Thursday, May 30, 2013

Bits of May Randomness

O!, many a shaft at random sent
Finds mark the archer little meant!
And many a word at random spoken
May soothe, or wound, a heart that's broken!
Sir Walter Scott



I've been trying to go through my old posts and make a list of things I've said I would share with you.  There are several new tutorials coming, please be patient.  I thought I'd share some of my recent fiber acquisitions with you today.  I'll start with my favorite batiks, of course!




Somewhere in the future there is a quilt with greens and neutral batiks that will spring forth from the depths of my brain.  I've quite a stockpile of the necessary ingredients now.




These butterflies flew right into my hands.  I don't buy too many large scale prints but this one had some of my favorite colors.  The butterflies are huge, hand size or slightly larger.  The folded ones on top are half yard cuts.  The one on the right is more blue than the photo shows (the gold is reflecting too much) and looks like a microscopic view of butterfly wings to me.





This might look nice on a door in my studio.  I haven't done many 'just for the fun of it' projects on this scale.  

Then there are all these little ladies that followed me home from Maryland via Massachusetts.  Did you guess right?





I haven't been able to get a full shot of it that I like yet.  I'll wait till it's quilted.  Why did I buy it?  I'm not too sure.  Pink is NOT my color, I've never been overly fond of Sunbonnet Sue, (I could tell you a tale about a guild quilt of one I helped put together once, shudder).  It is in really good shape.  There is a number stamped on one block (auction stamp?) that I hope will wash out.  It has only a few spots and they may come out in the wash.  The applique edges are all neatly turned under and then stitched around with a black outline stitch.  The setting is unusual, 5 blocks across but only 4 down.  The price was a little more than I'd have liked, $79 but compared to some of the quilts I shared HERE it was a steal. 







I think this might be the Dutch Girl version of Sue.  She has pointed wooden shoes.

I shared a close up shot of this on my Quilter's Favorite Post.  Did you notice it or guess what is was?  When I saw it in the Mass MoCA gift shop it just had to come home with me.  It's the perfect prop for a presentation about color!  I just love it!


Does the shape look familiar?

How about the other side.



This was the outside of the Seneca Cannery Antiques shop where I found the quilt top.  I just love old stone buildings like this one.  The round object is a gear or cog of some sort.


Happy Birthday Misty!
I know, it's time for a haircut.

Karen, over at Sew Many Ways has been having a Birthday Linky Party for her dog Annie.  May is Misty's birth month also, I don't know the day.  I think she is 9.  I have it written down somewhere.  The years pass to fast to keep up sometimes.  LOL  She was 7 months old when I got her.  I'll have to post another prettier picture after grooming next week.
So, Happy Birthday to Annie and Misty!  I hope you have many more!

What do you think about my Suebonnet Sue top?  Would you have bought it or do you hate the pattern?  Did you know that was an umbrella in the earlier post?  Would you have bought it?  Do you use a Color Wheel when selecting fabrics for quilts?   

I'm sharing my Randomness today with you and linking with Really Random Thursday and Sew Many Ways.

Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Time Spent

Time is the coin of your life.  It is the only coin you have, and only you can determine how it will be spent.  Be careful lest you let other people spend it for you.  
Carl Sandburg
Ahh, such words to live by.  The older I get the faster time flies by.  I remember when I was pregnant with my first child.  The months moved so slowly and the ninth month was at least a year long.  Now it seems that Christmas was just a few weeks ago and yet the year is almost half over.  We've been back home from vacation for a month and my has it been a busy one.  There have been Dr. and Dentist check ups, car shopping for my DH, a new Grandson and I managed to finish a quilt.  I still have a few things to share from our trip (it's not like I haven't been posting) but I will try make it interesting for you.

You get to SEE many things at museums!

Still need to hang this up.
Stockbridge still looks the way Norman Rockwell painted it.  The Norman Rockwell Museum was worth the trip and we could have spent more time there.
I LOVED the builds at Mass MoCA!

What's not to love about a Mary Cassatt?

The Williams College Museum of Art and the Clark Art Museum were wonderful!

We were first greeted by a bird at the Hancock Shaker Village

The next thing we saw when we got inside the welcome center was this beauty!



Yes, I bought a ticket.  Maybe it will be mine.

Great workmanship!

The round barn

I loved the barn.  I'd love to live in it, with a few changes.  This little fella would have to sleep somewhere else and it's a little drafty.


