More Quilts, Less Talk

Just a few quilts I liked from IHQS with very little commentary. These are not big winners; winners should be posted on the IQHS web site soon.


V Spot Target Attack by Connie Brown. I like the softness of this color scheme; the complementary orange/blue is bright but doesn't jump at you, and the whole arrangement is somehow restful.



Peace and Harmony by Terry Benzo. The title says it all.



Enticement Klonda Holt. Honorable Mention, Pieced Amateur. This is a Karen Stone pattern done with beautiful color, and the striped fabric making the secondary design was her original touch which sets this apart.



She finally reached her ideal weight by Sandee Winrow Milhouse. Another honorable mention, in Art Quilt. I like humor in quilts, even when it's black humor.




Redaction by Loretta Painter. Not my usual thing at all. I don't usually care for chocolate brown and blue, and the design is rather static. But it's interesting to examine how she put it together, and the quilting was done on a home machine, and very well too.

The Soapbox

Here are a few observations I made and opinions I formed from the attending the Indiana Heritage Quilt Show.

1. The quality of machine quilting now is truly extraordinary. In fact, the quilting on the winning quilts was better than the teachers' quilts, two of whom were teaching machine quilting. I'm talking about long arm quilting, I think, although this show doesn't make a distinction in categories, and so unless the quilt maker stated in her description how the quilt was done, it's hard to know. I do know that one excellent quilt was quilted on a standard machine.

2. Shows face a challenge in clarifying categories. Distinguishing different types of machine quilting is one area that is changing so fast that categories need to change to keep up. It doesn't seem fair for a hand guided home machine to have to compete with a long arm, particularly a computer guided long arm. Then there's the professional vs. amateur category. One thing I noticed at this show was how many more professional entries there are now. That's not surprising, considering how many people have long arm quilting businesses. But again, can a competent, small business long arm quilter compete with someone who is not just a professional quilter, but a professional competitive quilter? That's clearly what is happening.

Then there is a question of what makes an "art quilt." At this show the same person won in Wall Quilt and Art Quilt (amateur). The two entries were hanging side by side, identical in technique as far as I could see, and similar in subject matter (both raw edge applique/collage landscapes). The only apparent difference was size. "Art Quilt" or "Fabric Art" needs some definition--a tall order, I know.

3. And finally, I've noticed in the last few years an increasing emphasis on what I heard described as the "Wow factor." Of course a winning quilt has to have something special about it. But does special have to mean oversized, brightly colored, high contrast motifs? Does it have to mean fully saturated complementary colors used in equal amounts? Does it have to mean glue on crystals that don't necessarily enhance the design? Does it have to mean cloying sentimentality? Can't special mean a subtly beautiful color scheme, a well-balanced design, an interesting play of geometric shapes, or wit, originality, and taste? Is it a good thing for a quilt to "look just like a painting"?

If I go too far with this, it sounds like I'm criticizing the quilters, whose technical skills are breath-taking, deserving the highest admiration. I'm not. I'm criticizing a current trend, fad, whatever you might call it, that quilters are responding to. I don't think it's necessarily a healthy trend. If 80 years ago women were creating kitsch in their spare time with needle and thread and calicos, and they're now creating kitsch with $5000+ sewing machines, $10 a yard fabric, and $8 a spool thread, have we progressed? I don't think so. A few years ago, non-quilters began to look at quilting with respect. We're going to lose that respect and become just a marketing opportunity unless design becomes as important as workmanship.

Finally, since this sounds a bit negative, I just want to clarify that the IHQS is a very well organized, well run show, with a broad range of quilt styles and levels, and first class teachers. I've always enjoyed going to it, and will continue to make it part of my quilting plan. If you made it through all this, thanks for persevering!

Indiana Heritage Quilt Show

I spent a day and a half at this show. It caused me to do lots of thinking about quilting styles, not all of it pleasant or positive. I'm mulling over how or if to post some of these thoughts, but in the meantime here are a couple of big winners. As a White Glove Lady posted in their area, I examined them in detail. Both are a text book in detail and intricate workmanship.

