Hi everyone! Sorry I have not posted in a while. I have not been doing a whole lot of any particular thing. Some hand quilting (which I am doing without a hoop and loving it!) and some hand embroidery for a Christmas gift.

After the two hurricanes we had in this area I just felt lost for a while. We came back from Pennsylvania just in time for the first one and I had not settled into my home routine yet. Then the second one hit. We did not have any damage to our property but the emotional damage was there albeit, temporary.

I worried about the family and when something like a dangerous hurricane happens I begin to think about what is really important. Like when packing things up for safety (important papers and pictures, etc). But I also think about how I have been spending my time. Was it doing something important, something that could make a difference in someones life. If I would die today who would have been affected by me being here. Thoughts like these, throw my everyday routine into a spin. I begin to rethink things I am working on and am I doing enough for my family? I felt kind of lost not only in my everyday routine, including quilting, but in my thoughts.

Are the quilts I'm making important to someone other than myself? Is it bad that I neglect my domestic chores (dishwashing and cleaning, etc)? Should my quilting be going in another direction? Like maybe more charity quilts. I have not found the answers to these questions and it is a daily journey to find out but with the changing of the seasons comes feelings of change.

I don't know what it is about the fall but it makes me want to cook (things from scratch like my mother and grandmother used to do. Using their recipes) and also to clean. Maybe it is that old feeling of "Spring cleaning" but in the fall. So for now not much quilting is going on but, I will continue to enjoy the renewed feelings of cleaning and cooking while I have them (because I know they will not last!) I guess it is all part of the changing seasons.

A friend said maybe I had just lost my "Mo-jo". I don't know, but I am hoping to find it again soon. I had lots of projects planned for this fall. Many Christmas gifts to make. We'll see....

2 posts in one day! Wow!

I must have way too much time on my hands. Actually I do have other things I should be doing but thought I would take pictures of my last two paintings from paint class for you to see. Last night was our last class and I'm sad and happy. I learned a lot and built up confidence in my abilities to paint but I'm really glad to have my Thursday nights back. I'm very much a homebody and getting out at night to go to a class across town was not my cup of tea!

This is a painting I did from a picture in a magazine. It is not finished but this is as much as I got done last week in class. I have not made the time to tweak it. I think his mouth looks like the "Joker" from Batman but the paint would not dry fast enough to add the color for his tongue. Overall, I'm happy with it. The teacher was very generous with his critic and said this was good enough to be entered in one of the art contest going on right now. NOT what I am interested in doing. Just like my quilting-It is all just for fun!



This is what I painted last night. I can not tell you how much I was dreading this class. We were doing portaits and I don't usually do people as I stated before. But this teacher pushed me to do what I did not think I was capable of. He handed out a drawing of a man's face and said paint this or use a picture you brought. I had brought pictures but was less intimidated by the picture of this man. I started painting and at first it was not much to look at. The colors were wrong ( I used grey and browns for the shading) but after I started to put some flesh tones and add detail it was looking ok. After I did the eyes then he came alive to me. I am most proud of this painting because it is something I did not think I could do. It makes me think what else is possible. Now, can I do it again? That is the question.
The teacher said it was a very strong portait. A great compliment (at least as far as I'm concerned)!

We are getting tropical storm force winds all day today along with some rains and we may be under a tornado watch sometime today but it beats the hurricane force winds we had 1-1/2 weeks ago.
Thought you might like to see some pics I took of the sunrise this morning. Ike is doing his best to make them beautiful. The clouds were blowing in fast and it was changing fast. I had to be quick to take the pics (not to mention my gown flying everywhere-yes, I was not dressed yet!).
Enjoy! I did!

