dream boat

yikes - is it already the end of july?!?

how the heck did that happen?!?

the Old School Saturday Sampler BOM meeting for july was uneventful ... we brought our quilt tops and took them out of our tote bins ready to gloat because we were ahead of the pack and guess what?!?

 NOT ONE of us was asked to show her progress!!!

when i'm NOT prepared, i am always the one who is called upon... 

sigh

this month's assignment is the rest of the top - except for the final border... 

i embroidered a sailing ship designed by Urban Threads...

 those are supposed to be clouds, not waves, cuz it's a dream boat

and added a night sky border all the way around with two stars on the right side so there would be a second star to the right...

faerie frost and glow-in-the-dark stars - and they actually glow!!!

and now we are supposed to put our work in a paper bag and bring it to the next meeting... 

and then hand it off  to have the final border added by another BOMer... 

gulp... 

we've all known this since the beginning of the BOM... 

it was one of the reasons why i chose to work with the neutral shudder colorway...

 i figured it wouldn't matter to me who added the final border because i wouldn't like the quilt anyway... 

but...

yes, there is always a but

i seem to have become emotionally attached to the silly thing...

and now i don't want to pass it on to anyone else...

 yeah... 

um... 

no... 

that is not gonna happen...

i've decided to skip the handing-off part...

playing along

Kim at Kim's Big Quilting Adventure has been hosting Scrap Basket Sunday for several months... 

our scrap bag it isn't anything nearly as fancy as a basket - it's one of those zippered plastic bags that new bed sheets come in has such small pieces of so many different fabrics that i thought i would never be able to participate...

but then i decided to piece the backing for the Old School Saturday Sampler BOM out of leftover scrap fat quarters and bits and pieces of the neutral shudder fabrics from Dandelion Daydreams by Maywood Studios...  

i have been wanting to try a free paper-pieced Earth pattern that Auntia found here one day whilst surfing the Net...
  
i only had tiny bits of blue fabric, so i had to make my oceans green... 

a shining planet known as Earth

there isn't enough contrast between the continents and the oceans - but after i added the glow-in-the-dark moon which really DOES glow-in-the-dark - unlike the fireflies' butts it started looking more like home... 

anywho... 

this is my one and only scrap block for Scrap Basket Sunday...

it took the better part of two days to piece together the rest of the backing and i thought it would take every bit of fabric that i'd set aside for the OSSS BOM... 

however, i found myself with about three yards of MORE leftovers scraps... 

so maybe i can come out to play again...

You are not separate from the whole. You are one with the sun, the earth, the air. You don't have a life. You are life.

~ Eckhart Tolle

ahead of the game...

 last month i thought that this month's assignment for the Old School Saturday Sampler BOM was gonna be the long, skinny border of log cabin blocks ... and  i knew that i didn't want long, skinny log cabins... 
big surprise
i wanted moons...
paper-pieced moons...

in different phases...

and i knew that was gonna take me a long, loooong time...

so i worked ahead and pieced my moons...

such a cool pattern - worth every penny!!!

and folded them up and put them away, smug and smirking because i was gonna be sooooo far ahead of everyone else...

but when we went to the meeting on the second saturday of june we were told that this month's assignment for the OSSS BOM was to add borders to the left and right of the center panel...
say what?!? you mean i am NOT ahead?!? sheesh!!!

i didn't have any plans for the center side borders...
there are flamingos and the earth and moons and fairies and dandelion puffs and a leaf and a circle of geese and pinwheels...
i was running out of ideas...

Auntia to the rescue...

you know what you oughta do?!?

noooo...

fireflies!

fireflies?!?

yeah ... you know ... lightnin' bugs!!!

hmmm ... fireflies ... fireflies ... ooooo!!! 
fireflies!!! 
and i can use glow-in-the-dark fabric so their butts glow!!! 

and the search was on for a firefly pattern that i could actually accomplish...

so i searched and searched and searched...

but all the patterns i found on the Net were either too cartoonish or shudder appliqued...

what to do? what to do? what to do?

which lead to another conversation with Auntia...

what about the bugs in that pattern that you loaned me for the frog?

what frog?

the frog on MY quilt...

oh ... the quilt that you NEVER get around to blogging about?

you ended that sentence with a proposition ... i HATE that!!!

stop trying to be Colonel O'Neill...

