Easter in Shreveport: Spring has Sprung!

We had a lovely party on Saturday night to celebrate Easter as a family.  I made a tri-color bundt cake.  I filled the hole with malted milk ball eggs.  It was easy to make and was turned out tasty and festive.  I used Grandma Vivian's Noritake china - isn't it pretty?

Spring is in full bloom in Shreveport, from the rhododendrons at the front porch...

to the wisteria on the bird feeder.

Wisteria grows wild in the trees in Shreveport - it's just beautiful!

These azaleas are my favorite.  They should be ready to pop in a few more days.

The rhododendrons and magnolia tree give the entry way almost a "Secret Garden" aura.  I love this time of year!

I was glad to see that the "house" plants managed to overwinter outside just fine this year.  I've been watering them with rainwater every few weeks and they are thriving.  In fact, as I filled the watering can with water from the bucket, a budded succulent leaf floated to the surface.  I planted it in the back of the top cascading pot along with another budding leaf I found on the ground.   I love plants that can fend for themselves!

Cake Pan Carrier with Table Runner - Two March Finishes!

  

My sister gave a number of these 

retro fabrics as a fun fat quarter Christmas present a few years ago, along with a pattern from The Sewing Basket for a cake pan carrier and table runner, which I took as a big hint.  

I had good intentions of finishing this for my niece's birthday in January - better late than never!

The table runner wraps lengthwise around the outside of the carrier that is holding the pan.

The carrier has handles and wraps the short way around the pan. 

I designed the patchwork for both the table runner and the carrier.  The table runner has stitch in the ditch quilting.  I love how it turned out.  I really enjoyed working with the retro fabrics.

Designing the angled stripes into the carrier fabric was challenging.  I really wanted the carrier to coordinate with the table runner, and the dull green fabric just wasn't getting the job done by itself.  I upgraded the handles to leather.  Larry cut out the leather for me.  (Twice!  The pattern called for 1 yard of cotton webbing and it should have specified nearly 2 yards.) I bought a leather needle for my machine and it sewed like a dream. 

I had to settle for a covered muffin pan because I couldn't find a nice 9" x 13" covered cake pan like my sister bought me a few years ago.  (It is totally awesome.  The cover is engraved with my name so it will never go missing at a potluck!)  Now I just have to send it off to Green Bay.  Patience, winter people!  8)

Recent Prizes from Down Under

Not too long ago I was the lucky recipient of two lovely prizes from halfway around the world.  The first is this wonderful stitchery from Gail Pan Designs called "My Sweet Home", awarded to me from from Quilt Kitty in Perth, Australia.  [Go visit Tracee's blog and vote five paws up for the picture of her beloved Brunnie among the daffodils.]

I have often admired the Gail Pan line and am thrilled to finally have one of my own.

This lovely ditty bag came to me all the way from Tasmania, from Christine of Aunties Quaint Quilts.  Christine is currently busy making sewing kits and goody bags for people affected by the recent bushfires in southern Tasmania.

I don't know how I got so lucky as to win twice, but I'm very happy that I did.  Thanks again to my good blogging buddies from down under.

Dallas Quilt Celebration 2013

We had a great time at the Dallas Quilt Celebration and saw many lovely quilts, but there was bad news in this year's program: 

"Quilt Photography.  Taking photos of your favorite quilts to share with friends who couldn't come is part of the quilt show experience.  Please remember a few "rules of thumb" while viewing the many amazing works of art you will see here:

• You may photograph entries in the judged show.  However, please respect the copyright protection to which our quiltmakers are entitled by obtaining written permission from the quiltmaker before posting a photo on the Internet."

I'll comply with the rules, of course, but I think it is a shame.  And with only a name and a city to go by, getting written permission from the maker seems almost impossible.  No one supports copyright protection more than me.  I get irritated with people who disrespect pattern copyrights or somehow think copyright law doesn't apply to them; however, sharing pictures of quilts put forth in a public venue seems different to me.  For one thing, most of the quilts would be impossible to recreate even with a detailed pattern, much less from one of my fuzzy photos.  And if selling patterns is their aim, they are getting free advertising, since I have always provided full attribution.

I'm concerned about this restrictive trend.   I know the guild was probably just listening to their lawyers, but it seemed like the show was smaller this year than in previous years, with both fewer vendors and fewer quilts.  Also, they didn't provide a show cd of all the winners, which was really disappointing.  At the very least, they need to have a mechanism in place where written permission can be easily requested.

The posts I've done on past quilt shows have been some of my most popular posts, so I know this is one way quilters love to share in their craft and get inspired.  Now it has been severely curtailed.  Your thoughts?

First Post from Phone - it Works!

It was so easy to take a picture with my new phone and post it; 

I had no idea how simple this would be.  

Why did I wait so long?  lol  

I was going to delete this test post, but I love this picture.  

It perfectly captures my beloved's good nature and goofiness.

Now I just have to make something so I have something to blog about.  8)

OCD, Using One's Powers for Good

We were talking about stash-tracking over on Stitchin Fingers.  Now, I know a little something about this subject, having spent about two months this fall organizing Larry's Grandma's stash.  She's 101 now, and has the stash to prove it.  Grandma moved into assisted living and I promised to organize all her craft stuff as a housewarming gift.

I had no idea how much craft stuff she had.

For heaven's sake, she had been living in a one bedroom efficiency apartment!

She had six dressers and only two drawers had clothes in them.

And project boxes.  OMG the project boxes.  Nothing sorted or put away, she had duplicates, triplicates, even octuplicates of so many things.

