Pointless Quilter

but I can't show a picture because it's the guild's mystery quilt and the rest of the group won't be done until next June.  I spent way too much time quilting it but I like what I did.  That's 3 quilts that I've finished in the last 2 months that I can't show because of challenges and mysteries.  I also finished the project for my Loose Threads friendship group - it's the fiber art group and we're going thru Fearless Design.  We did the color project this month. However I didn't show last months project for Loose Threads - it was Exercise 4 - Identifying the Value in Color.    These are my blocks. These are Barbara Sawyers blocks. Sara Kelly's blocks Anna Koelewyn's blocks Adena Joseph's Blocks Grace Hoya's blocks We're having fun - but can't wait to start making projects that I will want to do something with. Going to Pacific International Quilt Show in Santa Clara this Saturday with 4 other girls...

A finish that I can share.  This is one of the projects I worked on at our friendship group, Material Girls, retreat at Pismo.  I quilted it and bound it today at the local quilt store Thimble Towne's 6 to 6 sew day. Today I finished the top of another fall bed sized quilt - but won't show that until it's quilted.  But right now I have two good sized quilts pinned and ready to go.  Now I just need inspiration for the quilting design. This week I also broke a bood vessel in my eye.  I was at the dentist getting my teeth cleaned and when the doc came into check my teeth out he blew air at a tooth and it made me cough - and after he calmed down because my head bucked up and scared the ??? out of him, he said what happened to your eye.  I didn't understand what he meant until I got to the office and everyone kept asking me what was wrong with my eye.  I kind of freaked when I saw it and then went on ...

I had Scrap Therapy on Saturday and this was my final project.  We had the option to make a travel pillow, a decorative pillow or a pin cushion.  I decided on a little pin cushion.  This is left over fabric from our guild's mystery quilt.  I had 2 quilts in our local fair --I got a first place on the yo yo quilt and a 3rd place on the blue cherrywood fabric quilt.  There were quite a few quilts there and they did a great job displaying everything.   My friend Adena ( Sew 4 Real - check out her blog) came with me.  We also checked out all the Home Art Buildings, checked out some animals and had a little funnel cake.  It was a warm day outside, but I'm glad I went. And finally, I completed 2 scrapbook pages of my niece with pictures I took last weekend.  She is quite the ham.  Here she is playing guitars for me. Also went to Home Depot and got the cabinets for my new sewing room cutting table.  They had all th...

          These are two of my latest finished projects.  Well, they still need names and labels.  I will take suggestions on names.  A blogger I read suggested you go through magazines like Good Housekeeping and look for names that way.  That's my next step.   I got the top done to my step-daughters Christmas rag quilt - I just need to make all the snips.  This past weekend was her bridal shower.  It was a beautiful luncheon at her aunts house in Livermore.  They did a great job with wonderful food and Kelly was just beaming.   That's Kelly and my mother-in-law on the right and her fiance's grandma on the left.  It was a little warm, but luckily there was plenty of shade.  While in Livermore I asked my sister-in-law Marcy if we could stop at a quilt store there.  So we did.  I got a 5" pack of Christmas material and some yardage to go with it and also some good scissors to help cut through h...

This months guild ATC theme is music - anything that has to do with music - favorite song, favorite artist, album, instrument, etc.  I love music - I have a very eclectic taste in music and it's all in my ipod.  I have over 2,400 songs on my ipod right now.  I listen to it all day at work (via a speaker - not with the ear buds) and I even drive with it on, usually listening to a book on tape.  So instead of picking a favorite song or artist, I made my ATC's to look like my ipod.  I even did the back of the card to look like my ipod.  This year I'm in charge of the Mystery Quilt for the guild so this weekend I worked on the quilt to make sure I had all the clues right.  Good thing I did because in Clue 6 I found a cutting error (which was Clue 1).  Whew.  I love the fabrics I chose.  They are all from designers samples from last seasons fabrics - this one is Park Slope by Free Spirit - one line but I got a few differ...

Here's the finished quilt I made for my nephew's soccer team auction. I finished the label last night and need to soak it and then dry it and apply it and then make sure it gets to my sister. This is from the book Happy Hour Quilts. It was sooooo easy and didn't take long to make at all and made a nice sized quilt with just 20 blocks. I stippled it since the fabric was busy enough and the backing material is soccer balls. Also working on my ATC's for guild. The theme this month is music - could be about your favorite song, instrument or whatever. I chose the whatever. I'll post when they are done. They are cut and glued - just need to stitch everything down and do a little painting/writing on them. My sister also asked for a GPS cover since her last one was stolen right out of the car (with the GPS of course). Thanks for looking.

