Playing with creating our own fabrics

My quilt design study group met last week and I was responsible for leading this week's session (we rotate responsibility, which is the best way to do a group!). We were on the last lesson in Lorraine Torrence's Fearless Design for Every Quilter. 

The lesson had to do with creating your own fabrics using a variety of techniques. I talked about this in my most recent podcast episode (Episode 120 In Which We Get Fused) so I won't go into detail here, but will give some pics of the evening. 

​Turning lines into pictures

​Turning lines into pictures

Using complimentary colors in a rubbing

Using complimentary colors in a rubbing

Working with stencils--analogous colors

Working with stencils--analogous colors

Following the line of the dye design (we thought it looked like a map)​

Following the line of the dye design (we thought it looked like a map)​

Using running stitches to create line on fabric

Using running stitches to create line on fabric

A little color inspiration...a bird in the hand

​(Pardon me while I continue to test out the different methods of placing pictures in my blog. Have to see how well they all work!)

While on vacation in New Orleans a couple of weeks ago, my husband and I spent a morning at the Audobon Aquarium. We got there when it first opened and wasn't at all crowded; by 90 minutes later when we were ready to go, it was pretty full. So fair warning--if you go, go early.​

In any case, my favorite part of the aquarium was, interestingly enough, not the aquatic creatures. It was the parakeet house. I grew up with parakeets--my grandmother had those that came to live with us a few months out of the year when she did. I only really remember one of them. His name was Gentleman Jim, or GJ. We'd let him out of his cage and he'd fly around the room, but he mostly liked to be right where we were. I did a lot of homework at the kitchen table with GJ perched on the end of my pencil or trying to sharpen his beak on it while I was writing. He may or may not have been the same parakeet that liked to dive into the fish tank. That was a little more of an adventure. My sister also had birds as pets most of her growing up years, and still does. Me, not a fan of birds in the house myself. Too much seed tossed around, too noisy. But still, I thoroughly enjoyed playing with the parakeets in the parakeet house.

So I'm including two galleries here--one is just photos from our trip that may entice you to go to New Orleans yourself. The other is strictly for the birds.​

The galleries are on autoplay, but you can speed up or slow down using the control buttons at either side of the gallery, or you can click on the thumbnails below.​

​First, general scenes around New Orleans, including random parades that spring up all the time, St. Louis Cathedral, the statue about immigrants (didn't get the actual title), various music ensembles we would stumble across (favorite part of the trip), Audobon Aquarium, New Orleans from the ferry to Algiers Point and one great house in Algiers, and the bayou boat tour (see if you can spot all the critters).

​

And now for the birds...fantastic colors! Definitely could inspire some quilts.​

An update on leaving comments

For those of you who have tried to leave comments on my blog before, it's now been fixed so you're able to leave a comment without having to sign into SquareSpace, Facebook, Twitter, or Google. If you choose not to use one of those accounts, you can leave a comment as "Guest." You will have a short form to fill out--that's just to cut down on spam and bots, you're not signing up for any accounts or anything.​

​I appreciate your patience with new blog set-up issues: Some things are very difficult to test before it goes live!

I hope to get a podcast episode out in the next day or two--I've been spending all my usual podcasting and quilting time on this site lately but we're getting there...​

Paper-pieced Block of the Month

Have I mentioned this one before? My guild is doing it's block of the month challenge in 2013 and this year, we're doing paper-pieced blocks chosen from Carol Doak's 300 Paper-Pieced Blocks. ​Each month, one of our leaders (Kate) chooses a block and we all do it in whatever fabrics, size, or quantity we want. We keep these blocks for ourselves--no exchanges involved.

My challenge to myself is to work completely from scraps. I'm doing four 4" blocks each month. No idea what I'll do with them yet but I'm having a blast!

January's block--starting out simple for those who may not have paper-pieced before.​

January's block--starting out simple for those who may not have paper-pieced before.​

February--let's add some houses to those trees!​

February--let's add some houses to those trees!​

​My faves so far. Had some great fabric to play with here.

​My faves so far. Had some great fabric to play with here.

April blocks. Not as fond of these just 'cause trees were too small to do much with, but they work.​

April blocks. Not as fond of these just 'cause trees were too small to do much with, but they work.​

Here's the combo package so far!​

Here's the combo package so far!​

First post on new blog...and hand-dyeds

So here it is, my first official post on the new website. Like?​

​This will be a short one--mostly pics. I am terribly delayed in getting these photos posted for you. Sorry about that--it's been busy!

Here are the results of my second session of hand-dying experimentation. I had two different types of PFD cotton and one PFD silk (very lightweight, like gossamer!) that I'd gotten from Dharma Trading Company.

I then also had some silk that I'd bought at a local sewing guild's annual rummage sale: a bolt of 30 yards for, wait for it, $15. WOOHOO! It's not as wide--I think it's something like 18" wide or thereabouts. But still, a steal. That silk was more of an ivory color to start than a true white. I only used about a fat quarter size piece of it to dye first, to see how it would work. It took the dye beautifully but I'll have to play with what colors work better on that ivory background.

Finally, I had lots of bits and pieces of some cotton lace and a crocheted doily that I'd bought at that same rummage sale. I had also bought some seersucker--no one there could tell me if it was 100% cotton or not. Apparently not--I only dyed a small corner of a piece and it didn't really take the dye at all. (Other dyes work on poly blends--the dyes I'm using only work on organic fibers.)

I also tried a variety of resists and dying techniques. You'll see examples of two pieces I used some Elmer's water soluble glue stick as a resist--worked better than I thought it would. (Couldn't find actual glue, only glue stick. Go figure.) Two other pieces were folded and secured between a pair of outlet switch plates in one case, and a pair of ethernet cable outlet plates in the other. Some pieces I folded and laid on a tray, then squirted the dye over them--you should be able to figure out which ones those are. That didn't work as well--I'll be overdying those eventually, though, and may end up with some cool results.​

I'm using some of these fabrics already for a Craftsy class I'm taking, but more about that in a future blog post!​

This blog and podcast are moving soon...

...as soon as the domain redirect happens, in any case. Which could be any time in the next 24-48 hours.

qftru logo.jpg

I am moving my blog and podcast show notes all under one roof. This is a change I've been wanting to make for some time, but never had the time to put it all together. However, some changes on one of my hosts ticked me off and made it too difficult for y'all to be part of the conversation. So I finally enacted something I've been poking away at for awhile.

If you subscribe to my podcast through iTunes, no fears. Nothing has changed there.

However, as soon as that redirect goes into action, when you go to www.quiltingfortherestofus.com you'll see my brand new, whiz bang website! (I'm not making the link in that sentence active because at the moment it still goes to the old place.)

There's a page for my blog.

There's a separate page for all the show notes to my podcast episodes, plus you'll be able to stream or download episodes from that page too.

Each of those pages has a separate RSS feed, available through a link on the sidebar, so you can subscribe to either of them however you want. You can subscribe to my blog through Feedly or Bloglovin' or whatever your what-you're-using-now-that-GR-is-no-more-of-choice is. You can use your favorite podcatcher to subscribe to the podcast, if you don't get it through iTunes.

The most important thing to me? You'll be able to leave comments on the show notes to my podcast without having to bow down to the Evil Overlord of Facebook. 

Okay, so I use Facebook. I don't mind Facebook. I absolutely detest being forced to use Facebook as my commenting system on my podcast and I detest having listeners not be able to leave comments unless they have a Facebook account.

But let me not get venting again. 

I'm excited about the new site. It's pretty. It has some very nice features for me from an admin point of view. I hope it's easy and attractive for you to navigate from a user point of view. I'm still poking away at some things--it probably won't be fully set up by the time you're first able to visit it. 

