Summer meanderings.

I haven't posted much because I don't really have much to show or much to comment on.  But. here goes.

 I sure haven't done much quilty-wise this summer.  I can't seem to get the momentum going.

I have my son's Christmas quilt on the frames (see picture on the right) and am about 2/3rds of the way through with the hand quilting.  I'm doing 'big stitch' so it is going a little faster than it might.

I've been doing a lot of genealogy.  I spend hours on the computer, sitting at my kitchen table.  It's amazing how the time flies.  I hope I'm not getting hunched shoulders because I find myself bending over the computer without being aware of it.

I started a bears paw quilt in an effort to use up some of my brown fabric stack.  I finished the sixth block this morning.  This isn't going to get done anytime soon as this rate.

I've missed my monthly quilt group, "Bound Together" for about 3 months in a row.  I finally went at the end of July.  One of the ladies was getting rid of  all kinds of stuff.  I wasn't interested in anything until she held up this piece of fabric.  It isn't my usual colors but there was something about it that I just couldn't pass up.  This is a picture of the fabric with the sun shining through.  I just put it up at my back door to get a picture.

And this is a picture of the the truer colors.  You can't believe how soft this fabric is.  I think it is drapery/upholstery fabric that has been washed.  It's just wonderful.

Years ago my grandmother worked in the drapery department of ZCMI.  She would give my mother colorful bright remnants and that is what my summer clothes were made out of.  I remember a particularly bright orange print that she made into capris for me.  It was the 70's so you can imagine the color combinations.

I'm not sure what I will do with this but I'd love to just frame it with wide borders of cloth and do whole cloth quilting.  

So soft. . . . . . . 

I can tell the autumn is just around the corner.  The 'Jack in the Pulpit' are changing color.

The pumpkins are getting big and changing color also.

The cloud dynamics are changing too.  We've had a very hot dry summer and this week alone we've had two deluges (is that a word?) in two days.  Everything is healthy and green again.

I made homemade hot dog buns for a family dinner last night.  They turned out great.  I cooked Brats in the oven.  It was really slick but the flavor sure doesn't compare to the ones cooked on the grill. 

I started a new applique project.  It from a block I saw on Pinterest.  Again, I'm moving like molasses and not get anything done very fast.  

Here is the block.  Isn't it the cutest thing your ever saw?  Those little birds are tiny so I have to be at my best (in the morning when my eyes aren't tired) to do a quality job with the applique.  The original block is small.  I made mine about 20" so I can use it for the center of the quilt.  I'm not sure what is going to surround it but I don't need to make that decision yet.  

One thing I do enjoy about summer is the fresh basil.  I have a tomato, mozzarella, and basil sandwich at least twice a week - yum!

If you are still with me, you are a true friend.  

I hope when the heat backs off I'll have more energy and more interesting things to say.

Robin

Summer so far

Needs something more on that back wall

Well, I think it's finally all put back together.  We got new carpeting and flooring in May.  It's great and I love it but why does it have to take so much out of me?  I just don't adapt well or quickly.  I never have.

The quilt in the hoop is finally done and I have it hanging on my sewing room wall.  I started it in 2004 when the pattern first came out.  I hand appliqued the gold house on the right, the whale house, the sailboat, and the house above the whale before it became a UFO.  During the lockdown I tried to finish up things instead of start lots of new things.  I finished the applique and it went into the closet in the quilting queue.

The pattern by Sue Garmen is "All Around Town".

 

As I hand quilted it I imagined who lived in the houses.  The block below was student housing.  Notice the cobwebs on the grass.  College students don't want to be bothered with mowing the lawn.  The house with the angel is "Guardian Angel Daycare".  It was fun to think about the people inside as I quilted.

The "Garden Gnome" is back to work outside.  We have shelled 1,000s of peas.

My granddaughter above was my biggest help.  The peas were picked three times a week and she would dutifully shell peas and only nibble a little.  Toward the end of their growing season I gave her one of the days whole harvest.  She took it home and ate it all.

We are currently working on green beans.  I pressure canned 6 qts. yesterday.  They are not as fun to prepare as the peas and definitely not as sweet to chew on. 

