Hey!

Where's everyone been? My faithful companion here has been her wild child self -- ripping through the house, climbing the door/window screens (I should try that someone -- Madeline loves it so it must be a lot of fun!), jumping on the back of the reclinder to attack me each time I walk by. Madeline still has all her claws and I have the scars on my arms to prove it.

The weather here has finally warmed up and that's meant lots of time outdoors soaking up the sunshine and gardening, both flower and veggie.

I have been doing a little needlework. Here's a box that I covered the lid with CQ work. The box is gold/beige/white so it was a limited palette for me. All in all, a pretty easy project -- getting the block on that round lid went much better then I thought! Enjoy the pics.

Garden Time

I know this isn't a gardening blog, but I thought I'd share a few photos of my yard with you all. It's been a very wet and cool spring this year and the plants are loving it.

An orange iris. This one ended up having 4 flowers.

A patch of wild flowers.

A giant hosta -- this is only one of about 6 or 7 hostas that live in the shaded side yard.

And how about this one? How many of you know what it is? Who would have thought that potatoes would have such pretty blooms on them? (LOL).

I've been working hard dyeing some lace and things. Some will go for prizes in a contest we're having at CQForNewbies -- others may go into the Etsy shop (which has been vacant for soooo long). I'll be back, hopefully, later in the week with more things to share.

And before I forget -- I want to thank all of you who took the time to comment on Ethel Rose and Emma Violet (last post). I'm glad you all enjoyed the story (and I didn't even tell you about the woman who owned the bar, Caroline. When I saw Bette Davis in the movie What Ever Happened to Baby Jane, I immediately screamed, "OMG, it's Caroline!"). I do appreciate each and every one of you who comment -- and HEY! I updated my blog template and found out I have followers. How cool is that? I didn't even know! So thank you all again.

Introducing. . . .

Ethel Rose

and Emma Violet.

I showed you all Emma Violet quite a while ago and I've been working off and on (mostly off) on Ethel Rose.

Ethel and Emma are identical twin sisters. They have lived together all their lives. A long time ago, Emma had a stroke and it left her wheelchair-bound, and affected her speech. Ethel has full-time care of her twin sister. When they were little girls, their mother dressed them in pink and purple (accordingly).

Now they are older, they no longer look identical and they wear lots of colors besides pink and purple. Their parents are gone, Ethel's husband is gone, neither twin had any children, there's just the two of them.

They like to go out to their favorite neighborhood bar and have a beer (or two, or three). Emma really likes her beer and gets very happy and sociable after a few. It's easier to understand her speech then too.

I met these dear ladies one night when I was lost, driving around a residential neighboorhood looking for someplace that was open so I could ask directions. I finally noticed a little hole in the wall bar called Caroline's and I stopped.

As I was walking up to the door, there were two older women, one in a wheel chair. This was before the days of ADA so there was quite a struggle to get the wheelchair across the gravel parking lot and into the bar. I assisted with holding purses, hats, coats, while the regulars inside got Emma and her wheelchair inside.

There was a flurry of greetings -- seems these ladies were still the belles of the ball -- and beers handed out all around. Ethel is quite the talker and had me captivated, first with the news they were twins, then with stories of their youth, with Emma correcting her when she got carried away with the story.

I had such a fun time with these two ladies that I never made my original engagement. I bought Emma a beer (or two -- she wasn't driving after all), and I would occasionally go back and see them at the bar on Friday nights. Ethel was always vivacious, Emma a little more quiet due to her speech difficulties, but she always had a smile on her face.

Some close ups for you:

The pictures were transferred to the fabric using the heat tool method and colored with crayon, colored pencil, fabric pens and embroidered details. Each one is small -- less then 16" (I forgot to measure them).

I had a lot of fun doing these and thinking about old times.

What I've Been Up To

It's baby quilt time again. The above ABC quilt is a commission piece. This Grandma ordered one from me last year, for a boy. Now Baby #2 is definitely a girl, so both of them had to have ABC quilts -- only this one a little more girly. In case you're wondering what that is beside the letter "W" it's a balloon. It's hard to tell, isn't it, without the string embroidered on. But that comes later.

The ABC quilts are my own design -- if you can call it that -- I make the balloon type letters and cut them out with pinking shears. The letters are sewn down as part of the quilting process with bright colored embroidery floss. I've made so many of these that I have lost count. I've been making them for 10 years now.

