DWM: two finishes, and other accomplishments

I hate to paint.  It goes back to the time I had my first apartment and I decided to repaint the shower stall.  I thought I had to strip off the old paint before I repainted it -- innocent stupidity -- I made a mess of it. I didn't dare tell my landlady but eventually went next door to the Smiths.  They had updated their old house, and Mr. Smith worked at the lumber yard so he knew about fixing things.  Mercifully he didn't judge my ineptitude. He recommended the kind of paint to buy and I fiinished the job.  35 years later I still hate to paint.  I don't like moving stuff out, I don't like taping, I don't like cutting in, I don't like the inevitable (for me) drips and splats.  But paint I did, and the master bath is freshly "coral" and the newly-installed ceramic-tile shower stall looks great.  (Don't look too closely at the corners. Or the ceiling.)

That was one of the accomplishments this four-day weekend.  Another was raking the back yard in the brisk temps and beautiful sunshine yesterday.

The third was finally compiling essays for the "Perspectives" column for the November/December issue of Public Libraries.  Just two weeks late. (Sigh.) The topic is "life after the front lines," about what librarians do when they're no longer directing or managing library departments.  Of the three contributors, one is consulting, another is an artist, and the third is on assignment in Brazil for the U.S. State Department.  


The fourth accomplishment was quilting and binding two flimsies! 

"Plaid Spinner" dates back to 2007. I made the spinner blocks and swapped them in setting exchange -- that is, I sent these off and in turn I got someone else's blocks to set.  I can't remember who created this clever framed setting, but it certainly made the spinners more interesting.  The finished quilt is approx. 64 x 64 and will be a raffle prize at the community spelling bee November 8.

I pieced the back and used up fabric that's been in my stash for about as long as Plaid Spinner has been a flimsy.


Rick Rack Batik was created just last month. I quilted straight lines in the 9 patches, continuous curves in the squares, and "almost feathers" in the border. 

What's next?  I have another old flimsy basted and ready to quilt!

See what other quiltmakers have accomplished at Judy's Patchwork Times.  

P.S. I did buy fabric....but just 6 yards, and more than 50% off.

DWM: weekend and Bear Paw

I took a red-eye flight from SFO to ORD (Sunday, 10/14, to Monday, 10/15). I'd never done that before and now I know what it's like:  I dozed but did not sleep.  I got home at  7 a.m. and took a 3-hour nap.  I was glad I kept up with work-related email while I was in California or I'd never have gotten through the week.  I stayed home Tuesday evening (and watched the presidential debate), but had meetings Wednesday and Thursday.  A day off Friday provided some catch-up but I had events at the library Saturday morning (Zion-Benton Leadership Academy) and afternoon (antiques appraisal).   

Sunday was a perfect October day.  We raked leaves and pulled the remaining tomatoes out of the garden. (Two little eggplants, too.)   

Back to quilting!  I will post photos from the Pacific International Quilt Festival and the Magpies' meetup once I sort them.  Meanwhile, here's how the scrappy Bear Paw quilt looked at 10 p.m. yesterday.  I combed through  my stash and found a beige print with red flowers that would do for the border. I wasn't wild about it but I'd settle for it.  After I cut crosswise strips I realized that the border had a "drop match" (like wallpaper) and if I didn't line up the strips precisely the effect would be all wrong.  I didn't have enough fabric to do that.  I changed the plan to flying geese made out of the  2.5" HSTs that are my default size for leaders-and-enders, with red strips for stability. If I'd pushed ahead to attach the last of the borders I would have gotten a second wind. I opted to go upstairs and get some sleep.

See what other quiltmakers are working on at

Judy's Patchwork Times.

Road Scholar: Yosemite

First view of El Capitan and Half Dome

"An American Icon: Majestic Yosemite National Park" was my 27th trip with Road Scholar, October 7-12.  Both the park and the week's itinerary lived up to my expectations.   

Fortunately the weather was clear that day

My husband wasn't able to  join me this time, but my fellow Magpie MJ was a great travel companion and roommate.  We took BART into San Francisco Sunday morning. It was a beautiful day and we walked and walked from the Embarcadero BART station along the bay (lunch at Pier 39) to Fisherman's Wharf (dessert: ice cream from Ghirardelli).  We ran out of time to take the cable car back to Powell St. and BART, but we made it back to the hotel in time to meet up with the Road Scholar group.

With 39 participants this was a larger RS than our other recent trips. The leaders, Pete and Arline Hora, are veteran RS leaders who have conducted this RS numerous times.  The itinerary allowed us to see the major aspects with flexibility for discovery on our own. 

