Oops - Forgot a photo

I meant to put this into the Northwest Quilters Quilt Show entry but forgot. The venue was Multnomah University which used to be called the Multnomah Bible College. So this gymnasium was used for their church services. As we looked up, there were these pipes and musical instruments in these boxes. And behind the glass was the pipe organ that they used. It was fun to look at - all the men who attended the show would be trying to figure out how it worked, I am sure.

My project for the week

I am involved in the Sandy Quilt Show which is held in the middle of July. About now is the time to think of what your entry will be for the show - or maybe not. Some people wait until three weeks before and then start scrounging through their stash to see what they can complete. Anyway, between April 1 and July 1, I will be gallivanting for a total of 5 weeks, so I need to make sure I have one in the works to be finished. Last year I did this top which is a wall hanging of the full size $5 quilt class. I didn't want a full quilt (already have two that need to be finished) so I chose to do this smaller version of "Kaleidoscope of Color".

Because I chose to do the "miniature" version, I had lots of pieces left over. So, I proceeded to do this as my backing. Now I will get time on the long arm quilt machine and quilt it. Yeah, an almost finished project. :-)

As you can see I still have some fabric left over. So, these will make nice borders for some of the squares we did last year at the quilt show called "Build a Block". More on that at a later posting.

Northwest Quilters Quilt Show

Yesterday my Q-FAC (Quilting and Fiber Arts Club) friend, LaDonna, her daughter Nissa and I ventured to Multnomah University to see the Northwest Quilters Quilt Show. They had 25 vendors, demonstrators and almost 300 quilts in their show. Very impressive and over-stimulating for the brain. Here are a few pictures I took of some of the quilts we saw.

This quilt was called "Pumpkin Soup", some piecing and some applique.
This was an indigo blue and white reverse applique quilt - meaning where the white is usually the blue is and where the blue is the white. These squares were 4 inch finished. Quite the eye opener when you first walked into the gym.

This was a three dimentional turkey called "Run, Tom, Run". His tail feathers were folded material and sewn into the seam and then fluffed to give it the 3-D look.

This was a wonderful fall applique piece. I loved the look of it - reminded me of Michigan in the fall.

This was a miniature pieced called "Button Baskets". Very cute - would be a neat hanging for a little girl.

This Quilt was done by a number of ladies. The blocks were all cross stitched and then put into a quilt. I believe it said it took them 5 years to complete.

This quilt was called "Almost Insane". Each square was 4 inch finished and put together with lots of little scraps of fabric.

This was one of the blocks in the quilt in the above picture. This 4 inch square has 200 pieces of material in it. (You can count them if you want - I took her word for it.) There was another one nearby that had 185 pieces in it. Very well done and the quilt was really neat to look at up close. Not for me to do!!
This quilt was fun to look at. The creator did log cabins for the baskets and then appliqued grapevine wreaths for the handles, flowers, birds, butterflies, etc.

Hope you enjoyed my little version of the Northwest Quilters Quilt Show.

Garden Party

Last year we had a container garden with rosemary, sage, basil and chamomile in one long container, two tomatoes in another container and lavender in one more. It was hard to keep them up because some require more water than others, and the deck was too warm so you had to keep up with the watering. So, this year, Phil is making me a tiered garden next to the deck. He starts by sawing the boards at the garage.
I took this picture from the deck, with Phil working hard on removing the clay, loom stuff that they call dirt here. We will remove it and put good garden dirt.

This is the first of three tiers; each tier being 6ft by 3 ft.

A man and his shovel playing in the dirt!!

A Fun Week - Stitching, Massage and Shopping

As many of you know, I belong to the Embroiderers' Guild of America (EGA) and have since our sons were little. We recently took a correspondence class called "A Swiss Sampler". I started mine, but only finished up two and a half of the motiffs before deciding that I didn't care to do blackwork and had too much on my plate to complete it. So, this is a picture of my work in progress, which is now on the back burner.

