Cutting squares

Cutting squares, a photo by marie watterlond on Flickr.

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!

Buttons!

Buttons!, a photo by marie watterlond on Flickr.

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

Moist von Lipwig, a photo by marie watterlond on Flickr.

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.

Favorite Tie

IMG_0275, a photo by marie watterlond on Flickr.

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!

Photographic Conference

IMG_0259, a photo by marie watterlond on Flickr.

The family shutterbugs compare notes!

Cousins at play

Cousins at play, a photo by marie watterlond on Flickr.

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.

I Occupied...

... Rupe's blog today! You might want to check it out--he's having several friends do "Occupy Rupe's Blog" posts this month, and I found the first two really interesting. Well, BronsonT's was interesting mainly because of the flashbacks to my tax-law-class days, but the info there was quite useful!

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.

Bead Store Bonanza!

Bead Store Bonanza!, a photo by marie watterlond on Flickr.

(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!

More WIPs

DSCN8857, a photo by marie watterlond on Flickr.

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!

Things To Do

DSCN8855, a photo by marie watterlond on Flickr.

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!

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...

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

Blueberries for Sal, a photo by marie watterlond on Flickr.

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!

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!

Audrey at Tea

Audrey at Tea, a photo by marie watterlond on Flickr.

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!

Wild Lettuce blocking

Wild Lettuce blocking, a photo by marie watterlond on Flickr.

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!

Carpinteria

Carpinteria, a photo by marie watterlond on Flickr.

Walking down the "main drag" in Carpinteria, we saw t his wonderful bougainvillea glowing in the sun. It was a gorgeous day for the beach!

Cousins at The Boat

Cousins at The Boat, a photo by marie watterlond on Flickr.

Mini-reunion this past weekend, with the "little" cousins getting together with their "big" cousins! L-R, Abby (age 1 1/2), Nate (3), Audrey (3), Garrett (5), Casey, John, Alyssa and Gordon.

Now that John and Casey are living semi-locally, we're getting to see them more often. It was nice to have Alyssa and Gordon visiting from the east coast. This was Gordon's first visit here so he got to experience a lot of new things!

Little boy, big pig!

That's a big pig!, a photo by marie watterlond on Flickr.

Naters checking out his "year of" animal at the LACMA exhibit--http://www.lacma.org/art/exhibition/ai-weiwei-circle-animalszodiac-heads

Pretty darn cute!

A Special Quilt

Time for a little photo essay here! These darling people are Pete and Marietta, who have been married for--hold on--64 years, and whom I've known for probably 20 or more. The number of quilts Marietta's made is pretty staggering, especially considering some of the physical challenges she's faced over the years.

Growing older is not for sissies.

The latest threat to her quilting productivity is a big one: she's losing her eyesight to macular degeneration. Enter Pete, who's always been interested in the whole process of quilting--he's an engineer, and has enjoyed learning about all the machines and the mechanics of putting a quilt together, but never felt any need to actually make a quilt himself.

But their grandson is starting college this month, at USC--aka the University of Southern California, which is pretty well known, at least in this part of the world. He needs a quilt to take to college, preferably one that showcases his school, right? Right. So a collaborative effort on the part of the grandparents is making sure he's going to get one. So Grandpa Pete has taught himself how to actually use a sewing machine.

This is one of those "takes a village" quilts--cooperation at a couple of different quilt shops, and lots of determination on the part of the quilters. After several weeks of piecing and sewing, this past Tuesday night the quilt top was completed and has been consigned to the quilt-by-check person. (You know what I mean--the age-old question of hand-or-machine quilting has had a new dimension added to it--now, quilting by check is another option!)

Here's hoping Grandson enjoys his quilt when he gets it!