Best of Show: String of Pearls by Mary Buvia


Excellence in Workmanship Hand quilted: Irish Cream by Linda Roy

And here are a couple of detail shots:



Most of the raised areas on Linda Roy's quilt are not trapunto, but applique. It's an exquisite piece of work.

Take It Further, February

For the theme, "What Can You Remember?", I focused on myself as a college student. I loved college, everything about it. And although I was always waiting till the last minute to study because I enjoyed my social life, I was serious, even excited, about all the new worlds and ideas out there to learn about. It was important to me to understand, to think, to read as much as I could. I definitely needed to lighten up (still do). The photos were mostly taken from a picture in the yearbook of me student teaching, an awful picture actually. Why the editors ran it, I can't imagine. But there I am, intense, naive, and boring those kids to death! It was so important then, and isn't now--and so the Bob Dylan line. There's not much to say about the construction of the piece. I scanned the photos, colored them on Photo Shop, and made this very amateurish collage. There's little stitching because I've packed up my machine, and the heavy weight of the fabric doesn't allow for hand work.

Thinking about this period was fun. By coincidence I just read a piece in my alumni magazine by a classmate and well known journalist, who described this era as the last time when college girls posed for photos in sweater sets and pearls, with their hands folded and their legs crossed. I'm not wearing pearls in the picture, but I could have been!

Tip for Squaring Up

Yesterday I made the unpleasant discovery that the square background for my Hoffman circle wasn't perfectly square in spite of all my supposedly careful marking and cutting. Since the circle has to look exactly centered, I couldn't just trim. I was hopelessly confused about what part to cut, but solved the problem by making a square of paper the correct size (34 inches), and then putting that over the inaccurate piece. I could see the outline of the circle through the paper, so it was relatively easy to move the paper until the circle was centered, and then cut along the edge of the paper square. I don't think I had this idea by myself. It's one of those things that I read somewhere and had buried in the unconscious until needed. I thought I'd pass it on. The top of the Hoffman is finished now; I'm sending my sewing machine to rehab before I quilt it. We need time apart, for sure!

Plan Ahea...

I successfully handled the tricky construction bits of the Hoffman, but then when I looked at it, I realized I had to add these additional shapes--too much blank space in the dark blue areas. I had put these shapes on and taken them off several times in the past, but had convinced myself I didn't need them. Wrong. And it would have been SO much easier to do the applique when I had a small piece to maneuver, or even a 30" circle instead of a 36" square. I think the moral of this is, if you think maybe you should do it, do it. This definitely applies to ripping out, and I guess to adding too.



And here are some pieces to be in the Take It Further Challenge, when I get to it. I seem to be able to only work at one thing at a time, partly because of obssessiveness, and partly because the mess from one project takes over the entire work space.

Success (almost)

I sewed the Hoffman together and it did go into an (almost) perfectly flat and even circle. A bit of fudging and fiddling was required, but I'm pleased. Now "all" that's left is to figure out how to draw a perfect 28" circle with that wobbly compass ruler I have, sew the bias strip that makes the edge on that circle, and meet a new engineering challenge of how to put together the pieces that square the circle, since they're narrower at the center of the circle than the corners. I've got ideas for both of these, but the execution is the trick. And then there's the quilting...

But for now I'm getting my hair done!

Are We Sick of This Yet?

This is about as good as it's going to get. I gave up fighting the gold on the flower and added more, including gold as the backing to the plate/circle. There will be more gold thread accents, probably as part of the quilting. I'm starting the assembly now, hoping that everything will fit together.

Take It Further, January and February

I have been thinking about my February piece, but don't have anything to post yet. As part of the memory theme, I'm going to use photos and scanned images to make a collage about myself in my college and early professional years. It was going to be black and white images, but I just discovered how to add color to black and white via Photoshop, so I may try that. I've been making a continuing, but very erratic, irregular, and frustrated attempt to learn more about Photoshop, and this will give me an incentive to practice. I find I can only stand a few minutes at a time, and then can't remember what I learned to do. A better manual would really help; it would also help to have Photoshop Elements instead of Adobe Creative Suite. (We have that for my husband's work, but Photoshop CS is way, way beyond anything I would ever need or be able to use. Ironically, he knows even less than I do.)

