sewing Archives - Page 40 of 42

Hooks on parade

I crochet primarily in a recliner in my living room, with a small end table next to me and a lamp on each side. There’s not a lot of room, and the floor around the chair is covered with yarn, patterns, and notebooks. A rectangular tin that originally held fancy soap sits open on the end table, the body filled with reserved and leftover embroidery floss, the lid with current materials – including hooks. The steel ones disappear inside, and the aluminum ones stick out at one end. All of them catch on things and go missing periodically.

When I first learned how to knit, several years ago, I made needle and hook cases out of wool and calico. I still think they’re among the most attractive functional objects I’ve sewn:

However, they leave a little to be desired when it comes to accessibility. I quit knitting because it always felt like a chore, but the hook case has stuck around (and will continue to indefinitely, for travel purposes). If I ever pick up Afghan/Tunisian crochet the needle case will be useful for those hooks.

More recently I crocheted a lemon and stuffed it firmly with yarn ends to use as a pincushion.

Unfortunately, blunt needles have quite a time with it, and even the sharp pins can’t be inserted just any which way.

Then I found the Tower of Babel. This is the answer to my dreams: a long tapered strip, rolled into a tiered cylinder. Between the tiers you can insert hooks, needles, pins, even scissors, storing them visibly and at hand with a very small footprint. Certainly I still expect the current hook(s) to be lying around on the end table, but my most commonly-used hooks (E, F, and the 2.75mm steel) can live there. I made it in a day. As a bonus, I was able to use some wonderful cotton yarn whose colors haven’t worked for amigurumi.

Success!

Tomorrow is my birthday, so I am taking a moment to reflect on projects that went just right. I’m generally happy with my work, but every once in a while the planets align and the result is better than I hoped.

In my early twenties I had a pair of jeans I loved, except that they were just a little too short. I added some length in the form of orange wire-edged ribbon, a beloved article from my stash, and miraculously, it worked! Even a professor who didn’t typically comment on such things said he liked them.

They are with me no more, though for the lovely reason that they are now too big, so I do not have a picture and must turn to more recent successes.

I adore brocade. It’s so rich! And so difficult to use for anything. However, I wanted a purse to go with a brown dress, and had brown and gold brocade at hand. My grandmother’s button box was in the closet and the two came together to make a perfect envelope clutch:

It is fully lined with an inner pocket. This picture shows the true look of the fabric better, too.

Perfect projects need not be self-designed, though that is a bonus. I wanted a hobo bag to take to Germany, and McCall’s M4400, in brocade again, came out exactly as I desired:

I didn’t technically have enough fabric to make the bag, so I had to piece the straps. In fact, though it does not show here, I pieced the lining as well. The depths of the bag are lined with a straw-colored calico because I didn’t have enough green; this actually is a bonus because it is easier to find things against a lighter background. In the close-ups you can also see the decorative topstitching I did (by machine!). The top seam of the strap didn’t stitch together so neatly, so I added a loop around to cover it up.

What projects, fabric or otherwise, have you had come out just right?

Pi pillows

Recently I was asked by a student to participate in a Pi(e) celebration, giving the mathematical side. I decided to make Pi Prizes to give out for trivia such as where the first zero is in the decimal expansion of pi, the best fractional approximation for pi, mnemonic devices for the digits of pi, etc. I intended to crochet an amigurumi pi or three, but quickly realized that would take far too long.

Instead, I typed a boldface pi in the largest font size LaTeX makes, blew it up to maximum magnification in the pdf viewer, screenshot it, used iPhoto to print it out as an 8×10, drew a half-inch margin around it and used that as a pattern. When I sewed I actually only used a 3/8″ seam allowance, and if I were to make more I would probably adjust the pattern so the pi is not so spindly. I would also leave the top as the opening for turning and stuffing, even though stitching it closed there would be more visible – the first one I made I left the inseam of the left leg open, and getting the stuffing into the right leg was very difficult. In the latter two I left the top of the inseams and the bit of crossbar connecting them open, and the closed-up corners are not as neat as they could be.

Pi in the Sky and Cherry Pi:

Lemon Meringue Pi and my original crochet pi:

The fabric was all from my stash, including the cheesecloth meringue puffs. Pumpkin, apple, and pizza pi are other obvious choices, and I’ve thought about finding a lime-printed fabric and extending the crossbar of the pi to the right with a trefoil-shaped end to make key lime pi. Moon pi would be adorable. There are apparently several kinds of velvet pi. I may be missing other easy ones, but it seems to get abstract fast – chicken pot pi? Mud pi? Mincemeat pi? Humble pi? Cow pi?

I’m just glad I didn’t got through with my original plan of crocheting pi from furry yarn.