But I hope you'll visit. And I hope you'll help me test it out by leaving all sorts of comments!

I'll post here again when the redirect has happened and I'll leave RSS feeds here and such too. Eventually I'll take the time (when I have it again) to actually post a redirect here. So this is just your heads-up. Keep posted!

​

30 Questions Thursday--Part 6

Finally--I've had the time to sit down and finish my 30 questions!

25. If you could have dinner with anyone in history, who would it be and what would you eat?

Two people, but that's mostly because they worked as a pair: Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. I wanted to name my daughter Cady Elizabeth, but my husband wouldn't go for it. That's okay--I nixed his Benjamin Franklin for our son. We found happy compromises for both.

In any case, I love the history of the women's suffragette movement and, in fact, it's very close to home since Susan B lived in my hometown and we're the site of the Susan B. Anthony House museum. More recently, however, I've become more aware of how the two women worked together as a team. Although Susan B is the most well-known, she wouldn't have accomplished what she did without Elizabeth as a partner. And Elizabeth was a very impressive person in her own right.

If you're interested in a fun way to learn more about them, by the way, the History Chicks podcast recently did an

episode on Elizabeth Cady Stanton

that was a great look into her life and talked at some length about her relationship with Susan B. Very cool stuff.

What would I eat? I'd probably cook for them because I'd want to just be able to listen to them chat with each other. But from what I've read, I also expect they'd shove me out of the kitchen and want to pitch in. So maybe we'd have to compromise and do a stew in the slow-cooker or order take-out so we could all just hang out and talk.

26. What popular notion do you think the world has most wrong?

That it's okay to be rude. That being mean is funny. That we're past racism, sexism, whatever-ism, and it's okay to say those things because "I don't really mean it, you know." That people who have a different opinion than us are completely wrong and should be shouted down and called names.

Yes, I freely admit it: I am one of those people who longs for a return to civility.

27. What is your favorite part of your body and why?

My brain. I love how much I love to learn; I love playing with ideas; I love those brief moments when I actually feel smart.

And no, this isn't a cop-out. Sure, I have the same body-image issues most women of a certain age and size have. But I also think we tend to forget that our brain is a body part and worthy of respect and love!

28. What is your love language?

I actually had to look this one up because I wasn't clear what was meant by "love language." I took the quiz on

www.5lovelanguages.com

and apparently my love language is evenly split between Quality Time, Acts of Service, and Physical Touch (although that last one is really only true for my intimates--my husband and kids. Everyone else, keep your distance!).

29. What do you think people misunderstand most about you?

I think I covered this in an earlier post. People think I'm much more complex than I really am. I'm really pretty WYSIWYG. I'm not permanently ticked off--my face just tends to look that way. I generally like people even though they think I'm being aloof. Yes, I like to keep my thoughts to myself, but that doesn't mean I'm shy or afraid or anything. Just private. Does that cover it?

30. List 10 things you would hope to be remembered for.

  1. I hope my kids always remember this momism I tried to use through their growing up years: "You can't control what others do; you can only control how you react to it." I try to live by that myself.
  2. I'd like to be remembered by someone as a person who encouraged them to be more than they thought they were capable of. I hope to be remembered by many someones that way, but one would be good enough.
  3. I'd like to be remembered for my writing.
  4. I might like to be remembered for my quilting--but really, only by my family and close friends. I have no dreams of winning big quilt shows or writing quilt books or becoming any sort of quilting celebrity. It's something I love doing for myself and simply hope that it helps my family remember me when I'm gone, like I still have my Mom's quilts surrounding me.
  5. I'd like to think people will remember having a few good laughs with me.
  6. I hope to be remembered as a wonderful grandma--although that would take having some grandkids, which is likely a ways off. Or granddogs. Whatever my kids choose to give me.
  7. I'd love to be remembered for playing some small part in raising awareness about justice issues and maybe changing a few minds along the way.
  8. I hope to be remembered as a deeply connected person--connected spiritually, connected to my family and friends, connected to life.
  9. Sure, I'd like to be remembered as a great cook. Why not? That would be fun.
  10. I absolutely would like to be remembered as a wonderful wife and a great mom. First, foremost, and beyond all the previous 9 items.

Hey--I think that's it! I've finished my 30 questions! What about you?

Are you reading this through Google Reader?

Google just announced it's plans to shut down Google Reader in July. I'm not panicking. That's plenty of time and, given the backlash, they may have been surprised by the number of people actually using Reader and may extend it. Still, it's a good time to explore how you follow blogs and perhaps make some changes.

Just don't change that you're reading this blog. :-)

I've been doing some research for my own use, so I thought I'd pass along some links to articles for you for now--these may help you check out some alternatives. Everyone has different needs and likes/dislikes so what works beautifully for someone else may not work for you. For example, when I first got my iPad, a friend told me I should use FlipBook because she just adored it, best thing since sliced bread, etc. I didn't like it at all. That doesn't mean she's wrong, just means we have different needs and tastes. So, test them out, play around a bit, see which one you like best.

http://lifehacker.com/5990456/google-reader-is-getting-shut-down-here-are-the-best-alternatives

http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2013/03/14/google-reader-alternatives/1986865/

http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-19512_7-57574201-233/google-reader-is-dying-but-we-have-five-worthy-alternatives/

http://marketingland.com/12-google-reader-alternatives-36158

(These are just a few articles--more will likely be coming out every day.)

These are simply the articles I've come across today--more will be written in the future so keep checking the web. It does seem like Feedly is coming out strong in terms of top recommendation, but as I'm writing this on vacation I can't test anything out until I'm home this weekend. By the way, as Google continues to tighten it's offerings-belt, I had already started the process of moving this blog from Blogger to Wordpress. Blogger has begun to annoy me, for one, but I'm seeing the writing on the wall. I'll give y'all fair warning when it happens so we can make sure we don't lose any of you! Meanwhile, have fun looking at your other Reader possibilities. Find what works for you.

Posted with Blogsy

Posted with Blogsy

Hand-Dyeds and A Finish

Remember these?

These were the fabrics created in my snow-dyeing experiments a couple of days ago.

Yesterday I had the day off and since dyeing is a fairly restful activity for a sick day (still coughing!), I decided to review Jane Dunnewold's

"The Art of Cloth Dyeing" class in Craftsy

that I'd purchased and watched some months ago. I'd bought the kit of supplies from Craftsy, figuring that it was simpler and just about as cost-effective to buy the kit Jane had put together with the basic supplies needed than it would be for me to chase all over the Internet finding and ordering them.

I felt a bit like a mad scientist in my basement, with rubber gloves and mask on, hunched over a table mixing chemicals. It was a hoot.

I started out well organized. Look how neat and clean everything is.

 And here are my fabrics, neatly wadded, scrunched, folded, banded, or bundled, waiting patiently....

Soon enough there were drips and puddles and bins of things in wonderful, hopeful color baths.

(By the way, those screw-on lids on Rubbermaid "Twist n' Loc" containers? They seal tight about half the time. Ask me how I know.)

And lookie what happened.

This one was straight turquoise.

This is roughly the same mix of turquoise and yellow that I did with the snow-dyeing above.

The colors are so much more brilliant!

I was shooting for teal on this one, using less yellow proportionately to the turquoise, but I ended up with this wonderful abstract art instead. Love it.

(Scrunched and rubber-banded little "buns" of fabric in a few places.)

This is a white tone-on-tone that I had in my stash and sacrificed to the Cause of Experimentation. In this picture, the side showing is the white tone-on-tone side. The white print acts as a resist for the most part--it's only dyed the lightest green but mostly stayed white. I wasn't too fond of this side.

