Productive Weekend

For the last month or so I've been working on a project that has been rather challenging for me.

It's been challenging because I've been using a bunch of orphan blocks, leftovers and lots of pictures to make a quilt for a special friend. I've borrowed a phrase from Finn that seems to fit this quilt "Everything But the Kitchen Sink". Here it is before the borders.

My freestyle letters didn't come out as nicely this time as they did the first time around. However, the first time around, I had set them with black and decided that the black background was just too much. So, I redid them with the blue background. I'm not as happy with them.

The Bearded One surprised me and made the suggestion of the split border with the light and dark blue. He also rejected the only blues I had in my stash that there was enough of. Oh darn, I had to go to the LQS. I really have to try to get a better picture of this. I got pictures from several of Bev's friends and tried to incorporate all of them. We call Bev the matriarch of our WetWesties camping group. It is a privilege to be able to boast an "I know Bev" bumper sticker on your Westfalia.

Considering the mish-mash of leftovers that I started with, I really didn't think this was all going to come together but yet, somehow, it did. I'm happier with the way this turned out than I thought I would be.

After just two years, my little patch of columbine has spread considerably. This year I've also added some new, red ones but I've put them up in the garden on the left, just below the shed. I love the patch of forget-me-nots in the background. They're spreading like crazy and I just can't bring myself to pull them, even when they're in a place I don't want them to be. I only wish the Magic Garden Elves would come visit and get rid of all the weeds!

And, in case you haven't figured out by now, I like to take weird pictures of a certain spotted one. How's this one KD?

Because...

....a girl can never have too many tote bags.

And because I decided that it needed a little "bling", I added some hot fix crystals. The picture doesn't do them justice. They really do sparkle quite nicely.

After being knocked out flat with the crud last week, I finally managed to get the Go in Peace banner quilted. It has been delivered to the church and will be hung shortly, I hope. Once it's hung I'll take a picture.

Meanwhile, my lilacs are blooming and my patch of columbine has doubled. Spring has most definitely sprung.




I'm hoping to get some serious quilting time this weekend. We won't be going anywhere and the Bearded One is now suffering with the crud so I KNOW he won't be doing anything. For once the weather in the PNW is actually cooperating too. Which most likely means that NEXT weekend, when we are supposed to go camping, it will probably rain. Such is life in the PNW.

Free Style Letters

I said I would make a banner/wallhanging for our church. The balcony extends over the end of the church and is about 4 feet high and is a big blank off-white space. This will hang up there, so that it's visible as you leave church. 

This was my first real attempt at Tonya's free style lettering. I had trouble with being "free". I'm afraid I'm just a little too anal. I had pieced all the letters into words and discovered that they were all very nicely lined up with the bottoms of all the letters nice and even. I had done this without even realizing it. So, rip them all apart and make sure that they did not line up. That was very difficult for me. 

Then came the stained glass blocks. Tedious is an understatement! If you look closely, you can see that the side rows of blocks have a little bit of black leading -- they were just that much too short for the ends. I figure that once this is quilted and bound those bits of black will be covered up wtih binding -- black of course. 

This was a real stretch for me, but, all in all, I'm pretty pleased with how it came out. I'll get it quilted this week and maybe it might get hung before next Sunday....well, that is if the cold that I'm currently fighting cooperates. 

Playing Tourist

It's not often that I get to play tourist in my own hometown. But, when I do, it's always a lot of fun. Even more so when two friends from California are in town on what was supposed to have been a Mexican cruise. Due to the swine flu, their cruise was rescheduled to make stops in San Francisco, Victoria and Seattle. So, first thing this morning their ship arrived in Seattle. They grabbed a cab and headed to Pike Place Market. I told Steve that he and Ray should find the big brass pig and I would meet them there. They found the pig. They also found the bar on the way. At 10:00 a.m. they felt I needed a cocktail -- apparently this is what you do when you are on vacation.

The market was chock full of scenes like this, all sorts of fresh fruits and vegetables and of course, the infamous flying fish stands. These buckets of tulips reminded me of the bolts of color in a quilt store. And yes, I did drag the guys into the quilt shop. I had to get a fq for the QB birthday/potluck on Monday. After strolling through the market we hiked uphill to catch the monorail over to yet another Seattle landmark.

We took the glass elevator up to the restaurant at the top (just under the observation deck.) There we had a leisurely lunch while the restaurant slowly revolved displaying the panoramic 360 views of Seattle. The only thing missing was Mt. Rainier. Sadly the mountain was "not out" as we say here in the pacific northwest.

But, the lack of mountain view was more than made up for in the wonderful desserts. This was my tiramisu. Ray's chocolate mousse was another beautiful work of art.

Here's a pic of their ship taken from the Space Needle during lunch. Their ship is the big one with the red & blue stacks. And using the binoculars from the observation platform, they made sure I saw the 7 story water slide on the deck.

Just in case you thought playing tourist can be boring, let me assure you, when you are with someone like Steve, it most definitely isn't!

Thank you Steve & Ray for a fun-filled day. I had a GREAT time.

Finishes & More

Finishes: The quilting on two high school senior quilts for church. Each June we present the graduating high school seniors with quilts. This year it's five. Each quilt is personalized for the senior with the main fabric representing one of their main interests or hobbies. Some years this can be quite a challenge. I lucked out this year, one girl ended her questionnaire with "I drive a VW beetle." Well, I just so happened to have the perfect fabric in my stash. I quilted this with lime green thread and Daisies Galore pantograph by Timeless. I'm very happy with how this came out.

The next quilt was pieced by Claudia, a fellow QB and then I quilted it using my double spiral board. Don't know if I will be using that again in the near future. What a pain in the neck it was lining it up for each of the 48 blocks. Then, once that was completed I needed to quilt the empty spaces between the spirals and the borders. Thankfully that part went quickly. I still need to get a picture of the whole quilt. This quilt is for the one guy in this year's group. The border is planes and helicopters which is why I felt the spirals sorta fit.

More: The next picture is a work in progress. I've been trying out Tonya's free style lettering. This is to be hung from the balcony at church so it will be viewed as you leave. I'm toying with putting stained glass crazy patch blocks around the words but I need to try it out first. For the record, I wasn't standing square in front of this when I snapped the photo.

On of these days I'll sit down long enough to figure out why blogger doesn't want to display my photo in my header........grrrrr!!!!!!!

And, because somebody has said I don't post enough pictures of a certain spotted beast, this one's for you K.D.