Rocky Mountain Quilt Museum

We've been in Colorado for a week, visiting Mom and my sister Jenny.  Mid-way through our visit, my Wisconsin brother Axel arrived.   We squeezed into the car one day (with two walkers) to go to the Rocky Mountain Quilt Museum in Golden.  Thank goodness it is only about 15 minutes away.  There were three quilters featured, including Lea McComas who I've seen on Quilting Arts TV.  She does some incredible thread painting.

Another quilter on exhibit was Sharon Schlotzhauer whose applique and 3-D quilts were also amazing.  I was very impressed with her use of pieced prairie points in the curvy lines of this quilt.  

Many of her quilts included beads and other shiny things, along with hand applique.

The sheer simplicity of this quilt really inspired me to try something similar very soon.

All in all, it was a peaceful trip with lots of family time.  Mom is 101 and still pretty sharp although she is a little less mobile than when I saw her last year.  We sat on the back porch, chatted, and watched the birds and gardens a lot.  I handsewed some Manx quilt blocks which are turning out pretty nice.

Now that we are home, it's time to get back in the swing of busy-ness, with lots of fall events coming up.

My appliqued piece

I've been thinking about a name for this appliqued piece, which I was happy to finish binding this week in between holiday preparations.   It started out as a neutral string background that had hung around for a long time, waiting for just the right thing to applique onto it.   I had thought of a basket of bright flowers, but I just never got serious about finding or creating a pattern.

Last spring a guild member showed an antique quilt she had found, and I finally knew just what I wanted to do.  The blocks in her quilt were about 18", and my melon shapes are a little larger resulting in a 24" x 24" piece.  But the colors are very similar.  I love pink and blue together.  I hand appliqued the melons mostly at my Saturday sewing group meetings this year; then I echo quilted around and inside the shapes using a walking foot.  I love the way it turned out.  The quilting smoothed out all the bulges that often appear in string quilts so that it lies relatively flat.

Since I started appliqueing this wall hanging, I've amassed quite a few "strings" which I hope to put together this year, maybe alternating the neutrals with the colored blocks.   But that's another thing to think about in 2023!

Unity is finished

Over the weekend, I put nose to the grindstone and finished my "Unity" quilt top.   I found the next-to-last round of this quilt quite difficult, requiring quite a bit of time with "Jack" the ripper and requiring what designer Bonnie Hunter called "ease."  There was quite a bit of stretchy easing needed to get the whirling blocks to fit, so much so that I decided not to make the last two pieced sides.  Instead, I put two solid 2" borders around and, while they were hard to "ease" on, they will, I hope, help the quilt lie squarely.

I'll take it to be long arm quilted this week, and as usual I'll be glad to see it leave our house!  I'll deliver the Tulip Tango quilt then, too.   Today I sewed the back for that quilt, and I also made some double pinwheel blocks, the online group's block for July.

The blocks at the bottom are the blocks for the month, and one will be swapped and the other kept.  I'll probably make a few more of those to go in a sampler I've been working on all year.  

After finishing those blocks, I got out my "orphan" box and started working on an appliqued piece I've had on my mind for a long time.  It's based on an antique quilt a guild member brought to a meeting.  Mine will use a pieced background (which was already in the box) and melon shapes in similar colors, but here's what was shown at guild.  

I haven't done any hand applique in a long time so this was fun.  I'll work on it again tomorrow.

It's fall

 

This is not a block I remember making, but I made it for a state quilt guild exchange a couple ofyears ago.  I love the soft colors.   I enjoy making leaf blocks in the fall, and this arrangement has always appealed to me.

This is the best time of year for us - cooler nights, crisp mornings, sun and warmth in the daytime, sweaters or fleece, apple pie, chicken pie suppers.  The latter will probably not happen this fall due to COVID - again.  It is fun to go to at least one in the fall, though.  People sit down with strangers, often those just passing through the state, and chat like old friends.  I hear that St. Monica's church will be having a take out chicken pie supper, so I may arrange one of those.  We went out to a restaurant a few weeks ago when the COVID cases were down, but now that they are up again, we carry out again once in a while.  Everyone is wearing masks in most public places again.

