sooner or later

This will be cut into ATCs, the edges painted and some beads added. I rusted the lightest fabric last fall at Art Camp and then realized I had some great coordinating fabrics in my stash. I have some of all of these left and will make a small art quilt that will have more interesting elements - some day soon. In the meantime, I'm practicing quilting and keeping busy and finishing cards for birthday RAKs.

I planned to stitch up a storm last night, but instead I watched the SofU speech. Monday morning, I fused some rusted fabric and other fabrics in ripped strips onto Peltex. It's going to be ATCs once I get it all quilted to death.

Last weekend was shorter than usual. We spent some time looking at dining sets. I want to replace our old one, it's falling apart and we can't seem to find what we want for the secret budget that the grill king has in mind. I would love a set of old library chairs. I think we should hit the flea markets next. We did see a wonderful granite table on powder coated aluminum at Sam's. It's an outdoor set - the chairs are comfortable but too huge for my dining room and our outdoor area doesn't require anything that fancy. So if we bought that for outside, I would be stuck with the old stuff in the house and you can't eat outside that many times during the year. It wouldn't be worth it. The table is way too heavy and would be impossible to move if it was in the dining room when we need more room for the holiday tree or whatever. Rats, I hate shopping.

Then the kids came over for grilled burgers and general messing about on Sunday. Grandkids are growing up too fast - I must take photos next time.

Birthday frogs ready to hop out of town. These are two inch squares and I really am glad I finally bought some Peltex. Makes all the difference in the edge stitching. I thought it was some kind of fancy machine, or the right attachment or knowing the perfect technique - but no, it's just buying the right interfacing! I also used a dab of watered down glue at each corner before I trimmed the thread ends. Tidy counts when the piece is tiny.

The background was once a shirt which became a rag and sopped up some fabric paint a long time ago. I'm glad I finally found the perfect use for it.

I'm on track on a number of projects but I feel like there's a steam engine right on my heels. Running as fast as I can.

I'm in the middle of a big, really big weaving project and I have to go looking for more paper to roll it on with. Mine is wider than my daughter's warp and I really should take my own advice and just get a roll of the right size that is a mile long - just in case.

Then there's the art quilt top I'm just about done with. An online class project. It's coming along nicely and will be a Christmas present for some lucky person who doesn't have time to read blogs.



Yesterday, the grill king and I got a lot of shopping done. Now we need to start wrapping things up and stowing them under the tree. Of course, none of the presents purchased so far are for the out of town crowds so no shipping will be done early.

Still carrying around a box of tissues and cough drops.

Four day weekends are grand. I could use one of these every month. I worked so hard yesterday, I am sore from head to toe today. I tried to work smart - lots of things going at once: the printer, the laundry - while I carried the holiday decorations downstairs with each run down to check the laundry or up to check on the printer. I have just about all the album pages printed for the Art Camp gang.

I found a new paper called ViaStone. I am not affiliated. But it looks pretty good and is not made from trees. Maybe it's recycled? I dunno, the labeling is kind of secretive. I also bought ink of the new Vivera Plus variety. Looks better than usual. But the old one was completely out of yellow so I couldn't do a side by side comparison.

I also worked on my homework for a virtual class in art quilts that I signed up for last week. It is a two way learning opportunity. We are learning while the teacher learns about how her virtual class software works with input from us. Fun!

Cleaned up selected areas around the house and in my workroom, too. But something always bursts out of place when I do that. Like fabric when you're looking for just the right scrap of color. And dishes seem to pile up when the grill king takes control of the shopping and cooking but not the cleaning. Never mind, he does a really nice steak and we had pumpkin pie with pumpkin sauce on top and pumpkin sauce on ice cream and cheesecake and pumpkin sauce as dip for ginger snaps as well. We are heavy into desserts right about now and seem to have a self perpetuating container of pumpkin sauce.

The granddaughter is painting pictures (and sniffing) while I type. She has a cold but the Boogie boy was better last night. Not so cranky and needy and he ate a better dinner than he did the last couple of times at bat. Usually there is more around the bull pen than in the strike zone.

This is the Boogie Zone of the tree.