Just a couple of pictures from the 4th of July.  My grandson below is wearing noise cancelling ear muffs.

We try and get together every Thursday for a family dinner during the summer (I have no idea what I am cooking this week!)  Whoever can come, comes, and so it changes from week to week.

Last week was a hot one for us.  I didn't want to heat up the oven so we just had bacon waffles.

It's not a low calorie meal because the bacon grease gets cooks into the waffle.  We ate them with real maple syrup - yum!

I finished this little quilt for my upcoming granddaughter who is due in September.  I made this quilt using a line by Barbara Brackman called Patterns of History from 2004.  It is a very pale pink.  The outer border was ice cream cones.  They were tricky to make but I was rather please when it turned out.

When it came time to bind the quilt, the curves and valleys were definitely not even and were more work than I wanted to go to.  Knowing that even if I worked really hard the binding would still not look very good.  So I decided to do a knife edge.  After working on that for a week (it was really slow and time consuming) I threw in the towel and cut the edge straight for a regular binding.  

I learned a lot about me with this quilt.  I used to like to do things the hard way for the satisfaction of being able to do it.  I have drawn the line with ice cream cone borders.  Uncle. . .  

I call this quilt "Dainty".

Robin

Not much sewing around here

The time for getting new flooring is almost here.   This is my tiny living room that no longer has that carpet on the floor.  My husband tore it out yesterday along with all the tiles in front of the front door.  

This is the dining area where the flooring is being replaced tomorrow.  I will be confined to my bedroom because the hall is getting done too.    At last. . . the upheaval in the house is almost over.

I've moved my floor hoop and a chair into the bedroom along with a heart stuffing project.  There is a TV as well and I have four books checked out from the library.
 

This is the basement that won't receive it's makeover until Thursday.  But, after Thursday I can put all the stuff back into the closets, clean off my sewing table that now has all the dishes from my pie safe.  I can replace the coats in the coat closet, put things back onto the linen closet floor, and the furniture can come in so there is a place to sit down on something other than a stool or a folding chair.  My backside aches from sitting on hard surfaces.  (I know, I'm really spoiled.)

The weather has been unusual for May.  It snowed on Sunday, a big slushy wet cold snow.

The lilac above and the wisteria below were shivering in the cold an the unexpected layer of snow.

Today we are getting rain and the mountain tops are in shadows and mists.

The slight sunshine on top of the rain is making the streets shine.  

Lori at Humblequilts  is talking about doing a Sew-a-long later this year.  She will be making the Oak Hills Farm quilt (below) by Lori Smith if you want to join along.

I'm making progress on my All Around Town quilt and there is a progress picture above in my sidebar and below.

Hopefully more quilting in my next post.

Robin

Everything is in bloom

I love geraniums.  I'm always looking for an unusual or different color, petal shape, or foliage shading.

They just make me happy.

 

I've bee working on a UFO.  Do you remember when Barbara Brackman did the Civil War Sampler Block of the Week?  It was 2010 or so.  I made a number of blocks and put them together with an appliquéd border and figured I was done.  The top has been sitting in the closet waiting for it's turn, and waiting, and waiting.  

I got it out to look at it and felt like it needed more.  So I'm making 36 more sampler blocks to go around the outside.  It's a fun finishing project because the blocks are 8" square and I get a couple made each day.  It's like a couple of finishes a day.    Wohoo!  I've got 21 blocks made so far.  That block at the top needs a different colored border.  The red is just too intense.

I got a root canal last week.  It was fine until it wasn't.  I was in a lot of pain and I had a slight fever so I had my husband go pick up the antibiotic prescription.  The pharmacist told him to tell me to drink lots of water.  Great!   It's been an interesting week

 

I went shopping for new carpeting Saturday.  The basement is finally all painted, the old carpet has been torn out and taken to the dump.  So, it's time to pick out a color.

Above are the colors that the first store I went to had to choose from.  Really?  I found two samples of color other than brown or gray.  I'm not a gray decorating person and I was hoping for something with a little more vitality than brown.  I don't know what I'm expecting but we'll go shopping again tomorrow and hopefully find something I like.