I've been working on some bigger blocks using scraps lately.  I saw something similar to this 16" star block at right and had fun digging through my scraps to put it together.  I have boxes of 2.5" squares and half square triangles, so I only had to make a few more HSTs.

I have another appliqued piece from the Piece 'o' Cake The Best Sampler Ever to work on.  I went through various websites and old magazines to find a few more 16" blocks I can make.  I am tired of the grind of blocks of the month, and I will try hard not to work on any more in 2022.  But I will eventually make my four orange pineapple blocks for Sept. and may make more in the coming months.

Quilting

I've been quilting my Pop Stars quilt here and there throughout the days.  It's easy but a bit repetitive, so I take breaks after an hour or so.  I'm doing close, squiggly lines all down the length of the quilt which is crib-sized.  It looks pretty good but it also feels odd to be doing something so free form.

In between quilting sessions, I've been appliqueing a Halloween door hanging based on a pattern from the Piece 'o' Cake ladies' book The Best-Ever Applique Sampler, but I used a variety of Halloween fabrics.  When did purple and lime become Halloween "colors"?   No matter - I like both.

A "tree" made of one of the big flowers will go to the right of the house, and now I'm wondering about a little embroidery or other embellishment.  A pieced border with a variety of Halloween fabrics will go around the house block, and then I'll quilt it very simply.  I love having a smaller project that will actually get finished sooner.

This has been really fun to work on.  I may yet make another small quilt out of the same book which features more floral designs, my favorite.

Appliique etc.

Dee asked me to teach another beginning hand quilting class at her shop in October.  It's just days after we get back from Colorado, so I thought I'd better start getting things together.  Yesterday I made a flannel board to attach samples of different methods of applique to.  I decided another Lafayette's Orange Peel might be fun to work on this winter, but in scrappy colors.  So my samples are all melon shapes.  I'll try and take a photo soon.

I usually start by having people practice the applique stitch using melon shapes created with the "used dryer sheet" method.  I don't really like this method because I can never get a sharp point with it, but designer Lori Holt uses it, as does a member of one of my guilds.   I need to buy a little more unbleached muslin to make a few more squares for the class, which is sure to be small but fun.

After they get the hang of the stitch, I move on to the class project, involving stems, leaves, and circles, mostly using the freezer paper method.   I used this design in 2016 for a class and then finished it for Cindy to hang in her newly painted room.   I made one last year which is now a pillow, so guess I'll make another along with this year's class.

This week I made four 6" basket blocks and then cut out four borders for the red, white, and blue medallion quilt I started last winter.   It was the biggest UFO in my closet and I thought it time to get back to work on it.  The background fabric for this border is a blue and white-ish stripe, so the flowers are red on a navy blue vine, and the leaves will be various scraps of blue.   I stitched the vine down by machine, but I'm doing the flowers and leaves by hand.  Because the weather got a little cooler, I worked on two of the borders quite a bit this week.  It's really relaxing.

I also put the August low volume blocks together today and started quilting this section of my year-long Splendid Sampler/Moda Blockheads quilt.  All this activity is good because it keeps me from snacking.  My cholesterol has gotten a bit high, so I'm taking the "life-style changes" (the P.A.'s gentle term for diet and exercise) route to avoid medication.  I walked about a mile and a half in the forest today, and we'll be having salmon and salad for dinner.   I hope to get more walks in if/when the weather cools.

Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to all!  We all had mothers, after all, and some of us are mothers.  I feel very lucky that my mom is still vital at age 94.  Still driving, attending classes, going swimming, and buzzing around.  I rarely call her because she's never home!   She uses a walker when she's out, just for stability, but it's hard to keep up with her nonetheless.  At right are Mom and Paul at a park near Denver last fall. 

It's raining here today (what else is new?), so we won't be grilling or gardening.  Yesterday I did do a little gardening and hope to do some planting during the week.  There are a few places in the yard that could use some new perennials.  I would like to plant dahlias and iris, too, near the house where the soil is less than optimal.  Last year I had tomatoes there, but I'm going to use pots for those this year.  I like to go to the garden stores during the week, so if I get a chance, I'll do that.  We don't plant vegetables until around Memorial Day here anyway, so even though I'd like to plant, it's good to wait.

