Sewing, fabric, biking and SNOW!

First - sewing
I put the borders on that multi layer piece so now it is ready to pin baste for quilting

Second - fabric

I received the rest of my order from Hancock's of Paducah of the American Made Brand cotton. The new fabric is at the lower right - all three gray fabrics they have in the line, dark yellow, and cream.

I also bought this cow fabric for a baby quilt I need to make. Cute cow fabric is hard to find! I think I will use a lot of black/white fabric and orange fabric with this print.

Third - biking
Last night Paris-Roubaix one day bicycling event was on TV. This race is 159.7 miles long in one day over smooth roads as well as cobble paths. I started watching it, but I had to tape the rest and go to bed. I needed my rest just in case I get to go to Columbus tonight to see Bruce Springsteen. Here is a shot of the boys riding over some cobble. That is not fog - it is the dust they kick up! Cobbles are very dangerous to ride over and if it was raining they get very slick and the boys would be covered with mud. This is motivation to stay in front!

And last - SNOW - yes it is snowing! Yesterday is was so warm in the trailer at work I had to plug in the fan. This morning I unplugged the fan and plugged in the space heater. It is not enough that I have to shovel, and the roads aren't bad, but come on Mother Nature!

Yardwork and sewing

What a beautiful weekend! I took a half day on Friday. I cleaned house for about an hour then a quilting friend came over to look at what hand dyed fabric I had left. I sat and sewed for awhile until my 4 cubic yards of sweet peat was delivered.

I went back to sewing and by Sunday I had this quilt top done. This is the veteran's quilt top I will be sending to Vicki. It is made with homespuns - something I don't use anymore. It turned out 52" x 69".

I still have a pile of homespun so I will probably put together another top and see if that will take care of the rest of this. I want to make binding for the first top so I will do that first before I start cutting what I have left up.

Saturday evening I worked in the yard for 2 1/2 hours and I worked another 2 1/2 hours on Sunday morning in the yard. I spread Preen down first, pulled any weeds, and then dumped and spread my sweet peat. I got the center bed done and the bed next to the house. Notice how the daffodils are not open in the yard, but the ones next to the how bloomed.

Then there is the bed that needs a lot of help. This first picture is after I had already dug out an ugly bush on the right side.

I then started to dig an edge around the bed so that I can install a brick edge. I have a bunch of bricks my brother had given me years ago and I am finally going to put them to good use. I also bought some landscaping fabric for this area because I have a real bad week problem here. I transplanted two Lenten roses back farther in the bed so they will get shade from the mugo pine. Where the bush was I transplanted a hunk of ornamental grass from one of the two plant that I gave a haircut to a couple of weeks ago. Man, that was a battle and a half trying to cut a chunk of that out! I used a sharpened shovel and two different knives and finally after almost an hour I was able to free up a piece. That root system is tough! So here is the bed as it sits right now.

Here is what my sweet peat pile looks like now. I covered it with plastic because the wind was howling and I didn't want it to blow away! It is also suppose to rain so now it won't get as wet. I could be a couple of weeks before I get that other bed done to the point where I can spread it with the sweet peat. At least it is easier to get the car out of the garage now!

I also worked on sewing together the multi layer blocks that I had used for the lecture last week. The shape of these came out very rectangular and I would have wasted a lot if I had cut squares. I decided to cut rectangles and see what would happen. I have the six blocks sewn together. I needed to add borders on the top and bottom to make the piece bigger. I scoured my cutting table and my scrap basket looking for enough fabric to make the borders. I had only one small piece of the dark blue, one piece of the blue with white squares, and one piece of the Dr. Seuss white with the blue shapes. I cut up what little I had left of the blue with the circles. I still had plenty of the word play cream and the green striped fabrics. At the left side is the binding. I was too tired last night to sew together the borders. This will make a cute baby quilt to add to my stash.

Caulking and sewing

I needed to get my new bricked in window caulked because it was suppose to start raining again. I did that and yes, it is raining. I still need to paint the lintel.

I sewed together one block of the multi layer blocks I showed at my lecture so I could email it to Dawn. There was a lady that asked why I didn't trim all four sides of the FQs before I cut the FQ into sections. I explained that the edges become uneven at the sides when you sew the sections together. This was a good question and when I show this technique again I will definitely have an example of a block sewn together but not trimmed so they can visually see what happens. Here is the block.