(Accordion fold, rubber-banded in a couple of places.)

But the reverse? Here's the wrong side of the above fabric. Very, very nice.

It was a fairly dense print on the fabric to start. It would have been more interesting if there were less of the print to resist and more of the background to get dyed.

This was in a mix that was more turquoise than yellow. I was hoping for a teal, but instead I got this really funky mottled effect. Love!

(Scrunched up with rubberbands holding little mini-buns here and there.)

Yummy red. Straight-up red, not mixed with anything.

(Accordion fold with a couple of rubber bands.)

Another section of that white tone-on-tone. I was shooting for orange here. Almost got it. I have to play more with my color recipes.

Again, I wasn't as happy with this side as I was with...

...this side. Wowzer.

(This one was scrunched up tight and then I wrapped the ball with a couple of rubber bands to hold it as tightly closed as possible.)

More of the white tone-on-tone, this time dyed with straight-up yellow. (I think this one was "Sun Yellow.")

The mottling comes out better in this picture than in real life. It mostly just looks like yellow fabric.

And the wrong side of the fabric. Although in this case, I'd use this as the right side.

Hmm. Looks pretty intense here. It's not that bright--just a nice, springy, lemon yellow.

And my favorite result of the day? Here we go, drum roll please.....

BAM!

Now THAT'S what I'm talking about.

I mixed turquoise and red for purple, folded the fabric in a triangle and used a couple of rubber bands on two of the ends.

I

Love

This.

Unfortunately, I've run out of dyeable fabric--at least, what I'm willing to sacrifice from my stash for the time being, so I've got some PFD (prepared for dye) fabric on order now from

Dharma Trading Company

. You don't have to have PFD, by the way. I'm just testing various things to see what I like best. Some of the above fabric was Kona PFD fabric I'd picked up at Joann's awhile back. Some was white/off-white quilter's cotton I'd gotten in the scrap box from Fat Quarter Shop, and some was the aforementioned tone-on-tone. I washed the scraps and tone-in-tone with Synthrapol to prep it for dyeing. It all took the dye beautifully.

Oh, and that other thing...my second finish for 2013...

"Are You Getting Sleepy"

aka The Poppies Quilt

Detail of pantograph quilting by

Mt. Pleasant Quilting Company

Sick Days...and Dyeing

I was going to title this post "Sick and Dyeing," but thought that might send a bit too much panic. Adding some elipses may at least give people pause before they assume the worst.

Although, a few days ago, it was arguable just how lively I really was. Doing ever-so-much-slightly-better now, thank you for asking. Still not quite up to a podcast. Hopefully sometime later this week.

Yes, almost two weeks ago I came down with the same cold/flu thing that's been making the circuit. For some significant percentage of the afflicted, it has gone into pneumonia. When I finally gave in and called my doctor to ask if she could prescribe me anything that would help the cough go away long enough for me to get a decent night's sleep, she required me to actually come in to see her. I wasn't aware of the pneumonia thing. Fortunately, not pneumonia in my case; she prescribed an inhaler which helped remarkably during the day and antibiotics. Nights are still rough. I'm allergic to codeine so the usual 'Tussin with Codeine thing didn't go well (the headaches it gives me are worse than the slight relief from the coughing). I'm back to Nyquil Cough and I'm glad to say, last night was the first uninterrupted night's sleep I've gotten since this nonsense began 12 days ago. I was supposed to be driving for 6+ hours today for work but gave in and called my supervisor last night. When I couldn't even make it through the conversation without coughing fits, she very kindly moved our staff meetings so now I don't have to go down for another couple of weeks. I feel like two or three more days of quiet should kick this thing for good.

Meanwhile, what to do on sick days? I hate being completely non-productive, but I had to take things v-e-r-y slow with lots of long breaks. I did manage to get some things accomplished, though.

Our Guild does Blocks of the Month most years, in which one of our guild members (Kate) chooses a block from a book and we all make it in whatever size/colors we want. No swapping--just making it for ourselves. (This year we're doing it with paper-pieced blocks that

I've posted about before

.) I'd started doing the BOM in 2008 and never finished, so I pulled out that bin this weekend. I was pleased to see I was only three blocks short. 

After I got this block done, I realized I'd used almost exactly that same combination of fabrics in a previous block I'd made five years ago. Oops. Oh well--shows that the combination has staying power, I guess.

I kept this one simple to balance out a few of the other busier blocks.

This was the last block, so I put all previous 11 out on the table to see what fabrics I needed to use to pull them all together. I had a rather troublesome almost-entirely-green block, and another troublesome strangely-pinkish block that I wanted to make seem more like they fit in with the rest of the collection. So I used one fabric from each of those blocks, and the third is a fabric I used often (note it in the block above).

With this one "tie it all together" block, I made the two troublesome blocks no longer troublesome. Now everything feels like it fits.

Dang, sometimes I actually know what I'm doing.

So here are the 12 blocks together for the first time ever. You can see the originally-troublesome green block near the front of the picture; the strangely pink one is sitting right above it, although it doesn't come across as much pink in this picture.

That's the problem with taupes. When you're buying them individually, they all read "taupe." When you put them next to each other, you realize you've got a pretty wide range of colors.

Those blocks are now hanging on my design wall while I decide what I'm doing next. I'm pretty sure I've decided sashing, and I'm pretty sure I know which fabric I'm using for it. I have a border fabric already that I know will work. It won't take me that long to get the top pieced--just have to get myself to the energy level where I trust myself to do math.

I also got a couple more steps done in the Kimberly Einmo "Chain of Stars" mystery quilt on Craftsy, but I'm not allowed to post pictures of that publicly yet. She doesn't want us ruining the surprise for anyone else. I hope she lifts that stricture soon, though--I hope to have it done in another few weeks and don't want to wait too long to post it as a finish.

Thirdly, I got my Poppies quilt back from the longarmer and finished putting the binding on this morning. (Another great sick-day activity since it requires hours in front of the TV hand-sewing.) It's in the wash at the moment. I'll post pics later.

Then, because on Sunday I woke up to several inches of new snow, I got the bug to do some snow dyeing. Dyeing is a fantastic sick day project. About 20 minutes of activity and then several hours of waiting; a few more minutes of activity and then waiting...It was great. I felt like crud but I could still be creative. For the win.

I have dyes and such because I'd bought the kit available for the

Jane Dunnewold Fabric Dyeing class on Craftsy

months ago and hadn't gotten the time to use it yet. I tweeted

Sandi Colwell of Quilt Cabana Corner

, who had recently been posting about her snow dyeing experiments, and asked if she could send me quick-like-a-bunny how she had gone about it. She immediately replied with an email of instructions. I love social networking.

I had a little bit left of some PFD Kona White I'd bought at Joanns months ago for something else, so I tore it into pieces that are something less than fat quarter sized. I scrunched two of them, then accordion-folded one and bunched and rubber-banded a second one. (That's Sandi's email open on my iPad so I could follow step-by-step what she suggested.)

I reached out my patio door to scoop snow into the container with the fabric. Just out of sight to the left of my hand is Sam's snout. He was extremely curious as to what I was doing and I had to keep shoving him out of the way. Doofus.

Here are all my containers ready to go.

Must have the face mask before opening the powdered dyes. Probably should've been wearing one of these on the plane back from Phoenix--maybe I wouldn't have gotten the plague. Go figure.

As soon as I poured the dye solution onto the snow, it melted. Oops.

In my usual "How fast can I fix this?" mode I just scooped a bunch more snow into the container, figuring it really had more to do with the water and cold temperatures or something.

I wasn't exactly thinking straight. I think all I did was dilute the dye.

I've since read information about people sprinkling the dye powder directly onto the snow rather than making it a solution first. That would likely work much better.

