I’m not even sure what I did yesterday during the day. Nothing much apparently.
Last night I finished quilting the quilt I had mentioned a few days ago, and I’ve got some pictures to share:
The pattern is called Red Hot Leftovers
It was designed by the quilt store that used to be open in town (she just closed and went strictly online this past winter).
It’s a great quilt — I quilted the pattern sample, and a customer brought me this one to quilt for her:
Here are a couple of close-ups:
I started by stitching-in-the-ditch around all of the black and red pieces. Then, I just played around with a freehand feather design that would fill the background spaces. Everything is freehand.
I started piecing a quilt of my own from this pattern, but I don’t like it is as well as the red and white original or this red/black/white variation. Mine is completely scrappy, and I don’t think it is as successful graphically as these are. It’s a fun pattern, the block construction is a little unexpected. The pieced border is also a different twist.
Gratuitous shot of my children: they were inside all morning, playing GameCube or reading. I gave them the option of going outside here at home or going to the playground. They chose home. I told my husband they were outside and he suggested that I needed to go check and make sure they weren’t (a) climbing the kennel fence or (b) throwing rocks on the driveway. They were doing neither of these things. What they had done was snuck inside, grabbed their books and are sitting on the tree swing reading.
At least they are outside, right?
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Actually, it was a busy weekend, but my blog was very quiet. Would you believe that I never even turned on my computer yesterday? At all? I really needed to get some quilting done, and so I just left it off. It was a little weird, but it was good for me.
I did turn it on today to make sure I didn’t have any book orders, and because I needed to look at some of the pictures I had taken at our Memorial Day family picnic and baseball game.
Well, it was on Sunday, so it wasn’t *really* a Memorial Day picnic.
And we ate inside, so I guess it wasn’t really a picnic either.
We did play baseball, though. Our “rules” are pretty loose though — it was kids against adults. The kids earned points for every run they scored, the adults earned points for every out they made. (Only the kids bat…and there are only 4 of them, so sometimes a kid has to run out to a base to take over running bases for the next kid in the line-up).
I surprised all of us by actually catching a couple of balls and making a few outs at 1st base, so that was a good thing. I’m not ashamed to admit that I’m afraid of the ball…
I can’t remember who won. The kids probably. But I think it was pretty close.
After we ate our picnic-that-was-eaten-inside, we headed back out to the baseball field. (I should mention that we have a 2 acre lot, and in the northwest corner, my DH put down some stones that we use as bases, and then he mows lanes and an area for the pitcher’s mound). It’s a nice flat space, and is pretty close to the size of the baseball diamond they use at this age.
This time, we weren’t really playing for points — the kids wanted to pitch to the adults, and then the kids wanted to hit some more balls. I took my camera out and got some pretty good shots. It was pretty entertaining. Joe made a big production of winding up and acting like a “real” pitcher. The 3 boys all did some pretty decent pitching. Then they started to get tired and silly and very few made it across the plate….
Here’s a shot of Joe pitching: he was very serious about it.
And here is Will waiting for the catcher to throw the ball back to him. You might notice that his right eye is a little red. He “caught” a ball with his eye earlier in the evening. He insisted (to me) that it didn’t hurt.
One last picture, of the other “boy” that lives here. He is pretty happy that the 2 little boys both like baseball…the “big” boy would be out playing catch all day long if he could, I think….
I spent most of Monday quilting, and instead of sitting here at the computer, I really ought to be in the studio finishing. I’ll try to post some pics of the quilt on the frame tomorrow!
TTFN-
Suzanne
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…my quilts are on their way to Kansas City for MQS (Machine Quilter’s Showcase). You won’t have to listen to me whine about my red wholecloth anymore because it is done and gone.
It seemed to take forever to put hanging sleeves and labels on everything. Maybe because I kept procrastinating and trying to find a gazillion other things to do….
My quilts are not “show” quilts — I don’t obsess over every single stitch, I don’t knot and bury my thread ends. I love to look at over-the-top quilts at quilt shows, but I also like to look at normal, every day kind of quilts — and that’s what mine are. I don’t send them expecting to win ribbons, I send them so that maybe somebody at the show will get an idea that they can take home and use on a quilt of theirs.
