THINK SPRING 2!

As I get up this morning to it being zero out side yet again, I am still determined to think Spring.  The extended forecast tells me it is not going to get above freezing any time this week.  Once again, I dig a nice floral fabric out of my stash to make a Spring like fabric basket but first I will talk about making a basket out of the scraps from the butterfly and flower themed hot pads.  Since the background of the main print was while I felt contrast was the way to go.  I have always liked teal and orange together and this is probably why I purchased this fabric in the first place.  I did not have much of the teal fabric left so I would need to plan carefully.  I started out with the teal for the bottom of the basket with the idea of making orange stripes further up the side and having a go around with the teal in between the orange stripes.  All was going well until I got up to the teal stripe...I was running out of the teal!  It was then that I remembered that these are bias strips and stretchy by nature.  I unwrapped part of the teal back to where it wasn't sewn and rewrapped it a bit tighter and also stretched the strip slightly.  YES, it worked and the teal strip did indeed go all the way around the bowl.  I had also decided to put handles on this basket, the question was, would the main fabric hold out?  Once I decided where the handles are going to go I always do 2 rows before I end and was VERY pleased that the strips, with just a little bit of stretching allowed be to do 3 rows.   Most of my baskets and bowls have stripes and I will remember this stretching technic next time I am running a little short since the stripes need to start and end in the same point in order for them to look right.  

The next day I had been thinking about making an oval basket to put my greeting cards in at the Shelburne Arts Co-op.  I decided on this lovely floral print that really made me think of Spring.  The length would need to be at least 8-1/2" so that the cards would fit in it.  I started out with a 12" piece of rope and folded that in half so the base would start out at 6" and as I added more coils it would lengthen to the 8-1/2" which would be when I would start tilting it for the sides.   I chose a darker green fabric that blended nicely with the floral. as the base and then on the sides I would put a green strip part way up.  Rather than using contrast, these colors were more subtle and blended very nicely.  Looking at both of these baskets, they both make a different statement but one that I really like.