migrating in blogdom

It has been over a month since I posted on this blog - that's because I've started a NEW blog called "GrannyGoodStuff" so please come to visit me there...

http://grannygoodstuff.blogspot.com/

see you soon!

Thea

May Flowers from April Showers

My garden is in full bloom at last - and I'm enjoying every growing thing in the garden... along with the dandelions and the thistles, etc.

Here are some pics of my little beauties...

This is the white bleeding heart that we planted to mark Sam's grave last year:

Looking good this year - last year it was a really thin, but is now filling out well in spite of the poor soil in this spot.... 

Here is the snow in summer that I will be planting - honest, really I will!

the phlox are trying their best to be a ground cover.....

and the azalea is now in full bloom - in spite of the HUGE pile of snow that was weighing it down last winter

and the Huchera (coral bells) is about to burst into bloom, but I grow it for this stunning foliage:

and I grow Lamb's Ears for the foliage, too....

now if I could only get these Red Hot Pokers to bloom!

is there a flower spike hiding in that leaf cluster somewhere?  I sure hope so!

All these flowers are giving me ideas for quilts, so I'll be in the studio if you need me.

Dancing Girls are (almost!) ready for the Stage

This is my next project, after I make a party doll and a few postcards....

Just a quick note early on a very rainy Monday morning to let you know that the Dancing Girls are ready for their debut performance ( meaning:  I'm almost done with the binding ) and as soon as the sleeve and label are applied, I'll have another pic to post, but in the meanwhile, if you want to see them kicking up their heels, check it out on my grannygoodstuff post from last week.  I hope this link works:

http://grannygoodstuff.blogspot.com/

Still so much to learn about this blogging stuff, but at least it is easier than writing Fortran!

and when the rain stops, I can go out and play in mud!  .... um, I mean, plant some flowers!

World's Biggest Hexi Challenge on display in Brisbane

Later this Spring I will be teaching a class in English Paper Piecing - also known affectionately as 'hexi' piecing.  I'm still working on the class sample, but stumbled upon this impressive example while trying to catch up on the blogs today and just HAD to share this hexi eye candy - very impressive effort by the world's hexigon quilters - proof positive that paper piecing is alive and flourishing.

They can't get it all in one picture anymore... so for more info, here's a link to the website:

http://worldsbiggesthexagonquilt.blogspot.com/2010/03/craftexpo-brisbane.html

I'll try to post again soon - I'm either out enjoying the sunshine or sewing up a storm in the studio.

Linda M Poole

My friend, Linda M Poole, has a new line of fabric featuring seahorses on her blog - check it out!
She has a wonderful blog, and I love her 'color' goodies.

It's all about the Challenges

Life is a series of challenges.  How we deal with those challenges defines us. 

The FAT group is having a 3 day challenge this week - today is day 3 - I have not seen what the last day of this challenge will bring, but I'm looking forward to seeing it.

First - here is my effort for day 1:

and here is the result for day 2:

so now I'm going to find out what to do with these little 4" quilted shapes of denim, batting, paint and thread....

...and I made a crown!



Enjoy your challenges, however they find you, however you navigate them.

Now if I could just find a way to enjoy paying taxes.... hmmm.

Spring is flirting with me....

The birds are singing, the sun is shining, and I'm in my flip-flops!
Working on this little ditty - Mexican Star - started last weekend at the QCE Quilt Retreat:

I'm also working on a calendar quilt (another Pat Sloan challenge!) and that is going well:
almost as tall as me!

Must get back to the studio!
Drop me a line.... I'd love to hear from you!

March is National Craft Month - loving the sparkle in this star!

I've been increasingly interested in using up the supplies I already have on hand - including using some rather unusual "raw" materials in ways I've never tried before.

Recently, I participated in a "Going Green" charm challenge - I looked around the house for something I had on hand that lent itself to recycling, and remembered that pile of holey socks in the bottom of my closet - AHA!  I remembered how well the painted batting scraps worked a few weeks ago, and applied the same 'painting' method to a square of tube sock cut across the foot - no toes, no cuff, no heel, just foot.  This worked out even better than hoped - although the sock fabric did absorb a LOT of paint!
Once dry (which took a while, even with the assist of the hair dryer) I layered the sock wrong side up and added a scrap of batting and a scrap of 'backing' fabric - then quilted a star shape, added a little more paint to the 'highlights' and came up with this:

I also dismantled a bracelet and 're-purposed' the beads and wire -  and I'm really pleased and encouraged by this result - I love the sparkle in this star.

Tell me what you have crafted lately.   I love getting comments - what's yours?

Quilt Show Deadlines

No matter how many reminders I put in my calendar to send them off well in advance, it seems that I'm always rushing to get my entry forms and pics submitted to quilt shows right up to the last minute!

Today I'm prepping these two little wall hangings for the Three Rivers Quilt Show coming up in April.  Check it out at:  http://www.threeriversquilters.org/quiltshow.html

So I'm off to the Post Office!

Check back tomorrow - and rest assured there will be NO MORE pictures of snow. 
Yes, I may be in denial, but I think everyone must be pretty darned tired of snow by now - where ever they are!

quilting, quilting, more quilting while cheering on Olympians!

