Projects

The Thinking Bed is empty. (By the way, that white quilt is keeping the sun off the tops of the other quilts that are piled onto the bed that is next to a window.)

Once the museum classes ended last week I went into hyper drive with the free days and got things moved to the next level.  When working with the kids, which is fun and interesting always, I am standing for four hours and talking for four hours and come home exhausted so not much energy for anything else.

Liberty circles have a binding sewn on but not down, quilting has begun on the green and blue scrappy and I'm doing big stitch quilting so it's going fast, several smaller pieces have been layered, the blue snowballs are layered.

And here they all sit, all piles off the bed and waiting but are at least at THIS stage

This is the emergency insurance two yard piece of fabric I bought last week.  I cut the tissue circles bigger than the end product will be but wanted Adelaide's idea on placement.  By text we moved them around a bit and I told her that it will probably have a framing border to widen it a bit.  But she is happy with this - leaving room for stems and leaves.  Sunflowers have long stems!   

With the Thinking Bed now empty of nagging little projects, getting them to the point of picking one up and quilting it, I will now focus on the flowers.  My plan is to get at least one flower done for a trial - remember, my concern is holding the fabric in my hand without having to cut it up, and then take it to retreat in April.  Might even get the stems and leaves ready.

I think now I am not worried about holding the fabric.  I remember I did it with Charlie's quilt so will make this work.  

I think that circle on the right needs to be moved down a bit. 

Sunflowers Part Two

 I'm getting good tips for the sunflowers.  One emailed and asked how big the flowers are.  At the widest point, after applique they would be about 15 inches across.  Thank goodness they ARE big and I'm not going to have to deal with itsy bitsy.

I don't use glue.  I don't fuse.  I know that's stubborn on my part refusing to use what's so commonly used.  I'm not judging anyone who does glue or fuse. I just personally don't like the idea.  I will baste the little buggers down very well to hold them in place and if a petal veers a little here or there, who's to know?  Has anyone actually ever gone out and measured the space between or around a real sunflower's petals?  I already warned Adelaide she will get what she wants but with MY interpretation. This isn't a photograph, it's a quilt.

Another email response was that I should be able to roll the extra fabric into my palm and hold it that way.  I'm going to measure and baste the circle size onto the dots and try that before I buy that plan. But she might be right.  I tried to remember how I handled Charlie's quilt and remembered I DID gather the extra into my palm to hold it.  If anything, the petals will be one piece of fabric and the stems and leaves another MAYBE being able to hide the seam under some of the leaves.  We'll see. 

There's a lot of measuring to be done, the only parts that are cut are the petals, nothing is final yet. The Thinking Bed will be put to use in placing the flowers because it's about a twin size. I went back to the store and broke my fast on purchasing fabric but I did buy more of the dots.  I have been kicked by THAT mule a few too many times.  I would rather have more than I need. The store still had what I wanted, I bought the last of it (2 yards) and now feel comfortable making a mistake or ending up with a pillow case for her if I have leftover.

Till then I will start prepping these after this week.  Until then, more classes at the museum. 

Sunflowers

 I had a few days off from the museum last week so spent some time organizing my brain around Adelaide's quilt.

She wants a navy polka dot background and I had collected a few yellow/orangey batiks for the sunflower petals.  

I enlarged the style of flowers she chose, labelled each flower and each petal. Then cut out each petal, again labelling everything well. She isn't going to notice the placement of each petal but I do want to remember how they fit together in the picture.  

After tracing them and cutting them out I thought I should get her opinion before proceeding.  Remember, she knows exactly what she wants and I don't want any disappointments at the end of this.

                                       I texted this photo to her and she replied, "Perfect."

                                     So now comes the part that is keeping me awake at night.  

This is an example of the arrangement she wants...not these flowers, not this pattern, not this background but this arrangement of flowers, a spray of three.  I do realize this is a copyrighted pattern and I am not using it, copying it or stealing it.  I'm just showing you an example of an arrangement of a spray of flowers she wants.

OK, that's done.  I needle turn applique by hand.  I don't used fusibles nor glue or machine applique ever.   My conundrum is how to do this without holding yardage in my hand and lap.  Right now I'm leaning toward cutting the background fabric into three large pieces that will accommodate the flowers individually and then putting them back together. But then there are the stems.  

I keep staring at this and thinking "ok, do it."  Or "ok, cut it so two flowers can be done and then a smaller piece."  Or "cut them into three large squares, applique the flowers, put them back together and then do the stems" which will be more straight line-ish stitching than the twisting and turning of the flowers. 

