Stars for Australia

As many of you know, Australia has suffered through some of the worst bush fires in history lately, with the death toll at 189 people and rising, not to mention the loss of homes, pets and livestock. This has really rung a chord with me, after living in California for over 20 years. Californians know a thing or two about fires too, but thankfully not usually on this scale. I've never gone through a fire, but I've been too close for comfort to a few. These fires in Victoria have been so devastating. I can only imagine how terrible it must be for the survivors. House & Baby has a post on her blog where she discusses what some people have gone through. Warning: this will make you cry.

So, in response to this disaster, Tia @ Camp Follower Bag Lady, has started the BushFire Quilt Project. She is collecting 12.5 inch quilt squares of wonky stars, a la Gwen Marston. If you click on the button for the Bush Fire project on the right side of my blog, it will take you to the Flickr site for this project, where you can see the entire explanation of this huge undertaking. My hat's off to Tia!! If you want to contribute to this cause, there are tutorials on Silly Boo Dilly's blog that will teach you how to make a wonky star (click here), or if you'd rather not try the wonky star, they're also taking whatever 12.5 inch star you want to make.

I made 2 wonky stars to send to her, the one at the top of this post and the one below. Of course, I had to make my own versions of the wonky stars. *grin*



Since it was Valentine's Day, I couldn't resist adding a heart to the plaid star! (For some reason, I just can't get these colors to show up well.)

Then I read at the Flickr site that they are specifically requesting some stars that would be appropriate for boys/men. So, I made two more, just for the guys!

This one was for the World Cup of Soccer a few years ago.

And this one has airplanes.

Here's a closeup of the planes star, which is more true to the color of the block.

I've also been working on my House Home & Pantry project.

I finally got all my letters made. As I suspected, the "M" and the "S" were quite challenging. I re-made the M because I thought it was too bad, but the S's I'm keeping. Well, that's not counting the one I made wrong, because I got confused in the middle of it and it ended up not an S. Duh! Now I have some left-over letters to send to Tonya!

So, now the next challenge - putting all the letters together into a readable piece. I'm hoping this won't be too difficult. *crossing my fingers*

I'm also about to attempt something I've never done before - a crazy quilt block. (more on that next post, I promise) While searching the "innernets" for information on crazy quilt block embroidery (all the books on that subject live at my daughter's house in Nevada), I found a page on sharon b's "in a minute ago" crazy quilt site. These are some fantastic bras (yes, ladie's undies) that were made by Members of the Southern Cross Crazies discussion group and the Canberra (Australia) Crazy Qulters, at the First National Crazy Quilt Retreat in October 2004. They were invited to decorate a bra in order to raise funds for Breast cancer research. These delectable 'bustenhalters' are quite a hoot! (As usual, you can see a bigger image of each bra by clicking on its thumbnail picture.) And, by the way, sharon b's site has some awesome information on crazy quilt embroidery etc. She does some beautiful work - go take a look!