I am not a fan of winter.
December gets a tiny bit of a pass, because people put fairy lights up and there’s celebrations and the solstice comes and goes and we all just try to get through the darkness as best we can. For reasons that elude me, though, we then take??? down??? the lights??? in January and February, when everything is dark and dreary and cold and wet and gray. Regardless, my goal in winter is to stay warm (I get cold easily and I’m solar-powered) and stay cozy.
In 2020 my local yarn and fabric shop received a new quilting fabric collection, as they are wont to do, and I was sewing a lot of masks, because it was 2020. And I really liked the fabric from that collection. Two yards was enough for two masks, two placemats, and two coasters, and lo, they were pleasing to me. It was a good amount of visibility and use for that fabric I loved. But it was not enough. So I bought the entire collection as a 10″ layer cake (precut squares) and additional yardage in plain red. I then added enough of my favorite print to serve as the backing. In flannel.
If it surprises you that the stash had to age a bit before I could sew it up, then you don’t know me very well. But eventually, in October-ish of this year, I got to work. I picked a fairly simple pattern because a) I don’t quilt much and I didn’t want a lot of fuss and b) I wanted to show off the fabrics. The pattern is the Salt Air Lattice Quilt by Mommy by Day, Crafter by Night. The top went together easily, although not perfectly, and my seamlines didn’t always meet where they should have. I’m pretty sure I misunderstood the instructions somewhere, but it doesn’t matter. This is for Cozy, not for Show.
I always get intimidated by putting together the “quilt sandwich” of top, batting, and backing. This is mainly because most of the instructions assume you have a large, hard-floored space to do it on. It’s very important to get the quilt sandwich smoothed out of any wrinkles; it’s this step where you baste it (temporarily attach the layers with either pins or spray adhesive) before quilting. I’ve got a sufficiently-sized floor area, but it’s on carpet. I’ve basted quilts on a wall before, but I couldn’t find my painters tape. Eventually I decided just to do it on the carpet anyway. I had to work around a wonky section of the carpet, but in the end it worked just fine. I used spray adhesive because pins are really annoying.
Quilting was very straightforward. I used my walking foot and followed the seamlines. Again, the quilting lines are not perfect, and again, it doesn’t matter. I used a green flannel for the binding and hand-stitched it down. I also embroidered a label and hand-stitched that down.
The quilt has since been undergoing a very rigorous testing process.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have some cozy-ing to do.
P.S. I also knitted these tiny Weasley sweater ornaments for all the new pets this year. I’ve been doing these for family members and very close friends since 2011, and these five will bring me up to a lifetime total of 39 tiny sweaters. They take me about 45 minutes to make and I knit them out of either City Tweed DK or Wool of the Andes Tweed from Knitpicks, then duplicate-stitch the initials. The pattern/instructions I use are here (Ravelry link—please contact me if you would like the pattern without going to Ravelry.)
Caroline M. Steele 