Quilt stuff...finally

I haven't posted anything quilty for a while and I finished the labels on these two quilts yesterday and took some pics. These quilts were made for my husbands Aunt. She is a nun and they do a lot of charity fund raisers. She sent me the embroidered blocks (done by her and a friend's Mom) and asked if I would make these into quilts for a fund raiser. No rush, just whenever. I got them last year around Sept. or Oct. and you know how it is, other things come up and these got pushed to the back burner a couple of times. But they were always in the back of my mind. My best friend and I worked on these together and we got them finished. We pieced them together and I quilted the smaller one and she quilted the bigger one (she had the harder job, that was a lot of blocks to custom quilt). I'm glad they are done and we will have to get them to her soon.

This is the larger one that my friend quilted.

Here are close ups of the quilting in the sashing and blocks. She uses a Juki TL-98Q sewing machine set on a table. It is hard to do some of these designs but she is getting good at it.

Here is a close up of the quilting in the border. I hope you can see it. It is quilted with e's and l's that have one echo stitch all the way around.

This is the smaller one that I quilted. I also use a Juki-TL98E set in my sewing cabinet. At first it was hard to decide how to quilt these. I knew we would have to quilt in the embroidered blocks but had never done that before. These were vintage blocks. That made me nervous but, I'm real happy with how they turned out. They are not perfect but they are quilted as my friend likes to call it "Machine quilted by Hand". Every block is different. It is not stitched by a machine so that they all are the same. You move the fabric and so sometimes it is not stitched exactly perfect. But you know what? It doesn't matter. The overall look is good and it is done! Sometimes I think that is the most important thing. To finish the quilt.

Here is a close up of the quilting in the blocks and borders. The border is quilted with e's that are echoed.

Here is a close up of the quilting in the sashing. This was something new to me. I did the small flowers and culi-cues. I usually do straight line quilting in the sashing. I like the way it came out.

I'm also starting to work on some Christmas gifts. I have a small table topper that has embroidery on it and some wool. I'm working on the embroidery right now and will get pics when it closer to being finished.

Every year I make a quilt for one of my in-laws for Christmas. I started this in 2001. The year I learned to quilt. The quilt this year is for one of my brother-in-laws. Making quilts for men and boys is fun and different. Using a different color arrangement to make it more masculine.

My friend is really good at choosing colors and knowing what looks good together so she will come and help me choose the fabrics, from my stash, of course. I'm really trying to use it up. Although, as much as I use it never seems to go down, instead it seems to multiply. Why is that? If anyone has any theories on this I would like to hear it.

We are back from Pennsylvania. My husband enjoyed his woodworking class. He learned a lot of tips and info about trees and how they grow then about how to cut it and make furniture. He made a sofa table but it is not finished yet because he had to bring it home unassembled. When it is done I will post some pictures.

The picture above is a tree that I did for my watercolor class. We were supposed to use one color to learn color value. I used water color pencils and a paint brush. It was kind of fun. The teacher said "The tree has dimension and the trunk is believable. Has visual interest and should be matted and signed. Now try using a full spectrum of colors...". I am happy with it. It looks like a tree to me. My next class is tomorrow night. I missed one class and I they were working on the color wheel so I will have to catch up.

A lot is going on right now. My daughter and her husband are temporarily living in my quilt teaching workshop. They have ordered a new double wide trailer and the company said it would take 4-6 weeks before it was ready so they put their old trailer up for sale and the first guy that came to see it bought it. They had to get busy packing and now they are done and out. Their stuff is in storage except for what they need to live right now. Today the trailer company called and said the new trailer is done and will be delivered to the lot on Monday. Wow! That was quick! The old trailer will be moved tomorrow then cement runners have to be done and a new septic tank before the new trailer can be moved.

And now we are watching a tropical storm that is heading to the gulf and possibly toward us. It is always a scary time when that happens. We will watch, wait and pray.

Trees...

