Design Wall Monday

My design wall shows a bit of progress on my Star BOM from 2008.  Since the Quiltathon, I’ve assembled  & joined the top 3 rows, the bottom corner, the 4th row.  I need to put the sashing in between the 3 and 4 rows, put them all together and then put the setting triangles at each end of the third row. 

I found that I wasn’t happy with some of my piecing.  Some problems you can’t  fix and have to live with. Some problems fall under the Galloping Horse Rule and can be tolerated. Finally, there are those that you can and do fix, because you know they will drive you bonkers if you don’t. I wound up ripping out some stitching and re-sewing so that I wouldn’t go bonkers.

On the knitting front, I’ve turned the heel and started on the ankle/leg of my socks (toe up, two socks on two needles). I’m trying to do about an inch each evening during television. With all the repeats, it makes concentrating so much easier. I’d like to do more, by my hands start to cramp up in a short amount of time. So I knit a bit, rest the hands a bit, try to knit some more. I want these babies done, so I can wear them…and so I can start on the next pair.

Quiltathon Progress Report..

After spending the considerable part of two days working on the quilt, I was eager to get back here to show all my progress. *sigh* It just doesn’t look like that much. As I said yesterday, the fabrics that I had originally selected just weren’t working, so I did some thinking, hubby made a suggestion, I did some calculating and decided to use the mottled green, eliminate the light green altogether and replace it with the dark brown used elsewhere. I’m happy with the changes. The light green would have disappeared, the brown stands out and gives definition. After making the decision, I had to get to cutting all the sashing pieces, and assembling them.

What a lot of pieces!!, and then some of the pieces had to be made for left and right sides.

Today I actually began assembling the rows, but had hoped to have most if not all of it together by now.

February Quiltathon….

Is getting off to a slow start. Yesterday the deep south was hit with a snowstorm, and ironically, the further south, the more snow. We are a bit north of Atlanta, so we didn’t get a whole lot, but before I had my first cup of coffee, I had to try for some snow photos.  Then, during my coffee, the sun started to come up and glisten-the stuff winter wonderlands are made of.  I’m not a great photographer, but here is a bit of my morning.  Before the sun (or coffee): and then  as the sun came up

(double click on the photo to enlarge)

Meanwhile, back in the sewing room, I have finally finished the stars for JudyL’s Star BOM. 

It is time to do the sashing and setting triangles, but as I am looking at the fabrics I selected so long ago, I don’t like the way they work with the blocks. This was the original choice for setting square:

The bright/light green as the field, the mottled green/coral as some of the detail.  I’ve thought of reversing it, like this:

The mottled as the field, the bright as the detail.  Somehow, neither is working for me……..I think I’m about to spend time digging through the stash to find a better fit.

Its not like I have finished that last pair of socks yet

But…….I couldn’t resist this sale that KnitPicks had. 

I was a little surprised when the instructions came, as my idea of ‘anklets’ and theirs is different, but that is ok-things will go faster this way!

When I think of anklets, I think of when I was a girl (me and Wilma Flintstone) and you had knee socks or anklets, and the anklets had a neat little fold over cuff on your ankle.  I’m not sure I ever heard a name for this type of sock, maybe sport sock, as I always thought of this as what you wore with running shoes, or golf shoes.

Now I have to hurry up and finished those stripped socks so that I can start on one of these!    That “Wannadoo” list of knits and quilts just keeps growing!

Starry Design Wall Monday

I’ve made some progress on the Star BOM - of course that is nothing to get too excited about, the first two blocks were made back in 2008! I hope to get further, faster now.  Three more to do then it will be sashing time, and these sashings are more involved than most. I’m looking forward to seeing how it all turns out. As I look at the blocks, I wish my some of my fabrics had a little more contrast, as in some blocks, things tend to blend together. I like the fabrics and the colors, I think they are a good combination for quilt, just that  some of them wind up next to a very similar value (see block in 2nd row, 2nd column). Ah, well, that’s part of the learning process!

Quiltathon part Deux

I did very little actual sewing today, but did quilty things. You may recognize two of these blocks. These are the first two of JudyL’s star block of the month from a while back. I made the first two and put them down to do other things. I have resolved to get this top put together. Today I spent cutting fabric for all the blocks and putting the components for each block in its own bag. If you did this quilt, you may remember that there were lots of pieces that had measurements with eights and sixteenths, add that to 8 different fabrics and that made a lot of cutting. I did get it done, and even had some time before dinner to put a block together .

