Binding on the Blooming Nine Patch

Yayy got the binding on:

Have you been doing Blog Search to look for Quilt Market posts? It's so interesting. My favorite so far is the Blackbird Designs booth; I want to make everything that's in it, especially the giant cross-stitch, and stow it in my bedroom.

Emails from College

[mom]"Timmy, email me immediately. I'm not going to pass these GACE exams tomorrow. What made me think I could learn algebra I and II, geometry, trigonometry, calculus, statistics, and mathematical processes in three weeks of spare time? I have no spare time, I am too busy quilting. Do you know a device for remembering what "mean, median, and mode" are? Help your mother. Love you."

[son]"Mom, you've had two months to study [three weeks, two months, who's counting]. You're just nervous. It will all come back to you. This is what Col. Sider used to tell me to do during a test: look up at the ceiling [I thought he was going to say 'look for the answer in the pattern of the styrofoam dots']. This makes blood rush to the back of your head, which is where short-term memory lives. Can't help with mean/median/mode, Mom, Mrs. Miller drilled those into me such that I will remember them for the rest of my life whether I want to or not."

So I thought of my own devices: average and mean both have "a" and "e" in them, picture median as a line down the middle, and mode and often both have "o"s in them. And I'll be looking up at the ceiling a lot in those exams tomorrow, probably with tears running into my ears.

Ruled by Cats

Ginger won't give me back my Blooming Nine Patch.


Rembrandt won't stay out of my sewing drawer. No wonder I've been finding thimbles all over the house.


Rembrandt won't stop playing with the stash.


Two hands reach out to grab one innocent 100% cotton victim:


The predator pulls the victim to the precipice:


Will you look at that snaky arm?


And she watches them fall...


Dead on the carpet.

It Was Still Wrong, and Better Things

All right, so I realized this stupid block was done wrong, so I re-did it. I am a saint. The only reason it still doesn't look that great is that I kicked it around the block a few times. Oh well, at least I got a walk in:

Got this one done as well:

Only two more A-row blocks to do.

Now for the good stuff. I made Marcie's Christmas Sparkler freebie! Go get the pattern from her blog or here :

I made this from a stack of wovens that I got at the Village Quilt Shop that used to be in Stone Mountain, Georgia, on Main Street. What a nice shop that was. I'm so glad I finally used some of these cute wovens (vintage by now) and I LOVE my Christmas Sparkler, never would have thought to make this without Marcie.

Dear Jane Gone Terribly Wrong...and more

This one wasn't going well...


A good stomping and killing might have been in order, but instead I layered on those dang triangles as fat appliqués and am calling it done:


These Dear Jane guys went better:




A few Show and Tells from the day classes of Jo taken by our leader:

Can anybody tell from this photo (maybe it's too small) what the background fabric is on the one below? Our Leader says it's a vintage Jo:



This is the Leftovers portion of the next Jo project:


These pieces accumulated under the sewing machine; aren't they pretty together??


The Blooming Nine Patch is done except for binding, but I'm not going to post a photo until I get that done. Oh, and a label, right :-) ? It has wool batting, I've been sleeping under it since Monday, and I LOVE it.

Little Women Class Show and Tell

First is this cute graphic that was contained in an email that was sent to me. Don't know the origin, but isn't it great?

Quite a Show and Tell last night. And this is only from the 3rd, evening, session. Remarkable. This is an antique quilt from a Kansas ancestor:

Several of these photos are blurry. I must have had a few drinks with my evening salad. An amazing quilt from one of Little Quilts' own:

There were some Merry and Brights:

One lady is starting a Dear Jane; aren't the light colors elegant??

Same lady has made valances, using some of the annual Second Saturday Sampler blocks that Little Quilts presents:


Same lady brought a Lori Smith. Could you die?

An enticing sewing basket:

Our leader has put together Jo charm packs for us:

A simply amazing color and print combination, by another Little Quilts' own, in Judie Rothermels. I could hardly keep from stealing this one. I was sitting right next to her and had a very large bag very handy :-) :

Beautiful!

There was talk of how beautiful this would be quilted in feathers overall:

This one is so pretty, I could just screeeeeeeam:

That's the new Kim Diehl for the tomato-y background.


Our next Jo project done by our noble leader:

Dear Jane-ing and Quilting from Gifts

This is fun. Windham's Dear Jane fabrics came out, so I was able to do the center block with the same print that Jane used:

A triangle. I'm only two triangles behind, yayyy:

Also updated my Virtual Dear Jane chart (thank you, Sharon Mastbrook) that I have posted on "Folk Art Children:

It feels like I have done more than this. Ah well, enjoy the journey, eh?

Our Jo's Little Women groups recently received some fabric as a gift. Wonderful, dear fabrics. I've kept mine together with the idea of making a Little Quilt to remember the gift, etc., by. Never end a sentence with a preposition :-) . So here it is so far; this is about 20x24":

A little applique'ing will layer on top of this.

My latest addition to the Economize Whenever Possible effort (which has sadly been necessary my entire life anyway) in these Hard Times is to dry clothes on the line:

Also please note the pile of firewood. I am quite seriously not expecting to turn on the heat this year. Rembrandt looks on horrified. She had not realized we were a poor family. Cats expect the best, you know.

Just Look: Tazzie and Marcie

Just look at what Tazzie and Marcie have sent my way. Tazzie sent me this fascinating fabric all the way from Australia that I admired from her blog. This Japanese fabric has a neat little texture to it and I love it. And note the cute magnet. My first souvenir from Australia! Thank you, Tazzie! Now I need to find a few good greens to mail back in return.

Marcie and I were emailing when she said, "have you checked your mailbox? I sent you something". What? What could she possibly have sent? I ran out wearing something not presentable to find a squishie. And just look at what was inside. The beautiful wool pillow she showed earlier on her blog.

Marcie, it is beautiful. It is the most heavenly wool and the design! This is me made into a pillow, that's all I can say. Thank you, I am quite overcome :-).

Phew, got a DJ done; now I'm only two behind (if you don't count triangles :-) ):