Design wall monday. WITH PICTURES Feb 28, 2011

I have my warm and cool virtual bee quilt up on the design wall. However I do not have my computer hooked back up yet to be able to add pictures yet, it should be done tomorrow. I will add a picture then, and you will want to see this one. It is the Quilt From Bias Hell!!!!!

glen

The new little guy

February 23 is International Dog Biscuit Appreciation Day, one of many odd holidays set aside (ok, often overlooked) for dogs and their owners.  Dog biscuits have possibly been around since at least Roman times, though they were far from the kind of dog treats we pamper our furry friends with today. The earliest dog biscuits were actually very old, hard, stale bread. Back then "bad bread" was considered "dog's bread."  By the 19th century hunters would give sporting dogs hard barley meal biscuits for energy on a hunt. Grain-only biscuits were slowly upgraded to include vegetables, meat and bone meal. These were homemade and, of course, did not come in any fun shapes or flavors.  Dog biscuits were once classified in the same category as soap! Delicious! 
So, how do you celebrate International Dog Biscuit Appreciation Day? There are probably as many ways as there are treats. Give your dog an old favorite or try something innovative and new. Teach a new trick. Or just enjoy watching your dog's body going on full alert in anticipation when you open the treat package! Yep, this is about the easiest holiday there is to celebrate!

And whe I get my computer back tomorrow, I will have an announcement about the new little guy in our family. Can you guess?

glen

Huh?

Where the heck have I been?

Well, Saturday mom fell, bashed up her face but didn't break anything. Luckily. Spent 3days in the hospital while Frank handled the Mystic Krewe of MUtts Parade from the set up on Saturday and the parade on Sunday.

All the while I was searching for a nursing home for my alzheimer Mom and getting her moved in. While she is not quite happy about the situation, she is moved into a new room with lots of staff and evaluations. She looks like Tom Selleck with a huge dark bruise where his mustache sets. Her whole upper lip and down the sides of her mouth like a Fu Manchu. And black eyes and a busted up nose. She looks rough. Really rough.

I can't imagine even having help doing the hard stuff in my life, as usual I was on my own once again since this was the two days Frank decided to put his van in the shop. It was fun finding share time to use my own SUV to visit nursing homes , just get lunch and get home every day.

Now I just have a headache and my computer is still at the shop so I have little contact with the outside world.

Can you say.......aughhhhhhh?

help!!! Save me from this quilt!!!!

Bet you thought I'd fell into the bayou and been eaten by gators! Not quite, but it feels like it sometimes. I will have to provide you with vivid word pictures since my computer is in the shop still and I can't send pictures out. I am not saying I am a difficult case, but since I brought it in, the service manager and the tech have quit. Hmmm.

So here is my story for you. I have been working on my Warm/Cold blocks. They are marvelous things of color, fabric and bright-fullness. I had planned to make them into huge drops of hearty rains on a white background ( you know how I am enamored of those white backgrounds). But somewhere between there and here I decided to make a glorious cascading quilt rainbow of colors.

I spent a whole night putting them on the design wall, trading out one for another. Adding bits of color here and there to enhance a shade of loveliness. It was pure heaven!

Then the fateful idea burst into my head like head lice on a loupe garou. (That is a Cajun werewolf for you Northerners). I suddenly wanted my blocks to course diagonally down/across my quilt. I thought to impress all of you with my fearless originality so you would elevate me closer to the quilting goddesses' light.

So I rearranged all of them to be diagonally wrought.

But that was not good enough. The bias on this quilt was killing me. So I decided to go back to the straight set and to......get this......trim off one corner and add it to the other side. Brilliant!!!! I am so smug about my intelligence level here. What do they say, pride goeth before the big plunge downward into the depths of the big chasm.

Well. I put it on my bed. Trued up the slice and proceeded to make the cut with surgical precision. Right through my underlying bedspread. Now I have incentive to finish that Patch No Work top for my bedroom.

And, worse yet, no amount of cutting and slicing and trimming and cajoling would make the piece I cut off fit back on to the other side. I decided that it only worked in fairy tales.

