Houston Part III

I loved this quilt.


If you know who made it, please let me know.
It seems I was really bad at taking photos of the quilt information this year.

Dutch Treat by Roberta Horton, Berkeley CA
She made this quilt from fabrics she collected during teaching trips to the Netherlands.
It was great to see all the different fabrics.

And just for fun:
Farm Truck - Retired by by Lynne Pillus, Oroville CA

Unconditional by Virginia Greaves, Roswell GA

Fusible and raw edge applique was very popular this year.

Going in a different direction

Other than quilting and sewing, I love doing things around the house - decorating, gardening, trying out new things...

I'd like to keep this blog mostly about sewing (although other things occasionally slip in).
I've decided to start a new blog dedicated to things around the house.
I'll do posts about decorating, gardening, cooking, organization, review products I've tried, recipes I've made, and so on. You get the idea?

Some posts may be repeats from this blog but most will be new.

I'd love it if you'd join me!

Houston Part II

And you thought Civil War era quilts were dull and boring. Some of the quilts I saw were so well preserved and bright that I'm starting to wonder if a bunch of those dull ones hadn't just faded over the years.






There was a "That Quilt" quilt this year!
It's new, not old. Machine pieced and wonderfully quilted.

(Made by Patricia Mayer and Karen Watts)

A new project

After yesterday's cleaning, I cut out the fabric for a new quilt.
I know, I know - I have many, many WIPs but this one is for someone specific and it was really due at the end of September.
It's time to hop to it.
Don't you love these prints?

And then I started sewing and either the pattern cutting instructions are wrong or I'm an idiot.
The jury is still out...

Sit a Bit

Today I cleaned for three hours.
Only forty minutes were actually spent Fall Cleaning.
The rest went to cleaning up after all the neglect this house has suffered in the last three weeks or so.
I'm now going to sit a bit...

...and then I'm sewing!
(The quilt is my Virtual Quilting Bee quilt and the front pillow matches my kitchen table runner.)

Houston Part I

Houston was amazing as always!
There was no way I could take photos of all the quilts - 500 or so - but I tried to capture the ones that drew my attention.

This is my favorite quilt in the whole show.

Even though it looks like raw-edge work, each and every little edge is turned under.

The quilt is at least 6' x 6'.
It was made by Martha Brown from Canada.
Here's some of what she said about the quilt:
"I found an embroidery I had created in my teens - a simple design of the wheel of the zodiac.
In interpreting it as a quilt, the challenges were to create effective imagery for each sign and element, maintain a cohesive design, and stay committed to the project.
It took over 6 months/500 hours and I loved every minute of it."

The center:

Pisces:

Aquarius?

Leo:

Aries, Sagittarius:

Virgo, I think:

I wish I had taken detail photos of all the signs but there were people waiting to see the quilt.

Kudos to you Martha!

Edited to add: Thank you Quiltbug for giving us a link to Martha's site where you can drool over her other creations: http://www.bluemoonfabricarts.com/Index.htm
She now makes absolutely stunning dolls. Be sure to have a look at those.

I made something!

I had to.  I was under pressure.
I have a friend who always has an artists' sale at her home in November. She wanted to get the flyers out but needed a photo of "something".
I had promised to make things for the sale and small items always sell better hence...

At least I know I can whip up one of these in about 20 minutes because that's all I had last night.

I'm back!

I'm back from Houston. It was wonderful as always.
I took a lot of quilt photos and will share them this week, but at the moment I have my hands full catching up around here.
When I went to the mail box yesterday, the new batch of Don't Look Now patterns were waiting for me.

Lilly Pilly:

Love Birds:

And my favorite - Willow:

To celebrate, Kellie is having a wonderful giveaway on her blog so head over there and enter!

And off we go!

Today I'll be running around trying to get everything together for my (very) early morning flight to Houston tomorrow.

I will try to blog while over there (haven't quite figured out the mobile blogging thing) but I'll definitely be on Twitter and Facebook.

And because I won't be able to ship any orders while I'm away...



If you're willing to wait a couple of days for your fabric to ship, you can get some good deals over in the store this week.

Bundles of Joy

These little guys and their accompanying instructions have kept me very busy this week.

