Beautiful Quilts Everywhere!

Did you see that the Quilt Pink auction has begun at ebay?? Just go to quiltpink dot com and follow the link. What a bunch of pretty quilts! I might bid on one. Wouldn't it be fun to own one of them?

Here are some more beautiful quilts! I made them! Yes, I am bragging about my own work! I am so pleased with these. I showed you the blue/red one earlier, before I had added borders. I hate doing borders! They always slow me way down! I managed to get these done during spring break and will hand them off to my machine quilter on Tuesday. It'll feel good to have them totally done!

The blue/red is for my brother-in-law and the green is for my nephew. He asked for Tlingit art work in the middle and jaggedy green lines around it. I felt a little nervous, but love how it turned out! Tlingit is an Alaska native tribe which is in my husband's ancestry. I modeled the whale after some Tlingit art that I found online. I don't know if the little shapes within the whale are supposed to have specific meanings. If they do, I really messed up something, no doubt. Maybe my whale says something like: "because the sunrise and eyebrow" (reminiscent of subject lines in spam e-mails).

It's my last official day of spring break! Things I accomplished: a good amount of sewing and quilting, visiting my mother and playing Scrabble with her, relaxing, finishing my cprint training!!!! (an online training I have been doing for work over several months), and a few loads of laundry. Things I did not accomplish: forget it. Who wants to think negatively??

Happy Easter and spring, everyone!

Spring Break Road Trip

Whose woods these are, I think I know. Their house used to be in the village, though. I stopped by these woods on a cloudy afternoon to visit the resting place of my grandparents and aunt and uncle. I miss these nice people! Interestingly, three of these four were Hamline University graduates. That's me wearing the Hamline sweatshirt. My son is a student there now. He's number 26 in our long line of relatives at Hamline, starting with my grandfather whose stone I am leaning on. He graduated from Hamline in 1903!

My sister is opening up a book store! It's an exciting adventure. We all love books and bookstores. We can't wait to see her new store: Cherry Street Books in Alexandria, MN. She is hoping to open the store this June. If you visit Alexandria, stop in at her bookstore and say hi! It's at 5th & Broadway (not on Cherry Street as you might think). The sad part is that she won't have much time for quilting. She makes gorgeous quilts. I'm one of her biggest fans.

Lucy at Aunt Annie's Quilts and Silks in Avon, MN helped me pick out these fabrics. They are for a challenge at my guild. I picked the gorgeous oriental, and Lucy helped with the rest. Aren't they pretty?? It'll be a while, but when it's all done I show you what these fabrics look like as a finished quilt. If you drive past Avon on your way to Alexandria, stop in at Aunt Annie's. It's one of my favorite quilt shops in the whole world.

I hope you enjoy these pictures. Karen told me it was high time to move on from the previous picture, so I am doing as told. I was going to visit Karen this week, but we had a freak April snowstorm, and she couldn't get out of her driveway. I was snowed in at my mom's house. I could have walked into town, but it was too far to walk to Karen's house. Mom and I played Scrabble, read books, and I took a nap. Isn't that a great way to spend Spring Break!? I thought so.

If you want to see a string quilt that I made, check out Mary's Heartstrings blog here. She is going to quilt it for me.

Those High School Girls

Meet Connie, Linda, and Karen. Just the other day we were high school girls. Now we are grandmas (some of us)! Hard to believe how fast time flies! I was pals with these three nice women in high school, along with Becky, who is absent. Becky died in a car crash a few years ago. We realized then that we had let too much time pass and that we needed to reunite. The first time we got back together, it had been 30-some years since we'd all seen each other! We sat there, missing Becky, but giggling about how funny it was to see us all with our same familiar faces, slightly altered.

Since then we try to get together once or twice a year. I am so grateful that we have re-connected. It's nice to know them as adults. I can still learn from them! And just to have some pals who can laugh with me about being this age... it sure is nice. Some of my other friends are younger than I am. I love them dearly, but there is something comforting about having friends all my same age. It just slays me that these three and I will soon all be eligible for senior citizen discounts, Elder Hostel travels, retirement, being grandmas.

Here's a fun perk: Karen and I have both turned into quilters! We have exchanged a few fabric postcards. Here is a display at a local quilt shop. She asked customers to send in postcards, and in exchange we got one from the shop owner. This is the display of what came in. I think I showed you mine earlier (if I remember correctly, without checking back).. can you find it in this display?

