The Annual Bed Show

We have a bed tour at our annual retreat. It's fun to see all the beautiful quilts! Guess which one is mine!

Every year we make a quilt to donate to the camp; goal is to have a quilt on every bed. Each room has 8 beds. The first year we got a grant and were able to make 8 quilts. They are all like this, scrappy fence rail.

After the first year, we've made one quilt per year. We decided to make each one with a star pattern, because our guild name has "star" in it. This is our 2011 donation.

Now guess which one is mine.
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I'll tell you right off, this one is not mine. It is a real Amish quilt from Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.

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Be sure to check back again tomorrow. I am going to show you my Masterpiece!

Projects by Others

Here are some of the quilting projects (and their people) I saw being worked on at the retreat.















The quilting fairy even made an appearance!

Retreat!

I'm back! Did you miss me?? I was gone for a few days. While I was gone, I scheduled my Friday Books post to go up on 11/11/11 at 11:11 AM. Did anyone notice that cool coincidence?

Why I was out of town: I retreated, as I do annually, into Wisconsin. My quilt guild and I and spent hours and hours sewing, talking, eating, sharing, laughing, sewing, eating, sewing, sewing, sewing. We had a great time! Fun, fun, fun was had by all.

Want to see some pictures of what I made?? OK! Here, for your viewing pleasure, are some of my results of all those hours of sewing.

a twin-size top; pattern is "Five and Dime" by All Washed Up.

my block for the quilt we donate annually to the camp where we stay

the block I made to participate in a block lotto (I did not win, which was fine.. I wasn't crazy about the Christmas fabrics that were chosen for this project)

three blocks I made for a quilt to be made and donated by our guild

six blocks I made for Sunshine; November assignment is fall colors

a Sunshine quilt top to which I added borders

When I returned home on Sunday afternoon after the retreat, I was exhausted! I slept for a couple of hours, and then I spent the rest of the afternoon/evening organizing my retreat photos. That exhausted me for a second time, and I fell gratefully into bed.

Later this week I am going to show you MY MASTERPIECE. It is a quilt top I am quite proud of. Just wait 'til you see it! And, by the way, I'm catching up on my sleep. Always a good thing!

Friday Books

photo found at stumbleupon(dot)com

My recent finish is Friendship Bread by Darrien Gee. At first I thought I was not going to enjoy this book. It is rather light and "fluffy" compared to what I usually read. But I found myself enjoying it anyway. There is nothing wrong with fluff!

The story takes place in a small town and centers around a few women who have had serious challenges in their lives. They are learning to be "alive" even while experiencing heart ache. Friendship Bread makes its way into the town and helps transform lives.

That premise about the bread may be a tad far-fetched, but like I said, it's fluff... enjoyable fluff. It's fun to watch the changes in the lives of the main characters in this book. A good vacation, beach, or just-for-fun read, I would say. Watch out, though. It might make you hungry.

400 Quilts by Thanksgiving!

Can you help Victoria collect 400 quilts by Thanksgiving? Here is a link to the program site:
http://bumblebeansbasics.com/

Victoria is a quilter in NY who is sharing her quilting talents with a program, BASICS, that helps people transition out of shelters into permanent housing. They need quilts!! She once asked if BASICS could use quilts (thinking she could donate a few) and the guy said "do you have 700?"

That's how many people were awaiting housing in NYC! Victoria was floored and reached out to the cyberworld for help. They have now distributed 300 quilts but need 400 more. The next distribution day will be in early December, so they need the next 400 in NYC by Thanksgiving Day.

Do you have any quilts to share? Please read about this cool program and donate if you can! (Finished quilts, please -- no unfinished tops.) Any size works!


I was excited to see photos of people receiving a couple of the quilts I donated. Maybe you could share in this excitement, too.

"I Thought You Were Someone Famous"

Today I worked a morning shift of three hours, then I returned home to discover that our power was out. I had forgotten! The City warned us they would be working on our neighborhood transformer, and our power would be out most of the day.

I packed up my knitting project and a good book, and I headed off to the library. We have a library with windows that look out on a beautiful "estate" of oak trees and a creek running through. Knitting by those windows was ideal.

the soon-to-be-famous knitting (?)

After a while a woman came along and said "Knitting! What a beautiful thing to do in a library! Don't be alarmed, but I'm going to take your picture." She had a big camera with a big lens and a big, loud click (very professional sounding) when she snapped the shutter. She asked me to sign a waiver, giving her permission to use the photos in library publications or other publicity for the County (for whom she works).

Nearby sat a guy working on his laptop. She had snapped a photo or two of him, too. When she asked him to sign the waiver, he did so. And then he looked at me and said "I thought you were someone famous." The thing is, I think she was smitten by the look of the knitting juxtaposed against the windows and the gorgeous view outside. She snapped a LOT of pictures of me! It was a funny feeling, and I can see why the guy thought I was famous.

Of course, I'm just a regular person, knitting in a library on a beautiful autumn afternoon. The funny part was, as a person who also loves taking pictures, I could imagine how pretty my knitting looked against that beautiful backdrop. I would have wanted to snap lots of pictures of me and my knitting, too.

Oh... and after I tired of knitting, I pulled out my book and began to read, and the photographer re-appeared and snapped more photos of me while reading.