Pat Sloan issued a challenge to her peeps - to finish a quilt during the Olympics - read more about it on her "Death by Quilting" website, blog, etcs: 
http://www.deathbyquilting.com/
http://quiltmashup.com/
http://patsloan.typepad.com/pat_sloans_corner/

Pat is an amazing talented, full of energy and ideas kind of person - I love her!  she's such a quilt enabler!

While I'd like to be doing nothing BUT quilting, there are other obligations a quilter must attend to, and those things have taken a lot of my time this week.  You know - eat, sleep, shovel snow, and sew on and sew on!
 Here is what I've been working on:

can you guess where this was taken?  Not much of a challenge, huh?  This quilt is getting big - and I've run out of places to pose big quilts for their progress cameos, so bear with me!  Until the weather warms up enough to put them outside, at least!

These blocks are from Pat Sloan's Turkey Tracks Block Swap last October - only one of these is mine, the rest came from swap participants, who all did wonderful blocks, as you can see!  I received six blocks, but only know three of the names.

I put the sashes on yesterday and then sewed the rows together and added the first red borders today.  Another border will be added, and then it will be a twin/large throw size.  This is an excellent way to make seven 12" blocks into a twin size quilt.  The only tough part is calculating the size of those setting triangles.  I'll put this one on the HQ16 to quilt it - as soon as the weather (i.e. basement!) warms up a bit.

Tomorrow is the last day of February - Are you ready for March?  It comes in like a LION, remember?

snow removal done well!

I was ironing fusible fleece to some muslin in my studio this morning when I heard what I thought was a bulldozer coming down the street outside - since I don't have a window that looks directly out onto the street, I came rushing downstairs to see what was going on - hoping that nobody had a collapsed roof, etc. and this is what I saw:

 

and  the best part was, they were removing the additional 6" of snow we had last night as well as the accumulation of snow piles between cars all the way to the sidewalks!

Every time the big dump truck was full, it went away and came back empty a few minutes later, and again the little snow blower vehicle would follow the truck along the street and "blow" the snow up onto the dump truck!  This is wonderful!  We can park again - at least for today!

In case the UPS guy is looking for our house, it's behind this mountain of snow:

it's not a big house to begin with, but it looks even smaller now!  and do you see the icicles hanging from the porch - and from my neighbor's roof?  Icicleville - that's where we live!
I'm going back to my studio and sew until it all melts... or bedtime, which ever comes first.

 

I'm going to add a few embellishments to this today...

and do a little machine applique too.

I'm going to hang up the snow shovel for today

Cheerie bye for now.

Lestoil or More Toil, that is the question....

The unmistakable odor of LESTOIL hit my nose this morning... it was coming from under the kitchen sink!  I thought perhaps I had been sloppy when I used the Lestoil to clean the kitchen floor last time, so I poked around trying to find the source, and sure enough it did leak, but not the way I suspected!  It turns out the bottom of the bottle had cracked, and leaked a whole puddle of LESTOIL under the bottle and it's surrounding bottles - into a mess that I cannot describe in words, so here's the picture:

I thought I could just wipe it up and put everything back under the sink.... but that didn't work out so well, since the LESTOIL had dissolved the paint - it just doesn't seem to have a bottom anymore - the wood is so saturated that it continues to leach out of the wood under where the paint was....

 

very penetrating stuff!

 So, instead of playing in the snow (with a shovel, of course) this morning I am coping with this mess:

So, if any of my deadlines are missed this week, you know why.  I looks as though we may have to replace the kitchen cabinet (and hopefully NOT the floor UNDER the cabinet!) to completely purge the odor, since I don't think I'll ever be able to completely suck all that LESTOIL out of the base of this cabinet.

If you have a suggestion for how to get LESTOIL out of the wood, please - by all means!

Because I'd love to get back to the studio and do more sewing, or painting, or even tidying up my fabric stash!

a snowy, sewy weekend

Good Morning Snowbunnies -

We've made it through the 4th worst snow storm of all recorded time (for Pgh, PA, at least) and so far, so good!
Actually, I spent the day in the sewing studio with a bunch of little square friends.....

getting ready for a block swap!

We had about 16 to 18" here in Greensburg, just east of Pgh, and dh spent a LOT of the weekend digging the cars out so we could fulfill work and social needs with the help of an angel with a snow blower - and I made it to teach the first of a four part quilting class to very appreciate newbie quilters. 
... so, how was your weekend?  have you made a new friend lately?

lots and lots of squares

Yesterday, I spent the day cutting up 5 yards of fabric into squares.  Today I sewed half of the little squares to the corners of the big squares.  This evening I'm snipping threads and clipping corners.  Mindlessly seaming endless corners.  Looking forward to what they will look like when they get together with all the other squares from the FB Quilters Block Swap.

 

And, I'm almost done putting the binding on this little beauty:

 

 

 Tomorrow I'll be teaching, so watch for another post over the weekend.  Let me hear from you - don't be shy!

is it painting? or just messing with paint?

