The time has come

After lo, these many months of not posting, it has become obvious to me that this blog's useful life is at an end.  So, with a tiny tear in my eye, I am saying goodbye.  I'll leave the posts up, but comments will be closed after a couple of days, and there will be no more promises of new posts!

I'm not disappearing, tho.  If there is anyone out there who still wants to see what I'm up to, I am now on Instagram as @waechter481.  Maybe we'll see each other there.

Edit: COMMENTS ARE NOW CLOSED

Mess in Progress

Seems like all I do these days is move from one mess to another.  Nothing is getting finished, although progress is being made little by little.

To the casual observer (aka Sarge), however, it is just one large mess!  He asked me the other day why I don’t just work on one project until it is done.  Silly man!

I do need to corral this particular project and get it off the table.  I need more room to add more projects!

TaDa!!

Oh boy!  This has been a satisfying week.  I had not one, not two, but THREE finishes!!!

Three of us at the weekly sew group made this lone star pattern.  Each chose their own fabrics so they don’t look exactly alike, but they are really impressive.  We will have to see about getting a pic of all three together . . . if we can find a big enough space!

A closer look.  My stars don’t show at all well in photos – they have a gold sparkle, so better in person.

Finish number 2.  The longer I worked on this one, the less I like it.  I’m not real fond of the intense colors, but I suppose I  will like it better when I’m not looking at it every day.  Besides, there’s sure to be somebody out there who will love it!

I do love the fabric in the center of the stars, though.  I only had a fat quarter of it, though, so star centers it is.

And Finish Number 3!  I believe I showed some of the blocks here earlier.  All that embroidery (well, almost all) is in “twilling” which is basically a row of knots.  It is a lot of hand work, but goes fairly quickly.  That said, I think I’ve been working on this for almost six months.  It is less than 50 inches long, so – yeah – I guess it was a lot of work.

I can’t call this a finish since it’s a Block of the Month and we’re only on Month 7 (I think).  But I am all caught up!  That does not happen very often with long-range projects like this.  The last time I showed you this (here) the rows were separate.  Now they are stitched together – even frogged and re-stitched!  Apparently I cannot count . . . or measure!

All these finishes mean I’ve cleared the decks for a couple of dolls I need to get busy with.  Or . . . these finishes were delaying actions because I don’t know what to do with those dolls!  I guess time will tell.

Meanwhile, Down on the Farm

The Farmer’s Wife was a woman’s magazine during the early 1900’s, and The Farmer’s Wife is the name of the current Block of the Month at my local quilt shop.  The blocks are a selection of those published in the magazine and the fabrics are all 1930s reproductions.

These are 6” paper-pieced blocks and they range from simple 9-patch to tear-your-hair-out complicated!  If you are not in love with paper-piecing, maybe you should not make this quilt!!

I have almost four columns done so far – only the fourth one stops at the floor.  This is going to be a Very Big Quilt!

I am loving the fabrics in this project.  And, yeah, I love some of the blocks.  Just not all of them.  Ha!

Rikki

Meet the latest of my creations, Rikki

Rikki is sculpted of polymer clay and she’s a larger size than I usually work with.  That’s because she will only be the head and shoulders.  Right now, she is waiting for ears and then hair and painted details.  The “clothes” are temporary, although I do like the orange against her skin.  It’s a lady’s handkerchief from Australia!

Rikki is the first in a series of classes at A for Artistic, called Children of the World.  I’ve had a lot of fun with this class and am looking forward to doing more in this series.

I’ll show Rikki off when she’s finished and I’m sure you’ll see more of these busts in the future.  Stay tuned!

Houston, we have a problem

So, way back here, I showed you some Stack ‘n Whack blocks.  I finished the blocks themselves and started to put them together in an on-point layout.

Thinking I was about half way done, I pinned it to the wall to see how it looked.  Uh oh.  Let’s take a closer look:

Alrighty then.  A little basic geometry reveals the problem (if not a solution yet).  These blocks are rectangular instead of square.  Thus, the angle is not 45 degrees, which is the basis of the typical on-point quilt.  Well, I never could do math in my head!

So, I will be spending some quality time with my seam ripper and then take another look at layout options.  I do like how the background forms those diamonds, so I think I’ll start there.  Stay tuned for the next installment of Life with the Mathematically Challenged!

POTC update

POTC = Patchwork of the Cross (see my original post here.)  There has been progress.  I now have nine blocks complete.

These make great portable projects or for watching TV.  I have a small box full of pre-cut fabric and I can baste them to the papers in no time.  Some require fussy cutting, but use of a glue stick speeds that process up, too.

However, this project has been placed on hold for the time being.  Why?  Because of this:

This is one of the blocks for “Paisley Parade” by Of One Mind and the embroidery stitch is called ‘twilling.’  For the seasoned embroiderist, it is also known as ‘palestrina stitch.’  I took a class in November and saw the pattern in their shop and had to have it!