My youngest son's family came over Friday night for a short visit.  I don't know who had more fun, my son or the kids.   (Sorry the pictures are a little grainy).

I was out hunting for a new geranium plant and found this cute little flower.  It's an annual so I'll only have it for this summer but I'm anxious to see how it does.  The yellow is just so vibrant.

It is a Calibrachoa.  I've never tried to grow one so it's something to look forward to.

This geranium, the same one that is pictured at the top, has white buds that you can see on the outside of the blossom.  It is just so pretty.

"Long experience has taught me that people who do not like geraniums have something morally unsound about them. Sooner or later you will find them out; you will discover that they drink, or steal books, or speak sharply to cats. Never trust a man or a woman who is not passionately devoted to geraniums."         Beverly Nichols, Merry Hall

Robin

Two Weeks under the tree was his record.

 Well, it didn't exactly turn out like I could see in my minds eye. . . 

And it had a few make-overs as well a drastic designer revision.

(Imagine me whispering)  "I won't tell you or show you the mistakes."

 THE CHRISTMAS QUILT TOP FOR #3 SON IS COMPLETED~

TA DA!!!!

That's a lot of mid-day brightness.

Robin

Doings around here

 

Well, Easter is over and so I put all the decorations back in their boxes and took them down to the basement.  All except this little guy that I just got yesterday.  I needed to enjoy him for a few more days before he went into hibernation for a year.   My oldest daughter made him for me.  So cute!

We worked on a Wysocki puzzle this last week.  I bought this over a year ago but haven't been doing very many puzzles like I usually do and so it has languished in the puzzle closet.  It was a really fun puzzle to do because there is so much going on.  There isn't a lot of water or sky (or snow) to try and match similar colored pieces.  I just really enjoyed it.  I'll have to get another one out soon.

The apricot buds were starting to swell so my husband brought in a few branches.  

They bloomed in no time. 

 

I'm working on the Christmas quilt (still).  It just wasn't looking right and I came up with two reasons why.

1.  The stars were taking all the attention from the center.  The whole point of making the quilt was to have the focus on the little boy sleeping under the tree and that wasn't happening.

2.  I used white for the star backgrounds because I thought the background print of the center was white.  It's not!  It was just not right. 

So, I've spent a lot of time unpicking.

I decided to take a page from Laurie Simpson's book.  She often makes quilts with lots of applique framed by a really simple border.  Here are two examples;

Kato's Garden Quilt

and Hartfield.  I have wondered why she uses such simple borders and I figured it out.  It's so the center can grab the viewers attention, so the center can shine.

And so, with that in mind, I've put a simple surround to compliment the center.  And I used off white fabric - snow to be exact.

I put a 6" solid red border around it and called it good.  That was a week ago.  The quilt keeps whispering from the closet that it's not through with the stars yet.  So I've cut out an outside border of double stars.  

Only time will tell if it will look better or if I've got 28 more star blocks without a home. ~sigh

I thought I was going to have jury duty this month.  I sent in the questionnaire and haven't heard a word back.  Maybe I've reached the "too old" status.  When I watch courtroom dramas I seldom see a grey haired granny in the jury - ha!

Robin

Ongoing progress

I finished the center with the gifts and put on a double star border.  It now measure 48" square.

Now I'm at a standstill. . . 

I'm not sure what to do next.  I had considered putting a border of present blocks but that seemed to be too busy next to the star blocks.  I thought about flying geese, red and white pinwheels, 9-patches, a row of tiny trees, and just this morning I am thinking about words.  

With this improv and the Bramble Blooms improv - I think I'm ready for a straight forward pattern, of  cutting and sewing where all I have to consider is the beautiful fabric.

I guess I'll get one of my UFO tops ready to be quilted and then at least I'll be doing something productive while my indecision wallows.

My 2 eleven year old grandsons decided to roll a snowball to use up all the snow on the grass in the backyard.  They finally had to stop because they couldn't push it anymore - too heavy.
 

I had hoped for a snowman.  But no, I just have a very large lump of snow in the corner of the backyard.  We've got some more snow coming but  we won't get very much on this side of the valley, we never do.

I think I'll make a pie this morning.  That would make my DH very happy.

Robin