Car Projects and Other Small Commitments

Car projects are always hot for me. I have two toddlers and a temporary house (we moved in a year and a half ago and won’t finish building our new home for another year and a half… can a three-year house really count as temporary?) so I don’t have the time and space for my usual quilting.

A great portable roadtrip project

I have wool appliqué quilt blocks (from a Quiltmaker magazine project) that I started on the way to a Las Vegas tradeshow and worked on heading south en route to the grandparents in Los Angeles and north to my brother’s house in Chico. That counts as quilting, although I don’t intend to sew them together (I ended up not being wowed by my felt color selections).

I have a long series of other crafts I’ve taken up to keep me busy on the miles of empty highway on California’s I-5. Knitting, crepe paper flowers, Felt Wee Folk (from Salley Mavor‘s Felt Wee Folk). On a trip to the wine country, I even made a Felt Wee Folk bride and groom (complete with top hat for him and beaded veil for her) for one C&T editor’s wedding cake.

But I miss quilting. While I usually make large quilts (I have a long arm so I love making bed-size quilts), I’m really starting to think small. As in miniatures. That might be a way to limit my commitment in terms of time and space. We have a couple of books coming out in Spring that just might save my sanity. (Because I often deal with spreadsheets and schedule databases during the workday, I really need the creative outlet.)

January we are releasing Miniatures in Minutes by Terrie Sandelin. I can chose from 24 paper-pieced projects that use just one foundation each. That sounds like something I can get interrupted during and still not mess it up.

In February, Mary Kay Mouton’s Flip Flop Paper Piecing hits the stores. That one isn’t miniature specific but the foundations and her technique are perfect for tiny and accurate blocks.

Both books and their projects seem very exciting and very contained… If I set up on part of the dining room table, who will complain? We don’t eat there often, anyway. And because in my temporary house I’m temporarily not unpacking my fabric stash (which is housed in more than 60 moving boxes), I can visit the local quilt shops to buy little charm packs and fat quarters!

I’m thinking small. This could work.