Still, not bad results!

This first one was mostly yellow with some turquoise thrown in (scrunched).

This was mostly turquoise with some yellow thrown in (scrunched).

This is the one that I bunched up with rubber bands; it was in turquoise, and then I had a little yellow dye solution left over so I dumped it on one end of the banded fabric.

This is the accordion fold one that was in what I thought was a fairly even mixture of turquoise and yellow, but it was clearly more yellow.

Hence ends my first experiment with snow-dyeing. I might try it again at some point, but today I've returned to the Dunnewold class in Craftsy and am working on doing standard dyeing using her methods. I'm in the waiting period at the moment--it's all in the dye bath and I won't know how it turns out for another couple of hours, so that'll be tomorrow's post...

30 Questions Thursday--Part 5

 Happy Valentine's Day!

(For previous 30 Questions Thursdays, use the tags at the right or the little search bar on the upper left.)

20. Describe 3 significant memories from your childhood.


I have a very strong memory of sitting on my mom's lap as she was watching "The Secret Storm," her soap opera of choice. Given where we were living at the time, I could've only been maybe two or three years old. I just remember the feel of being on her lap, of feeling her breathing, and watching the opening credits of show. I mostly remember feeling her breathing, and how soft and comfortable and safe I felt. 

 The second memory that pops to mind is not soft, comfortable, or safe! When I was turning five, we were building our new house out in the country. And I mean, literally, we were building it. My Dad and Mom had decided to do a "back to nature" thing and my Dad was determined to build as much of our house with his own two hands as possible--never mind that he wasn't a contractor nor an architect. But he'd read a lot of books about it. Given that, he actually did a remarkably good job--it kept us warm and dry for many a year, even if it was never finished. I have a lot of memories of the building of that house, but specifically I recall the pouring of the concrete in the basement floor. Dad had my older sibs helping with rakes and shovels to smooth out the concrete as it was being poured--there were planks criss-crossing the framework every which way to give everyone a dry place to stand and walk as they were doing their work. I'm sure I'd been warned many times to stay out of the way, but as five-year-olds do, I was determined to be right in the action. And, of course, I slipped off one of the planks as I was running and my foot plunked right down into the wet cement. I remember Dad grabbing me as fast as he could and carrying me in his arms as he ran up the hill to where the trailer we were living in was so that he could rinse off my foot before the concrete set. I thought of it all as a grand adventure. I'm sure my Dad remembered it quite differently!

The third memory is more of a montage of scenes around a theme flashing through my mind: My Mom and my sisters and I trying to shove cows back into the pasture. Seems like that was a general past-time. We only had one cow at a time--we'd raise it for a year, then it would feed us for another year as we raised the next one. My friends used to ask if we were sad when it came time to move the cow along into the next life--and I used to respond, "No, by the time it's time has come, I'm ready to see that dang thing go!" Cows are stupid, and cows are stubborn. Or perhaps they're cleverly stubborn. Anyway, they managed to work our last nerve on a regular basis. Our fence wasn't electrified, just barbed wire. The cow would lean against it to reach the grass on the other side, eventually managing to knock it down, and then it would just casually wander out into the yard. One of us would notice it wasn't where it was supposed to be, and we'd call in the rest of the troops. Mom would haul on the halter strap and the rest of us (four girls) would lean as hard as we could into that cow's rear end--and dang if that thing wouldn't just plant its feet and refuse to budge. So many cows...so many shoving matches. Sigh.  


21. If you could have one superpower, what would it be and what would you do with it first?
The power to shove really, really hard--and I'd go back in time and get all those dang cows back in the pasture quickly like a bunny.

Okay, really...

Probably teleportation. It would be so super-cool to just show up wherever I wanted without having to deal with flying coach. 


22. Where do you see yourself in 5 years? 10 years? 15 years?


In five years, I'll be in much the same place doing much the same things. In 10 years, it's within the realm of possibility that I could be grandmothering. That would be cool. In 15 years, I'll be within a few years of retirement and hopefully making some grand plans! 

 I know that may all sound terribly dull--don't I have ambitious goals for things to accomplish and ways my life will be wildly different? Not particularly. I like my life very much. And what  I've learned in 47 years of living is that whatever I think will happen is not likely to, and what actually does happen is something I've never imagined. So I keep my eyes and ears open, but basically just enjoy the flow.


23. List your top 5 hobbies and why you love them.

Oh, this is such a gimmie.



First: Yep, there would be that quilting thing. Although I'd quibble with whether I call that a "hobby" or not. But I did an entire episode on the nuance of "art", "craft", and "hobby" so I won't go into that now. Why do I love it? So many reasons: connection to my mother;connection to my ancestors (I'm at least 6th generation so I'm carrying on quite a heritage); the social network that develops--many of my besties now are people I've met through quilting; the fact that there's ALWAYS something new to learn and new to try and fun new things to play with; the opportunity to play with color and shapes when most of my day is spent with words and numbers; creative expression in general; spiritual expression on occasion; and I could go on...

 Second: Writing, although I don't do near as much of that as I'd like to and should. I spend too much time quilting, really. But when I've allowed myself the time to get deep into writing fiction, I absolutely love losing myself in a time, space, and people that only start with something in my imagination and then grow from there, surprising me with who pops up and what they do next.

 Third: Reading. Is that a hobby? I guess maybe someone needs to give me a really, really good definition of hobby--whenever I name something as a "hobby" I always find myself thinking, "but is that really a hobby?" Hmm. Things to ponder when I'm awake at 3 a.m., I guess. In any case, I'm a voracious reader. Even cereal boxes are fair game. 

 Fourth: Photography, although this ebbs and flows. I enjoy doing it; sometimes I do a lot of it, then I can go through months of not picking up my camera except for utilitarian purposes. That's something I always think, "When I'm retired...." I'd like to own a digital SLR with all the lenses and filters but haven't bought one yet because I don't want to haul it around with me. So I guess that means I'm not a "real" photographer, heh heh.

 Fifth: Travel. Is that a hobby? But my husband and I often spend evenings tossing around ideas for places we'd like to go next. By the way, our next trip? New Orleans in March. Can't wait. 

24. Describe your family dynamic of your childhood vs. your family dynamic now.





So here's an example:

When each of my sibs and I turned 12, my dad took whichever of us was the birthday kid that year on a week-long camping trip in the Adirondacks as sort of a "coming of age" thing. I didn't really question why he did it at the time--I was the youngest, so I just recall thinking, "it's MY year this year! Yipee!" It felt like it was a benchmark of some sort, even though I didn't really know what it was a benchmark of. Dad was a big fan of Thoreau, though, so I'm sure in his head it was a way of marking our coming of age by getting back to the land, connected to nature, and all that. I really enjoyed my week on the island with Dad, although (see above) there wasn't a whole lot of talking going on. Mostly reading and writing and hiking. But it was a good memory. I didn't feel like I'd grown older or learned anything particularly through the experience. I think I had more of a sense of now knowing the secret handshake that my sibs all knew--I was part of the club of "Those Who Had Camped with Dad." And I had my carved walking stick to prove it.

My sisters continued the tradition with their kids--taking them on a trip to the Adirondacks when the kids were 12, and Grandpa went with them.

