Bird is the Word*

"Bird" is the word I drew for the Animal Challenge by the Tacoma Modern Quilt Guild.  

"Bird is The Word"
19.5" w X 18" h

The word brings to mind so many possibilities....owls, penguins, emus, cardinals, eagles and so on.  But I knew immediately that I wanted to make my bird with Lynn's tutorial.  Lynn blogs at Patchery Menagerie, and her tutorial is available on her Etsy site.  I've long admired Lynn's way with improv and especially her fabric choices.  So I bought both the bird tutorial and the tutorial on making your fabric work for you.  Both are immensely helpful! And a very reasonable price for all the information she gives you.

The quilt had to be no smaller than 12 x 12 inches and no larger than 24 x 24 inches.  I think that's a great size for a challenge quilt.  It only took me 3 tries to get a bird - the first two times I cut the fabric wrong for the wing.  The rest of the bird was pretty easy.  

check out the little ladybug button!

 But he looked a little lonely by himself.  I didn't want a very big quilt, so I didn't really want to make more birds.  Then I got the idea to do the birdhouse.  After that it just came together easily.  I kept the quilting simple too, as I was running out of time to get the quilt done before the meeting.  I'm very pleased with how my little challenge came out!

* Bird is The Word was a crazy song from 1963 by The Trashmen.  You can watch the video here, which is so bad, it makes the song even crazier!

I'm supposed to be sewing a particular quilt top together, but I wasn't quite feeling it.  So I found something else to work on.  I found this one, hiding in a pile of other projects.  I started these blocks a few years ago.  2011 to be exact.  Ok, I guess that's 6 years ago, slightly more than a few.  Wow, a little longer than I realized! You can see previous posts about this here and here.  When I pulled this out, I only needed a few more blocks.  So I made another 12!  It is set 6 blocks across by 8 blocks down, and it now 60 inches by 80 inches, with only 2 blocks left over.  I've decided what I want to do for the border and am auditioning sizes right now.  I used my brightest plaids for this quilt and it's pretty intense in person.  I love it!  And another long-time WIP almost finished!  Yay!

I had to stop working on this one to do some secret sewing.  I need to get my other guild's challenge quilt quilted.  It's all pin basted and ready to finish this weekend.

Another plaid project!  My local guild had a sew-in day where we were taught this simple quilt pattern to be used as a charity quilt.  It uses 9 fat quarters.  Except my woven plaid fat quarters weren't 18 inches across.  I pre-wash all my fabric and the FQ's had shrunken up to 17 inches across, so I ended up cutting into yardage.  It was a pretty simple pattern to do, and everyone's quilts looked so different with the different fabrics!  Now I need to trim that bottom edge, baste it and get it quilted.  It's bigger than I like to do myself, but I think simple quilting will be OK.

Here is my sample block for the Tacoma MQG's Block of the Month for July.  It's a fun, easy block and I want to make some more before the meeting.  The tutorial by Cluck Cluck Sew for this one is here, if you want to make it too.  The original quilt looks a lot different from this block!

My DS recently made a wedding gift for some friends, and I thought you'd enjoy seeing it too.  He made a woodburned clock for them, using a celtic Tree of Life design.  I think he did an beautiful job!

For Father's Day, we went with the family to Point Defiance Zoo in Tacoma for the day and it was a lot of fun.  The zoo had an amazing display of artwork called Washed Ashore on the zoo grounds, and I think you might enjoy it too.  It's very creative work.  Be sure to click on each photo to see it bigger.  They are incredible!

The explanation of these art works goes like this: 

About Washed Ashore - All of the plastic on these sculptures was collected from beaches by volunteers.  Each sculpture is designed and directed by a lead artist and then created through a collaboration of the artist, Washed Ashore team members and volunteers.

An ocean wave

The other side of the wave has a sea turtle!

The marine debris in this sculpture includes shot gun shells, disposable lighters,

 bottle caps, flip flops, toy shovels, soda bottles and a boogie board. 

It was fun to look at each sculpture and try to find what items were used.  There were even more sculptures, and all were just as good as these are.  I love seeing how others are creative!

That's it for now....Happy quilting, have a great weekend and Happy Independence Day to my American readers!

Linking up with Crazy Mom Quilts' Finish It Up Friday.

A Catch Up and AHIQ - December 2016 edition

Merry Christmas to all my blog friends!  I hope you have a Happy New Year too!

Wow, what a busy month December has been.  Not a surprise at all, is it?  I am surprised that I'm managing one last blog post this year....Yay me!

We had a wonderful Christmas this year.  A little different, in that we did all our socializing on Christmas Eve which means we got to spend Christmas Day at home for the first time a in few years.  That was nice - very relaxed!  No schedule, no visitors, no stress.  I actually slept in until 12:30 in the afternoon!  It was the latest in the day that we've ever had Christmas.  We just had sandwiches for dinner.  And then we watched the Dr. Who Christmas Special.  A very lazy Christmas and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

I haven't done any sewing this month, other than some little snack bags for the granddaughters.  *sigh*  I really need to clean the quilt studio before I can do much more.  But, I do have some sewing to share.

