The Art of Homemaking

Welcome to our Home!  Can you believe that we've lived in 18 different houses in 22 years? One year we had to move three times! And not once did we have a budget for decorating.  I'm sure you are thinking...why bother if you have to move every year.  Well, we actually have stayed more than 1 year...sometimes 3 years. But each time we move into a new home, I have always felt that each room in that home was a 'palette' waiting for me to paint on.

   Until we moved to the country, our style  leaned towards formal, traditional or victorian.  My favorite look is English.  But my main approach to decorating, was to group like colors together to match whatever decor or paint color happened to be there already.  I've only painted a room once in all these years except to paint rooms white before we left to get our deposit back.  

I knew this was MY house the first time I walked in and saw the border of wolves, bears, and moose.  A little cliche I'm sure, but since I have so many quilts and paintings of cabins in the woods...it was absolutely perfect for me and not just a store bought copy to make a 'woodsy' look.

Here was the real problem though...we've always decorated English/Victorian!  Where was all this stuff supposed to go in my new 'country' home?!!  In the bedroom of course...but it's not just any bedroom now! We have three bookshelves in this room and a beautiful old 70's chandelier thanks to Angela Frye's dad!  It really is our get away.  Tim loves it too!  Every room in our 1600 ft house does double duty...so welcome to our library too!

Typically, I have a fall colors room, a pastel room  (hints of the country blue and pink days of the 80's), our favorite blue and burgandy color scheme, and sometimes a forest green/red. 
 

In my sewing room/computer room, I actually did something I wanted since it was our first time to actually BUY a home, so I made the room spring green with Beatrix Potter wall prints that I purchased because I love her art.   I wanted to have a garden feel to the room. and am hoping to have Laurie help me actually paint a room for the first time ever! 

At first, my sewing/computer room was all pastel blues because of the framed wedding heart that I have...a cross stitch by Tim's grandmother for our wedding, the baby quilt of Rebekahs and a huge beautiful impressionist print of the the beach and a flower garden.  But I was so tired of pastel blue that I finally took the print down.  

Our last home forced me into a PINK color scheme. Sigh... I discovered I had more pink or compatible to pink stuff than I thought. 

  Every house has some decorating scheme that I tend to fight or resist.  Cream wall paper with pink flowers all over it drove me crazy, but finally, I gave in and made it look like a tea room. 

Our bathrooms here are awful colors--hunter green and purple! How I fought it! I finally gave in and discovered I love deep purple rugs. 

I played up the white and purple in the guest bathroom but those Sante Fe style splotches on the wall drive me nuts!  I found a beautiful shower curtain with silk embroidered flowers on it, that almost made it seem 'planned'.  Now I like it a lot better! 

Each room has a few pieces of our favorite art but is also full of things people have given us over the years...gifts, giveaway items etc.  Very few things were bought on purpose. 

Occasionally, I'll buy a rug, or make a matching curtain.  But it takes very little to 'complete' my pictures.  I just have to be willing to shuffle everything around for the new house.  I wait for it to tell me how it should be decorated rather than insist it work the way the old house did. 

The kitchen has a lot of blue and white which made it hard to keep my fall colors theme.  But I have lots of retro and antique kitchen items. That made it a lot of fun!     The coffee pot and a teapot are both antique porcelain pots from Corningware with blue and white flowers which really works well in here.  

I got the the canisters for $5.00 at our local thrift store to match the counter tops.   Andrew and Ebeth gave me the rooster papertowel holder, and my dad, who loves to can, gave me jars of canned jalapenos.  They look awesome in here.  I'm 'warming up' to southwestern decor, however, I do have a beautiful chicken border which I have not  replaced the Sante Fe border with yet.  

  This hutch is an antique my mother came up with.  I have an English china tea set on it, and several items from Tim's trip to Poland, our trip through Holland on the way to Germany and a ruby red antique crystal bell.  Some other collectibles and an antique chocolate pot from Prussia (wedding gift to Tim's grandmother)  are on the top shelf and our gift wrapping supplies and candles are all tucked in the drawers, plus our art supplies.  I had not hung up the rooster in the corner yet in this picture. I was working on the entry way at the time. 