Today is the 2nd to last day of school. Wow. Where did this school year go? After Tuesday, we’ll have 3rd graders at our house. Doesn’t seem possible. I was invited to Joe’s classroom to listen to some reports that he and a few other kids got to work on. They went to the library with the classroom aide and did some research on a historical topic that was interesting to them. They put together posters and gave a short talk to the rest of the class. Joe’s was about castles. The kids were so funny — they did really well for being 2nd graders. One of the little boys rocked back and forth throughout his whole talk. I wanted to go stand up behind him, put my hands on his shoulders and keep him still. Will was very jealous that he did not get to do a report also. I told him that he could do a report whenever he wanted to — but he wants to do an “assigned” report — assigned by a teacher, not just his mom…
I’m going to try to go do something creative this afternoon, so maybe I’ll have pictures to share later.
TTFN-
Suzanne
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Monday night we were driving home from the Lion’s Club Steak Fry. We happened to pass our old house, which has gobs of peonies out front (and in back, too…). I said to my husband “You know, we need some peonies at our new house.”
He gave me the long-suffering-my-wife-is-an-idiot look and said “We *have* peonies at our new house.”
Ahem.
Not only do we have peonies, but they are in a really out of the way spot that is hard to see. Like, right at the end of the driveway next to the mailbox.
Ahem.
So, after noticing them (they weren’t there before, honest…LOL), I decided to take a few photographs of them.
And one of the few blossoms that is open:
I’m glad I know where they are now, I’ll be sure to keep an eye on them.
Yes, I am incredibly unobservant sometimes. It’s almost embarassing. I keep reminding the DH that this sort of thing is part of my charm. He still doesn’t believe.
One last shot: another 26 Things Scavenger hunt photograph:
Landmark
This beautiful pine tree graces our front yard. Before the current house was built (about 14-15 years ago), this property was a farmstead. Somewhere on our 2 acres the remains of an old house and several outbuildings are buried. I wonder how many years old this landmark of a tree really is — I’m sure it has weathered storms too numerous to count. It’s getting some rain tonight — it’s raining quite hard at the moment. Thank goodness!
TTFN-
Suzanne
p.s. Yes, this post is still part of my attempt to avoid the quilt. I couched the Madeira around the binding and you know what — it disappears into the ditch created by the binding. So it was pretty much a waste of time. Phooey. Now on to Plan D. Or maybe it’s closer to about Plan X by now….
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Oy.
I think I’m making this too hard. In fact, I know I am. It’s gotten so bad this week that I have resorted to doing laundry and cleaning the house in order to avoid finishing this quilt.
Please ignore the phantom chalk lines that appear at the bottom left and bottom right. They were an experiment in potentially trimming the quilt to a funky shape.
Also ignore the yellow pin heads at the top of the quilt. The quilt is pinned onto my design wall. It’s too heavy to stick on it’s own.
You can’t tell in this picture, but the feathers are outlined with a couched-on sparkly madeira thread. You can see a closeup of the small heart in a post from a few days ago.
I’ve wanted to do some beading, or some crystals, or ….something….but I think right now that what I’m doing is trying to embellish for the sake of embellishment. And I most certainly don’t want to fall into that trap.
I’m just worried that as it is, it looks unfinished. Like I just quilted a big heart, and then pebbled around it. I’m worried about that left-hand corner being too big and looking empty. I’ve played with some beading ideas, including a beaded echo of the assymetrical heart motif down in the left-hand corner, but it was looking….stupid….
I’ve had trouble getting a good picture of it that is true to the color and shows off the quilting. The picture above makes it look much brighter than it is — the red wool I used is a very dark red. I’ve thought maybe it needs some more sparkle, but maybe the couched thread is enough.
What I think I’m going to do right now is go couch on some more of the Madeira thread around the inside of the binding. And then I’m going to call it done….unless somebody comes up with some brilliant idea for me. Something brilliant but simple that can be accomplished today or tomorrow, because this crazy thing has to be on it’s way to Kansas City right now! That isn’t too much to ask for, is it?