After my last post, I thought I would share my Bullseye quilt to show what the raw-edge applique looks like after a few washings.

This quilt is about 15 years old now.  It's been washed lots of times.  This is the pattern called Bullseye based on the pattern in the book "Quilts From Aunt Amy" by Country Threads (Mary Tendall Etherington and Connie Tesene).  I didn't have the book or the pattern with me when I made this at a quilt retreat.  I didn't even have any circle templates.  I just cut the center out of a paper plate and made it up from there!  All of the fabrics I used have dots or circles of some kind on them, even the background fabrics.  

Here is a detail shot of two of the blocks.  You can see that the raw edges have softened and frayed some, but not as much as you might think.  Every once in a while, if it seems as if there are some big clumps of threads, I'll trim those down with some scissors.  But mostly the fraying doesn't bother me - I really like it!

Now that I think about it, I guess this quilt also qualifies as an improv quilt!  It is my favorite way to make a quilt.

Even my candy told me to do improv!

all four placemats

In September when I went to retreat in California, I took along this project.  I wanted to make some placemats, I needed something to demo bindings at the quilt show, and Katie wanted me to teach her something new,  So, I taught her how to do Debbie at A Quilter's Table's Cross-Cut quilt!  We had a lot of fun doing this process together.  I still want to do even more of this technique!

a truer representation of the fabric colors

I used royal blue and lime-y greens because I love those colors together.  

Katie's flimsie placemats

Katie decided to use brights with black, her fave combo.  She also cut her insert strips wider, about 1 1/2 inches, I think.  I cut mine at 1 inch.  

my inspiration page

The Tacoma Modern Quilt Guild had a color challenge this fall. due at the October meeting.  They had us choose a magazine page instead of a paint chip.  It was folded up and in an envelope, so we couldn't peek!  This page above was my choice, which I was happy about.

We had not-very-big size parameters and just had to do something that was related to the page, whether it was shapes or colors or any emotions the page evoked.

19" W x 17" H

Here is my challenge quilt.  Those books in the cases really spoke to me.  I'm not entirely pleased with this quilt - but I don't hate it either and it's DONE!.

the back of my inspiration page

the back of my quilt

I had to do the IKEA numbers fabric on the back!

If you want to see some of the other TMQG challenge quilt, click here.

For my birthday, my husband gave me a book I really, really wanted - Artful Improv by Cindy Grisdela.  I love her work - it really inspires me!

    

So, following her Building Blocks of Improv Design in the book, here is my first attempt at the Angled Stripes exercise.  I just picked the blues and greens that I liked, then added the hot pink for a zinger.

So, then I tried playing with various fabrics for the border.

the center is 10" W x 15" H

And you can see here that I tweaked my design some to be more interesting.

sorry for the terrible photo - it's so dark here

I think this is my final border choice.  I like the way the darker border color plays with the interior, making it more important.  Now I'm trying to decide on the final sizes for the sides.  I think they'll end up being 4 different sizes, just to make it more interesting.

Now I want to play with more of Cindy's exercises, particularly the curves!  I plan on doing more improv this coming year - it really is fun to do.  

I'm linking up with the Ad Hoc Improv Quilting.  Click here to see others' improv!

My 15 Minutes

No, not playing with scraps.  My brush with Fame.  Hee hee!  (As an aside here, I have to say that Andy Warhol had no idea of the internet when he said his famous quote.)

After my post on my little quilt I made in class with Gwen Marston, Kathie over at Inspired By Antique Quilts blog was inspired to make a little quilt using the same colors as mine.  She was nice enough to ask me if I would mind (I didn't), and then she blogged about all this.  Well, my stats went through the roof!  I got so many visitors, and also some new Followers.  Thank you, Kathie!!

And then, I discovered that my new Liberated Log Cabins quilt (see previous post) was featured on Craft Gossip.com!  Woo Hoo!

This has been fun!

Back to our regularly scheduled programming now.

One Whole Year!

Feb 5th - my one year anniversary of blogging! Wow, what a great year it's been. I've met so many nice people and learned so much! The quilt blog community is such a great group of people...so sharing, generous, kind, understanding and very, very talented! And I love reading everyone else's blogs...to the point that, I have so many I enjoy, I have trouble getting into the quilt studio! Thank you to all who read my blog and thank you for all the wonderful comments. You brighten my days.

We had a great weekend with my sister. We had a nice trip to Bellingham. I really liked it there. And we stopped in Mount Vernon to buy some wine. The Pasek Cellars winery has the best cranberry wine! I don't usually drink wine, but I really like this one. Their raspberry and blackberry wines are great too. These wines don't have any grape wine in them, just the fruit in the name. Wonderful wines! So, we bought a few bottles. We had a good time with our niece...went to lunch, did some shopping and some sightseeing. It was a good day.