When my son was coming up on his 12th birthday, my father had recently passed away. As Ben approached his birthday, I kept telling my husband, "you should really take him camping!" This treasured memory of mine seemed an important tradition to carry on. My husband loves camping and was willing to go for it, but my son wasn't interested. "Mom, I'm in Boy Scouts. We go camping all the time. Why would I want to go camping for my birthday?" I kept pestering him about it and he kept saying, "Why do I have to do that?" So we sat down and talked about what that camping experience actually meant, and I realized it was really about my dad trying to stay connected with each of us as we moved from childhood into adolescence and on into our teenage years. It was to mark that this was a special time. "So, Ben, what would mark this as a special time for you?" I asked. "A weekend in New York City!" he answered immediately. So that was it: His dad and he went to NYC for a weekend; took in a Rangers game, ate at restaurant that featured as much meat as you could want (a big deal for an almost 13-year-old, by the time they went on their trip), and generally had a great time being guys-about-town.

For my daughter's birthday a couple of years later, she chose a spa day with me. Honestly, I'm not sure I even suggested a camping trip since I don't enjoy the camping thing as much now as I did when I was a kid. But we had a really nice day being women together, and talking about women things. I look forward to more spa days with my daughter in the future. Bonding over facials. Gotta love it.

And so we change our traditions to fit the times and needs of the current generation. 




 
 Coming soon...

25. If you could have dinner with anyone in history, who would it be and what would you eat?
26. What popular notion do you think the world has most wrong?
27. What is your favorite part of your body and why?
28. What is your love language?
29. What do you think people misunderstand most about you?
30. List 10 things you would hope to be remembered for.

It Is Finished... Easy Street Complete!

 
And so, it is complete.
The longarm quilter did a nice job with a pantograph flower. I asked her to do whatever she wanted, but to make it blend. She chose well!
I did a purple binding (also from my stash--yay). The backing was 108" I bought at the quilt shop when I dropped it off for quilting. The measurements worked out perfectly--I didn't have to cut or piece a dang thing for the back.      

Looking back through time from its humble beginnings as a stack of fabric...

No, I'm not a whole lot more thrilled with it now than I was before. However, my husband really likes it and it fits the bed in our son's bedroom (now mostly a guest room). And it's soft and cuddly now that it's been washed--nice and wrinkly like I like them. I'm not sure it'll ever grow on me, but that's okay. I don't feel the need to absolutely love everything I do. If I don't love it, or love the process, I at least have to have learned something, and that I did. So it's all good. 


So much fun to be had in one box!

As you may know, I just returned from a business trip to Phoenix, Arizona.

I went from this...

back to this....

Hence, my purchase of this....

It came while I was gone so I had my first "session" with it over my morning coffee. I do feel more vibrant today, normal trip exhaustion aside, but at this stage that has a lot more to do with hangover effect from Phoenix sun than one day with a light therapy box. However, by the time the Phoenix sun wears off the light therapy box "sun" should be kicking in. So hopefully February won't be as much a miserable-mood month for me as it usually is. (I am pleased, however, that it's a nicely sunny day out today so that helps, but it's clouding up fast.)

Adding to my joy today, however, is that I also came home to my "12 Pound Scrap Box" from Fat Quarter Shop waiting for me. Look for it on their website. If you're an adventuresome sort, it's a box full o' fun! It's also a very inexpensive way to pick up a wide variety of stuff to play with.

A whole lot of fabric scraps are stuffed in that box! I sorted as I pulled them out of the box: large scale florals, geometrics, solids, traditional/Civil War, one fabric with gold layering, novelties, pinks, modern prints (which probably could've been included in geometrics), and a small stack in the back of flannel and batik scraps.

This stack (traditional/Civil War) has colors and styles I don't normally work in at this stage. However, I've been wanting to make more wheelchair quilts, especially those that are more suitable for elder men, and it's very hard to find charm packs that have mostly masculine colors. So my plan is to chop these up into pieces of a size to make Disappearing 9-Patches for that purpose. I might even tackle the cutting today--that's something that doesn't require a lot of mental acuity. Sun vibrancy aside, I'm still Travel Stupid at this point so that's just the kind of job for me!

I made this stack of everything that was mostly pink or flowers and hearts because I'd just been saying to my daughter recently, "I should really make a table runner for Valentine's Day or something. We have no Valentine's decorations in this house!" I don't trend towards pink or hearts when buying fabric so it's very useful to have this stack of scraps now!

These two were a nice surprise after this weekend. We have an auction every summer at our conferences and proceeds benefit our girls' ministry. The leadership team of our girls' ministry (which includes teen girls on it) was the team I was with this weekend. They choose a theme for the auction--and this year, they chose "Oh, The Places You'll Go," based on Dr. Seuss' book of that title--my all-time favorite Dr. Seuss book, by the way. So I said, "That means I should make a baby quilt out of Dr. Seuss fabric for the auction!" Of course, these scraps aren't enough for a baby quilt but it was fun to see them in there, anyway. Sort of confirmation, if you will.

And this one was my complete, total, absolute favorite in the entire box. It just makes me grin. I have no idea why a bird is wearing a crown, and why is he standing next to a deer (reindeer?) with a scarf on. But they're adorable. I'd never seen this line and now I want to know more. The selvedge just tells me it's from Andover Fabrics, so if anyone can tell me what line this is, I'd be grateful!

 My next job for today--after I clean this all off my cutting table and figure out how to store it--is to choose fabrics for ... yes ... another mystery quilt. While I was gone and, might I add, quite vulnerable, some tweeps talked me into doing the

Kimberly Einmo Mystery Quilt available through Craftsy

. I was willing to give the whole mystery quilt thing another shot before I determine once and for all if it's for me, and this one has some real benefits to it: She gives you information for a variety of sizes, as well as a ton of information on how to choose fabrics that will work. After watching her fabric selection session I feel very confident that I'll be able to find fabrics that I'll enjoy working with and like the finished product at the end. So...off to shop in my stash!

30 Questions Thursday, Part 3

(For previous 30 Questions Thursdays, use the tags at the right or the little search bar on the upper left.)

10. Describe your most embarrassing moment.

Strangely, the first one that comes to mind is when I was in first grade. Back then, wrap-around clothes were all the rage: wrap-around skirts, culottes, etc. I was wearing a pair of wrap-around shorts/skort that my mother had made me. To put these on, there were two pairs of strings. You held it up to your front and tied around the back, then pulled it between your legs and to the back, then wrapped it over your backside back around to the front and secured it in the front with another set of ties. It ended up looking like shorts in the back and a little bit of a skirt thing in the front. 

 We'd been playing on the playground for recess and I came running in when the bell rang. Somehow I didn't notice that the ties on the front of my skorts or whatever they were called had come undone, and I raced into the classroom with the back of my outfit dragging on the floor, my little undies visible for all to see. My teacher had to come over and help me get everything put back together. 

 Fortunately, time has dulled the memory of the humiliation. However, I don't think I ever wore those shorts again. And when wrap-around skirts came back into fashion when I was in late-high-school/early college, I hated wearing them because they tended to blow open and be a bit...revealing...shall we say, and brought back that first-grade memory.

