Hooray for Spring!

What am I doing with my time?  Spring stuff, I guess.

I posted this quilt on IG recently.  It is a fan quilt that I made Hanna when she was three years old. (1996)  Each fan has a different color story or theme.

  I has a cute backing and I machine quilted it.  It has held up nicely!

Well, taxes are done and I also audited all our old tax files.  This led to lots of shredding.

The shredded actually starting smoking at one point.

I made a lemon cake to take guild.  I forget how good a simple bundt cake can be.

I also baked a Red Velvet Birthday Cake for  my son, Andrew.

My nephew, Nick,  was visiting from Colorado to help celebrate.  Three Vedder guys. 

I potted some pansies.

I saw this adorable photo on FB of my baby quilt in use!

I hope you all had a Happy Passover or Happy Easter.  It was a joy to attend Easter Service after three long years.   After the church the bells in  tower rang out for a full 10 minutes and it was glorious!

Happy Spring at long last!

xo

Something New

On a whim, I decided to start this new applique' quilt.  It is very bright and happy.  I will share more of my intent as I move along.  Numget looks perplexed and concerned.

  I am reprising a quilt I made in 2009.  I will be making a few changes in the design.

I have finished my top for Cecile and Corrine's Quilt Along.  This is my first idea for  machine quilting.  Too fussy and fancy I think.

I decided to do a simple 45 degree cross-hatch.  It is one of my go to straight line quilting designs.  Better.  Don't you think?

I have taken two more trips up to the New England Quilt Museum.

A fun girl trip my sewing buddies from New Jersey.

Here is a visitor to the museum inspecting my quilts.   I love to watch people look at my quilts.  I wish I could read their mind. Sometime I talk with them, sometimes I just leave them to it.

I went up with my husband and son.   It was a special trip.  My family  are my biggest fans and supporters.

It is funny, they live with me working on my quilts, but I don't always tell them everything about them, so they enjoyed reading the placards.

I had the opportunity to teach them about thread painting and other art quilt techniques.

This is one of my favorites.  Sorry!  I didn't get the info card.

I watched the Academy Awards Show and what can I say?   Adults need to act like adults.  There were many inappropriate things done and said.  Why can't they just stick to honoring film making and the movies??

Have a great week!

xo

Baby Boy Quilt

 Off it went today to a new home for a sweet boy named Warren.

It was made with two different swap blocks; the star and the churn dash.  The tutorials for those are still on my blog below the header.  I love how the bright buttercup yellow really set off the blue blocks.

the back - pretty wild, huh?  Sadly I had to piece it, but that's okay.

I included a snowman because he was born in January.

One lesson I have learned using solids with white is that it is always a good idea to grade the seams.  This means I trim back the seam allowance so it won't shadow on the front.

makes a little mess, but worth it!

I used teacher bulletin borders to mark the wavy lines.

Miss mischief was so happy to keep me company. 

She has no regard to being in my way.  

I machine quilted it very slowly - the curve was very curvy.  

I've been doing really well this year watching the movies.   So many are available on streaming platforms.  I do miss going to the theater and will go more in the future.

So far my favorites have been The Power of the Dog and The Lost Daughter.  I haven't filled in my ballot yet.  

If you like films and podcasts these are my two favorites:  

they can be found where ever you get your podcasts.  I use an Apple iphone, so I use Apple.

Coco and I went to the Sound today and she had her first swim of the season.

Tomorrow I'm off to MA to visit the New England Quilt Museum with some friends and to visit my quilts again.  I'm going again on Saturday with my boys.  

Thank you to everyone who sent me a comment or email with concern for  Rich.  He is doing very well and we so appreciated all of your well wishes.

until next time~

xo

Life....You Know what I mean?

It's what happens when you are making other plans. 

I've been away from things for about 2 weeks.  Mr. Fun was in the hospital for almost 5 days with a transient stroke.   It was very scary and it took a little time to determine what was happening, but thankfully he is okay and doing really well.

No permanent health issues.  New diet guidelines and reducing stress is the priority right now.

I'm so grateful for my family and Yale hospital.

While doing laps in the Atrium of  Yale, New Haven Hospital I admired the beautiful artwork.  This sculpture is at the entry of the Children's Wing.

I even found a quilt made with masks. 

I'm grateful for my son, Andrew, who is a nurse in the Yale Health System.  He was there to support me and knew all the right questions to ask.

I'm grateful for Hanna and David who came up from Washington DC to help with food, pets and to take care of everyone here at the house.  (I was starting to take down the angel tree, when the whole thing started, so it had to wait.  It is down now.)

Here is another sculpture that was labeled a quilt at the Hospital.

Thank you as well to all the family members and friends for  their concern and support.  

This is a little dolly quilt that I made for Diane B.  I don't know how many are in her collection now, but it must be over 15 Birthday Doll Quilts.

Do you remember Miss Lollipop from Avon?  I still love the smell of this girly cologne.

I've been having a sore back, so not much quilting going on.  I started a crochet scarf for  NEXT winter.

I picked up this yarn at Joann's.

A doll quilt that I made in 2002.  Hand appliqued and hand quilted.

Hurry Spring!  We need you.

xo

February Fun

New England Quilt Museum!

I had a  day of good weather so I drove up to the NEQM to see the new exhibits and my quilts on display.  Thank you to Pam and all the volunteers who made everything look so beautiful.

Here is my Artist's Statement~ 

Old Abe has never looked so good.  Nice to have it on display for his 213th Birthday.

I don't know who Joan and Lew are, but their little note in the guest book  touched my heart.

There is a bird exhibit on display that I loved.

I'll share one with you.

Laura L. has put together a gorgeous display of Tree Quilts from the museum's collection.

I adore this quilt by Ruth McDowell.

Since the show is still open that's all I'll share for now.  I know several people who are going to attend, so I like to let them discover it all for themselves.   See details on the NEQM Website.

I'll be giving a talk to The Applique' Society this Saturday at 1pm Central Time.

 Here is a link to their website if you are interested in becoming a member.  Membership is $25.  There are many resources and benefits.

I thought I had finished my words quilt.

Then I decided to go back and quilt additional lines.  I'm glad I did. I will say more about that when it is completely finished.

I've also started a baby boy quilt for a friend with two different Fun With Barb swap blocks.

The tutorials to make all the swap blocks are still available, see the tab at the top of the home page.

Stay Warm and Well and let me know if you visit my quiltts!

xo