Hasty piecing

I've had my Madrona Road fabrics for weeks. I had a kind of lofty idea for using them, but it was going to be a bit of a challenge, so I stalled. Finally, I thought, if I'm going to get anything done in any sort of timely way (I had already missed the deadline for the MQG competition) I was going to have to simplify. So I went with squares -- very simple. The sashing & setting was/is (it still isn't quite done) time-consuming. But it's about 3/4 done & I kind of like how it is shaping up.



I had also gotten out my swoon blocks. I arranged the colors to my liking, then gathered them up to work on after the Madrona Road top. Fortunately for Pippa, I didn't get to them. :-)

 

TMI?

QuiltCon is getting closer & closer & the host, The Modern Quilt Guild, is hosting a link party. 

So let's see 5 things you might not know about me .... Some random bits you've already learned: I collect wedding cake brides & grooms; Shug & I sail a 14 foot catamaran; my Mom has Alzheimer's; I love my social media. 

Five more things?!? 

Well, (1) fabric & sewing have always been in my life. The first thing I remember sewing was this little outfit for my Pepper doll. 



(2) My hair has gotten really long! I don't really like it & I'm sure it is not flattering but I just don't know what to do with it. All I need is a muu-muu, 3 cardigans, scuff slippers & a cackle to officially be a Crazy Old Lady! (3) I work at a natural science museum. Mostly it is just a job, just with more T-Rex, polar bears & mummies! (4) We don't have children & we don't refer to our cats as "fur babies". (5) I'm trying to get healthy & fit -- again! -- this year. It needs to be a way of life, not a program & it gets really hard the older you get. 

Are you going to QuiltCon? I hope so! I'd love to meet you in person!

The promiscuous piecer

Last weekend, between 6 (!) loads of laundry, vacuuming, dusting & errands, I finished 3 (!) little tops.

I would sew a while downstairs with Betty, then take my parts upstairs to iron the seams. While I was upstairs, I would start up Frere Jacque & assemble the project on the design door there. Strike while the iron is hot, so to speak. Even with this unfocused sewing, the 3 all came to completion. All small, all done! (well, except for sandwiching, basting, quilting, binding)

Polka Dot Day

The clock is winding down on it, but I just wanted to give a Tip of the Hat to National Polka Dot Day!

Yay! Polka dots! They always make me smile.

I didn't actually go through my stack of quilts or rummage through my quilt images, but I would say that many of my recent quilts have at least one polka dotted fabric in them. The first to really feature them was my fruity stars that I made about -- hmm, maybe 15 years ago. At that time, dots were hard to find (yes, dark days indeed) & I bought some of every kind & color that I found.

We are so lucky in so many ways, not the least is that polka dots -- of every stripe sort -- are available to us today!
Yay! Polka Dot Day!

Brrrrrr

This week was Houston winter at its worse. I know much of the world will think we're a bunch of wimpy whiners & they are probably right, but when the temps are in the low 30s & the humidity is over 90% & it's drizzle-y & windy, that adds up to bone-chilling cold! Those days were followed by crisper & colder days. (By the week's end, we were up to the low 60s -- I did my walk in shorts. But I was a chilly!)

I was wishing I had a quilt ready to bind, but nothing is at that stage. Instead, I've been getting better acquainted with Betty with some piecing -- some spotty Amy Butler HSTs & candy scrappy trip along. (I LOVE this machine! I'm calling her Betty the Cat -- she purrs!)









And cutting up big piles of my stash into squares & strips & triangles for donation quilts. Once I'm through with the Cutting Table it will become the Quilting Table & I'll pull out Laura's Lightning -- I guess I am about 1/4 done with it.



And I do have a bit of hand sewing to do -- sleeve & label & travel bag for Lucky.
Because?
It's going to QuiltCon!!!

And then there were nine.....

For Christmas I got another sewing machine. She was -- & was not -- a surprise.

I had seen her on eBay & told Shug that perhaps she would be a nice birthday gift (my birthday is in early February). But when we go back after our holiday travels to have our own personal Christmas at home, I found a big box under our little tree: a 1963 White! She is kind of a celadon green with an ornate face plate & nearly like new. I've decided to call her "Betty".

