Got a New Baby

I've been away from the blog for a while, I admit. It's a mixture of post-big-project let-down and the fact that I've been getting ready for a summer teaching job (very exciting!) I've Assisted the Wearable Arts class at the Uarts Summer Institute several times in the past, but now I actually get to teach my own version of the course as an evening elective. I'm a little nervous to be honest, and scrambling to get my syllabus and supply lists ready.

In other exciting news I have a new baby:
My old iron spat out some awful rust water right out onto one of my nice shirts, and I finally decided that was the last straw. It had really been broken for a while, the dial had snapped off months ago so the temperature was impossible to control. This one works so nicely, but I do need to get used to the weight of it.
I also did a silly project. I found a bedazzler long ago, and had yet to use it, so I jazzed up this plain white shirt just a little bit.
I'm also continuing to add leather here, although I've put the project aside for the time being.
And I think once I'm done with all the leather braid I'm going to use some metallic threads to sort of sashiko quilt the whole thing together.
I've also restarted the coif project with the varieted white recycled yarn. This time I sort of knotted and felted the ends of the short strands together, it seems to be working out. I'm rushing this so I can dye it while I have studio access.
I'm hoping that dying it gray will preserve the nice variation in colors.

After Three Years!

It's finished! The t-shirt quilt I started back in the summer of 2008 is piece, tied, and bound. It's a trip going back and seeing the pictures of a few little blocks. The whole thing really started because I was making altered t-shirts for the Punk Rock Flea Market, and I had lots of scraps. Now it's a beast of a blanket!
It's super heavy and soft--there's a whole old comforter in there! And the multicolored tying just adds to it's obnoxious colorfulness.
I actually spent some time on my Tumblr seeing if I could find a more awfully bright quilt, and so far I haven't. So this may well be the most awfully bright, obnoxious quilt out there.
The back is also pretty enjoyable, with the little colorful stitches all over. I know tying is not usually done so close together, but I like the way it looks and feels.
So thick!

Anyway, I'm just glad to finally have this piece incorporated into something useful, and not just taking up space on my shelves. Feels good. I like making my weirder garments too, but sometimes it's so satisfying to be left with something you can really use all the time.

Tying it Together

The borders are on and the t-shirt quilt is laid out for tying!
Underneath this layer is an old comforter, and the bottom layer is a black jersey sheet.
I bought one of those party packs of embroidery floss and cut lengths of it to tie with--I've already gone through that whole bunch and cut another. The curved needles have been invaluable to the process.
I'm just going with random selection for the ties. The whole thing is pretty offensively colorful anyway, so I'm going whole hog.
I love I can get up so close with my new camera!
And it actually looks pretty nice on the back too! I'm definitely tying it much closer together than it strictly needs, but I like the sturdiness and pattern of it. Only problem is that it's taking a pretty long time.

Sleeves and Cuffs

Real short update today. The quilt's borders are all on, no picture though, since it looks pretty much the same as the last picture, just with the border on all four sides. Hoping that I can get down to the store to get a backing on Friday.

And I've been busy at work on the jacket, it's just a little slow going.
I'm focusing on the sleeves and shoulders now, then probably the front closure area, then the back. It's getting pretty clear that I need more leather though...
Pinning the cuff on to see how it looks with the rest of the sleeve. It hangs loose really nicely when I tried it on--has a nice weight to it.