One of my friendship groups, Material Girls, has a challenge each year that we decide on in January (or thereabouts) and then we reveal them at our Christmas party. So that gives us all a good amount of time to finish them. However, most of us wait until the last minute. I did not this year. The challenge this year was a paint chip challenge. I picked up all these paint chip color packs, numbered them and we drew names and numbers so each of us got chips with colors we may not have chosen for ourselves, hence the challenge. The rules are to use at least 5 colors of the chip (some had only 5, some had more) and they have to use as close to the colors on the chip, they can add one additional color (I used a green) and to throw in a little glitz, they must use beads somewhere on the quilt. The above picture shows a hint of mine (can't reveal the whole thing in case any of them check the blog.) But I've been working so hard on this for a few weeks I just had to show someone at leas...

My stepdaughter is getting married in about 2 months and had her first fitting for her wedding dress. I didn't actualy see it in real life - but she sent me pictures but wants to make sure my husband doesn't see it. She's a beauty and so is the dress. Can't wait to see her coming down the aisle or whatever you walk down on a beach wedding. As far as a quilting update, I have been busy machine quilting my Material Girl paint chip challenge and am almost done with that. Unfortunately I won't be able to share it with you all until we reveal in December.

By thrifty, I mean my mom found this quilt top along with a whole lot of quilt blocks, some good, some not so good, for $5. So finally I found the perfect backing fabric on sale and then simply quilted around the "seeds". I was going to quilt in the background, but there wasn't enough room to do something nice. It's super long - 66" by 92" So mom, get ready to have a new quilt when I see you next. I've also completed a scrapbook page for my younger sister. Sometimes she needs a little help getting caught up so I get some pictures of her to scrap. My folks were recently visiting them up in the Seattle area and they went geo caching at the Kabuto Gardens and these are just the flower pictures they took. And we have been battling ants at home in the kitchen. I scrubbed the place on Sunday and still they come. So my husband got some strong stuff and we'll see how it works. Now I have one more quilt pinned but I can't show it until December since...

I am very fortunate to have in-laws who own a little house in Cambria, California. It's a two bedroom, two bathroom place with a trailer in the back that we call the third room. We can get 8 people sleeping there, but the problem we have is where to quilt. This is the latest set up we've had. Pictures were taken by Adena, who is in this photo. To the right of Adena, sat me and my friend Kathy. To the left and behind Adena sat Sheila, Rita and Anna. Sue came with Sheila for 2 days but she did hand work and sat on the sofa. We had to remove furniture to get all of us and our stuff in. Here are some of the tops that we worked on or finished. Adena finished this block of the month top. She added blocks to make it this size. Sue brought us some goodies, actually her new husband snuck those in her suitcase with a love note. Sheila working on a log cabin heart quilt. Rita finished (mostly) a kit quilt that uses a panel. Can you believe it. It's beautiful. This is our "desig...

Oh, it has been so hot here. Over 100 degrees since last week so I'm off to Cambria where the temps will be in the high 60's. I'm going over with some quilting friends and we plan on sewing, sewing a little eating and more sewing. A lot of our friends are going to Long Beach for the show, but some of us knew if we went we'd spend too much money so we decided to use our stash instead of add to it. I'm bringing enough projects to keep me busy for 2 weeks. Just couldn't decide what to bring to work on. Plus, I just finished the top of my challenge for my friendship group - just needs to be pinned and quilted - I even have the binding ready to go. I'll do that when I get home. I'm sure I'll have few more tops ready to be quilted when I get home on Sunday too. Since I promised myself I wouldn't post pictures of quilts until they were quilted, this is a pictureless post. Keep cool!

This is a quilt for a friend. Hopefully she isn't reading my blog. I can't give it to her for a few weeks. I need to show and tell it at guild in August and I haven't made a label yet. I plan on embroidering labels during my mini retreat in Cambria in 2 weekends. This is a pattern from Buggy Barn's Certifiably Crazy book. They made it from wool but I thought wild patterns would be interesting. If anyone has any name ideas, I'd be more than happy to hear them. That is one thing I am horrible at doing.

Here's a close up of the quilting. I can't believe it. I got a call yesterday from friend who was there and said I got a Rosette (I'm assuming a big ribbon) for Best of Show, Machine Quilting. I also get $10. Woo Hoo! So excited. This is the quilt that won the ribbon - it's a Scrap Therapy quilt. Who would have thought it could win a ribbon. The outside border took over 1,000 - 2" squares - it wasn't hard when you use the Small Scrap Grid by Quiltsmart. You iron them on then sew the seams one way, snip the cross seams and then sew the seams the other way. If you want to check out Scrap Therapy, their website is http://www.scrap-therapy.com/projects.html Our local quilt shop, Thimble Towne has a class every month to work on one of their projects.

