Monday, May 31, 2010

Memorial Day, 2010

"At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them."

"For The Fallen" Laurence Binyon, 1914


With thankfulness we honor all those who have served their country especially those who have given all.

Placing the flags for Memorial Day. So many came to do the work that 45,000 flags were placed in 35 minutes!


Grandsons, along with scouts from many troops, saluted at each grave as they placed the flags....



while their Dad, Active duty AZ. Army National Guard, lends a hand.........



along with his Dad, US Army Aviator, retired .



Then breakfast........


Sunday, May 30, 2010

Baby Quilt


The second in the baby quilt series of similar colorway and design from Andee. She made it using left overs from the last one with some coordinating additions, way to go to using those pesky scraps Andee!


The center fabric has cats all over it so I pulled out a panto- gasp, yes I did another panto- that I remembered from long ago, I think it's called "Scaredy Cats" or something and they do look scared - or something!


Yesterday I visited a couple of quilt shops with a friend from Alabama, picked up this adorable Lucy fabric for an apron...........


and the red shoes for my shoe addicted friend Gale...........


this to add to the watercolor quilt fabric collection...........


a nice large floral panel that will make a quickie quilt when I need one in a hurry........



a few notions like these adorable little scissors - you can never have enough/too many.........


stain remover touted to be the very best and a new Chaco marker.

The afternoon was passed giving a lesson on the longarm on feathering and I think my student took home some new skills to practice.


Now I am taking a short break from the longharm to work on piecing this wedding gift quilt-the wedding was late March- I have six months don't I according to etiquette?


The pattern L chose is a very traditional Pat Speth design from her " Amazing Nickel Quilts" book.



L chose the colors substituting greens for the blues though I see the colors are very much more dull than in reality probably because I had the flash off. Click on the pics to get a truer idea of the colors.
Turns out that L's tastes are very traditional and she leans towards the scrappy style- the fabrics are mostly Civil War repros and some Thimbleberries I think. Some came from my generous stash of CW repros but I did have to buy more to add to the mix, I never have a problem buying new fabrics, LOL!



The two parts of the blocks are made and I am in the process of finishing trimming the HST's this afternoon to get the perfect 4.5" squares. I think it will go together quickly once the blocks are constructed.
I haven't yet decided on backing or the quilting design but I am leaning towards feathers and perhaps a burgundy/red backing. We will see what L thinks - I only took her to two quilt shops
[I will swear that on a stack of Bibles and I never even breathed on her or cast any spells or anything] before she had contracted the dreaded pox -quilting pox, that is- and would you believe she went home and immediately infected her teenge DD and now they are both addicted! More about them in a future post, it is a very funny tale!

Friday, May 28, 2010

Finshed For Friday

Here ya go Andee!



Schnibbles #5 I believe! Oops I just visited Andee's blog and this is actually her eighth schnibbles! WOW!



Close up............



and the back.

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

VTT Inarco Statues

It's that "loverly time of the week'' again when we display our vintages treasures so follow the thread over at Colorado Lady's blog!



I saw these sweet little children in the Humane Society Thrift Shop in Ridgway, CO.
I was very tempted to buy them but they were about $6 each and I baulked at the price.



A month later I decided to check on them and they were still there but the price was only $3, I couldn't pass them up.



They are so very cute, I had to make room for them in the china cabinet.






I looked them up on the internet but didn't see much on them.
There were a couple on eBay though no more info available there.
They have registration numbers on them so perhaps I will eventually be able to get some more background on their vintage.

Saturday, May 22, 2010

Blogger's Quilt Festival


Miri, Milk And Honey Quilts, just reminded me that the Blogger's Quilt Festival is online again and here's my choice.
I blogged about it already when I finally brought it to completion, my Stash New York Beauty.



Almost all the fabrics came from my stash, exceptions being the larger pieces in a couple of the border areas and the backing & binding, a beautiful Asian print.







Every block has a theme, African, Asian, musical, Monet, etc. and each block is quilted according to the fabric design, the quilting took several days on my A-1 longarm machine.



The blocks and the border are all paper pieced and the border was designed to reflect the identical fabrics from the adjoining blocks. I made bias binding to accommodate the curved edges on opposing corners.



It was so much fun to pick out the coordinating fabrics from my collection and then to watch as the blocks came together.


The process was a long one, the project began a few years back with a group of quilters in Montrose Colorado who invited me to join them as they learned the art of paper piecing meeting each Wednesday night through summer and fall to work on this project.


All the other quilters completed theirs within a year, every one quite different then the quilts were displayed at the Montrose Quilt Show that year. Perhaps I need to show mine this year to prove it is done, the finished quilt makes me very happy!