Baby Lamb

Didn't get to add any of these to my collection, sigh.

Nothing like the Shaker Craftsmanship

Wouldn't that drying rack be a great idea for a quilt display rack if it was about 7 feet tall and you had the space for it?  It was just 3 dowel ladders that were tied together.  They had one for sale in the gift shop for $85.  It stayed there.

We didn't get to see nearly all of the Hancock Shaker Village.  Part of it didn't open until May.    It is beautiful and all the workers are full of knowledge about the farm and the Shakers.  If you go be prepared for a lot of walking and the steps into some of the buildings are at least 12" high so it's not very little old lady friendly.  My husband had a hard time with some of them and he has good knees.  I had enough sense to not even try.

Well, I took a few moments to share for me and you.  I hope you enjoyed to quick glimpse of my travels.  I have one more post about my fiber acquisitions that might interest you and then I'll move on to other things... like the next trip I have coming up maybe.  Just kidding.

Linking with  May for Me at Marcia's Crafty Sewing

Monday, May 27, 2013

Time for Something New

Love all that has been created by God, both the whole and every grain of sand. Love every leaf and every ray of light. Love the beasts and the birds, love the plants, love every separate fragment. If you love each fragment, you will understand the mystery of the whole resting in God. 
Fyodor Dostoyevsky


I hope you had a great Memorial Day weekend, if you are in the USA.  If you live elsewhere I hope your weekend was great too.  My daughter and her husband wanted to come over and grill out yesterday.  We haven't used the grill this season so my husband went out to check it while she was on the phone.  It's about time for a new one and he wanted to see what state it was in after the winter.  It looks fine from the outside.

The Grill

I was in the living room on the phone with my daughter and saw something fly into the kitchen.   It was a bird!  My husband quickly came back in off the deck and opened the other door in the kitchen and the bird left but where had it come from?



Guess what this is.  Want a closer look?


5 little eggs

Does look sort of like a birdhouse from this angle.

We went out to eat.  LOL  We will have to get a NEW GRILL soon.  Not because of the bird but because this is what the other side looks like.


It won't hold the food up to cook it!

So what else is new at my house this month?  I cut out not one but TWO quilts with the ACCUQUILT STUDIO CUTTER at the charity quilting meeting this month.  Haven't sewn a stitch on them yet but they are ready to go.  Got a few more important projects to get sewn and I going to be running Aislin Joy this week.  The 'to be quilted right away' list is getting too long!

Another Churn Dash 
Take 5 Quilt

This is what's on my design wall now.  This is the charm pack triangles I put together last month.  It's not enough for a top yet.  I'm not sure where to go with it.  It probably will morph into something else.  So far I haven't had much that works with it in the stash and I'm not buying anything new for it.  There isn't an even amount of colors for this idea to work.

Any suggestions?

That was most of the excitement of the weekend for us.  My youngest stopped by to see us (or was it to be fed?) this evening.  I am seriously craving some cuddle time with the new grandson but that hasn't happened yet.  Very soon I hope!

Linking with these great blogs:

Thursday, May 23, 2013

The Sunny Side

Be so strong that nothing can disturb your peace of mind. Talk health, happiness, and prosperity to every person you meet. Make all your friends feel there is something special in them. Look at the sunny side of everything. Think only of the best, work only for the best, and expect only the best. Be as enthusiastic about the success of others as you are about your own. Forget the mistakes of the past and press on to the greater achievements of the future. Give everyone a smile. Spend so much time improving yourself that you have no time left to criticize others. Be too big for worry and too noble for anger.  
Christian D. Larsen



AmysCreativeSide.com



I've been stitching away at the binding to get this quilt FINISHED so I could enter it in the Blogger's Quilt Festival.  So here it is still warm from my hands and from the photo session.


The Sunny Side
72" x 89"


This is a Thimbleberries design called Sunny Side Up.  I decided to to just call mine The Sunny Side because I prefer to think of the attitude described in the quote above rather than eggs when I look at it.  LOL  I hope you enjoy looking at is also!





The top is all Thimbleberries fabrics.







Because the Background Fabric is a paisley print I decided to use a paisley panto-graph.  You can see it in the photo below but the fabric colors are not right in that photo.







I used some of the leftover fabrics to make the back a little more interesting.