Finally! It's not that it was hard, it was just a matter of finding the right time to work on it. I did the work outside and when it was over 100 I had no desire to go outside to work on it. I like the look. Clean and simply and a little quilty looking. Pretty proud of myself and a big thanks to my husband for making the frame to set it in. Got the 42 blocks done for my friends quilt and the first border. Now I just have to work on the piano key border, and quilt it. Sounds easy, doesn't it? This Friday is Cut Throat quilters. Hope to get little projects done - like the guild's block of the month and maybe cut out and start my next project. Now I just have to decide what I want to work on next. I have so many choices. Oh, I finally got on to the Road to California website at 12:30 am and signed up for Pat Blair's painting with ink class. Her stuff is amazing. I have some oil painting background so this sounded like fun. Her website is www.pattsart.com if you want t...

I got my confirmation in the mail yesterday (but only got mail this morning from the box). I am going to take Elly Sienkiewicz Baltimore’s Iconic Clipper Ship class. Many new and different techniques to learn - “paint” with fabric, advanced layered appliqué, Unit appliqué; Ultrasuede Appliqué; Reverse Appliqué; dimensional flowers (of cloth or ribbon); theorem – stenciled or pen-shaded sails or ocean waves using oil pastel-stenciled into foaming caplets. Embellish with ink work and thread, or outline the top deck with a prim, straight line of bead embroidery. Now let's see how lucky I get with classes at Road to California. I'll know that on Tuesday.

Finally, something finished to put on the blog. This scrap quilt was quite easy--and because of the prairie point border, I think it makes this a little more unique than my other scrap quilts. Still need a name for it though. I've already started a new quilt for my friend who's had some trouble (the one I talked about a blog post or two ago). It's the Churndash quilt from The Buggy Barn's Certifiably Crazy book. It's made of wool in the book but I'm making mine with cotton fabrics. I won't say more because I think she sometimes looks at my blog. I'm hoping it will go together quickly. This weekend will be busy - today was a trip to Thimble Town Quilt Store because they had their big sale. I bought fabric for the quilt I described above. Tomorrow I go to the Lemoore Park 4th of July celebration in the morning/afternoon to help sell our guild's opportunity quilt tickets and help with the great little quilt sale. And then in the evening I'm off to...

This months ATC challenge was round and round - we had to use circles on the card. I decided to play with my paintsticks by making a circle template from freezer paper and a circle punch and just started stenciling. Tonight I tightly quilted around each circle, painted the edges instead of sewing. On one of them I rubbed some paint after I quilted. Kind of outer space looking. I've also been working on another Scrap Therapy quilt - I have 1/2 the blocks done. I don't like to show pictures until the quilts are finished. This week I have been very thankful for a very boring life . The people I work with have had a lot of drama in their life - drama I wouldn't wish upon anyone. Two of them are dealing with abuse - one friend very seriously injured. It's a sad situation. I wish I had a magic wand to help but all I can do is pray for them. What happened not only affects them directly but the whole family. Due to their privacy I won't say more. But to end my post on a h...

During the day I am a bookkeeper for a medium sized shopping center. Recenlty the CFO of the company gave me the title RKQ. He dared me to put it on my business card. I didn't and won't but what I did was put it on my work email in big letters after my name. I got so many comments and laughs from that. It started when I was telling him I was taking another day off and he asked if I was going somewhere fun and before I had a chance to answer he goes, "wait, it's another quilty thing, huh?" The answer of course was yes and then he laughed and came up with this title. I'm pretty proud of it. He appreciates the art of quilting. I have made him 2 baby quilts for each of his daughters when they were born. He always asks me questions about what I'm working on and I appreciate that too. Tonight I finished a purse for myself for the 4th of July holiday. This pin tuck purse is so easy to make and I love the look. I think I might need to get the bigger size as this...

Had my Friday night "party" at the local quilts store. We call ourselves Cutthroat Quilters because we are a full class and we won't allow any new members. (Mostly because of lack of space.) See my friends blog http://sew4real.wordpress.com/2009/06/13/cut-throat-quilters-were-meaner-than-hell/ = she explains it so well with a lot of humor. So Friday night I finished hand sewing a sleeve on the back of quilt I'm submitting to the Kings Fair and I machine quilted and bound the Spool quilt here. This is another Scrap Therapy quilt. And then on Saturday I had to clean house because my in-laws came for dinner - it was my father-in-law's 79th birthday. Sunday had my husband and I shopping at Lowes for tile. The back of my wood stove (converted to gas) fell down and cracked so I have to remake it. I wanted to get some design to look kind of like a quilt block since this is in my studio, but the stuff I really wanted would have cost me over $100 for just the tile for a 1...