So far I have six blocks completed – out of 12, so six more to go.  There’s sashing and filler blocks so it will take awhile to have a complete quilt top.  Here is what I have so far:

I love paisley!  And I’m finding this stitch to be almost meditative.  And even more portable than POTC.  On a recent road trip, I could stitch as long as there was daylight – or when I was not required to read road signs.  I’m the designated navigator, so it’s always my fault if we go wrong . . . always.  But that’s a story for another time perhaps.

And while I’m working on Paisley, I can decide how large I want to make POTC.

Evening Star

This is the cover of the January issue of American Quilter.  I just love this combination of flying geese and star burst.

I don’t usually make a magazine pattern until long after the magazine comes out.  I will (sometimes) flag the page and (usually) forget all about it until (nearly always) several years later.  But this one is just too pretty to forget – especially when I played around with color changes in Electric Quilt.

I love how it came out and I think it is prettier than the magazine version – if I do say so myself.  It’s about 47 inches square, so I could quilt it on my home machine.  For now, though, I’m enjoying the view while I consider quilting options.

A very long week?

My, it’s certainly been quiet on this blog, hasn’t it?  The last time I posted – TWO MONTHS AGO! – I promised a look at my quilt on the longarm.  Now that it has been quilted, bound, and showed at guild meeting, here you go!

As you might guess, I have lots of other things to show you.  Two months translates into a lot of sewing and crafting!  But, rather than load your computer (and patience) by trying to give it to you all at once, I plan to do a bunch of shorter posts.  Hopefully, by the time we are all caught up, I will have slipped back into the blogging habit.

We shall see, shan’t we?

Best Laid Plans

So, the PLAN was . . .

I was scheduled to do some quilting on the longarm (my LQS rents time on their longarm) and I was going to take some photos of the quilt loaded and in progress.  Even wanted to try posting from my smart phone. 

Technical difficulties turned all those plans upside down!  Tension was all over the place and we had to call in the big guns (ie, owner who had been to training on maintaining the beast).  By lunch time I decided I better pull out another project to work on.

This one!  Another Stack ‘N Whack.  I got all the hexagons finished and started adding triangles to square them up.  As you can probably tell, the fabric is a Finding Nemo print.  It was something my mother bought (I don’t know why!) and I have puzzled over what to do with it.

I’ve been pleasantly surprised at how pretty the blocks are turning out.  Everything from nice subtle patterns like the one above . . .

. . . to wildly silly like these eyeballs! 

I’m working on how to put the blocks together.  There was a lot of this fabric – I have 42 hexagons measuring about 11” – so I will probably get two quilts out of this project!

And maybe – just maybe – I’ll be able to show you a loaded, quilted quilt next week!

Starting a New Year

In hopes for getting back into the blogging habit, I thought I would pop in this evening with a quick update.

Here are the first three blocks of Patchwork of the Cross (to be known as POTC hereafter).  I am making great progress as there are two more blocks almost ready for viewing.  I suspect things may slow down now that there are no holiday specials to watch.  Who knows?

I have a couple of completed quilt tops, but they will have to wait for another post when I have more time.  See you then!

P.S. Happy New Year!

P.P.S.  Suddenly my blogging app isn't connecting to Blogger so this has taken much longer than I planned.  Plus, I wanted to crop the photo so you don't have to look at my cabinet doors.  Not happening.  Sigh.

There must be a name for my condition

So, in my last post I showed you several projects in various stages of completion.  Any sane person would be happy to keep working on that and maybe even – oh I don’t know – actually complete some of them!

But any sane person is not me!  While I have been working on the afore mentioned projects, I had to start two new ones.  Of course I had to!  They called to me and I could not resist!

First up is an embroidery project I picked up on a Shop Hop awhile ago.  It’s by Barri Sue Gaudet of Bareroots.  When I took a class on “twilling” I knew exactly how I would do this piece.  I had the squares assembled and fabrics fused in a single afternoon.  The twilling is the heavier lines in the letters and a few of the details.  You will be seeing more about twilling in the near future.

The second new project is Lucy Boston’s Patchwork of the Cross.  I’ve been seeing pictures of this pattern on various web sites for quite some time.  On the same Shop Hop trip I mentioned above, I finally found the book and some elongated hexies.  It took a little while to pick some fabrics and read up on the project.  But I’m ready – why not start now?  This one will be a long-term project, probably reserved for TV time.  I love how the stripe fabrics come out in these blocks.  I also am looking forward to some fussy cutting for other pattern matching.

Lest you think I have abandoned my other projects, here are some updates.