The photo above is my Christmas present from my sister. We didn't get together over the holidays because she was stuck in So. California and couldn't get home due to the bad weather here. So, this was our first opportunity to do our Christmas present exchange. Anyway, when my sister was visiting in August, I shared bags and bags of wool fabric with her. I have so much wool - more than I will probably use in my lifetime. And she was using her wool...and even buying wool! So, I thought I would share with her. Well, she made me these wonderful hand-hooked wool flowers! Aren't they cute? They're each attached to a stick from her yard. Very rustic-looking. And I have the perfect hand-made pottery pitcher to display them in. I just have to get some foam or something to help them stand up. Thus, no picture of them in the pitcher yet. I don't know if you can tell from the photo, but my sister has tied a strip of green plaid wool fabric around each stem for a leaf. I just love these!

Here's individual pictures of each one:

I love the hand-dyed lilac in the center of this one. And that chartreuse green is a kick with the purples.

I love the long loops on this one.

This one reminds me of a sunflower.

It's a really tough call, but I think this one is my favorite, because I love these colors. That's a dark purple in the center. Yum!

I love the outside strips on this one!

And I love that zing of hot pink on this one.

I just love wool. I guess because of growing up with it, in Michigan. We wore lots of wool. I love the smell of it.

Here is the latest Color Book page. That square in the upper right is a funny grayed-brown. It didn't photograph well. It looks better in person, so to speak. The button reminds me of wood-burning and was the first element I picked for this page. I'm kind of stalled on the other pages right now. I have 4 more pages to do. And I'm still working on my Witch's Pantry project. I haven't touched it since last Saturday and need to get back to it.

Here is Shade and Dunkel on Wed. It was almost 60* and I opened all the windows for some fresh air. The cats were watching another cat go across our yard, and they were kind of worked up about it. I think they were enjoying the fresh air too! It was a beautiful day.

We've been seeing on TV and hearing on the radio the most hysterical commercials. Pemco Insurance Co. has a great ad campaign about the people of the Northwest. You can go here to see their Helpful Guide to the People of the Northwest. My favorites are "Goat Renter Guy", "Sandals and Socks Guy", and I think the best one is "Blue Tarp Camper". Take a look and get your laugh for the day!

Another Fall Quilt

This is my Scarecrow quilt, that I always hang by the front door for fall. This was a pattern from a Piecemaker's calendar many years ago.

I used a fusible for the applique, but I didn't "window" it, so the poor scarecrow looks pretty stiff! And I think I'd add more quilting now, as it's kind of poufy. (I may still do that, depending on how much it bothers me!)
I felt that the plain borders, in spite of the busy fabric, were just too - well, plain. So I added some flying geese. Appropriate for fall, I guess! However, these geese seem to be confused - hahaha!

When I was shooting pictures today, Dunkel couldn't get onto the Scarecrow quilt for his usual hijinks, as it was on the wall when I photographed it. So, he got on the half-wall on the stairs. He usually gets on the tippy-top part (which you can't quite see in this photo), and that gives me the heebie-jeebies! I'm always afraid he'll fall, which is about 12 feet down. He knows it "pushes my button" - naughty cat! As you can see, he's pretty comfortable with the whole thing. He does the same thing up top too. He even tries to snag my arm when I walk past him. I try to not even look at him! In case you can't tell, yes, I'm afraid of heights.

I've finally finished the Secret Project for my sister. (Yay! Another finish!) I'm waaayyy late for her birthday (in August), so it will be an "I Love You" gift. I can't show you how it came out until she receives it, just in case she reads my blog. Soon, I promise!

We've had just wonderful warm weather the last few days. The high was in the low 80's and we even got to wear shorts! But, alas, the usual rain and chilly weather will be returning in a few days. *sigh* It was nice while it lasted. My allergies have been miserable, but I still enjoyed the warmth. Still haven't gotten the pansies planted. My bad.

I've only got 2 links to share this time:

If, like me, you're fascinated with the Disappearing 9-Patch, you need to visit Dionne who has lots of links on her blog. I love seeing how many different ways one pattern can look!

One of my favorite quilters is Mary Lou Weidman. Check out her blog. She's really "into" fall!

And, one last thing for September. I think this little video of a sneaky cat is so funny. I hope you enjoy it too! (Watch the kitty carefully.)

See you in October!

Cats and Blogs

I thought I would show you my cats. They were being still long enough to photograph tonight. This first photo is Dunkel. He wasn't being too cooperative, but did hold still for one shot. He's hard to get a good photo of. He's a smoke-coat tabby. He has what I call "stealth stripes", and has a white undercoat. He doesn't like the camera.


This next photo is Shade. As you can see, he's been a very clever cat and has gotten the quilt off the back of the couch to make a comfy bed for himself.

My daughter Helga has started a blog about her writing. She's at 'Words Into This Darkness', and the link is on my sidebar.

Here's a cute project to do with buttons and cards. It's at How About Orange. Very cute, and could be great for a Valentine!

And I found this cute sock-doll post on homemade by jill. Great sock dolls! Jill's blog has made the list of "Blogs of Note" on Blogger. Way to go!