four 4-leaf clovers in less than 2 weeks!  Wow.

I'm going to press and dry them for good luck!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!


Saturday, March 9, 2013

Putting Sleeves into a Sleeveless Dress


A friend of mine needed sleeves added to a dress she was wearing to wedding.  This was the right color, just no sleeves.  I hunted all the local fabric resources and found some fabric that was the same color at JoAnn Fabrics.  It was knit, so I was happy because that's what I work with mostly right now with my nursing shawl business.

   
First we determined how far down from the top of the armhole we needed to make the sleeve.

Saturday, March 2, 2013

Denim Quilt Red White and Blue

It was probably over 1 1/2 years ago that I started this quilt with a friend, who has posted on this blog once- the dumpster truck cake.  I would teach her to sew and help her do projects while she taught my kids to play the piano.  I wouldn't recommend making a denim quilt the first sewing project for someone because she's lost the taste for sewing for a while.  (Quilts aren't my usual project of choice.)

We used her husband's old jeans and bought some red and white fabrics to use in the middle and for the bias tape (which I can post a how-to-make-bias-tape post if anyone is interested.).  She had her 12-13 year old girls church class help tie the quilt at an activity.

Here it is!
Almost King-sized- backed with flannel
Center- long yarn stitching on the red fabric
back of quilt- long yarn stitching

Yea- it's done!
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