Friday, May 21, 2010

Finished For Friday, Donna's QOV

June at Quilts Of Valor maintains a list of longarmers who will quilt tops made by others for our wounded warriors. Most of the year I sign up to do two a month, sometimes I get more if I have time to fit them in. June pairs up quilters and toppers, this month I got lucky and my assigned partner is right here in town so we are saving about $20 on postage that we can better use for more supplies. Donna's friend dropped off the quilt top on Tuesday and I have it "Finished For Friday".
Litandlaundry is hostess for FFF and you can find on her blog a list of other productive and crafty bloggers.


This is Field and Furrows, one of many settings for the Log Cabin block, which came into prominence in the 19th. century after the Civil War and is thought to represent the log cabins built by the settlers heading west. This a scrappy version, Log Cabin quilts are perfect for scrap use, just divide your scraps into lights and darks and you can easily produce a very effective pattern.


I couldn't decide what to quilt on it so I resorted to the ever popular feathers meandered all over.


Muslin backing shows up the quilting very well, but most solids will work if you want to see detail of the quilting.


When quilting the feathers randomly it isn't necessary to keep the size consistent in fact I think it's more interesting to vary the size of the feathers.



I continue to experiment with lighting for quilt photography, the lighting is the big issue- do you strive for accuracy in color over clarity of quilting or the other way around? And I am sure you can do both with the right camera and lighting conditions-I am obviously not there yet, I need to find that tutorial!

Thursday, May 20, 2010

Linda's Batik Quilt


Early hours of Wednesday morning this came off the longarm. I decided to stay up and finish it so I could get it mailed off priority to Colorado before noon. Linda is flying to TX Saturday and would like to take the quilt with her for her future DIL's wedding shower.
Linda's border treatment helps to frame the dark fabrics, notice the unusual effect in opposite corners.


It isn't easy to see the quilting with such busy fabric but I used King Tut thread in a variegated blue, quilting leaf wreaths in each block and leaves in the sashing. I decided to treat all four borders as one with columbines and hummingbirds and I notice that I forgot to take a close up of the border.

I experimented with different angles to see if the quilting showed any better...........


then turned on the flash to see if that helped but I think it only faded the colors.



Here's a close up of the backing and one of the leaf wreaths.


You see a little of the border design from the back- more experiments with lighting-I once read about a tutorial online about photographing quilts, I really should hunt it down and do some study on the subject, when I have time!

Keeping my fingers crossed that it reaches Linda safely on Friday.

Sunday, May 16, 2010

Finally, I Think It's Fixed!

After a couple of weeks of intermittent tensions problems, something very unusual for my A-1 machine, today I put in a new hook, re-timed, fiddled with the tension and after about three hours and some screw driver and flashlight- holding assistance from DH, I seem to have it running the way I like! Something interesting, one final adjustment was to take it out of "cruise" and put it in unregulated and it appears to be running better. Not at all sure why it made any difference but I can deal with that! I might also add that the techs at A-1 are wonderful, helpful, and so patient!


This little quilt is another of Andee's that I slipped in while waiting for machine parts and other larger quilts to arrive. It's a fused applique that had not been stitched down and Andee asked me to just "quilt it all over" because she was done with it and didn't want to do anything more.



I told her I couldn't allow her to abandon the quilt so after quilting everything else with green thread I used a monopoly "invisible" thread to stitch down the edges of the applique and then outline the shapes.
Something about these "invisible" threads, I would never use the nylon because it turns yellow and melts but the monopoly retains the clear look and does not melt.
I have an enormous cone of Madeira monopoly but it will not run in my machine it's too fragile even taking all the tension off it. However, Superior monopoly works beautifully and that is what I used.
I hope Andee is happy with it, I think it is a much nicer solution than quilting some other design all over the applique pieces and hoping they won't fall off.
Now I have the "queen size batik wedding shower gift quilt" on and I have quilted the first couple of blocks. It will take a few days to quilt, there are sixteen blocks, sashing, and four borders one of which is nearly 10" wide.
With any luck it will be done by week's end.

Friday, May 14, 2010

Quilts, Finished For Friday

Two more from Andee, small ones that I did in between larger quilts, and while I am waiting for a new laser for my longarm that I need to quilt the racing car panto on June's quilt!
The quilt top that was lost in the mail finally arrived much to the owner's relief[and mine] but not until I lit a fire under USPS! The box had been mailed from CO. two day priority, insured, 4th. May, arrived in Phx. 5th and eventually delivered 12th! Very aggravating because it had been booked in for quilting to be completed in time for a wedding shower gift for a DIL to be.
I have been quilting others in the meantime but now I have one on the machine that I have to complete before I can load the shower gift quilt!



A baby quilt with all over peacock feathers in orange thread........



the back.


Schnibbles number ? five I think, quilted with trailing leaves and leaf border and green thread..........




the backing.

Now you might like to pop on over to Litandlaundry to see the other Friday Finishes.