Eleven Stitches

Clam Bake (and a Dress)

I realized that most of you probably have no idea what a New England clam bake is like.  I didn't until I started attending them five years ago!  If you're not interested in the details but like sewing, you can skip to the end where I have a dress to show you.

A clam bake is quite an affair, and it takes a lot of planning!  First, several people have to gather rock weed. There's a certain spot my family goes, and it has to be at low tide in order to get to the rock weed. This year, I think they got 14 bags full.

The morning of the bake, we build a large bonfire on the side of our concrete-lined clambake pit. Interspersed in the wood are rocks about the size of cantaloupes.

We light the fire in the morning, and then let it burn for about 4.5 hours.  By this time, the rocks have gotten very, very hot!  Several men dress up in long pants, long sleeves, and gloves to rake the rocks (but not the wood) into the pit. This is so hot that they can only do it for a few minutes at a time, and someone also has a hose to spray them down every once and awhile.

While the men are raking, a lot of us are preparing the food to go into the pit.  We put lobsters, mussels, salmon, corn and onions into wire baskets.

Once all of the rocks have been raked into the pit, we pour all of the rock weed on top of them.  The water stored in the rock weed immediately begins to steam. We start passing the food down a large assembly line to go into the pit.

We have enough food to almost completely fill up the pit.  The steam escaping from the rock weed is very hot, and it cooks the food.

Everything is covered up after this with wet burlap bags, old bedspreads, and a tarp.  We let the food bake for a little over an hour. 

After that, all the food comes out!  We eat the mussels first, as they aren't as good once they go cold.  And then?

Oh, it's a delicious day.  As it gets dark we throw more logs on the bonfire to enjoy its warmth.  We have an unspoken contest with the other houses around the pond to see who has the best fireworks.  We were the unquestionably the champions this year.

You might have spotted me in one of the photos above.  I was wearing what I feel to be proper clambake attire: a very picnic-y dress!

This is Butterick 4443. It came together easily and didn't use a huge amount of fabric given the fuller skirt.  My one problem with it is the wide neck.  It looks nice when it sits correctly, but when I wear the dress, the straps tend to edge away from the shoulders and make the neck look gappy.  I don't know how to fix this.

I love the fabric I used for this dress.  I think it's perfect for a perfect summer day! 

Like Potato Chips

So I've fallen down a new obsessive hole.  Hexagons.

They're hand-pieced onto die-cut pieces of paper. These hexagons are 2 inches per side. When I first started quilting, I had no interest in hand-piecing.  I mean, a machine is so much faster!  But knitting has taught me patience (in many things!), and now I don't care how long it will take to make this quilt because I'm having fun along the way.

And also? They're quite addictive.

Some of you might think that I have a big yarn stash.  I'm not disagreeing with that at all.  But my fabric stash makes my yarn stash look like that ball of twine in everyone's junk drawer. So, my goal is to outfit every one of my 300 paper hexagons with a different fabric from my stash.  I'm not worried.  It will get done.

I think I'm close to the halfway point in cut hexagons (not yet sewn), and I haven't even breached my bookcase of fabric yet.  This is all from stuff lolling around on my sewing tables and floor. Maybe I'll have to order some more hexes and make a bigger quilt.

I'm taking a big stack with me to Rhode Island this weekend for our annual clambake. (I'm also hoping to get some major sleeve progress done on Betty.)  I'll be offline for three days -- my only time all year-- and I'll see you on the other side.  I hope you have a great weekend, holiday or otherwise!

Mini Quilt Monday

Have you heard of Mini Quilt Monday?  There's a pool on Flickr, and the quilts there are pretty cool!  I decided to get in on the fun.  This week's contribution was simple, as I am recovering from a weekend with houseguests.  (It was a great weekend, though.)

I realized that I have a lot of polka dot fabrics, and I decided to put them together into a little quilt.

Last week's contribution was a little bit out of necessity.  The only way I could give away that Solstice quilt was to have a small version of my own.

It's now gracing my sewing room wall, and making me cheery whenever I see it.

Happy Mini Quilt Monday!

My First Successful Knit

I finished a knit dress!  Now, don't get too excited, hand-knitters.  It's machine sewn, made out of knit fabric.  (I would love to hand-knit a dress, but I haven't taken the huge amount of time to do it yet.)

