Harry Potter Project of Doom "Quilt-Behind": Week 10

We're five months post-move, and things are finally falling in to place!  Our dumping ground bedroom is finally cleared out and my studio is functional.  I feel so much more at peace having my sanctuary back.

Even better, my embroidery machine is back to working condition!  The repairman showed us where it was clear the movers had dropped the machine and broken a belt and some other minor pieces, but he fixed everything up and I'm back in the embroidery business.  I even got a new sewing machine for Christmas!  I told my husband I just wanted a basic machine that has a straight stitch and a zigzag, and maybe a true quarter-inch foot if he can find one.  That was the whole of my sewing machine wish list.  Instead, I ended up with a Brother DZ2400, so I would say he did a pretty darned good job.  However, I think I have a bit of a learning curve ahead of me in preparation for FiS's X-Files Quilt and Stitch Along this January.  This is my first sewing/quilting/embroidery machine combo and my first modern machine, so hopefully it's simpler than it looks.

I didn't expect to dive back in to the PoD until next year with all the holiday hoopla, but since Christmas presents were all finished up today (and can actually be shared next week!) and I had a few minutes to myself, I sat down for a quick stitch on the machine.  I figured Block 10 was a good place to start.

The Standard Books of Spells, Levels 1 through 7.  And check out that desk: a workspace is finally visible even though this was Ground Zero of our move!

How cool is this Patronus?  Mine would probably be a raven if I designed it, but Susan saved me the trouble.

I do love Jennifer Ofenstein's original patterns for the Standard Books of Spells, but I knew I wanted something embroidered on these and the original patterns are a bit thin width-wise to do that.  And Susan over at The Bored Zombie's embroidered books are pretty irresistible.  You can find the embroidery files here.

The finished block.

I have attempted to use this silver-grey fabric several times in different blocks, and hated it every time because of the metallic sheen.  I'm not sure why I had about three yards of it, but I was determined to find a place to use it.  I think it actually works for these books.  Susan's books were beautifully colored and used different fabrics to add to the interest, but I went for a black and white for a simpler effect on this fabric.  I had to restitch the first book once  because I didn't have enough fabric top and bottom to center it vertically (and I can see that I forgot to trim a thread on it), but they all stitched up really easily.  This ended up 13" unfinished, so it will cut in to the next block a bit.  I'm not actually measuring my blocks, because I will see how close my rows are in size when they are complete, and if I need to add a book to the end of some rows to make them the same size, that's what I will do.

I did finally unearth my PoD box and found my giveaway fabric from this summer!  I'm going to go back through those old postings and find the people who entered and send all of you a small stash of fabric for your PoD or other projects.  Will anyone be joining me on completing the PoD in 2016?  Let me know how it's going for you.