S
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For my 26 Things scavenger hunt, technically it’s yesterday’s, I just didn’t manage to get it off the camera and play with it (using Picasa) until just now.
Stop
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I’m sure this seems like an odd thing for me to be talking about. In all honesty this post was originally going to be a purely self-indulgent-look-at-how-cute-my-kids-were kind of a post.
But then I realized that it is quilt/craft-related and that some of you might be interested in the projects that are depicted in these pictures.
But first you have to read through the self-indulgent stuff. Hey, it’s my blog, I can blog about whatever I want, right?
So, the background of why I’m even bringing up the topic of ring-bearer pillows: as I mentioned before, my Mom and I went to a blessing of a wedding a little over a week ago. In preparation for this event, I printed pictures of my kids, my brother’s kids and my dogs so that I could show these lovely creatures off to family friends that we hadn’t seen for years.
On the way to the airport it dawned on me that I hadn’t actually managed to bring a picture of my husband. I had remembered the dogs, but not Mark. Oops.
I called my sister and asked her if she might have something she could bring. The picture she chose is one of my very favorites, of my husband and the boys at her wedding:
The boys were 3 years old. I was the matron of honor, Mark got to be the ring-bearer-shepherd. Aren’t they all adorable? Joe had managed to have a playground accident the day before the wedding, thus the cut under his eye. This picture was taken seconds before they were to head down the aisle. Mark quickly slipped into the church around the side and met them in the front pew with some new toys (maybe some tractors? airplanes?).
(Make note of the pillow pictured here, I’ll be coming back to it after I get through the rest of the self-indulgent stuff…)
Debra let me bring home the photo that she had printed and Mark and I were looking at it last night. He asked if we had any frames we could put it in. I was sure we did, but couldn’t find any in the first place I looked. I thought this was odd, as I knew we had lots of unused frames, but didn’t have any clue where they were.
“Oh, there’s a box in the basement labeled frames,” he said.
Holy crow! It wasn’t just FRAMES! It was FRAMED PICTURES! In our previous house, the family room was in the basement, and our bookshelves lined one of the walls. All of our family pictures were displayed on these bookshelves. When we moved 2 years ago, the pictures got all boxed up and Mark stuck them on a shelf in the basement of the new house. He was tired of dusting around all of the pictures, so he just left them in the box. I’m pretty dense sometimes, and it hadn’t yet occurred to me to go looking for all of them.
It was like Christmas going through that box last night! Ultimately, most of the pictures went back into a cupboard, because I was informed that if I wanted them out and on display *I* had to be the one to dust them.
Yeah. Like that was going to happen.
One of the pictures that I uncovered in the box was of the other wedding that the boys were in the year that they were 3 years old. They were actually a week or so away from being 4 when they were ring bearers in Mark’s cousin’s wedding. They got to be ring bearers along with their cousin Ben (and Ben’s sister Lucy got to be the flower girl. Which is a whole ‘nother full circle story, because Lucy’s mom was the bride’s mom’s flower girl….).
This one they didn’t have to wear tuxedos for, but they were still awfully cute. My mom actually made the vests for the 3 boys. They were a sparkly metallic red and blue plaid. Totally cute.
So about all of those pillows for the ring bearers.
First wedding
For my sister’s wedding, my Mom and I worked together. Unfortunately I don’t seem to have any good pictures of the pillows themselves, but I thought I’d tell you what we did in case you ever need an idea.
I had recently purchased a Barbara Brackman book: Create your Family Quilt — she listed a variety of blocks that were associated with each state. We picked a block for the states that Debra and Matthew were born in — South Carolina and Michigan, and Mom pieced the 2 blocks in creams/whites. I think they were 12 inch blocks. I layered the blocks with a thin batting and a backing and quilted a feather design over the blocks. Mom made them into pillows for the boys to carry. I have to say that I do not know the current location and/or usage of these pillows — my sister reads my blog, perhaps she can comment. But Deb, if you don’t know where they are, I don’t want to know about it. VBG.
