Saturday, July 21, 2018

TRIP TO WASHINGTON

We took a short trip to Washington state this week and saw so many amazing things!  First of all we visited our DGD and she took us to a couple quilt shops.

The Quilt Shoppe is located in Poulsbo, WA which is a scandinavian town with a street named King Olaf!  The owner is Norwegian and she has created some Norwegian type patterns.  Unfortunately, I didn't take very many pictures there, but if you ever get to that town, you should stop in.


Next, we went to Quilted Strait in Port Gamble, WA, which is a very cute, old town.  The quilt shop is wonderful and we had a good time looking at all the fabrics.






I didn't buy much and don't have a picture of it.  Don't you love the quilt in the above picture?

Next we went to Olympic National Park and up to Hurricane Ridge at 5242 feet elevation!  The drive up there is beautiful, however, they are re-paving the road, so it is down to one lane for a significant section of it and took a little longer to get up there.


The Visitor Center is on top of the mountain with a perfect view all around!


Look at this!


Then we drove down to SW Washington and went into New North Light House, built in 1898.  The light is still in use and can be seen for 17 miles out to sea.


It wasn't too tall, so we were able to make it to the top!


I had been wanting to go to Astoria, Oregon in the North East corner of Oregon for quite a while.  We crossed into Oregon via the Astoria Bridge, which is 4 1/2 miles long.  The special thing for me is that I have a good friend whose husband worked on building the bridge in 1966!

While in Astoria, we learned a lot about the Columbia River.  The entrance to the river from the Pacific Ocean is the most dangerous of any other river in the USA and it is called the "Graveyard of the Pacific."  Over 2,000 ships have gone down there.  The ships are required to have a "bar pilot" help them go through the entrance (which is called the bar).  The Columbia River Maritime Museum was so interesting!



We also went to the Flavel House Museum, which was built 1883 by Captain George Flavel, a bar pilot and business man.


I love touring historic homes!


Astoria is the oldest city on the west coast and got started because of the beaver trade.  I love history and there is so much more to learn about this area. 

Now, I'm anxious to get some sewing in this weekend!


Friday, July 13, 2018

FAN QUILTING

When I got ready to quilt two table runners, I was trying to figure out how to quilt them and I finally decided to use the Baptist fan stencil, which is becoming my favorite way to quilt things - especially small things.  I like the large stencil that I got from Barb even on small items like table runners.  

I had these stars already done and found them in a box, along with the stripy blocks which I just had to make a few more of,  and put this table runner together.  I had to go get some more brown fabric and my quilting buddy and I went to Grandma's Attic in Dallas, OR - which is our 2nd favorite quilt shop.  I got the brown for the border there.


I also bought the backing fabric, which was on the sale shelf for only $3.00 per yard - there were 2 yards left on the bolt!  You can see the quilting better from the back.


I don't remember if I showed this "bright kitty" fabric before, but I purchased a yard of it at a shop in Des Moines, Iowa in April.  I made a table runner with different size blocks and have the kittys facing in all directions, so if it's on a table you can see the kitties from each side.


Again, the fan quilting seemed to work best and I quilted it with a gold thread, but used a purple and pinkish variegated thread for the black border.


We went to a quilt guild meeting on Monday and I won a kit for this lap quilt, which I put together today.  I have the backing ready to go and need to see if I have enough batting to baste it - I don't think I do.


The weather is very hot this week, but not up to 100º.  The 90s is hot enough for me.  My echinacea plant just started to bloom.


The humming birds love this crocosmia flower. Unfortunately, it doesn't last very long.


This is what's left of the hosta planted in front of my house in the shade after the deer ate all the leaves and the one flower from it.  I think next year I'll just plant some more begonias because they seem to do fine there.


Keep cool everyone!

Saturday, July 7, 2018

BASTING, QUILTING AND WASTING TIME

I've been very busy basting and quilting, so why? do I waste time???

First of all I worked on this project, Secret Window, and got it quilted.  It is pretty wonky, so I hope when I put the binding on it will straighten up.  I used different colors of threads when quilting the flowers and then used a turquoise thread when quilting the "window" lines and backgrounds.



I started out quilting the backgrounds a different way and then had to take out all the stitching (of the background that I had done) because my tension knob changed and loosened up the top thread which was showing through to the backing.  The tension knob is right in front of my machine and is easily bumped without my knowledge until I notice that it is way off.  I don't know when or how it happens, but it is very frustrating when it does.  After fixing the tension, I decided to stitch feathers in the black and turquoise background parts and I liked it a lot better than my original choice which was ripped out.


Here is a pile of basted Christmas wall hangings (2) and table toppers (3).


I also finished my Topsy Turvy table runner which I posted about here.  Before I basted and quilted it I decided to change a couple of the side triangles so that I wouldn't have 2 of the same fabrics right next to each other.  I quilted this with Barb's Baptist fan stencil and that went quickly.


Moving along, I quilted another table runner made with Australian fabric.


Here comes the wasting time part.  I have some boxes where I will put little pieces of fabric or HSTs, etc.  In fact, I have quite a few of these boxes, be they those plastic shoe boxes, or smaller ones like the one below.


Sometimes I will look into these boxes and get side-tracked by taking time to square up HSTs, maybe sew a few into pinwheels, etc.   Or place them into baggies that I have with the size written on the baggie.  I have HSTs in all sizes for future use!


I came across some pieces of scraps that I had started to sew together some years ago.  I just don't like to waste fabric, so I don't throw small pieces away.  You never know when you might need it, right?


I made these small pieces into coasters of various sizes.  I had these left overs from making some 9-patches years ago for DS#3/DILs bed quilt and couldn't stand to toss them.  I love some of these fabrics!


Others were from a variety of other projects.


One never knows when one will need these tiny pieces of fabric!  Am I nuts or what?  Don't answer that question!

Monday, July 2, 2018

HAPPY 4TH OF JULY!

This is my first Patriotic quilted wall hanging that I made in 2001~  I have loved it all these years.


Next is my all time favorite, Colonial Glory, that I loved when I saw Lori's - click here for her blog.  It's hanging on the quilt rack that my DS#3 and DIL made for me one Christmas.


Another small wall hanging is this wool appliqué hanging on a skinny space in my living room.


Here's a few pictures of my outside decorations.




In the mean time, I have just finished the table runner top - "Topsy Turvy" from the Spring/Summer 2017 issue of Quilt Sampler and designed by Kim Gannaway.

It is paper pieced and almost was a disaster, but I managed to get it done!


I did a lot of paper piecing when I made my Dear Jane quilt, but it had been a while.  My first mistake was not noticing that my printer was copying pages at 93%!  That doesn't work well, when other pages were at 100%.


It's not a large difference, but does not work!  The 93% section is on top of the correct size, so I had to remake several sections.

Of course, I had to rip out some PP sections when I didn't place the fabrics the right way.  I folded the light section over so you can see how it should have been.


After fixing everything, here is the completed top!  It measures approximately 17" x 38".


I really like it and may make another one since I have several sections already done with the 93% sized foundations.  I would have to reprint all the sections with the same 93% that was incorrect the first time.  I will have to think about that.

We will be having neighborhood fire works here as well as traditional summer food such as hot dogs, potato salad and watermelon!  With strawberry shortcake for dessert.

Do you have any plans?