This hanger holds about 8 baby quilt tops. Sometime real soon here I've got to stop piecing tops and start layering and quilting. These are for my shows this Fall. I'm thinking with the economy the way it is now, warm coverings are going to be a must for this coming Winter. But I don't even want to think about Winter, as I'm *still* waiting for warm weather here. Maddie and I saw one day of sunshine last week and won't see another day of sunshine until late next week. Lots of rain though. And thunder. And lightning. And cool weather.

This little bunny quilt is hiding behind the others on the hanger. I love the flowers on this little guy. I'm going to spend a couple of days and one night with my friend, Crazy Judyth. We've got lots of work to do for the quilt show that she's going to vend at. I hear there's an iron that's calling my name (LOL)

Hope you all have a good weekend and that you're having sunshine. I know the sun is shining somewhere, just not here.

So Sorry!

Hello? Is anybody still there? I'm so sorry to those of you who still check my blog and see nothing new. I do appreciate you still dropping by, and I know how disappointing it is to check a blog and never see any updates. I really admire those of you who are able to post everyday and I enjoy looking at your new postings. I know it's been over a month since I posted anything.

What can I say? The weather has been rotten for the month of March and most of April. It's just now beginning to warm up and everything is a month behind. I've been trying to get a garden in and it's been hard when there have been hard freeze warnings (and hard freezing) way into April.

I've been working on a few things, mostly baby quilts (yes, again). I've been dyeing some laces for a quilt show a friend and I are going to do in June. I'll post full details of that later for any of you that are near.

Hopefully now that the weather is starting to warm up and spring may actually be here, I'll be more motivated.

Seam

Just a short note here today. Here's another little seam/patch treatment for you. It's a piece of flowered trim and I've simply added beads in the center. I "grew" some silk ribbon flowers along the top of the trim to help fill up the space some. This is actually organza ribbon, not silk ribbon. Organza is a little stiffer and as you can see, makes more lily shaped flowers instead of little knot type flowers like the silk ribbon would have done.

For those of you that had questions, if your comment came through with an email address, I emailed you. If your comment shows you as no reply or no email, they I answered in the comments section.

Someone was asking about how I handle the metallic thread and I at first gave a very smart answer about knowing lots of cuss words. Then I started paying attention to how I embroider with the metallic thread. One thing I do: after coming through all layers to the front of the block, I slide my needle between the top fabric and the backing. In other words, my needle and metallic thread do not go clear through to the foundation backing on the block. I think that helps some with the wear and tear on the metallic thread. So try that and see if it doesn't help some of you with your metallic threads.

Now it's almost the weekend and here is Miss Madeline blowing raspberries to everyone.

Finally Friday!

YAY! Finally Friday! I'm so happy. Last night I received a gift from one of my cyber-friends, someone whom I've never met but we have emailed for over 10 years now (!). She sent me the new Judith Baker Montano spiral book of crazy quilt stitches -- diagramed for LEFT HANDED people! Guess you know what I will be doing over the weekend.

For some of my newbies in CQForNewbies -- today's pictures are appliqued motifs. In the first picture, you will see a flamingo that I cut out from another piece of fabric and hand stitched to the block. Lots and lots of hand stitches. I did not use anything on the edges of the applique to keep it from fraying, just sewed with floss.

The second picture is the same thing, the sun motif was cut from fabric, only this time I appliqued it on with a machine satin stitch using metallic thread. My sewing machine seems to handle the metallic threads a lot better then the hand embroidery threads and then I beaded the edges. By the way, this is the very first CQ block I ever did and I was playing around with machine stitching vs. hand stitching. And if you're wondering -- hand stitching won (LOL).

So I hope that gives some of you an idea on how to use fabrics as motifs.

I want to take the time to thank all of you for your sweet comments. So many of you come through with "no reply" or no email addresses or names, so I'm going to start responding to comments in the comment section. I know I like to read the comments on the blogs I visit and I hope you do too.

We're supposed to have snow tomorrow -- ugh! It was 70 degrees on Wednesday and now snow on Friday night. Everyone is so tired of winter and anxious for spring that I know we're trying to rush Mother Nature. I wish she'd take the hint (g).

OKAY! I have these first two pics in here so that you can click and make them bigger.

