IN WHICH WE CELEBRATE OUR ONE YEAR BLOGIVERSARY AND INCLUDE A RETROSPECTIVE AND A LOOK FORWARD!

An anniversary is a good time to look backwards to review how things have gone and to look forward expectantly to the future.

My first posts were about my terror of free motion quilting and how likely my use of it would ruin my beautiful appliqued quilts!  A healthy concern! My first posts also listed what I was then working on and my projects for the foreseeable future.  These included:

1.  Quilt Mountmellick.  Did that-completed-rather proud of the job after finishing!  I have done a lot of FMQ practice this year thru classes from Craftsy, thru Lori Kennedy, thru the Sit Down Free Motion Quilters blog and just on my own learning motifs,  quilting images and patterns, and just generally practicing.  My confidence level has really risen.

2. Quilt Caswell.  Didn't happen-put in next year's stack.  This is perhaps my favorite quilt I ever made so I did not want to rush into it. 

3.  Finish what at that time was a Stonefields quilt from a pattern by Susan Smith but morphed into the funnest quilt I have ever made--Chuck, Susan, and Me which incorporates blocks from Chuck Nohara, Susan Smith, and ones designed by me. I ended up making 144 blocks altogether.  the quilting process has begun.

4.  Make Sweet Surrender:  Been there, done that!  Got the gold medal!  Pattern and fabric:

Finished quilt:

5.  And last, Village quilt-not much progress on this quilt during the past year except for mental, invisible, but none the less, meaningful work.  This is a Yoko Saito pattern thru my favorite magazine, Quiltmania and my version in soft taupes.

OK-END OF RETROSPECTION.  LET'S LOOK AHEAD!

1.  My first emphasis for this year will be to continue "perfecting" free motion quilting.  I am looking at a class by Judi Marsden on Iquilt.  She quilted a stunning version of Sweet Surrender so learning some techniques from her would be invaluable.  I also purchased two study books:

Margaret Gunn is, of course, a reknown quilter and her advice, pointers, and lessons will teach much.  I want to practice, practice, practice!

2.  Quilt these two babies.  Judi Marsden's version will be my model for SS and I have a couple of ideas for my Caswell.

3.  Finish quilting Chuck, Susan, and Me.  This is doable-I am having fun with it.

4.  Before the cold weather sets in again in the fall (we always keep the temps in the house a bit low so we don't hog the world's resources), put together and quilt Over and under.  Think about how to make it bigger than 60x60 so it is a good snuggle.

5.  Keep playing with fabric paints.  I recently purchased some Derwent Inktense pencils and WOW are these great!  I have a pattern to quilt in different colors (I think) and then paint.  This is a simple pattern with lots of room for different colors and ample spacing.

6.  Pull together the infamous Village quilt.  A photo of this project is above.  I want to dye some fabric in soft taupy colors of water, sky, grasses, rock walls, and stone walkways.  I want to do some embroidery on this quilt such as lots of flowers, some fish, definition of rock etc.  Lots of work to be done but I am feeling enthusiastic.

7.  Quiltmania does it to me every year!  They always manage to suck me into their world.  This year it is Yoko Saito's quilt Imaginary Garden.   Lovely!

This photo does not do it justice.  The quilt is a lovely combination of applique and embroidery.  I would do it in a palette full of soft colors and in a smaller size than the bed size quilt she has made.

OMG!  I'm exhausted!  

See you next week!

I am linking up with:

Slow Stitching Sunday, Bambi's Blog,Patchwork Times,  Em's Scrapbag, BOMS,

Esther's Wow, Let's Bee Social,Whoop Whoop, and Off the Wall Friday, and Finish or Not!
           

IN WHICH SWEET SUFFERING HAS ENDED AND MORPHED INTO THE SONG OF???????

Sweet Surrender flimsy is finished! and ready to be a sandwich to be quilted.  The name of this quilt is not yet finalized-it will be "The Song of ???" or "Music of???".  Maybe "Singing of Spring".  The background is like a music staff with whole notes and the vines look like music.  