It took me a while to get the tensions right. There were skipped stitches at first, but a new needle fixed that. She also sounded kind of click-y, but with some oil & attention, that seems to be going away. (Both Betty & Amie had a short, refreshing trip to a sewing machine spa & returned rejuvenated & ready for play. Both sew a fine seam now.) Feather-weight she is not! -- tips the scale at 37 pounds -- I won't be toting her to any retreats! I wondered what roll Betty would have among my sewing machines. Except for the 2 family machines, which don't work right now & are more sentimental than functional, & the Singer 99 Lotus, which is mostly an art object, all my machines provide something unique: portability, deep throat for quilting, programmable stitches, off-the-grid ability for when the power is out.

I think Betty will be my downstairs machine, to set up in the dining room or on a folding table in front of the television.

Meet the new girl!

Yes, I have another sewing machine -- and I'm not going to apologize!

I didn't seek her out, she sort of sought me. She was a hostess gift (!) from mon amie francaise who came for Quilt Festival last year. A Singer Feathweight 222!! I know!!! What an amazingly, awesomely generous gift!!!! And this is the woman who has already given me a Featherweight 221!!!!! (OK, enough with the exclamation points.)

She is passionate about machines a coudre anciennes & often finds them for good prices. Her husband is involved too, he cleans them up & gets them into good working order. So it is an especially lovely gift because both of our friends are present in it. I've decided to call her "Amie". Her first project is stitching some HSTs from several Amy Butler charm packs & she is doing a fine job!

Off the Rails

OK, it is the 2nd day of the new year & I'm already deviating from my Quilting Resolutions!

Actually, my head was turned well before the year began. Shug & I have been traveling -- a lovely week in the midlands Christmas-ing with our families, 1 day home, then off down the coast for a few days of nature & relaxing. I put away my sewing machine on 18 December & have only now gotten it back out! 14 days without sewing makes one weak -- well, actually two weeks, but, well. Ahem!

 



Anyway, while I wasn't sewing, I was watching Instagram (do you Instagram? I do & I love it!) & seeing an avalanche of scrappy trip around the world blocks. So much fun! I was mentally going through my stash, trying to decide what mine would look like. As soon as the sand had settled from our travels, I was literally going through my stash, picking my fabrics. And here I go!

Merry & Happy to All Y'all!

Year-end Review

It has been a busy year & I have a tall pile of quilts to show for it.



I ticked off quite a few of the to-dos from my January list. Let's see, I finished 8 quilts that have remained in-house & 5 quilts for donation. There were 2 tops finished -- I'm quilting one now, 1 stack of blocks ready to go together & 4 small tops for donation to finish. (I wish I had kept track of how many yards of Kona Snow I used! 2 finished quilts & 2 quilts-in-progress have all used it -- I guess I was something of a Snow Plow. :-}) There were 2 mini swaps for HMQG, 5 Jane Market Bags -- 4 given away, 1 kept & 4 zipper pouches -- 3 given away, 1 kept. Well, phew! 

I'm now thinking about my list for the coming year. Do you make Quilt-y Resolutions? I've been doing so for a long time, before I started sharing them with my on-line friends. They used to be shorter & less specific than they are now -- "log cabin" vs "x & + blocks using black & white prints & solids (blues?)". But at the top of my list for 2013 -- & all my lists in the future -- will be: Relax, Enjoy the Process. Because I don't really think I enjoyed all my finishes this year. With each one, I was mentally on to the next project rather than just enjoying the one just done. It was more about checking them off than about loving what I love most in the world to do -- QUILTING!

Measuring my days

For some time I've been trying to remember a quote, I'm pretty sure my Mom read it to me. Not so long ago, I could have called her & asked, "What's that quote? Something about counting days with spoons?" & she would have told me what it was.

No more.

So I typed 'counting days in teaspoons' into an Internet search -- no luck. There was a small ping in my head that said the author of the quote was T.S. Eliot. So I tried 't.s. eliot quotes' & there it was: "I have measured out my life in coffee spoons." (I was kind of close.) I'm not sure of the intended meaning, but I am drawing a parallel with the spools I've emptied this year -- measuring out my life in empty spools.

Last finish of the year

And just in time for cold weather -- well, cold for us.

This little quilt --  in spite of all the stars, it just isn't very stellar, in spite of all the birds, it just hasn't got wings. I guess I'll say it has a Good Personality!

I loved the 2.5 inch rolls from Connecting Threads; I have loved for a very long time the fabric I used on the back; I was eager to try making a jelly roll race quilt; this was my first time to attempt the walking foot quilted braids. But sometimes the product is less than the sum of the parts. It was fun to make & quilt though, & it will still keep us warm even if it won't be winning any beauty contests.





And it is starting to grow on me. :-)

Busy weekend

Some cutting & playing.



Some quilting.