I wrote to the publisher of 4000 Flower and Plant Motifs to ask permission to use their motif so that I could donate my January TIF piece to Ami Simms' Alzheimer's Art Quilt Initiative, and received an email this morning granting permission, so as soon as I make it to the Post Office for the prepaid envelope, I should be all set. This would be a good use for any of these pieces that anyone didn't feel the desire to save. I have an interest in the cause because my father suffered from Alzheimer's, and as I struggle with Photoshop, I begin to wonder...

Not a Paid Announcement...

The other day while I was browsing in the Hallmark store for Valentines and birthday cards for my sisters, I found this great looking little tote. It's made out of African mud cloth, produced in Mali by dying fabric with actual mud. It's usually brownish, not black like this, but otherwise looks quite genuine to me. Hallmark is having a special promotion of a line of products, cards and gifts, with the label RED. Part of the proceeds goes to help fight AIDS in Africa. I couldn't pass up the chance to buy some of this cloth, already made into something, Mud cloth products are expensive, even in Africa, and it's a good cause, although I could be cynical about what percent of the money actually gets to Africa. Nevertheless, I bought two, one for myself, and one to solve the problem of a sister B-day gift. Maybe some other fabric lovers might like to know about it. And by the way, if you want a laugh, I strongly recommend the comic birthday cards section. It works for me every time.

Moving On

I'm back to the Hoffman--maybe I see some light at the end of the tunnel. It wasn't a creative breakthrough though, but new fabric. There's something wrong about that.

For full disclosure, here is what I had last week. I don't like it; it's too much dark, and there is too much stark contrast between dark and light.

Here is what I'm doing about changing:


I've added another medium value fabric (this was what I had been unable to find), and also a busier dark in the center). I think this may work better. There are still decisions to be made about the center and the outer rim, not to mention the square that will hold the circle. I think I'm ready to do more stitching, but that's what I thought Friday! I am not pleased with the way this is working out, even now, but I decided to be brave and post anyway. You have to stick you neck out sometimes.

And how cute is this!

We stopped by yesterday to watch the twins eat oatmeal, and then left cold, sunny Chicago to return to cold, snowy home. We definitely live on the wrong side of Lake Michigan.

Grumble, Grumble

I pulled my Hoffman Challenge post because I think I jinxed myself by putting it up. Nothing is going together right on this. I can't find quite the right fabric, so in trying to make the best of a second rate lot, I've changed my mind a dozen times. Yesterday I thought I had it, and began to sew. I finished enough to put it on the wall, and realized there are still problems, so I will continue to try to tweak it. Very discouraging. In the meantime the Take It Farther February thing hangs over my head. Can't do anything till Monday anyway because we're going to Chicago today. It's going to be the classic, miserably cold Chicago day, windy with temperatures that feel below zero. The mink coats will be out in full force tonight; almost makes me wish I had one!

Fat Tuesday

I couldn't resist--This is a traditional Polish pre-Lenten treat called a paczki (pronounced punch-key). Yum. It's basically a richer jelly doughnut, and although lemon is my favorite, I happily settled for raspberry. Happy Fat, and Super, Tuesday everyone.

Take It Further, February

Sharon B's challenge for the month is the question "What are you old enough to remember?" Like everyone else, I've thought of historical events (many are the same as others, but some of mine go far back), but I've also thought of more personal things connected with my childhood at the farm, and my family. I'm thinking of using an old photo in some way, but everything I think of is the sort of thing I've seen done several times, so I'll keep worrying at it until something comes out that speaks to me, I guess. Bob Dylan's words "I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now," keep going through my head. I'm going to try to work them in. Since this is just for personal use, I guess Bob wouldn't sue.

In the meantime I progress S-L-O-W-L-Y with the Hoffman Challenge.