Commonly, this quilt is made with red at the bottoms of the pieced triangles.  My motif or mood ideas using green/teal instead was to encourage the feel of growing things in spring.  You can even look at the pieced triangles as abstract flowers with growing from a green base.  The green/teal was intended as a grounding basis for all the colors.

So you can have a closer look, here are the four corners.

I washed the flimsy to remove glue and markings.  I was worried about bleeding with all this brightly colored fabric.  Fortunately, only one item bled and that was the purple/turquoise circle in the lower left corner which bled a bluish color.  It is a small bled so I think I will just remove that circle and stitch down a larger one which covers the bleed.

You can see that most the dots are actually flowers cut from Kaffe Fasset fabric. So the vines have leaves and flowers growing on them.

I have ordered the white batting and already have the backing so I am very happy about the progress of this quilt which I now love in a way I never thought I would given the trouble, headaches, and misery it has caused me.

CHUCK, SUSAN, AND ME

I have also been quilting Chuck, Susan, and Me this week.  This is a relaxing occupation and fun thinking up quilting patterns to use.  Since each block is 6 inches square and some are densely appliqued, only a simple outline of the motifs is necessary.  With some of the blocks one can have more fun.  Here are some samples:

If you looks at this last one, you will see I quilted in some invisible flowers on one and grasses on the other. 

This quilt is quilted in 4 sections plus the border.  I did this to have ease in complicated quilting.  One thing I have learned is to leave the outer blocks, that is the ones which will connect to other blocks, unquilted.  Otherwise joining the pieces together will be a major nightmare.

💗🙋💗

I am back to feeling my old perky, pesky self.  I miss me when I'm gone.  Thank you my readers for your kind regards and wishes for my good health.

AND NOW....

YOUR MOMENT OF ZEN!

I love fun fashion and these two dresses are petal perfect!

The dresses were designed by New Zealand artist Jenny Gellies.

That's all for this week.  Happy quilting until we met again!

I am linking up with:

Slow Stitching Sunday, Bambi's Blog,Patchwork Times,  Em's Scrapbag, BOMS,

Esther's Wow, Let's Bee Social,Whoop Whoop, and Off the Wall Friday, and Finish or Not!
           

IN WHICH I FIND THAT EYE SURGERY HAS TAKEN THE WIND OUT OF MY SAILS!

I don't know why surgery on the second eye would be more exhausting than the first but it was.  I had to lay out for a few days and consequentially did not finish my leaves and flowers for SS border.  I did manage to do a bit of on line shopping. One always feels a bit at loose ends when a major project is finishing even though I have several projects lined up.  Here is my new pattern and fabric:

I can already see I will need to change it up as the size is really to small for really snuggling in and getting warm.  I ordered extra background so I have some to play with.

Have you made any plans for the great eclipse of August 21?  We are lucky enough to live very close to the most optimal pathway.  Here is a map showing the path of the eclipse:

If we go about 40 miles north we will be in the "path of totality" and the world will be dark as night for a couple minutes.  (There is also a nice quilt shop in this town)! Apparently this is a very rare astronomical event the next one concurring for us in about 500 years.  We are going to take a picnic and make a nice day of it.

AND NOW .....

YOUR MOMENT OF ZEN!

This is an amazing spot near Salzburg, Austria in the Salzkammergut mountains.  You can take an old fashioned train to this summit which is 1783 meters or 5850 feet high.  The ride lasts about 35 minutes and, from the photos of the trip, looks like there are some hair-raising moments on the side of steep cliffs.  When you reach the top, you have a 360 degree view of the Alps and several lakes lying below you.  The sweet little house is a guest house.

I entered Salzmammergut into google translate as German is always interesting in how they construct one word out of several.  Google translates this as "salt chamber good".  I can see "salt" as these are white limestone mountains.  "Good"  also applies.  But "chambers"?  I know the limestone in Missouri is riddled with caves so maybe that is what is implied by "chambers".  Please, any German speakers set me straight.  

Update Monday 4-17...I received a very informative email from Bonnie reminding me of the movie Monument Men in which Allied troops hid precious works of art in the salt caves around Salzburg.  So that answers 2 questions:  Salz is for salt and not just for the white of limestones, and kammer does mean chambers or caves ergo: good salt chambers!  Love it when a mystery is solved though I could have googled Salzburg and found the answer for my lazy self.

