Colour continued

Last year I finished the Southampton Blanket. This was my ongoing and relatively undemanding crafty thing that came with me every time I packed up my little suitcase and my car and headed off to the Premier Inn at Southampton for work. That blanket is now finished and lives on my bed and a new blanket is in progress. Just as before this one comes with me on my travels to while away time in hotel rooms. My ideal project for this is that it is easy to pick up and put down and doesn't require a lot of concentration to do. The pattern for this blanket caught my attention on the Stitches Galore blog. It's a perfect project for my travels. It uses beautiful Shetland wool from Jamieson's and you simply work your way through the shade card. Totally relaxing as someone else has made the colour choices for you! I also have to work s-l-o-w-l-y with this project as the wool is expensive so I can only afford to buy a batch every now and then. At the moment I'm just moving from browns to yellows.

This is a real education to me as none of these are my colours of choice - blues, reds, purples and greens are far more my thing. However I am pleasantly surprised by how much I like these colours and also how they are affected by what is next to them.

The blanket I am making is for a double bed. The width is no problem as the pattern is easy and very repetitive. It's all made up of treble crochet with regular decreases and increases to form the chevron pattern. I think the pattern is in The Gentle Art of Knitting by Jane Brocket. On the Stitches Galore blog there is also a blanket done in a ripple crochet pattern, the pattern for which can be found on the Attic 24 blog.

There is nothing very creative about my blanket - but it is pure crafty relaxation. All my creative energies are going into a quilt I'm designing and making - which is still quite a new thing for me ... more of that soon.

New year plans

The arrival of the new year used to make me feel really apprehensive - a whole year for unexpected things to happen - a huge stretch of time which might be filled with good things but might also be filled with difficult things too. Too long to contemplate and not really a reason to celebrate. My reaction to new year has always surprised me as I am generally very optimistic - but recently I have learned just how to deal with it. Not for me the lists of things that have happened over the past 12 months nor the resolutions. I just take it as another day. So tonight I am not out merry making - in fact I have just spent a couple of hours free motion quilting. Today is simply 31st December - nothing special. There is one bit of new year I love though - the early morning of new year's day  - out in the garden ......so quiet ....when everyone else is still asleep ...

But....I do have one new year plan and this is to finish the quilt you see above on my washing line. And in the not too distant future. I have been trying to get a photo of the quilt top for ages, and between the storms which are chasing through the UK at the moment I caught a moment of the dying light and snapped this. It still doesn't really do the colours justice, but I do love the way they are highlighted by the bricks of our outhouses behind.

This quilt is part of the process of me learning about colour. I bought a pack of Kaffe Fassett squares in yellow, orange and brown knowing I would not usually choose these colours and almost daring myself to use them. This half log cabin quilt is the result. The pattern is inspired by Jane Brocket's Purple Rain Quilt. In a way I have cheated because although I have substantially added to the fabrics in the pack I just chose more of the same from the Kaffe Fassett collective following their yellow, orange and brown grouping. I haven't followed any special pattern for putting the blocks together, or even the strips within the blocks as you can see below

So now I need to get on with some piecing and then decide on a backing fabric. If I go for a Kaffe Fassett backing, which I probably will, I will order it from the US as the price is so much less than the UK ( $10.00 per yard compared to £13 per metre which is a big difference over the 5 or 6 yards I will need, even with customs and postage) so that may be a slight delay. But surely, ... surely I can get it done for Spring?

So that's the plan - definitely not a resolution, but just something nice to look forward to!

Colour

Two years ago I went to a two day colour workshop with Emma King and Sarah Hazell based on their book 'Exploring Colour in Knitting'. Although it was focused on using colour in knitting  we talked a lot about colour in a wider senses and how to use it. I must admit I had not really given how I used colour in my crafts much serious thought until then. I knew what I liked and what I didn't, but tended to pick wool and fabric just on instinct. Attending the workshop didn't change how I thought miraculously overnight, but it did make me start to think bit by bit about how I used colour in what I made. These two cushions above are an illustration of one of my first attempts at playing with colour. They are made from a needlepoint pattern adapted from this book

It's very simple and just requires you to stitch in colour blocks of  7x7 stitches framed in a grid of a single colour. I based my colour choices for the cushion at the back of the sofa on one of my favourite plants from my garden.

Now this all sounds very artistic - realistically this was an inspiration, not a lot more, as I was struggling to buy tapestry wools using internet colour charts or nipping into Hobbycraft between appointments and guessing what colours I needed. I soon worked out I should have made a 'shade card' of colours I had used already to help me buy new ones. But even with these practical limitations I think the cushions turned out well and I do love them for being all my own choices.

I'm less confident with my quilts, but improving. Initially my favourite quilts have been those made with a fabric pack like this, where I have used a jelly roll so I am sure that the colours will go well together ( Fabric: Mama Said Sew from Moda, Pattern: Garden Trellis by Pam and Nicky Lintott).

However, I am gradually getting more confident about fabric choices and have just completed a quilt top with my own colour choices which I really like. Unfortunately I can't show it to you just yet as it is a gift for an occasion next year - but let's hope it is the first of many. 

I feel quite excited at the possibilities - and if there is the odd mistake along the way - well maybe that's just part of the learning process.