Under the Weather

I haven't posted lately for a couple of reasons: 1) I was just feeling blah about everything. Maybe it was the "end of winter blues." Is there such a thing? Maybe it was the gray days, the gray snow... who knows? I was in a slump. 2) I got sick! Yeeccchhh! I'm not sure if it was flu or food poisoning. Whatever it was, it wasn't fun. It lasted through today, and thank goodness, I am feeling good enough now to return to real life tomorrow. What a blessing good health is!!! I'm going to try not to take it for granted in the future.

I did manage to make this tote bag. The block actually was made by Ann D. So all I did was the bag. (Does that make her a Block Head and me a Bag Lady?) It'll go to a silent auction for a women's transitional housing project. I followed a pattern (sort of) but wish I had altered it. The handles are too short, in my opinion. But the bag is long, so longer handles would make it drag on the floor, unless you're tall like me. The pattern wasn't quilted, but I added batting and quilted it. I love quilted bags! If I do another one, I'll alter the proportions. I'm thinking of getting a couple pretty buttons and sew them on where the handles are attached. Don't you think that would look nice?

Oh, today is so pretty! The sun is shining, and our high temp was 81. Nice day to stay home and recover from blecchhhy sickness. I sat on the deck reading for a while. The sun felt so great.

Now I'm back from the blahs, my yucks are gone, I feel great, I want to sew, and after 4 more work days, I'll be on spring break so I CAN sew. Yippeeee!

Shopping for Fabric

Today I got to do a bunch of fabric shopping for other people! I bought 21 yards of fabric to be put into sewing kits for women around the world. I had a blast! The fabric was on sale, the notions such as thread and buttons were 50% off, and I got 5% off my entire purchase. I was able to buy lots more than I had expected! What fun! These chunks plus some others already purchased will go into sewing kits for 13 women somewhere in the world. The idea is that they can learn to sew some garments for themselves or their family, and perhaps learn an income-producing skill.

After the shopping trip, I put together these two tops that are made from Lotto blocks at Sunshine list. These will be going to children somewhere in the world, also. Aren't they bright and cheery? I don't know yet whether I will quilt these or someone else. It's probably my turn to do some of my own tops. I farm them out a little too often, I think. I just think others are so much better at machine quilting than I am -- however, when I do my own machine quilting I always feel so proud and enjoy the process, plus I get the joy of seeing the finished product. So I will try!

Colors are a little off in this first picture. Those purples really are red, not so purpley.

It was beautiful and sunny today. Slowly but surely our giant snow piles are melting. Hooray!

Fascinated by our Snow

You would think we had never seen snow before. It's all the talk around here. We did get two huge storms in one week, so in a blink of an eye we went from drought to doing OK. It just strikes me funny that it's such a big deal to us -- this is Minnesota! We are supposedly used to this stuff. But when it comes in huge amounts, it takes over one's life for a while. It requires a lot of work to dig out, shovel, clean up, and figure out how to get around. Makes for interesting pictures and news stories.

My mail box hasn't been nearly buried like this in many years. I actually like to see this much snow all over. It's so beautiful.

This snowy bush is in my front yard.

Today I shoveled a bit, until my back hurt too much. Then I walked a bit through my neighborhood and took pictures, until my camera battery died. I also did some sewing today.. made some blocks for a Lotto I'm in. I didn't feel particularly inspired and am not thrilled with my blocks, but I guess they'll do. I made the cute snowman to give the Lotto "owner."

Have a great weekend, everyone.

Winter Wallop!

We're getting another big storm! Can you even see that guy on the sidewalk? School is closed tomorrow, so I'm enjoying a long weekend, warm and snug in my house. I'll get another shoveling-aerobic workout in the next couple of days. When I'm not shoveling, I will do some sewing. Yippee!

Blocks of the Day

This is what I did Friday night and most of Saturday... about 52 crumb blocks. There is a noticeable change in my scrap box. However, it's just a small box, and I have more scraps in other boxes. I could do these blocks for the next month... in fact, some time, if it wouldn't drive me insane, I should try that -- a whole month, or perhaps my entire summer when I have lots of time off, do nothing but crumb blocks and scrap sewing. I wonder if even that would make a dent?