By now there was no semblance of a rainbow left. I thought now to just make squares. So I set upon the quilt with a renewed sense of determination the next day. I was in Day Four by now. I sewed and sewed and sewed all day long. But now the Wonky Bias Fairy was looking at me as her plaything; twisting and stretching my squares into odd shaped unrecognizable pieces.

On Day Five I knew what must be done. I dug out my black fabric and began to straighten the sides of my unintentionally wonky squares and FORCE them to obey. Into Day Six I struggled and cursed the malevolent beings that inhabited that quilt. But with each row upon difficult row I was beginning to tame the Bias Demons.

It is done,now. I have fought the good fight and reined in the wonky sides and...while not making them totally square....they are at least playing nicely with each other.

And you, my dears, will have to wait until next week for a real picture!

But I can tell you, it is beautiful!!!!


Glen: I surewish my computer would come hime soon

Hmmmm...........Computer woes

Dear readers, for those of you who have been the recipient of 427 of the same emails at one time from me, you will be elated to know that my computer is now at the computer hospital getting the proper care. I was told by my daughter yesterday that she would block me if I didn't fix the problem. ( I didn't know you could block your mother out.....hmmmmmmm).

So I have no email until I get it back since my addresses are in that sicko computer.

I did see where the auto workers are getting a $4000 bonus. I am glad, but want to say that I never got one that big from Ochsner Clinics no matter how bad the economy was. Hmmmmmm.

And I really don't care if the US Immigration Service checks ID of everyone who is arrested. I think they should. And deport them if they are illegal. I am required to produce my ID when I am stopped by the police, right? Hmmmmmmmmm.

I had to watch TV this morning since I had no computer.............

Don't Touch My Junk top Complete

Wouldn't a Baptist Fan quilting pattern be the utmost irony???? 

My design wall is empty because I just finished this top yesterday.  It is a compilation of Junk from my orphan box.  The interesting thing about these poor disjointed blocks is that they brought back so many memories of all the quilts I had attempted or completed (or still have in my UFO pile!)

glen

Couldn't have asked for a better day

What do you do on a cloudless Sunday when temps reach beyond the 50's and into the 60's?  Ride bikes of course!

You couldn't have asked for a better, more beautiful day than today.  There is not a cloud in the sky anywhere.  Usually there is one floating on the horizon somewhere or other, but today there were none.  Frank was meeting the CAAWS Mystic Krewe of Mutts Committee downtown for a final walk through of the Bark in the Park site.  We hit the road at the Louisiana State Capitol Building just after noon.  When we returned, the sun was just over the shoulder of the Kingfish, Huey P. Long. 

We rode through town and on to the Mississippi River Levee by the New Bridge and watched river commerce as tugs pushed their load of 14 barges upriver toward the Old Bridge.  The New Bridge is over 40 years old and the Old Bridge is over 60 years old.  One is just newer than the other.

Passing the Farmer's Market where we head early every Saturday morning for fresh local produce, fish, grainfed chickens, fresh file and whatever is in season, I had never noticed the brilliant yellow green of the canopies.   I guess I just didn't look up!  I am always so enthralled with finding the veggies and fruit and goodies from the bakers that the building just passed me by!

Then we headed past the Old Governor's Mansion to meet the CAAWS group.  The parade will begin directly in front of the Old Governor's Mansion right after the contests for Best Float and Best Costume take place. 

This is the Old State Capitol.  It used to sit on the levee right next to the Mississippi River.  But the river has changed its course over the years and moved westward.  It now sits over 1000 feet away from the river.  I am standing on the levee to take this picture.  And a 4 lane street and the Louisiana Arts and Science Museum lies between the levee and the Old St. Capitol now.  Here is a view of the planets, Saturn and Jupiter I think.

On our way back to the van, we got a glimpse of the moon rising in the cloudless sky.  Incredible sight it was.

Aren't you glad we don't have 4 feet of snow to shovel today?  Don't you feel sorry for those not living in Louisiana today?  I do.

glen:  wish you were here!

Hurray For Howl-y-wood

This is our theme for the CAAWS Krewe of Mutts Parade that is set to roll on Feb 20 at noon in downtown Baton Rouge.  You can get all the information at the website http://www.caaws.org/

If you are interested in supporting the CAAWS shelter you can purchase a t-shirt themed for the parade for $10.  100% of the money goes to CAAWS because Raisin' Cane's Chicken Fingers donates 300 shirts to us at no cost.