Usually I can fall asleep trying to solve a quilt problem and then a solution will come to me.  But this one keeps giving me options on how to handle it.  I am TERRIBLE with that adage "measure twice, cut once" because I can measure ten times, leave it for days, look at it, decide, cut and dang if it's wrong! 

Opinions? Options I don't see? Thoughts? Ideas?  

Winter

                                                          This is what winter looks like.

Every week I go to an elementary school and read to a class of first graders.  When I turned the corner down the corridor a couple of weeks ago I stopped and laughed and took this picture. 

Kids are required to wear boots, hats, mittens and snowpants.  This class just came in from recess - I think.   

There is no doubt why the lost and found is overflowing! 

We had a very nice respite from the cold this past week.  Yesterday I had a window in every room open for the fresh air and sunshine. Snow is gone, melted away.  Winter isn't through with us yet but we've seen the worst of it. 

Reality

You remember I said I don't take photos ( much) of buildings, but I couldn't resist this bookstore in Winchester.  

Amazingly, we didn't go inside.  For me, bookstores are worse than fabric stores are for you.  Definitely a rabbit hole.  

We should have gone in but we were with Brian and his daughter and SIL and truly, I would have held up the day. We didn't have much time and wanted to keep going. This was a hard pass.

Look at that little sign.  How true!  How needed! One of the things we discussed before this trip was whether or not we would admit to being Americans.  How's that for reality?  We know as soon as we open our mouth people will ask where we are from, it's obvious we aren't British.  We decided if anyone asked we would say we were Canadian. 

Well, first day someone asked if we were American.  I actually hesitated. A long hesitation. Stared at her. Sighed and said, "We aren't admitting to that (being American.)"  She smiled and said it was ok, they loved us.  I said, "uh...no you don't."  Then I assured her WE are NOT like THEM.  

Next day, another one.  By the third time I realized we were like Thomas, denying the third time.  

    As soon as people knew, though, it opened the door to them giving us their opinions and one actually, ACTUALLY asked if "he" was crazy.  "Yes," I said, "he is." 

This trip we didn't do the souvenir thing.  We are old.  We are purging what we have.  But I can't and don't resist books.  We stopped just a couple of times because I knew I'd buy and books are heavy to transport.  But these are the ones I did get.  The top two I brought from home to read on the trip.  If you haven't read Remarkably Bright Creatures, do. It took me a long time to decide to read it because I couldn't understand the premise of the octopus but the recommendation from Friend Laurie made me finally do it.  I read half on the way to London and finished it over Newfoundland on the way home.  There was NO time to read while we were there.  

Like I do when home, when I finish a book immediately after closing it I search out the next one. That was Tilt.  I'm not one for survival stories and this one is certainly How-Would-You-Survive-A-Disaster-Like-This and setting priorities and what IS a priority to you and how far could you extend yourself. We have certainly been racking up natural disasters lately so I thought this was worth the try.  We aren't inclined to earthquakes in Michigan.  This one was really, really good.  A lot of "oh,yeah, didn't think of that, I guess that would be a problem" moments because truly we just don't realize how good we have it when everything works.  And then it's gone.

 

Hampton Court

 When we travel I take photos of not normal things.  I take photos of things I want to remember but am not great on pictures of buildings.  I like the quirky things inside the buildings.  

On Wednesday of our trip we visited Hampton Court. Henry VIII's house. It's not a ruin, it's still a viable building used for events and films like Wolf Hall. As we walked we were well aware we were walking the same paths and on the same stones as Henry VIII and his retinue, beheaded wives, counselors, Elizabeth I.  This isn't the first castle we've ever visited but this one was daunting. 

Don't you sometimes wish you could give your guests a behavioral expectation when they walk in the door?  Especially those vagabonds, rascals or boys? Notice boys is in all capital letters.   It was interesting that there were a few signs of the times that specifically targeted boys. 

The Great Hall was organized for us to see that it was a place of meeting both for court but also feasts.

I thought this was a great idea for visitors.  Each place setting included an expectation of table manners of the time.  These are all true, documented expectations of guests.

Turns out things don't change much.  Must have been a boy.

This was the king's chocolate kitchen. Of course he had a chocolate kitchen.

Dare to Do

 Have you ever done something you swore you would never do?  Something you couldn't even imagine yourself doing?  No matter how hard you tried?  Ever?  I have.  And I'm putting more and more of those things on the list of dares accomplished.  

I now sit up when we drive across the Mackinac Bridge.

I went to the top of what was formerly called the Sears Building in Chicago...the one with the acrylic floor that extends out from the side of the building that you walk out onto and you are "floating" over the streets of Chicago and if you dare look down the people are the size of ants.  That one was hard.  PH wouldn't even go inside the building but waited for me on the sidewalk. That platform was so high up you couldn't see it from the street.  I told the worker in the gift shop that they should be selling clean under pants.

