Been working on this quilt top for the last couple of weeks--there are more progress pictures on Flickr. Now the top is done; the binding is cut and ready. Just need to find a back for it--and, oh yes, quilt it!
This is a "legacy" project from Drs. Harry and Ellin--the notes in the package are dated 3-12-05 and I think may refer to this quilt, although the colors aren't specified and I know they made several using this pattern.
Most of the light-and-dark blue pieces had been cut, as had the pink squares for the centers; a couple of them had been sewn, but the whole thing had been set aside. Once I started working on it, I found I needed a little "intervention" with Jack (the ripper) to get it on track again. Then I found the real problem, and the reason there was another piece of dark blue almost-matching fabric in the box: it was short by 18 pieces to finish the 48 blocks.
A little cutting and sewing later, and the blocks were completed. I don't happen to mind sewing partial seams, so this went together very nicely. I'm not sure that this is the way I'd have chosen to do the borders, but it's what there was enough fabric for, so...
I like it. I'll get it finished and hopefully will be able to give it to Harry, along with the two "layered" quilts that I've already begun quilting.
Ellin, I hope you approve!!
Sunday, August 05, 2012
Twisted Sister w/ borders
Monday, July 09, 2012
Audrey's New Pets
Well, they weren't pets for very long, they were released back into the wild after she realized they only do one trick!
Friday, June 29, 2012
Friday, June 15, 2012
Over-Under Quilt
Aka, FO #6 in this series! This one is from a 2003 Asilomar class. Lots of Laurel Burch fabrics in this one! There's a bit of perspective going on here--you can see it best in the white cat areas and the pink-and-green ones--in one of the blocks the green dotted fabric almost disappears!
Wednesday, June 13, 2012
FO #5
This quilt needs a name, too! It's mostly Australian aboriginal prints--the fabric is designed in Australia, and the name of the designer is printed on the selvedge. The design is Sylvia Einstein's "magic square" and this was done in her class at Asilomar in 2008.
Not the oldest of the UFOs in the current batch... #6, like #4, dates back to 2003. Oh yes, there are other older projects in the Great Wall of Rubbermaid. I'm just excavating by strata.
Saturday, June 09, 2012
Ballerina quilt in action!
The most fun part about finishing a quilt is seeing it in use... and how happy a little person can be!
Sunday, May 20, 2012
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Ambleside Chemist Shop Tile Quilt
It's going to come with me to Asilomar, for my quilting class with Sue Rasmussen. Very fitting, since it had its genesis in a class at Asilomar.
The person who designed and developed this pattern is Chris Porter. The book is called Quilt Designs from Decorative Floor Tiles. This particular quilt is based on a tile floor that she spotted at a chemist's shop (drugstore to us Yanks) in Ambleside. My friend, Louise, has actually been there and seen the floor in person. Pretty neat! The original floor, and Christine's quilt, are in terra cotta, browns, and golds.
But that wasn't the color scheme I needed for this quilt, nor was it going to work in the original shape. You see, I made this for my middle daughter (who is known in these pages as D3), who has a large bare wall in her living room. She loves green--any shade of green--with burgundy a close second.
Luckily for me, she hasn't changed her color preferences over the years so despite the passage of time, it will still work.
The long sad story of why it's taken so long to get this quilt to this point has a lot to do with my "life" over the last six years. The class at Asilomar was my first one for several years--and my sewing machine had pretty much just been living in its case for a while before that. Something about a husband with a broken leg, a knee replacement, a couple of weddings, then the husband's cancer... I did manage to get some sewing done during this time period, and even afterwards, but it was always elsewhere and for a relatively short period. Lots of "ugly quilt" and charity-quilt workdays. A couple more trips to Asilomar, but again never with a "finished object" to show for it.
I'm not even going to talk about my back. At least, since the surgery, I have been recovering, and thus this hauling out of old projects and getting them finished. Eight quilts (I hope to blog about them as they get finished) went off to be "quilted by check" with the nice ladies in Turlock at Cloth and Quilts. Six have already come back, had their binding sewn on; one's got the hand part of the binding done, so that might be another post.
"Hand" is a four-letter H word, especially when the arthritis is flaring up. Oh well. It will be worth it!
Summing up, the Tile Quilt is now ready (after a good press) to be quilted, and I have high hopes to see it hanging in its new home soon.