TWO "L's"

stop it ... what pattern?!?

that pattern in the pizza box over there...

there are over a hundred pizza boxes in this room ... WHICH pizza box?!?

the one with the frog pattern in it ... it has bugs, too!

frog pattern frog pattern frog pattern...  
oh!!! 
the FROG pattern!!! 
you mean Over by the Pond?!?

yeah...

it has bugs?!?

yeeeeeesssss ... it has BUGS!!!

eeeew!!!

whatever!!! then don't make fireflies...

i'm looking ... i'm looking .... ooooo!!! 
i COULD make those flies look like fireflies!!! and look!!! there's a BEE!!!

no bees!

oh yes ... this quilt needs at LEAST one honeybee for my sweet Melissa ... you do remember that your name...

yeah, yeah, yeah ... my name means honey bee in Greek... 
whatever... 
neither one of us is Greek and your quilt doesn't need a bee...

well ... i needed two borders, not just one...
and i made a bee or maybe two...

 yes, it DID need a bee!!!
 and after she SAW the bee, she agreed with me...

 i did learn that not all of our glow-in-the-dark fabric actually glows...
only bits of it glow...
and i learned too late that most of those bits did not make it into the little bitty pieces of firefly bottoms...
but it is still kinda cool...

 i swear by my pretty floral bonnet i will end you!!!
and i'm leaving them in...

is this begging for a night sky border, or what?!?
and NOW i am ahead of everybody else ... bwah ha ha ha!!!

circles and swirls and strings

oh my!!!

the Old School Saturday Sampler BOM meeting for may was ... 

i dunno... 

two weeks ago... 

has it really been that long?!? 

anywho... 

this month's assignment was to make TWO blocks and then put the sashing and corner stones on the eight blocks that are the bottom of the quilt... 

i didn't like the assigned blocks again - big surprise so i made these...

 Circle of Geese and Strings Around the World

the swirly world is a design from Urban Threads named Leafy Earth and took a whole lot longer to stitch by hand than i thought it would...

but it is pretty doggone cool and was definitely worth the effort...

and here are the eight blocks all together...

oooo!!! fairie frost cornerstones!!! where else can i go with this?!?

these are rolled up and put away till june's meeting on the 8th... 

so... 

the center is done and the bottom is done... 

and none of it looks much like this...

not only was this pattern EXPENSIVE - it is also riddled with errors!!!

which is a good thing, innit?!?

may the fourth be with you ... and the fifth, too

this has been a really, really good weekend... 

i did lots of work outside that did NOT involve a snow shovel except for scooping up leaves and the front porch looks like this now...

no snow ... not even a little bit!!!

and then we ran errands which included... 

 Hallmark to turn in our wish lists

and Noodles - next door to Hallmark - for their famous rice krispie treats cuz i have an aversion to paying $9 for a bowl of noodles 

and Lowes where we spent waaaay too much money on plants because Spring has taken too long to arrive and we needed a fix from the Green Nation 

and Perkins for buy-three-get-three-free muffins

 and Diamond Shamrock for our monthly tank of gas

 and a garden center to look for a planter to replace the one that i broke

 and Wendy's for salads

and then we grilled yes - dianne cooked with fire!!! Auntia's birthday bacon-wrapped filet mignons that have been languishing in the freezer since december just waiting for a warm and sunny day 

and some not-that-great corn on the cob...

we watched Mission Impossible 3 meh while we ate the steaks and corn 

and apple caramel tartlets with vanilla ice cream for dessert...

and then both of us headed into the Magick Shoppe to work on our april blocks for the Old School Saturday Sampler BOM meeting next saturday...

a dandelion log cabin and two not-hot-pink flamingos

which are 

So. Not. Me.

this sampler has made me stretch way, way, way far out of my comfort zone... 

i think i might have pulled some muscles...

anywho... 

this morning Auntia was up-and-at-em really early before me - which almost never happens and we went to see Iron Man Three ... woo hootie hoo!!! 

i love me some Tony Stark smartassedness ... if you go, stay through the credits!!!

and now i'm gonna ignore the housework and laundry and all those dandelions calling my name and go spend the rest of the day in the Magick Shoppe...

"When we become comfortable, do you know what happens around us? Absolutely nothing. Each day becomes just like the one before. We do what we have always done, therefore we get what we have always gotten."

Kip Davis, A Comfortable Situation

how's your aspen?!?

about those leaves...

my original thought was to make the leaves as black silhouettes, with cream fabric for the background ... so ... half black and half cream ... but Michael Myson's quilt was way too light for me with 50% cream and i ended up adding those darker borders... 

what to do? what to do? what to do?

i decided on gold leaves with a grey background ... which, of course, meant that the leaves HAD to be aspen leaves, right?!? 
the colorado rockies are KNOWN for their aspen gold!

i couldn't find a pattern for paper-pieced aspen leaves... 
i already knew that from when i had to draft leaves for Awesome! 
but i wasted a few hours searching the Net anyway...

and then i took out the graph paper and started drafting my OWN 5 inch finished aspen leaf... 

well... 

that was the plan, anyway... 

it took three attempts, but i finally managed a leaf that i can live with...

destined for trash ... destined for the orphan blocks bin ... destined for greatness - bwah ha ha!!!

the first one was very, very wonky ... the second one was okay, but had no room for error ... so i copied the second pattern at 105% and tried again for the third leaf ... it is pretty much what i was looking for...

this is the linen tea towel...