Lizzie’s Quilt is finished

I showed the beginnings of this one a week ago on Design Wall Monday.  I made it as a gift for a dear friend that recently lost her beloved black lab.  You have to have known the friend and the dog to realize what a special relationship this was, and how deeply it affected my friend. I have lots of dog crazy friends who treasure their dogs, but this was a particularly precious relationship.  Here is the  quilt, which I finished and delivered today.  The front:

 

The backing fabric, and if you click on the photo, you can see the quilting, which was a ball and a bone.

Yes, she really loved it, but I think she was most amazed that anyone would think to do something like this for her. She doesn’t realize how much she is loved by her friends.

Design Wall Monday

I’m making a quilt as a gift, so the photo you see has paper pinned over some blocks to preserve the element of surprise, should the giftee happen to stop here.  I have the blocks pinned onto the background fabric, trying to decide on placement.  Also trying to determine if I want to trim back on the black shadows. On the blocks that were my inspiration for these, the shadow was the same width as the colored frame. I’m wondering if that is a bit ‘clunky’ looking.  If I trim the black back   just 1/4”, then the shadow will be 1/2” narrower than the frame is.Do you think the shadows are too big? Would they look better if they were a bit narrower??

Thanks for stopping by.

Design Wall Monday

Nothing was accomplished in the sewing room last week between the holiday preparations and having the grandchildren for the week. Today, however, I got down to business.  The quilt I showed last time now has the borders on it!  I am making it for one of my sons, and since he was half of my quilt hanger for the photo, he asked if  he’ll have his quilt  soon. Hmmmmm, then he laughed and said, ‘guess not’. I didn’t raise a fool.  [NOTE: clicking on photo will enlarge it for better viewing, if you are interested]

After getting that photo taken, I promptly dug out another top that has been languishing for want of borders and knocked that one off too. It is currently in residence on the design wall so I can enjoy its happy colors while I decide what to tackle next.  The dark borders are a purple/eggplant and black print, similar in eggplantiness to the dark squares (which I didn’t have enough of for the borders!)  Do you recognize it? It is one of JudyL’s from a while ago, I can’t seem to resist her designs!

I do have a number of tops that need to be quilted, so I may get one of them on the frame next. Of course, there are still a few WIPs that need to be finished, and they are calling to me, too. I’m trying to be strong and resist the siren’s call of a couple of new quilts that I want to start. I’m sure they’ll be very pretty, and the fabric is just sitting there, waiting to be cut into….I really should get a few completely finished….shouldn’t I…?

Design Wall Monday

Not too much to show, all my good intentions after last week went down the tubes. Between car troubles and physical therapy and then some really good news and excitement, I didn’t get much done.

On my wall this week is one of the quilt tops I mentioned last week that needs borders. It is folded in half on the wall so that I could get a measurement for the first set of borders. I did get all the border strips cut and sewn together, now I just need to apply them. What are the odds that I’ll get it done by next week?

Oh....and that really good news and excitement? My second son and his wonderful girlfriend are now engaged! We couldn't be more delighted.

Design wall Monday……

After a long absence, I’m back. I had my knee replaced in October and have been busy with physical therapy and such. Things are coming along nicely, generally a much better experience than I anticipated.

Now to the important stuff……….I finally got back into the sewing room! I started working on the last few borders of my Bear in the Farmhouse Quilt and was hoping to get the top finished this week. I saw that JudyL has another Bear/Farmhouse on her design wall, and when the backing that I had ordered for this quilt arrived this morning, I took it as an omen to get this puppy finished and posted.

In an effort to get a picture and be able to post before it would have to be Design Wall Tuesday, I grabbed my hubby and eldest son (grumble grumble)to hold the quilt for me. Not the best way to show off a quilt, but now that it is finally off the design wall and ready for quilting, I’m happy. The color is not great, the purples are showing up as blue and the dark borders aren’t black but a dark purple with a lighter purple design on it. Better color can be seen on my March 24 posting. Yes, it has been on the design wall since March! Just waiting on the borders……..

What is it about borders?? Does anyone else have a problem getting the borders done. It is not the process, I can do them, I just put off doing them. Why is that? I have two other quilts sitting next to the machine waiting for their borders, too. I hope to finish at least one of those this week. It needs 3 plain borders. I’d like to get that last one finished too, but that one is just for me, so I think that I may shift my focus to the pile of finished tops and try to get a couple of them quilted.

Speaking of borders, JudyL designed Bear in the Farmhouse with borders that were striped fabric and mitered . I haven’t done any mitered borders in at least 10 years, so I had to dig out a quilting book and refresh my memory. I really enjoyed it, much easier than I remembered. Thanks for the challenge, Judy!