Saturday, May 05, 2012
Shadow study 2
As in, part 2 of the previous post. This quilt was a lot of fun to do: except for the background, which is stars, the fabrics are all batiks or hand-dyed. I loved making the little bitty squares. The shadow strips are almost as big as they are!
All three of these quilts are coming to Asilomar with me for another class, this one in machine quilting. It's been a long time since I was able to do any quilting to speak of; I have some tops, from classes, which I've been rounding up and finishing up, but nothing quilted. Hence my recent quilt-by-check spree! But now I'll have five days to practice, get comfortable with the machine again, and hopefully learn some new techniques. Hard to believe it's been ten years since I last taught machine quilting!
Shadow study 1
This is the first quilt that was the source for scraps for the Woven Ribbons. I've realized that my tendency, when I take a class like this--I did it again this year--is to start by tackling a relatively simple project,. to get the technique down and work through any problems. Then, with (in this case) one quilt top done, I can tackle something more complicated. I'll do another post with the second quilt in this series.
What I Did Today
Here it is--today's project, a Woven Ribbons quilt. Of course there's a story to this!
Remember how, last month, I went to an Empty Spools Seminar at Asilomar? In choosing fabrics to bring, I ran across a little roll of batik strips wrapped around what looked like more strips. So I threw it in my fabric box.
When I started my project, I thought I'd use some of the outside fabric--a really dark, almost black batik with little hints of deep blue in it. Imagine my surprise when I unrolled it, and there were a whole LOT of little squares, all neatly pressed and cut to size. Hmmm. Worst part was, I had absolutely no idea what they were or how they had gotten there. Figuring I could always sew them into something, even if I couldn't remember what they were originally meant for, I re-rolled them and set them aside.
Memory is a funny thing. As I worked on my Mariner's Compass, an idea of a quilt came to me...and with a little digging (I had a whole bunch of stuff with me that had no relationship to what I was going to do, which is a story for another time and will probably not surprise anyone who knows me) I came up with the book and the project they'd been cut for. Victory!
Flash forward to yesterday. I'd been sewing binding on the six quilts that have come back from the longarm quilter, and thinking about this project. So, once all the quilts had binding around them, I got out the book and the squares and got ready to sew.
And then... it's on to finish more UFOs. I really do seem to be on a roll with this! Heck, maybe I'll even blog about the rest of my projects!
But please, don't hold your breath...
Wednesday, April 04, 2012
Friday, March 23, 2012
Lemon Bento Box, with cats~
The "boys" love to inspect any new floor covering, especially if it's a quilt top trying to be photographed!
Tuesday, March 06, 2012
Lemon Bento Box
This is the fraternal twin to the quilt in the post below. Just figured they each deserved their moment in the blog spotlight! Hoping to get borders on in t he next day or two!
Lemon/Lime Bento Box
Assembled this quilt top today, along with it's fraternal twin--which I've christened Lemon Bento Box. Borders are cut and ready to be assembled for both quilts.
These two quilts were cut out and mostly (but not completely) sewn into the small squares which make up the larger 4-patch squares, when I got hurt last year and my world came crashing down around me. One of the best things about finally feeling better (surgeon said it would take a year to be "healed") is that I can pick up and start working on projects again. It will be really good to have these quilts done!
Monday, March 05, 2012
Ugly Shirt, coming apart!
Yes, this is all on the same shirt! I have seldom seen anything like it. Showing this here just to say that I have not given up on the Crazy Quilt project, just got sidetracked by another great source of material for them! I don't know if any of these will find their way into the Tie Quilts--my guess is, not, but one never knows!
There's just something really satisfying about digging in to a project like this, even if it does lead to little black threads everywhere. The good thing is, black-thread-spiders are easy to dispose of!
A few FOs!
I really haven't dropped off the face of the earth, honest--just been fighting allergies and other accoutrements of "aging" that seem to sap my energy. However, I've been digging into some of my UFO piles, and there's progress on the horizon.
This stack includes 5 ragg quilts (not very big, but still...5!), some pillowcases that were cut out the night before my back went out last year, and a couple of quilts that are going off to be quilted. Lots more pics on my Flickr page, not all of which are blog-worthy in themselves.
