This isn't NYC, it's just funny

Poor New York City

Frogs and the Chicks are home...smile

My husband likes to buy me roses.  I'm so blessed.  When the roses are on the fading end of beauty, is when the frogs come out.  I don't why they are called frogs, but, for minimal display of flowers, they are best.

My chicks are both home, well, sort of.  You know we want them to have friends, but, we like to have them see us too.  Our lovely Chelsea is just way too popular for her dad's and my liking.  I guess I should be happy she's here for a week and we get to see her some.  She's too old to ground and who would be in New Mexico to make sure she stays there.  Maybe we could pay her lovely dog Fawn to do the dirty work.

Now all you do is fill in the blanks and you've got a baby quilt!

Here is a baby quilt that needs to fill in the blanks.  Quilts are generally built by blocks then by rows, then sew the rows together and your done.

Besides the Dr Seuss panel I bought the fat quarters for the collection plus enough for a border and binding.

I'll load the pictures later.

Happy Quilting!

Baby Quilts and Dr Seuss

Well, you know who needs a pattern.  I've got a baby nephew on the way any day and the quick way to make a quilt is to use a panel.  This is a chopped up Dr Seuss panel.  I've decided to make it a sort of wonky medallion quilt .

I like to use stripes in a quilt.  It makes it look like you've done a lot of work sewing strips together, thus giving more visual texture.

These stripes are great for mitering as they are a little wonky to begin.  I'm not a perfectionist quilter, unless I'm entering a quilt in a competition.

cut your stripes and sew them to the ends.  Then on the sides. Last, fold under one of the stripes in a pleasing way that continues the stripe around the corners.  Use you ironed crease as your guide.

So we all have our favorite LQS, but what is your other favorite?

I'm assuming everyone knows LQS is Little Quilt Shop.  You know the one where they know your name and practically bend over backwards to make you satisfied.  There are 3 in our town, or I guess the Louisville area that come to my mine.  First, before all the rest, there is Happy Heart Quilt Shop.  I say, before the rest, because literally, she has been in business in Louisville longer than any of these other two. Yvonne is a favorite in the quilt community here and has long been a supporter of the events for quilting in the area.  One thing everyone in the area should do is attend one of her twice yearly retreats.  You learn so much from the other 20 to 30 quilters.  Call the shop for information.

 Forget Me Knot Quilt Shop, has a couple of owners that greet me with a kind smile and want to help pick fabric.  They really know my style and taste, or at least they seem to.  Describing color is an almost impossible thing to do, one person's blue is another's teal, you know what I mean.  But, Carol and Darlene are both very helpful when I come in and describe my project I'm working on.  They seem to know exactly where just the right color is.  In Louisville, they are probably best at having a wide variety of color gradations and helping with your selection.

The Gathering Room is in Lagrange, Kentucky, just a short drive out of Louisville.  It's well worth checking out.  The main room, where the cutting table is located has some very interesting samples on the walls and they often have really good Blocks of the Month to join.  If you are fan of civil war prints or like a warmer pallet, then you will feel right at home here.

Now, besides the quilt shops in the area, there are a couple of cute places to shop for unique items.  The Dot Fox is a clothing and accessory as well as shoe store that carries some of the coolest things for young and old.  If you don't know just what your teenager might want, this is the place to buy a gift card.  The Dot Fox is for daughter and mom to shop at.

Clay and Cotton is another unique store for items for the home and apparel.  This is for mom and daughter to shop at.

Tis the season, hopes this helps some locals with last minute gift ideas!

Merry Christmas!
Happy Quilting New Year!!

...So you won't be USING this quilt...hmmmm

That was a line said to me by one of our newer quilters in the Northeast Quilting Friends group of which I am a part.

Quilts are "used" in so many ways.  First and to me foremost as a work of art.  Whether it adorns a bed or a wall.  Tradition and function collide in the quilt world in that way.  A quilt is to be used for warmth and snuggling is probably the traditional thinking of quilts.  To me an art quilt is also functional in that it is used to warm the heart just by it's "mere" existence on the wall.

So there, quilts are great, no matter what they are used for.  This one, may be for either purpose, it can hang on a wall or to snuggle.  I don't think the embroidery will be any worse for the wear.

Here is what you see when you walk in my house at Christmas time.  I like kitchie things...smile.

Finally feels a lot like Christmas around here...smile

Wow!  It's been a rough few weeks.  I've been under the weather a bit after returning from family in Oklahoma at Thanksgiving.  Why can't we make a national vote and spread this fabulous holidays out a few months!

Oh well, off my soap box for now.  We got rid of my 7 foot tree and have scaled back to a 4 foot one.  I still have the tree skirt for a big tree and I have an angel for a big tree.  I think I'll keep my tree skirt but, I need a new topper.  Don't you think?

We've also been snowed in here for a while and not even the snow can brighten the grey days of winter.  Oh well, these are great quilting days.  Hmmm...I just realized I'm working on a project that is taupe-grey, what's wrong with this picture?

Actually it's a project that includes embroidery.  The embroidery work "bleeds" onto the quilt blocks.  I've said it before, if you to want to renew your interest in quilting or any hobby, go back to what excited you when you first began.  I began my obsession while living in Houston from 1985 to 1996.  There of course is the Houston Quilt Festival where there are so many teachers available to the quilter.  I took a lot of classes.  As a child I was an embroiderer, so crazy quilting was what really lit my fire.  So, going back to it, even on a grey quilt project during the grey winter days lifts my spirits.

