While the Weekender Bag and I are still maintaining our separate lives, I finally have a finished quilt top. After spending nearly three glorious days with my friends and my sewing machine, the Single Girl quilt top is completed. Do songs ever endlessly loop through your brain? The whole time I was sewing Single Girl, and including times during the night when I would wake up briefly, I could NOT get Beyonce's song, "All the Single Ladies," out of my head. Okay, Beyonce, I get it. The name of my quilt is "Put a Ring On It." I'm pretty happy with it. Um, both the name and the quilt top.
This was the view from my ironing station.
After all the curved piecing that SGQA entailed, I was kind of on a roll, and moved on to my 3x6 Sampler Quilt Mini Bee, the same block done in six different color schemes. Of course each block will be in the hands of a different person, but even with all the variations in colors, isn't the secondary circle design cool?
It's a little hard to see with the bottom right block because it's quite busy, going into a quilt for little boys, but I sure had a good time making this block
I'm planning on doing a Sherbet Pips quilt using this block. I got the block information from Mary at Molly Flanders. It's called Flowering Snowball. Thanks, Mary!
By then it was late Saturday night and I was tired of curves. So I started working on Supernova. Yes, just a bit behind on the schedule. I had changed my mind so many times on which fabric to use. Then I was staring at Lee's blog button, with all the hot hot hot colors against the cool grey.
I haven't sewn with batiks in ages. In fact, most of them have been given away. But for some reason, I had saved all the colors Lee used in the button.
So here is my first block. I adore the block and can't stop staring at it. Worth the wait, I think!
Don't forget to see what everyone else has been working on this week!
Just a little sneak preview of "Put a Ring On It" (so-named because I could NOT get Beyonce's song "All the Single Ladies" out of my head while I was working on this quilt all weekend...).
I just had lunch with my friend, Cheri, at Panda Express. My fortune cookie contained this fortune:
"You will spend many years in comfort and material wealth." I don't think the fortune writers meant it quite so literally, but this arrived from Australia yesterday.
I grew up listening to classical music. I think the best composer ever was Sergei Rachmaninoff and the best thing ever composed is Variations on a Theme by Paganini. Paganini wrote something called Caprice No. 24 in A minor, probably his most well-known composition. Rachmaninoff then wrote twenty-four variations on this theme, probably the most well known of which is Variation 18. Why I am telling you all this?
Well, because there has been a lot of talk recently about the "dumbing down" of quilting. I'm not going to link to any of the original posts, but last week both Jennifer of That Girl, That Quilt and Rachel of Stitched in Color had very interesting posts, and it led to a lot of introspection on my part.
Questions like why do I quilt? Why do I blog about it? And why am I letting anyone I haven't even met make the decisions on what is appropriate or inappropriate for my personal quilting journey?
Case in point. I frequently go through my fabric stash. I came across this piece of fabric and my first thought was "I should probably put this in the donation pile because a 'modern' quilter would never put this in a quilt." I stopped myself right there and thought, "But I still like this fabric. And why do I even care whether or not someone else would put it in a quilt?"
Quilting has gotten me through the loss of a my first grandchild six years ago and the loss of one of my best friends last year.
(a "family tree" quilt with signature of parents, grandparents and great-grandparents made for our first grandchild)
It has sustained me through times when I needed to be alone, and it has cheered me up when I have been surrounded by my quilting friends.
When I think of the debate between modern and traditional, between acceptable levels of creativity and "dumbing down," it just makes me sad. And two phrases keep going through my mind: If you can't say something nice, then don't say anything at all, and can't we all just get along?
Everything comes and goes in cycles. It's like that in every aspect of art. There are new ways of interpretation, new methods, new supplies at our fingertips. But when you think about it honestly, there are very few things that are actually original. Nearly everything is just a "variation on a theme."
One of my first quilts was this kaleidoscope quilt. I "borrowed" it from a little 3-inch picture in a quilting magazine.
This is my newest variation on a kaleidoscope theme. It will have narrow sashing between each block (not sure what color yet--I was just had this blue strip handy) and the Kona snow should form a secondary pattern.
It's a combination of a quilt I saw in a quilting magazine from 2004
(from QNM, 9/2004, "Sashed Batik Kaleidoscope" by Addy Harkavy and Sandi McCann)
I'm not the person who designed the kaleidoscope block, nor was the designer of the 2004 quilt or even Kathy Doughty. But good for all of us to come up with our own unique variations.
So my point (and I do have one) is that we should never have to apologize to ourselves or anyone else for what we create. And we should be kind and considerate when viewing what someone else has created. Because most of it is just another variation on a theme.
Things I'm not apologizing for:
*Not being able to complete a quilt in a week...or a month. I'm doing everything at my own pace and I'll be okay with that.
*Not participating in any more quilt block swaps after my current quarter of 3x6 swap is completed. I will have 12 orange, grey and white blocks by then. I already have six that I'm really happy with,
but I have a lot of ideas in my head and I don't want to be distracted by time obligations.
