A bit of Show and Tell

Last Monday evening was my guild meeting and I took two quilts for Show and Tell. I made the tops last year, but they didn't get quilted or bound till this year, so I'm counting them as my first finishes of 2013. You saw these previously in their design wall state, but oh does quilting really make them shine - in my humble opinion. And a quick apology for the lighting of these pictures. The weather has not cooperated to take them outside so I guilted my sons into holding them for a quick snap.

First is the one I call Big Stars for Nick. It is now gracing his new bed and he loves it.

This is the Missouri Star quilt pattern that I found online and you can see the video here. This block goes together quickly and it is BIG.

Cass used a variegated black and red thread with a loopy star pattern. Nick likes it because it isn't "girly" and observation both of my boys have about most of my quilts.

And here is my quilt from that same Missouri Star Quilt Company video - Big Debbie Stars

I used a total of 91 different Debbie Mumm fabrics in this one. If you want to see some close ups of the fabrics click on this post- here. Now Cass totally surprised me with the quilting on this one. I submitted my standard request for her to pick a nice overall pattern and use a variegated thread. I didn't quite see the pattern until I looked on the back..... oh my goodness!!! CHICKENS!!!

Aren't they just the best quilting pattern ever? LOL!

Cass said when she saw this pantograph she knew she had to use it on a quilt for me and had been waiting for the right one and this certainly is it. LOVE LOVE LOVE it!

So that is my bit of Show and Tell. As I finished up taking pictures of the quilts I asked my sons if I could take a photo or two of them. Nick declined but Chris acquiesced.... sort of....

this is the shot I got. He is there under the quilt - a sort of padded witness protection program. Oh well - they are both great kids and I am very proud of them.

Happy stitching-
carol fun

Happy Scrappy Trips on Design Wall Monday

Yesterday gave me some quality sewing time and I finished 4 more blocks on my Happy Scrappy Trips 2.0 version.  I am having such fun with this block. Thank you Bonnie Hunter!

More dots and plaids and brights - lots more - LOL!

Big dots and little dots...

Wavy lines and scribbles...

Plaids and dots with more dots...

This quilt should finish at about 80 inches square, and will look great on my bed. In this version I am making the block 8 X 8 and the squares finish 2 1/2".

 On Friday I showed two friends how to put together this Scrappy Trips block and the fabrics they are using are tempting me to do a third and fourth version - oh no!!!! One was using yummy batiks and the other had Kaffe Fassett fabrics - I don't think I can resist. I have plenty of these fabrics in my stash to do both versions. I just need more time to sew!

Happy stitching-
carol fun

Some slow chicken stitching on Sunday

So on Thursday I said I'd be back on Friday and now it Sunday afternoon. My weekend disappeared faster than that hour we lost to Daylight Savings Time - which is one of the biggest pains in the butt I know of ... more ranting later. Anyway I have had a bit of time to stitch and this is what I'm working on...

This design is by Tra la la and is called Duo de Printemps. How could I resist this one? First, that chicken has a polka dot wing, then there are those giant tulips (my favorite flower) and it includes an alphabet. The trifecta of cross stitching wonderfulness in my world. I did change the colors to suit me and this little bit of gingham linen I had in my stash.

I started this last Wednesday when we had a snow day and was determined to use stuff I already had. So, I changed the red tulips to yellow (I don't have to tell you yellow is my favorite color, now do I - LOL). I used a Cosmos Seasons floss, 8027, which is a Japanese company. It has a variegated look to it that I love. The green leaves are color 8016 and the outer border and the alphabet are 8025. This skein is marvelous - it has two shades of blue - similar to DMC 931 and then two shades of taupe-y brown and two shades of a forest green. I selectively cut lengths of the colors I wanted to use. I stitched the outer border in the blue shades. I used the taupes and greens for the alphabet. Lots of variety of color from one single skein of floss - love that. The red is DMC 4210, one of the new color variation skeins.

This finished about 4 1/4" wide and 5" tall. I'm not sure if I'm going to frame it or finish it as a little pillow. Oh looking at the picture I realize I'm not totally done. There is another heart and some little motifs to finish. Oh well I'll get to that later.

And now for my rant on Daylight Savings Time - the short version - I intensely dislike it. I can't see a single reason to have it. We don't save any power with this and it messes up people's sleep cycles and has been related to an increase in accidents when it changes. I know the battery companies use this occasion to remind you to change the batteries in your smoke and CO2 detectors, but I'm sure they could tie this reminder to Easter and Halloween and still make their point in a timely fashion. So now that I'm up on this soap box I found this site - you can click https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/eliminate-bi-annual-time-change-caused-daylight-savings-time/ShChxpKh#thank-you=p - it is a petition to eliminate the bi-annual change. It is on the White House page where petitions are posted. It needs to get 100,000 signatures for the government to look at this issue. I would love them to change this instead of my health care and taxes - just saying. So if you are on the same side of this issue as I am, go over and sign. Climbing down off the the soap box now...

Happy stitching-
carol fun

Showing my socks on another snowy day

The snow is still on the ground and the temperature is a chilly 32 degrees so socks, warm socks are required for today.

