Red Shawls

Fitting the holiday theme, I recently finished two red shawls.  The first one was a UFO that I'd knitted half of and recently picked up and finished.  The pattern is Gaskell by Sarah Jordan.  It's a very warm garter stitch shawl knit from side to side.  It's the perfect shawl for wearing around the house.

I was on looking for a shawl with pockets to knit for my mom when I found the Contralto Shawl, a vintage pattern available free on line.

It has beautiful cables and is also knit from side to side.

Many of the other pocket shawl patterns I'd seen were very plain, but his one has pizzaz.

 I love this barn red color, just what we need during the long dark (and rainy) days of winter.

Happy Holidays to all, and good health and happiness in 2015!

Two More from the Vault

I've got two more fully completed quilts!  The first one, Wheel of Fortune, was a long-term project.

Contemporary machine quilting was done by Debra Dixon, whose work is high quality, quick, and reasonably priced.

This detail shows the blocks that are featured in my blog header, as well as the straight-line quilting.

I found this great flannel for the back.

It's lovely and squishy and it now lives in my home office.  I need a bit of visual excitement when I'm working in there sometimes.

The second finish is of a UFO from LONG ago.  When I first started quilting about 15 years ago I pieced these blocks and hand quilted the entire center of the quilt

When it came time to quilt the borders I ran out of enthusiasm.  When I pulled out this quilt recently I had half made up my mind to throw it out, because I had no intention of finishing the hand quilting.  But, hey, I thought, I have machines that do that.

Sure enough, the machine quilted borders are just fine for this quilt.  I still like the graphic design, and now it's fully quilted and bound. 

Cleaning up my UFOs has left me all kinds of mental and physical storage space for projects for the new year.

A Finished Quilt

 

After many pauses and hibernations, my butterfly quilt is bound and on the bed.

Getting my UFOs finished up has been made easier by the machine quilting of my pal Debra Dixon.  She does lovely contemporary machine quilting for a reasonable price, and her turn-around times are very good.  Thanks to her quilting know-how, I've only got one unfinished top hanging in my closet right now, and that will be the next one to go to Debra.

 She can be reached through her blog Debra Dixon Design, and through her Facebook page.

I love the way these colors cheer up my room, especially during the dark winter days.

I think my slow creative process has paid off.