1978 ... it was a very good year

the plan is to surround the towel which is only 11" x 22" with some skinny borders, and then add a border of 5 inch aspen leaves... 

followed by a couple more little borders of some kind

and then some 7 inch aspen leaves... 

the 7 inch leaf pattern was much easier to draft because i'd already made the mistakes on the 5 inch leaves ... and i decided to test it with fabric from the Old School Saturday Sampler...

first try - very, very close call

it is a 9 inch finished block with the added borders ... but the leaf is just barely 7 inches - so this one will have to be copied at 105% too cuz i am NOT drawing it out again...

it snowed like a sonuvagun last saturday and we didn't make it to our monthly meeting for the Old School Saturday Sampler BOM ... which is okay cuz i wasn't gonna make their blocks whatever they might be anyway ... so i was able to test the pattern and complete a BOM block at the same time - woo hoo!!! 
  sometimes being snowed in is a good thing...

today the sky is wild and billowy ... we went to The Quilt Store to celebrate their birthday and spent a bunch of money we don't have ... i should be piecing little aspen leaves but i think i'll just take some ibuprofen and take a nap instead cuz i have been feeling puny all week...

wind power

back to the Old School Saturday Sampler BOM ... this month's assignment is pinwheel blocks

simple enough, huh?!?

but...

yes, there IS always a but

the pattern calls for two pinwheel blocks ... each made with four HSTs that finish at 4.5 inches... 

and (here's the but) that would have left no room for the fairies...

so... 

i made two modified Clay's Choice blocks...

one little fairy is giving her pinwheel a twirl ... and the other little fairy is huffing and puffing for all she's worth

 here they are with last month's block...

not at all like the pattern ... but not too shabby

and here is a picture of some of the other BOMers' blocks for last month...

there are a few other rebels in the group ... do you see Auntia's dog house up there?!?

and now i'm gonna go put on a pot of water to cook some pasta... 

i shouldn't take too much credit for all its shininess - it's a self-cleaning oven ... but i DO hafta pay the electric bill

cuz there's no way i'm gonna mess up that sparkling clean oven...

ding ding ding

here is the Old School Saturday Sampler at the end of round three...

it seemed more impressive when i was sewing the pieced border the night before saturday's meeting

the other Neutrals have baskets or panes or big pieced blocks in their centers ... the Brights' centers are a lot more interesting than the Neutrals - but none of them hold a candle to Auntia's ... oh ... wait ... she says she's gonna start blogging again, so i'd best not post a picture of hers just yet... 
i'll give her a month before i give steal her thunder... 

this month's assignment is this block...

what does that look like to you?!?
i dunno ... it just looks wrong to me... 
like a roofless house knocked over onto its side... 
or maybe an archway that someone forgot to round off... 
so far, mine looks like this...

the little fairy was supposed to have pigtails, but they made her look like she was wearing Mickey Mouse ears ... i am gonna stitch some lines to give the tunnel some depth ... she isn't supposed to be levitating, even if fairies do fly 
except that In Real Life, it isn't crooked ... i really ought to read the instruction book for my camera...

p.s. to Molly - the dandelion blower block is 16" x 16"

huff and puff

The Quilter's Studio in longmont has a new saturday sampler ... the rules are basically the same as the past few samplers...

sign up and pay a $5 fee

arrive by 9am on the second saturday of the month

have the assignment from the previous month completed

show your work

watch the demonstration and 

receive the assignment for the next month, along with some of the fabric 

the pattern this time is Old School by Quilt Soup...

Auntia and i  had to buy two of these patterns to participate ... which is kind of silly ... especially since i wouldn't have purchased even one cuz it's ... well ... asymmetrical for crying out loud ... shudder

for the first month, we were handed two fat quarters in our choice of colorways - brights or neutrals shudder...

i didn't like either one ... both of the focus fabrics looked like old lady scarves dated to me ... so i shocked everyone and chose neutrals... 

bwah ha ha!!!

at the first meeting the Neutrals were handed a fat quarter of a solid cream and a fat quarter of a brown floral fabric and told to make the center of the quilt... 

have fun! 

do whatever you want! 

leave it plain! 

piece it! 

applique it! 

applique and piece it! 

try broiderie perse! 

do what ever you want! 

let your imaginations run free!!!

i came up with this...

be free little puffs!!! dance in the wind!!!

sigh ... it goes without saying i was the only one of the Neutrals who saw dandelion puffs  in the fabric ... which is kinda strange since the fabric line is Dandelion Daydream by Maywood Studio