For one brief shining moment...

...there was actually something like Cleanliness and Order in my sewing room. I've been clearing out my stash and classifying/putting away the pile of Things I Don't Know What to Do With that had gradually engulfed the cutting table, the little table beside it, and was encroaching upon the sewing machine table beside that. The Elder Spawn is planning a yard sale and was happy to carry away 2 large boxes of fabric and 3 bags of yarn; that helped considerably. Anyway, today I was feeling almost-done... and then I got ambitious. "That quilt I started yonks ago and got stuck on... the pieces and possible trims are filling up two big plastic boxes. I really ought to toss it and put away the fabric and then I'd be able to get, say, the two boxes of silk scraps off the floor and into the closet."

Well, whaddaya know, I'm not "stuck" any more. I've been happily stitching down cheesecloth "hair" on the floating figure.

A bit of background: this piece was inspired by a WWI poster based on the sinking of the Lusitania and a poem by Elinor Wylie. I'll spare you the poem (for now) but here's a scan of the poster:



So, you see, the "hair" has to look as though it's floating. I'm reasonably happy with the result:



And sewing is a LOT more fun than folding fabric and deciding what to do with various odds and ends.

And now my cutting table looks like this:



But there was that moment, earlier today, when the table was actually clear of everything but a cutting mat, a ruler, an iron, and the box for Mistyfuse scraps.

I should have taken a picture.

Defining the SolvyLace border

So far we've been making ragedy-edged bits of SolvyLace that are fine for making bowls, or appliqueing to a solid fabric to make an interesting base for embroidery, or setting a lacy window insert into a dress or a quilt. But suppose you want to use the SolvyLace on its own - for a scarf, for instance? You might trim the edges with a rotary cutter and hope they stay even. You might bind the trimmed edges to make sure they stay even.

Or - and this is my preferred method - you might start making your Solvy sandwich by laying down a wide ribbon all around the outer edge, and then make sure your stitching goes into the ribbon so that it'll be well anchored to the rest of the grid.



That's how I bordered this sample, as well as the "Jewel" scarf to be seen here.

And that, I think, is quite enough variations on the Solvy sandwich; and a good time to end the series, because tomorrow and Thursday I'll be out of town.