Oooo! Lookie what's on my design wall!

My hubby and I are back to ourselves; TGS and OSLW went home about a week ago. What fun we had! It was a whirlwind visit with lots of things to do. I miss them already, but am happy I will see them soon. I will be winging my way to the East Coast in just about a month to visit them and to see Nancy Drew and her family. I'm excited about seeing Nancy Drew; it's been a year. Curly will turn three right before I come. She is a little firecracker and talks all the time. I'm looking forward to seeing how she's changed.

One of the things TGS, OSLW & I did when we were in San Francisco was to take the tour of Alcatraz. It was a federal prison for about 30 years, until 1960s. It harbored the most heinous criminals and was escape proof. The tour is fantastic and I highly recommend it if you are in San Francisco. The tour is self-guided; you get an digital recording and are able to wander at your own pace. This is the second time I've gone and I enjoyed it just as much as I did before.

TGS & OSLW on boat to Alcatraz

A cool pic I took of the two lovebirds
during our tour of Alcatraz

A cell at Alcatraz, very, very small
@ 6 feet across

A decaying building. They continue to reconstruct the
buildings to add to the tour.

A great picture of the three of us
(against a picture backdrop  of Alcatraz!

No, the decaying building is not my next project! I finally am going to get going on the wedding quilt for my TGS & OSLW. You might remember in January I was making goals to start the Double Wedding Ring quilt in the colors of fire. (see post here).  I kept getting stumped by the arrangement of the fabrics and trying to get them all to play together nicely.

Once I finished the current quilts I was working on, it was time to start on the DWR. But by golly and by gosh I couldn't make those colors work. In the meantime, I hadn't quilted for almost two months. I knew I needed to start, but I just couldn't. I actually stopped quilting at all for almost two months. It IS true that quilters cannot make quilts that they don't like or don't like the colors.

I pulled out the last playing card I had and called in SUPER COLOR DUDE: my hubby. I had him come in and help me out. Hubby is the "color guy" around here. He helps me out oodles with figuring out colors for quilts, sashings, etc. Well even the guru of color couldn't find a way. He finally threw in the towel and said, "These colors just don't work together at all." Wow. I heard the death knell, the boat sank and the train wrecked. My lovely plans for the beautiful wedding quilt that OSLW loved was toast. I determined to break the news when they came to visit.

OSLW took the news well. After talking about colors and quilts, we went to the LQS and looked for fabrics that would go together for the quilt. We finally conceded that a DWR would not be the quilt to use with the fire colors. Next we wandered around looking at other fabrics. I had tried to be helpful and told her the blue and yellow quilts are Beautiful. We picked out fabrics and OSLW realized we would need a different quilt pattern. I suggest a Log Cabin and we were on our way!

Here is a mock-up of the Log Cabin square that I've done.

Add caption

Isn't this going to be gorgeous? I absolutely love Log Cabin quilts. I made a Log Cabin quilt for Hubby for Christmas one year. I followed Eleanor Burns Log Cabin methods and it turned out beautifully. Since the quilt will be a California King size and I'm using two-inch strips instead of the 2.5 inch that Eleanor uses in her book. I wasn't sure how much material to buy. I estimated from Eleanor's fabric requirements, adding a half yard or more to what she put. Then when I got to the fabric store I panicked. What if I had too little? What if I ran out of a fabric and I couldn't find the same one anymore? The what-if imp got to me and I added a half-yard to a yard more to my already inflated yardage. I have a feeling I'm going to have some beautiful blues and yellows to add to my stash when all is said and done!

I already have all the strips cut and ready for the quilt. Thanks to Hubby's generous and fantastic birthday quilt, an Accu-Quilt Go, I made short work of the cutting!

I'm linking up with Patchwork Times; check out what others quilty doings by clicking on the badge on the right! Also hooking up with Fabric Story at Quilt Story here. Linking up with WIP Wednesday, click on link in sidebar.

Get It Done January

Well, well, well.
Well.

That's all the wisdom I have for today. No, come to think of it, here is a quilty saying:

My Great Grandma used to say she made a quilt] "by guess and by gosh". Then if it didn't turn out right, she'd say "I guessed it was right but by gosh it wasn't".*

That's about where I'm at with my January Git It Done... Judy over at Patchwork Times (click here) has a fun thing going. Each month anyone who wants to participate can make four quilting goals to accomplish in a month. On the last day of the month, everyone reports by linking into her blog. I'm here to make a full accounting.

My Get It Done January Goals and Progress:

1.  Finish Spiderweb top and sandwich.
I have one more border to put on and the top will be finished. I fell behind when I made a pieced border and then found it looked like a sock on a chicken's lip with the rest of the quilt.