I thought it was a very special way to provide them with a custom keepsake. It wasn’t hard to do, and while most people wouldn’t need to make *2* pillows for ring bearers, some variation on the theme might work — there are so many blocks with interesting meanings, I’m sure you can come up with something appropriate.
Second Wedding
So it was bad enough having to make 2 pillows for the first wedding, but the 2nd wedding required 3 pillows! I don’t remember exactly all of the thinking that went into the design process, but I know this: first, the color scheme was primary colors and second, and second, I wasn’t sure they were going to want to end up with 3 pillows to have to find a home for. So, the plan was that I would make these three pillows, and after the wedding take them apart and make the pillow tops into a wallhanging.
The heart and scroll design that I used was adapted from a Robyn Pandolph book (Stitched With Love). I don’t know if you can tell from the wedding photo above, but each pillow has a different word embroidered on the scroll: Faith, Hope, and Love.
The photos I have of the wallhanging that I made aren’t great, but here’s what it ended up looking like:
My mom got involved in this project, too: she got to embroider the verse from I Corinthians that got added to the bottom of the hearts.
Remarkably, I managed to get this wallhanging done in time to give it to them at Christmas time that same year!
Phew, that was a long post — thanks for hanging in with me through all of my self-indulgence. If you ever have to make a ring bearer’s pillow (or 2 or 3…) or even a gift for a wedding, I hope this gives you some ideas that you can use!
TTFN-
Suzanne
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Good grief, how did it get to be Monday again? And not only that: this is the boys last week of school. Well, they have to go back next Tuesday for Track and Field Day, but that doesn’t really count. Only a few more days of being 2nd graders. Weird. I’m pretty sure I’m not ready for summer vacation already, but oh well, time and tide wait for no woman, right?
I didn’t manage to take a 26 Things photo yesterday, but I thought of one that I had already taken that I could use for the world Tangle. I posted this on the blog before:
Tangle
I convinced my lovely assistant to pose for a entry on the 26 Things list, so you get to see Katie twice today:
Nose
You could almost hear her thinking “Mom, why are you bugging me? Why do you keep taking my picture? Will you get out of my face already?”
I got the binding done on my red wholecloth today. I couldn’t get a picture of the whole thing in my studio — it’s too dark — I need to take it out in the sun, I think. I finished couching the sparkly stuff (I think Vicki said that what she sent me was from Madeira), but now I’m stuck. And I need to get unstuck really soon. Like tomorrow. This crazy thing has to be in the mail by the end of the week. I want to do some more embellishment, but I don’t know what. I don’t know if I’m trying to hard, or if I just haven’t hit on the right thing yet. It’s hanging on my design wall again, and I’ll keep contemplating it while I work on a quilt for a customer.
Time to take the boys to piano lessons — last lesson for the year!
TTFN-
Suzanne
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As if all of my posts aren’t vaguely random?
1. The other frog. Joe tends to march to the beat of a slightly different drummer. His paint job is a little rough, but the artistic vision is there:
Note the tongue sticking out and the hat on the frogs head. I laughed right out loud when I saw it. Isn’t it awesome?
2. Joe’s Jawa still doesn’t have a name. Will slept with George. I tucked them into bed together. I forgot to take pictures of Will’s Jawa. I told the boys they could design creatures for me to try to make in fabric, Joe jumped right on that, and I actually spent part of today making his creature. I’ll try to post a picture tomorrow.
3. Today was our last soccer game. Ever. Phew. Now it’s baseball season (coach-pitch at this age, games are 2 nights a week for the month of June). They started practicing this week — the whole team seems to be doing pretty well. I had to go help last night (I was the line police, which is like herding cats. Or turtles). I was pretty impressed that nearly all of the boys could throw the ball from 3rd base to 1st base. Mark is the head coach. We were a little embarrassed that the 2 children that were the worst behaved last night were the coach’s kids. The boys hate ball hogs, but by golly, guess who was being a ball hog last night?
4. I started working on a quilt for the current quarter’s Quilt Studio service quilt challenge. I picked up some rolls of fat 8ths at Joann’s the other night. Don’t ask me why I bought 6 bundles of each color way. The body of the quilt that I’ve designed is only going to take 1 bundle each, and I bet the border and binding both won’t take more than 2 bundles of each. I didn’t want to run out…..I’ll try to post a picture of the blocks tomorrow.
