Flowers for my Birthday!

the dining room flowers

I had a birthday this week.  My two daughters sent me flowers.  No, I won't admit here how old I am, but suffice it to say that they ordered four bouquets to equal the number of years!  I have the flowers in vases in the dining room, living room, and kitchen!

the ones in the living room here and below

On the kitchen counter:  the small vase was a gift from
Thelma, my beloved next door neighbor.  The little pot
of miniature roses, from oldest daughter, this a Mother's Day gift.

Here's a portrait of our three children, taken in 1999, before both
daughters had married.  I love this picture because
you can see both girls' engagement rings when you look closely!

New Computer!

I've had a fun week, getting to know my new computer!  I haven't posted in a long time, and I thought my next post would be all about our recent Easter trip to California.  But I left my best camera there; it's not yet arrived here, and so, I couldn't get to all the wonderful California photos.   Instead, I share this news and this photo, taken with my old digital camera!

I love everything about my new iMac.  The monitor is bigger than the one on my old Dell.  What you see here is all that I have--no tower, no separate speakers, no Webcam perched on top--everything built into the sleek and big monitor.  And I didn't even buy the biggest!  But there's so much more that I love--too much to list here.

Truth to tell, making the adjustment from a PC to a Dell isn't duck soup. [Wonder what the origin of that idiom is?  Must check that out!]   But I am having fun learning.

Some things I've figured out on my own.  For example, I just plugged my old Sony digital into a USB port, clicked on iPhoto, and sort of felt my way through putting a picture in an album on iPhoto and then selecting it for this blog post.  Other more complicated procedures I've had to call the help-line at Apple to get some expert help.

I hate to admit that I have spent this entire week messing around with my iMac.  But being a bit under the weather and not having much energy, I've sat here at the computer and had a chance to begin my acquaintance with it!

Waco Quilt Show--Part Three

The fourth quilt that I entered in the show was Cotton Candy, which was featured in this blog several weeks ago.  It was entered in the division called "Small pieced, hand or machine quilted."  This turned out to be a small category, with only 15 quilts entered.

My quilt earned no ribbons, but I was pleased by the positive comments made by the judge who judged it.  She praised my idea of hand-quilting the border and machine quilting the center, and she also liked how straight the quilt hung--saying that was a sign of an even distribution of quilting and of careful construction.

Below are the quilts, though, that my colleagues entered in that division which did earn awards.  And just for fun, I'll put in a few more quilts which won awards, ones which particularly impressed me.  More than these few impressed me, actually, but I don't want to burden my post with TOO many photos!









This Feathered Star quilt won 2nd place.

And this quilt, Giraffes for "Casa-G-Raf"--which name I get only partially.
won the blue ribbon.

Waco Quilt Show--Part Two

My Redwork Romance quilt was entered in a division that was described as "Kit, Block of the Month, etc., all sizes and techniques (pattern or blocks purchased with preselected fabric or top is pre-stamped."  My quilt was originally bought as a kit, with the embroidery design pre-stamped, and it included all the fabrics for the blocks; only the backing had to be bought separately.  Over the years since I purchased it, I have worked sporadically on the embroidery.  Finally this Spring at my Bee gatherings, I finished the embroidery.  Then, I assembled the quilt blocks, sewed them together with the embroidered squares, and friend and super quilter Judy Steward quilted it for me, for compensation.

My quilt didn't place, and after seeing the competition, I felt that was absolutely fair and that the winning quilts well-deserved their ribbons.  My quilt is lovely; I am proud of it.  It will hold an honored place in our house.  I think my embroidery was well-done, and of course, Judy's quilting enhanced the quilt.  The scalloped border was refreshingly different and added to the quilt.  But the blocks were basic and simple four-patch blocks. 

The winning, blue-ribbon quilt was accidentally mis-placed in another division, but it was judged in competition with the quilts where mine hung. Rita once again placed with her block of the month Dear Jane quilt winning a red ribbon. And a quilt that also included embroidery and appliqued little girl dresses, each tiny dress different, won the white ribbon. Here are the 1st, 2nd and 3rd place quilts in this catch-all "Kits" division, as well as my contribution to this category:

Here's the blue ribbon winning quilt that
was in the "kit" category.

Again, the top quilt

Close up that shows the incredibly dense
HAND quilting that this quilter did
on her quilt.