2.  Finish Bricks & Stepping Stones top and Sandwich
I didn't do anything on this one. It's going to the back burner now; I have to start on my DWR.

3.  Finish Square in a Square
Not there yet, but close. It's a Quilt-As-You-Go. I have to hand-sew the last column. Add the columns around the edge by machine and hand-sew. Bind, with purchased binding, then it's done.

4.  Start DWR.
The first goal I actually finished!
I took down the box with all the DWR "stuff" in it.
I pulled out the pattern and read it.
I looked at the template and the tissue foundation.
I looked at my colors again, decided I needed more blue. Figured out whether to do random or planned method. Decided on both: blues will be in the same position throughout all, other colors will be random.
I decided what color for the background AND purchased it.

There's a lot of detail on this goal because my TGS and OSLW are going to be looking this over very carefully. I wanted to show them that "started" was more than opening the box, looking in and then closing it back up.

Tune in tomorrow for the February Get It Done.

* Pasted from <http://www.quiltingboard.com/pictures-f5/crazy-quilt-antique-hankies-t191083-3.html>

Shhh! It's secret!

I guess I should say "Shhh! Oh darn. It's no longer a secret!"

My Talented Geek Son (TGS) and his Oh-So-Lovely Wife (OSLW) have already found out that I making them a Double Wedding Ring. It's OSLW's favorite quilt. How could I not make it for her? I love her dearly. Of course, DWR is a difficult quilt and sometimes I shudder thinking of it. OSLW wanted the colors to be like a fire: red, yellow, orange and blue. Lots of blue. She's seen audition of fabric colors. She probably didn't recognize the fabrics as batik. I thought it was the best bet for fire. And, as of yesterday, they saw the background fabric. Here's a sneak peek. I still need more blue:

Most of the Fabrics for DWR

The darkest blue will be the cornerstones. One of the blues there got discarded because it had some purple in it. I still think it's going to be beautiful. I'm going to make a couple of rings and let her see to make sure she likes it in quilt form.

My first daughter may know there's a quilt coming for her. I mentioned a couple of posts back that I was going to make her quilt as a leader/ender with the DWR. Of course, she has no idea what that means. It can stay that way for awhile.

I haven't gotten a "Name Alias" for her yet. I've switched it three times already! She has a dozen nicknames. It's quite a record. I'm just nervous about their privacy on the web. It's a big place and I'm not comfortable enough to call them by their given names.

I should ask my TGS. He knows all about Net Security. It's part of his job. In fact, he scares me to death with stories of what people can do to steal your identity and how far they can go to practically make you disappear from cyberspace. Among his credentials is one of his college classes was Ethical Hacking! Basically learning everything about hacking (fight fire with fire) but only for defense.

But I Digress. That's probably the phrase they'll put on my gravestone...

The Happy News is I just finished cutting all the sets for the main blocks, which are churn dashes. Now, you know and I know what that block is, but this will still keep some of the surprise until a few inches down!


I've shown my daughter the fabrics when she was here once. I saw them and thought they were perfect for her. They are Japanese Taupe Daiwabo Fabrics. I love this type of fabric so much and #1 better be careful. This quilt may do a disappearing act also! Not into cyberspace, but into a Secret Hiding Place in my home. Shhh!

A preview of the fantastic fabric in the block sets.

But I Digress. There are 72 sets of blocks. The dark is two 3" squares and four 2.5" squares. The light fabric is two 3" squares and one 2.5" square. Those of us who can do quilt math can tell this is going to be a six inch block. Oh oh. That's the first time I put it through my math brain. Ouch!!! Say it's not so. Six inches--arggghhhh. I'm 90% through making the Farmer's Wife quilt, which is 111 or close to that, Six Inch Blocks. I only made it through by paper-piecing.

Breathe.

Big Breath.

Sit down.

Put your head between your knees.

Okay. You can do it. This block only has 4 HSTs in it. (The pulse is coming down). That's child's play next to some of the FW that had 50-75 pieces in them. (Pulse going up.) I kid you not! I sadistically counted the pieces for the blocks. It's amazing I even went through with it.

Oh dear, you're beginning to get enough information to think I'm foolhardy. I'm using that nice word. Some would just drop the "hardy" part of the word.

But I Disgress. The quilt is going to be absolutely gorgee-oh-sus. Here's a looksie.

I'm going to go lay down now. I'm still feeling a little faint....

Stash Count Week 3

A Traditional Double Wedding Ring

I'm following Judy at Patchwork Times to do Stash Counts. Check over at her blog to see other's stash counts.