They're now in their envelopes, adressed, and ready to go out to their new owners on Monday.
Woohoo!

These are all fabric bundles for the Rainbow Jane Block of the Month. I have decided that the latest session will be my last RBJ session.
There's one signup spot left and then it's over.

Now I have to clean this house so the boys can mess it back up when I'm in Houston...

Blogger's Quilt Festival

I was so excited about this and then almost forgot!

Since we should probably all have started our Christmas sewing by now (yeah right!), I thought I'd share my Christmas quilt.

I made this last year with leftover fabric from strippy runners I'd made to sell at a friend's studio sale.
I had been wanting to make a zig zag quilt for a while and Christmas was right around the corner.

I love this quilt and can (almost) not wait to take it out of the closet.

If you'd like to have a look at other lovely quilts or enter the Festival yourself, just pop in over here.

My New Toy

Remember when I broke my timer?
I ordered a new one.
It arrived today.

It's amazing.
FOUR separate timers!
Oh the possibilities!

Pink

There probably won't be much blogging this week.
The Rainbow Jane kits have to go out on Monday.
On Tuesday I fly to Houston and I haven't even looked at the supply list for my classes.
I'm stressing a little but trying to breathe.

A little bundle of pink that went out in the mail this morning - $2.50 donated to a good cause.

Joining the fight

The National Breast Cancer Foundation's mission is to save lives by increasing awareness of breast cancer through education and by providing mammograms for those in need.
More information about the National Breast Cancer Foundation over here.

This little friendship bag...

...will be off to its new home tomorrow.
And yes, I am a little obsessed with Panache right now.

(It's my bag for the Friendship Bag Swap. Tutorial over here.)

Birdie!

Cleaning has come to a grinding halt over here. A terrible cold bug has me in its grips but I'm sure I'll survive.

Finding these on my doorstep definitely helped.

Birdie Quilt Fabric by Me & My Sister Designs.
I'm in love.
They're in the store now.

Move over Martha

My glue gun and I have been busy.
This is the kitchen notice board before:

And after:

All I removed were the buttons. I just covered the rest with new fabric and ribbon and glued new buttons on.
I used thumb tacks to secure the fabric and ribbon. Push the tack in as far as you can and then whack it once with a hammer.
The fabric is from the Panache line by Sanae for Moda.

Oh No!

My timer broke! I probably wore it out.
Yesterday I tackled the "red bathroom" - the one where the teenager lives. Not good.
3 hours (give or take a couple of minutes) later I had everything cleaned. I just have to sort through the cabinet and drawers. That could take another three hours.

And these arrived.

Aren't they cute? They're going to be freebies with bigger store orders.
Today I'm going for a walk and coffee with a friend.
Then I'll come home and maybe finished cleaning said bathroom. Or sew.

(BTW Don't Look Now patterns are back in stock. For now. They're really popular. I'm happy to announce that I now carry all Kellie's quilt patterns.)

Wednesday

Powder room: 1 hour 20 minutes

Amongst other things:
Washed all the moldings - door frame, window frame, baseboards, door.
Clean baseboards really make a difference. You should try it.
Applied some toothbrush power to areas of the toilet normally impossible to reach.
Windex-ed every shiny surface.

Tip: When crawling around on the floor, wear socks. If not, you may end up with hard to remove red nail polish lines on your floor and very unflattering white tips on your toenails.

I cleaned and sewed!

Cleaned a lot. Sewed a little.

The kitchen is clean!
I did not scrub the floor because it extends into different rooms and I'll just tack that onto another room. Makes sense, right?
Oh, and the junk drawer is now in a shopping bag. I'm going to go get some drawer organizers today.

What I learned:
We like beans

and banana pudding.

There's an explanation for the pudding.

The most disconcerting thing about the whole kitchen cleaning experience was the vast amount of food I had to throw away. Some items had expired in 2003!
I need to find a way to organize the pantry cupboard so that I know what's in there.
Any suggestions?

As for the sewing:
Made a Dear Jane/That Quilt block

And the September SewConnected 3 block(s) for Ashley.

Today I start bathroom day/week. Gosh I hope it doesn't turn into a week as well!