Another close-up of her hand quilting and
applique.

My Redwork Romance quilt

Rita's Dear Jane quilt, complete with the intricate borders.
This quilt was a "two-sided" quilt, with the
quilting of these tiny blocks forming a lovely
second quilt on the back.

The committee member who was in charge of fashioning
the ribbons did an outstanding job!  This is Rita's 2nd place, red ribbon.

The charming third place winner.  Notice the absolutely
beautiful quilting on this quilt.  Within each of
the four sections of the quilt, a different quilting
stitch is done.

The placards contained the information that we
quilters included on our entry forms.

One of the lovely little dresses which stood out from the quilt with a 3-D effect.
You can see the tiny, intricate embroidery on the dress.  Again, click on the image
to see the outstanding quilting done on this quilt.

The little baby girl faces as corner stones--so charming!  You can see, too,
some of the tiny hand-embroidery strategically placed within the sashings.

Waco Quilt Show--Part One

I am so proud of my fellow quilters!  Our show this year is outstanding.  I plan to post three parts and to keep it chiefly personal, emphasizing the three categories in which my four quilts were displayed.  I can't resist, here, though, sharing with my readers the Best of Show quilt.  My fellow China Dolls Bee member, Rita, won this award.  Rita had a total of 13 entries in the Show!  I lost count of how many ribbons she won.

First, the Art Quilts.  I entered two quilts in this division, my big scrolls quilt called Jubilation! and my very small one called Aqua in Abstract.  I was delighted to get an Honorable Mention ribbon for Jubilation. Good friends Judy and Rita took home the top honors, with Rita winning the blue and Judy, the red and white ribbons.  Here are their outstanding quilts:

This is a close-up
of the fourth panel, the winter
one. 



Rita was commissioned by good friends in Kentucky to do a series of quilts
of the friends' lovely back yard in the four seasons of the year.  Based on photographs
she fashioned these quilts, using the fused "snippets" technique.



This quilt by Judy Steward was
designed and constructed in the spring of
2009, at Quilting Adventures, in the same
Katie Pasquini-Masopust class that I took.
I made by Aqua in Abstract quilt (also entered
in the Art Quilt division) in our Show.



Here's Rita with her 4 Seasons quilt, showing only the summer and fall panels.



My honorable mention ribbon. 



Here is my Jubilation! hanging in the Art Quilts division.

 


This is Rita's Best of Show Quilt.
She made it at a retreat under the tutelage
of famed quilt artist, teacher, and
innovator, Georgia Bonesteel.  She has attended
several of these retreat/workshops, and Rita has
produced a number of quilts influenced
by Bonesteel.



And this is Judy's 2nd place art quilt, a lovely

fall leaf. 

Here's the Best of Show ribbon on Rita's quilt.

Here's a close-up of the applique
on Rita's Best of Show quilt.

A close-up of Rita's Best of Show quilt, which was
a "trip around the world" quilt, utilzing many
tiny squares.

Auction Quilt #3!

I wasn't pleased with my little Minkee blanket that I made yesterday, so today I decided to make a second Minkee, a third auction quilt.  I suppose I'll let the other one be put in the auction, but if it's not bid on, I won't feel too bad! 

This time I decided to use just one big piece of the Minkee rather than wrestling with different types and patterns of Minkee.  This time, I backed it with strips of pink fabrics from the Cotton Candy quilt I made for our friends' baby, due this month, and one of my four entries in this week's Quilt Show.  It's pretty ho-hum, admittedly, but the construction is better and neater.  I love the pink fabrics, so perhaps that ought to be the front, and the Minkee, the back!

Incidentally, I wish I had read the link above before I made the first Minkee blanket!  That site has some excellent tips.

The Minkee side

The back side, with 3 different pink
fabrics from the Cotton Candy quilt.

I turned back the top corner
so that the backing and the front
could be seen at one time.





My Two Silent Auction Quilts

For the Waco Quilt Show this week, I committed myself at one of our Guild meetings to donating two baby quilts for our silent auction.  Knowing that I had many juvenile fabrics on hand, leftover from various baby quilts I've made through the years, I thought I could quickly complete two.  I could have done that, had I started earlier! I began one some months ago, but left the borders, the quilting, and the binding until this past weekend.  And that was only one quilt.  For the other, I decided to make a simple receiving-blanket type "quilt" from soft Minkee fabrics, backed with flannel.  It isn't technically a quilt because (1) it doesn't have the typical 3 layers of top, batting, and backing (no batting) and (2) it has no quilting!