* Coach bus from Burlingame/SFO to Yosemite, and also for transportation in the park

* Lunch at the historic Wawonah Hotel, established in 1879 for the first tourists

* A short hike through Mariposa Grove (sequoias) with commentary by naturalist David Lukas

* Yosemite Lodge -- comfortable motel-style rooms with cafeteria-style meals at the Food Court

* Tuolumne Meadows, Olmstead Point, Tenaya Lake

 * Yosemite Valley and Bridal Veil Falls (a mere trickle at this time of year)   

Sequoia roots

Ahwanee Hotel

Ahwanee Dining Room

Bridal Veil Falls

* Lunch at the magnificent Ahwahnee Hotel  

* An evening with John Muir (reenacted by Frank Helling)

*  Glacier Point  

The scenery was magnificent and the company was very pleasant.   We concluded our Road Scholar trip on Friday afternoon....and MJ were on to our next adventure with the Magpies! 



With MJ at Glacier Point; Half Dome in background

I saw this same plaque at Isle Royale. It is a memorial to Stephen Tyng Mather, under whose administration the National Parks were established.  "There will never come to an end the good that he has done." What a wonderful tribute! 

 

 

Half Dome from Serenity Bridge



With Liberty and bargains for all



I went to a fabric sale today at a church a couple of towns over.  The church women had been given the last of the inventory of Cotton Pickers, a long-established quilt shop that closed about 10 years ago.  "All fabric $2 yard, proceeds to mission projects."  I had a meeting early in the day so I didn't get there until 9:45.  That was just as well because I could not have coped with a greater selection. 
Here's my haul:  Hoffmans, Jennifer Sampou, Jinny Beyer, and more.


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I knew from the hand of the fabric that these five pieces were lawn, and I suspected they were Liberty, but the tags that fell out proved it.  I scooped them up.  (Two four-yard pieces and three yard-and-a half pieces.) 

I spent $284 for 142 yards.  Yikes!  But at the original price (circa 2000), about $7/yard, I'd have spent $994. And at today's cotton prices ($11/yard) I'd have spent $1562.  Plus sales tax.  (And that's discounting the Liberty.)   

And now, on the eve of vacation, here's my design wall:  very scrappy bear paws in progress.....Next post will be from California!

Guild challenge: I won!

The ballots!

The "tradition with a twist" guild challenge quilts were revealed this evening.  There were 6 "art" and 9 "traditional" entries.

Traditional quilts

I won third place in traditional!  (A ribbon and $10.00.)   I've decided to call mine "Cubed Batiks," since there are 9 9-patches of 9-patches.  






The art quilters are so inventive! 

Art quilts

DWM: housing project

The Liberated Quilters are having a house block swap. The instructions said "any size," and mine are all different.   I needed to work on them this weekend because I'll be out of town October 6-15, and they are due October 15.  My blocks aren't as wonky as Tonya's (because I just now found that tutorial link) but they are my first effort.  I sliced and stitched and it didn't take long to get the hang of it.  The swap is for 10 blocks and that's how much background fabric I had.  BTW, that background print had a selvedge date of 2000.  I don't know if it's good, bad, or just embarrassing to know long a piece of fabric has been around.

 Two weeks ago when I posted a photo of the Cake Stand flimsy I said I hadn't decided about a border.  Here's what I came up with. It took longer than I thought it would to make all the HSTs. I discovered that I needed an inner border to make the HSTs fit--note the additional pair of HSTs in the upper right and lower left corners.  I would have finished it a half hour sooner had I not realized that the left border was on the wrong way--after all four HST borders were sewn on.  (All the dark triangles are on the outside.) The HST borders have so many seam lines that I added the outer border for stability. This is about 70 x 70 and used 4-5/8 yds of fabric.

See what other quiltmakers have on their design walls at the beginning of October at Judy's Patchwork Times!

DWM: Challenge quilt

This year's guild challenge is "Tradition with a Twist."  The original block must be recognizable on the front of the quilt among the twisted version.   Maximum perimeter is 144".  My interpretation was just a wisp of a thought until late last week.  Since Saturday morning was taken up by the first session of the Zion-Benton Leadership Academy (which I am co-coordinating), the afternoon by a wedding, and the evening by the reception (for which occasion I made the second quilt shown here) that meant I spent Friday evening and a good part of Sunday in my studio. 

When I worked on the "disappearing" blocks for the guild's schoolhouse demonstration night in June I discovered that 3" nine-patches "disappear" nicely.  Just about any block looks terrific in batiks.  I combined both ideas.  I tried to keep the batik squares subtle. The nine-in-nine patch design should be evident at second glance.  It's just under 36 x 36.

(A couple of the blocks are oriented incorrectly, which I discovered after the quilt was assembled and basted.  I declare that a design element!)

The challenge reveal is October 3.

See what other quiltmakers have been working on at Judy's Patchwork Times .

DWM: dots and scraps

Saturday morning was the 7th annual LibraryPalooza, our celebrate-the-library event.  There were 27 "discovery stations" where people learned about e-resources, programs, and other library services. Kids made treasure boxes out of old CD and VHS cases.  The "creme de la creme" used booksale was outside.  It was a grand day! 