What's that you say?  Where have you been all week?  Oh, you don't care?  Well, I'll tell you anyway....
It's another cold snowy morning in SW PA - so I've been making messes at the 'painting salon' in the basement and turned out some very colorful batting scraps to use in an upcoming Fiber Art Trade/Challenge:

and yesterday I went to play with friends - with paintsticks and stencils and inkie goodies,

and the day before that, I was quilting on this:

which I'm hoping to finish today.

and then I'll be serving the "World Famous FPC Spaghetti Dinner" at the church tonight... so come on over - it's all you can eat!  Includes beverage, salad, bread and dessert for only $6!  Such a DEAL!  and I'll be your server, and you don't have to tip me!  how easy is that?

Monday already - where did the weekend go?

A few weeks ago, I joined an online yahoo group called QuiltersFleaMarket - hoping to post some things for sale as I de-cluttered my sewing studio and storage space.... so okay, I haven't posted anything yet, but for any of my newbie friends who are looking to BUY things for their studios, including books, sewing machines, etc. this is a goldmine!
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/QuiltersFleaMarket/

Today I rec'd two wonderful packages in the mail - a box of Aurifil thread:

and a Fiber Art PostCard:

the picture doesn't do it justice - it looks like a treasure map - complete with little treasures made from silk, paper, and brass!  ...and doesn't my stove top make a good background?

Sometime last weekend I managed to start my 'calendar quilt' with a strip for each day of the year... here's January, so far:

I can see why they need to be trimmed at the end of the month...

And  the quilt rack is attached to the dining room wall:

complete with the dragonfly quilt I made some time ago.... and yes - this is hand applique - and free-hand machine quilted, with dozens of tiny little crystals on those orange flower petals.

So - it was a productive weekend, which explains why it is a blur in my memory!

Hope yours was a good weekend, too.

Sweethearts Rock, and sewing in general rocks my world!

Hello again,

I've been sewing again....

 

this little dittie will be mailed on Monday to my swap partner, and I'll be looking forward to the one she is going to send to me!  Whoohooo, what fun!  I love swaps!

Here's a close up:

those are not X's, they are BOWS!!!

Today I worked on my 'calendar quilt' adding 24 pieces to my strip so far this year.

Beautiful day today - hope yours was, too!

quilting progress

Good Morning (or Evening, or whatever...)
I've been spending a bit of time listening to online radio while I quilt - what fun!
Watch for a pic of my 'Sweethearts Rock' quiltlet coming soon....
Enjoy your day, whatever it brings.

red, red, red up!

I love to get into the red stash and play - it's invigorating!

This is part of my red stash - sooo pretty!






I'm going to spend the rest of the morning cutting some up.
gotta go now...

fiber art attempt

So, I recently joined a Fiber Art Traders group - I think I may be overqualified for a group with the initials FAT, but that remains to be seen...

 

Here's my first efforts at being artistic in the group - it reminds me of that old song "The Sun Shines Out of Your Shoes"  by Petula Clark.  Have to smile, ya' know?

the other one was just for practice - these are only 4" x 6" so I had to get my sea legs under me before I got serious.  

So now that I know that I'm not really a doodler by nature, do you think I should give it up or keep trying?  Let me know, before I make a fool of myself!
Thanks!

Pat Sloan's Calendar Quilt Challenge

busy day in PA

You may not believe this, but it is only 6AM, and I’ve been awake for 2 hours already! I think this is a sign of aging – or it could have been that the paper carrier was just extra noisy this morning. Just as well that I’m up, tho, cause I have a busy day ahead of me and need to get moving.

I’ve been reminded that there hasn’t been a post on my blog yet and its now TWO WEEKS into the NEW YEAR – so here’s what’s up: I had a lovely post that I thought I had saved, but it is nowhere to be found…. Lost in cyberspace somewhere, pics and all.

First – the Studio part of the sorting adventure took a ton more effort than the yarn sorting, and it’s still not done! There is floor space showing, and the furniture is in place, but the sorting out uncovered yet another 8 boxes of fabric that I had completely forgotten about! How could that possibly happen?

Also uncovered – a LOT of ‘almost finished’ UFO’s – very tempting to just drop everything and finish a few of those, but I’m doing my best to restrain myself. I did have to put the sorting on hold while meeting a couple of deadlines, one of which is this coming Monday!

Other stuff: an almost finished knit scarf, a pincushion, a jar of buttons and a bunch of small gift bags!

AND – I’ve been putting a LOT of my energy into shoveling snow – it snowed here for 11 of the first 12 days of this year – enough already! It’s amazing how long it takes to recover from just an hour of shoveling snow…

Today is supposed to be pleasant, so I’m going out to spend some time with friends and do a couple of errands.

I know a lot of us leave our purses in the shopping cart while we are reading labels, reaching for frozen dinners, etc. - but this habit is an open invitation to purse snatchers, so when you are shopping, consider taking just your wallet and keys in your pocket – or maybe wearing one of those mini-messenger bags with just the necessities. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure!

And finally - please leave a comment to let me know you are reading this… don’t be a stranger! Let’s be friends. I’ve made friends in Australia, Belgium, and Cyprus just this month!