Thanks for the comments that say you like my red, white & blue top with the light blues. I do, too, I think. I'll know for sure when it's a complete quilt. This week I hope to get it to the machine quilter. I think (I hope) I'll love the quilt when it is done.

We're getting an all-weekend snow storm. It started out slowly, but finally tonight (Saturday night) we have some good accumulation. It will continue to snow for the next 24 hours, they say. I love a fresh, deep snowfall, especially when it comes on a weekend.

Long Weekend

Hooray, I have today off! I have been so naughty this weekend. I stay up sooo late into the wee hours. I'm embarssed even to admit how late I stayed up on Saturday and Sunday nights. I have never been up so late, even when I was a young night owl. Anyway, I have spent most of the weekend sewing on this quilt for my brother-in-law. I promised him a red, white & blue quilt. He doesn't remember asking for one in those colors, but he did. I'm a little disappointed that I used so many light blues and that I'm not as fond of how they look. A mixture is nice, but I think I have too many lights in there.

As you can see, my design wall doesn't accommodate a very big quilt. This is 40 x 60 and takes up every inch. I actually have two design areas about the same size, but they are not side by side. And one is currently my make-do "bulletin board." I keep hanging reminder items on there "temporarily." I just never seem to get around to removing them so I can use it for its intended purpose.

This quilt is now on the living room floor so I can add to it. I think I'm nearing completion. Good thing, too, because I am running out of the background fabric.

I made another fabric postcard this weekend, similar to the last one I posted. Can you see my tiny initials on there? Look for CE. This one is going to a LQS that is sponsoring a postcard challenge. Next month all the postcards they receive will be on display. And everyone who sent one in will get one back from the shop. It'll be fun to see what I get from them. The shop owner is in the artist category whereas I'm in the putzy category, so I look forward to seeing what she sends.

Oh, I just remembered another postcard I made, just for fun. Here's that one:

I'm trying to convince myself to do some housework instead of sewing, but I'm so close to getting this top all assembled.... I hate to interrupt the flow. Have a great, sunshiney day, everyone!

Postcard Connection

I found out about a fun place where people can exchange postcards with others around the world. It is here: www.postcrossing.com

I made this postcard for a person in Finland. She said she likes homemade cards. I hope she likes this one.

Valentine

I made this valentine for my husband. It's about 6" x 12". Clothes pin is there to show you scale. I'm still looking for the perfect little dowel and string for hanging. It's fat-free, carb-free, sugar-free. Think he'll like it?

Quilt Show Photos

Thought I'd share some photos from the quilt show. Enjoy!

These are my dolls, displayed in a glass cube. The standing doll is my "bride doll" (remember those?) from probably 1960 or so. My mom made her that coat and a little muff and a whole bunch of other clothes. The only thing I have left is this coat. The baby doll is modern. I made both dolls' quilts.

I made this one (below) from a pattern called "You Just Can't Cut It," designed for large print fabrics that you don't want to cut up.

Set-Up Complete

We set up our quilt show today. Wow! It gets better every year. Here is a picture of the set up process, almost done.

Here is a picture of the quilt that I plan to vote for (Viewer's Choice). The ribbon is from one of the show committee members. We decided to let the show committee vote for their faves. I put my ribbon on a different quilt but plan to vote for this one as viewer's choice. It's just beautifully done in felted wool.

Quilters in Denmark?

First a question: I know a quilter from the USA who will travel to Denmark this spring. She would love to make a connection with a quilter in Denmark or at least find some information about quilting there, visit some shops, whatever she can find. Does anyone have some info I could share with her? Just FYI, she is a very talented long-arm quilter.



Second: this is my challenge quilt that I only showed the back of last month. It's nothing to brag about, but I had fun making it. It is made in honor of the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency books by Alexander McCall Smith. We are setting up the quilt show tomorrow! I will share photos with you soon.

Liberated Quiltmaking

Isn't Gwen Marston's "Liberated Quiltmaking" the book that so inspired Tonya and others? It is at Amazon in paperback for $24.95 ... isn't this a lot less than the hardcover cost? I hope it's the same book. I just ordered one for myself, and they said it is expected to be available for shipping in late Feb... so I assume that it being available in paperback is a new thing.

Just thought I'd share this tidbit, and I hope I'm talking about the right book and have my facts right (e.g., that is wasn't available in paperback before).