Aren't those Hoffman Challenge coordinates beautiful? I ordered the package from Keepsake Quilting with a gift certificate, but won't use them. The last week in January is traditionally Hoffman Challenge week for me. My husband goes away for the week, making it easier to focus. So yesterday I refined the design, did some cutting, and plan to cut more and audition fabrics today. I probably won't post pictures for a while; it's not that I think my idea is so great anyone would copy it, but it's not unique, so I don't even like to plant a tiny seed. All I'll say is that I'm doing lots of fussy cutting, and the finished product will not look at all like the fabric or the coordinates. Ironically, the more I hack up that fabric, the prettier it looks to me! Who else is thinking about this challenge? It's still early---

Keeping Posted

I was amazed to see that I haven't posted for a week. It's been a busy time. My husband had a surgical procedure done on his eye which, besides being worrisome, required driving and sitting in waiting rooms. Everything went well, and although his vision may not improve, the problem has been arrested, and the scary complications did not develop. Yesterday we went to Chicago, checked on son, daughter-in-law, and of course most importantly, the twins. Everyone is thriving. We then had a terrific dinner at a new restaurant called Powerhouse; it's one of those places where the menu is seasonal, the meat comes from small local farms, the produce is organic, etc. Delicious, but expensive. I had cod (NOT local, obviously.) Then we saw La Traviata with Renee Fleming at the Lyric Opera. She's so lovely that you can forget the idiotic, courtesan-with-heart-of-gold-dying-nobly-of-consumption plot. It didn't bring tears to my eyes like the film Atonement did though.

As far as creative things, I have gotten this far:

I need to applique the circle and sew two last sections together, and then I will put it aside for a while and work on the Hoffman challenge. Later I'll come back and think about embellishments and quilting. Thanks for everyone's input.

The World's Most Unnecessary Quilting Tool

Looking through catalogs lately I've seen several contenders for this title, but today I found the winner in the Keepsake Quilting catalog: a ruler to cut bindings. One end is straight (you line it up with the edge of the fabric for straight bindings), and one end is cut at a 45 degree angle (you line it up with the fabric for bias bindings). You can buy this ruler in 2 1/4" width or in 2" width. Now since all rulers will cut a 2 or 2 1/4 inch strip, and all rulers have a 45 degree line, WHY IS THIS NECESSARY? Each ruler costs $13.50, so for less than $30, you can have two unneeded tools! My choice for runner-up would be those pins with arrows pointing left and right and up and down. Any other nominations out there?

Still Thinking

Thanks for all of the helpful comments about my design dilemma. It's amazing and wonderful to see what other people think of, and please, feel free to weigh in again! Following Debra and Nellie's idea I did stitch together the small yellow shape in the upper right to see what it looks like.

I was really intrigued by Liz and Fran's idea of using some of both, so here is what it would look like if some shapes were smooth and some irregular.

Fran's idea of a diptych certainly made me think. I'm not sure I'm ready for that many more blue blocks. But if this were a smaller piece it would be something to consider seriously. While I mull this over, I'm going to stitch together the background blue blocks. This is slow because I have to be systematic to make sure I don't confuse the placement. I take four blocks off the wall, carry them to the sewing machine, stitch and press in a certain order, and then carry them back. Since the design wall is clear across the room from the sewing machine, I tell myself this is good exercise.

Decisions, Decisions

After tinkering with this blue piece for a while, I had finally got the large circular shapes looking as good as possible, I thought. The original sketch I made for this in a class was circular shapes crossed by lines, some behind, some in front, some through the circles. I'm trying to get the effect of spheres floating in space. Even after much work the "spheres" or "blobs" still weren't satisfactory to me.


Then last night I realized that I could piece the contrasting squares, cut them into a true circular shape, and applique them to the background. I think that was what I originally planned long ago, but I got so caught up with these curving blocks in the background that I forgot my old idea. So here is what it looks like with the small circle on lower left roughly shaped and pinned on.

It looks much smaller because the seam allowances are gone. I think I like it better, but I think the original would look better also when tightened up with seam allowances. And will the rough and irregular streaks look odd if the spheres are so regular? I'm still debating. Any comments?

I've also decided to try the Hoffman Challenge after all and began to plan that. I had a very clear idea of what I wanted to do, so that would be easy, I thought. Wrong. So last night was not a restful night.

Take It Further, One More Time

Thank you to everyone who commented on my Take It Further piece. The best part of the challenge for me has been hearing from so many new people, and seeing what they're working on. The Flickr group for the challenge has some lovely things.