She and I decorated the tree last night. She caught on quick that some things can't be hung down low since we'll have a toddler in and out of the house over the next month or so. So with each ornament, she asked, "Can this go in the Boogie Zone?"or "This one will be fine in the Boogie Zone!" Some things are too fragile, some things are too tiny, some things are too precious, some things have special memories. She loved pulling things out of the boxes, some she remembered from last year. She liked hearing about the things that her mom had made a long time ago and reading the years written on them as though it were so long ago...1986???? Wow!

One of the reason my muscles are sore is that I tried to come with a way to wind a warp that wouldn't strain my shoulders. Instead the muscles on the top of my theighs are aching! I put the warping board on the trunk and tied it leaning against the weaving bench for support. Then I sat on the sofa and wound the top part while standing and then sat down to wind the bottom half and so I was constantly sitting down and standing up. Quite an aerobic method. My shoulders are okay, but man, going up and down the stairs today is killing me. It's always something, isn't it, Rosannadanna?

One of the round robin collages came to me on Friday. I'm the last stop on this one. I was gonna think about it but they really are like a monkey on my back. Once I see them I can't seem to stop thinking about them till I add something. This one needed some buttons and some Shiva paintstiks to carry the colors around the whole piece. I think it looks super. I wish I could post it a scan of it but since it's a collaborative piece I'm not sure of the protocol on this. I should ask that group what they think.



I missed a frog last Friday so here's one to satisfy your need for green.

Before I put the binding on it, I looked at the July journal quilt and decided my daughter was right. It wasn't really me and so I cut the darn thing up. So now I have finished a completely different project and one with a deadline. With a little tweaking, this will become my postcards for the Romance swap. They're mostly red, with hearts on each one of the three. I printed out a card stock back and fused and stitched it on. They are ready to be mailed. I should probably hit them with a bit of spray sealer since it is inkjet printing and it's raining here again. More photos later after the tweaking.



On Sharon B's CQ blog (see link in my right sidebar), she is looking for comments to help her decide on her 2008 challenge. She has a large readership and motivates a lot of people to stitch more. I put in my vote for a finishing-up-projects kind of a challenge but mostly the votes are going in the pocket of a design thing. I want to see the hanging chad on this ballot. Oh, well, I suppose I must struggle on alone in my quest to find the bottom of the stack of the stuff I want to finish.

May's Journal quilt. We worked on mosaics in May and I was thinking I would do a mosaic, with nice little black grout lines and tiny little squares. Thought about it deeply all day. Sketched something out. Got home, hardly keeping my eyes open, I read for awhile, tried to think about getting some sleep, but this little pile of fabric I had pulled out kept calling me upstairs. This is as good as it gets. Not at all what I sketched. Much simpler, believe me.

Not based on a photograph this month, but still a simile for a name. Not really a mosaic, but raw edged pieces laid down with abandon - my approach to mosaics, too, with lots of practice on free motion quilting. I sometimes get it smooth and free flowing and sometimes run into a brick wall. I confess to lusting after a room size frame and industrial size machine. But ... this is as good as it gets for me.

Ahhh, now I can sleep.

August journal quilt finished - as shiny as a Magpie's nest.

Thrums from the August weaving project combined with an acrylic felt wadding that shows through the nest of clipped dyed and maroon fibers, bits of sequin numbers thrown in for good measure. In person, the dyed tencel yarns fairly glow.

If I planned a journal quilt each morning and sewed it up as quickly as this in the evening, I could be caught up in a week.

This is the work-in-progress photo of the cooperative quilt. I've done the assembly and the quilting. All that's left is the binding and the quilting on the border. And of course, to hear the announcement of the birth of the little one. Wow, I could be finished before the blessed event. It's a surprise, so I'll tell you who made what blocks later. You never know who's reading the same blogs.... I don't have that many friends who are pregnant, though.

Just starting to quilt this now. A group project. Blocks made by friends of the mother-to-be and I'm putting it all together. I'm not an expert quilter so I learn a lot with every project I start. I am going slowly and trying to do my best. First time I've machine quilted anything bigger than a journal page quilt. So far, I've just done some straight stitching in the middle block. Next I'm thinking of drawing a hand print and foot print to put into the plain corner blocks. There's a heart embroidered in one block so that will have heart shaped quilting. Another block has stars so that will be the shape of the quilting lines. Big plans. Small steps.