Category Archives: Boro

More cold. More rain.

Added a skirt. Going to put some more yellow at the bottom of the woven strips. The seam line lands in an awkward spot on me. Hope it works better on someone else!

Going to turn the neck under with a hand stitch or add a bias tape binding (if I have any left. Turned a few old packs into ties for masks).

No sleeves.

This mask makes 60. For a neighbor who is a pediatrician. If I were a kid, I’d love seeing that frog on my doctor’s face.

Sunday stitches

tissue house backlit

with new roof and door

when lit from behind, there are many moons

tissue house before roof or door

before

black felt for a patch – used a dental floss container as a form

Ta-dah!!

It was a good weekend, if a little hot today. Finished a book, started another. Did the crossword puzzle. Took a long walk. Cleared out more of the basement. Cooked a lot. Weeded some. Finally planted my Mammoth Sunflower Seeds. Watched two movies – the new Jason Bourne and the one about the tsunami with Naomi Watts and Ewan McGregor (“The Impossible”). C recovered from wisdom teeth surgery. K bought lumber for the darkroom. D said, about an hour ago, “Come look at the moon, Mom.” So we did. And there it was, hanging like an ornament in the eastern sky.

Apron and Mickey


Here’s the apron I referenced the other day, back when it was just a bunch of woven strips attached to a rectangle of linen. I am wearing it now. It works.

For an apron to work for me, it MUST have strings long enough to tie in front, so that I can tuck a dish towel into it. Pockets unnecessary.

For the many quilters and fiber artists out there who make work as gifts or to sell, how do you know when something’s A KEEPER?

I knew I wanted this for myself, but sometimes I DON’T. One way to turn something I haven’t admitted I want to keep into a keeper is to price it too high. Ha!

P.S.  This apron combines the learning from two Jude Hill classes (Spirit Cloth) — Cloth to Cloth and Contemporary Boro.

and speaking of collars

Talk about workmanship!!! Wow is it humbling to peruse the book, “Dress In Detail”!! Many of those bands of color (e.g. the deep orange) are rows of teeny and uniform chain stitch.  The pale orange and salmon fuzzy rows near the bottom are couched chenille – a great idea, right?!! You can definitely see why the French word ‘chenille’ means ‘caterpillar’. And the top and roughly-middle black bands are applied black velvet, embellished with near see-through sequins and waving rows of seed beads – two more wonderful ideas.

I came across another men’s wedding vest here — All the Pretty Dresses – a website devoted to archiving garments from prior to 1929.  I especially love the brown ink signature in the lining.  Boro ragmates will appreciate the photo of the patched placket on the inside.

Perhaps this attention to finery is prompted in part by prom festivities last night.  It was quite a scene – five young couples gathered and at least 12 adults, quite a few stray siblings, with most of the onlookers taking pictures!  I felt like a member of the paparazzi. I won’t insert the more traditional scrapbooking shots here, but you have to admire this collection of shoes:

And, you can’t help but smile at this one:

glue and interfacing?!

Gorilla glue on my fingertips from helping out with a science project last night (building a model of the levothyroxine molecule) means touching T-shirt knits and interfacing is horrible!! Everything is sticking to the dried glue remnants on my fingertips and feels awful, to boot!  But, I have to keep at this T-shirt quilt.  Have to. Have to.

Will google ‘gorilla glue removal’ and get back to it.  Last night, though, I took the pocket and collar off of this workshirt and am going to apply woven strips to the sides of the front plackets.

Also, I cut the landscape panel off of the cardigan that I had been stitching.  It wasn’t working.  And, proof that it was the right thing to do?  Now I love it.  More on that later!