Weekly update: round robin revealed, progress, uncertainty, and estate sale bargains

I was one of six guild members who participated in a monthly round robin. At this week's meeting we got our projects back.

Here's mine.  Wow!  I'm delighted.

I was only able to get photos of three of the other five. (And the collage cut off the edges of the quilt on the left.)

Linking up to OMG June Finish here . 


My Rainbow Scrap Challenge project this year is to make pinwheels using the monthly color plus gray/taupe/white, one block per day.  I overcut and made 32 dark blue blocks for June.  I also made light blue blocks.   Making both sets was my declared OMG for the month.

(Some of the pinwheels appear to be going in the opposite direction but that's because many of the light blues are lighter than the grays.)




Here's this month's wonky house for the guild BOM.  This is the layout. The design will include sashing.  There will be one more tall block and one more square block.














I finished all the red star blocks for the Christmas quilt. I tried red background. Too much red.  I tried green background. Too much green. I tried white with reds/greens. Pretty busy. I'm not sure if I like the arrangement -- but I've already sewn all the nine-patch blocks. I took everything off the design wall, put it all in a box, and will let it simmer for a while.







Balderdash conducts many of the estate sales in this area.  They have a new gimmick--pay $5 for one of their bags and bring it each time for a discount.  A three-day sale started Thursday: the home of a former music teacher (there were a dozen mountain dulcimers as well as several violins and guitars, and a lot of sheet music) who also did some crafting. I didn't buy anything the first day. I went back on Saturday: 75% off and another 15% with the Balderdash bag.   All of this was $12.50!  The fabric is 15 yards by weight (on the first day it was priced at $3.00 per piece).




 I couldn't pass up this Colonial-revival stitchery.  I'm sure it was a commercially-made piece (clue: the gift shop sticker).  The inscription reads:

To Audrey
Love Nana Ham
June 1984
Nana has had this for many years





Linking up this week with
Monday Making
Design Wall Monday
Oh Scrap!
Rainbow Scrap Challenge

Weekend wildflowers

 I went to  the north unit of  Illinois Beach State Park on Saturday afternoon. My quest:  flags (wild iris).  They differ from hybrid iris in that they grow at water's edge. They come in purple/blue and yellow.   I got a distance photo (see the upper right in the collage).  I also found other wildflowers -- a hybrid iris at the shoreline (how'd that get there?!), phlox, lupine, coreopsis, fringed puccoon, shooting star -- and a mushroom.

When I was driving out of the park I saw a superb stand of yellow flags on the edge of Sand Pond.

It turns out that the yellow variety is an invasive species   The blue ones are native.

Weekly update: it's June! Stash report, a flimsy, and OMG

I included quilt shops on my trip to Peoria (see previous post). Quilt Corner is in Morton, just east of Peoria. It is not open on Sunday so I planned my trip to stop there prior to the convention.
Peddlers Way  in Washington is open on Sunday and I thought I'd go there on my way home. However, I had a window of free time between events on Friday so I zipped over.

I sought two particular fabrics: gold tone-on-tone batik [see it on the right?] and red-on-red for the Christmas stars. (Yes, I have lots and lots of red fabric but not enough of any one red-on-red for this project.)   I found what I needed and bought more that I wanted!

 P.E.O.'s flower is the marguerite, or daisy. It was fitting that I buy daisy prints during P.E.O. convention weekend.

Usually when I drive to and from a meeting in central Illinois I am in a hurry and I don't stop.  On Sunday afternoon I pulled off at Dwight ("the first stoplight from Chicago" on old U.S. 66) to see the Oughton Windmill.

The Prairie Creek District Library is in the carriage house adjacent to the windmill.


A few miles north of Dwight I pulled off again.   I've seen the sign -- and the building -- for  Countryside Village for years.  It's 2/3 gifts (made-in-China, mostly) and candles, jams/jellies, etc., and 1/3 quilting with a great selection.  Two one-yard pieces from the 50%-off section and more daisies.

Mind you, the Countryside Village purchases were in June so they don't count for the stash report. 