Now I'll wait and see if I show up anywhere in County publications. What are the chances, do you suppose!?

Quilt = Love

I have been sewing like mad! What fun! My tendency to bounce between projects means it's hard to get things done and show you pictures of completed quilts. But I have been having fun, and I trust that everything will eventually get done. (I may be 100 years old, but I'll get'em done by hook or by crook.)


Here is one (above) that I made recently and decided to send to Margaret's Hope Chest (MHC). One of the projects MHC does is quilts for kids whose parent is in prison. I like helping out with that project; I hope a quilt is helpful to the child (and the parent) in some way. Maybe it makes them feel loved or appreciated. I don't know about you, but I feel like the prison system in this country is really messed up. I hope my quilt will, in some tiny way, make someone's life a tiny bit better at least briefly... it's better than doing nothing, I guess. (Some problems are so big, I feel they are too huge to tackle. But giving away a quilt? I can do that and am happy to do it.)


This quilt top is also on its way to Margaret's Hope Chest. It was made and donated by someone in my local guild. She was not happy with it and wanted it out of her house! I gladly took it, and I think it is very cute. It's flannel, so it'll be really snuggly. I just know some child will love this one.


This is a quilt top I made and sent to MHC several months ago. MHC got it quilted, and it was given to a child..... isn't helping someone you will never know a great thing? I make the quilts with love, give them away, and I hope the quilts are loved, but I can't dictate that. I just enjoy knowing that at least someone is warm because of something I did. If they cuddle and love it, that's an extra bonus. The quilt can be a symbol of someone, somewhere, loving them. What could be better?

Still a Night Owl

I have always been a natural night owl. I love to stay up late and putz around. That's when I get my second wind and my energy for doing "stuff."

Now I'm in this new job where I am discovering that I love to work the early shifts. Friday, for example, I worked 7:30-10:00 AM. A nice little stint at work, a little cash in the pocket, and I still had almost the whole day to myself. I'm still a night owl when I get to be. If I don't work the next day, I stay up late and have fun. When I have the early work shifts coming up, then I'm careful to rearrange my habits so I get a decent night's sleep. This retired life is really slick. I'm loving it!

Now that the boutique is done, I am back to sewing what I want, when I want. This small quilt (about 8" x 10") is my attempt at being modern. Or something. My quilt guild has a show every February. This year they are doing something different and asking us all to make small quilts. I had one similar to this, made of all solids sewn together randomly.. a couple months ago I decided impulsively to quilt it. After a few minutes of meandering all over it, I discovered that I had ruined the quilt. The modern-ish style did NOT look nice with traditional meandering quilting all over it. Yuck.



So when I found this smaller piece of random solids, I decided to quilt it a modern way. I like this better. For pizzazz I added the flower corsage that was given to me the year I was Featured Quilter at our quilt show. I like this look much better, and for formality, it even has a title: Solid Style. Does giving it a name make it seem a little artsy?

Friday Books

Oh, boy! State of Wonder by Ann Patchett is a GOOD book!! Definitely a 5-star book. When I'd read the first third-to-half of it, I was describing it as "dark." That's because it takes place in a jungle, the protagonist is not comfortable with the heat, the huge insects, the snakes, the thick undergrowth... all those things made me kind of squirmy, too. And there's kind of a mystery that is not a happy one.

But... by the end I would no longer call this a dark story. At the end of the book I sat there thinking "Wow!" Not many books can do that to me.

The protagonist goes through a lot of new and strange experiences, and learns a lot as she goes through them. I felt that transformation along with her.. no longer thinking of the jungle as such a dark setting, for example.

I don't want to give away the story details, so I won't say much more. I am fascinated by how people can be such GREAT story tellers, though. How can a person have all these ideas in her head and write them down in such a captivating way?! It's awesome! I would say this is one of the best books I've read in a long time.

Boutiques and Storms

Our boutique and turkey dinner took place last night. We were very busy! Tons of people came, and we all had a good time. Boutique items were plentiful and varied. So fun! A few of my personal friends came just for the boutique part (not the dinner) and did some shopping. That was fun!


Totals have not yet been officially tallied, but I believe we took in about twice the usual amount of money for our boutique. That is fabulous news! All the money goes to programs we support in this area: transitional housing for women who are facing homelessness and addictions, a neighborhood project that supports many categories of people in need, and a homeless shelter that serves families and helps some of them move into permanent housing.






On a completely different subject, I have been thinking about the change in seasons and the inevitable snow storms we will get here. I have never before worked in a job that is open 24/7. I guess I've been spoiled. I worked in schools that would have snowdays, and I never had to force my little car to drive through the storms to get me safely to work. Now I'm in a job that runs around the clock, and I'm wondering how I'll manage when the storms hit. Our little road is often the last one plowed in this neighborhood, and we only have a shovel. It might be time for a snowblower, something my hubby has adamantly resisted all these years. Should be an interesting winter.

really not looking forward to the arrival of the white stuff

Another Peak

Our fall colors peaked a while back, and most of the leaves are nearly off the trees... now we're getting a second peak, this time of the lovely reds. This week while out running errands I snapped several pictures of the beautiful red trees that are among the last to show their full, brilliant colors. Breath-taking, aren't they?? I love fall!