Before giving this topic a rest, I have a few more thoughts on the color scheme and on color in general. Clarifying some ideas will have to be the "further" part of the challenge for me. I complained about the colors, but while putting away some purple fabric, I found this in my drawer.

I bought this a while back simply because I liked the colors and thought it might be a focus fabric! Ironic, isn't it?
And then, on my wall is this piece I made a couple of years ago.

Same thing again.
The challenge palette, the fabric, and the little quilt thing all have the same triad color scheme of bluish purple, bluish green, and reddish orange. What's different is the values of the colors and the proportions. So here are my conclusions:

1. Value makes all the difference. What I disliked about the palette was the small range of values, no real dark (although there was a light).
2. Proportion is important. Equal amounts of all colors is boring. Again, I looked at those equal swatches and went "Yuck!"
3. These three-color combinations really need all three colors. I wasn't joking when I said that the purple and green alone make me wince. There has to be a third color.

None of these conclusions are new to anyone who works with color or has any art training. I "knew" them myself; but sometimes you need a real, concrete exercise to make things clear. Which leads to a conclusion about myself: I jump to conclusions! But then, I knew that too. Thanks, Sharon, for a great reminder.

Japanese Iris - TIF Completed

I finished this today; it's pretty if you like purple! Actually, I like the design very much; my only contribution to that was using Adobe Illustrator to make it oval instead of the original round because I wanted a rectangular finished product. The distortion of the flowers is very slight and of course they're stylized anyway. The colors work well together actually, except that I got the placement of light and dark stems exactly opposite from what they should be to give an effect of shading--next time I'll think more.

TIF Progress

I'm almost finished with the applique. What I have found most interesting about this is seeing the way the colors interact; they always do, of course, but for some reason this piece is a strong example. The greens and purples in the first photo were actually painful to me, but when the creamy peach flowers were added the pain stopped. The light lavender in the stitching and fabric paint (which looks pink in photo) helps too. All that's left is a touch of yellow in the flower center and the oval frame which will be dark green I think. Then the quilting. I would have done the arrangement of dark and light in the stems differently if I'd auditioned, but oh, well---

Post Card for a Cause

Here's a link describing a new way a fabric post card can do good: by benefitting the Children's Miracle Network. Sounds like fun.

Easy Curves

Debra asked how I made the abstract blocks in the blue piece I'm working on, so here's a tutorial. They're wonky, free-cut curved blocks. The technique is basically the same for any kind of curved piecing, but this is easy because the curves can be gentle, and you don't have to worry about getting them perfectly straight, because they'll be trimmed later. You start by cutting a block bigger than you need though, so there's some waste. I cut my squares 5 inches to trim down to 3.5. I usually work with three or four squares at a time.

Stack them, right side up, and cut in a random way with gentle curves into two or three pieces.

Then clip the in-curved piece about every one half inch, not going in quite a quarter of an inch.


Then you shuffle: I take the top left hand piece and put it on the bottom, and then take the bottom right hand piece and put it on the top. They're partially shuffled here.

Then line the pieces up, flip the in-curved piece over, and put a pin in the center.

Then gently pull the top piece so that the edges line up. The corners will not match; the top one will over lap about a quarter of an inch.

Sew as usual, pushing the fullness out of the way. On a gentle curve there isn't much.

When you get to the center remove the pin and rearrange the pieces so that edges on the rest of the seam are lined up. If a pucker seems to be forming, stop, lift the presser foot, and rearrange the fullness. On a sharper curve, you may have to do this a couple of times.


Do the other seam the same way, always putting the in-curving piece on top. You end up with three blocks, each one different. There was very little distortion on these blocks, but sometimes depending on the type of curve, there may be more. Trim them, and play with them.

Quiet Sunday

Actually, I've been working obsessively on this thing:

It's not where I want it yet, but it's come a long way, and I'm not ashamed to show it. I still want to add more detail to the background and work on the circular shapes so that they're less blocky. This is actually lots of fun. I made A LOT of blocks and then began to move them around to approximate the design I had in mind. It's interesting to see how a block that seemed like it would never work can turn out to be just the right thing for another area--sort of like working a jigsaw. But I still had to make some blocks specifically for a particular place. You can click on it to see better.

