I'm headed out of town again, but this time, its 100% for fun and only for a very short spell.
As a quilter and stitcher, you know that it's important to be well-prepared with plenty to work on while you're away! I always bring more than enough to work on, but this time I have the luxury of traveling by car, so there's always room to throw in one more sack of goodies.
For riding shot-gun, I've loaded up this Molly Maker bag, personally crocheted and assembled by my dear friend Joan Hawley.
During the pandemic, Joan and I had an on-going challenge to see who was ordering more stuff online. If a couple days went by without a package delivered to the door, it was inevitably time to order . . . something!
She got on a jag making these beautiful bags from her own Molly Maker pattern, she crocheted the front and back panels, then followed the pattern to line the bag with cotton and complete it, complete with snap closures and faux leather handles.
I feel so very fortunate to have been gifted one of these special bags from Joan's family after her passing. It's like she's traveling with me and I can share the journey with her. She has already been to New York City and back with me! She can't wait to go to Hawaii, too!
Aside from some easy stitching packed away in Molly, I'm also taking a bunch of Heart Fulls ornaments to work on.
There's a little something at every stage of the process stuffed into this vinyl pouch. That cardinal design isn't quite ready as a pattern yet, but it's coming soon! And the Paw Print pattern was released just this past week. The adorable blue puppy print is from my personal stash.
And, again, because, I'm traveling by car, I'm taking my full collection of stitchy threads in every color of the rainbow. These 12-weight threads are tidy and easy to access in a wooden shaker basket.
I have a separate box of 5-wt perle cottons. Can't leave them behind!
Can't leave behind some of my favorite tools either. . . special thimble, clips, finger cots, and this new-to-me gadget from Quilters Select. It's a self-erase marker. (Ask for them at your local quilt shop!)
It makes a nice thick line and applies easily with ink that disappears quickly - no need to rinse or scrub the lines away. I ran into a little challenge using the marker on wool. . .I needed to blot the markings afterwards. The wool didn't absorb the ink as thoroughly as with cotton. And it disappeared pretty quick, so I got right down to stitching. You can see the marking before, then after on another coming-soon Heart Fulls pattern called Sunbeam. (The stitch is called Portuguese Knotted Stem Stitch - you can find a tutorial for this stitch in the stitch library.)
Okay. I think I'm all packed and ready to go.
Wait . . . Might be a good idea to pack some clothes! Or not, there must be some shops where I'm headed, right?
Happy Stitching!
Head Hummingbird
Hummingbird-Highway.com
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