I signed up for a paint class for absolute beginner's. My daughter is taking it with me. I had my first class last Thursday and we didn't paint-we drew! It seems that you have to be able to draw before you can paint. Why didn't anyone tell me this.
It is a watercolor paint class and for some unknown reason I thought I would just go to class and put paint on the paper canvas and have tons of fun. No, that was not to be. Instead he said draw a tree. A TREE! I don't know what a tree looks like in my mind. How can I do this. Oh well, I thought I can put down lines that look like a trunk. I did and the result is in the upper left corner. He said "It looks like a fantasy tree". Huh, it seems my branches are out of proportion to my trunk. He said "Start over and try to let the branches go off the paper. Don't let the paper confine me". WHAT!
Ok, I can do this. The result is in the upper right corner. He said "You are concentrating too much on the individual leaves. Try to think in color value. Blocks of light and dark." So I fixed it. He said " It looks good. Your strength is texture and detail". Didn't he just tell me not to do too much detail? I'm confused.
I try again using a light source this time coming from the upper left of my page. The result is bottom left in the picture above. He looks at it and tells me to try my darks and lights in different places so I do (I didn't take a picture of that one.) His remarks "You did exactly what I said, but it doesn't look right, you were right with the other one". Huh? Ok, I think, a great teacher, not afraid to admit when he is wrong.
I try for another tree at home and the result is the bottom right corner. Our homework was to read this paper he gave us on "line", which made no sense to me at all and to draw more trees. I don't want to draw more trees, I want to paint some trees. It is a paint class, after all. Oh well, we will see what the class holds in store for next Thursday. Until then, I'm drawing trees.

Hi All, it's Friday, my favorite day of the week! I don't have any big plans this weekend but I'm still looking forward to it. I have had to be out of the house everyday this week for one thing or another and I'm looking forward to staying home today. Tomorrow I will be having some of my quilty friends over to hand quilt and a quilt that was made to commemorate the 250th birthday of the Marquis de Lafayette. It has already been quilted but does not have enough quilting in it. When we put it up on the wall it sagged at the bottom. I love to hand quilt. It is so relaxing to me. My thoughts can run wild while my hands are kept busy.

Here is a block that I made for a project that my mini group was working on. We decided to make a Louisiana quilt. There are 12 people that are making a block and the only rules were to make it about Louisiana. It could be any technique and any size as long as it is divisible by two. I did one on Louisiana music. The saxophone for the jazz music and the accordion for the cajun and zydeco music. The blocks were collected and all the names put in a hat and a name was drawn to win them. I did not win but that is ok because a friend won. We will help her to put the blocks together into a quilt. It will be fun. I used machine appliqué with fusing and I drew the notes with my pigma pen.

It has been really crazy around here. My oldest son had some medical problems last week and it took a couple of days but he is ok now. My sister and her husband won the St. Jude Dream home on Sunday and the whole day was spent going to the house and celebrating with them. They have not received the legal stuff yet but the excitement is starting to wear off because now they are worried about having to pay the taxes and selling the house. They love where they live and don't want to move. They are middle class with two incomes and live pay check to pay check. I hope it all works out for them. Seems like winning something should be a good thing and not come with headaches but we'll see.

I'm taking a blog break. I can't seem to find the time to blog right now. I am trying to keep up with reading my favorite blogs and even that is hard. The summer is supposed to be a time of relaxation (at least it used to be) and slow paced but my life right now seems to be on fast forward and something has to give. I will try to come back soon. Hopefully things will settle down. I will check in as often as I can.

This morning I started with the first class of my beginner quilt class. This is the third go around. The three ladies in this class are all friends that I have known for a few years. It went pretty good. They learned cutting and 1/4 inch seams. One of the ladies has a 1/4 inch foot on her sewing machine that came with her machine. It was not working correctly. The little metal guide on the right side would bend out whenever she put the foot down to sew. It was frustrating for her. I marked her machine with blue painters tape (about 4 layers) to make a guide for her to follow but I suggested she let the dealer know about the problem with the foot. I wish they made one 1/4 inch foot that fit every machine. It would sure make it easier.

