Final Salute

Linking up with Books And Quilts

This is the title of a Pulitzer award book by Jim Sheeler,  given to me by Sam Holder father of Fallen Hero SSGT.Theodore "Sam" Holder who gave his life in the service of  his Country, November 11th. 2004 in Iraq. As Colorado Coordinator for Home Of The Brave Quilt Project, I had given a memorial quilt to the Holder family and Sgt. Holder's Dad kindly sent me this book.
The book details the stories of some of the many who have died and the selfless service also of the soldiers tasked with bringing the dreadful news to the families and of their efforts to support the families in their grieving.
It's a book worth reading especially timely in view of the Memorial Day we have observed this past week.

May God's Mercy and Grace bless them all.

Circle Lord Swirls

Emilio's quilt got the CL Swirls quilting, the templates were still on the table and it was a quick and pretty solution.
This is the true color, using the flash on the camera but the quilting doesn't show well………..

As is my custom with children's and babies' quilts I used Quilters Dream "Dream Angel" that is genetically engineered to be flame retardant, no harmful chemicals.

More pics without the flash show stitching detail.

I wish I were a photographer who knew how to get both detail and true color!

As light, soft and drapeable as Dream Angel batting is, there is still nice definition of the quilting design.

Emilio's Baby Quilt

Linking up with Heather over at Needlework Tuesday

Having a quiet Memorial Day and needing a quick baby boy quilt I went to the bookshelf for inspiration, I get bored repeating the same thing.

This is the first book my hand touched so I pulled it out and chose this design.

I decided on these fabrics and proceeded to cutting. What I did not recall is that I had made one or two? Stack and Slash style quilts many years ago and that I do not like the process! I would even go so far as to say that I most emphatically dislike it!

However the dice were cast by the time I remembered and no sooner had I cut the nine patches than I realized I should have only cut four patches to at least simplify block construction. As it was the piecing took me twice as long as I had hoped and I will probably never make another S and S quilt in my life, in fact perhaps I should just give the book away, get it off the shelf so that I do not ever make the mistake again! Maybe I just don't like wonky?

  By this time I had already decided that the black and white border was not happening and I would come up with an alternative!

Here are the pesky little things laid out in order to ensure that no two same color fabrics would touch from block to block.

 The alternate borders are pleasing and the quilt now measures about 40"x50", quite satisfactory for a baby quilt

The pieced backing is nearly as cute as the front and I was able to use stash fabric.

Now to the longarm.

The Path of the Warrior, Memorial Day 2014

Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one's life for one's friends.

John15:13

A beautiful tribute to all our Warriors who protect those they love with their own lives.

They shall grow not old as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them

We will remember them.

Laurence Binyon 1914
"For The Fallen"

I Got It Together!

The wedding gown quilt pieces are now sewn up into a whole and when I got right down to it not as difficult a task as I'd feared! I stayed up past midnight working on it though.

You can see one of my many diagrams and some notes, a necessary process for best arrangement of the available pieces in order to create as few seams as possible.

I just had to be right the first time, measuring over and over before cutting-there simply wasn't enough fabric for a do-over, consequently there was a trash can half full of discarded diagrams!

At the end just one more 10"x10" square was needed to fill in the final corner.

 I was able to cut it from this last useable piece avoiding that stain at the top, one that did not come out with Biz.

Here's what is left of the skirt, a few triangular scraps.

In some ways it would have been easier to leave the fabric unwashed to retain the sizing but everything else is clean and it makes sense that now all the pieces have been laundered the same way and can be again in the future without fear of distortion of the finished quilt. It is well, though, that every raw edge was stay stitched, silk ravels insanely, worse after washing out the sizing.

This is the batting I chose, the silk blend has a beautiful hand and is light and thin perfect for this quilt.

 The top is now spread out on the queen size bed in the guest room. I will leave it now till next week and work on other projects, I need a decision from Andrea to go further and she is on vacation, lucky lady!
I hope she brings back pictures from her exotic destination!

Breakfast "Sludge"!

Linking up with "Weekend Cooking"!

Well "sludge" is what my friend Gale calls our "green drinks" and looking at it you can understand why! But never judge a book by it's cover, this is both yummy and nutritious and to prove it the ingredients are listed below!

A handful of organic greens from the garden including spearmint, cress and kale. The herbs are growing especially well almost outgrowing the container though I think cilantro is getting ready to "bolt" it doesn't tolerate the heat as well.

They share the container wth the small Mexican lime tree.

 Spearmint and Italian parsley are in this hanging basket, the  mint more lush than the parsley.

Additional ingredients for the sludge, hemp, flax and poppy seed.

Also raw oatmeal, almonds and walnuts.