I ended the month with a burst of stash enhancement.  In addition to the Peoria-area purchaes, last week I stopped at Salvation Army and bought cotton sheets (twin flat and fitted), white with black stylized flowers -- 8 yards for $3.20.  I was surprised to find out that I'm still ahead in use-vs.-acquisition.

Fabric OUT, May:  62-1/8  (that included 26 yards for the lap quilt project I mentioned last week)

Fabric IN, May: 81 yards, $423  (average $5.18/yard)

Fabric OUT, year-to-date:  238-1/8

Fabric IN, year-to-date: 220-1/8, $893 (average $4.05/yard)

Net reduction: 18 yards

I put the gold batik from Peddler's Way to use last evening.  The batik slab blocks are 9-1/2" unfinished. The flimsy is 59 x 62.  (3-1/8 yards used).

It's time to declare my One Monthly Goal for June.   Absent any particular deadlines, I've decided I will do two RSC months in one.  June is dark blue.  Angela said that light blue will come later.  I'm going to make both dark and light blue pinwheel blocks this month.  I already have the fabric cut (not just the blues but also pink, purple, and black which are the remaining colors). 

Linking up with One Monthly Goal
Design Wall Monday
Monday Making
Oh Scrap!
Moving It Forward

Weekly update: P.E.O. convention 2019

 The 117th convention of the Illinois State Chapter of P.E.O. was held at the Pere Marquette  Hotel in Peoria.

There were 353 "members of convention" -- local chapter delegates (like me), state officers, past state presidents, and committee chairs.  There were 633 visitors (mostly P.E.Os. but also family members).






Friday afternoon: The weather was sunny and not too hot for a brisk walk down to the riverfront. It was a great way to meet other sisters.

I didn't arrange for a roommate so one was assigned. I'd never met Vicki. She's president of a chapter in Moline. It was her first convention.  We got along splendidly....the fact that she's a quilter had something to do with it!






Friday evening's Time of Remembrance included a harpist who plucked a note for each name read during the necrology service.

Saturday morning's business meeting went expeditously.

The Honors Luncheon celebrated 50, 55, 60, 65, 70, 75 year members -- and there is one 80-year member in Illinois. (That means she is at least 98. She did not attend. :))  But my chapter sister Lenee's mom Katie was there to be honored as a "golden girl."

The afternoon workshops were serious (chapter leadership and officer training) and fun.
Lynn Rymarz and Christine Price portrayed Franc Roads Elliott  and Lulu Corkhill Williams in 1919, meeting at Marshall Field's and recalling the early days of P.E.O. (I saw Lynn in the role of Mary Cassatt just a week ago.)

The Projects Dinner celebrates our philanthropies.

Illinois P.E.O.s gave nearly $700,000 to the International and state projects in 2018-19.  200+ candidates proposed by Illinois chapters received grants, scholarships, or loans. Clare Happel Ashe is a P.E.O. Scholar recipient getting a PhD. in harp performance. She played for us.  (And I had a good sight line from our table in the front corner, where I happened to sit next to another quilter!)

Because we took care of the proposed amendments at Saturday's session, the Sunday morning business meeting was ceremonial:  installation of officers, recognition of the outgoing president, and the announcement of the 2019-20 theme.  The final gavel was at 11:30 and it was time to head home.


I've gotten to know many Illinois P.E.O.s because of my involvement with the Lake County Round Table and my participation on state committees.  My new appointment is  the P.E.O. Home Fund committee.

Virginia (left) is in the Springfield AAUW branch and Sue (center) is an Alpha Gamma Delta sister.

Jane was in the Waukegan AAUW branch for many years.  She retired to Galena and is now a P.E.O. I hadn't seen her since she moved.










Stacy and I are from the same home town.  When she lived close by she and I carpooled to P.E.O. meetings.  Now she lives in another suburb and belongs to another chapter.

From the state archives.  The names on the plate are that chapter's members. The other plate came in three sizes (so read the sign) and was sold as a fundraiser. (Both are hand-painted.)


 . . . . and of course I found fabric.  Read the next post to find out!

Midweek: not finished yet -- but another start!

I'm about 3/4 through with quilting the bullseye stars   It is not going as well as I'd like. I didn't press the top flat enough.  I will wash and dry it on hot in hopes that it will  shrink up enough to make the bubbly quilting less obvious.