Yesterday I finished appliqueing the wool piece and squared it off.  I'm setting it aside while I work on a small Rail Fence Diamond quilt using what's left of a jelly roll.  Everyone in one of my guilds received one from a rep of Quilting Treasures, and it's been fun to see what folks do with them.  I'm using a pattern from Missouri Star Quilt Co. (https://quiltingtutorials.com/tutorial/make-an-easy-fence-rail-diamond-quilt-quilting-quickly-with-jenny), with black diamonds.  My goal is to have a piece small enough to practice quilting in a spiral with my walking foot.

Chris helped me gather and load miscellaneous junk around the house to take to the town-wide bulk trash day yesterday, and he'll come over at noon to join Paul and me for lunch at the Chinese.  Eating Chinese food is a long-time family tradition.  Dad used to boast that he could feed our whole family of six for $10, so we used to go for birthdays, anniversaries, graduations, and any other special day.   For dessert we'll go home for a blueberry pastry I made yesterday with refrigerated puff pastry dough.  That was so easy that I'll be working with it again soon.

"Dutch Treat" reboot

I started working on Dutch Treat earlier this year but found the white I had chosen raveled too much.  I hunted around for some off-white batik and got some blue, too.  The blocks are reverse appliqued, so the blue is behind the off-white.  My three earlier blocks were all sorts of colors which was nice, but I thought I might only do a small number of the blue blocks.  Here's what I finished this week.

There are 146 4" blocks in the quilt, much like Dear Jane.  Because each block takes at least two hours to do, I don't know how much time I'll devote.  I do have four more prepared for applique, and we'll see how I feel after those are done.  The batik is easier to needle turn, and I can make much smaller stitches.  Not all of the blocks in the book are Dutch-related, but I doubt if I'll have the patience to do them all anyway.

And what will happen to the earlier blocks?   I have put them in with the other orphans for projects along the way - potholders?  a table runner?

Quilting, albeit slowly

Because my recent back problems seem to be finally getting better, I decided that I wouldn't overdo sandwiching the 365 Challenge-inspired quilt.  It's about 80" x 80" so took a little finagling as I pin-basted it on the double bed in my sewing room.  It takes a lot of care to do it in a way that avoids puckers on the back.  I started the process Sunday, taking breaks to read and work on hand appliqueing my "reboot" of the Dutch Treat blocks, this time with cream batik on the top and blue batik on the bottom.

It was all ready to quilt by Tuesday noon, so I started what will be several weeks of quilting.  (And I finished one DT block and started on a second one).  First, I went around the borders, and now I'm filling some in.  I often don't know what I'm going to do until I start handling the quilt.  So I begin with straight lines and think about further designs while quilting.  It often depends on how the quilt handles, although lately I having been using Quilters Dream Select which is very easy to maneuver.  I will probably stipple the center and crosshatch the outer border.  But what about the borders in between?  We'll have to wait and see! 

Yesterday I got no sewing done at all due to a library board meeting, grocery shopping, and a chiropractor appointment.  I spent a bit of time this morning before heading to an elderly neighbor's to pick up 9 boxes of books for the library booksale which Paul and I delivered after that.   It is nice to be able to take my time quilting when the mood strikes.  I have also revised my expectations of how many DT blocks I'll be able to do.  If I can get a nice wallhanging or table runner out of the blocks, I will be happy.  Each block takes enormous concentration and fairly bright light to work on.

Side-tracked

I had every intention of going to the LQS and getting some white-ish batik so I can continue with Dutch Treat.  But "life" got in the way.  First, Paul had a slight medical procedure requiring me to take him to the hospital in Burlington on Tuesday (what a way to spend Valentine's Day!).  We had to be there by 8:15 am, so we left home at 6:45.  I did a lot of waiting, but he came through just fine.  His roommate, once he landed, was a neighbor which was quite a nice and fun thing.  Paul spent the night in the hospital, and of course the weather report for Wednesday was simply dire, with lots of snow predicted. 