*Still really liking Sherbet Pips,even though due to the blogging frenzy before it was available, I preordered, forgot how much I preordered, and over-purchased (see below).
*Still loving the first pattern I designed and published, Charm Parade. At times, it seems that nearly everyone (but me...) makes a certain quilt once, and then never wants to make it again. So far I have made this quilt at least seven times, each one a little different from the others.
I still have more variations I want to try. For example, what would it look like done in all solids? I won't know until I try it. Who knows? Maybe I'll be like Rachmaninoff and make 24 variations of this theme.
*For loving Flea Market Fancy and paying some outrageous prices to add it to my stash.
*For being glad I'm in the Single Girl Quiltalong because I've learned a lot, from making way too many templates to increasing my skill at curved piecing.
*Keeping my stash of batiks (gasp) because they are bright. And I like them.
*Keeping that weird piece of green fabric. I may never use it. But then again, it might be the perfect fabric in some yet-to-be-designed quilt.
*For finding inspiration from the many quilters who are generous with their ideas, designs, where they find their inspiration, and are willing to share it with others. *Writing my blog the way I want to write it and not comparing myself with anyone else (which isn't always easy). Many times I have said I write, but I'm not a writer. Whatever. Turns out I enjoy documenting my quilting journey, along with a few other things along the way. And I hope you'll be along for the ride because you want to be, not just because you want to win a giveaway (see below).
What? You're still here?
Well, then... I love Charm Parade. I have three charm packs of Sherbet Pips, and I only need one for the quilt I'm planning. Yeah, I know. Pre-ordering frenzy. For a copy of Charm Parade and two charm packs of Sherbet Pips, leave a comment before Thursday at 6 p.m. PDT about whatever you feel like commenting on--the weather, something that inspires you, a favorite color, a flower that poked through the snow. And if you are so done with Sherbet Pips, no apologies needed, we can substitute something else. I have lots of charm packs hanging around. And I'm not really feeling the need to apologize for the size of my stash...
I sat down to write my WIP post and Mark (my husband) told me he had already written it. What? Alrighty then. Without further ado, welcome my first guest blogger:
***** For weeks, really longer than I want to admit, I could not figure out what WIP meant. I was hesitant to ask because I knew when I asked it would be some thing so simple and Cindy would be thinking “duh”, so I didn’t ask.
So there were a few things I came up with, but I knew it had to be something quilt related because everyone responded. “Wednesday in Patterns” was a thought because there were pictures of blocks. “Wednesday in Piecing” but that didn't seem quite right and no one mentioned how well her points lined up. Week after week all these other three-letter words kept popping up (unlike the construction business where mostly I hear four-letter words!), like FMF, KJR, ISO, OOP, ETA and more I can’t even remember. And I hadn’t even figured out WIP. This was like reading a foreign language.
Finally I came up with the one that I knew was WIP, "Wednesday's Inappropriate Pictures." That week Cindy posted about 10 pictures and I looked and there were no good inappropriate pictures. When I told Cindy that she needed to tell me what WIP meant, she asked me what I thought it was so I told her. Can you believe when she told me, she didn’t say “duh”--she laughed at me.
The first time I saw a comment with FMF I thought, wow, this is a friendly bunch: “Friends More Forever” but then I saw it was a FMF giveaway and I knew it wasn’t what I thought, because you don’t give away friends. The first time I saw KJR I thought it must be some kind of jelly roll. I remember the first time I heard Cindy talking at a quilt show and she was talking about getting some jelly rolls. I was excited since I didn’t expect donuts at a quilt show. Then she showed me one, and I felt really let down (What? No maple bars??) but I was good and didn’t show too much disappointment.
One more thing.
I was going to comment on one of Cindy’s posts and I told her to let me know when it went up. She did, but I was in the middle of something at work so I was about 20 minutes late and already eight of you had commented. How in the heck can you be that quick?
As a first-time guest blogger, I'm really looking forward to your comments. So be snappy about it. Mark ****** There's not much more to be said this week, so here is what I worked on in the past week. My Single Girl quilt-along.
Nine rings of Hope Valley prints (please excuse the annoying post-it notes):
Three rings of solids:
Side by side:
And Mary Ellen's Best Press, my new BFF for sewing these wacky Single Girl Quilt-Along (SGQA) units together. (Shhhhh. Don't tell him what SGQA means. It will take him weeks to figure that one out...)
I was a bit under the weather this weekend, which was too bad because the weather, for the most part, was spectacular. Mark sings in a men's chorus (160+ men--really amazing sound--you can even hear our daughter-in-law's brother singing if you click here and the best part of his solo is about midway through the song). All proceeds from the concerts go to Mennonite Central Committee, an amazing organization where 90 percent of monies raised actually go to relief efforts. A freewill offering is taken at each concert, which will then go to earthquake and tsunami ravaged areas in Haiti, Thailand, and now Japan. I know relief efforts, particularly for Japan, are fresh in our minds, and I'm so proud of the work done by MCC.
