Turning 49

I am really excited to have turned 49.  It just seems so momentous and joyous. An accomplishment, a medal of honor. A dinner at Ol' Mexico with my family and friends was delicious.  The Cave Women gave me this awesome fiber postcard and a quilt shop gift card for $49.  Aren't they fun?

I want to make my 49th year the best yet.

The Challenge "Abode"



Blue sky and grass blowing in the wind.
Knee high grass blowing in the wind on a sunny day is so beautiful it mesmerizes me.  This beautiful earth is my home.



Minnesota Contemporary Quilters "Abode Challenge". 

The piece on the left is for the challenge.   I think I must quilt a big circle in the sky as another representation of earth.
The piece on the right is for myself.  I have another idea that will result in a third piece, but I have other things to work on yet.  Maybe someday.

The Tree Project Completed Wallhanging Part 4

It's done!  Hurray!  Yee haw! Boom shuga shuga shuga, boom shuga shuga shuga!

Its called "Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall".  I was lucky to get different seasons.

Now I want to get the "Abode" challenge done this weekend.

Strips and Curves

My strata was 120 strips wide.  I had to coax myself to start cutting.  By looking at the strata's in the book I thought my 120 wide strata would make a huge quilt.  Not so.  There's lots of waste cutting on the bias and cutting quarter pie shapes and their counterpart.  I didn't really have it thought out as to how it was going to work, light and dark, different colors.  I mostly tried to put opposites together for contrast.

Now I have to decide the layout and nothing seems to be jumping out at me.

Challenge Fabrics

So many years buying the challenge packets at Minnesota Quilters Annual Quilt Show and then saving them perfectly wrapped so someday I can do what? 

 I dunno!

So I unwrapped them all, washed them and they're going in my stash!

As I unwrapped them I felt like I had come home from the quilt shop with a butt-load of fabric!

Crumpled, smashed or crushed present bows

Lamest craft ever?
I wanted to figure out how to use the bows from Christmas that are not worth saving.  I got a 5" foam disk that's about 1/2" thick at Dollar Tree and hot glued the bows to it.  So it's not small, probably 7" tall.  It's more like for a tree outside.

Fun new pens

Testing out one of the Christmas gifts I got from Eric, Tsukineko Fabrico Markers.

The Tree Project by Wanda Shelton, part 3

Now that I actually marked the cutting lines, I had to remove leaves because I put some too close to the cutting lines.  Yeah-it would have been smart to mark those earlier!
Now to put the upper 2 sections and the lower right section in their own zip bags, with my name and some extra leaves; and then get a piece of fabric the same size as the whole thing and pin my lower left section to it and wait for the trade at the MCQ meeting.
All these days off from work and this is all I've accomplished so far. :-(

Exploding under pressure

So much has been going on with the Holiday Season that I haven't had time to post.  I've been busy, and yet my first thought to post is this lesson Isaac experienced...forgetting an unopened can of pop in your car when it's frozen outside.  If you can see it, both the top and bottom of the can are pushed out, and the pop came out liquid all over the seat of his car and froze, some as if frozen while suspended in air.

Reduce, reuse, recycle

So many times I go to the grocery store and forget to bring my cloth grocery bags.

  So when I accumulate some of the plastic bags instead of putting them in those recycle receptacles at the grocery stores, I take them to the cash register clerks at Goodwill.  They really appreciate them!

Goodwill Easter Seals Retail Stores
How's the saying go?  Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.

Tea Cup and Coffee Mug Pin Cushions

It is so relaxing to be busy with a fun project and listen to an audiobook.  These little pincushions in small vessels I bought at Goodwill (most for .49 cents) and using a smidge of that huge stockpile of felted wool I have, were perfect for hiding away in my sewing room while the temperatures went from 60 to 20 in one afternoon.

And listening to Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn is so suspensful that I don't want to stop!

PostmarkdArt Round 16

Using the branch and leaf pattern I used for The Tree Project, I made my postcards.  I've never been so early getting my cards done for a trade and I am so pleased!

 Scanning them with the white scanner top didn't show up the white fuzzy fiber I used on the edging.

I'll mail them tonight after Cave Women.

The Tree Project by Wanda Shelton, Step 2

Those last few leaves clinging to the tree, trying not to succumb to the cold wind.

I stopped working on it because I don't have the pattern at the moment and I realized I went a little gung-ho on the leaves without respecting the guidelines.  When I get the pattern back I'll adjust them.

The colors in photographs never seem to be true.

The Tree Project Pattern by Wanda Shelton

At Minnesota Contemporary Quilters Wanda Shelton came forward with the Tree Project where all who sign up will receive the tree pattern, make the tree art quilt front and then it will be cut into 4 quarters (on the fold lines of the pattern) and the pieces exchanged and then put back together and completed.  You keep 1/4 of your own, but you will have the 3 other quarters replaced by the other quilters who also completed their tops.

I'm inspired by 2 ideas. One being that Sharon Englund has not only already started hers, but she's going to sew on individual 2-sided leaves and I like that idea.  And the 2nd inspiration is just looking out my window at the lovely bright yellow maple with the blue sky behind.
Since many of the leaves on my beautiful maple have already fallen, I will have some of the branches showing through.  I've done a rough sketch of some arty branches.  They remind me of thorns!

UFY...Un Finished Yo-yo

 I think it's pretty safe to say I've been working on these yo-yos for 20 years.  Because that would be about the time DuAnn Wright taught a short class at the Quilt Crossing (Boise, Idaho) that I took on making the yo-yo's to string together for a tree garland.  I've been working on these for so long that some of them were sewn by quilt buddies in the Friday Nooners group in Idaho.  Many by Lois Bell.



In the back shows part of the arm rest sewing caddy made by Wilma Smith (Idaho) that I always use for my yo-yos. 

I made one 25' garland years ago and gave it to my Aunt Joan.  I guesstimate that I have at least 1,500 pre-cut circles left to sew.  So if I sewed 10 per day it would take me half a year to finish but 10 per day is actually a tall order.  I think the finish date will be at least 3 years from now, but don't hold your breath.