So I worried all night, and when I saw flakes coming down in the morning, I got in the car and drove back to Burlington.  They had said he probably wouldn't be released until noon, but I was taking no chance.  When I arrived, he had been discharged and was ready to leave, amid some big, sloppy snowflakes.  They let up on our way home, though, and all that worry was for nothing.  Paul is fine, just has to take it easy and then have cardiac rehab when we get back from Alabama in March.  We'll walk and take it easy down there, where it's in the 60's and 70's.  Can't wait!

Meanwhile, Dutch Treat.  Still haven't gotten the batik (I have a gift certificate burning a hole in my purse), so I've been making little wallhangings instead.  One is a vase of flowers with almost everything - stems, petals, vase - made of selvages.  It needs a little more work - outlining some of the flowers in black or green so they stand out better. 

But this one, done with wool and a vase made of selvages, is coming along really well.  I'm not great at embroidery, but I'm learning as I go along.  I need to add the leaves and a bluebird.  It's from a book by Wendy Williams - Wild Blooms & Colorful Creatures.  There are some really fun designs that I hope to use as inspiration.

November weather

It's cloudy.  Gray.  Chilly.  Every.  Single.  Day.  It's November.

We got a little spoiled earlier in the month, first by going to Colorado where it was sunny and 65 degrees every day.  After we got home, it was also warmish and sunny.  But for the last week or so, November has been it's old usual self.   I suspect December will be similar until later in the month when it will be very cold and sunny right through January.  That's "normal" for the north country.

Meanwhile, it's a good time to do indoor things.  Yesterday I did a mountain of laundry.  Paul had no clean socks left - highly unusual.   I read Seven Days newspaper and a little more of Jennifer Chiaverini's latest book Fates and Traitors, about John Wilkes Booth.  It appears the Quilters Book Club group has gone moribund because, although the selection for November/December was chosen ages ago, no one has mentioned reading it.  I have it downloaded to the Kindle, but haven't started it either.  I "retired" as moderator back in July after unsuccessfully trying to get people to participate more.  People seemed to want ideas for good reading but not to share their thoughts about what they were reading.   At any rate, I'm finding Fates and Traitors really fascinating.  Didn't know anything much about the Booth family.

Of course, I've been quilting.  I took a break from the orange peel quilt to make some quick coasters in Christmas fabric for Diane, my boss at the historical society.  I usually make her something for Christmas and have run through a variety of quilted items over the years.  I hope she likes these, made with six 5" squares each.   Diane is a peach of a "boss" for a volunteer.

The biggest news is that I finished the Orange Peel quilt yesterday!  The sun came out briefly today, so I managed to take some photos...

Blue scrappy orange peels

Every time I start a new scrap quilt, I think "this will really make the level of my [whatever color] box go down."  Wrong!  I've been appliqueing orange peels on and off since last spring when I taught a beginning applique class.  I'm using cream scraps for the 6" block backgrounds, too.  So far the piece measures 24" x 36" with several more blocks prepared for applique.

I like it a lot but am dithering about whether to keep making more or to stop.   A variety of blues, from dark turquoise through indigo is really fun to work with.  Orange peels are so easy to applique that I think I'll put what I have together, set it aside, and reassess after I tackle a few other projects. 

Over the past few days I've re-discovered how nice it is to sit and applique on a snowy day.  Saturday afternoon we went to an organ concert at the library (unusual and funny), and, when we got home, the weather took a turn for winter with snow and wind.   It has been snow showering off and on ever since.  Just a week ago we were grilling burgers and opening the doors.  That's fall in Vermont, a truly transitional time.   As the weather changes, we add layers of clothing, too.  Time to get those turtlenecks out!

Some gifts and a start

I've been working on mug rugs to give to the library staff at the Friends and trustees' staff appreciation dinner after Thanksgiving.  Usually I get little party favors - chocolates, funny socks, etc., and this year I wanted to make something. No fabric or batting was purchased, just scraps! Here are the 13 I made.