Anyway. The men have four concerts a year, three of them in consecutive weekends. Yesterday was the first concert in a town about two hours away. Due to massive coughing on my part, I stayed home. So in essence, I was a "single girl." (Do some of you see where this is going?) As to the age parameters of what actually constitutes a "girl," let's not go there, okay?
I'm making twelve blocks, nine from Hope Valley fabric, and three from solids. The Hope Valley rings are all sewed together (but not pressed)
and then I started cutting out the solids. *sigh* I hope the solids don't overwhelm the prints.
And let me take just a second to jump up and down because Elizabeth posted the tutorial to make her mini bookshelf quilt.
I can't wait to get started. Because it would seem just weird to me to actually start and complete one project before moving on to something else...
Did you complete any projects this weekend? Or start any new ones? Link up at That Girl, That Quilt and let us all see what you've been up to.
P.S. Do you need some free fabric to start a new project? (I'm claiming the fifth on that question...), Fat Quarter Shop is sponsoring a giveaway here.
Because I was fortunate enough to spend a lot of time with these two this week,
I didn't spend much time here. And I'm totally okay with that.
This morning I purchased supplies
for this. Thanks to so many good suggestions, I'm feeling quite confident about getting a lot accomplished on the machine quilting this weekend.
I added another contender in the battle for who "rules" my sewing room. It looks promising.
And stacked up the coordinating solids for Single Girl. (Excuse the weird shadow on the fabric; that would be me standing in the way of the light from the window...)
*sigh* I wish it were last Thursday. Because then I would be on my way to the mountains for a long weekend of quilting and spending time with my best friends.
It is not at all unusual for there to be snow during Quilting in the Pines. Last year, I called my post "sewing in a snow globe." It was pretty much like that again this year. With one big difference. It turned treacherous to get back and forth from our cabins to the sewing room. We had snow, then it warmed up and turned slushy, then it got really cold and froze. So underneath all that pretty white snow was a layer of deadly slick ice. For the first time, we used the services of the resort SUV and driver to get us back and forth because it was just too dangerous to walk, even with snow boots. One poor lady slipped and broke her wrist in two places!
This was the view from our sewing table:
This is only about one third of the total sewing room:
And our little section:
Jennifer always makes the cutest placecards for our group. Deborah didn't like the picture Jennifer used so we tried to take sneaky pictures of her all weekend. Next year she will not be allowed to cover up her picture!
This year I didn't take many of pictures of other quilts, but this one definitely caught my eye. Super cute and lots of fun embellishment.
Here are some of the "challenge" quilts on the walls. I was standing there looking at the other quilts and someone said, "Oh, look. Someone used the fabric labels." Um, did you mean "selvages?"
Every year, we friends keep our challenge quilts totally secret from each other. When they are on the wall, we try to figure out which quilt each of us made. This year, other than mine, because my friends obviously know about my total obsession with selvages, none of us could figure out who made what. Everyone did something completely different than her normal "style." It was fun.
This was Dotty's:
And Jennifer's (she was in a three-way tie for third place. Way to go, Jennifer!). It had so many cute buttons, and I know she loves buttons. But it was machine quilted (by someone else), and Jennifer always does her own quilting on the challenge quilts. Very sneaky, Jennifer...
Jennifer spent most of the weekend working on her "gaggle of geese" because it was just so time-consuming, but also very cute and cheery.
Dotty seemed to work on a lot of different projects and accomplished a lot of different things. She even made two quilts from my Charm Parade pattern. The fabrics reminded us of Easter eggs.
Last year I was working on a quilt-along by Randi of Fresh Squeezed Fabrics. There is a basket in the sewing room where you can throw scraps you think someone else might be able to use. Well, someone did use some of my scraps and made this cute pincushion last year. This year she was sitting at the table next to us so I snapped a picture. (Note to self: please finish the quilt because the fabrics are awesome and the pattern is great...and it's been a year.)
Are you wondering what I worked on?
While I had great intentions of working on Single Girl, the first two days I worked on Popbeads:
I'm so glad I chose Flea Market Fancy. Interestingly, not a single person blinked an eyelash when they saw that I was using FMF (FMF, people!!!!), on which I spent a virtual fortune slightly more per yard than the going rate.
I'm making two separate Birdie Stitches quilts (Central Park and Hoopla) and my thinking process was that if I had all the blocks made ahead of time, it would be easier to get the embroidery done. All the quilt blocks are finished and ready to embroider!
Sometimes odd things happen when you have been sewing for so many hours and it is 10 p.m. on a Saturday night. Dotty ended up sewing the right side and wrong side together on this block. Oops.... (Why is that non-bloggers think we bloggers take some "odd" pictures? Yeah, I don't know the answer to that one either...)
While we were having snow in the mountains, this is the kind of "snow" we have down here in Fresno. The orchards are in glorious, sweet-smelling bloom. (I asked Mark if this was a "drive-by shoot" and he assured me that he stopped the car this time.)
