On Vacation

Ray and I have been on vacation since July 5th. We hung around Phoenix, awaiting the birth of Ashlynn Renee, daughter of Ethan and Tish, which happened June 20th. She's a cutie, and I can hardly wait to see her and big sister, Logan, again! I haven't done a lot of quilting while on vacation, but did some beading while we were in Cascade for a month. I made a baby quilt for Ashlynn in June, and plan to have Sarita quilt it for me when we're back in Nampa in another week or so. Ray and I did our dreamed of Alaska trip this summer. One week was a cruise and the second week was a land trip. We did get to see Mt. McKinley, which we hear only about 10% of Alaska visitors see. We saw most of the wildlife that Alaska is famous for, so had a great vacation! Pictures will follow, probably when we're back in Arizona.

Tulips finished

I've finished all 52 of my tulips and have about half of the needed leaves done. I'm working hard at getting the pieces that will be appliqued done before we leave for the summer. Here's part of the tulips - the rest are still in the camera.

Tulips for Lilabet's Garden

I haven't posted in ages, but I have been busy, and need to get many pictures attached here. I'm working on a Block of the Month, with Annette, who is also making one for her granddaughter's wedding gift. I have 13 tulips made for the quilt, which is only 1/4 of the tulips that I need.

California granddaughters' quilts

Dianna helped me make the New Year's Mystery quilt from Planet Patchwork. When Dianna and Jenny were visiting at New Year's, Jenny fell in love with the stack and whack cats that I had made several years ago, so I put them together in a quilt for her. Ami Krenzel, in New Mexico, quilted both of them for me. You can see some of the detail of her quilting in the picture of the label in Dianna's quilt.
I can see that the pictures didn't load in the same order I thought I did, but I think you can get the idea. I had planned to put black binding around Jenny's quilt, but decided that I liked the tan that is around several of the stars in the quilt.

3/21/06

I've completed four quilts! Both the matching games quilts for Sarita and Ethan's kids are done, except for writing on the label. I got the binding on one of the charity quilts that Denise quilted, and I bound the toddler drag-around that I did before.
I need to remember to take some pictures!

Bindings and Labels

I made the labels for one of the matching game quilts and for my round robin quilt. It's totally sewn on the matching game quilt, and I have the label in place for the round robin, but need to make the hanging sleeve before I add the binding.
It feels good to be getting some of the UFOs done!

Mystery top finished

I finished the mystery quilt top, from the retreat, this morning. I decided to add the accent color as a flange, and then the pale fabric as a border. I'll use the floral paisly fabric for the binding, once the top is quilted.

3/10/06

I worked on my mystery quilt (from the AZ Retreat 2006) last night and got the top finished. I've considered adding another border. Carolyn asked if the border wasn't part of the mystery and already in place. I've decided that I like her thinking, and will leave it as is. I was going to do a raspberry flange, a 3" pale green border and then bind it with the paisley, but I'm probably just going to make raspberry binding and bind it at the size where it is. I wonder if anyone else had one hourglass block left over?

Retreat's over, Sarita and McKenna's visit is over and I'm back on the weight watching. I'm going to try to see the weight going off, not on, as I watch! LOL

3/6/06

Two days ago, Sarita and I went to Denise's and quilted three tops on her machine. We had the playpen for McKenna, who was a little angel.

2/27/2006

Returned home for the AZ Quilt Retreat last night. Dead tired, but happy! :-)
I'll post pictures in my webshots, will put the mystery quilt that we did at the retreat here, once I sew the final three rows on.

2/11/06

I've managed to get the body of the Best Friends quilt together, and need to add a purple border before I put a picture of it up here.
I've been working on another quilt, called Nine-Patch Garden, and have it done except for the final border, which will be 10 1/2" wide, and have vines and more nine patch 'flowers' appliqued onto it. I'm adding a picture of the top, done through the dark brown border, which is hard to see in the picture. I need to have longer arms.

2/9/06

I've gotten a lot more done on the Best Friends quilt top. Only one more row of sashings and blocks to add before I'm ready for borders.
My eye is better, but still puffy. This picture is 5 days after surgery, and I can still only open it a crack, and still have double vision. I have to open the right eye that wide to get the left eye open.

There must be an ounce of fluid in that under eye pouch!

The surgeon says everything is coming along well.

Eye surgery

I've been working on some more UFOs, but have been slowed down temporarily by a detached retina. Had surgery Saturday afternoon, and this is what I look like by Monday afternoon.

1/29/06

Since my last entry, I have finished another small 'drag around' toddler quilt top for Sojourner Center. I think I'm up to 8 tops ready for quilting!
I've started the Lillabet's Garden quilt, and have finished the first blocks - Hen and Chicks.

