Project: Mod Sampler Quilt

all my rows stacked and pinned

A few months ago I started the quilt-along hosted by Elizabeth of Oh, Fransson! I had discovered the quilt-along because I saw Elizabeth’s quilt patterns for sale on Etsy. Her work was so inspiring that I bought one or two of her patterns and all the fabric to make a quilt for Zadie’s toddler bed (even then I knew it would take me forever to do it so I was thinking way ahead – no crib quilts here, I know me). I followed the links to her blog the day she started the quilt-along – what great timing.

I had only made one other quilt before, the patchwork crib quilt from Amy Butler’s In Stitches. Although that was technically a quilt, I didn’t really feel like I had made a quilt. There was something just not quite patchworky about it. I thought the quilt-along would be better as a beginning project than just jumping in with my precious Heather Ross fabrics that I had bought for the toddler bed quilt project.

I was very excited to get started. As I moved quickly through the first few steps and was able to keep up with the instructional posts, I photographed my fabrics, my stacks of pieces ready to go, and the different blocks along the way. I even posted everything to flickr and put them in the pool. I got all of my blocks pieced together and then I stopped. Cold.

I piled everything up on top of a storage box in the office and left it there. I’ve been looking at it become a fixture for all these months. Then all of a sudden, Elizabeth started posting on her blog more frequently. Then she started another quilt-along. Instead of going absolutely insane and joining in, I decided to finish my Mod Sampler. I got everything out and pinned together my rows. Wednesday night I sewed two of them together and last night I did two more. There are two more left and I’m loving it.

But as I’m learning more about the process, I realize that even though I’m still a beginner at this, I can do things my way. I do not like sewing on the freezer paper so I’m taking it all off and won’t ever use it again (quilters use freezer paper to help add on some width to a cut that is too short). I also don’t like my quarter inch foot so it’s coming off and I’m going to make do with my regular one.

I never thought I would learn so much by simply picking up an old project where I left off. I feel like a better stitcher and am more confident in the decisions that I make with my craft. I’ll post again with pictures when the top is finished. I’ll definitely need some help picking a fabric for the binding.

For more information about Project: Project, read this post.

Project: Someone Else's Project, THE 2010 HANDMADE OLYMPICS!

The rikrack studio is hosting the 2010 Handmade Olympics. I've been a follower of their Twitter feed for some time now and just learned of this awesome event.

So here's the deal: you can nominate yourself and others in 8 different handmade events from eco-friendly goodies to a handmaking-focus blog. I just submitted my first nomination and then posted that to Twitter (I can't bring myself to type the word tweet as a verb in that usage just yet except in parentheses like this. The same thing goes for Google as a verb, journal as a verb, and blog as a verb. I'm sure I'll get over this one day but my years as a lit. major are still winning my inner battle with technology.).

Anyway, check out this post for all the details. I might even nominate myself.

For more information about Project: Project, read this post.

Project: Sometimes you never learn...

Creamy broccoli was made this evening with vanilla almond milk. I guess the gravy we made that one time with the vanilla soy milk didn't taste bad enough.

Anybody have a fix for this (other than never buying the delicious vanilla flavored versions of our non-dairy beverages)? We're sure to make this mistake again.

For more information about Project: Project, read this post.

Project: Cape

I made my niece Gracie a fabulous cape using this pattern I found on the Martha Stewart website thanks to my amazing crafty friend Nikole who made an even more amazing cape for her daughter for Halloween last year from the same tutorial (hopefully Nikole will agree to be interviewed for Project: Project sometime soon).

Gracie is the girliest of girly girls and just turned 5. So for Christmas I put together a bin of dress up clothes for her since I had heard she was the only girl in the neighborhood without one. I picked up a few things here and there but that box just seemed empty (even though it was overflowing with tulle). I decided a cape was in order and set out to make it happen.

The directions were pretty easy to follow but I did have some problems. The Red Riding Hood cape pattern calls for 28" of fabric but FOLDED. So that means that you must have yardage that is at least 56" wide (so from a 60" bolt). The silver satiny stuff that I bought was 60" and it worked out just fine. Then I started to cut the pink and realized that it was from a 45" bolt. So even if I were to cut the pattern and create a seam, I wouldn't have had enough fabric. Keep that in mind if you want to make a cape from this pattern -- and really do your math if you want to make one of the longer ones.