I did take a break long enough to choose fabrics for Take It Further Challenge:

The light fabric is more peach and less pink than it looks in the picture. I didn't try to keep the same mid value slightly grayed tones because I don't particularly like them. Browsing around to see what other people are doing made me think better of them however. But these fabrics should work for me.

Take It Further

I'm participating in this challenge, and the January challenge was just posted; there's the theme "some one you look up to", or a palette consisting of two medium-value violets (one darker than the other), two medium greens, and a pale peachy/yellow. OK, let's get the negative reaction out of the way first. "Someone you look up to" sounds like the kind of essay topic that would have brought groans and eye rolls from my eighth graders, and those colors are insipid, or to be less judgmental, "out of my comfort zone." After more thought, I remembered that I admire Eleanor Roosevelt, so I scanned in a picture and checked the exact words of my favorite quotation; I could do one of those photo/collage things. Or, since the colors look like violets or iris, I found some pictures, scanned them in, and may probably do a machine applique. This will NOT be slow cloth.


Since I want this to be fairly quick, I took this design from a book called 4000 Motifs of Flowers and Plants by Leslie McCallum. It's a wonderful resource of designs, historical and original, and like the Dover books, they're copyright free.

But first, I have to make some more little blue blocks so I can get to the cutting table.

New Year, New Snowfall, New Project

The snow began late New Year's Eve, continued all day yesterday and into the night, and here's the view from my bedroom window this morning. There's something about a snowy woods, isn't there? Even without Robert Frost, the sight is so evocative and peaceful. That pile of snow on the deck rail gives you an idea of the depth, close to 18 inches I think. Fortunately we have a new snow blower, and the road crews here are excellent, so life is pretty normal. It was nice to be semi-snowed-in yesterday though. Here's what I'm working on.

It's at the stage where you just have to have faith (I'm not sure I do). There will be more of the yellow shapes and swirls and lines of some color in addition to the blue shading. Right now I've just tried to outline the perimeter.

It's amazingly difficult just to line up these little blocks on the wall and have them halfway straight. If anyone wants to develop a new product, I would suggest a design-wall fabric marked with a grid. It would be very helpful; so helpful that I'm surprised it hasn't been done. Of course I could take mine down and mark it myself. A Sharpie would work, and so would lines of stitching, but I can't see that happening.

It's also fun to see so many people blogging again after the holiday break, isn't it? I particularly enjoyed Sharon B's post about weighing her stash and supplies. My husband feels a bit more at ease about my fabric weight now!

Looking Back, Looking Ahead

Unlike many people, I don't think I posted any goals for the year. Either because of that or for other reasons, I don't feel that this has been a productive year for me. I spent a lot of time on the Hoffman Challenge, and quite a bit at the orchid quilt in the fall. Other than that I made half a dozen baby quilts, for charity or for gifts, and a couple of quilts out of blocks from a block exchange; nothing that was a stretch for me there. The highlight of the year was the class I took with Jane Sassaman at the Indiana Heritage Show in March, and I did finish that project and used her technique on a couple of others, including the orchids. Those did stretch my "artistic" skills, although the technical aspect wasn't particularly difficult.

This year I hope to finish the blue piece I posted about recently and have it be successful enough to enter somewhere. I'd also like to make a large, traditional pieced quilt, using a difficult block. I do like piecing, and I'm pretty good, but I haven't done anything terribly challenging on a large scale. I also signed up for the Take It Further challenge, so we'll see how that goes. I don't think I'll do the Hoffman challenge, which is ironic, because this time I have an idea which is perfectly clear in my mind. It doesn't seem too interesting however, so I think I'll use the time on something else.

Everyone--may you meet all your goals in 2008, and have some pleasant surprises along the way too.

Beaded Jewelry

I'm supposed to be cleaning up some post-Christmas debris, breaking down boxes, doing laundry, etc., but I thought I'd pause a minute for something more enjoyable. My sister gave me a ring for Christmas made by this artist. It's embroidered bead work, beautiful, although my nails will need some work before I can wear it. Rather than show the ring, I'm just posting this link so you beaders out there can admire. Just wait long enough for the pictures to scroll through. Pretty cool, huh?