1/23/06

Once again, it's been awhile. I've been working hard on the UFOs and will post pictures. To the right, this is a possible lay-out, using three different stack and whack cat fabrics. My granddaughter, Jenny, admired them, and will be getting this one when it's done. (When it's done, I'll have 8 tops waiting to be quilted!) My friend, Debbie, suggested that I leave the ends the way they are. I may give that a try and see how hard it is to put the binding on.
The bright colors photo is the quilt that is using up the last of my matching game (pairs of novelty fabrics) quilt. It is the 7th or 8th quilt that I've made from these swap blocks, and I'm getting pretty sick of them. The others all had black sashing, which made the colors pop out. I got sick of black and chopped up some gaudy fabric to use for sashing, adding hot pink cornerstones. It's a bit much, but it's staying at my house, so it's OK. The pictures shows only the top half of the quilt. The rest has been added since the photo was taken. I'll add another shot of the fabric. Since this is a matching game quilt, and some of the fabric looks like it's on fire, I've named this quilt "Flaming Matches".

1/16/06

I haven't been here in a while, again! The quilting forum at about.com is to have a new guide, and Susan has started a new quilting forum on delphi. I've been trying to keep up with both forums!
I did finish the sashings and cornerstones for the last quilt I was working on, and that is now a completed top. I've put together four sets of pillow panels to be used as a charity quilt, and I've started the last (finally) of the novelty blocks quilts. This one is to live at my house for grandchildren to use when they come to visit. I was getting sick of black sashings, so chose a bright blue/green/orange/purple/yellow splotchy fabric, and will use hot pink cornerstones. I'll need to wear sunglasses, when I'm around it, but grandchildren should love it.
I've also been doing the ahead of time cutting for the mystery quilt that we'll do at the retreat at the end of Februaruy. You can see a bunch of the QSTs in the photo. The green isn't as pale as the photo shows.
My goal is to get two or three things off my UFO list that have been there for more than two years. There are several of them!
I now have five completed tops to be quilted, and in a couple days, should be able to say that it's six tops.

More sashings and cornerstones

I sewed together seven more rows of the strips of sashing and cornerstones that I need for my daughter's quilt. Only three more rows to go, and I have all the sashing strips cut and each has a cornerstone attached. Hopefully, before work tomorrow, I can get those done, and then when I get home, get the top totally together. That will leave me with four tops done, and ready to quilt.

1/10/06

I did some more sewing together of sashing pieces and cornerstones this morning, but haven't put them into strips yet. I took my handy-dandy gift certificate to JoAnn's tonight and bought the fabric I'll need for the mystery quilt that we'll be doing at the retreat at the end of February. I was having trouble picking fabrics, and asked another shopper if she was a quilter. We hit it off, and she stayed with me through several focus fabrics until I found just what I wanted. Chatted up the clerk at the cutting table - discussed baking bags for microwaves, and creating block patterns. Her grandmother is teaching her to quilt, and has probably only three more months to live, so it's bittersweet for her. I've told her about about.com, so she may show up in the quilting forum one of these days.
The mystery quilt I'm doing requires a 'dark' focus fabric, a light background and an accent fabric. My focus isn't truly dark, but compared to the background, it is, so I hope it will work. Both the background and focus fabrics have paisley, which I love. The background fabric is really a little greener than the photo shows.

1/9/06

I did get the matching game quilt top, which is for my son's children, finished and took it for show and tell at our get together on Saturday.
I've started putting together the similar one for my daughter's children. All the blocks are into the horizontal rows, and six of the sixteen sashing/cornerstone strips are done. Sashings and cornerstones are cut for more, but I've had it for tonight.
I see that the New Year's mystery quilt picture is up at the Planet Patchwork site.

On a roll again!

Before I worked on the New Year's Day mystery quilt, I had a matching game quilt on my design wall, with half the quilt put together. Last night, I cut more of the horizonal sashings, and the shorter, vertical ones. This morning, I got most of the verticals sewn to the remaining blocks, and then this evening, I sewed the rest of them, cut even more horizontal sashings, and have all the rows completed, with a vertical sashing sewn to the top of each. I've 'hit the wall' for tonight, so will sew the rest of the rows together to finish the bottom half of the quilt top tomorrow, hopefully, before work! On Saturday, I have a quilting meeting - retreat hostesses, for the (?)final meeting before the retreat , and would like to take this for show and tell, as well as the mystery quilt top. What a feeling of accomplishment, to spend more time sewing than I do on the computer!

It's been a while

With company here, I didn't get to my blog for a while. I think I mentioned that the granddaughters and I shopped for pillowcase fabric. Dianna made two with help from me, and did very well, especially considering that it was satin-y fabric, and slipperier than goose grease! I made Logan's for her, as she's only three, and had to help Jenny quite a bit, as her main interest isn't in sewing.
I had cut out the blocks for the New Year's Mystery Quilt and Dianna and I spent a couple days working on that, and really love how it came out.
There were errors in the cutting and sewing instructions, but with help from on-line friends who were also making the quilt, we got it together.