But what a happy accident. I pieced together a panel from some of my favorite and most girly of girly girl prints to extend it. If I had remembered to add seam allowances to my cuts, this would have been simple. Ha!

I used some grosgrain ribbon to make the tie and topstitched all the edges because I'm crazy and I love to topstitch. I think it turned out great and Gracie loves her special cape -- and it's reversible (if only I had a steamer).

For more information about Project: Project, read this post.

Project: Me

Self Portrait: Family, Pittsburgh Children's Museum, the week Zadie really started walking

I am married to the venerable Mr. Lemon and we have a daughter, Zadie (formerly known as Baby Lemon). I have a bunch of degrees but teach technical writing (not one of my degrees) at one of the nation’s highest ranked party schools. We live on the outskirts of the student ghetto close to town and campus in a small house with an enormous yard and a summer vegetable garden.

For as long as I can remember, I have been sewing. My first project of merit was a small purse with a really big button, all stitched by hand. Out of those patches you buy at the grocery store to fix the holes in your jeans, I made bizarre outfits for my lego guys. Mom let me help her pin and cut out patterns, reminding me to leave the notches.

In college I took a course called Flat Pattern Design because I wanted to be able to make and alter my own clothes. My love of really awesome fabrics led me to make plush bellies out of satin, silk shantung and velvet. And then I wanted a baby so I started making baby clothes. People loved my stuff so I opened up an Etsy shop and the blog to promote it and the flickr to have more pictures.

It took about two years to get pregnant and it’s been over two years since then. Zadie has taken over our lives and we are not looking back. I love sewing her little dresses and puffy quilts and crazy dolls. With Project: Project, I will talk about all that process and some of the other things we consider really important to us like how we eat and the products we use, and living in a house smaller than most Manhattan apartments so that we can travel.

For more information about Project: Project, read this post.

Introducing Project: Project

So lately I have been figuring out some things. Lemon Cadet is going to see some change.

The background: Little by little, after almost 6 years here, our tiny house has started coming together. I asked myself how it was happening and it took me a while to remember that a couple of months ago, Mr. Lemon and I agreed to keep the kitchen table clean. What was once a huge pile of mail and newspaper inserts and hats and gloves and my bag and cookbooks and magazines is now a clean yellow surface. That clean spot spread to the hutch against the wall, then the side table next to the couch in the living room and then the mantle above the fireplace. What used to be this huge pile of dread that sat there sucking my life away into its vacuum of procrastination, is now where we eat dinner. And cool cookies (since we have no counter space). And decide what coffee cake recipe to make. And pin quilt pieces together.

Now I'm not saying that I'm some organization queen. In fact, that photo above depicts about 15 seconds in the life of that countertop. There's a lot going on in that space right now. And we have some messy closets and one earthquake aftermath of a basement.

But it seems I've been able to start cleaning up this mess. I have just been doing it a little at a time. And I feel a lot more free. I've been doing projects like a maniac. We have been decorating -- making the transition from living like messy college students to like adults or something. I've been sewing lots of great things and designing and taking pictures of it all.

I'm giving it a year. Project: Project is going to chronicle the new action. Look for more frequent posts (I promise they will not be this long) and tutorials, interviews and the results of my OCD research. As always, I'll continue to post about all the craftiness that I'm up to with a little bit more information on the process (pattern review), the results (what I had to change to make it work), and the accidents (happy or not). I'm really excited about this and am looking forward to it. My goal is that others will be motivated to start on some projects of their own.

Tomorrow: A bit about me.

Soon after: Some projects.

Stay tuned.

We made a play kitchen

I had an idea of what I wanted and I sketched it out in the car on the way to Ikea. We picked up a bunch of stuff from the wonderful land of AS-IS and went to town. We spent a total of $68.04 (plus tax) and used up a lot of stuff that we had in the basement.

Mr. Lemon did all the building and I provided emotional support and detailing.

Many more photos in my flickr set. The descriptions and comments have more information as well.