Time to divide the loot

Deb sent Mom some hand dyed fabric for us to share. They make great
backgrounds for our postcards. Thanks Deb!

Ann's new project

We worked on getting Ann's project ready to hand stitch last night.

Postcards

After a trip to NC today to visit family, we're playing with postcards
tonight.

I've been bad!

A new project for Mom

I decided I'd show Mom the method I used to make my Pineapple quilt on this trip. She picked out this pink one from the book Pineapple Passion by Nancy Smith and Lynda Milligan and we'll use the Quilt in a Day ruler and the book Pineapple Quilt; A piece of cake by Loretta Smith for the instructions.

Mom didn't have enough of any one pink so was ready to run out and buy fabric but I convinced her to make the pinks scrappy. Use used about everything she has in this shade so I'm hoping we have enough.
Speaking of books, I bought this one about a week before my trip and had skimmed through it when it came but I took time to read through and study the photos when I was traveling yesterday and I've got a lot of fun ideas for my postcards. Some of the pieces don't appeal to me at all but even in those, I'm seeing neat ideas for beading, embroidery, and quilting stitches.

I've never felt compelled to buy or subscribe to Quilting Arts magazine but I think this book changed my mind.

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I love to travel

But it's hard to leave Chesty for so long. He's always so clingy when he sees the suitcase come out and he didn't leave my side all day yesterday.

I quickly ran out to get the mail this morning before leaving for the airport and there were lots of goodies for me. I had the camera packed so I used the phone to snap some photos to share.

First up is an Airport Art Binder from Sio. It is so beautiful, this photo doesn't do it justice at all. I know it may seem greedy of me but I love all 3 that I've received. Gail's is with me on this trip, Marilyn's is up in my sewing room for jotting notes and drafting layouts, and Sio's will stay by my chair and travel with me when I go work at the library or coffee shop.

You need to visit Sio's blog, she's been making more binders and she's up to something!

I also had 2 postcards waiting. This one from my sister Ann. It's so cute! The hearts are embroidered and there are tiny paper flowers attached with beads.
And last but certainly not least, a postcard from Suzanne from our MQResource swap. I'm not sure of the title of the fable, but it's about an astronomer who fell into a well because he was only looking up at the stars. Very cute!

Since Keith brought me to the airport before work, I still have a couple hours to kill. I'm in the NWA lounge and am going to work on some layouts for my class while I wait.

Hope you all have a wonderful day!

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Tell me I'm not the only one

You've seen my sewing room photos so you know I can be kind of messy when I'm in the zone and working at a fast and furious pace. Well, other things stack up too like this laundry basket with clean clothes (and a pillow? and some jeans I bought from Penney's Saturday). (Can you believe I'm showing this mess?? I have no shame!)

So since I have to pack today, I decided it was time to clear this out and put everything away.
I went through EVERYTHING hanging in my closet and culled about 4 bags of clothes to donate.
And while I was at it, I pulled out some of my *travel* T-shirts and cut off the fronts -- I'm saving them to eventually make a T-shirt quilt. I typically buy a t-shirt and wear it a while ( a year or two) and then it gets cut and put into the bin. I've been planning this quilt for a few years and one of these days, I'll stop and count how many t-shirts I have. I added 7 to the pile today.
Speaking of traveling, did I tell you Keith and I are going to Chicago for his birthday March 6th? Just a couple nights but I haven't been before so I'm really looking forward to it.
The only quilt related activity so far today was taking down the K-top and putting up these blocks on the design wall. They need some arranging but having the design wall at the top of the stairs is actually a good thing....each time I go up, I look at what's on the wall and move things around a bit.

I leave in the morning for Virginia and will be home the 4th of March, just a day before going to Chicago. It will be a busy 2 weeks but the blog won't be idle, since I've learned out to post directly from my iPhone you can come along on my trips with me.


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Well...