Rather than continue to frustrate myself I looked at my quilting to-do list. At the top:  AAUW Christmas Quilt.  (I made the list at random, not in alphabetical order, but AAUW came first.)  I make two raffle quilts to benefit my AAUW branch fundraising. One is at the spring convention (Good Fortune this year) and the other is at the holiday/Christmas party.  Usually I begin thinking about the Christmas quilt in July. Or August. Sometimes inspiration comes slowly.  But this year it came very early.

I saved a photo of a Christmas quilt -- Pinterest, probably -- I don't remember the source. I figured out that the star blocks were 12", 8", and 4".  I may use the layout in the photo, or I may use the layout for the Churn Dash quilt I coordinated for the ALA Biblioquilters*  or I may come up with something else.

Meanwhile, I'm having fun pulling fabrics from the Christmas stash as well as the red and the green shelves.

*  This is the Churn Dash quilt.  Units are 9", 6", 3".
The 4" star blocks for the Christmas quilt are a lot easier to make than the 3" churn dashes.

I'm linking up with Susan's Midweek Makers

Weekly update: tote bag finished, slab blocks, helping a friend, and new acquisitions

I used some of the newly-harvested rhubarb (see last week's update) to make Bertha's Rhubarb Dessert when I hosted P.E.O. on Monday evening.  My Fargo AAUW/Alpha Gam friend Pat S. gave me this cookbook years ago. It's from Litchville, North Dakota.

Lynn Rymarz portrayed Mary Cassatt at Wednesday's luncheon for the Clara Cummings Book Club.  Lynn's programs are always entertaining. (You can see her roster here.)   I'm new to CCBC though I know many of the members from AAUW, P.E.O., and GFWC.  (And I look forward to seeing Lynn at the end of this coming week at the P.E.O. state convention. Her role will be one of P.E.O.'s founders.)




This morning (Sunday) we went to the annual Winthrop Harbor Fire Dept. pancake breakfast.  It seems that everyone in town turns out!

Right: the back of one of the fire trucks. Wouldn't it make an interesting quilt pattern?

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In the studio:

I finished the retirement tote bag.  I fussy-cut motifs from Australian prints for the centers of the flowers, the red/purple circles, and the bird's wing, eye, and belly.  I fussed with fabric/color placement of the flowers. I had an extra flower and used it on the inside pocket.

I made 40 scrappy slab blocks and set them with a turquoise tone-on-tone print. The blocks are 9" finished and the sashing is 5" finished.











One of the quilters on the Stashbusters list has announced an ambitious project. She will make 80 lap robes for the local hospice (southwestern Missouri) in honor of the 80th birthday of a man who helped her through some challenging times.
I used units and blocks from the orphans box to make these three tops. I'll add more blocks and some fabric and send them all off to her. 

(Sharp eyes--that's you, CB -- will note a mis-turned 16-patch block in the second row. I corrected it-- after I'd sewn it the wrong way and attached the border.)

Here's the indulgence.  I won the drawing for a $100 gift card from the quilt guild at the conclusion of the 2018 Block of the Month . It's been burning a hole in my wallet. I extinguished the flame by buying 11 yards of sale-price batiks (left side). The quilt shop in Chappell Hill, Texas, sent an email announcing that Art Gallery fabrics were half price with $10 shipping. Those delicious prints are on the right side.

This week I hope to finish quilting the indigo stars quilt. I'm about 1/3 of the way through.  There aren't many meetings -- it's the fifth week of the month.  I leave early Friday morning for the P.E.O. convention in PEOria.

Here's the weekly linky line up:
 Oh Scrap!
 Monday Making
Design Wall Monday
 Moving It Forward

OMG link up and a tip

Here are the two mug rugs that were my OMG for May.

Here is the May OMG finish link-up. (Thanks for hosting OMG, Patty!)

This is the second time I've used the State Fair block for a mug rug.  The one here was part of a two-mug-rug-swap back in 2014. (The theme was "summertime," hence the flip flops and State Fair.)

I think it would be fun to use State Fair for a swap with fussy-cut centers.