These are a pair I made back in October or Socktober as it was referred to. And in keeping with a theme - and I LOVE a theme- I was knitting along with the Patchwork Times blog and only using Opal yarn. Now this it not your typical Opal yarn. It was called Antonia Hand Dyed and it has a picture of some young gal on the band. I assume she is some star in Europe but I haven't a clue. Anyway this yarn comes in a skein not a ball like the all the rest of the Opal I have, but it is definitely the same quality and it totally machine wash and dry. I snagged about 4 skeins of this when it was on sale at Simply Socks for about $10 a skein. What a bargain! I did a little search of the web and it appears this yarn is pretty much gone. Darn it! (ha-ha bad knitting pun) I did see a skein or two on WEBS site but I have both of those colorways.

I was pleasantly surprised by the flashing and pooling of this yarn. It is the antithesis of Opal's regularly patterned stripes - which I like too. This is another skein I'll keep in mind when I get around to dyeing yarn this Spring.

And speaking of socks, check back tomorrow to see what's on my needles. I realized that I have been knitting nothing but socks for the last month or two and now have another lovely collection of single solitary socks. Gotta buckle down and finish a second sock for a least one pair - right? Probably not - LOL! I'm too crafty ADD. They will sit for a while and age and when I discover them again the yarn will seem new and then I'll finish them up.... I hope.

Stay warm - happy stitching!
carol fun

Snow day

Looking out my kitchen window 

Well, we got about 5 inches of the white stuff and it cancelled my youngest son's college classes and freed me from my chauffeuring duties for the entire day - yippee! I've cross stitched a bit, and I've knit a little and I made another block for my latest Scrappy Trips quilt. And I've spent time leisurely reading blogs which had lead me to two interesting videos. First, click HERE to a link for a wonderful video about Kaffe Fassett from Creativebug. I adore his fabrics and I love that he appreciates the crafty as well as the arty forms of expression.

And then I was on Quilt Swissy's blog - you can get to it by clicking here - and she had a link to a video interview of Dominique Ehrmann by Bonnie McCafferry and her innovative quilts. The video is about 14 minutes long and it is fascinating. You can see it HERE. I would love to see her quilts in person.

Also last Thursday Judy at Patchwork Times said that would be her last link up of  Show Us Your Socks till Fall since it was getting too warm in Texas to wear socks.  However, refer back to the picture at the top of this post.... I will still be wearing wool socks for a while and I plan to Show My Socks until it is warm enough for sandals... probably in June. LOL! I hope that others will continue to show their socks too.

Now back to enjoying my snow day... the sewing machine is calling my name!
Happy stitching-
carol fun

Scrappy Trips 2.0 on Design Wall Monday

As with many quilts I do I had no intention of immediately starting a second Scrappy Trip just hours after finishing my first one. But I came across this quilt  - go here and check it out - on the Flickr feed and I was a goner. As I was putting the blocks together from my first Scrappy Trips I has contemplated making a double bed size quilt with this technique and this quilt gave me a game plan. First I would make the blocks 8 X 8 like she had and by increasing the size of my blocks to a finished 2 1/2" square, I could make an 80" X 80" quilt from 16 blocks.

So I immediately started pulling fabrics. The white I'm using is a tone on tone with a variety of different sized dots. My first thought was to keep this quilt "quieter" - use fabrics with low contrast and that's what I did for the first 2 blocks. If you look back at my first picture they are the blocks in the upper left and the lower right. However while the "quiet" choices are nice they don't make my heart sing the way the "noisy" choices too. To my way of thinking "noisy" fabrics are the party animals, the happy campers and I LOVE them!

noisy choices

quiet choices

quiet choices

noisy choices

So the original two "quiet" blocks may or may not find a place in the finished top. I may put them around the edges or maybe on the back. It is too soon to tell.

Now the other day someone asked me where my color sense came from since the quilts I made 20 years ago are by no means as bright as what I make now. I have to say that this book

totally changed my quilting style. This book was published in 1999 and I had never seen quilts with such a variety of  saturated color and  busy pattern. Freddy considers red to be a neutral and I've developed my own palette where yellow is my neutral. Freddy loves polka dots and well, you know I adore them. Freddy's quilts are some of the happiest quilts I've ever seen. I've made a couple of quilts from this book. I will take some pictures and show you my version of one of her house quilts.

So to wrap this up today, I leave you with a picture of Big Dude giving my Scrappy Trips 3 Ring Circus a final inspection before I take it to the guild meeting tonight to drop it off to my long arm quilter.

Happy stitching-
carol fun

Slow stitching on Sunday

So here is something you haven't seen for a while on this blog.... cross stitching! Yes, I have actually picked up my needle and completed a little sampler. This is True Love Sampler by Stacy Nash.

As you can tell from the photo of the chart below I totally changed the colors on this one.

It all started when I chose that evenweave. It is 32 ct. and I hand-dyed it myself a while ago. I love that mottled rosy hue. As for the flosses they are all Anchor ones that were in my stash. Years ago I was quite fond of Anchor flosses. I used them a lot on Ewe & Eye & Friend pieces. I'm going to take this one to the framer this week.

And I released my Quaker Diamonds by Rosewood Manor from its ziploc bag. Oh it was fun to stitch on this for a change.

I am about 1/3 of the way finished on this. This little cartouche has space to add the year the sampler is complete. I'm not going to tempt fate by putting in 2013, but I's sure like to.

And did you see this latest release from Rosewood Manor?



I can't wait to get my hands on this one.

So I'm hoping to get a bit more stitched done today and some sewing too. The quilt guild meeting is tomorrow night and I want to get the binding on my latest quilt for Show & Tell.

Hope you have a great week...happy stitching!
carol fun