We had a busy weekend. It passed so fast. We were invited to eat at my BIL's house on Saturday night and went to the movies with them on Sunday night. It was a lot of fun. The men went to see "Ironman" and the women went to see "What happens in Vegas". It sure was a funny movie.

I think it is time I got off this computer and got to some sewing. See ya!

I have finished the step 5 of Orange Crush Mystery. Yeah! It was alot of fun working with that orange fabric. It is not a fabric color I deal with too often. This whole project has been fun! I have enjoyed learning alot of new things.

Tonight I am teaching a class. My SILs wanted to learn how to quilt. Neither of them owned a sewing machine. They each bought one and we are starting from the beginning. Last week we had a good time talking about quilting supplies and fabric. Tonight they will start cutting strips and sewing their blocks. We always have a good time when we get together and this is no different.

I know I have not posted in a while. I have worked on the Orange Crush Mystery quilt step 5 this past weekend and when I finish I will post pictures. Today is guild day. I go to the morning and night meetings so it is a full day. Plus my youngest son has guitar lessons at 4pm. I will be tired tonight. I'm in charge of Door prizes this year for out guild. I get to spend some of the guild's money and buy nice things to give away. What could be better! For this month I bought...I can't tell yet! Some of my friends read my blog. I will share later what I bought. Gotta go, right now I should be getting ready instead of playing.

Friday Fill-Ins #72 and some scary weather!

1. There is absolutely NO way you can get me to fly in a plane (that is what I used to say, now I'm thinking of planning my first flying trip)!
2. Hurricane emergency kits reminds me that summer is almost here!
3. I cannot live without my bible first then needle and thread.
4. Painting a picture and flying to Hawaii are two things I'd like to try.
5. When life hands you lemons you believe that God is sending sweeter fruit.
6. Getting a banana seat bike with a basket on the handle bars for my birthday is my favorite childhood memory.
7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to going bowling, tomorrow my plans include whatever I feel like doing (I finally have a Saturday to stay home) and Sunday, I want to do more of the same (will probably include some sewing and quilting)!


Yesterday we had a scary morning. A twister passed through two doors down. It did not touch down but took the tops of the trees down across our road and the power lines with it. This is the first one I have ever experienced and never want to do that again. It was about 6:30am. The electricity cut off and I noticed my fan had stopped (I was in bed fixing to get up). The wind outside sounded different, it had a whistle to it I had never heard before. I jumped out of bed to tell my hubby what I had heard (he was in the kitchen eating breakfast before leaving for work). We looked outside and the trees were bent in half from the wind and things were blowing all over. It was hard to see because it was white from the rain. My SIL was leaving for work right when it was passing and he saw the trees come down in the road. He ran back into their home and got our daughter and ran over here, they live in a trailer. By the time we let them in (they were soaked) it was over except for the wind and still some rain. By 10am it was all over and the sun was shining. Our whole town got hit some way or another but some parts of town got it bad. There is a place we call the Oil Center (lots of businesses and doctor's offices) that had a direct hit. Windows blown out and roofs blown off. Our doctor's office was one of them.

I am counting my blessings this morning and praying for those that are in need. I'm not looking forward to hurricane season which is due to start here on June 1st.

Busy

I can't believe it has been almost a week since I blogged! I have been so busy. The quilt above is the one I'm doing in my Hand quilting class from Quilt University. I got it together on the weekend and just marked the quilting and basted it yesterday.

This is a close up of the center quilting design. You can't see it that well but the center grid is 1/4 inch and there are wheat stalks and leaves with a 1 inch grid on the outside of the feather ring. There is also wheat stalks in the red borders. It was the first time I marked a quilt design using my light box. It worked quite well but the freezer paper design had to be made before I could do the marking and that took a little longer than I thought it would. But I'm happy with the results.
I'm quilting it with red thread so the quilting will show up good to take pictures for my class. Since the class is online that is the only way for the teacher to see our work.

