Dogs and What Else is New

Sometimes it's better to just type first and then add the pictures in second. I have the hardest time trying to add type after I have the pictures in place. I wanted to share with you the newest pictures of three of my dogs. I was sitting on the couch downloading pictures from my phone to my e-mail so I could up-load them at school (and here) so I took a few quick snaps of my dogs. Taegan wasn't in the mood so I left him alone.   Below is Mr. Finnagan.  He is my only non-gray Shi Tzu.  He is also a foundling - found running in the streets after a major rain storm a couple of years ago and when we had thunder and rain the other day, he and Taegan (another one afraid of thunder) were my constant companions. 





Finnagan

Next up is Miss Fiona.  (a foundling)  She was found by a neighbor who thought it was one of mine and to tell you the truth, I thought it was mine, also until she turned her head and looked at me.  

Miss Fiona

 I wasn't going to keep either one of these, but after searching for 3 months and no flyers, ads in the paper or anything, I kept them.  Due to the oilfield traffic, we get people who just up and leave the apartments a couple of blocks over and put their dogs out on the street when they can't keep them or don't want to keep them.  It's sad, but unfortunately part of life.  Last, but not least, is Mr. McCallum.  He is my Yorkie and is a handful sometimes.  He is smart and inquisitive and gets into trouble all the time.  (mostly by climbing over the baby gate on the stairs and taking the squeekers and stuffing from Finnagan's toys.)  this was his second picture.  He moved in the first and I told him we had to take it over and he posed so pretty for me. 

McCallum

 What am I currently working on?  That is a good question.  Last weekend was a semi-quilt-in (only 2 days) for our group and I didn't know what I wanted to work on, so I followed in my mom's footsteps and pulled an unfinished project out and decided to put it together.  The blocks are from a color challenge over at 15 Minutes Play.  I had made 13 of the blocks before I got busy and had planned on coming back to make the other 3 later, but then decided I was finished.  16 didn't go together as well as this 13 did.  I found this fabric in my stash - it's a Terri Mangat fabric - and it is perfect for this quilt.  I plan on adding a small dark brown border (background fabric for the blocks )  and then I am calling it done. 

Color challenge quilt top in progress

 I took a journaling class at the Ogallala and below is my start of the journal.  You take two pieces of muslin and fuse them together.  Then using red and blue thread, you stitch the lines to make your fabric look like a sheet of paper.  I painted the letters and pig and then free-motion stitched around them, added the spider, web and words.  I plan on adding more words and pictures on this one and then I will make several more and put them together in book form.  This was fun and interesting. 


Journaling with the machine

Weekend Works

Remember a couple of weeks ago when I posted this quilt top.  It was to be the background for my Ogallala retreat quilt.  I put up some of my elements on the wall and decided that I really didn't like it.  The background, which I was trying to make subtle, was just overwhelming the top completely.  I left it all on my wall and walked away.  I didn't know what else I was going to do.  Tonight, I put up the rest of the orange curly cues and some yellow dots and I think it has come together. 

It definitely needs more yellow dots, but I didn't want to put them up there yet.  All of it is just pinned and I am not sure if I can get it down in one piece to iron everything on there.  I used steam-a-seam 2 and I should be able to just press them on there, but I ironed it to my fabric before I cut it out and I think I took all the sticky away.  I really need to read the package directions before I use a product.   Tell me what you think.  All of the symbols have a different meaning and some of them I can only have a set amount.  I am going to move the third "flower" from the top left up a little bit, I think that's the one that fell off and I just slapped it back up right before I took the picture.  I may need to make one more open leaf for the bottom left, for some balance, maybe.   This is definitely a work in progress. 

What else have I been working on this weekend?  I made 5 more bags using Jenni's tutorial .  If you haven't had a chance to check it out, click on the highlighted words and it will take you to her website.  I also made this pin cushion from Bari J.  Click on her name and it will take you to her blog.  Scroll down and look on the right side for the pin cushion tutorial.  I don't  have it completely finished in this picture as you can tell by the pins sticking out the side, because I want to stuff it a little bit fatter.  I don't have any more stuffing here at the house, so I will have to pick some up tomorrow after school.  This is a large pin cushion.  It measures about 4 1/2" X 4 1/2" X 2 1/2".  I will add a button in the middle when I get it all stuffed.  I copied down how to make this pincushion several months ago and finally got around to making one.  I thought it was going to be harder to make than it was.   It went together rather quickly and easily.  I can't wait to try this one again. 

What else have I gotten into this weekend?  Well, since I am still trying to work through the quilt at the first of this blog, I don't want to start anything new, so I found this partially quilted top and finished quilting it.  Well, I thought I was finished, but I think I want to add some more quilting to the middle of the hearts.  I had previously quilted in a shiny purple metallic thread, the rays coming from the hearts.  I just remember the thread breaking over and over again.  I didn't want to machine quilt anything else it was soooo frustrating.  I will show the rest of this quilt when I have it all finished.  If I remember correctly, these hearts were leftovers from an online block exchange that were just laying around and I made this top with them. 