 I ate a roasted brussels sprout.

And in London last weekend on Robert Burns Night I ate haggis.  This one is almost on par with sitting up while driving over the Mackinac Bridge.  No, I think this is a category of its own.

All of it.  I ate all of it.  

If you know what's IN haggis you probably wouldn't eat it, either. Sometimes it's better not to read the ingredients label. But we had just arrived, were checking into the hotel and they were advertising their Burns Night dinner special.  And being in a sleep deprived travel weary jet lag fog I said, "I have to!"  So PH made reservations for that evening, Brian walked over (his building is across the street from the hotel) and we had dinner.  I ordered the four course Burns Night special and the second course was haggis. Each course had choices very Scottish but the second course was fixed. Haggis.  It tasted like the end piece of a meatloaf. It was quite good, actually. Brian and PH just kept drinking their wine and beer and shaking their heads and enjoying the fact they were NOT eating haggis. 

That list of Daring Things to Finally Do can now be wadded up and thrown away.  I've reached the top.

Liberty

Mecca.  That's what this is to a quilter.  This is the front door of Liberty of London. It was built in 1875 and that Tudor look is a standout in the neighborhood.  It's a huge place, walk down that street in front of you and it goes all the way to the next corner.  The store takes up a city block.  

This was the department I was interested in.  This is the fabric department, the fabric is iconic, the Tana Lawn feel is like running your hands through whipped cream.  They DO have 'quilting cotton' that has the more woven feel but this is beautiful.  And the prints are quite iconic.  There is variety but Liberty fabric has a 'look.'  

The floor above was featuring their Bridgerton line and to be honest I've never watched Bridgerton and wasn't interested in it so I stayed on this, their main floor for fabrics.

This isn't just for quilters, of course.  There are people out there who actually sew garments - who knew!  

I know I've been saying for months I'm done buying fabric unless it's a very special and specific project (like the kids' graduation quilts) but you don't go to London and not go to Liberty and you don't go to Liberty without buying fabric.  Not if you are a quilter, that is.  

This was my cutting table spot.  I know what I'm going to do with this and the Liberty I have at home, something very simple that lets the fabric be what it is.  And two pin cushions and a tote bag.  I'm a sucker for tote bags and this was one I wasn't going to leave behind.  Happy Birthday to me!!

No, the fabric is no less expensive there.  It's the same price as anywhere you might find it so I got some but not yardage. There might be enough here for two quilts.  We'll see!  

I can't tell you much about the rest of the store other than it is very expensive.  We walked in the door and there was a striking display of scarves that I went right to.  They were on sale for 50% off so hey, why not?  Well, at 50% off they were $225 pounds.  I ran my hand through them and took the elevator upstairs to the fabric.

Our Brian

 We just arrived home from a trip to London last night.  Over the next few days I'll elaborate a little on things but for now, the reason we went.  It's a long and special story.

In 1903 my grandpa was born here in Kalamazoo, Michigan.  When he was two years old his parents took his older brother with them when they returned to England, but left Grandpa here at a county poor farm.  They abandoned him, no sugar coating that. When he was 4 years old he was adopted and given a new name.  

When Grandpa was in his 30's he tried to find out what happened to his parents and find his brother.  He knew his birth name, his parents' names, his brother's name which is a lot of information especially before computers and the internet.

In the very early 1980's I tried to help him.  I wrote letters, made phone calls, asked any professional in the field: historians, judges, the British government, found people with his sir name who ripped pages from phone books in the London area with his sir name and mailed them to me.  When he came here for his yearly visit from California, I took him to county clerk offices, libraries near here.  We usually came up short but we did find out one thing.  I took each "no" answer as a backward "yes."  It told me, "don't look here, look somewhere else." And I'd ask more people more questions.  I even went to a psychic.

Eventually I found his brother's London birth certificate and obtained a copy.  I found his brother's school records from here in Michigan and obtained a copy.  Grandpa thought I'd found the Holy Grail.  But we couldn't find his family.

Many years later the internet had taken genealogy and simplified it.  And we who search must thank the Mormon church for sending their people out into the world to search for information and record it for the rest of us to use.   

One day maybe 15 years ago (give or take) I signed up for a two week trial of Ancestry.com. Grandpa's brother had a very distinctive middle name and if you found that, you found him.  And one day, I did.  I remember jumping up from the chair and my heart missing that beat.  There was someone out there searching, too, and our paths crossed. Finally.

That person was Brian.  

