La Flor de la Nochebuena

I just put the final stitches into this oooold UFO. She's the sister my Fall Madonna, and here and here are some of the process photos, jeez, from 2010.

I got stuck with this piece because I felt like the Madonna looked like she was floating in space.  Easy fix: I extended the poinsettia swag under her.

This piece is built on a vintage napkin, and features, broiderie perse, silk ribbon embroidery, and lots of beads.   The embellished lace circle represents the new moon.

I had to add a bird.

 The Virgin's beaded skirt references the Mexican national costume, and the poinsettia is native to Mexico, and a flower associated with winter.  La Flor de la Nochebuena, the title of this quilt, comes from one of the Spanish names for this flower, which literally means Christmas Eve Flower.

I have been saving this backing and binding fabric of gold poinsettias for a long time.  The quilt is labelled, like lots of my other quilts, with a vintage doily.

Many blessings in 2014 to all.  I'm relieved to begin the new year with one less unfinished project.

Using My Powers for Good

 

 A student of mine in an intern at a center for youth, and she's asked for outerwear for the kids she's working with.  I decided to make up some hats, the first batch is made of bulky yarn from the Rockstar pattern.

 

I got a little bored and so switched to Keiyla's Basic Beanie and broke out some scraps.   This runs a bit big if you want to knit for someone with a bigger head.  Both patterns are free on line.

 Continuing the children's clothes-making for Debra's project, I sewed up this size 6 dress.

Contrasting facing makes for a fun deail.

 Instead of gathering the fabric for a ruffle, I stitched on some eyelet, so the finishing was super fast.

 

After this my Janome had a bit of a meltdown, and I had to take it to the repair shop.  This gave me the chance to dust off one of my old Singers, the 301 and to oil it up to sew a couple of pairs of shorts I'd cut out.  Boy the stitch on these old machines is a thing of beauty.

Toasty

We're doing what we can here to stay toasty.  The temperatures have been very cold all week: down to the mid-20s overnight, and barely scratching 40 degrees during the day.  I  wanted some long fingerless gloves to keep my wrists warm, so I knit these up from a partial ball of worsted weight wool

The pattern Toasty, is free on line.  I added ribbing to make it fit more snugly, and I'm thinking of adding some crewel embroidery.

I finished the scarf/shawl I was weaving from self-striping sock yarns on my rigid heddle loom.  Here you see it before I twisted the fringes and wet blocked it.

I also used a fine yarn with tiny sequins, which you can see in this photo.  Note to self:  in the future save any yarns that might snag in the heddles for the weft only.  I like how it looks, but it was slow going easing those sequins out of the heddles.

It's too cold to do much in the way of outdoor activities, so I'll warp up  another shawl.  I'm learning a lot about what yarns do best in the warp, so this next one should be smooth sailing.