Something to talk about...

Okay, to be perfectly honest I always have something to talk about... but it doesn't always seem to be something blogworthy to talk about... but today it does! Last week I got 3 quilts back from my long arm quilter, Terry and today I have one bound and hanging in my living room!

I'm calling this one Spiral Star, all the hexagons were cut Stack n Whack fashion from that border print. This is a different setting than I usually go with and I like the stars that appear in the negative space. I chose a small scroll-y panto which echoes the "swirliness" (is that a real word? I might have made that up) of the fabric and the variegated thread picks up the colors in the hexagons nicely.

And this quilt shows the value of having a well aged stash... look at the brown/black fabric of the inner border and binding...

An eagle eyed friend saw it and asked, "Is that a Mary Ellen Hopkins fabric?" Yes, yes it is... which makes it about 20 years old!  It was the perfect inner border and I had just enough to eke out a binding... I love my stash!!!

As for some decorating I may have shown this before but I'm showing it again... this is my 3 tier trayed decked out in bird stuff...

I love this display piece and look forward every season to decorating it... I'm pretty sure that I'll be switching to Fall stuff in early September as a way to think cooler thoughts... another week with 90 degree temperatures and high humidity...ugh!!! I thought we would get past it since July was so hot but no luck... I'm not looking forward to seeing my electric bill or my water bill this month... hate to spend money on those items when there is so much lovely fabric and yarn and thread out there calling my name...LOL!

Hope you are staying cool ...

happy stitching-
carol fun

Everything's coming up......

petunias!! Hit it Ethel(Merman)... LOL! Okay so the song doesn't exactly roll off the tongue but everything is coming up petunias at my house.

I finally got the sleeve sewn on my Stack N Whack petunia quilt and got it hung in my living room. All of the hexagons were cut out of the fabric in the border, a Phillip Jacobs print from a couple of years ago. Phill does great florals...he is also the designer of the Spiral fabric I'm using for the Stack N Whack on my design wall which you can see here. I LOVE his style.

Terry Finnerty of the Walking Needle quilted this one for me in an all over swirl. You don't see it clearly on the front on the back it is easy to discern.

You get so many different hexagons with this large scale fabric...

I think my favorite hexie is the one that looks like a peppermint...

And in keeping with the Everything's Coming Up Petunia theme here are some of the pots I planted...

I've got those yellow and white striped petunias I was hunting down all over Cincinnati in the pots on the porch railing and in the window box I have purple and white striped petunias mixed in with the hot pink geraniums. I know they are a bit hard to spot in this picture but they are they and I'm hoping they will fill out nicely as summer progresses. And speaking of summer how is the weather in your little spot of the world? We've roller coastered again from the 80's to the 60's...and this morning it is downright chilly. The high is only expected to get to the upper 60's today but I saw an 88 in the forecast for next week so I know this is just another dip on the ride.

Memorial Day is Monday...how did it get here that quick? Don't have any big plans yet except for going to the local food festival, Taste of Cincinnati. Plan on going first thing on Saturday before it gets too crowded... and there will probably be something on my grill before the weekend is over. Other than that I plan to take it easy... sew a little, knit a little.

happy stitching-
carol fun

They are calling me.....

can you hear them? Okay this has been up on my design wall for several days.



It is an well-aged Stack-n-Whack that I had forgotten about.(oh this pic looks better than on my design wall. I just figured out how to crop my pictures and I eliminated all the yuccky parts of my design wall. How cool is that? Yes I am totally blown away by my own ineptitude - LOL) Anyway, in looking at the blocks I still like them and there were plenty - 98 totally finished blocks. Why did I stop on this? I got no clue. All the blocks are cut from this fabric



which was taken from the illustrations in the book The Quiltmaker's Gift that has a 2000 copyright date. So that means this fabric was probably produced in 2001 or 2002 and has been languishing in a giant ziploc bag for the past 9 or 10 years. It still looks great. Maybe ziploc bags have rejuvenation properties? Hmmmm... here's a closer look at some of the blocks. They have a cool milleflori (can't find the right spelling) look - like a glass paperweight.



The blue and red I'm using resembles a sun print and it is of the same vintage as the focus fabric.I always am captivated by fabric that looks like a crazy quilt and they make great Stack-n-Whacks. I've moved some of the blocks around since I took these pictures and I think I have the final arrangement. Sewing them together will be mindless and that's right up my alley.

Last night I was trying to finish my Crazy Mom QAL.(See my post of 1/6/2011) I'm on the last plain borders. I got one side sewn on and then in attempting the second one, I realized I cut it too long (no wonder I couldn't ease in that extra 2 inches) and then I ran out of bobbin thread(grrrr) and then I lost my concentration (I have the attention span of a fruit fly) and went from stitching a 1/4" seam allowance to a 3/8" seam allowance and had to pick it out. So I decided it was time to call it a night - hey you don't have to tell me 10 times, although it did take 3 "issues" for me to catch on that I should quit. Oh well -

So I need to do the last 2 borders on the yellow Crazy Mom QAL, then I want to sew these blocks together. This SNW will make a nice size lap quilt and then there is that Hoopla fabric I bought a couple of weeks ago. It is talking too. It is nice bright colors - kinda like a brand new box of Crayola crayons. I loved a new box of crayons when I was a kid. I think you could get a box for a dime or a quarter -- yeah back long ago and far away, a misty water-colored memory (sorry for all the old song lyrics -my mind just works that way)

Happy stitching-
carol fun