The rest of the weekend accomplishments will have to wait to be shown until I take down the retreat quilt from the design wall. 

Quilt-in Background Top

This is what I have worked on all weekend.  Well, not really allll weekend.  I did take a couple of naps and played games on the computer and read blogs and finished a book.  So, I don't want you to think I slaved over this one quilt top.  This small top - about 36 inches square - is the background for some applique.  Back in September I attended the Ogallalla Quilter's Society's annual fall retreat.  The proposed project for that retreat was applique.  Since applique is not really one of my favorite things, I decided to work on another project or three.  However, watching people at the retreat work on this project, I found it really intriguing.  I loved the concept, the story and the meaning behind the pieces along with the designer, Cinde.  My friend Kathy and I decided that we needed to do a project, also, but we would wait until the January quilt-in at our guild.  That quilt-in was this past weekend. 

Kathy got to the church with a sketch of what she wanted to make and an armload of her hand-dyed fabrics that she recently snow and ice dyed.  (way cool stuff)  She just jumped in - which we learned at the first of the school year is her nature (can you say North?) - and began working on her quilt top.  She got it all put together before we left Saturday afternoon.  (sorry, I didn't take a picture of it.  Maybe she will send me one and let me post it here later, hint, hint Kathy)

I showed up with my folder of the design elements, a couple of tubs of fabrics to choose from, another stack of fabrics that might include a background fabric and some steam-a-seam 2.  I also arrived with no clue as to what I really want to do.  My original intention was to use the light blue as my background.  However, Friday night I had changed my mind and decided I wanted a pieced background of subtle monkey wrenches. (or churn dashes)  I left the quilt-in Saturday with the middle squares put together.  Today, I added the borders.  I didn't know I was going to put those on there, but Saturday night while eating dinner I saw the two fabrics (waiting to go in the wash) and decided they would be the perfect borders for this quilt.

Now, I am making and cutting out all of my elements.  Hopefully, I will have everything ready to go later this week and can begin the designing.  Even though the quilt top could stand on it's own right now, it's just a work in progress, but I am pleased with my background. 

Liberated logs and baskets

I have been wondering and trying to decide what and how I was going to  teach my scholarship class at Ogallala this year.  I took two classes from Gwen Marston - Liberated log cabins and Liberated Baskets.  When I was discussing this with my mother, she came up with the wonderful idea of using the log cabins for the basket.  ding, ding, ding we have a winner!!!   I made two log cabins with orange strips (different fabrics in each) and made one yellow cabin.  These were all from the scrap pile that I use to make "fabric" with for my intuition quilt.  I pulled some brown fabric from a stack of fabric that has finally graduated from the pile by the sofa and made it up the stairs and into my quilt studio.  I had thought I was going to use it for squares in the 6 inch square swap from a couple of weeks ago and decided that I didn't want a solid brown.  It's no really solid, but kind of muddled.  I used a different teal fabric for the handles on each of the baskets and sashed it with a brown/orange/yellow/green fabric that for some reason I really, really like.  (I have been on a brown/orange kick for a little over a year now).  I was going to make the border a large strip of that fabric, but decided that it needed a kick.  So, I went through my teal drawer and pulled a fabric that has little bitty silver strips in it.  The selvage says the fabric was made in 1999 so it is a bit on the old side, but I am so glad that I have it because it works perfectly here.  Now to decide how to quilt this baby.  I want to have a completed quilt for my project instead of just a top like last year.   Now that I think about it, the year before I had three - count them - three completed (that means quilted and bound!!)  quilts for my solids class.  Last years wasn't quilted because I couldn't decide . . . . okay, I won't lie, it wasn't quilted because most of my tops aren't quilted. 

Ogallala classes

I just posted this on 15 minutes play. This is only part of what I have been working on this week. It is made mostly from scraps leftover from the following quilt.

This is part of the quilt class that I took from Yvonna Hays at the Ogallala Quilt Festival this past weekend. The pattern is called Dashes and Patches and consists of 12, 9 and 6 inch churn dash blocks and 6 and 3 inch 9 patch blocks along with plain fabric fillers. I saw a quilt made from this pattern last year and knew I wanted that pattern. When I saw that it was offered as a class at festival, I signed right up for it. I now have the first three rows up on my design wall - minus the last block since I can't stretch over my cutting table to put it up. I plan on sewing those rows together tonight unless I am totally distracted by piecing my own fabric out of scraps. (15 minute play) Here are samples of my students work in the class I taught, Divide and Conquer. They all did a great job. I can't wait to see what their finished quilts look like.

Sit and Sew @ the Sewing Cottage

Friday night was spent in the company of my friend Kathy at the Sewing Cottage in Andrews. Norma, the store owner, had a sit and sew from 6 to midnight. Since Kathy and I had gone to the Midland one a couple of weeks before, I called her up and suggested we try this one, also. This time I would definitely take pictures of everything that was going on. Well, turns out, Kathy and I were the only smart ones to take Norma up on her all night sewing fun. And what fun we had. Can't wait until the next one! We will definitely be dragging more of our Odessa group up there to join us. We talked, and sewed and ordered pizza which Norma's daughter was brave enough to go and pick it up for us. (apparently that was an education no one would have wanted).