Was it worth me fussing over it another week?? It took a bit of work to turn those different size scraps into a border and I had to really scrounge around in my stash to find bits and pieces that would work with the fabrics in the quilt but it's done now.

Click the photo to enlarge.

The final size is 62 x 74.


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Sunday Progress Report

• K-blocks finished/twisted and sewn together. Pieced border completed for two sides of the quilt. I bought 3 fat quarters to supplement my dwindling scraps in the hopes of eking out the last two sides
  
• Finished the Red/Brown/Pink Happy blocks -- from stash
• Quilted Ann's wallhanging - backing from stash
• Bound QOV #1 from San - binding from stash
• Binding made and machine stitched to Maureen's wallhanging -- binding from stash.

The fat quarters I reported as purchased last week arrived in the mail and I bought some yesterday too. I also ordered a bunch of 2 yard pieces for use as borders and backings which should arrive while I'm gone but my stash used YTD = 62 yards. So I am still using it at a slightly faster rate than it's coming in.

Other than tying up a few loose ends - my February to do list is completed just in time for me to travel on Tuesday.


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The *after* photo

I posted the *before* photo this morning and here Chesty is after his visit to the beauty parlor! He's so skinny without all that hair.



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Snow!

We had 4 and 1/2 inches of snow yesterday evening and during the night. It's been a while so I'm happy to see it again!


On today's agenda a visit to the beauty parlor for Chesty and lunch and errands for us while we wait for him to be groomed.



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A finish

I finished the binding on this top sent to me by San (Gypsy Quilter) for Alycia's Quilt of Valor project. I have a couple more tops that will be quilted next month and I should have all 3 mailed by the end of April which is when Alycia wants to have all the quilts.
On a sad note, of all the shops in my neighborhood did it have to be the wine shop that went out of business?



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Happy Friday

After being up more than 24 hours straight, I slept last night -- well at least until 3AM when I started worrying about pulling stuff for our meeting today with a new tax guy so I got up and started searching through my files. This is just a preliminary meeting so I've got work ahead of me still once he tells me what all he needs. Keith's former BIL has done our taxes for 20 years so I'm not exactly excited about having to go to someone new.

While I was up yesterday, I did manage to get a few things done including a haircut and some shopping. My MQResources postcards were mailed out along with a HeartStrings quilt. I got a binding on Ann's wallhanging and just need to hand stitch it down and I worked more on piecing the scraps into a border for the K-quilt. I love how it looks but my pile of scraps is dwindling fast so I may not have enough in which case I will just stop where I am.

I've had a lot of great suggestions but as I said -- I don't have other yardage options from stash AND I'm not going to purchase anything. This is a quick, stash quilt for donation. I did find just enough of the purple from one of the blocks that I'm looking at for a narrow inner border assuming I can stretch the scraps far enough.

I'm going to work on bindings this morning and then walk downtown for lunch with Keith and the meeting with the tax guy and we even have dinner plans tonight with another couple -- hope you all have a great day.


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Fun things in my mail today

We've been chatting on HeartStrings about the Mid Atlantic Quilt show, we don't have plans to meet up but there will be several of us there and we talked about how we might recognize each other.

Today, I opened my mail and found the cutest pin from Sue (one of our coordinators) for me to wear at the quilt show. I love -- it looks big in this photo but it's just the right size -- not too big to be overwhelming but just large enough to be noticeable.
I also received the marking pencil and fat quarters I ordered from Suzanne's shop last week when I signed up for Deb's class -- and look, she wrote a note that she pulled ones with printed selvages for me. That's what I call personal service!



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It's done

I appreciate all the comments and support - I think I just expect more from myself because I've been quilting with my longarm for 6+ years now and even though I don't do much of this type of quilting - it seems like I should be better at it than I am. The photos should enlarge when you click them.

Deb suggested these half flowers for the white portion of the log cabin block but the shape was odd for me - I wanted to try them but decided to do them in the dark where they wouldn't show as much.
Quilting inside of applique makes me really nervous but these were very large fused shapes...I'm not completely happy with the results but they're OK.