Well, well, well. I went and did some Serious Fabric Buying this week. I bought eight yards of this absolutely lovely butter colored yellow for the background of the Double Wedding Ring. The quilt is going to be king sized--arghhh! And DWR has a lot of backgouund.

 Serious Fabric Buying tends to happen when you've got to do borders or backgrounds on quilts. The exciting factoid is: everything I'm buying is going to be used in the next few weeks! Oh, mmmm, except for the five yards of cheddar that I bought for my somewhere-in-the-distant-future Cheddar Bow Ties. To my credit, I've already started saving fabric for it...and it was 50% off. And I love cheddar so I had to buy more than I need to keep some on hand. Then there's the 1 yard of orange halloween plaid (for my future Moth in the Window which I'm also collecting for...) and the orange crackle because I hardly have orange in my stash. But those two were 40% off. And it was a Holiday Weekend Sale and you know, you're not supposed to miss Holiday Sales. And I had been in the house quilting for 7 hours and needed to get out and get some fresh air. And I figured if I didn't support JoAnn's that they might go out of business...

AND...I'm blaming Bonnie Hunter for every last piece of fabric I bought. All the patterns mentioned above, except the DWR, are hers! If she didn't write a great blog about using scraps and have this friendly, fun personality, I wouldn't have been drawn in. And further more, how do you get scraps if you don't buy fabric in the first place? 

What's that you say? "Bad excuses are worse than none"? That's what Thomas Fuller said. I think I like that guy. Oh yes, I like him a lot!

Here's my report:

Used this Week:  4.25
Used year to Date: 7 yards
Added this Week: 15 yards
Added Year to Date: 15 yards
Net Used for 2013: -8.25 yards

The Good News and The Bad News

Are you a "let's get the bad news out of the way first" person or "give me the good stuff first" person. Hang in there a sec. I flipped a coin: it's Tails--bad news first. This isn't going to hurt you as much as it hurts me!

Remember all those "piano keys" I was doing for the border of my Spiderweb Quilt? I was selecting the inner and outer border, found the perfect combination and found that those keys make it look Awful. All that work. I spent almost a whole day last Saturday cutting and sewing these babies. I need to look on the bright side: there's a quilt in my future that is just waiting for those borders!

Good News: Speaking of Spiderwebs. I found eight completed blocks while looking for something else yesterday. Hurrah! I thought the quilt was squarish at 6x7 blocks but what can you do when you run out of the middle fabric? Now I will be able add an 8th row and get it more into a rectangle shape.

Bed is calling and when I wake up, it's a Holiday and I get to Quilt!

Psst...don't let anyone know I have an order coming in from Connecting Threads!  

My Nutty Son

Barely a few minutes after I posted my Get It Done list, I received a text from my son. "Move number four up to number one and it will be perfect!" Of course number 4 is starting on the Double Wedding Ring quilt. This is the wedding quilt for him and his wife. Wouldn't you know that a few moments later his wife chimed in with a cute remark about abandoning numbers 1-3 and just doing the DWR. At least both were happy that the DWR was on the list and that I was planning on "working furiously" to get it done.

This is a picture of the two of them on their wedding day. They were married in Virginia in June 2012. They had it in a bed and breakfast in Leesburg and the wedding was in the back of the inn. As part of their wedding package, the whole inn was rented out and the family of both sides got to stay there. It was utterly fantastic. The entire inn and room were enchanting.

 It was not too bad in the weather department, for late June in Virginia. But doesn't this picture look so wonderfully green and shady? One thing we learned there was that the pineapple is a sign of hospitality!

We had the "mandatory" wedding pictures of family. Then, of course, my side of the family began to show their true colors.

This is by far my favorite picture of the wedding. This was taken after the wedding as they were "walking down the aisle." There is so much love and bliss in their faces. And let me tell you, if two people every deserved to be happy and crazy in love, it's these two.

 You've seen these lovely portraits of my son but truly his personality is more like this:

That is my middle daughter with her brother. I cannot tell you how many pictures I have of these two growing up where they are goofing around. There's another in the wedding picture of this daughter and her husband being silly during a family picture, but I'll spare you.

If you want to sum up my son's personality, this picture is pretty representative.

When he calls me when I'm quilting with a group, I let him know I can't talk right now. Then he proceeds to tell me about the quilts he's making. He'll name an actual quilt pattern, like Log Cabin, and tell me he's almost done and it only took 2 days. Whenever I press him about giving me a quilt, he says he gives them all to charity. The goof.

When he texted me about making the DWR the top of the list, I told him since he could quilt he could help me out. He just said that he was too busy making his own quilts!

I can tell you life was never dull around our house when our son was growing up!