On the day of the parade we will sell out of the shirts, so if you do want one, you need to let me know soon.

The shirts are Hanes shirts so they are good quality, not the thin ones some organizations have.  These are real shirts!

Let me know.  If you are in town I can bring them and we can meet.  If you are out of town I can mail them for $5.00.  Priority post is $4.90 for the shirts so you will be donating the extra 10 cents to CAAWS!  I jsut don't want to fool with change.

Here are the front (top) and back (bottom).  Just let me know.  I have kids sizes, Adult S, M, L, XL and XXL.  But quantities in each size are limited and they are picking them up at the shelter on Quinn Drive today as well.

Junk Evolving

So today I had this wonderful idea for borders.  I though for a while that it did not need borders, but I really MUST put borders on this.  I thought it needed to be just bigger.

Then, after I started getting borders on it, I thought, duh.....I could have put more blocks around it to make it this size and used up more blocks.....but borders were already begun by the time that realization hit me.

So borders it is.  I wanted a "stop" border, and an outside border and that thought evolved into a three strip border. 

Then I thought the three strip border was dull compared to the inside center and I started chopping up the three strip border.

 

So here is a top, bottom and one side with borders on or near to be on.  you will notice my strip block for a cornerstone at the upper left. 

Do you think it looks too odd with the chopped up border and would look better with a "normal" border?

glen

Don't Touch My Junk needs borders

This picture is of my "Junk" quilt hot off the machine as the last seam was finished on the center of the quilt.  It needs borders now.  I am thinking of the color it needs, and will take the day tomorrow to audition different colors.  I tried to have all the flower and landscape blocks in this quilt.  And all the teapot and cups blocks in here as well.  But as I put it on the design wall I found a cup block on the floor.  I guess it needs to go in the border!

Helen Roddy Brown, I think her name is actually Lynne Roddy Brown maybe, said that purple is her choice for borders on a quilt with too many colors. 

Here is the center of  "Junk" on the design wall.  I have a CAAWS Board meeting tonight so no work will get done.  But I did work most of the afternoon!

And it felt fabulous!

glen

Inspiration – Don’t Touch My Junk

 

I have been working on my Inspiration Quilt  Don’t Touch My Junk today.  And it felt good after a frustrating day of just running around and doing work on my CAAWS stuff.  I longed to be sewing all day.

I began putting the blocks together.  Remembering the admonition of not thinking too much about color and placement, I just grabbed and sewed and didn’t think at all! 

There were some strange bedfellows! 

But I continued on, not worrying if one matched or not.  The easiest way for me to achieve this level of nirvana is to listen to books on CD so I plugged in, pun definitely intended, The Seamstress by Frances de pontes Peebles. 

I am liking the way it is heading.  Although I think it is like that Ugly Dog Contest, only a momma could love him.  This quilt will be mine totally. 

The best thing about doing this quilt, I am finding blocks from quilts that are long gone to their forever homes with friends and family.  And I am living back memories from those wayward blocks

 

Like this poor attempt at a sheep dog.

It took me a minute to even remember him!  I had to figure out, what the heck was this?  Oh, yes, a sheepdog.  He is supposed to be looking after his sheep, bur the sheep never made it to the pasture!

 

glen

 

Technology - on and off

Technology failed me today.  For the first time in my life I have relied upon a piece of technology to keep my information safely and it failed me. 

The IPad Frank gave me for Christmas died sometime in the night.  I assume it did, it won't turn on at all.  Despite all my nasty words and thoughts, it continues to remain blank.  I shall return it shortly.

And it was really something I liked.  It was the first time I had anything from Apple and just may be the last if their stuff only lasts for about 2 months!  My wonderful Dell computers have served me so well for years and years. 

This is what is should look like:

This is what mine looks like: 

In addendum:  My Mac Is Back.  My Mac Friend Valerie delved into a forum for people with this type of personal problem and found that if you press that button on the screen with the square on it, and the on/off button at the same time it should reset.

It did.  So I will look upon this as a learning experience, not without trepidation.  I shall continue to keep my important dates in a normal datebook.  But I will give it another chance to prove it's usefulness. 