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The question is....

Do I not like this type of quilting because I'm not good at it....or am I not good at it because I don't like this type of quilting (and avoid doing it)?

Tonight I've been quilting a wallhanging that Mom pieced for my sister Ann. I've had this for several months and have been avoiding finishing it but since I'm going to VA next week and Ann will be there, I decided it was time to just get it done.

I had some idea about how to quilt parts of this and Deb had some suggestions for me too (I ignored all the ones that included stitch in the ditch!).

I did break out my ruler and quilted some straight lines in the 4 patches.

Did some leaf quilting in the border and in the background around the flowers & vase where it may have been less successful. (See first photo)

I just have to reload and quilt the last couple borders but I was getting really tired and decided I should do that after a break or after sleeping.

I'm need to accept that if I'm going to quilt these types of tops that I'm just not going to be but so good. I don't do them often enough to be really good at them and I'm trying to focus on the fact that Mom doesn't care how I quilt them and is always happy with the results.


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Pondering

I'm still reading and re-reading all the comments and pondering this quilt.

I debated leaving it as is but it looks a little unfinished to me.

I have NO fabric in my stash that would work as a wider border -- and since I'm trying to use stash -- It's either the pieced border or just stopping at this point.

I do like the idea of a narrow border and I *might* be able to find something that works... had thought along the lines of the comment that suggested using the binding fabric for an inner border and then finding another binding fabric.

All great input and I appreciate the time everyone took to comment. Thanks!


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Opinions please!

I've got limited options here because I only have little bits of fabric left. The dark blue is gone except I have just enough for the binding.

So do I just stop now?? Or do I take the scraps and do a pieced border and end with the dark binding? The size will be OK whether I add a border or not.

Please click on the photo to enlarge. Thanks!



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I'm excited again

I mentioned I'd signed up for another online journaling class but I didn't realize it was starting today - how great was it that one class ended as the other one began.

This is going to be SO perfect. I got the introduction and the first prompt and she wrote.

This album’s framework has three sections: Here, There and Everywhere. In the first section - Here - we’ll document the places near us and the short journeys we take regularly. The second section - There - will be home to the travels you have taken so far. Section three - Everywhere - will be filled with your notes and a few daydreams about the places you still want to go.

I love Minneapolis, I love traveling, this class is made for me. I'd actually done just one page a few months ago using a photo from my trip to Copenhagen last year...I can't wait to start making an entire album.




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Twisting and turning

This was a quick set of blocks! I finished the last 20 tonight before turning my attention to the Kaleidoscope blocks. You can just see the Quilt as you Go blocks for Australia in the back corner of this photo -- I pieced a couple of them before starting in on my blocks.

What does one do when blocks won't play nicely with each other, separate them of course. Since I don't like sashing blocks I usually turn to Sharon Craig's Twist N Turn method.

The colors and fabric in this photo are not shown very well, my hallway at 3:45AM is not the best place to be taking photos. The dark fabric is a subtle dark blue/turquoise print that picks up the colors from the blocks. I'd discarded it as too dark earlier this week when I was looking for a border but between the blocks it's working well.

I stopped working early -- I'm too tired to continue but not tired enough to sleep -- I'm happy with what I got done tonight so I'm going to veg now.


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Sunday Progress report

• K blocks finished - all from stash
• Strips & Strings Log Cabin #2 top assembled - from my strips and strings bins
  
• 8 Selvage postcards made
• 8 postcards for my MQ Resource exchange are all in progress now
• 18 Quilt as you Go blocks for AUS - all from stash and leftover batting
• 2 backings pieced from stash
• Started the brown/red Happy Blocks from stash
• Finished my Photoshop/Digital Scrapbooking class and learned lots!

I did purchase one set of fat quarters from Suzanne's online shop when I signed up for Deb's class.

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