Look what the UPS man brought me! I got a good deal. The batting was 50% off,I had a coupon for an extra 15% off, and I had a $25.00 gift card from my sister-in-law, brother and Michael for making stuff for the band.
I guess I will be making a few more quilts.

I have plans for the weekend to make a veteran's quilt top for Vicki at Field Trips in Fiber and working in the yard. The rain is suppose to stop so I hopefully can get out in the yard this afternoon (I am taking a half day vacation). I have a load of Sweet Peat coming this afternoon to dress up my flower beds.

Have a great weekend!

Last night's lecture and a suprise today

I was so busy with setting up, talking, and then tearing down I never took one picture of the wonderful group of ladies that at the meeting last night. There must have been at least 50 women there! Everything went well thanks to Dawn who helped show quilts, fold them up, and helped me unpack and pack the car. Darla also helped carry stuff for me too. The quilts that drew the most ohs and ahs were the two gray and yellow quilts - the multi layer baby quilt and the big one I made for my guest room.

I sold lots of fat quarters and bundles. Look - I now have emptied one full container!

Remember how I had shown that picture of all my samples organized into a nice pile? This is what the pile looked like after I go home. There is no time to be neat when you are moving from one example to the next. I just took them off the design board and dumped them in a bag.

I needed to get the brick fixed around a window. There use to be a little bay window at this location and when I replaced all the windows in the house the new window didn't fill the space the bay left. So my brick guy called me this morning after I had already gone to work and wanted to do the window today. I went home quick - it is only a mile away from work - and got the hose out for him. You can sort of see the issue with the window here.

Here it is all done! It is amazing he was able to find a match for 55 year old brick!

I just need to caulk between the window and the brick and this will be a good job done!

Samples and has spring sprung?

I worked on getting my sample blocks and pieces organized last night. Here they are piled up in the order that they will presented. This pile is actually upside down. I need to cut a piece of cardboard to sandwich the pieces to the board I have underneath for transporting them to the lecture. I made some notes in my copy of the program so I have stuff to talk about while I change the pieces on the design board.

I went for a 45 minute walk last evening just to get out and enjoy the weather. The sun was shinning, but the air is still cool. I took a look around the yard to see what was happening. There was a cute group of crocus that the squirrels had transplanted for me and the deer hadn't eaten the flower yet

The Lenten roses are blooming - these are poison to deer

Where it is warmer next to the house because of the brick facing south, I saw my first glimpse of yellow from the daffodils.

There was frost on the roof this morning and the temp is only 43 right now. The sun is shinning, but 43 is still cold!

A behind the scenes look

I spent time gathering quilts and items I need to take with me for my lecture tomorrow evening. There is a fair amount of prep work that takes place so hopefully I don't look like a goof!

The place I am going to does not have a projector so I need to take my portable design wall I made in February for the art museum workshop. I decided to modify it and put an easel back on it. After thinking about this for the past couple of day I had a plan. I had a cardboard shipping box from some shoes I bought a couple of months ago and never got around to throwing out the box - thank goodness! I cut the whole width of the front off leaving on the end flaps. I positioned the piece on the back and taped one of the flaps to the back of the wall. I then got some fabric and taped to the other flap. The fabric goes under the design wall and I used small binder clips to hold the fabric in place. To give the design wall some stability I will place one of my covered bricks inside the easel back. I did the fabric at the bottom so I can unclip the fabric and the easel back will be flat for transporting and storage.

I have my quilts and quilt tops gathered.

My boxes of FQs to vend

The handouts (already in the car)

All that is left is to sort thru this pile of pieces and parts that I have used in previous lectures and the workshop. I will not be cutting or sewing so I need to have step by step examples ready to put on the design wall. Gosh, I am going to have to be super organized!

7th finish of 2014

I spent most of my weekend working on this quilt. I am glad to have this one done. I will add it to my baby quilt stash, but I wanted to get it done for my lecture on Wednesday. It is 44" X 59". I used Warm & Natural 80/20 for the batting and Mettler 40 wt. cotton quilting thread in natural for both the bobbin and top thread.

Look how my canna is growing!

The weather was cool again this weekend. Sunday morning there was frost on the cars and it was only 30 degrees. It warmed up in the afternoon to the low 50's so I went for a nice long walk. Today and tomorrow rain is predicted. The ground is still very wet so we really don't need a lot more rain right now.