11. Describe 10 pet peeves you have.
  • Ignorance. Not people who haven't had a chance to learn, but people who refuse to.
  • Arrogance. Those who think they're all that and a bag of chips work my very last nerve. A little humility works wonders.
  • Taking up space. I hate going to the grocery store and getting stuck behind people who park their carts in the middle of the aisle when they could easily pull to one side or the other, or people who walk two or three abreast very slowly down the middle of the sidewalk forcing me to duck and dodge, or sitting next to guys (strangers) on airplanes who spread their legs out so I'm crammed into a corner to keep from getting too intimate with my knees.
  • People invading my personal bubble, as my daughter would say. This is similar to the above--but people who put their face too close to mine when talking really wig me out. This doesn't happen as much now but when I was a kid and adults would lean down and get really close to me to talk to me just made me feel like shrinking into the floor.
  • My kids leaving "floaters" all over the house. This may just be a family name for this, but when someone drinks half a can of pop (soda) and walks away, that's a floater. When my kids were home, I'd find floaters in the family room, the basement, the computer room...drove me nuts. Trying to get them to take their cans to the sink and rinse them out was a never-ending battle. I still end up picking up floaters now after they've gone back to their dorms/apartments. 
  • Commercials. Thank God for DVRs and the fact I can buzz through them now. 
  • People who get onto airplanes smelling like a bar floor. Yes, I've sat next to a few of them on long flights and had had to work hard not to get sick. (I don't mean someone who's had a drink or two in the airport; I mean people who were clearly up drinking all night and poured themselves onto the early flight the next morning--smelling like stale beer, sweat, and lord knows what else. Stomach-turning.)
  • Those who act like technology is the devil's tool. I'm tired of having conversations about whether or not computers have killed face-to-face relationships. My social circle has greatly expanded plus I'm able to be so much more closely in touch with my kids and sibs via texting, social networking, videocalls, and so forth, than I would have back when all we had was the phone. And it's not just a generational thing: When my mother was alive, she and I would talk on the phone, but we'd also text and chat. She had a Facebook account. (Still does, in fact--did you know you have to send Facebook a copy of the death certificate to get a Facebook profile removed? We still haven't gotten around to that four years later.) She was a gadget girl and enjoyed learning new technologies. Go, Mom.
  • Not sure I can come up with two more. I had to really think about it to get the eight I've already listed. I'm not sure I'd call all of those "pet peeves" but more, "occasional annoyances." I try to be a pretty zen person most of the time.

12. Describe a typical day in your current life.
Wake up; have a lot of coffee while doing some professional, spiritual, creativity-motivating, or quilty reading; finally eat breakfast (my stomach has to wake up first); take the rest of my coffee and go upstairs to my home office to work thinking I'll just check email and then grab a shower; hours later realize what time it's gotten to be and stop for lunch--usually not until early afternoon--then take a shower and get dressed during my lunch break since I'd lost track of needing to do that earlier; finish work; and (if I'm being healthy) go to the gym or (more usually, when I'm not being as healthy) work on some quilting project while waiting for my husband to get home; sometimes start getting dinner ready before he gets home but usually wait until after I see him walk in the door because after he's called me to tell me he's leaving his office as often as not he gets stopped in the hallway by someone and it's another half hour before he actually heads for the parking lot; have dinner; watch TV with husband but read magazines or play games with daughter on my iPad while she's away at school or some sort of hand-quilting project or whatever because I'm constitutionally unable to simply sit and watch TV without doing something else at the same time; go to bed far too late and read for awhile. 

If husband is out of town, which happens a lot, scratch everything after work from "getting dinner ready" through "watch TV" and change it to "work on quilting project, grab leftovers for dinner, quilt some more, go to bed far too late." I'm also usually out at least one night a week for something or other.

13. Describe 5 weaknesses you have.
  • Math. I hate math--I actually believe in "math trauma." I have terrible memories of a math teacher in early elementary school who was very "old school" in her approach to teaching and would highlight kids who weren't doing as well in front of their peers by saying things like, "Because Sandy didn't get this, we're all going to do it again." My husband doesn't get why I don't get math because my brain is, in so many ways, very systematic and logical and math should come easily, but my brain just has a block. And it makes my stomach hurt to do it.
  • I can get very task-oriented when I'm overly stressed, which usually doesn't help the people around me. I can quickly go into "heads-down, blinders-on, let's get 'er done" mode while some people are still struggling to catch up with what the issue is in the first place. I really have to watch myself and take a deep breath, then wait for awhile for things to play out a bit to see what actually needs to happen.
  • I can tend to avoid conflict, although it depends on the kind of conflict. If it only affects me, I usually avoid it. If it affects others--depending on the situation--I am more willing to confront it. If it affects a project I'm working on or a group dynamic or a process, I'm perfectly comfortable dealing with it. 
  • As my husband says, I can sometimes sound more intense than I really am. I have a naturally deadpan expression and a tone of voice that can come across as being intense when the reality is, I can just as easily go one way or the other on the given question. I've really had to learn how to say things like, "I don't really have an opinion on this but I'd probably want to think through X," or "I'm thinking out loud here" (and have had to teach myself to think out loud, see below). I've also had to teach myself to laugh out loud at my own jokes when speaking publicly--the deadpan thing mixed with a very dry humor means a lot of times people don't know when I'm being funny versus serious. It's genetic. My oldest sister, also a pastor and with about 10 years of experience on me, was the one that coached me to do this when I first started preaching. "People don't always know when we DeMotts are joking, so we have to cue them. 'See, I'm laughing--that means you can laugh now too!'"
  • Because I'm an introvert, there are a lot of people who have used words like "arrogant," "aloof," "disinterested," "unemotional" and the like to describe me. That's not at all true. I'm extremely interested in you and very, very curious about the world. I won't necessarily ask you about your life, not because I'm not interested in knowing, but simply because I have a very high sense of privacy and always assume that if you wanted me to know, you'd tell me. I'm being quiet because I'm observing, not because I'm judging or aloof. I like to formulate what I'm going to say before saying it; I do have emotions but don't choose to share them unless I've known you for a very long time. (All the extraverts reading this are thinking, "But you should get over that!" All the introverts reading this are nodding their heads and saying, "Yep, people have said those things about me too." LOL) I don't view my introvert nature as a weakness--indeed, there are a lot of strengths to it. However, I do view some of how it comes across in group settings, some of the "symptoms," as it were, as something I've really had to become highly aware of, and learn to compensate for, in order to be more effective in my vocation and in social terms. Hence, I'm always exhausted after being around people for awhile--I've had to spend most of that time working against nature. No matter how much I'm enjoying you and how much fun I'm having, you're wearing me out. So please don't get offended if I disappear into a quiet room or take a walk by myself for half an hour to regroup. :-) 
    •  By the way, one of the outcomes of my specific Myers-Briggs personality type (and yes--I found this listed in a book as common with folks like me!) is that I'm terrible at remembering names. That IS a weakness. My BIL is fantastic at remembering names of people he only met once years ago, and I've always been super-envious of that ability!

14. Describe 5 strengths you have.
  • See some of the paragraph above: I keep things confidential and have a very high sense of ethics, professionally and personally. I may not always ask you what's wrong, but if you tell me, it'll stay with me. 
  • I'm intensely curious and love to learn new things. Learning about people, places, techniques, history, science.... It doesn't entirely matter what I'm learning, I'm just enjoying the process of learning. (Well, except math!) 
  • I'm very organized and systematic. I can easily see how to set up a process for just about anything that needs to get done. I can change the process on the fly if it needs to be changed, but I like to start somewhere. 
  • I'm very loyal. I'm not blind to faults--but I'm loyal anyway. When we watched Law and Order together my kids always joked that I wouldn't be the mother who was trying to conceal her kids' crimes--that I'd turn them in on a dime. I always said, "Yes, I would, because you need to be held accountable--but I would love you regardless and stay with you through whatever came after!" I'm loyal to the organization I work for, my quilt guild, my friends, and my family. And my listeners!
  • I love being a part of helping to provide opportunities for people to grow. I absolutely love watching someone discover things they didn't know they knew how to do, or gain new confidence, or whatever. That's my favorite part of my job and, as I've discovered, my favorite part of doing my podcast. I love challenging people to move beyond what they think they're capable of and whatever little boxes they've put themselves in (or others have put them in). That just jazzes me no end. I get a little thrill just thinking about it.
Wow--this week was hard!