Merry Christmas

I just realized that my last post looked like my final word on Christmas, and a very Scrooge-like one it was! It wasn't intended to be that, just my way of saying that I had nothing interesting to post about the subject. I still don't, other than to report that my house is as decorated as it will be, my gifts are wrapped, my menus are planned, out-of-town son and family are arriving in a few hours. So a very happy holiday to everyone!

There will be no Christmas news here

The last issue of Quilter's Newsletter gave me an idea of how to translate a design I made a year ago into a quilt. So as a first step I have pieced these blocks in what is supposed to be a nine-step value scale. It was an interesting exercise even if I do nothing else. I learned that even though I think I have a large stash, especially in blue, it isn't as large as it might need to be to do this successfully. There isn't a completely smooth blending. Not too bad though--it actually looks better in the photo than in reality. I think I'll keep going, although it will take lots of little blocks!

Stuff

Today while in the grocery, I saw the new issue of McCall's Quilting (I think--these magazines are easy to confuse). Anyway, a headline caught my eye: Discover Quilting Blogs. Isn't it nice to feel ahead of the curve? Do you think all quilting blogs will see an increase in hits as a result of the article? I didn't recognize the name of the featured blogger/ author, but Quilt Maverick ring was mentioned.

The Ghost Orchid quilt is finished except for the label, and that is printed and ready to sew on. This detail shot shows a bit of the quilting, which I kept understated. Quilting isn't my strongest suit.
The quilting looks simple, but there were many stops and starts, making it slow and laborious. I do like it, however.

My piece of Hoffman Challenge 2008 fabric finally arrived. I didn't take a picture, but you can see it at the Hoffman Challenge website. I find it interesting that the fabric for the last four years has had basically the same color scheme, in different values and intensities. I know this is true, because I have used one piece of fabric as a coordinate three times, and could use it again if I had any left! Are they in a rut, or am I? Don't answer. Other people see other color schemes, but I always seem to focus on the red violet, although I've combined it differently. Hmmm.

And finally, I had a brainstorm concerning a new project. There won't be any details for a while, because I hesitate to talk about possible totally off the wall (for me, that is) ideas. But I like it so far.

Back to on-line shopping. How many more days?

Feasting and Family

Aidan tastes some apple pie juice,


while Conor works on his smile.


Actually these were taken last weekend, not at Thanksgiving, but they certainly fit the theme! We had a very quiet but excellent dinner. My son tried the new high temperature method of cooking a turkey, and it was delicious, moist and juicy. An under-16 pound turkey can be cooked at 450 degrees in about 2 hours, with 30 minutes resting time. You need an accurate thermometer for this, I think, but it worked for us. I hope everyone else's day was happy, and if you shop, don't drop.

Dumb is Good

Sometimes you can have design decision overload, and it's good to have some no-brainer projects to fall back on. That's my state right now. I have almost finished this little charity quilt for one of my guilds, using flannel scraps left over from the quilts I made the twins. It's good to accomplish something simple and useful. I hope to finish the binding this afternoon.


These split nine-patch blocks came from idea in a class taught by Mary Ellen Hopkins. Her idea is to cut scraps into small squares, keep them in an orderly way, and between other projects, or in a few minutes of non-creative time, stitch up a block. After a long time, you have enough for a quilt. The blocks can be arranged in any log cabin set. I have made one already, (it took about two and a half years), and I have about 90 blocks toward another.

Individual blocks are sometimes amazingly ugly, but the overall effect can be striking, I think.


And finally, to use up the many neutral strips I seem to have collected, I started making small nine patches. I have no plan for them yet, but there is no hurry. Some day, I'll feel like a decision again.

Still Smiling

This morning, on The Writer's Almanac, Garrison Keillor quoted Robert Louis Stevenson: "Our business in life is not to succeed, but to continue to fail in good spirits."

So with that in mind, here's my orchid quilt, top finished, ready to quilt. No further comment.