This is my friend, Jeanne, and the quilt I gave her. It only took me about five years to finish this easy little quilt. It was a total happy accident that it perfectly matches that chair to the right.

Sampler's Finished!

I just finished the binding and hanging sleeve. This one doesn't even need a label. It's ready for the show set-up on Saturday! The top hanger thing really doesn't bow like it looks like here.

Quilt Show Coming Up

Greetings, readers! It's a cold but pretty day here in Minnesota... we started out the day at about -3 degrees F (about -18 C). You can see why I chose to stay inside today. It's pretty outside, but I didn't feel like bundling up. Today I am working on bindings and finishing hanging sleeves for the quilt show that is about to start (my guild's annual show). I also made another small quilt for the silent auction. The show opens on Feb. 7th. If anyone is in the Twin Cities area and wants to see the quilt show, check the info at this blog:
it's called dcsq (dot) blogspot
When I tried to make it into a link it went to a really weird site, so I unlinked it. Trust me, it is a normal blog.

I have made three small quilts for the auction. This year I just kept going! Usually it's a struggle to get one made. If I want to be brutally honest, I should admit I made four small quilts this year. One I'm turning in as made by "anonymous". It was rather ugly, and I didn't want my name on it. It was a quick, thrown together thing made of pre-quilted small blocks that I won as a door prize a while back. They started out ugly, and it didn't get much better when I made them into a top. The other three are at least worthy of having my name on them.


Here is the one I made today. It is nothing like I had in mind when I started. I hope someone likes it. It is totally made of scraps. The beads are leftovers from some I bought in Port Townsend, WA last July. Wish I'd bought lots more. They are fun to add to small quilts, and I haven't seen anything as nice here in MN. The dowel is from a very cheap, ugly wall hanging I bought last year in the after-Christmas sales. I paid 50 cents for the whole thing and mainly it was to use the dowel. And all the fabrics are from my scrap bin. So it was a very inexpensive little quilt.

I haven't been through the blog rings to catch up on everyone's news. I'll go do that now and hope that I hear about an upcoming arrival in Paris of Tonya and her cats. Have a happy week, everyone!

A Sewing Weekend

Wow, this week went so fast! My work week was crazy and busy. I was so happy when the weekend came. I spent almost the entire weekend sewing. My sweet husband did a bunch of housework and laundry to keep us going on that mundane stuff, and so I could sew to my heart's content. Isn't he a gem?

These are the string blocks I made to send to Nancy of the Stashbusters ring (her birthday request). I assumed more people would make them with red center lines, so I made mine blue. Then I found out on the Heartstrings project that they are getting more blue centers than red.

The next photo shows the 8 blocks I made for Heartstrings. These are a great way to use up strips of various widths, and they make such cute quilts! After I catch up on UFOs I am sure I will be interested in making more of these and making the tops myself. For now I'm going to send these in to be used in the communal pot for making charity quilts.

Another thing I did this weekend was make 50 four patch blocks for Sunshine, another Yahoo group of which I am a member. We make quilts for kids who undergo cleft palate surgery, and quilts for kids in orphanages worldwide. Here is a sample of some of the blocks I made, and the pile of 50 that I am sending to the person who issued this challenge.

These are some bags that will be filled with school supplies. This is a project we do at church. They are given to a church relief organization that distributes these to areas in need. I like making these bags. Today I had to be creative as some of my fabric pieces weren't big enough. I like these funky bags! The last one, made entirely of upholstery fabric sample pieces, got pretty thick on the sewing of the handles, and I broke my needle. I think that's a sign to stop sewing for the weekend and start to plan my work week.

front and back

I have a whole box full of upholstery samples that we got from a neighborhood furniture store. A woman at my church works there. The samples are so helpful in making these bags!

Tomorrow is the fifth anniversary of my father's death. I can hardly believe it was five years ago! But when I think of my son who is now 20, back when he was 15 seems like a lifetime ago. It's all relative. I hope my mom has an OK day on Monday, remembering her husband, my dad who was such a loving man. I still miss him and dream about him. But I know he is doing fine, and so are we. Give your family a hug today!

Just Looked Outside

It has been snowing, and I didn't realize how beautiful it was getting to be. About two minutes ago I took this picture out my front door. Finally - snow! We look like Minnesota again!

