What do you do when the deadline for the Flirty Apron Swap is just around the corner, and you can’t seem to find any of your apron patterns, or even a suitable fabric for starting from scratch?

Well, YOU are probably too responsible to get yourself into such a situation, but I am organizationally challenged in more ways than one. So last night, I googled frantically for a cute apron idea, and found this. Today, I made the rounds of home stores downtown until I found a cute tea towel:

To make an aprony shape, I followed the guidelines of the Ben Franklin tutorial, but balked at hemming.

I don’t know why. It’s not hard. I guess I’m not having an “I like hemming” day. Thankfully, I pretty much never clean my workspace, so I had a big pile of pre-made bias tape getting in my way the entire time I was trimming the towel. Ta-da!

I decided to leave about a 30-inch section for the neck, because who wants to squeeze her head into an apron? I ironed the bias tape to get any kinks out, and folded it in half, marking the center of the tape with a pin.

Then, I pinned the tape 15 inches on either side of the center. It’s easy to do with a cutting mat:

The pins indicated where to start pinning the tape around the raw edges of the towel. A bit of masking tape was invaluable at this stage:

And then I sewed away! Only very slowly, because bias tape can be a real mess when I go too quickly! I reinforced the edges where the bias forms the ties, because there will be quite a bit of stress on that area. Sorry for the blurry pic; all it shows is a straight stitch worked about four times back and forth:

I may have a hard time giving this one up. Good thing I was underconfident in my ability not to screw this up, and bought an extra towel!

Last Tuesday, I played hooky from blogging. I couldn’t help myself - I was traveling on the east coast, and an acquaintance had arranged for me to take a tour of the U.S. Capitol! WHEEE!

If you know me in person, you can imagine what a huge thrill this was for me! And for anyone who loves art as well as history and politics, the Capitol really has so much inspiration to offer, particularly in its floors and ceilings! But that’s true of a lot of places. Check out my nifty new flickr mosaic for some examples:

From L to R:

1. This is a bit of floor at the Basilica di San Pietro in Vaticano, on my honeymoon. (And, no, I did not spend my entire honeymoon at the Vatican. This was just a day trip.) The Basilica is decorated with many, many different depictions of keys, to represent Jesus’ having given Peter (San Pietro) the keys to heaven. Even though I am really not one for devotional crafting, I have always wanted to make a small quilt from this photo. For one thing, I always thought the keys to heaven were a beautiful idea, and, for another, there is so much art in Rome, and on such a grand scale, that, if I were to replicate anything I saw there, I’d want it to be something overlooked, like a section of the floor.

2. Once I had it in my head to make a quilt out of tiles, I started simple. And humble. This quilt is made up of a bunch of Amy Butler fabrics cut and pieced to replicate the floor pattern you’ll find at my local Una Mas.

3. Some year I will get around to turning this into a quilt, as well. It’s part of the floor on the second level the Small Senate Rotunda. There were lots more amazing tiles in areas of the buildings where photography is prohibited. Alas!

4. A gushfest over the Capitol would be incomplete without mention of the corridors painted by Constantino Brumidi! Brumidi was an Italian artist who so admired the United States that his dream was to come to Washington and decorate the Capitol. And he got to, for 25 years! It pays to have goals! His work is really breathtaking. I love this painting of the Committee of Five, and that it decorates the space above the meeting room of my very favorite Senate committee: The Committee on Foreign Relations.

5. & 6. A bit simpler are these tiles in the corridor connecting the House to the Senate, and I love how bold and graphic they look. I also liked the way my feet looked on them, and, if I decide to turn these photos into quilt blocks, I’ll have to get all Las Meninas and appliqué my shoes into the picture!

So what you’re saying is that by harmonizing all these different elements,
you’re creating kind of continuity in the piece?

– How to Make an American Quilt

Who remembers my recent log cabin post?

In which I made a log cabin block, and, in a fit of ambition, joined a log cabin challenge and swore I’d have a log cabin quilt, made up only of scraps, at the end of the year?

Well, I tried. I really did. I made the February block. And I didn’t like it.

So I made another February block. Once again, I did not like it.

I don’t know if I’m just short on the number of scraps required to make a log cabin block actually look like something other than a hot mess, or if I just don’t have an eye for the log cabin. But, I am, as they say, so over it.

Hambone asked me what I thought I was doing wrong. I told him that everything would look fine during assembly, but once I had two or three blocks, the whole thing would look messy and disjointed.

“I think all log cabin quilts look that way,” said Hambone.

“You do? Well then, to hell with log cabins!”

I value Hambone’s opinion in that, when I ask his advice on a quilt, he tends to point out something I haven’t thought of, and that leads me to make good decisions. Never mind that I usually do the opposite of what he suggests - it’s the discussion that matters, right?

So he was pretty shocked that I swore off log cabins then and there.

“You’re going to stop making a quilt because I don’t like log cabins?”

“No,” I said. “I’m going to stop because I don’t like the quilt. I’m not going to start again because there’s no point in making a quilt you’re not going to like. I can just make something else.”

By the way, I quite like what Jenna is working on at the moment. But I wouldn’t choose to make that myself, which is a pretty good indication of why the log cabin-along was a bad idea from the start. Every now and again, we quilters have to admit to ourselves that there is not time in a lifespan to make everything we might want to. It’s not a fun realization, but it is part of what makes a handmade item beautiful and special.

The original, cute block, by the way, was easy enough to make into a pillow, and is now on sale at Angelfish & Co. I may be a quitter, but I’m a resourceful quitter!

Why is Hatbox looking all, “OMGWTFBBQ?”

Could it be that The Total Love Quilt - yes, I started it so long ago, that the reference to Parappa the Rapper was still vaguely current - could have a cousin?

A CANINE cousin???

It’s FDR’s dog, you guys!!!

I may swoon. I may swoon until these are no longer on backorder!

I promise!