Some basting.



And thinking about this.

Phew!

Boy! I earned this finish!
 
It began innocently enough -- the Low Volume QAL. A perfect opportunity, I thought,  to use up some of the box of scraps left over from several braid quilts I made a few years ago. I dug out the box, sorted some of the pale, swirly, seashell-y, text-y prints, cut them into squares....then, what?

I got out one of my sketchbooks. I hope you have one of these. I have 2 & am nearly ready for a 3rd. I LOVE my sketchbooks! They are filled with drawings & clippings & printouts. They go everywhere with me! Well, I looked through one of them & found this:



Looked like fun, though unfortunately, I used up more Kona Snow than I did scraps from the box. {oh well} The piecing was easy, just squares; the setting together just a bit more challenging.
But the quilting -- again, not complicated -- wobbly walking foot straight lines & free-motion in-the-ditch around the patchwork. It was just the mass of the thing & working on it at a diagonal. THAT was WORK!!! I began referring to this quilt as The Monster, but I think I will name it "Stairs".

 

 

Pippa is always a Big Help when I quilt, but she seemed especially fond of this quilt. Maybe she knew that the colors were quite becoming to her.

What to do first?

After the Quilt Festival, I was -- & remain -- starry-eyed with the wonderful experience of seeing beautiful quilts, beautiful fabrics & talking to talented people. I was so full of ideas & idea fragments that my mind was bouncing around like a pinball! I had to force myself to be practical & focus first on what was on the downhill-side of being finished: finishing up some lap robes for the HMQG charity sewing & quilting my low volume quilt.

Done & getting done!

Where did the month go?!?

I know exactly where my month went:

First, there was 2 weeks of an all-hands-on-deck, mad house, work-a-thon at my job -- 8 to 12 hour days straight through (we did get Sunday off) slaying mastodons with our atlatls.

 

Not really, *that* exhibit was installed months ago, we were on to the next thing. :-)

After the paid work was over, I needed to do some serious house-cleaning for house-guests coming for Quilt Festival. I know you know what I'm talking about -- the sort of cleaning you only do when you are expecting company. I was sure my company wouldn't notice, or care if they did, but I felt better knowing it was done.


Louis says, "Food Lady, this is nice! You should make the beds more often."

I did nearly no sewing. All I did was finish my HMQG logo colors mini challenge & made a few more zipper pouches for gifts. (I think I'm beginning to feel more confident about my zippers.)

 

 

Then the 2 house-guests arrived -- a quilter friend from France & my MIL. And Quilt Festival!!! An exhausting good time! This year, I really enjoyed looking at the antique & vintage quilts being sold -- I even came home with one!





In spite of an oath with myself not to get any fabric, I managed to come home with some: a stack of Grunge, some vintage bits, plus some other pieces. 

 

Next, a trip to the airport with one departing guest & a route home over a very attractive bridge.



Then, relaxing bay-side with the remaining guest.



Then it was just me & Shug, tired, but with pleasant memories of the last week.
And did I mention that my quilt was hanging at the Quilt Festival!?!

Weekend Update

I didn't have the weekend I thought I would, the weekend I *hoped* I would.

It was my first weekend at home after my trip to visit my Mom & I was finally starting to feel well after a 3-week cold. I wanted to sew, I wanted to relax, I wanted to indulge. Instead, I spent much of the weekend emailing back & forth on Guild bidness. Have you ever noticed that when you are dealing with people, you have to deal with personalities? What's up with that?!? Anyway, a group of awesome women & I did some important work for our Guild & if I may say so, we did a pretty good job. And the weekend wasn't all tense shoulders & typing!

I nearly finished my HMQG logo colors mini challenge (say THAT 3 times, real fast), all done except the handwork -- but I can't show it to you yet.

I made another Jane Market Bag as a gift for house-guests here for Quilt Festival.



I basted my low volume quilt -- I'm only 90% happy with this one. Had I realized how big it would be I would have made the design element larger. (The cans of tuna were for ballast, it was windy when I was basting.)



And Shug & I went to Big Lots for our very first time. Shug has been eating the breakfast cereal, Product 19, for about 25 years. It had disappeared from all our grocery stores some time ago. He had signed up for a sort of 'cereal subscription' from Amazon -- every month a box of 4 boxes would automatically arrive at the door. Then that stopped. The End of the Product 19 Era!!! But his Mom found some at a Big Lots in the Kansas City area, so we searched out a local Big Lots & came home with 8 boxes to help postpone the Era's end for a little while.