A stroll through the (Pop) Garden

Sure is nice to be back in this comfortable space. I spent a lot of time last week sprucing up the shop (not quite done yet, but it’s a start), and making a handful of small improvements to the book store as well. It was good to take a little blogging break. I can tell that it was good, because I didn’t really miss it until today. I didn’t feel the pull to sit down and share anything, and had I forced myself to do so anyway, I would likely have churned out pointless drivel.

I’m not entirely sure I have a point to make today, but I do feel like writing, so that’s something.

I got reaquainted with my sewing machine yesterday, and spent some time doing fabric-ey things. It started with a stroll through the garden – Heather Bailey’s new Pop Garden collection, that is.  I bought a “layer cake,” which is a stack of 10-inch squares, one for every pattern in the collection.  It’s a great way to see every print up close without spending a fortune, and those squares can then be used for small projects.  I plan to turn some of them into patchwork scarves.  Others seem to want to be handkerchiefs – the rose prints, in particular.  Hopefully this week, I’ll get some quality clay time, in which to make some buttons to match this collection.  Then I may proceed with Project Pop Garden Patchwork Scarves.

Speaking of scarves, I did manage to make one this weekend.  Remember when I mentioned finding fabrics to match my Tweed color scheme?  Well, I did make a bag out of them as I’d planned, but it was a new design of my own, and enough of a failure that I didn’t bother to share it here.  The leftover pieces didn’t go to waste, though.  There was enough left for two patchwork scarves, one of which I made yesterday as a birthday gift for my cousin (Hi, Kathy! – the only member of my family to regularly read my blog) and another which is not yet complete, but will soon be added to the shop.

I’ve since found out that this fabric is from the Zenith collection by Kathy Hall.  And I know where to get more, should it become necessary to make more of these.  You know.  In case I decide I need to keep one for myself.  This is Kathy’s scarf I’m trying on here, but I think these colors would look really nice with my tan winter jacket…  Heh.