I'm quite happy with the first quilt that I made.  I used coordinating fabrics, depicting pairs of animals, so I am calling it "The Animals Came, Two by Two," though I'm not putting that name on my label, which simply has my name on it.  The Minkee blanket--well, the colors are nice!  I found this slipperly, stretchy fabric rather hard to work with.  It is soft and comfy, though, so perhaps someone will find it worthy of a bid.

Now for some photos of the two silent auction quilts:

The block pattern is the tried and true Log Cabin, with an unusually large
center square, all the better to show off the fabric.  It has a narrow yellow
inner border, wide borders of two different fabrics, and corner-stone
blocks.  I bound the quilt with the same fabric used
in the top and bottom borders.

This shows one of the complete log cabin blocks, with the dark side (green and red)
and the light side (blue and yellow).  The green "log" to the right is actually the green
log for the next-door block, not a part of this one.  My favorite animals
in this print are the elephants and the giraffes!

I added the "corner post" blocks, smaller log cabins,
to make a definite division between the two border fabrics.

This was the first quilt in many years for which I machine quilted the entire thing.
Here the backing fabric (I thought this quilt needed some fish!) shows the
free motion quilting better than the top does.  I deliberately chose a dark blue
thread for the top, to make the amateurish quilting less obvious!

This block shows the "straight-line" machine quilting that I did.
A serpentine stitch in the yellow and red logs.  A straight stitch
in the blue ones.  Back to the serpentine in the yellow inner border.
The green log also has a serpentine stitch.  For the center square and the borders,
I free-motioned stitched loose and casual loops and circles around each animal, and then added
some loops between animals, where there was empty space.

I used two coordinating border fabrics because I didn't have enough
of either one to make four.  The top and bottom border fabric has
 pairs of animal faces, and it includes many animals
not featured in the other fabric. Most of the animals
appear to be smiling.  I really love the pink pigs and the black
and white raccoons!

Here's the Minkee blanket.  I did have fun devising
the pattern.  As I was laying it out, I repeated it to myself
as I laid it out starting on the bottom left:
"Pink, green, blue, pink, pink."
And then starting again on the bottom, the next vertical row
began with a green square,and I followed
 the same sequence of colors.  I was
delighted to discover that
this pattern resulted in nice diagonal
lines of the three colors.

I used a baby-animal printed flannel for the backing, which has the blues and greens, and at least the pig
has a pink face!  There are really cute descriptions for each animal, such as
"Baby chick skips in the rain; baby piggy plays in the mud; baby turtle
strolls with lady bug."  I like to imagine a mommy reading these to her
baby as she rocks him or her!

Some of the Minkee has raised dots;
some has stripes;
others, stars; and
still others,
plain.

Redwork Romance

One other just-finished quilt that I'll enter in the Waco Quilt Show is my redwork one.  I've named it Redwork Romance.  I have worked on the redwork embroideries for, literally, years.  I would guess about six or seven!  For long stretches of time, I would do nothing on this project, and then I'd take the embroidery to work on when I was out of town.  When my Bee began last fall, I started taking this embroidery to do, since I really disliked having to pack up and haul my sewing machine anywhere.  After I had finally done all 12 of the embroideries, then I assembled them into a quilt.  This was the first and only kit I've ever purchased.  The Alex Anderson pattern and fabrics turned into a wonderful quilt! 

As usual, I got my machine-quilting wizard friend, Judy Steward, to quilt it for me.  She did her typical outstanding job!  I especially love the way she quilted closely within the embroidered squares, which highlighted the bouquets of flowers and made them look almost like trupunto.   She also did a beautiful quilting job in the borders.

And now, some pictures.  As usual, clicking on the photos will enlarge them.

One of the flowers.  You can see the close stippling
quilting that Judy did, and hopefully, you can see how
the flower looks very like I had used trupunto.

Judy echo quilted around each bouquet and then, as mentioned above,
stippled closely in the background.

This close-up shows several of the flower bouquets and
then the adjacent four patch blocks, each of which
used a different Alex Anderson fabric.





One of the most charming aspects of this design is the scalloped edge on
the borders!



Here's the quilt in its entirety.