As I said, we talked, even when we slowed down enough to eat. Of course we had to have our cokes from Stripes or we wouldn't have even been able to begin sewing.

Here's mine next to my ugly bag and my eye glass case. I really need to make a prettier bag. I was experimenting with the zipper and putting it on like I had seen in a TV show, but couldn't exactly remember how to do it. It works, but it doesn't look great. I keep using this bag since it is so handy. One of these days I will make another one that is much prettier. What's in it? All my little things that I need when I am on the road (even when I am not on the road. It sits in a partially opened drawer next to me when I sew at home) Oh, yes, you did ask what was in it. . . extra needles, wound bobbins, screw drivers, buttons, seam rippers, pens and markers. Everything a quilter or her friend might need.

speaking of bags. Here is Kathy's cute carry all bag.

she carries all her sewing stuff in there and has for quite awhile now.

Here is my purse.



Not looking so good. Today, I even discovered that my tote bag that holds all my school papers is ripped. I guess I will be getting two new bags this week. Or next. Or maybe even when we are off for Thanksgiving. Yea, that is probably the only time I will have to go to the store and even look at bags. My two have served their purpose.

I am sick of my pink bag. I bought it this summer when the purse I took to conference was WAY to small. I couldn't add anything to it and I had a hard time zipping it closed. That meant that I was carrying my cameras around with me along with my notebook and water bottle. So, quick trip to Target and I purchased this messenger bag. Worked great all the way through the first 6 weeks of school. Now, it is WAY to big. Nothing stays in it's place and everything falls to the bottom. Good thing that flashlight we got at the Ogallala retreat is still in there. It comes in handy when I am trying to find something.

This is what Kathy worked on after she finished up her retreat quilt. Sorry, can't show you pictures of it until our retreat. (What I really mean is, I didn't take a picture of it when it was all done)



Those are the greens she cut circles out of so she can put together project bags for her girl scouts. They are making yo-yo's into a tree. It is a really cute project, but we will all have to wait until next year to see their finished product since Norma and I talked Kathy into waiting until then to make them. The girls were only going to have about an hour or less to start on them in the meeting and Kathy expected them to take them home and finish the tree. How many of you would have finished your yo-yo tree when you were in 8th grade if you had never made a yo-yo before? "Not I," said the fly. So, that is why she is sooooo ahead on her Christmas project for next year. Now she has plenty of time to look for those little metal stars to go on the top.

In the next post I will show you what I worked on all night. It took me most of the time to just cut everything out. Plus eating, shopping, talking, looking around the store and of course talking.

Hooray for batteries!

Okay, I spoke too soon. I took a picture Wednesday of what I am currently working on, but couldn't upload it to the computer because my batter was going dead and it wouldn't keep the camera on long enough to download the picture to the computer. So, today, I went and bought some more batteries. I put the fresh batteries in the camera, turned it on, downloaded the pictures, shut off the camera and unplugged it from the computer and went to look at the downloaded photos. Huh? Not all the photos downloaded! Okay, no problem since I have new batteries right? WRONG! Now, my camera is playing dead. No matter which combination of the 8 new batteries I have tried in my camera it is simply not turning on. It has done this before which is when I purchased my second camera. But this one is my favorite to use. Of course. Isn't that the way it goes? I will let it rest until tomorrow or later tonight and see if it wants to turn back on. In the meantime, I will show you a picture of an older quilt I made. My cousin got on facebook and wanted, no wait that wasn't the right tone, demanded that I put my quilts on facebook. So, to please her and several other requests I have received, I changed my profile picture to one of my quilts.

This quilt was made as a name challenge with my quilt group. The rules of the challenges were that you could only use colors in your quilt that started with the same three letters of your given first name. My first three letters are N A T. The colors I chose for my quilt are Navy, Ambrosia and Teal. It is hand quilted with pink pearl cotton in sweeps that come off the tips of the pinwheels to help show the motion of them twirling in the wind. This challenge was so much fun we decided to do another challenge, but you couldn't do one for yourself, it had to be for someone else in the group. We drew names from the hat and I drew Nancy. Since her name was so similar to mine, I had to come up with other colors to do her quilt. I chose Newt (green), Ash (gray) and Naval blue. (okay, yes it is a form of Navy, but I really thought the blue was needed in this quilt and didn't want the dark Navy I used)

Sorry about the picture quality. Our quilt group, Bee Friends, was the feature group at the Ogallalla Quilter's Society quilt show in 2009 and we displayed some of our quilts we had made from challenges, retreats and mystery quilts. Prior to this time in my life I have not been real good about photographing my quilts. Sometimes if I need a picture of them to send to my mother or something I would take them up to school and have one of my students hold them up so I could photograph them. I have even given a stack of tops/quilts and my camera to a group of students and had them go out in the hall and take pictures of the quilts. I have a few of those pics saved on my computer and unfortunately they may show up here on my blog at one time so be prepared.