I think there's a time after learning a craft where I switch over from wearing what I make because I made it to wearing what I make because I like it just as much as what I would buy in a store.  Eventually, the hope is that my craft progresses enough that what I make is better for me than what I could find in a store!  I love wearing my quilting-weight fabric dresses, but I'm not sure I would buy so many of them if it cost money instead of time. The store-bought dresses that I wear and wear are made out of knit fabric.  They're comfortable (like a big t-shirt), they look nice, and they don't wrinkle.  What's not to love?  I've been anxious to try to make my own, but there isn't that much availability of knit fabric that I would like to wear. Last week, Jody and I went fabric shopping in Philly.  I came home with four knit fabrics, in chocolate brown, sheer black, a pink print, and the yellow you see below.  They will keep me busy for a while!

Pattern: McCalls 5752, view B
Modifications: The dress was bunching up funny where the bodice met the waist, so I took it in about half an inch on each side, and everything worked out.  I also made an integrated camisole/slip so I could wear this dress to work and not get in trouble.

The notches to connect the dress to the waist did not seem to match up in a meaningful way, so I had to give this a couple of tries before it looked right.  I'm not sure if it was pattern error or user error!

I learned a lot by reading this thread on Ravelry.  In the past, I would stretch the fabric and sew it with a straight stitch.  That never was comfortable for me, and I couldn't tell where the seam allowances should be because the fabric distorted when it was stretched.  This time I tried zig-zagging all the seams (except gather stitches), and the result was so much better.  The fabric fed easily through the machine, and the seam didn't look distorted when I finished.

I really love how this dress came out, and I'm excited to have another comfortable, great-looking dress in my rotation.  You'll see more knits from me soon, to be sure!

PS.  I seem to have a repetitive stress injury in my elbow.  I think a bunch of things added up to cause the problem, and I'm being proactive about fixing it.  But there might not be too much knitting for the next week or so, as I'm certain that knitting was one of the contributing factors to the problem.

More Sewn Shirts

My knitting is still pretty boring.  I'm about to start the sleeve cap on my first sleeve of Betty, and it seemed forever to get to that point!  So in the meantime, let me catch up on some sewing.

Pattern: Simplicity 4122, View C
Fabric: Spoonflower's fabric of the week from a while back.  I love the pears!
Modifcations: I added a pleat to the bottom of the sleeves to keep them from being so flyaway.

I love, love, love this fabric, and therefore I love the shirt. I do think the design is a little boxy, but I forgive it because the shirt has pears on it!

And here's a second shirt.

Pattern: Simplicity 2927

I feel pretty good in this shirt, but both time I've taken pictures of it it seems to not be fitting me correctly.  Perhaps I'll have to take a look at it again.  In the meantime, I think it's a cute shirt and I love the color combination.

Happy Solstice!

Today, the sun actually peeked out this afternoon in New Jersey.  It's been a rainy month so far.  I thought the timing was especially appropriate, as it was my friend Becky's wedding day! Another weekend, another wedding.  Which means, another quilt.

I started and finished this quilt in a week!  Yes, it was an intense quilting week :)  The colors and pattern were inspired by Becky. She's a very green, earth friendly sort of person.  She and her husband chose today to get married because it is the summer solstice. The suns in this quilt are paper pieced, and the leaves are machine appliqued. I used a new batting for this quilt as well.  It's 50% bamboo, 50% organic cotton.  It was very soft and easy to use, and I'm sure I'll be using it again soon.

I have to mention that David was a great helper in the photo shoot this morning.  We were waiting for the rain to stop in order to take pictures, but the ground was too wet to lay the quilt on the grass.  He did a great job holding up the quilt so high for long enough for me to get some pictures.

I had such a fun time making this quilt.  When I finished each block I taped it to my wall, and I think it was a great inspiration to keep going.

With the exception of the borders and backing, all the fabric came from my stash.  It was fun to use up a lot of my yellow, blue, green, and purple scraps.

We had a lovely time at the wedding today, and we wish Becky and Kevin the best.  I hope they get to enjoy this quilt together for a long time!

Betty and Distractions

Here is the current status of my Betty Jean McNeil sweater.

I finished knitting the body, and I cut the arm and top neck steeks so I could try it on.  It's currently only seamed with safety pins!  It took me quite a while to get started on the sleeves, but you can see that I have finally gotten a little bit finished.

For some reason, I really was not interested in starting those sleeves, so much so that I knit a sock while I was procrastinating.