Saturday, January 21, 2012
Monday, January 16, 2012
80 squares ready...
just need to find enough (washed) muslin to cut 4 more and they'll be ready! I'm considering getting 12 baggies and separating them by months; but maybe that's just an extra step. I can bag them when I finish them.
What do you think?
Cutting squares
Next step in the crazy quilt process--getting the base squares cut. I decided on a 10" square, to finish around 9". My compromise between a decent finished size and something I might actually finish this year!
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Buttons!
Found these when I was waiting in line to get a ball of yarn to finish Delilah's blankie. I will put these on the tie quilts. Most anyone who knew Bob would definitely associate little peppermint candies with him! I wish they had had more--I might have to go back and get the green ones, although red was definitely his favorite!
Just thought they were such a serendipitous find, I couldn't resist! In other news, the ties are now all ripped. On to Phase Two of Operation Tie Quilts.
Moist von Lipwig
Got this month's installment of the Twisted Disc yarn club--it's a gorgeous range of colors and so appropriate for the character! Moist is the (anti)hero of Terry Pratchett's Going Postal and Making Money. He's a con man who gets coerced into running first the Ankh-Morpork Post Office and then its Bank. The gold sparkles in the yarn are an echo of his golden postmaster's outfit--the one with the winged hat.
Okay, so you need to read the book. But only if you like to laugh.
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Favorite Tie
This was Bob's absolute favorite tie. He kept it in its box for a long time and was so proud to show it to me when we first started dating. He wore it at our wedding, too.
He paid a w hole $10 for it--in 1961 that was a lot of money. It has real gold threads in it and came from Woodruff's Men's Store in Alhambra. So this piece of history is definitely going to have pride of place in the tie quilts!
Monday, January 09, 2012
Cousins at play
on Route 66! Waiting for our table for breakfast...celebrating a birthday!
For some reason, this photo is cropped on t he blog--on the far right, if you go to the Flickr page, you'll see that Big G is also in the picture. Not sure why it does that.
Saturday, January 07, 2012
I Occupied...
Today is devoted to de-holidaying the house. The outside lights are down--thanks, Michael!--the trees are packed up and put away, and so are the holiday houses. I've almost finished washing the holiday linens and they can get packed up for another year. Last thing will be changing out quilts--might have to take a few pics of the new look.
Friday, January 06, 2012
Bead Store Bonanza!
(This is my post for Jan. 5. Computer issues yesterday--only semi resolved today, but at least I could upload pictures today!)
Met up with Yarn Addict Annette and her mom at San Gabriel Bead yesterday, and found some "treasures" for my crazy quilt project. I am especially fond of the variegated rattail--as much as this stuff has driven me nuts in the past, I couldn't resist buying a few yards to couch down on my tie-blocks.
The plastic boxes hold small and medium sized flip-top boxes, which will be perfect for transferring those beads in plastic baggies into. I have very little desire to be chasing beads everywhere.
The buttons are a great find, they're all glass--very appropriate for using with the Glass Man's ties, no? The only problem I'm beginning to see is that there may have to be an entire work station set up for this project, since there are so many parts to it!
Wednesday, January 04, 2012
More WIPs
These are ragg quilt squares. They've been batted and cross-stitched and just need to be assembled. There are 110 of them and I'm undecided about how to put them together. Perhaps two 30-block small quilts and one 48-block bigger quilt? They're probably going to be for charity, unless I repurpose one for the little great-granddaughters.
Decisions, decisions. This is why they're still sitting around stacked and ready to sew up!
Tuesday, January 03, 2012
Things To Do
Part of my collection of WIPs--these are pillowcases that need to be sewn up and French seamed, and then they'll be done. I seem to have a bit of a pillowcase thing going on lately--dunno if that's a good thing, or a bad thing, or just "a thing." Anyway, I'm hoping that soon I can show you a stack of completed pillowcases!
Monday, January 02, 2012
Second Verse...
Thought I'd share some more of the Christmas quilts that have been up during the holidays, since they are all going back into hibernation till next Christmas.Not quite sure how this is going to work, since the Blogger layout looks a little wonky. However, here's some folk art angel quilts, including the famous "angels in sleeping bags" as on of the cherubs dubbed it.