U R Cool

This is a miniature quilt that I made today. It measures about 11" x 14". It was very spur of the moment. I actually sat down to make a fabric postcard. Now that this is done, I wish I had used an upper case R, because this kinda looks like "Up Cool." I'm not even sure what I'm going to do with this little quilt.

On the news I saw the horrible ice storms going through the southern plains states.. quite a widespread storm! We got some very beautiful snow here in the Twin Cities area of Minnesota. It looks like about two inches. It finally looks like Christmas! I turned on my outdoor Christmas lights again, just for fun, because they never looked "right" when we had our brown Christmas.

I hope you are all doing well, especially Tonya while you work through this medical exploration thing. And I hope none of those horrible car accidents in the ice (that I saw on TV) involved anyone I know from Blogland. Stay home and be safe! Tomorrow is another day off, so I plan to do more sewing! Wheeeee!

Getting Lost in Blogland

Does anyone else do this... start traveling through the mavericks ring and then accidentally find yourself in the midst of the stash busting ring or some other? I could wander through rings forever and not know what happened.




I'm posting a picture of my mom. Doesn't she look great? Guess how old she is! I bet you won't guess that she will be 86 in two months. It's true! I think she looks much younger than 86. This was taken on Christmas Day. She looks happy and youthful. I want to go visit her and play a game of Scrabble with her. I never win, because she's a Scrabble professional.


Nothing new in the quilty front. I'm back at work after my nice break and haven't had time to sew this week. What does one do with all the ideas and sewing motivation in one's head when there is no time to produce?! Maybe I'll take my sewing machine to work. Wonder what the boss would say.........

Another Quilt Done!

Wow, I'm on a roll! I finished another quilt today. It's for the challenge at the Feb. show, so I can't show it to you until later. Here's a sneak peek... what do you think?? Does it look like a winner to you??? LOL.



This is the back, and when I took the picture, I wasn't quite done sewing down the hanging sleeve.

Next I'll show you a random, crazy shot. I took this just to see if my camera battery was still working. (It was.) I look out my sewing room door to the front hall. There's a little table there full of junk. I try to keep it cleaned off, but it piles up again. There is a big box I will put in the mail tomorrow, a piece of clothing and an old goldfish bowl/terrarium that I will give to Goodwill, a set of sheets that we got for Christmas (those are now in the dryer), some quilting books that were in my way, some quilty stuff that I am going to give away, some stuff to take to church, and the big dark object on the bottom shelf is my FW that is in a cooler. (I didn't want it to get too hot in this unseasonably warm winter weather.)



Want to show me what you see when you look out your sewing room door? I dare ya! And no fair cleaning up first, either.

A Busy and Fun Break

I haven’t written for a while, and I’m behind on reading everyone’s blogs again! I have been on break from my job, but busy with family and things to do. I have been sewing a lot, getting some things done, but not the things I should be working on. Here is an example. It is a wall hanging I made quite a while ago; just this week I finally quilted and bound it. I do not plan to hang this in the February quilt show for which I should be preparing. This one is just not that well produced. Even though it is paper pieced, I had several mis-matched points. It’s good enough to hang in my house, but not in a quilt show. Not that I usually have a strict criterion for myself. If it gets done, I usually put it in the show!



We finally got a little snow. Just a little. It looks pretty to have our landscape white instead of gray and brown that I was getting sick of seeing. But it’s still unseasonably warm, and the snow probably won’t last long. What strange weather we are having! Where did Minnesota go??

My break is flying past all too quickly. I go back to work next Monday, January 8. Not that I’m complaining. I know I’m very lucky to get a break over the holidays! It is so refreshing; I really think more businesses should give their employees breaks like school employees get. It really helps refresh one’s soul. (I just wish I had gotten more quilting done during the break. With the number of days left, I know I won’t get done all that I had hoped. So it goes.)

I had such fun with my kids during the break. My son came home from college and actually hung around and talked with us! It was great. He and I made an apple pie together just before he went back to the dorm. He took half the pie with him, still a little warm. I meant to take a picture of my son with the pie, but I forgot. This Thursday I get to spend a little time with my daughter when she has a day off. Maybe I can visit her cat, too. He used to live here, and I miss him.

That’s all for now! Hope you are enjoying 2007 so far.