 The hutch is the first thing you see if you come in through the french glass doors from the deck into the kitchen.   It separates the kitchen from the sewing room.

My final challenge is the main entrance into the home, which is supposed to be in the front but ends up being on the side through the laundry room of all places.  I did my best to make it look hospitable inspite of the coats being the first thing to greet visitors.  I covered the laundry hamper with my grandma's heart quilt--kind of matches the coats don't you think?  I even hid the power box with a pretty calendar. 

Well, that's our home.  I hope you enjoyed my little tour!  I really was inspired years ago, by Edith Schaffer, in her book, "The Art of Homemaking" to make every part of my home a work of art.  I hope my blog helps to pass on that vision to the next generation of homemakers.  I love my job and love to share that enthusiasm with you.

Happy Homemaking!

Persian Rug Weaving

Have you ever wanted to make a Persian Rug?
Me neither!... at least not up until now. :o) An art teacher from Paces (Parent and Child Educational Services http://www.pacesinfo.org/), who knew I was interested in ethnic textile arts, told me that the one form of ethnic textile art no one ever does is Persian rug making. When I found out from researching Persian rug selling companies on the internet, that the authentic hand-knotted rugs take about an hour per inch to make by the best weavers, I thought...well no wonder!What crazy person would make a floor size rug at the rate of an hour per inch!!?? Well, as you probably know, if you know me at all...I am exactly that type of crazy. Except that I'm not about to make a floor size rug. I have some sanity after all. :o)
Well, I spent the next week and a half trying to figure out, via the web, how in the world you did such a thing. There was lots of info on weaving, but only poor resolution videos from companies who sell Persian or Turkish rugs of various Indian, Oriental, African, and Middle eastern men and women tying rugs at blinding speeds. It's rather difficult to figure this out by trying to watch moving blocks of poor grade movie when they won't even show a close up of their hands! I did find a drawing of a piece of yarn tied in a "persian knot" and a "turkish knot". This was info provided to customers to help them verify that their $2,000.00 (4'x9') to $10,000.00 (floor size) rug is actually authentic and quality.
Well, trying to learn Persian knot-tied rug making, is a lot like trying to learn how to make cheese, by first discovering you need to learn how to raise cows. I have a diagram of a knot and blurry video. So what to do first? Well the video shows them tying colored pieces of string on a floor loom. Occasionally they weave string back and forth, bang it with a comb, and then tie knot after knot, but I can't see how, though I can see sticks with 4-5 colors of yarn spooled on them dangling over their heads and it looks like they are using one of the spindles of yarn to tie the knots.

Well before I can even begin to try to figure out the little diagram of a turkish knot and how to tie it while leaving one end attached to the skein of yarn, I've got to learn how to weave. No problem of course!
And gee, where do I get a loom from? Oh my, well...there they are and boy are they expensive. Next question, do looms for weaving work the same way as a loom for making carpet? What is a shuttle anyway, or a heddle stick...warp?? weft?? If you can believe it, after nine days of sporadic searching in the wee hours, I did finally figure out how to make a homemade loom, from a picture frame of all things. My first efforts were a mess, but there are websites that teach how to do this on a small scale with minimal expense (my kind of art!!) though it took me a very long time to winnow them out of the mass of info out there! This evening, I'll upload links and step by step pictures (all 24 of them) for every part of this process from making the loom, to warping it, making or buying cheap tools (several from one 3' long ruler!).

I've even done some videos. I started with a 11 x 14" frame and have begun a nicer 26 x 24" frame. I'm in heaven!! This is oh so much fun, though I'm just learning the basics. My attempts at actual design are quite abstract at the moment. My diamonds look more like smudge lines, but the back looks pretty nice!

I hope you enjoy this learning process along with me.... with God's help and a big dose of 'can do attitude', I hope to learn this ancient art and actually produce something resembling a turkish rug (1-2 square feet of it) in time for next year's art show. I sure hope it works, but I'm having a blast learning how to do it.

Happy Persian rug making!!

Moonstones Won!

I'm so excited and pleased that Moonstones won the 3-dimensional division of the 2009 GCC artshow. Andrew's artwork is so amazing and unique. When I saw the watercolor that this one is based off of, I begged him to let me try to replicate it in cloth. I promised Andrew that if I made a hash of it, I wouldn't enter it. I'm glad the judges and my artsy friends liked it as much as I did!