Here is the first quadrant of Fancy Forest all assembled.  Just three more of these and I’ll have a finished top!  This piece is about 30x43, so the finished quilt will be pretty big!

And here’s a finish!  Stars and Hourglass was all from my scraps and I’m pleased with the way it turned out – even if it did present some challenges.  For some reason I could not calculate how many red squares I needed.  At first I came up short by more than two rows.  After making some more hourglass blocks, I now have quite a few left over!!  But I lucked out on the borders – there was about 3” left of the blue when I finished.  Whew!  This will go to Quilts of Valor.  I can probably use those extra hourglasses on the pillowcase!

I have some more blocks done on Farmer’s Wife, but no photos yet.  I need to dig out my cutting table so I can get some more projects done.  Or maybe it’s the other way around!

I’m going to try to resist starting anything new for awhile.  Wish me luck!

WIPs, PHDs, and some Finishes

Wow!  When I decided to let the blog go silent, I had NO intention of being gone for NINE MONTHS!!  As you can imagine, things just got in the way, and then something else, and pretty soon you are out of the habit.  Don’t think that means I haven’t been doing anything worth showing.  Not at all.  So let’s see what’s been happening.

Works in Progress (WIPs)

This is a quilt I am working on right now.  Pattern is by Elizabeth Hartman and the “critters” are all standard piecing – rectangles, squares, and half-square triangles – so it is going pretty fast.  I loved the owl eyes laid out on my ironing board!


Another quilt project (yes, I usually work on several projects at a time.  Can’t be getting bored, you know!) is this Stars & Hourglass.  I hope to get this one finished for Quilts of Valor next year.  The blocks are all done, just need to finish assembling rows.



This is a (crooked) shot of the first three blocks from The Farmer’s Wife 1930’s style – a Block of the Month from my local quilt shop.  Actually, it’s eight blocks every month, but they are small!  They’re also foundation paper-pieced, so tiny pieces are not tooooo stressful.



Annnnd. . . . here is the “test” block for a Stack ’n Whack project.  The fabric is something I inherited from my Mom.  I haven’t the least idea why she would have yards of Finding Nemo fabric, and I struggled to come up with a design to use it in.  Stay tuned to see how it works out.

Since I have a lot of fabric that was acquired without a project in mind, I’ve been trying to pick some interesting patterns and match them up with fabric for future reference.   Anytime I have all the fabric for a quilt, I make up these “kits.”  When I finish a quilt I just grab the next kit and start cutting.  Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to have made much of a dent in the stash!


One thing that does help in reducing stash, however, is cutting all my leftovers into 5” squares.  There are tons of patterns out there that start with a 5” square (Stars & Hourglass above is one) and you can see how fast they stack up. 

Projects Half-Done (P.H.D.s)

I classify these as a project that came to a stop and shows little signs of getting started back up.  Most of these were class or club projects and they are stuck in the state from the end of the class.  There may be no hope for these projects, but I’ve gathered them together so I can see what is what.


Here you can see two dolls and a row of doll heads.  Club projects waiting patiently for the grand finish.  Also some postcards – just need the backing or maybe a few more stitches – and a Stump work project that came to a halt when I realized I haven’t made enough flower petals!  The ribbon and lace to the side is actually a future project, but it’s also a club project so probably won’t make it to finished either!

Finished!

While it may appear that my working habits are in disarray, I have managed to finish a few things.  What else would I be doing instead of blogging?


I went to Florida again this spring and took another class from Deb Wood.  This Dryad was our project and the other students were people I knew from previous classes.  It was a wonderful week and I am feeling so much more confident in my sculpting skills.


This is Puck – that mischievous imp from A Midsummer’s Night Dream, among other stories.  I made his head a long time ago and you’ve probably seen it before,  I decided that it was time to test what I learned from all these classes.  I think he turned out pretty well!


You might recall I was working on an Alice in Wonderland quilt when I last blogged (more on the quilt in a moment).  My doll club did several shows this year and picked Wonderland as our theme.  My character was the caterpillar.  Fortunately Suzette Rugolo has done several patterns from the story so I did not have to start from scratch.  This doll is BIG!


This is the quilt made from patterns available on Fandominstitches.com.  I made it to hang behind our dolls displays at shows.  Yes, it was a lot of work, but since I was laid up with a broken foot there wasn’t much of anything else I could do!

There have been several quilt tops finished as well.  Some have even been quilted and bound – others still waiting to be quilted (I’ll have to photograph the pile of Waiting!)  Here are some of them, in no particular order.



And last – but definitely not least! - - - -

My contribution to our club charity project – One Million Pillowcases.  I made 28 and I think I can safely say I am a whizz at making pillowcases!

There you go – nine months neatly packaged in one post!  Now I am adding Blog to my ToDo list so maybe there will be more for you to see in shorter bursts.  At least I’ll try!