5. My 26 Things Photograph for today:
Fold(s)
There are 2 because I can’t decide which one I prefer.
6. The Panoramic photograph I posted last night is the view out our west windows. Every so often we like to take the camera out, stand on the back patio and snap a group of pictures of our view. It’s really cool to see how different it looks throughout the year.
7. Movies: We watched Children of Men last night — very strange and different, but I liked it. I’m not sure Mark did. It didn’t keep him awake. We watched Are We Done Yet? tonight. It was not the worst movie I’ve ever seen, but I’m glad we only paid $1 per ticket to go see it.
I think that’s all for tonight. I spent most of the day working on cleaning up my desk and on bookkeeping. Why do I let the piles get so high? I know that if I kept up with it all, it wouldn’t be so painful, but here I am yet again. Ugh. I did make progress, and the piles aren’t threatening to fall over anymore. As soon as this is done: back to the studio reorganization that I started and abandoned a few weeks ago…..
TTFN-
Suzanne
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Last fall, I made myself a ladybug. After I made her, the boys asked me if I would make them each a stuffed Jawa. For those of you that don’t know, a Jawa is a creature from the original Star Wars movie. I’m not really sure why they have captured the boys imagination, but they sure like hte Jawas. Maybe it’s because they are about their size?
This picture is from the Star Wars official website. They have a pretty impressive database, more than you probably would ever want to know about Jawas.
Every so often the boys will mention the Jawas I’m supposed to be making and I put them off, because I’m not really sure why I agreed to do this. They guilted me into it the other day, though. After I made my kitty, they asked why I had made the kitty but still hadn’t made their Jawas. Because I’m a horrible mother, that’s why….
Will was a Jawa for Halloween this past year (you can see a picture here) . After making the robe that he wore, I had a pretty good idea of how to make a robe for the tiny stuffed Jawas. I also had leftovers of the brown fabric I used to make the robe, so that was easy. I needed the body to be very easy to make (in other words, I didn’t want to spend hours on this, when all you really see of the Jawa is the robe and his glowing eyes.
When I printed the pattern for the kitty I made, I also printed a pattern for a cute, easy bunny. As I was looking at it, it occurred to me that if I left off the ears, I would have a passable Jawa. I’m sure that the designer of the bunny (Wee Wonderfuls) had no idea it might turned into something like this, but I’m grateful for the help. She may not want to know.
I made Will’s first, and decided that the robe I made was really too small. He’s happy with it the way it is, so I’m not going to push it. The robe I made for Joe’s Jawa is probably too big, but Joe is happy, too, so that’s just fine with me. The boys don’t seem to mind that their Jawas are armless.
Will’s Jawa went to school with him, so I only have a picture of Joe’s to show. Maybe I’ll take a picture of the pair later and add it.
I should also mention that Will’s Jawa is named George. I don’t think Joe’s has been named yet. So, without further ado: a homemade Jawa.
The things we do for our children, right?
I’ve been looking around at stuffed creatures online. Some people call them softies, some call them plushies. In our house, any stuffed creature is called a “beanie” — whether it is stuffed with beans or not. I think that got started by their cousin who is 2 years older.
Two more pictures today:
Will made this frog in art class. Isn’t it cute? Joe’s is still at school. I’ll show it off as soon as I can convince him to bring it home.
And lastly: I found a website called 26 Things, it’s a photographic scavenger hunt. There is a list of 26 things you are supposed to depict with a photograph. I’m going to try to do the May list over the next few weeks, here is my first entry:
Panoramic
I try to reply to comments with a private e-mail, and I think I’m a little behind on doing that. I apologize if I haven’t replied to you. I do appreciate hearing from people, and want to thank everyone that does leave a comment. I hit 5000 visitors this past week — I go back and forth between trying to ignore stats and being obsessed by them, but I was excited to see the counter turn over 5000.
Thanks to everyone that visits! I think that’s all for now.
TTFN-
Suzanne
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