May take it further

For my May take it further challenge I resorted to the color bar. The star points are made from the one seam flying geese technique and the center is a dimensional cathedral window block. I found I am NOT a pastel person.
This is a last minute piece as we had a flash flood Thursday night (in fact two--first at 10:30PM and again at 2:30 AM Friday morning.) A second cloud burst sent the little creek a block behind us into a roaring river twice in one night. We had ground water seepage into the basement and lost our fence, but at least we didn't get water in the house.
Anyway I finished on time.

Blocks

Here are some of the blocks for our guilds fund raiser quilt for next year. The background is 4 squares of different blacks then the appliqué added on top of the backgrounds. Two more are complete but I do not have pictures of those. 5 blocks and the border to finish. Whoo hoo!! Can't wait to see these all completed and into a top.



Hope everyone has a wonderful Memorial Day. Services were earlier in our park. Lets all remember our service men and women today.

trunk show

Traveled this past weekend. Presented trunk show and did a class for the Panhandle Guild. What a fun day that was. I so enjoy going out there as there are so many talented quilters in the group. the show and tell was wonderful. Hope they thought the trunk show was Ok too and that the class learned to do the ironworks technique. Had a minor glitch when some of the fusible web was to narrow, but thats life. It all worked out in the end. some beautiful pieces were started and lots were ready to layer and quilt by the end of the day.
Stayed with a friend (wonderful quilter and member of the guild) and enjoyed a beautiful sunrise at her home. She lives on a hill with a beautiful view of the valley. The birds were singing while the sun came up. So peaceful. Thanks Jan
Saw several other of the members that I know from previous state guild meetings and met others who I hope I will see again in July at State meeting.
Sorry no photo's as I forgot my camera. Oh well.
Hope to have some photos to post soon, so don't give up on me.

Aprils challenge

Yeah my April chooseday challenge piece is done. The word was "bird", so finally found a use for the chicken wire fabric background fabric. That has been in my stash for "years". ha.
Mays word is "signs" so will have to do some thinking on that one.
The Take it Further challenge for May is pretty challenging so may go with the color theme this month. Will see how that goes.
Have been pulling quilts for my trunk show and class next week. I think I have about 50 pieces pulled, so should be a good trunk show. Maybe I should take pictures and post them before I put them away again.

change

finally something to put up here. Finished my "change" for April. Made a small 4 x 6 to add to a personal progressive I am doing with a friend. Kill two birds with one block sort of deal. The "change" is the three stages of a butterfly. cleaver or what? grin

windy day

Small quilt made for the CPQG mini quilt auction that will be next Monday night. Hope someone likes all the little character buttons I put on it.
Its been a very windy day here. Gusts of wind to 50 mph. yikes. Wasn't fun driving in it this morning,but at least coming home it was with the wind.

Hancock retreat quilt

Finished the star top from the Hancock retreat. I changed the placement of some of the colors in the strips and changed fabrics for the stars. I used two different golds and alternated the center colors on the stars. I like the effect, even DH said he liked it a lot. So suspect I will finish it and he will be the proud owner of the quilt. Now to decide what to do with the quilting.
The new Take it Further challenge came out, the subject is change. Now what to do with that? The moderator mentioned "circle" and I thought life is a circle, so may think up something using circles. The color scheme for this time is kind of neat too, so may have to play with that a bit also. should be a fun challenge though.

progressive center

Finished this little 6" block for the center of a progressive that I am doing with my friend from Las Vegas. Their guild is doing a personal progressive, where each person works their own quilt. Each month new directions will come out as to the next step. Should be fun. I decided to go really small as I don't need another large project right now. Machine appliqué with invisible thread. Can't wait to see what the next step will be.

A photo of the crazy 9 patch class we did at quilt club on Tuesday. It turned out a lot better than I thought it would. Used leftover black/white plus some green squares to start.
To do this you cut 9 squares of fabric, all different if possible, Stack them and cut through vertically at an angle through all the layers. Keep the edge of the cut at least 1 1/2 inches from any edge. Take the top piece from the smallest section and put it on the bottom of the pile. Sew them all together. Keeping them in order, press the seam open and restack in the exact order you sewed them in the first time. Make a second vertical cut through all the piles, move two of the pieces from the smallest section, to the bottom of the stack. Sew again. Press, restack, cut across horizontally, move 3 layers to the bottom of the smallest section. Sew them all together, keep them in order. Press, make the 4th cut horizontally, this time move 6 pieces of the smaller section to the bottom of the stack. Sew again. Press then square up all the blocks to your smallest block. Repeat this with 3 more stacks of 9 fabrics. This will give you 36 blocks, This is set 6 x 6 blocks with a 3" border around. Really good way to use up fabrics. I started with a 9 1/2" square to start and ended up with 8" blocks. You can use any size starting square. One in the class used 18" squares to start, one did 12 1/2" squares to start. So you can figure about 1 1/2" to 2" smaller square in the finished block that the square you started with. If you want larger quilt, keep making stacks of 9 until you have enough to make a quilt the size you want.Have fun with this.