15. If you were an animal, what would you be and why?
16. What are your 5 greatest accomplishments?
17. What is the thing you most wish you were great at?
18. What has been the most difficult thing you have had to forgive?
19. If you could live anywhere, where would it be and why?
20. Describe 3 significant memories from your childhood.
21. If you could have one superpower, what would it be and what would you do with it first?
22. Where do you see yourself in 5 years? 10 years? 15 years?
23. List your top 5 hobbies and why you love them.
24. Describe your family dynamic of your childhood vs. your family dynamic now.
25. If you could have dinner with anyone in history, who would it be and what would you eat?
26. What popular notion do you think the world has most wrong?
27. What is your favorite part of your body and why?
28. What is your love language?
29. What do you think people misunderstand most about you?
30. List 10 things you would hope to be remembered for.

Wedding Pictures for My Tweeps

Several months ago, a few of my tweeps posted pictures of their wedding days just for fun. Those wedding days ranged from having been just a handful of years ago to, oh, let's just say, a lot longer. I raced through my house to find my wedding album so I could play along...only to discover my wedding album was nowhere to be found. I blamed my daughter--it was, after all, only a few weeks away from our 25th anniversary so I suspected she had made off with it to do some sort of scrapbook or something.

Nope. It was just buried in our basement. My husband found it tonight. Yay! So, here's a sampling of my wedding pictures--which are, actually, of interest for a quilt blog. You'll see why in a minute.


October 17, 1987

Me and my husband following the ceremony. I know he looks 15, but he was quite legal,, honest. (I was 22, he was almost 25.)


Me and my mom. Yes, that's the mom to whom my podcast is dedicated: Shirley, the one who taught me (a decade or so after these pictures) to quilt.

She made my dress, my veil, and all of my bridesmaids' dresses. I had drawn out on a napkin what I wanted them all to look like, and she figured it out from there.

If you look closely, you may be able to see that the bodice of my dress is hand-quilted. By Mom. (She also used scraps from my dress and made a crazy-quilt-style cover for our card box at the wedding reception--also hand-quilted. I kept that box for years until it got water-damaged and had to be tossed. It was beautiful.)


When I say Mom made all of my bridesmaids' dresses, I mean ALL OF MY BRIDESMAIDS. Yes, I had a boatload of them.

The three on my right in the picture are my sisters. The three on the left are friends. My fourth sister officiated the wedding and isn't in this picture.

I still remember hitting several Joanns in a row with Mom to find enough of the pink fabric for all the dresses. It was quite a search.

And here's proof that Mom did, indeed, make the dresses. Still making alterations 10 minutes before we were about to walk down the aisle.

I think she was only smiling for the camera. I don't recall that much hilarity about it at the time. But still, she was a trooper, and very patient with young adult women who wanted everything to be skin tight.


So here's the funny thing: after Mom had the dresses all made, she said, "You realize, don't you, that your gown is almost a dead ringer for my wedding gown?" She'd worn a very similar wedding gown herself, 30-some-odd years prior. I had seen her gown at some point in my childhood when we were playing dress-up but I'd forgotten that completely; apparently the image stuck in my head as being what wedding gowns are supposed to be.

Thanks, Mom, for everything. I certainly appreciated it then, but I don't think I appreciated it as much as I do now that I know what hard work that is!

Rewarding Myself

I took Easy Street and Poppies ("You're Getting Sleepy") off to a quilt shop for their longarm services today.  I don't particularly enjoy quilting larger quilts on my home machine. Easy Street is gi-normous, at least, for what I usually do. Poppies is a little more manageable--it's about 55"x70"-ish. But I figured I may as well have someone else working on that one while I move on. I should have them both back in a couple of weeks.

Then I decided to reward myself with just a little new fabric. How can we walk out of a quilt shop without taking something home with us, really?

I've been eyeing that top fabric in magazines for awhile: Earthtones: Art in Motion by Norman Wyatt Jr. for P&B Textiles. The quilt shop only had about a yard and a half left on the bolt. Finish the bolt, get the whole amount for 20% off. Sold!

And, of course, I had to get something to coordinate. The blue is a blue I don't already have in my stash so I decided better safe than sorry. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

Yesterday, a local quilt artist was cleaning out her studio and had a huge studio sale. I wasn't able to go myself, but my friend Lori hustled on over and had my permission to buy me anything she thought I'd like and I'd reimburse her. Lori and I have done enough fabric shopping together now that I knew she'd be able to hit the nail on the head. Sure 'nuff, here was what she handed over to me today.

These three large ziploc bags were filled with scraps of a variety of fabrics that the quilt artist had experimented with or used parts of and so forth. She was selling them as bags so it was pretty much pot-luck, but that was the fun of it. There were some real treasures in there! Hand-dyed silks and cottons, stamped fabrics, organzas, other fabrics I couldn't even identify (not being much in the garment world you get me too far beyond cotton and I'm lost), but they'll be fun to play with.

This evening, I had the very cathartic experience of dismantling my Easy Street project bin and cleaning off my cutting table. I ended up putting a lot more fabrics back on my shelf than I'd thought I would at the beginning of this project--I was hoping it would use a lot more stash. Oh well--I can always make pillowcases!







A Near Finish: Easy Street Top Complete

Phew!



  (Not a great picture--the only place big enough for me to use as a design wall on this was my bedroom floor and the lighting in there isn't exactly made for photography.)

I'm planning on (weather permitting) dropping it off with a longarmer tomorrow. I'm not going with borders because I ended up with the same fabric running all along the outside edge of the quilt and I like the idea of it just ending there. May bind with that same fabric since I believe I still have enough of it, or I may pick up the red or purple from the quilt.

If you want my full review of my experience doing this, including my feelings about the end product, listen to the episode I just posted tonight. Suffice it to say that my feelings have NOTHING to do with Bonnie Hunter. She does a bang-up job with a mystery quilt, descriptions of steps, and so forth. And I love her designs. In terms of my end result, however...well...you'll just need to listen to the episode!

30 Questions Thursday (Part 2)

 For questions 1-4, click here.

I had fun reading your comments to my first 30 Questions Thursday post--there are a few other folks out there who play flute and are afraid of heights! Please keep responding, or if you post your own 30 Questions answers let us know the links to your blog entry.


5. What are the 5 things that make you most happy right now?
     1. At the moment, my space heaters. It's way chilly outside.
     2. My husband*
     3. My son*
     4. My daughter*
     5. Expanding my mind.

*Since, arguably, numbers 2-4 could all be lumped under one response as "my happy little nuclear family," which would also then throw a couple of dogs into the mix, I'll also add here: quilting, chocolate, friends. The order of how happy these things are making me would vary within any given hour of any given day.

6. What is the hardest thing you have ever experienced? Math. Kidding. Childbirth. But that ultimately turned out okay. The loss of each of my parents. Still miss them terribly.

7. What is your dream job, and why? I've always wanted to live in a cabin in the woods, or in a cozy cottage on the beach, or a palatial estate somewhere in the UK, and be a writer. Sure, I could be a writer anywhere--but why not have a stunningly beautiful view out the window while I'm doing it?

8. What are 5 passions you have?
     1. Quilting, rather obviously. 
     2. My family
     3. Global women's issues (poverty, economic empowerment, justice, maternal health, etc.)
     4. Education--my own ongoing education, that of my children, and equal opportunity for education for all worldwide (see #3)
     5. Travel, although it seems rather odd to say I have a passion for travel. But I do thoroughly enjoy it and my husband and I prioritize it--we'll give up other things before we'll give up travel--and I encourage my kids to do it. I think it's related to #4 as well--no better way to learn about the world and other people living in it than to get out and see it!