I am also working on my Louisiana BOM for May. I will post pictures when they are done. And I'm ready to start on Step 4 of the Orange Crush mystery quilt on Bonnie's site. I will have some sewing time today so I think I will split it up between hand quilting and the Orange Crush.

Things just don't seem to slow down around here and I'm trying to figure out what to cut out to make things simpler. I love all that I'm doing right now but can't seem to spend the quality time on each individual thing. It is just a moment here or there that I have to give to it and it seems not enough. I will have to give it more thought. I don't want to give up my teaching of quilting. I'm enjoying that so much. It is overwhelming at times but rewarding. I have two classes on Thursday, a morning and night class. I guess things will slow down after my QU classes are over and my own beginner quilt classes finish at the end of this month. I'm looking for the slow lazy days of summer. Is there such a thing? I will find it. I have to. Well enough rambling. On to sewing. Have a wonderful day everyone.

Here are the split nine-patch blocks that I made for the "Combing through your scraps" class I'm taking from Quilt University. I love the idea of using a block (in this case the Variable Star) to make the whole quilt. I really liked using my scraps and the split nine-patch were easy to put together. I used the Easy Angle Ruler for the half squares. I did find out that I don't have a lot of really light fabrics. I have more mediums. I did as the teacher suggested and used the backs of several of the light to mediums that I had. It worked. I think I will make some more of these and make a different block. I have my eye on an Ocean Waves block and for that I need 48 split nine-patch blocks. It will be an on going project. That's what I worked on this weekend. I am also working on my April and May Louisiana BOM. I had to redesign one of them. It was for LSU in Baton Rouge and I had to do ULL for the university in my city. I now have to do the machine applique on it. I will get to it later this week. Hope everyone is having a quilty day!

This is what I have been up to. I have finished the Step 2 and 3 of Bonnie's Orange Crush Mystery. There are 142 Split 4-patches in step 2 and 44 half split 4-patches in step 3. I'm so looking forward to step 4. It will not be for two weeks so I have time to catch up on some other sewing. Like all the things below.

Below is the 12 inch hoop and the top and bottom fabric I will be using for my Quilt University class in Handquilting. I had to buy the hoop because all I had was a 14 inch one and I found out that the 12 inch works better for me by using one of my friends. My arm is short and the reach is better on the 12 inch. I will be using red thread to quilt this with. The teacher said to use a contrasting thread so when we take pictures to show her she would be able to see our stitch good. The red thread will work perfect because I will be using this as a wall hanging in my workshop and it has red accents.

Here is what I have so far on my Quilt University class-Combing through your Scraps. I spared you the sight of all my scraps everywhere trying to figure out my lights and darks. I have cut half squares and squares of light and dark fabrics and now I'm sewing split nine patches. I'm sewing them like Bonnie suggests, as leaders and enders. Check it out if you want to know more. I'm liking it a lot.

The picture below is all of the BOM's I have done so far on the Seasonal Delights. I finished April and May as much as I could. Some of the applique's have to wait until it is pieced together. This is how these blocks will be put together. I'm liking it so far.

I have more BOM's to do for April and May on Thimbleberries and Louisiana Blocks. I will get to those next week hopefully and post pics.

That's all for now. I must go and sew some more. Lot's to catch up on. (But you know I'm lovin' it)!

Friday Fill-In #70

1. Two of my favorite ingredients in a drink are lime & cranberry juice (a favorite at the moment)!
2. Watching children play often amazes me.
3. You can keep doing that forever, the dog is nowhere to be found (I'm not an animal person.
4. Scraps of fabric & some quality time, mix it all together and voila! You have a quilt!.
5. If I had a yard with a garden, I would love to grow plenty of vegetables (fresh produce is always good).
6. Soap is best au naturel.
7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to a night out with hubby, tomorrow my plans include lots of sewing (as usual) and Sunday, I want to see my daughter and her hubby off (they are leaving for a one week vacation it's a 16 hour drive)!