And the tip:
I use my cutting table to baste quilts. I often had a hard time getting the backing and the batting centered. (It's easy to center the quilt top because you can see it!)   Another blogger wrote that she taped two toothpicks to the center in an X.  Rather than rooting around for toothpicks I chose a button.  I hold it down with masking tape. Both tape and button are easy to remove when the basting is done.

Twenty years ago: the first PieFest

Twenty years ago the Magpies met up in Ruidoso, NM, from May 20-22 for the first PieFest,  We became acquainted a couple of years earlier on the UseNet newsgroup Rec.Crafts.Textiles.Quilting and collaborated on a "hug" quilt for Sarah (second row, farthest right). We liked to talk on topic (quilting) and off topic (life and opinions). We spun off from RCTQ so we could chatter like, well, magpies.

We still chat on our YahooGroup. Many of us are Facebook friends.  We've had meetups in 2001 (Kansas City), 2004 (Vancouver, BC), 2006 (Lowell, MA),  2008 (Las Cruces, NM), 2010 (Chicago --here and here), 2012 -- Santa Clara, CA (no blog post), 2014 (Australia), 2016 (Fort Worth), 2018 (Maine).  [There have also been smaller meetups with fewer of us.]   We've shared births of children and grandchildren, deaths of spouses, parents (and two Magpies), illnesses (cancer that's reappeared, several surgeries), jobs obtained and lost and retired from.   Oh, yes, and we've made a few quilts along the way! 

Weekly update: bullseye stars and something new

 (You'll have to read about rhubarb, art, and golf before you get to the bullseye stars-and-more.)

There was a notice in the church bulletin that Mrs. C had rhubarb to give away.  I took her up on the offer.  I brought two kitchen garbage bags and filled them (had I brought another I'd have taken more).

The timing was perfect because I used the last bag of rhubarb from last year to make a pie this weekend.

On Wednesday Pat and I enjoyed a day at the Art Institute. We went to see an exhibit of Rembrandt's portraits.  We were surprised that there were only four, but we went from that gallery to another and another, enjoying other Dutch/Flemish and European artists.
















We saw long-time favorites, too.  (Renoir, Van Gogh, and Seurat's Grand Jatte.)




 The arms and armor exhibit has been relocated and re-staged. There are interactive (iPad) stations that explain how the armor worked. (For example, the articulation of armor that covered the foot.) 
















This uncut embroidered silk waistcoat caught my attention.








Did you know that panache originally referred the the plume on top of a jousting helmet?














And in the underarm of a chain mail "shirt" are little gold (brass) rings as a charm for protection.













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On Friday it was cool but there was no rain for the 19th annual  Rotary Memorial Golf Outing. (Yes, I made the fREADom banner on Friday morning. I helped set up for the banquet in the afternoon and the event began at 5 p.m.)

Our event sponsorship allows us to have a foursome.  Ben and Gabe work at the library. Tom used to work at the library. And Ben's dad likes to play golf!

 The quilt I donated to the silent auction went for $140. The two quilted tote bags were in the bucket raffle.  Our friend Liz won one of them.  (For my part: I spent $40 on 50/25/25 tickets and didn't win. I spent $40 on bucket raffle tickets and won a $25 gift card to a local restaurant.)

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Last week I said I had begun to cut into my hoard of  South African shweshwe indigo.  Here's what happened!

The blocks are 8" fin. I used three different blue-on-white prints and one blue-on-blue print for the backgrounds.  I fused the bullseyes and used my machine's blanket stitch.  There is no border.

Yes, I still have shweshwe in the box. But not as much!






 I've begun a tote bag to give to my sister who is retiring at the end of June.  The pattern is by Sue Spargo. She uses wool applique and lots of embroidery. I'm using cotton and fusible applique.  Australian prints (such as the red outer panel) seemed just right.

My sister likes crows. After after cutting the shape of a black bird [the white is the fusible, no fabric yet] I thought it was too much black.  I'm thinking about a blue bird instead.



 Monday link ups:
 Oh Scrap!
Monday Making
 Design Wall Monday
 Moving It Forward

P.S. The green fabric at the top and bottom of
the tote bag panel is a candidate for World's Ugliest Fabric:  chartreuse, turquoise, purple, and brown. It was a thrift shop purchase....But
it works so well here!