9. List 10 people who have influenced you and describe how.
     1. My mother--I've learned much of my pragmatic, "get 'er done" attitudes and skills from her. My Dad dreamed the dreams, my Mom made the dreams work in real life. I also learned how to plan conferences from Mom, since she was part of a small group that founded and hosted a big annual quilt conference for many years. I got the gift of hospitality from my Mom as well--I love welcoming people to my home, cooking for them, and having them be comfortable and happy. (I never learned Mom's trick, however, of being able to stretch a meal to accommodate 10 extra people with only 15 minutes notice since Dad or us kids were always inviting people over at the last minute.) Mom baked all of our bread and canned all season long. Eventually that worked its way back around to me wanting to join a CSA and eat local. I still don't can, though. Not only did I learn how to quilt from my Mom, but I witnessed the joy that creativity brought to her and the deep and abiding friendships she had from within the quilting community, and wanted those things for myself. I also look and act a whole heck of a lot more like her the older I get. 

     2. My father--Dad could also be pragmatic but he was more of an idealist. He spent his life committed to teaching and practicing conflict resolution with the dream that world peace was actually possible, even within his own lifetime. Dad was also big into creativity--although I don't know if this came more from one or the other parent or--most likely--a combo package. Dad just went about it in a unique way. He wanted to learn how to throw pots, so he built himself a potter's wheel with a big ol' cement base he poured himself. He wanted to learn how to tool leather, so he not only bought the tools but tanned his own leather (we had a small subsistence farm so our dinner also became Dad's briefcase). He wanted to learn how to polish stones and, from there, we also made our own jewelry. He wanted to learn how to weave so he built himself his own loom. He wanted to make maple syrup so he carved his own taps out of wood and his own yoke out of a large tree branch, strapped buckets over his shoulders with the yoke, and hiked off into the woods to collect sap. Then steamed up the house boiling the sap on our basement stove. (It was years later I learned most people made syrup in outbuildings. Not us. We were well humidified at certain times of year.) He made wine--dandelion wine, elderberry wine--in our basement. He didn't just build us a treehouse with his own hands--he built us our family home, with his own hands. Dad liked to be intimately involved with everything he did from the tiniest nail to the roof, literally and figuratively speaking. From both parents I get my values and ideals, my priority on the importance of family, and the desire to nurture creativity in myself and others. I did not, however, get the yen to boil sap on my stove.

 3. My husband--My husband and I met when I was 19 and got married when I was 22. We more or less grew up together. Although our marriage works because we each allow one another to be fundamentally ourselves, we also have undoubtedly influenced who each other became in the last 25 years. For which I am eternally grateful.

4 and 5 are my kids. Being a mother has definitely focused my priorities and has both tried my patience and given me more patience. As I watch who my kids have become I'm able to identify things in both of them that I can trace directly to one side of the family or the other, or one family member or another, but they each have qualities uniquely theirs that I think are just the coolest thing going and I wish I had me some of that. 

6. My in-laws. In the key ways that count, my husband's family of birth is like mine--when we first met and spent hours talking, we laughed about how similar our family vacation stories were. However, in some ways our families are very different--and yes, some of that took both of us years to get used to and we still occasionally run into it. But being part of another family for almost 30 years does rub off on you, and I know there are ways I do some things now that are more directly related to my husband's family than my own.

7. I guess here I'd have to lump in a whole bunch of friends--some of whom I've had for many, many years, others who are newer. But they each match something in me and, at the same time, challenge something in me to help me continue to grow and expand. I read somewhere that the best friendships are those that help us become more than we would be otherwise, or something along those lines. I've definitely got a few friends that fall into that category. 

 8. I had an English teacher in high school who was very supportive of my writing. His comments on the margins of my papers were always very positive and constructive, and I often let him read things I'd written just for fun, which he enjoyed (or, at least, said he did). He encouraged me to start a creative writing club and agreed to serve as its advisor. We were a small group and the club only lasted a year or so, but the fact that I had that kind of support from a teacher at a time (adolescence) when you're mostly barraged with negative feedback was memorable. Unfortunately, he died from cancer not too long after I graduated--still a relatively young man with a couple of children left behind. I do wish every kid could point to a teacher who was supportive and helped imbue in them a love of learning or feelings of success. 

9. There are two or three senior women of my acquaintance of whom I often say, "I want to be her when I grow up." They are so gentle, kind, wise, and funny. They have such a great perspective on life--about what is important and what isn't worth the energy to get upset about. Their commitment is genuine and deep, and they just make me feel good to be in their presence. I pray every day that I'll be a content, joyful, thankful senior woman and not someone embittered by life that is difficult to be around. I cement these women in my memory so that when I reach a certain age and catch myself being snarky, I can call one of their faces to mind and say, "What would Jean do?" or "What would Sally do?" or "What would Miss Mary do?" and take my cues from there.

10.  For number 10, I'll say, "everyone else." Really, how can I narrow it down to 10 people who have influenced me? Every member of my extended family on both sides has influenced me in some way or another; Every woman I've had the privilege to serve with in my job has influenced me; Every author I've read, every teacher I've had, every professor, and so forth. Even coming up with the 9 I've already listed was tough only because for each one beyond my parents, husband, and kids, I was finding myself thinking, "Yeah, but what about this one or that one or the other one I'm not listing?" If we're not daily influenced in some way by the people who cross our paths, we're not growing and becoming. 

 That's it for today. Whew! These were long ones!

 Coming up:
10. Describe your most embarrassing moment.
11. Describe 10 pet peeves you have.
12. Describe a typical day in your current life.
13. Describe 5 weaknesses you have.
14. Describe 5 strengths you have.
15. If you were an animal, what would you be and why?
16. What are your 5 greatest accomplishments?
17. What is the thing you most wish you were great at?
18. What has been the most difficult thing you have had to forgive?
19. If you could live anywhere, where would it be and why?
20. Describe 3 significant memories from your childhood.
21. If you could have one superpower, what would it be and what would you do with it first?
22. Where do you see yourself in 5 years? 10 years? 15 years?
23. List your top 5 hobbies and why you love them.
24. Describe your family dynamic of your childhood vs. your family dynamic now.
25. If you could have dinner with anyone in history, who would it be and what would you eat?
26. What popular notion do you think the world has most wrong?
27. What is your favorite part of your body and why?
28. What is your love language?
29. What do you think people misunderstand most about you?
30. List 10 things you would hope to be remembered for.

Some new toys

It was a busy weekend with family in from out of town to celebrate my husband's birthday. The last of the family left town this morning. Although normally I'd have been back to work today, I think I've got a stomach bug (or perhaps my stomach is just well and truly tired of all the unusual eating patterns of a weekend of celebrating) and I ended up laid out for the day.

I mostly slept, read, and watched Netflix, but by late afternoon things were settling down enough for me to make a little progress turning blocks and triangles into a top for Easy Street, and then I played a little with the Transfer Artist Paper (TAP) which has been on my shelves for awhile waiting for me to just start messing with it. "Messing" is the appropriate word at this point. So far I'm learning all the mistakes to avoid later. Hopefully in another few days I'll have something more interesting to post about that.

Meanwhile, over the weekend I got my delivery from Meinketoy.com (fiber arts supplies), which I'd seen advertised in the latest issue of Quilting Arts Magazine. What fun! I can't wait to use these as embellishments in my experimental quilting. Here's some eye candy for you.




Mesh Yarn--that I can either use all squished up or pulled out into its full mesh-y glory.

Ribbon/yarn made from old saris. Absolutely mouthwatering colors.

Meinketoy also sells what they call "toy boxes," or collections of random scraps of sari yarn. I bought two.

The prices are great, too, b.t.dubs.

Yes, I'm applying peer pressure.

(More later when I'm back in the swing of things about the drawing for the 2013 Quilty Resolutions, and hopefully I'll have more updates on the Easy Street front in another day or two.)