The Sing Off

The Reverend would be proud of the Christian singing group.  They make him sound so good.

The Sing Off

Here is group #2 that's giving the other group a run for the winning title.

The Sing Off

The pure voice doesn't get much better than this!  This program is new to me and I'm liking it.

Tammy Faye Quilting No More

Ah yes, my days of eyelashes on the back of my quilt using my Horizon are gone.  The thing to do is crank the tension to the maximum 9 and the top thread is not sucked to the back yeah!

Baby Monkey (Going Backwards On A Pig) - Parry Gripp

Chelsea's Raffle Quilt for the Geology Club

Yes, quilters are either generous or we have sucker written across our forehead and don't realize it.  Well, it's not really being a sucker if you love your daughter and want to help her succeed.  Which is the case for me and my 2nd DD, Chelsea.  She's working on her Master's Degree in Geology at New Mexico State University.  While at college it's important to get involved and Chelsea is trying to help earn some funds for the group.  So guess who she turns to for help in fund raising, her local quilter, me.

I chose this pattern, called Gems which is a no brainer pattern, the best for raffle quilts, most times.  But, it being a geology club, I chose fabric that had a certain stone like quality.  You know if you click on the pictures you can get a close up of the picture and you will see.  I'm liking the floating effect of the bright squares.

In order to make a quilt like this it is vital to have a design wall.  This is one I've had for a long time, it's flannel that's quilted in 2 inch squares.  It's really valuable when you make a watercolor quilt, but, I use it for designing anything.  Another design wall is using batting.  Pin it to the wall and the fabric pieces will stick to it for easy move around design.

Statement Quilting

This is a quilt I finished that was made from a book published by That Patchwork Place.  It is a Tennessee Waltz quilt.  I put some statement quilting in the "rest the eye" blocks.  I was pleasantly surprised by the way it enhances the arches that are an optic illusion created by the pattern.  All the pieces are straight lines but, when combined with the angles that join the blocks it looks like they are curved.

On my horse quilts I made for my girls the quilting is not statement quilting, it helps to enhance the horses on the quilts.  On Chelsea's Japanese Horse Quilt, I let the background fabric design the quilting and went around the squiggles and grass for the quilting.

Sarah Jaffee So young to be so wise....Clementine

Quilters never need buy a purse again

Yes, I've made another bag.  This one is Laurianne, a pattern by Moonlight Designs.  It is very complicated to make and took me all day.  But, I'm pleased with the outcome.  I need to find a good snap closure for it.  Any suggestions?  I've used Velcro in the past, but, it seems to wear out or can't hold all my stuff together, so I'm probably going to Joann's tomorrow to find a good closure.  The beads are from old necklaces that give it the closure for now.

Pictures will follow soon.  What is it with Blogger and the slow recognition of pictures I just took.  It seems it takes a couple of days before I have the ability to upload my pictures.  I think I might be switching to Mobile Me soon.  Does anyone like or dislike Mobile Me?  It's the Apple website/upload place.

Another Dollar Store Find

If you are like me you do some shopping at the giant warehouse stores.  The one we "belong to" is Costco.  They have all kinds of great quality items that come in large quantities.  The best way to open these is with the Dollar Store scissors.  Yes, they only cost a 1.00 and work very well opening the over bundled, wasteful packaging that is done by said warehouse stores.  If you make the Snappy Totes they work equally well cutting the carpenter's tape that is used for the snapping closure of the totes.

My latest project is going to be taught in our class tomorrow, it's a coaster and then there will be a hot pad.  Quick and easy!

Machine quilting with my new Horizon, a learning opportunity

Well, I can't say it's all been a piece of cake, learning this machine.  It's certainly been easy sewing regular fabric.  I put the borders on my quilt top and then started to machine quilt.  My main purpose for purchasing this machine has been to use it to machine quilt.  The wide bed was my main draw to purchase, and that has generally worked out well while using on my Hinterberg table.  It gives me more bed space and less hassle having to stop and roll the bars.

The new challenge is finding a correct tension for my free motion machine quilting stitches.  This is always a challenge for the perfect stitch while machine quilting.  I should say if I use a regular stitch to machine quilt, instead of dropping my feed dogs and doing free motion machine quilting the stitches are just fine, so if you are doing cross hatching, it's probably a perfect machine.

At Moore's Sewing Center this Saturday, I have my first class to learn the ins and outs of the machine.  So, I'm sure, there must be a quick fix for my stitches that I've not figured out yet.  It seems to be "hit and miss" on perfect tension stitches.  This might also have to do with the speed at which I'm trying to machine quilt.

My husband and I are going to the YUM! Center concert, My Morning Jacket with Wax Fang and the Louisville Youth Orchestra on Friday night, so I hope I'm awake enough to absorb all the things I'll learn in my class.

Oh yes, and the endorphin express goes on and on.  Bob and I rode a total of 30 miles this last weekend.  I rode 12 miles around my neighborhood, Briar Hill, which is like riding 15 miles in any other neighborhood as ours has many many hills.  Again, sitting at the machine needs to be offset with the same amount of exercise, in my opinion.

These pictures are of me in my dining room, what a great place I have to quilt!  Plus roses my hubby bought me and last but not least, a little bag called the Lantern Bag I just finished.

Life is simply quilty right now...smile.