Brian's father was one of the brothers Grandpa didn't know about.  Grandpa thought he was looking for one brother.  Turned out, as time went on, there were more.  Brian is grandpa's nephew.  He figured out  we are half first cousins once removed.

Brian and I started sharing family information, sent pictures, I introduced him via email to Grandpa's son.  We shared the very extensive genealogy information he had uncovered. I found newspaper articles that confirmed family lore on his side.  He filled holes Grandpa only dreamed about.

Then one day, maybe about 8 years ago PH and I went to visit, to meet him. We immediately fell in love with Brian.  And like a bad penny we keep going back.  We immediately fell in love with him and simply want to spend time with him. 

I like to think Grandpa knows we found his family.  I'm sure of it.  We refer to him as "Our Brian" because, finally, he is.

Cold

 Really, I don't know what's worse, the heat you in Australia are dealing with or our temperatures and relentless snow.  This morning where I live the actual temperature is -18F.  That's 18 degrees BELOW zero. 

I leave you with this.  We will be busy the next several days so I won't be posting.  

We don't have penguins walking the street here but someone said it's colder here than the Antarctic so they would feel right at home.

Meijer is a grocery store.  This is just about right if we step out the door we better be ready for what's out there. 

PS, you know how I say I don't need any new hobbies?  I was sitting in the blue chair watching the birds jockey for position with the feed and I focused on the window screen and thought...."hmmm, a cross stitch grid! I could use the screen for cross stitch! "   Now, talk me out of it.

Monday

 You may have seen these photos.  If you live in the US, you have because they made national news, but if you don't live in the US, well, here's what our last few days have looked like. 

The COLD arctic air coming in from Canada over the not yet frozen Great Lakes produces this. This photo was from yesterday, Monday.  The air was arctic, the wind very strong, the snow light enough to blow around.

Even though the police, the snow plow drivers and tow truck drivers BEGGED people to either stay off the roads completely or just slow down, well, sometimes this happens.  

It took eight hours to clean this up.  The schools in the western half of Michigan were all closed so they bussed people from this mess to a nearby high school to get them out of their cars and warm, then tow truck drivers played a game of pick up sticks for eight hours untangling the mess.  In addition to the snow, it was/is brutally cold. Brutal. 

This isn't normal, this is not ABnormal. It happens more on roads in snow belts, areas where the snow just hits differently. It happens close to the lakeshore with high winds. It happens when you get high winds and snow so light it's like dust and causes white outs where you can't see past your windshield. And it happens when you insist on driving dry July road speeds.  People do. Luckily, in this, no one was killed.

We heeded the pleas and stayed home. No errand or even job is worth this. 

And More

 When we started acquiring our grands I was into making reading quilts for them.  I bought those cloth story book panels, cut them apart and put them back together sashed.  I made a lot of them when they were infants and toddlers.  

And of course, I bought some I didn't use because they outgrew the need. So here they sit. Another never. 

These WILL be donated but if any of you who live in the continental US or Canada want any of these for your grands, speak now and I will be very happy to mail them to you at my cost.  I'm sorry, Australia, but postage is nuts right now.  

These were a big hit with my grands starting when they were little and I made them as their baby/toddler quilts. I didn't do fussy because I wanted them to drag them around the house carrying their sippy cups with them.  I sashed them and quilted them.  

Now, I COULD make these into charity quilts with the fabric overload I've been whining about but I will NOT quilt them. My machine is not a fancy thing and I'd end up using the thing for dust rags if I tried.  So they would become yet another unfinished project.

I apologize for the color, really, white is white in real light.

I will wait until February 1 but after that they join the donated pile.

Just to Give You an Idea

 Just to give you an idea....

Last night at 11 p.m. I was sorting through two tubs of stuff. I made a donate pile that included those 9 patches I've been dealing with for months.  I'm tired of dealing with them and neglecting other possible projects.  I also put in things I saved because "I might use them someday" which is never.  A real conglomeration of unsentimental stuff.

Then I uncovered things like this:

Do you remember this? Probably not, you're too young. Those prairie point pieced into stars?  I distinctly remember my mom coming over to our house and I had some friends over so she could show us how to make these. This is an embedded memory.  Note the cardboard templates.  The dusty rose color is a dead giveaway to the 1970s. I hate dusty rose. There were two of these completed to this point but not completed as a finished anything in the tub. Now, 50 years later they might be back in style.

Two pieces of cross stitch.  I haven't done cross stitch since 1980.  This is finished, on very small linen stitched over two threads.  I looked at it closely and marveled at my eyesight back then.