Using the Kuna Indian's mola techniques and traditional reverse applique, I was able to do it. It has over 96 pieces and I limited the project to 32 colors. (Oh my!) Thank goodness for Batiks!! They are the only kind of cloth that will give the depth that a watercolor painting has. Normal cloth would have looked very plain and boring. The cigar lines has the Kuna Indians call them, are slits in the cloth pulled apart, turned under at the very edge and stitched down with teeny tiny applique stitches. It was actually intended to be flat...but I just can't resist making it three dimensional. It's like I crave the look and feel of depth and texture. I couldn't really quilt it in the traditional sense because it was too thick. I sort of 'stab' quilted it, but I needed to stitch down both sides of the white lines to keep the definition. It really helped the shapes to stand out.

Thanks to Margie Lawrence, who taught me needle-turn applique, I was able to tackle this project and do a barely creditable job of sewing. I kept hearing her voice saying..."Smaller stitches, Donna!". That was eight years ago! When I look close I feel so anxious about not having done a good enough job. Sigh...perfectionism rearing it's head. Next time, I'll work through the summer so I can go slower!

Even if I had not won, I would have been thoroughly happy...I knew that my artsy friends loved it and that was plenty enough reward for me! I feel like I know Andrew's painting inside and out after analyzing every color, shape, and nuance. Someday the world will appreciate his style as much as I do! Thanks Andrew--this would not have happened without you.

And thank you so much Shona, Shannon, Marcus, and Colleen for your encouragement and inspiration. Shona and Shannon especially have been assuring me that what I do is 'art'...after two winning entries...maybe I will begin to believe that I really am my 'father's daughter'. He is a wonderful artist and sculptor and I think I'm beginning to realize that I did inherit some of his talent. :o)

I can't wait for next year's show! Without the art show, I'd never have a deadline, or judges to give that feedback.


I also entered my Sunbonnet Sue quilt which is a gift for Lena and Elisabeth, my daughter-in-law. It didn't win, but that's ok...they like it and that's all that matters. Really, the wonderful thing about entering things like that, knowing they aren't particularly 'artsy' is the enjoyment they bring to others. We like to see each others work even if everything can't win! Everyone likes to ooh and aah over each other's creations. I'm always so amazed at the art our church turns out...even the kids' work is astonishing!

Floo-floo Journal Covers

I have to let you in on a secret addiction.....Journals!! I love them even though I never write in a journal...at least not like a diary. But I often need to write things down...lists, songs, poems, lists, sermon notes, measurements for a quick alteration for someone at church. I love planning on paper. I just can't do it on the computer.

One day a couple of months ago, I was feeling like I needed a little 'cheerer upper' and having no available funds to 'buy' something, thought...hmmm...maybe I could make something with all my scraps around the house.

I have a favorite journal that Kristy Bailey and her daughters made that is a composition book covered in chicken paper with an orange spine. (They know I love chickens!) Well it was falling apart and I needed a replacement.

And here it is... of course..one thing leads to another!


The pictures look like they aren't square but they really are perfectly fitting to the standard composition book. The bottom one doesn't have the book in it though. It stretches a little so the cover fits snug.

We made a all purple one for Rebekah's friend, Laura Strack, and a mini covered book to match. The little one is the perfect size to carry in a purse.

Rebekah's black journal cover is sleeker looking. She doesn't like floo-floo which is hard for me to comprehend. For our church craft sale, I plan to make quite a few with tapestry covers that have less floo-floo, but plenty of texture. With all the costumes I have made, I have lots of left over cloth like that.This one really is a little wider at the end. I tried to do some top stitching but it made it bulkier. The ones I sell will have all the kinks worked out. I have to learn by doing and that was a mistake I won't make twice. :o)

I also have made some fake leather ones in tan and plan to do some black velvet and brown suede ones as well.