I took two beach walks this weekend -- Saturday and Sunday afternoon.   On Sunday I went to a less-used stretch of our lakefront. Few people realize that the park district has a patch of beach between the north and south units of Illinois Beach State Park.  I had it all to myself!  (And the water is still summertime warm.)




Cake Stands

Bear Paws: a new quilt sprouts!

And, yes, I sewed!  I made more polka-dot Cake Stand blocks to go with those I received in the Bag Lady Swap.  The idea for the string-pieced setting triangles came to me in church on Sunday morning.  Divine inspiration?  **If anyone has suggestions for the border, let me know!**

I have a box of 2.5" half-square triangles made as leaders-and-enders.  I received a package of 4.5" half-square triangles from the Block Swappers.  These units are the basis of the Cake Stand blocks and I decided to see what would happen if I sewed them together.  And so another scrap quilt is born! 

See what other quiltmakers are working on at Judy's Patchwork Times!

DWM: dots

Pfrieda, the Pfaff 1472 that I use for quilting (and for most piecing and general sewing), has a problem with its tension discs. There's a burr or  obstruction of some kind so that the thread does not feed smoothly.  That means I can't quilt the flimsy I have basted (and for which I have figured out the quilting pattern).   I won't be able to take the machine to the shop until Wednesday.    In the meantime I've set up Sweetness, the Singer 301, which is superb for piecing.

I pulled out a stack of polka-dot fabric and have added two more (thus far) Cake Stands to the Bag Lady blocks.  In my head I'm planning a design for the guild challenge, "tradition with a twist," which is due next month. Nothing like an imminent deadline to provide inspiration. 

See what other quiltmakers are working on at Judy's Patchwork Times.

Wisconsin Quilt Expo



"Eternity" by AGD Pat Hilderbrand

With Karen D.

This was the first year that my schedule permitted me to go to the Wisconsin Quilt Expo in Madison.  I picked up Mary B., whom we met on our Isle Royale trip, at her home in Milwaukee.  We arrived at the Alliant Center just after 9 a.m.  We spent the morning looking at quilts and the afternoon shopping.   The exhibit ranged from exquisite to ho-hum.  There was quite a variety.  I was pleasantly surprised to see a quilt made by an Alpha Gamma Delta sister from my own chapter--I hadn't known that she is a quiltmaker. 

I met Karen D. from western Wisconsin. We're on several online quilting lists and had not met in person.

I take quilt photos because I want to remember particular techniques or designs.  I usually forget who made them.  I also have a 4" stack of printed photos from quilt shows in years past.  I can't bring myself to throw them out even though I only look at them if I happen to come across them in the box where they are stored.   

There were fabric bargains to be had. I indulged in batiks (6 yards and 30 FQ) and others (9 yds and 4 FQ) for an average price of $6.23 per yard.

This was a nice show. I hope I can return next year.

Ugliest fabric ever? and a new flimsy and garden bounty



Few fabrics are truly ugly.  I think this is one of them. This Marikmekko print was on the giveaway table at the guild meeting on Wednesday.  I took a yard and another guild member took a yard. We're having a little challenge to see if either of us can make a silk purse out of this sow's ear.  

The other Marimekko print is more appealing, though still unconventional.  It was also on the giveway table. 

Here is Rick Rack Batik with borders!  The orange border batik is a new purchase.

 

Tomatoes from our garden

Parsnips from the farmer's market. We love parsnips!

DWM: leading up to Labor Day

 We were up early enough on Friday to go to the beach to catch the sunrise (6:16 a.m.)   The remnant of Hurricane Isaac gave us less than a half-inch of rain -- but also a high surf yesterday.  It was almost like the ocean! (But, as my husband points out, fresh water doesn't smell the same.)

Labor Day is a day "on" for me and by extension for my husband.  The Mayor's Prayer Breakfast is from 8:00-10:00. (The event is theologically to the right of us, but this is a politically important event in the community.)  The library has a float in the Jubilee Days Parade in the afternoon. We have 100 lbs of candy to toss at the crowd, which numbers as high as 15,000. 

Of course I'd rather be messing with fabric.  Here's the update from my studio.

If I can't resist adding to my stash, at least I can try for bargains. These came from a thrift shop--9-1/2 yards for $12.00.  

I was channeling Bonnie Hunter when I scored these sport shirts at Salvation Army--$4.16 for both of them.  Many of you know that Bonnie recently led a quilters' tour of Bali. This shirt may have been a souvenir from a previous trip.  (Take a look at the label.  How often can you identify the original owner of a thrift shop item?  Here is more about  Helmuth.)   This orange Ralph Lauren print was too good to pass up.

 And, finally, here's what's on my design wall. 
These are the batik 9-patches I mentioned last week. The pattern is Bonnie Hunter's Rick Rack Nines, but set horizontally.  I had one yard of yellow/orange batik for the setting squares and that determined how many 9-patches I needed. This is 44 x 54.  I have to attach the corner triangles and trim it.  I don't know what the border fabric will be.

Check out what other quiltmakers are doing this holiday weekend at Judy's Patchwork Times.