A little bit of this and that

Hello!

I am doing lots of things.  

Finished the two-color brioche hat:

My gauge was pretty far off, I think - way bigger than called for.  This was a beanie pattern and ended up fitting like a beret.  It's nice and airy and warm and looks great on child #1, so my plan for matchy-matchy winter is a bit derailed at this point.  However!  I have more plans. 

Finished some mittens:

Gryffindooooooor!

Wasn't sure how the Madeline Tosh singles would do, but these came out nice and soft and warm.  Hoping they'll wear well. 


Finished a baby quilt:

Koalalalala!

I'm also working on a cross-stitch of a baby raccoon.  I saw the pattern on Etsy and decided instantly to make it.  I ordered 18 colors of thread.  I quickly realized that the pattern is what they call "confetti" and then resigned myself to spending months on it.  

This picture was taken what feels like a long time ago!

My crafting time::money spent ratio is incredible for this one.  Tedium?  Yes, please!  Really, I think this represents at least a month's work of probably an average of an hour a night.  That could also be way off, I don't know.  I did work on it so much one night in January that I couldn't move my arm for two days.  Have been mixing it up a bit more since then. 

I'm also elbow-deep in my scraps right now, cutting pieces 2"x 1-1.75".  Decided to make a quilt like one I thought I'd seen on crazymomquilts.  Started planning and checked out her site and couldn't find it.  After lots of duckduckgo-ing for scrap quilt images, I found it: Bright Birches, which is in fact by crazymomquilts, but is offered through Connecting Threads.  I thought I remembered one scrap strip through the square, but it looks like she used three, so three it is.  

On the right is my collection of 2" squares, which I'm making into four-patches as a leader/ender.  Don't have an ultimate plan for that quilt - sashing between bigger squares?  Postage stamp all the way?  No idea.  

For my birches quilt, I'm really hoping to find enough solids in my stash for the square backgrounds so that I don't have to buy any more.  This one may be a gift for a long-time childcare provider we had.  I haven't made my way through the yellow or purple scraps yet and need a lot more of those, but the cutting is getting a little old.  Am ready to sew.  Do not have any idea how many scraps the quilt will ultimately use, but I can always either cut more or make three more birch quilts, whichever seems to be required.  

I miss reading quilt blogs.  Back in the day, I had a nice list of bookmarks.  Then some blogs went defunct (nooooooo!  show me more quiltssssss!!) and then I got a new computer that likes to reinstall my browser every time I restart the computer.   That... seems like something that shouldn't happen, but damned if I'm going to spend time figuring out how to make it not do that.  It does somehow save my bookmarks, so I can look at some quilt blogs.  But ever since Finish It Up Friday went away, my quiltblogosphere just hasn't been the same.  But look, I am posting on my blog more than once per year!  That's something!

Happy crafting!