New Projects I'm working on

Lena's quilt is almost done! Then I will be able to finish Brenan's quilt. I hope to enter this in our church art show this Oct. 31. You can see my earlier work on just the blocks on older posts.
This is my other entry for the art show. It is a 3 dimensional rendering of Andrew Rieth's water color painting. He painted the piece on an 8x11 piece of paper and I blew it up with a copier to 18 x 24". I'm using reverse applique and layering techniques of the Kuna indians to sew the designs. I'm using trapunto techniques and boutis to stuff each part of the picture though not all the pieces have been stuffed yet in this picture. In fact, this is only about a 1/3 of the whole piece.
This is a mock up (just folded cloth and cut outs of horses trees and fence posts) of a wall hanging that I'm going to do, on commission, for the Spendlove's new home. The mountains and hills certainly won't be so pointy and I'm buying special batiks with some artwork already printed on them for the mountains, sky, and pasture.

I always said that when the kids grew up, I was going to do custom wall hangings for people, as a home business. I discovered, a few years ago, that I was pretty good at designing cloth pictures when I was doing row quilts where each woman traded quilts for a year and worked on each other's quilts. Shannon Mucha said..why wait? I asked my dear hubby about it the next day and he said wondered how I would find a 'client'. I told him not to worry. I was sure the Lord would bring someone along who needed something new and original. How ironic it is that we were having this discussion on the way to help paint trim on our friends' new home. Gee...I wonder who needs a new piece of wall art? Hmm...Can you believe that it really didn't occur to me until I was on the floor painting trim to ask Kim if she needed anything? Voila..my new home business is born! Of course this is very much just a starting place.

I've done lots of custom projects over the years: baby quilts where they just told me, "we like these colors, and want this theme etc."banners for various ministries, and themed quilts to give as gifts to friends and family. I not only get good ideas for designing these, but also, have learned so many techniques for quilting, applique, embroidery, and beading, that I can do just about anything I can imagine. So the Spendloves agreed to commission my first one. Hurrah!


Kim wanted three main colors--the ones they painted most of their main living areas with: Deep purple, tan, and a darkish spring green. They had no art work to go with the new colors they painted with--she just loves those colors. The theme will be the Colorado Rockies.

We will add a pieced border (herringbone pattern) and possibly a scripture border on the bottom. I don't think she wants any rows of quilt blocks added, just the picture and border. I'm pretty good at lettering too which is fun. I have tons of experience with banners and even do soft sculpture. I may try to work that into her wall hanging as well as embellishments for the pasture. It may end up being about 4 x6' since they have a very large living room wall opposite the fire place, because they have a vaulted ceiling. It will be fun to see where we end up!

Summer Sewing Class

Meagan Brenon and Sarah Parlin-- Brand new seamstresses!
Introducing Sarah Parlin and Meagan Brenon, my newest sewing students. They both wanted to learn to sew and picked out summer jumpers. In these pictures, we were halfway done with their dresses. We are working at the Parlin's house because we did a little swimming before class. Most of the time, they drive out to my house.


Sarah is sewing ruffled tiers for the bottom of her jumper--quite a challenge for a new seamstress!

Meagan sews beautifully straight seams on her jumper...long seams need lots of pins!!


Sarah sews the tiers to the bottom edge of the jumper.Meagan sews the straps to the back of her dress.

Mrs. Rodgers supervises the sewing at her house--"Watch those seam lines girls!"
Sarah likes sewing, I think!

Shannon, Sarah's mom, is a great teacher's helper--but is taking a break--for just a minute of course!
Meagan likes sewing too!


Ta Da!! Here the girls are in their beautiful jumpers! Great job girls! Keep sewing!

Yes..of course I sew my own clothes!

A good friend, and fellow seamstress recently asked me, "Do you ever sew your own clothes?" We see each other at church every week and she had seen the banners, quilts and other projects I had done, but didn't realize I wore home sewn clothes all the time. I never thought to mention it--Ha! So here they are, Trudy! Enjoy!

I really needed some new clothes for this summer, so in early spring I bought a bunch of clearance cloth to make things I could wear in the heat. ( I hate the heat!!) The blouse pattern had six different variations. This is one of them. The capris are made of white cotton twill.


This blouse pattern had a yoke that I really liked and using the crinkle cloth (on clearance-- yea!) was a challenge, but worth it. I made the capris out of soft stretch denim.