Design wall 2/6/11

The design wall is pathetic this week. Nothing has changed much, if at all. I had a huge backache for which I actually took some muscle relaxants I found from 2009 when didn't use them for some pain back them -- probably my knee.

But I really have to start on the virtual quilting bee quilt. That is what I plan on working on today ---- in my copious free time!!!!

Oh, and this flower on top is about 2 feet by 3 feet and is done using reverse applique!

glen

Looking toward Springtime

I thought I would give you a nice look toward Spring since Phil the Groundhog predicted we would have an early spring this year.  In years past, mostly remember him predicting that we would have a late spring, so this is a good sign.  And for all my non-Louisiana friends who are suffering under blankets of snow and ice, it was a welcome thought, I am sure.

This piece I did about 4 years ago in a class from Quilt University.  I think the class was Flower Power.  It taught a new applique technique that made it so much easier to create small intricate curves and lines in a landscape/portrait piece.  I demonstrated the technique at several meetings but I don't think anyone has used it to create anything with, so it must have been of no use to them.  It really is easier, far easier than needleturn.  I hate that type of applique anyway.  This is fast and precise.

I have been looking through the book I purchased from Bonnie Hunter's class, Scraps and Shirttails, and there is nothing I really didn't know.  What I do like about the book, however, is her ideas on how to use the shirts I scavenge from family and friends and Goodwill.  I am ready to start tearing into that part of my stash. 

First I must do the UFO Challenge from Judy's Patchwork Times Challenge.  This month she chose the number 10 and that is the Virtual Quilting Bee Warm/Cold and my Christmas Scrappy.  Both need to be done and I will enjoy them when they are completed.

The Pumpkin Gals met to discuss the pumpkin quilt we plan to produce.  It is a Buggy Barn Slash and Burn quilt, as I call them.  The pumpkins are way too funny not to be turned into a quilt.  The border is candy corn!  We all fell in love with that!  And we plan on unveiling our 4 quilts at a guild meeting maybe in the summer time.  We have set a goal of getting them done before  Halloween and I think we can do this.  Of course we reall want to do the witches too.  They have the cutest feet that dangle off the quilt. 


Needless to say, I will be busy. and that is good. 

I am busy now cleaning the oven up from the overruns on the dessert I made for the Superbowl Party.  And the only reason I know it is the Superbowl, is that I was charged with dessert!

glen:  who might just rather to be quilting.

It is sooooooo cold.......

Let's face it.  In southern Louisiana we just don't get cold here.  On the rare occasion we want to see some snow, we head to Alaska or Utah.  But  those occasions are certainly rare.  Even more rare are snowfalls right here in Louisiana!  This was the sky last night: Red sky in morning, Sailors take warning, Red sky at night, Sailor's delight.  Hmmm.

This just might be the year we have Louisiana Snow!  We did have maybe half an inch last year.  I noted it because I had just buried the Fabulous Bonnie Doon in the corner of our yard where she loved to look out on the open field.  She was nosey like that. 

If it were any other dog, I would have been upset because of the cold.  We buried Pepsi and Max in blankets.  Bonnie Doon LOVED the cold.  She was as true to her nature as a Greater Swiss Mountain Dog as ever lived.  I considered it sort of a tribute to her passing when the world sprinkled her with some snow as she crossed that Rainbow Bridge.

This year it is just plain cold!  The thermometer outside my back door, under the patio where it is in an enclosed area reads 29 degrees at noon.  I am not sure it got up over the freezing mark at all today.  And they are predicting freezing rain to begin any moment. 

Frank, of course, is driving in from Pensacola MS about now.  I hope he makes it home.  He may not be able to get over some of the overpasses if they ice up.  We don't have ice and salt trucks here like y'all do!  And they are announcing closures west of us her already.

Oh well, stay warm and go make yourself a nice cup of hot tea!

glen

UFO Finishes #6

In January Judy picked #6 for the UFO list.  Mine was the Guild Snowball  Mystery Quilt and the infamous Outhouse Blocks. 

Since i have never found the Outhouse Blocks I finished to the top TWO Snowball Mystery Quilts.  I would have quilted them but my longarm is not using tension properly,,,,which is causing tension in me.

So here they are, to the top stage, but without Outhouse Blocks.

glen