Now let me tell you what they are. This is one of the blocks from my Fantasy CQ. It is a wizard and he is a rubber stamped image, stamped onto fabric and then colored with crayons, colored pencils and now threads and beads. There are so many ways to get an image transferred to fabric. Since I have a rather modest collection of rubber stamps that I love, I've decided to use them in my CQ work.

To stamp on fabric, you need to have a PERMANENT ink. Not dye based, not pigment ink, PERMANENT ink. I used Versa-ink, but there are a couple of other brands. It has to say PERMANENT or you will smear the ink while you're working on the image and that is not good. Also, the dye based and pigment inks will wash away if you get any moisture near the image.

The first picture shows some work done on Mr. Wizard. He is still very much a work in progress. The second picture, you can see how I've worked on his beard. I'm just using a simple back stitch to outline his beard with dark grey thread. I will use a lighter grey thread for highlights and shading inside his whiskers. The floss is just regular DMC embroidery floss. I've also used some Krenik metallic blending filaments (yes, they were a real treat to use and try to keep from fraying) on his robe.

Since I have these pics in here and you can enlarge them, I'm not going to risk adding anymore at this time. I'll post more pictures tomorrow.

Lots of Eye Candy

Remember my last post where Miss Maddie was sitting at the window trying to find Spring? Well, this a.m. it is so dang cold -- seriously folks -- it's only 18 degrees outside. Maddie decided she needed a house within a house to keep warm. This is her little tent, or her "cube" as I call it. This is a fun toy because she can jump around on the walls of it and make it roll over and over and over. But I'm sure you can tell from the expression on her face she's not a happy campber.

In my group, CQForNewbies, we've been talking about how to embellish "patches" -- you know, those great big empty spaces that sometimes creep up in a block. My fellow list owner, JK, is showing how she does patches. She does the most beautiful artwork that she paints and transfers on her blocks. Since I'm not that talented , here's how I tackle patches using needle and thread. Please be advised most of these are still works in progress so these are just to give you some ideas and inspiration.

The green spirals above are a nice curvy shape to break up all the hard lines of a machine pieced CQ block. I've started adding some beads, also in a curvey line.



On this block I'm using the fabric as my inspiration. I've started outlining the flowers and beading the centers. Next I'll probably add some embroidery to the birdhouses to make them stand out a little more also.

On this block, I've enhanced the flowers on the center patch and then added lots of feather stitching to the left of the patch. I've added beading and green leaves to the feather stitching to mimic the flowers on the center patch. While the feather stitching could be considered a seam embellishment, I just wanted to let you know that not all seam embellishments need to stay on the seam line. They can wander all around, make curvy lines, spill over into the next block. It all adds interest to your blocks.

Here's the (almost) completed block. This is for Lynn, a CQForNewbies member who is recovering from a very serious auto accident. She's been in rehab for over a month now (maybe 2 or even 3 months). We do a Hearts and Flowers Shower for any member that has a celebration or needs a pick me up. This month we ended up with two members needing Hearts & Flowers, as one of our members was involved in the Australian fires.

I hope the above pics have helped you all some. If you have any questions, just ask and I'll answer everything in the comments so everyone can read.

p.s. Once again, blogger is not letting my pictures enlarge after you click on them. Seems I only get 1 picture to do that and then the rest of them don't. All pictures have the same settings, etc. If anyone knows how to fix this mystery, please let me know.

End of January

It's finally coming to the end of January, my least favorite month. It's been bitter cold, we've had some snow and ice, but thankfully, we did not get all the ice and huge accumulation our neighbors to the south and east got.

That was supposed to be our weather, and in fact, 5 years ago, it WAS our weather. A big storm that rained ice on us for a day and a half and then took all the power out to three-fourths of the city (I was one of them). We dodged the bullet and I am so glad. Here's to February and an early, early spring. Madeline is looking for spring -- I don't think it's out there yet, Maddie (LOL).

I've had this picture on my camera for about three weeks now -- it's my Birds of a Feather quilt block. This is my favorite block because I love the bird's nest and the eggs in it. This block looks very cool when the quilting is done on it and I can't wait to start that. I only have two more applique blocks on this quilt and I have them both prepped and just waiting for the needle. Then there's just a couple of pieced blocks and it will be ready to put together.

Since my baby couldn't find Spring, she decided to go back to bed.