But here are the finished ones of three of my fellow Rose City Stitchers Chapter members who did complete theirs and received the certificate of completion from the teacher. Good job!!

So Tuesday was Massage Day. Sorry no picture here. I received a gift certificate from my sons to go to Dosha Day Spa for a massage, hair cut, manicure, etc. So, I chose just to do a massage to get the knots out of my shoulders from the last few weeks of hectic sewing on HUGS. Ah, the bliss of Hannah's hands as she massaged, soft music, just a great pamper afternoon. Have to go back soon to get another one as I still have money left on my certificate. Thanks Greg and Nick - a wonderful gift!!

Then Wednesday we went on a field trip instead of sewing as usual at Quilting Delights. We started out at Elmers (like a Bob Evans) for lunch. Then on to Acorns and Threads in Raleigh Hills, a needlework shop filled with fibers, material, kits, beads, etc for hardanger, cross stitch, pulled threads, etc. The store owner had just returned from market so there were lots of great things to see. (I forgot to take a picture so you will have to imagine it.)

Then we went to A Common Thread in Tigard to shop for quilting material. They have a wonderful classroom with these neat tables on wheels that are perfect for quilters to lay out their tools, sewing machines and projects for efficient sewing. We decided we will have to talk to Thea at QD about getting some.

We then asked a kind fellow who was shopping with his wife to take our picture among the batik fabric. We were helping Betty to get purple and blue materials for a wallhanging that she wants to do for the beach. (left-right- me, Dixie, Marilyn, Betty, Donna and Cindy. It was a fun, relaxing day, even with the drive back through rush hour traffic on the freeways.

Hope you enjoyed looking at my week as much as I enjoyed doing it.

More Quilting Pictures

While looking through my stuff, I noticed that I had a couple of more pics of things that I had made. Here is my Mom modeling the Sack-It-To-Ya Bag that I made here. She wanted something to carry her shoes to weddings to dance in comfort. I have made a few of these and they hold lots of items, such as material, 4-5 library books, etc.
This is a quilt that I did for our second bedroom. It is called "All By Me" as I pieced the top, quilted it on the long arm machine and bound it. It is hanging in the Sandy Quilt Show last year and won a first placd ribbon in the "First Time" category - the first time the entrant has placed something in the show. Our Show is the third weekend in July and we have a wonderful time putting up all the magnificant quilts that people enter. More on that in July.

I really do quilt!!

I really do quilt! I have projects that I have done but not many have stayed here. A few have been asking to see some of the things I have done so, here are a few items that I have pictures of on my computer. The rest are pictures that I made prints of so I will have to find those cds and figure out how to load them on here, etc. But that is another day.

My sister & brother-in-law, Mary Ann and Jerome, have a stall at the Eastern Market in Detroit, Mi where they sell flowers in the spring, veggies in the late summer and pumpkins in the fall. So, I made Mary Ann a hand pieced and appliqued wall hanging that she can put up in their stall to dress it up a bit. They don't do anything with chickens, but this guy was too cute not to add.

When I was in MI in August, my mom had me go through her sewing machine cabinet as well as a closet to look for material. I found this red polka dot piece and decided to make myself an apron. So I added the checked material and red and white buttons and -- ta da - it was done. But then I decided it should go to my new daughter-in-law to be as she loves red. So it found a new home at Julie's house.

These little snowmen wall hangers were gifts to the neighbors. They did baking and brought over lots of cookies and fudge and stuff. Well, since I don't do much baking any more, I made them a mini version of the window hanging that we have as our Christmas treat to them. I added little sleigh bells to the tops of the hats before I sent them to their new homes. They all loved them.

Last year I made Greg some moose placemats for Christmas. He loved them so much, he asked for a Christmas tree skirt with the moose on it as well. So, I dug the pattern out and proceeded to make this with 8 moose on it, and added snow flakes as quilting. But there was a question from Phil while I was making this --- Since I made 8 moose, is the plural for moose - mice????? :-) Yes, you should have guessed he would ask a silly question like that!! Anyway, I will try and send more of my quilting later.