Thats all for today.  I am beginning to pick up my strength and energy which I really miss so maybe next week will be better.  I hope you have a nice Easter and good week.

I am linking up with:

Slow Stitching Sunday, Bambi's Blog,Patchwork Times,  Em's Scrapbag, BOMS,

Esther's Wow, Let's Bee Social,Whoop Whoop, and Off the Wall Friday.           

SOMETHING DIFFERENT!

I don't know about you but I am awfully tired of showing my current project so instead of 

Sweetly Surrendering to that path, I have decided to show you a quilt I finished a few years ago.

This quilt is from a Pearl Pereira pattern called Pearl's Garden. The border is my design-I wanted to add a lattice look to the garden-as well as the beehive.  The pattern had a lot of intricate applique work with thin curvy stems and leaves as well as some reverse applique.  I used batiks as these have a painterly look with a lot of color variation.  One difficult part was 4 blocks composed mainly of green. A lot of searching was necessary to find contrasting and complimentary greens.  Below are some detail shots.

This Garden quilt was fun to make with the challenging applique, the embroidery, and the lettering. The quilt measures about 40x50 inches.

A SMALL PEEK...

I spent the week on the borders of Sweet Surrender.   Lots of new leaves etc were made and right now the elements are just pinned together.  I will probably make some changes but hope to have all appliqued pieces sown this week.  So here is a peek to give you an idea of the direction this quilt is taking.

We had a hellacious storm last week.  It knocked down some limbs from the trees and I found this along with the other fallen limbs.

 The holes were made by woodpeckers.  The holes go in about 3 inches and then turn upwards.  I am going to make a birdfeeder out of this log by filling the holes with gooey birdfeed made of lard, seeds, raisins, cranberries etc.  This mixture gets stuffed into the holes for the birds which climb the sides of trees like woodpeckers and nuthatches.  The log is a bit fragile so maybe I will mount it on a 1x4 to stabilize it and provide a secure way to hang the log.

AND NOW.....

YOUR MOMENT OF ZEN!

A 650 foot tunnel in Shenyang, China covered in living lavender to provide a lovely, harmonious, and delightfully fragrant escape from the everyday.

Happy quilting!

I am linking up with:

Slow Stitching Sunday, Bambi's Blog,Patchwork Times,  Em's Scrapbag, BOMS,

Esther's Wow, Let's Bee Social,Whoop Whoop, and Off the Wall Friday.           

IN WHICH WE ROUND THE FOURTH LAP TO FINISH THE BORDER ON SWEET SURRENDER!

All my quilts take a long time to make but this one was frustrating with so much work and time put into making the diamonds and triangles.  I love applique so that part has been a pleasure.

I have been rethinking the binding.  My current thinking is based on an idea from another quilt I made where the fabric in the applique was used in the border.  My plan would create the same multicolored striped effect as in the sample below:

  All three of the narrow borders are made from 1.5 inch squares.  This might be effective as binding.  It is not hard to make: sew long strips of 1.5 inch fabrics together until you have one large striped pieced and then cut 1.5 in the other direction if you see what I mean.

My eye continues to heal nicely and the pure color seen in my right eye is spectacular to behold.  Left eye gets a re-hab on April 12.  This is a nice time of the year to get new eyes are spring has arrived with all it's spring colors: new-born greens,  yellows of daffodils and forsythia, fuchsia of the redbud trees, pinks of the japonica, and other beautiful easter colors.

AND NOW .........

YOUR MOMENT OF ZEN!

Since I do not have a lot to say for myself this week, I thought some fun images would be in order.  As we walk through parks or down streets, there are lots of benches to sit on, to rest and look around.  How much better the experience if the benches were like these:

To delight the eye and the imagination!

HAPPY QUILTING TO YOU UNTIL WE MET AGAIN!

I am linking up with:

Slow Stitching Sunday, Bambi's Blog,

Patchwork Times,  Em's Scrapbag,

Bom's Monday, Esther's Wow, Let's Bee Social,