There[s the wintery trees--this may stay around for a while since it's really more "winter" than "Christmas" like the Snowball Quilt from a previous post. Then there's the flying angels with their gold wings and trumpets.Pay no attention to the butterfly quilt. That's one of my WIPs and really needs some attention. If I can work on it, you'll soon (I hope) see it as an FO.
That's enough for today. I need to experiment some more with layouts on this thing. You'd think this was my first blog.
Oh wait...
Sunday, January 01, 2012
Let the Crazies Begin!
Button, button--who's got the button? Well... chances are, it's me. Yes, those are jars of buttons up there on top of the bookshelves. Those are some of my quilting and knitting books on the shelves. The silver tins (they seem to be reflecting gold light from somewhere but they're silver colored) also have buttons in them.
More jars of buttons. These are on top of the green Hoosier that used to live in the old kitchen. It's in the process of being repurposed to serve as a craft Hoosier now. The reason for the button pictures is because I'm getting ready to start the Great Crazy Quilt Tie Project... although the name may change several times over the course of the year.
Yes, I did say Ties. As in, tie one on? Ties that bind? How about, a tisket, a tasket, a green laundry basket--full of my husband's old ties. Bob wore one every day that he worked, so for my kids, ties are quintessentially "Daddy." It's been in my plans for a few years now to make a crazy quilt out of the ties--many of them are silk, or at least "silky" stuff, so they'll lend themselves perfectly to the medium.
But, you know how it goes... if I make one quilt out of them, well, who gets it? Can't play favorites, so I guess I need to make... seven quilts. Oh-kay.Now, look over there on the right sidebar. See that CQJP logo? Well, the challenge this year is to make a block a month, at the end of which there will be 12 blocks. Right. So, if I can make one block, I should be able to make...7? Each month?
Not like I haven't had practice in assembly-line and production sewing. My earliest sewing memories are of helping my mother make doll clothes. No, not for my dolls. She sewed for Peggy-Ann and Totsy, two big producers of doll clothes. She'd get a big box delivered to her, which would have the cut out pieces for anywhere from 20 to 50 dozen doll outfits. There'd be a sample, and whatever trims she'd need to make them--laces, ribbons, rickrack, etc. She had an industrial machine that sewed forward, very fast. No backwards. A ruffler that screwed on, one of those complicated looking gizmos that would ruffle the bottom layer and sew it to the top at the same time. She'd sew the pieces one after the other in huge long chains, and my job was to snip the chains apart to get them ready for the next step.
So, good practice for piecing quilts!
Now, crazy quilts aren't really put together like that. The pieces are odd sized, and they're sort of flopped down in different directions depending on the shape of the pieces. That's why ties, with their kind of skewed cuts, are perfect for this. Here's the plan: I'm going to cut out 84 (or maybe a few extra) pieces of muslin for backing, and then I can put the pieces of ties onto them with the machine. I want to be sure that every quilt has pieces of the same ties. so doing 7 at a time ought to make that a little easier than trying to do 84 all at once. I figure the piecing part should be pretty quick--maybe an afternoon's work for each set of 7. And there's no reason I can't prep more than one set of 7 at a time--depending on how quickly I get the ties dissassembled.
It's the embroidery and trimming that will take longer. Especially since a lot of that will be done by hand. And I haven't figured out yet how to knit and embroider at the same time... so we'll see. Because of course I still want to knit!
This should be an interesting year, especially if things work out the way I'd like them to.
Lastly, here's a bit of eye candy for you! This is a quilt my friend Sandy made for her "other" friend Marie. It's truly a gorgeous thing. Every one of those squares has a different quilting pattern in it. (More pics on my Flickr page, where you can even biggen the pictures to see the details. There are even pics of Sandy with her pugs.)
Time for me to go start picking ties apart. Going to be a good thing to do tomorrow while I watch the Rose Parade on TV!
Blueberries for Sal
Books have always been my idea of a perfect present, so there were books for all four of the little grandkids on Christmas this year. In the midst of all the gift opening, Audrey came to this one, and something about it intrigued her. Her gift unwrapping came to a halt while she went through the whole book, very carefully, then had her mom read it to her from the beginning.
The Snowball quilt on the back of the sofa is one I had made back when I was teaching at the "old" Bearly Stitchin'--the small shop on the corner of Roosevelt. It was the first installment of a Calendar Quilts series, one per month. That was one of my first Tuesday night quilt classes.