The back is just lovely texture.  It will look even better after it is washed.

Thanks to AMY for giving quilters so much eye candy and a chance to share our work on Blogger's Quilt Festival.  Make sure you check out ALL the categories!

Also linking with:  

Nine Lives

Dogs come when they are called; cats take a message and get back to you. 
Mary Bly


AmysCreativeSide.com



I didn't have to think about it very long before I decided which quilts to enter in the Blogger's Quilt Festival.  I decided on this one fairly quickly because it is one of my favorites.  It was made for a guild challenge that I participated in a few years ago.

The challenge was to make a quilt using as many fabrics that had circles or dots in it as possible.  I had a group of Black and White Nine Patch Blocks from a Block Swap from a Longarm List that I had participated in a few years before.  When I looked through them I pulled the ones that fit the description best.  I had some Laurel Burch Fabric that I knew would work well with Black and White Prints so that's what I went with.  The Laurel Burch Print had a lot of circles and dots in it too. I pulled my bright star colors from the border print.  Most of them have circles or dots.   After playing on EQ for a little while I had my design done.


Nine Lives

Here are some close up shots so you can see the prints better.







More Cats on the Back
I quilted on my longarm using a variegated thread and floral panto-graph (which doesn't show up  because the fabrics are so busy).
Thanks to AMY for giving quilters so much eye candy and a chance to share our work on Blogger's Quilt Festival.  Make sure you check out ALL the categories!

Linking with: Sew Many Ways

Wednesday, May 22, 2013

Something To Smile About

There are only two lasting bequests we can hope to give our children. 
One of these is roots; the other, wings.                                                                                               
                                                                                               William Hodding Carter, Jr.


I have been trying to get a post written since Monday and this isn't it.  What I was going to write about will just have to wait for another day because I want to share something that is going to make you smile.  I'll share a few other things first.

I've been trying to get through with a quilt for the Blogger's Quilt Festival.  This year Amy decided to allow 2 quilts to be entered by a quilter.  I have one from a few years ago with photos all done and I have been trying to get the binding on another one.  I'm about halfway through stitching it down.  Hopefully it will be done tomorrow.  Yeah!  You should enter one too!  Check out the link in my sidebar.  It's not too late yet.

If you have been reading my blog, you know I like OWLS.  I found another one while one our trip.  After I came home I found another one.  They were both on sale for half price so I just couldn't leave them on the shelf could I?  If you like them I'll let you know where they can be found.  Both places are national chains.



Ceramic Owl

Metal Owl

I really love the color of the first one.  We are going to change the wall color in our bedroom soon and it will go it there.  The metal one has eyes that kind of follow you around because it is very three dimensional.  I hung him on my longarm studio wall for now.  He will also stand alone so I may find another spot for him.  I have some shelves that I want to add somewhere in the studio so he may end up on one of them.

While we were in Massachusetts we visited Hoffman Pottery.  Elaine is a very talented lady.  You can see some of her work at EHoffmanPottery.com.  Some of her designs reminded me of quilting designs.  I found this plate, which will also go in our bedroom.  Notice a color theme here?

Just a nice little plate...

Make that a BIG one!  That's the width across.

Can you see the star in the center?

I worked in ceramics some in college.  They say the clay gets in your blood and hooks you forever.  Sometimes my hands almost itch to work in clay again.  Maybe someday. . .

Now, I hope my OWLS are making you smile but just look at who showed up Monday!


Say Hello to Levi !

Do you see a resemblance there?  Same nose and kisser.

Three generations of LINES men.

"I thought I'd get some MILK when I woke up!"

This little monkey didn't like to be still.  He was still doing flips so the Dr. said C Section to get this little one here.  Yes, he's a chunk!  Just an ounce shy of 9 pounds.  We got to meet him yesterday and he's just perfect!!!  I can't wait to have some more time playing with those sweet little baby feet.

As I was bouncing around looking at the quilts on Blogger's Quilt Festival this week I came across one blogger who was telling about the frustrations she had while working on her quilt.  I left her the following comment and thought I'd share it with you.  I've had birthing babies on the brain this week for obvious reasons.

"Remember making a quilt is like birthing a child, in time 
you forget how much trouble and pain you went through 
to get it here and just love the results."   Patricia Lines  

Enjoy the Smiles!!!  
Patricia
Linking with:  Really Random Thursday
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