Paper Starfish

I have really debated writing about this on my blog. An old friend of mine passed away recently. He was my age (35) with a wife and three small children. We were not as close in recent years (we were high school friends) but kept up with each other on birthdays and to trade a funny story every once in a while.

He died of complications from Hantavirus. The CDC had to come in and the health department investigated. He was cleaning out his basement when he contracted the virus and within a few weeks, he was gone. His wife and children are staying with friends until they can return home.

Besides the terrible loss of a truly wonderful person, I have been shaken by the seeming randomness and speed of it all. On June 9th he celebrated his birthday with his wife and responded to birthday wishes from friends and on June 17th, he passed away. Scary.

It has made me really think about some serious and sad things and hug my small guys a little bit tighter.

Some knitting and some sewing going on. I'll post pictures in another post.

1. Booking a 5-day trip to Disney World for the whole family. We're going in November. Now, when do I tell the 6-year-old so he's excited enough but I don't hear "When are we going?" every day?

2. Being caught up on bee blocks for June and July including this wonky star headed to Canada:

3. Casting on for a new project in Malabrigo:

So, it has been H.O.T in North Carolina this week. I have been dreaming of wearing jeans and sweaters and getting ready for Halloween and snuggling up! I though maybe a quick winter knit might help me think "cool".

The pattern is Foliage from Knitty. The yarn is Malabrigo worsted in the Ravelry Red colorway.

I really love this hat. Malabrigo is soft and warm and there is enough of a pattern to be cute and different. I am embarrassed to admit how many times I had to tink back though. Lace is tricky to tink because of the yarnovers and I would pick back up and think I was okay and then be off by one stitch. Very frustrating! And just because he got glasses and looks cute with bedhead and pajamas here's one of me with Kid Starfish:

I love IKEA. The closest one is a bit over an hour away but it's fun to go and browse around. I've been checking it out for classroom decorating ideas lately and love how you can use things for unintended purposes. I saw someone on Pinterest who bought several spice racks for $4.99 each and used them as shelves for books in her classroom library.

I bought two DEKA curtain wires recently to try them out as art gallery hangers. This is what they look like at the store in the packaging:

Mr. Starfish put one up in a corner of Kid Starfish's room to hang his masterpieces:

The clips come with the wire and hanging hardware and it's so easy to trade out artwork frequently without making multiple marks/holes on the wall. Yay! What does everyone out there buy at IKEA? I've never bought furniture - just smaller stuff.

I have a quilt top to show very soon. I love it but it involved lots of trimming of the blocks:

I need some new rotary cutter blades!

Here is the latest block I made for Sew Bee Wonky.

Janeth asked for this specific block and we could arrange the colors any way we wanted as long as those four black squares stayed put. This was a challenge for me as I'm still not the best at matching points. With that being said, I was pretty darn proud of myself! I can't wait to see how this comes together. This bee has really stretched me in my confidence in using solids vs prints and colors that I wouldn't normally pick on my own. I'm up as a Queen Bee in August and I'm putting something together with scraps. I'll post it soon.

Hello Anything Goes Bee-mates! *If you're not a bee mate, I hope you'll still check out my newest quilt-in-the-making and let me know what you think!*

We'll be making 20"x30" blocks for a confetti quilt. I made a gallery on Flickr to give you ideas.

Everyone will be getting a half yard of Kona Ash for the background and a pile of scraps that look like one of these:

There are pieces in your scrap pile that are way bigger than you need. Feel free to keep all scraps. I love collecting little scraps from bee members and there is some Mendocino, Prince Charming, Picnic and Fairgrounds and other goodies in there!

I started by cutting the scraps into different sized squares and rectangles. Please don't go bigger than 4" square. Feel free to go as small as you like. Then I cut some strips of Kona Ash and and chain pieced the scraps to the Kona like this:

I cut my Kona strips 3" wide and I think it was too wide. I might have wasted too much this way and you won't have too much extra Kona with which to play. Once you get lots of scraps surrounded by Kona start laying them out and see how you like them like this:

Once you have a layout you like, fill in with some negative space (Kona Ash) and start seaming together.

Here is a block I made that's finished:

Some tips and guidelines:

1. You will have a lot of seams. Try to minimize unnecessary seams so things don't get bulky. It will make it easier for you while piecing (and me while quilting)!

2. Please don't make any sort of pattern or order with your scraps (ie. all one color family or uniform size/placement). I'm going for a random look. Please stick with squares and rectangles for the scraps (no circles or shapes like plus signs, etc)

3. Aim for 10 - 18 scrap pieces in your block. There are 15 in my block.

4. You might not have lots of extra Kona Ash. I had to work carefully near the end to get my block to size without running out.

5. You can click on the pictures above to make them bigger and easier to see.

Sound good? I'm excited. Let me know what you think or if anything is unclear!