I'm still here...

I have been real busy sewing up a storm. I'm trying to finish a quilt for a family friend to give to her granddaughter for graduation. I machine quilted it this weekend and now I have to hand sew the binding on. That will be night time sewing. I have also just finished the Step 3 in Bonnie's Orange Crush. I am also taking two classes right now from Quilt University. "Combing through your Scraps" with Karen Combs and "Tessellating Stars" with Cindy Thury Smith. I have two more I signed up for that will start next month. "Handquilting" with Nancy Chong and EQ6 Sampler with Fran Gonzalez. There is a lot of home work. Cutting and piecing. I get so busy I forget to take pictures. I will have to try to remember next time I'm working on them. So you can see why I have stayed away from the computer. The computer steals a lot of my sewing time so I have to limit it right now. Just wanted to let you all know I'm still checking on all my favorite blogs but can't find the time to do that, blog on my site and sew. I'll be back soon. Terry

Friday Fill-Ins #69

1. When I fell in love it was with the man I knew I would marry!
2. I feel renewed and look forward to no routine when the flowers bloom and it heats up outside!
3. Oh no! The internet connection is down, oh well, I'll get more quilting done.
4. I would not know what is the craziest tv show ever I don't watch much tv.
5. Cheese and macaroni make a great meal!
6. I planted and we have a garden.
7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to eating out, tomorrow my plans include quilting a quilt for a customer and Sunday, I want to finish it!

We are back! A very pleasurable weekend away at relatives home. We had a wonderful time. We ate well, had good conversation and played a Wii video game. My son had been wanting one for a while and they are hard to find so when my daughter saw one at the store this weekend she picked it up for him. It came with the sports games and we had the best time this weekend playing with that thing.

I'm very tired today, though, the concert that my husband was going to out of town was supposed to be on Saturday night but unexpectedly was moved to Sunday night because of a double booking. We didn't get home until 2:30am this morning and caught a few hours of sleep before hubby had to get up and go to work. I, of course, could not get back to sleep after he left so I got up and started my day but I'm dragging. Maybe an afternoon power nap will do the trick. My hubby, on the other hand, will have to make it up tonight.

Because I don't have pics to show right now the progress I'm making on Bonnies Orange Crush mystery project, I will show you a picture of a quilt I did way back in 2001. It is a stained glass quilt. This was the second class I took after my beginner quilt class. I must have lost my mind at the time because this was not an easy quilt to make. It is paper pieced. I love the way it came out though, and it hangs in my bedroom.

Speaking of classes, I've signed up for three classes at the Quilt University online. I have taken classes with them before and I love it. I can work at home at my own pace. Which right now is very important since I don't seem to have a minute to spare lately. The first class is "Combing through your Scraps" with Karen Combs. I'm also signed up for "Tesselating Stars" with Cindy Thury Smith and "Hand Quilting" with Nancy Chong. I'm looking forward to learning a lot.

That's all for today. Hope everyone has a quilty day!

Here is a super simple and easy birthday card I made for my daughter. I pulled out a few triangle pieces of scrap fabric from my scrap bag in greens, browns and golds. I stick glued them to the card stock then on my sewing machine I used free-motion thread work. I used only brown thread to sew out the tree, sewing over and over in the same spots to make shadows. Then I sewed over the triangles of fabric free-motion. It was fun, just moving the card around under the sewing machine and letting the thread do all the work. When I was finished, I took a sharpie marker and drew a little bird in the tree with a nest (you can see it is a very simple shape, I'm not that great at drawing things from my head). I wrote my message and then I put some other colors on the fabric with the green, orange and brown sharpie markers just to add depth. I love the way it came out and I know she will like it because it is an original from her Mom. I have wanted to try this for a while. I'm glad I did it was fun and a new way to use some of those scraps, even though it is just a small amount.