challenges

Finally getting something posted. The flower is for February Take it further challenge. I remember the beautiful peony's that my Mom always had blooming in the summers. Had to locate a photo and get it on the computer, then printed the actual photo on the fabric. What fun.
March is little things. There have been many little things this month, but mostly they have been not so good, so will not bore people with them. My piece for March is of my former neighbors kitty. I put it in a kaleidoscope program and then quilted it. Angel kitty was rescued last winter while almost frozen solid. She did earn a place in the house though, so maybe being frozen was worth it.
The last piece is of my poppies, also put into the kaleidoscope program.

progress

Stitching on block #9, then 3 more to stitch down and I am ready to trim and put together.
Was -2 degrees this morning with a wind that made the wind chill minus 22 degrees. brrrr. Good day to stay indoors and sew.
TIF--small thing today was watching the temperature get all the way to the teens. Ah for some of that global warming they are always preaching about!!!!!

Geese flying

Went out early this morning and the geese are flying North. Beautiful.

still stitching

Still stitching the appliques down on the blocks. Working on #5. decided to do colors for the applique instead of invisible thread, so its taking longer to switch colors all the time.
New take it further challenge is "small things". My first small thing observed was the crocus poking up through the snow bank. Also saw the first string of Canadian geese migrating. The first morning I heard the cardinals singing too. Lots of small things in the spring of the year. Now to figure out something for a small quilt.

Block 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12

Ok --would you believe they are all up on the wall? They all have seams turned and now are liquid stitched to the backgrounds and ready for the actual machine applique to be done. I couldn't stop until I had them all in place and ready to stitch.
Next step the stitching, then deciding how to put the blocks together and if they need border. I am thinking they will need borders, but will see once all the stitching is done. Now off to bed. I deserve a good nights sleep.

Las Vegas challenge

Hi Shirley, here it is the fabric challenge. I just love the through the window look and thought this fabric was ideal for that. Anyway, looking forward to the challenge for next year.
FYI Shirley and I have done a challenge every year since she moved to Vegas. One year I buy fabric and send to her and the next she buys fabric and sends to me. Then we each make a wall piece using the fabric. What fun way to keep in touch with a dear friend.

block7

Block 7 is up on the wall. All those little pieces!!! Kept me working lots longer than I anticipated. But its up on the wall and Block 8 is ready to work on.

block 5 and 6

Block 5 and 6 are on the wall. Sorry the 6 block is a little off, but it was late when I completed it. Will work on 7 later today. What fun seeing it come together on the wall.

block #4

Yea, block 4 is up. Now to work on Block 5 while the weather is so crumby. 16 degrees and dropping plus strong wind and snow flurries. Where the heck is all that global warming the news media is always hollering about? Humm don't hear much about it these days when we are freezing our tails off--wonder why? Anyway off to work on block 5

block #3

Block #3 is up on the wall --I think I am liking this quilt already. 9 more blocks to go. The flower pot is one of my hand dyes. I really need to make some more hand dyes as my supply is running low, however I do not like mixing dyes in the house, so will have to do that when the weather warms and I can do it out on the porch.
Stay tuned for block #4 coming soon.

home again

Block #1 and #2 are done. Yea. Started an applique quilt a few days ago, Have all 12 blocks cut out and the pieces ready to glue to fabric. I'm using Stable Stuff for the inside of the blocks and liquid stitch to position the pieces onto the backgrounds. Its working great so now hope to get the rest done in the next month or so. Some blocks have 70 plus small pieces to work, so will take a while. I'm working on #3 and will put it up when I have it finished. This is really fun.
Norfolk retreat was this weekend. What fun. We had to have it at a different venue this year as the place we usually go was being remodeled. So it goes. We were at Divots Golf Course. Nice place but not quite as handy as before. Completely spaced off taking my camera so I didn't get any pictures of the neat stuff people were doing. We had two working on Dear Jane blocks. Oh my goodness, I am glad I didn't start that one. Would take me a lifetime to do all those tiny blocks. The blocks were really neat though and I give them credit for having the nerve to do this quilt. Lots of bright colors this year. and lots of projects completed.
Had best go start unpacking. Will post pictures as I get blocks done.