I do love hauling out some of my older wall quilts and draping them around. Right now there are 6 "holiday" quilts up. Hmm, idea for another post!
Saturday, December 31, 2011
Last Day of the Year
So, another year gone by and now we've got another one coming at us, ready or not! I woke up this morning thinking about writing this post--and it's hard to think when there are two ferocious catboys trying to get my attention because, yanno, they haven't eaten for hours and hours and they are just starving... yeah. With two feedersful of dry kibble (two different kinds, who's a spoiled darling?) they still want their morning treat of a shared can of wet stuff and as soon as the light begins to change, they think it's time to get it. Then they do what Simon's doing over there ---> and I'm left to get up and start my day.
I've already done my year-end post over on the other blog, which is my sadly-neglected "photo blog" but which I'm hoping to utilize more in the coming year. We'll see how it goes. This past year has certainly not gone the way I thought it would, but as I look back at it, I'm finding that there are some good things that have come out of it. I really need to focus on the positives instead of the negatives--cliched though that sounds. So my health isn't the greatest--at least I'm on "the right side of the dirt." I've been blessed with a loving and supportive family, who really pulled together to get me through the worst parts of this past year. Now to look forward, instead of backward.
There are some plans afoot for the new year. I signed on to a couple of challenges and I'm hoping to use this blog to document them. One is Take a Stitch Tuesday, a stitching challenge, so with any luck on Tuesdays I'll be posting a photo of some kind of stitchery. This is a corollary to my other challenge, the Crazy Quilt one. (There are links to both on the sidebar over there. I just can't see them to link them here right now.)
That one is really the crazy one! The basic idea is to do one crazy quilt block a month, with the end result being 12 blocks by the end of the year--enough to make a nice sized wall hanging. I thought this would tie in nicely to one of my ambitions, which is to make a crazy quilt out of Bob's old ties. One for each of the "kids." So yeah, seven quilts for seven people. Seven blocks a month. I'm already prepping the ties, and tonight I'll probably cut the backing squares for the project. I'm thinking I'll cut the squares either 8.5" or 9" to finish at around 8" each--so 12 squares would make it 24" x 32" before any kind of borders or sashings. I've got a "few" kinds of threads for embroidery, both hand and machine; I'm not going to limit myself to one or the other. My Bernina 1230 has some "fancy" stitches that should work nicely, and I think I can manage some hand work as well. Plus I have lots of bits and bobs of lace, ribbons, buttons, beads... You get the idea. We'll see how it goes in practice, but this is something I've been wanting to do, and the time is right!
The house is beginning to come together--note I said "beginning." The bittersweet part of this is that I'm really needing to get the house ready to sell, and to make some hard decisions about where I want to move to and what kind of life I want to live. You can look forward to some musings on that topic as I explore alternatives this year.
Physical improvement is also on my agenda. I was doing really well after the surgery in April--managed to lose 10 lbs. It's easy enough to do when someone else is going to the market: give them a list, make sure it's all the good stuff and then just eat the good stuff. Of course, once I could start doing a little more of my own marketing, that went right down the tubes. Those 10 lbs have found me again and plopped themselves right where I least want them! But, they need to leave, along with a few dozen more of their friends. Dr. B keeps telling me that there's nothing more to be done for my left knee, other than replacing it. Well, I'm not going into a knee replacement at this weight. (I don't want to do it at all, but that's another story.) I'm sure the neuropathy in my feet would also be helped by not having to lug around all this extra avoirdupoids. And, I'm trying to exercise a little more too. I got a Fitbit and have been wearing it and I think, starting tomorrow, I'll try logging my food as well as letting it record my steps.
This post is long enough, and if you've stuck to it this far, I'm sure you're ready for me to wish you a happy new year and all the best as it comes roaring around the corner at us. Should be an interesting one, at least!
Monday, November 21, 2011
Audrey at Tea
Took the girls to the Huntington Tea Room for our "annual" birthday tea. A yummy time was had by all. This year we had a special guest--Auntie Jennie was here!
Saturday, November 05, 2011
Wild Lettuce blocking
An actual finished object...the Wild Lettuce shawl, pattern by Fickle Knitter and yarn from Little Red Bicycle. The color isn't quite true: in real life it's a very vivid limey green. Hoping it dries in time to wear it to the Fiber Festival in Torrance!