Today is our anniversary!

To celebrate 39 wonderful years together, we had a late breakfast and drove to Burfordville, Mo to visit Bollinger Mill State Historic Site. The skies were a gorgeous blue with lovely white clouds, the sunshine was almost blinding. We traversed highways and country roads, it really wasn’t very far, but it felt removed, the atmosphere was different. Bollinger Mill is a 19th century water powered mill, four stories high, made of stone and brick. They still grind corn there.

Side view of the mill, what seems to be sticking out on the right is actually a covered bridge that is next to the mill.

 

Couldn’t fit the whole building in one shot, so here you have the top floors, then the ground floor entry and porch.

  

A better shot of the bridge mentioned earlier, it is Missouri’s oldest covered bridge.

And what did we find in the back corner? Can you spell splinters?? I surely didn’t need that sign to discourage me from using this facility!

 

The quilter in me was thrilled to find these feed/seed/flour sacks, although I was disappointed that they didn’t have designs on them. A few steps across the room and I discovered this, an entire showcase dedicated to feed sacks and their use!

As we drove back to our room, I noticed that the sky in the rear view mirror was much darker than the one above and in front of us. As I sat here writing this post, the room became steadily darker; much too dark for this time of day. It is currently pouring down rain, which I hope passes as quickly as it arrived. I’d like to go out for a nice dinner with my special guy. Love you, Dar!

A city of murals

The folks of Cape Girardeau must really like their murals. There is a long sea wall along the banks of the river, presumably to protect the city when the river floods (anyway, that would be my guess). The city side of the wall is decorated with several murals, each blocks long. One section depicts the city’s heritage, another shows famous folks from Missouri. We haven’t seen all of the murals yet, but we did notice that quite a few buildings also have artwork painted on their walls. Conventional artwork,not graffiti. Here are a few pictures from the section on famous folks, and then a few pictures taken as we drove through farm land, just enjoying the beautiful sunshine.

I haven’t seen these pictures on a full size screen yet, I only have access to a netbook. Can you see all the woodpecker holes in this tree? Its a wonder it is still upright.

Anyone have any idea what this pretty roadside weed is?

The Trail of Tears

You may have heard of the Trail of Tears, a tragic and sad part of American and Native American history. In the early to mid 1800s,a treaty was signed by some people of the Cherokee Nation agreeing to relocate all the Cherokee people to place far west of their original lands. The original lands would go the the government. Not all Cherokees were in agreement, and when it went through Congress, it only passed by one vote. None the less, the Cherokee were rounded up and journeyed westward. It was winter when the reached the Mississippi River, and the whole group was unable to cross before the weather made crossing impossible. Part of the group wintered on the Illinois side, the others on the Missouri side. It was a bad winter, many died.  In Missouri, at the spot of the winter encampment, there is now a state park commemorating those people and that winter. Seeing it in the September sunshine, the leaves just hinting at fall color makes it hard to imagine what a freezing winter would be, the the ravines and mountains would be a challenge with proper hiking gear, even today. We visited the park, and here are a few pictures from the lookout. 

  That’s Illinois on the other side!

 

We wonder if this is the same barge that we saw earlier in the day from the city.You’ve heard of The Old Man and the Sea? Well this photo is the Old Man and Old Man River (one of the nicknames for the Mississippi).

Lemonade from Lemons

Circumstances redesigned our plans for our trip. We never did join our friends at Montauk State Park. One of those ladies has a blog, so I have seen photos of their exploits, and we are disappointed to have missed out.  However, we  have been spending time in a very nice place that I would otherwise (probably) never have visited. Cape Girardeau, MO. The people here have been wonderful, right across the board, from complete strangers to service personal.  The first day we were here, we met a couple that told us they had visited Cape and now that they have retired, they have moved from California to here. That’s how well they liked the area.I can understand that.

We have been sick in our room, nursing bad colds for a few days, but what we have seen  of the area is pleasing. We haven’t gotten out as much as we would have liked, but here are some pictures taken on our ‘urban camping trip’. An overlook at one of the city parks, right among some great old houses, perched on the bluff overlooking the Mississippi River.

Looking back towards the city.

This view from the park overlook shows

the beautiful bridge that connects Illinois and Missouri, spanning the Mississippi River. I don’t like driving over bridges, but this one is gorgeous to look at, it sparkles in the sunlight.

One of the legendary barges of the Mississippi!

The second day of our trip

and we ran into some difficulty, so we didn’t make it to our destination as planned. We did stumble upon a place to stay, clean and with all the amenities, but not a state park in the great outdoors.