I love fall and this crinkled gauze-like cloth with jungle print made the perfect fall skirt. I made it last year. The brown crinkle blouse that I made recently, goes very well with it.

I made this skirt (not the blouse) after teaching our church girls (10 of them) to sew skirts. I like the idea of buying really beautiful cloth to make a simple but elegant skirt. This cloth is rayon and drapes very nicely.

Rebekah and I stocked up on summer patterns for a $1.00 each in February, and it sure paid off this summer. I love this new style of blouse! It has a little split V at the top that you can't see very well in the picture.

I made this skirt almost three years ago for a trip to Hawaii--wore it to a Luau! It is my very, very favorite skirt. It is made of batik cotton of verigated green with a pretty embroidered pattern all over it. The skirt works fine for square dancing too, since I don't like wearing all the petticoats--way to hot!

The blouse I made a year ago with eyelet trim for square dancing--my new favorite hobby. It's handy because I can thread any color ribbon I like through the collar and then add bows to match whatever skirt I happen to be wearing that night.

This was my first 'stylish' blouse with the baby doll style. Rebekah encouraged me to break out of my standard t-shirt and blue jeans and try some new things about a year ago, so we decided to make matching pink and brown polka dot blouses. That fabric was decidely NOT clearance--but cute! Thanks Rebekah! I also made a second pair of capris in a soft stretch denim.

I really wanted a denim skirt to wear around the house with t-shirts, so I made this A-line out of the rest of the soft denim I got last spring. The blouse is purchased. (The pink flip flops were supposed to go with the polka dot blouse.)

I've made other things, vests, skirts, and a beautiful renaissance dress, but I don't have the time to post them right now--I'm about to start another sewing class!

Hair Cutting Lessons - Home Ec 102!

Ruffled Skirts and Ribbon flowers

Here's a cute project for Spring!
If you are following my blog and recognize these dresses, please don't mention it to the family who wore them as I wanted it to be an anonymous gift. I know hardly anyone is checking this blog. :o) Making skirts from cotton krinkle cloth makes a nice skirt with so little effort! I used a ruffler foot to gather these layers of a tiered skirt and a rolled hem foot to do the hem for each layer. It took quite a bit of practice to learn how to use the sewing feet which can be purchased at any sewing store. The ruffler foot costs 30.00--ouch! But we make a lot of square dance clothes, so it was worth it. (You could use a coupon at Hancocks to get 40% off.) Also, great for curtains and anything else you want a ruffle on.

This was so easy! I bought the beautiful scalloped cloth on clearance last summer. No hemming required! I roll hemmed the upper edge and than gathered the ruffle and then sewed it onto the bottom of an inexpensive baby t-shirt.
I had made yo-yo flowers before but found another neat way to do these flowers quickly. Just make a quick basting stich along the upper edge of a 12" strip of grosgrain ribbon, pull the loose ends to gather and then tie in a knot to make the circle. Then stitch it down really good, especially if it's for small children. I pinned the rickrack in place then topstitched it to hold it. The leaves were difficult. I had to fraycheck the whole leaf to keep it from coming apart. Grossgrain ribbon is not good for this! I pinked the edges and then zigzagged the leaves on to applique them to the shirt. I also decorated a cheap canvas tote bag with these flowers--so cute!! and quick! The blouses were on sale at Walmart and cost very little and coordinated very nicely with the krinkle cloth skirts.

Covering a Couch Cushion

This was a fun project! I recovered a bay window cushion for a friend. Here is one end view. I'll post a picture of the cushion wrong side out later so you can see how I did it.
1.The first step is to seam rip the whole original cover apart.
2. I used the pieces as a pattern to lay out on the new cloth.
3. I saved the zipper and piping to reuse. The hard part is figuring out how wide to cut the side strip to reapply the piping. I measured out a strip that was the width plus 2" each for the upper and lower piping. You can take up any excess by folding it behind the piping and into the seam allowance. That allows for a perfect fit.


Adding the zipper was a bit of challenge. But not too hard.

This was the most difficult part..pinning and then sewing around tight thick corners.

Right end of cusion.

Left side. To smooth the ends, you can tuck in strips of batting. I didn't want to make it so tight that I couldn't get the cushion back in!