There was a sorting frenzy that went on for weeks. 

But it's all much better now.

I borrowed a label maker from Liz, my "work niece", bought the extra-large tape for it, then labeled everything in nice big block letters.  (You get the discount if you buy clear shoeboxes by the case from the Container Store - ask me how I know!  lol)  I put her beads & yarn below where she can get at it, and tucked the less likely stuff up high.

"That Susan, she sure knows how to get things organized."

"Yup."

"I bet you didn't know I had that much stuff!"

"Nope."

It makes finding things a snap, and best of all, she loves it!

I made a sweet little old lady very happy. 

(If you look closely, you can see I even labeled the phone for her; she likes that too.)

Always use your powers for good.

Alzheimers Art Quilt Initiative Round-up

The Blanketeers managed to create six AAQI quilts in 2012 to help generate money for Alzheimer's research.  From the left, I'm pictured holding Rachel's light Guadalupe quilt and my own Clothesline Capers.  Sheila is holding Mary's Butterfly quilt and her mother's (Bea's) applique quilt.  Dorthy is holding Rachel's dark Guadalupe quilt and Jonquele's tiny little Baltimore Beauty.

I found it lots of fun to work on something this size.  I really want to make some more!  Life interfered with the plans of so many Blanketeers this year that we have decided to continue making AAQI quilts as a group throughout 2013.

I'm hoping by this time next year we'll have well over a dozen little "Priority Quilts" ready to send off.  Hope on, hope ever!

Twister Quilt and a Big Decision

This Lil' Twister has been in work for over 6 months.  I love the results, but I thought the process was a pain.  I started using the Twister as a cutting template, but it has feet where it should have sandpaper and my cuts looked awful.  I then used it as a template, penciling, then cutting with a scissors, and that was better.  Rosa said she had no problem cutting with the smaller Twister, so maybe it's just me.

My Blanketeer buddy, Rachel, was dismayed by the amount of fabric wasted in the Twister process.  She was happy I put all the scraps to work in the outer border.  I just love the narrow red border, and to think, I only put it in after the twister/block seams wouldn't match up!  I'm going to bind it in the same red fabric for some extra pop.  I think it turned out well for two charm packs and some leftovers. 

The twister flimsy is actually laying on its backing fabric; I just have to complete the sandwich and it will be ready to quilt.  I pieced enough batting for two quilts out of all my leftover scraps on Wednesday and spray-basted them to their respective backs yesterday.  I have another flimsy completed out of the fabrics used in the following blocks, but I haven't taken a picture of it yet.

And now for the big decision.  The blocks above are laid out to audition the strip color, which will go all the way across the quilt.  Initially I thought I would use yellow, but after looking at it I fell for the intensity of the blue.  I asked my husband's opinion (thinking he would confirm my blue choice since he ALWAYS goes with blue, no matter what else is available) and he prefers red!  He says it makes the colors pop more and I think he's probably right.

Valentine Bears

Larry and I decorated a small tree for Grandma Vivian with all the Christmas decorations she had made over the years.  I put her favorite dolly underneath the tree, and it looked so adorable that she wanted to keep it up all year.  I convinced her that the CNAs would think we pretty lazy if we let that happen, so I promised her a seasonal tree (because, you know, I really just don't have enough to do. lol)

We were cleaning out more of Grandma's stuff at Dad's house when I came across a whole box of these tiny little bears.  I took them home, stabilized some red velvet with tear-away, then figured out how to do a "combi" stitch on my new Bernina.  Fortunately that turned out to be very easy. 

I drew the hearts right on the stabilizer and cut them out, then I hot-glued some red floss to each heart and tied them onto the bears.  Now I have a whole army of adorable little Valentine bears to put on her tree, with a few left over for a matching wreath.

Too bad the Bernina doesn't have a shamrock embroidery option.  I'm not above flogging a good idea to death; I even have bears left over.  I wonder what the original plan was for all those bears?

Sabra's Christmas Present from Plastic Canvas UFO

In moving Grandma Vivian this past fall, numerous of her UFOs saw the light of day for the first time in years.  One of our "finds" was a bag of 7 completed pieces of needlepoint plastic canvas; clearly a tote bag that had never been assembled.  Now wouldn't a group gift from Grandma, Larry & me make a terrific gift for Sabra?  She does so much for Dad, driving him around and looking out for him in general as his fogginess increases.

I explained to Larry that lashing plastic canvas with yarn was exactly the same thing as lashing leather with lacing and put him to work (because I really hate messing with plastic canvas.)  I showed him how to get the handles positioned correctly and explained that, yes, you do have to lash all the edges or it looks icky.

While he got to work on the lashing, I added one set of missing antennas to the blue butterfly.  I also thought that some feet would make it extra special, and help keep the tote clean too.  In the stash of buttons I gleaned from cleaning out Larry's Dad's house, was a perfect match of four shank buttons.  I sewed them to the base piece and wound them tightly with the lashing yarn until they stood up nice and straight.

When Larry was done I added some yellow taffeta from my stash for the lining.  I auditioned several fabrics and almost went with a dark blue that looked very nice, but I decided to go with yellow in the end. The light color will make it much easier for Sabra to find her keys & sunglasses, and I've noticed that she spends an inordinate amount of time fumbling for things at the bottom of her purse.

We had a Christmas party at Dad's house on Sunday before Christmas, and Larry, Grandma and I gave the tote bag to Sabra then.  She was absolutely thrilled with it.  It was great to give her a gift from all three of us and I loved seeing another completed UFO, even if it wasn't one of my own.