I also made a mug rug for a secret pal and will be mailing that eventually.  She asked for a winter one.  It's a swap, and I'll be getting one, too, in a winter theme.  I can't show a photo here but will take one to post in December.

Over the weekend, I also finished a quilt top using half square triangles that I received ages ago in a swap.  I have set it aside for the time being as I wanted to make some smaller things - instant gratification.  I'm not participating in the craft show I've been in the last two years, so I have more time to finish projects.

Of course, I had to start another one, a block of the week called "Be My Neighbor" by Moda. The blocks are 18" high and I'm planning to use stash for it.  Here are the first two blocks.  I have the pattern for the next block, but have set it aside for the time being.  It has a sweet little bird to applique, and I'm thinking of using wool for that.  Will have to see if I have any blue in my stash of wool.

Bloom is finished

I finished the little "Bloom" quilt this morning.  The blocks are hand appliqued using Lori Holt's block of the week "Bloom" pattern, but the fabric was so wild that I only made 12 blocks instead of 20.  Someone in my guild is using Holt's fabric and is it adorable. 

I have a lot of the bundle of Amy Butler's "Violette" fabric left, so now I'm working on a curved log cabin with those fabrics plus black and white prints.  Then, I hope I can go back to my comfort zone!

Getting my steps in

It was a rainy weekend, so a nice time to do a little hand sewing.  My small quilt group was "homeless" for its June meeting, so I invited them here.  Only two people came (it's a busy time of year with high school graduations and such), but we had a nice bee anyway.  I got a few Lafayette Orange Peels sewn and/or prepped.  Whatever this will end up being is coming together quite quickly.

At last week's applique class, one person asked if I could show how to finish the block I designed, so this week I hope to get it machine quilted, just to show how applique can be handled.  I think it will end up as a pillow anyway.  Yesterday I basted the parts of the same block which I will use for the next class, since this was their homework.  It wouldn't do for the instructor not to do the homework!

We did get in another forest walk in between raindrops yesterday.  Walking with Samantha is always interesting because she notices things I don't always see.  This time it was a variety of amazing fungi growing on trees.  The small group had a good time.  One of our newbies was the guy who owns the comic book/collectible card shop.  He was a favorite of Chris' when he was growing up.  These walks are a fun way of meeting new people and sharing our enthusiasm for the forest, the views, and the history of the abandoned quarries.  AND I got in almost 8,000 steps Sunday!

Prepping some applique

My sewing machine is still in the shop (which is closed Sun.-Tues.), so I am taking a little time to sit and applique.  This is good after a couple of hectic weeks anyway.  I finished this block over vacation and need to write up the directions for the beginning applique class I'll teach in June.  Thanks to Dee, I'm postponing the classes from April when I have too many activities to squeeze in two Saturdays.  And May was too busy, too.

Besides this block, which is for the second day of the class, I'll be starting the class by teaching a variety of applique methods using a larger melon or orange peel shape from an old book by Ruby McKim.  Her 12" pattern is pieced, but I think it's much easier to applique.  A recent issue of Block magazine showed a similar quilt, and I've found a couple of nice scrappy ones online to show the group.  I have a bunch of 6" blocks to work on, too, in scappy blues on a cream background.  They can be put together in a variety of ways, and I have lots of blues I can use.  This will be an on-going project.  Who knows when I'll stop?

It is week nine of Lori Holt's "Bloom" quilt-along, and I finally started preparing a block yesterday.  I like this simple, cute pattern and will try to catch up eventually.  I have some really wild fabric for it and do have a stack of 9.5" background blocks cut.  I cut out freezer paper shapes and am ready to baste the pieces and the stems today.  If I like it, I'll make 3 more for a block exchange I signed up for.  That's why my blocks are a little larger than the "Bloom" blocks are.  And I'm not sure I'll sash them as Holt suggests either.  I never follow pattern directions completely!  Holt suggests sewing Pellon to the pieces and then turning them right-side out for applique, but this method doesn't work well on points IMHO.  Her plastic template shapes are great, though, and can be used for other projects in the future.