Block Swap Basket

I’ve been participating in the Block Swap Adventure for 2 months now.  So far, it’s been tons of fun for me—I have done two blocks that I probably never would have ventured to make for myself.  The first was extremely difficult for me and involved lots of triangles and matching up seams.  This last one was a lot more my ability level.  My partner, Sunni (also from Maryland), requested any kind of basket block.  It didn’t even need to be on point or on a specific background color.  Her only specification was no bright colors.  Color choice is a bit subjective, so I hope I hit the mark for subdued or muted colors.

My daughter Bea and I had a blast picking out fabrics and she even helped trace the flowers.  We used templates from Eleanor Burns’s Magic Vine book, which I highly recommend.  Her directions are always so clear and each flower has a little story behind it.  At first I thought I’d make yo-yos with the makers I bought but never used, but after a long car trip perusing the Magic Vine book, I decided to do applique.

I ended up doing a machine blanket stitch around the basket and then I used a pretty dense zig-zag around all the flower parts.  I am hesitant to use a satin stitch because I’ve have had problems with my machine getting stuck in places and making a huge thread ball.  I own a Janome 6600 and really love it, except for this fact.  I don’t have any other problems doing anything, and it’s probably user error anyway:)  I tried out the clasp stitch to make the center of this flower.

We had such a good time that Bea made her own flower block:

And, I’d been dying to use my 20% off Joanns coupon that came to my email inbox on Friday morning.  I didn’t really have any reason to go to Joanns, but when I ran out of blue thread and also needed a green and orange, I just had to go.  Baby Veronica helped me do my shopping and I ended up almost breaking the bank when I checked out.  All the home decor weight fabric was on sale for $7 a yard, so I got a couple to make my girls library bags.  I saw a cute library tote on someone’s blog recently and thought I’d make one for each of them.  I got some fusible fleece which I’ve never used before, but I’m going to try it as interfacing for these bags.  I also got lining fabric I will use to make an outside pocket for their library card and put their initial on it.  At least that’s the plan…