And this, I believe this was Aida cloth?  Again, I was impressed with my careful working (that temperature tree project made me realize I lost my touch for cross stitch.) Unframed because back then I wanted my cross stitch projects framed but didn't have the money to buy a pack of paper plates much less take this to a framer.  So it sat.  For 40 years.

I moved on from cross stitch to needlepoint.  This was a little "L" that I intended to make into a seat cushion for our daughter's rocking chair she received for her first birthday.  Fifty years ago. 

I bought this shirt at a garage sale for 25cents when our son was maybe three?  Four?  I absolutely loved it and when he grew out of it I tucked it away.  It was my favorite favorite thing and he looked so darned cute in it.

That was 44 years ago.  I'm not giving up on this one.  I saved it because I want to use it "someday."  Now that it's unpacked from the tub I'm trying to think of how best to do that so am open to ideas from you.  Right now as I stare at it I'm thinking of NOT cutting it up and using pieces but leaving it whole, sewing it shut along the buttons and seams and using the whole shirt as a medallion like center. 

Is this the sign of a hoarder? Hoarders can't let things go.  I'm more sentimental than a hoarder but I do know it's time now for those 'maybes' that turned in to "nevers' to go.  These things?  They'll stay (see what I mean?) 

Fiddling

Still fiddling with scraps.  Still trying to clean up the bits and pieces.  Still trying to control the mess.  

Still using January to do it.

I spent a day sorting through Friend Sally's little 9 patches and my four patches and put them together for a small mat.  It's too big for a placemat and too small for a table topper so who knows where it will end up?  Looks a little Valentine-y to me.

Found some more four patches tucked away and put them together not knowing what to do with this long piece.  I put it on the windowsill for the photo and said, "oh! it fits perfectly!"  Why does this matter?  Well, this window is where we sit.  If I am on the phone I'm sitting in the blue chair (in photo above) by the window.  If PH is reading the newspaper or on the phone he is sitting in the blue chair.  Just enjoying the birds at the feeder?  Sitting in this chair.  But we both ALWAYS have a drink of some kind with us and PH is a fan of coasters. Voila!

More digging.  I decided this is finished.  Time for a border of some sort. These four patches are the same ones I used for the first map of Lowell I made a few years ago. This one represents the area just as the fur traders arrived so there were no buildings.  I worked with it till I decided I'm trying to put things that weren't there in there and called it finished.  As I walk past the Thinking Bed I decided to make the sky border uneven, sort of like it is now.  When you look at the horizon the sky is not a straight line, is it?  

That little building in the bottom right corner?  Many years ago a friend gave me a birthday card with this little house that she batiked herself on it. It's silk. I knew someday I'd use it in a quilt and tucked it away.  I decided it looked like the first fur trader's cabin enough to become the cabin for this.  I gently peeled it off the card and appliqued it to this and will quilt it down well.  

There are Native homes, corn and squash fields, animals.

I struggled with representing the animals that were prevalent and trapped for the Native's use and for trading.  Then I found this background and was thrilled. I believe Thimbleanna saved the day on this one. The animals are there but I didn't have to fussy cut and applique them all.  

For the Indian corn I used little beads and again, it's perfect.  This is a wall hanging so it won't be used like a quilt so I thought the beads will stand up to it.  There is, of course, a planting of pumpkins which were so important. 

The state tree for Michigan is the White Pine and I represented that with a fern print.  Again, the animals.  An owl, deer, badger.  All relied upon by the Natives.

This is why you keep scraps.  I found this birch bark looking scrap I used the original for at least 15 years ago.  Birch bark is what the Natives used to make their homes.  The apple tree represents the orchards that fed them.

So, yes, I decided it's done.  Could I busy it up with more bits and pieces of this and that?  Yes.  Will I? No.  That's not what this is supposed to represent.  So, time for the border.

This is the first map I made years ago.  The center portion is of a hand drawn map a woman here in town made in the 1950s. I traced her image of the streets. On the lower right is the river that meets the river that runs through town.  The Natives called this place "Where the Rivers Meet."  

The buildings represent the area, there's a barn on each of the four sides because this still is considered a rural community even though Lowell is growing. On the lower right corner is our daughter's house, built before the Civil War, on the left side is King Milling,  a couple of churches, a farm stand on the top row far left.  Each tree in the corner represents one of the four seasons.  

I don't deal in absolutes, this is a representation, like the one I'm working on now.

The dining room table is full of blue snowballs as I put them into rows, probably finishing that today. 

I am really tired of the mess, the scraps, the closet full of fabric and for a moment thought about quitting quilting.  No matter how many scraps I use I just make more.  They will never be gone.  There are also pieces I think I will donate and try to get a fix on things.  I know if I quit I will be sorry, so I guess I won't, but boy, am I tired of the mess.