This is the first half of a pair of Francies.  I used some delicious Malabrigo sock yarn, and I'm sure the pair will be a favorite once it's completed.

The return of summer (sort of-- it's way too rainy here) has slowed my knitting progress recently.  I've been all about using my sewing machine.  More on that to come!

Kate's Quilt

Oh, hello.  I'm back from my blog break.  A few weeks ago I got a surprise (and welcome) promotion, and the excitement drove me offline for a while. But now school is out for the summer, and I've got some things to show you.

This past weekend, my lovely friend Kate got married! I was quite busy making a quilt for a wedding gift, and a dress to wear to the big event.  The dress still needs some photos, but here's the quilt!

Her wedding colors were hot pink and lime green, and she also happens to have a room in her house decorated in those colors and chocolate brown.  It's a great color combination, and it makes a fun quilt! (The colors are a little washed out in the sunshine, but in real life they're really bright.)

I admired Chawne's Blue Whimsy quilt top so much that I had to make a version of my own.  Since there is a lot of blank space, the quilt went together quickly, and I love the minimalist look.

I mainly used a new fabric I had bought for the backing, but I also pieced in some leftovers from the quilt top.  And the binding was those leftovers again pieced together.

This was a fun project to get me back into quilting again, and I hope the new bride and groom enjoy it in their home!

Knit, Sew, Quilt

That's what my plans were for this long weekend!  How did I do?  Well, let me show you.

I've made a lot of progress on Betty.  I just finished with the armhole shaping, and I'm about finished with the colorwork band.

At the movies (Star Trek!  Such a good movie.), I almost finished up my second Trekking sock.  All I had to do when I got home is knit the toe.

I feel pretty meh about this pair of socks.  I know there are a lot of people who really like Trekking, but I don't think I'm one of them.  I'll see if my feelings change once I start wearing these socks next fall.

In the sewing department, I finished up a dress.

This is Simplicity 4116, an out of print pattern that I really like. This is the second time I've used this pattern, and I really like how nicely it fits and how easy it sews up.

The cantaloupe-colored fabric is pretty simple, and I love the Peter Pan collar.  I added a little bit of topstitching in the hopes the facing won't shift around too much after it's washed.

I made my own bias tape to finish the armholes, and I added pockets to the dress.  I also appliqued on a flower!

And finally, I got started on a new quilt this weekend.  I've admired Chawne's Blue Whimsy quilt so much that I thought I'd try to make something similar.

I've got some bread rising for tonight's meal (and this week's lunches), and I have a few more hours of crafting to fit in before the work week comes.

Sweater Report: After The FO Post

Now that sweater season is really over, I thought I'd do a review of some of the sweaters I've knit.  When a sweater is first finished, it's sometimes hard to know how much it will be worn.  Here are some of my thoughts about a few finished sweaters.

Phyllo Yoked Pullover

I really like wearing this sweater.  It's flattering and I always feel nice when I wear it.  I did discover that since the yarn is superwash wool, I actually need to wash and dry it in the washing machine/dryer.  As I was carefully handwashing it, the sweater got longer and longer, so that it was tunic length and I had to roll up the sleeves to see my hands!  The washer and dryer do the trick, though!

Piedmont Park Hoodie

I love the way this sweater fits.  I love the buttons and the short sleeves.  I do NOT love the hood.  I feel like the hood makes the sweater too casual to wear to work, and so I just don't wear this sweater.  Since I never have much use for a hood anyway, I've decided that I'm just going to remove it.  I'll have a little more Rowan tweed, and a more wearable (for me) sweater.

 Cobblestone, Venezia, and Beet Sweater:  I love all of these sweaters, and they fit well.  They are too hot! I wear them on really cold days (or in really cold houses), but other than that they stay in the drawer.

Baby Cables and Big Ones Too

This is my most favorite sweater I've ever knit. (Although the recently finished Whisper might tie.  Time will tell.) I didn't realize how much I'd love this sweater when I was knitting it!  The skinny yarn at a loose gauge make the sweater snuggly and lightweight.  It always looks really nice.  Have you ever had one of those days when you come home from work, immeditately put on your PJs, and THEN your husband wants to go out?  When that happened to me, I would put on this sweater. Love it.

So that's this season's report!  I didn't want to include my 2009 sweaters in this list because I haven't had enough time to really wear them yet.  I'd be interested to know what you think about your sweaters after you've had some time to live with them.  It's hard to know right away!