 On the left frozen pineapple puree [when I cannot use all of the pineapple I puree it and freeze for use later in drinks, cakes etc].
Lime, blueberries, green apple, strawberries, plum, mango and cantelope, I forgot the carrot and coconut oil! A little ice water and bingo, breakfast in a cup! Now doesn't that sound tasty?!
I think I'll get sushi tonight!

Friday Non-Quilting Fun!

Needed a few things I can only get at Cabela's so since I was feeling much better, mostly over the nasty tummy virus thingy I had this week, after the gym I headed over there.
It's such an interesting store, everything from A-Z for the outdoor person, for fishing, hunting, boating etc. and lots of workout clothes too. If you have never been in a Cabela's you would be amazed at just what you can buy there it's huge store, lot's of shoes, sandals and a wide selection of casual wear plus all kinds of other things.

 This display in the center of the store is really amazing, waterfall and all!

It's a magnet for kids……….

 they feel as if they are out in the woods!

 Then I saw a couple of things that I had to buy for my quilter/hunter friend. 

This is a belated gift for her birthday…...

 and this I will set aside for another day, it's just her style, LOL, and I couldn't resist it! Her entire home is all cowboy/cowgirl and hunting theme, even the bathrooms. 

For myself some new safety glasses among other things, and a couple of items I can't show because the intended recipient may look at the blog!

Last night I began to sew the wedding gown silk pieces together and I am hoping to have an update on that tomorrow, it's a busy day but mostly the morning including doing a blood donation, but I should be back at the machine after lunch.

With Memorial Day almost here, please go give blood if you are able, do it for the veterans.

Righton's Quilt

Using the beautiful Superior King Tut variegated gold thread. It's Egyptian cotton and quilts very well with nice definition. Added benefit is the batting, Dream Angel from Quilter's Dream, genetically engineered to be flame retardant so no chemicals involved.

Circle Lord "Swirls" is the quilting design. 

What a great backing, and I think the circles in the quilting fit in with the global theme.

This quilt, along with Grandma Hannah's goes back to California tomorrow.

G'Ma Hannah's Baby Quilt

The green fabric has a sort of swirly organic design so I thought it was a great time to trry out the new "Jitterbug" panto from MeadowLyon.

 Hard to see the quilting with a light green Superior thread.

 Even after taking several pics nothing showed in the quilting, it's the color of the fabrics and yours truly's inadequate photography skills!

 The backing shows a bit more of the definition- what you don't see is the flame retardant batting from Quilter's Dream, Dream Angel is genetically engineered for safety so there are no toxic chemicals left behind.  

Showing the label and more of the quilting detail.

Ring Around The Hexies

This is Angela's work, and a lot of it too all those hand pieced hexies, it deserved a custom quilting and that's what it got.

 Sort of a feathery, leafy wreath in the star blocks………………………

 a flower in the hexies
.

 Angela's interesting pieced backing shows the quilting better.

And the label securely quilted in.

Thread is Superior Art Studio "Arabian Sand" and the bobbin has Superior Bottom Line .

Prepping The Wedding Gown Fabric

Today I took on the job of getting the silk from the gown cleaned, using the recommended Biz powder. It's a little scary if you haven't ever washed silk, but I grew up in a household that hand laundered all delicates, silks etc plus our woolies and they survived admirably! In fact I would venture to say that they probably fared better than with all the nasty chemicals and bulk handling of a dry cleaning.

Here's how the silk looks after laundering and rolling in a towel to remove excess water. I set up the large ironing board in the guest room, the surface I normally use for quilt prep ironing was a bit smaller than I needed. Covering the ironing board with a double layer of a clean white sheet protected the damp silk from any possible discoloration left behind from ironing other articles.

I used medium heat, a very clean iron and of course no steam.

You can see that the silk looks very nice, the large stains are all gone just a few tiny spots remain that are negligible and will mostly be covered by the hankies. The only real change is the softer hand of the silk now the sizing is gone. It was as well I stabilized each piece, silk ravels quickly and easily.

 Here is the list of the fabric sizes I harvested from the gown, all that's left are some smaller pieces that I may have to work in somehow to get close to the desired size.

2[32"x48"]

2[14"x40"]

2[10"x31"]

2[10"x24"]

4[10"x20"]

It doesn't seem like much and it is causing me some brain strain trying to figure out how to put it all together into a quilt top! I keep thinking there must be some software out there for the computer to figure it out for me, and it would have to be Mac compatible. Right now I have resorted to drawing diagrams on scrap paper!

I also removed the lace from the center panel of the skirt and laundered it, hoping to be able to use it on the quilt. Parts of it are a bit fragile, so I am waiting to see if I can do anything with it once I get the top pieced. Next week I must tackle the challenge of piecing all those bits together into a top, after that it should be a piece of cake, comparatively speaking!