for this week's stay at home round robin, we were challenged to interpret signature blocks.
These were used in times gone by, for friends to sign their names for someone going away as a memory.
they are squares with diagonal white strips. I chose to make mine resenble lattice in a garden.
a bonus post this week, because 4 challenges were just too much for me... I finished two others and posted ( HERE, ) with one offering for the RSC green in January
This is my challenge # 4, SAHRR I went ahead and thread basted the strips down, one shadow and one lattice but... I expect to rip that out and stitch them better in the quilting process at the end. I will thread paint them and texturize the appearance. But for now, they're stable for me to add more rows to my center.
whew! what a week... my choice to join so many challenges though today I thought I am tired of being rushed.
The challenges are good because of the prompts that inspire me. The time crunch ensures I don't dither too long on decisions. But...Project Quilting is stressful. This time the challenge was to design, make and finish a quilt with the prompt "sky colors, not blue" in ONE WEEK.
finished quilt 12" X 15"
I started with these fabrics, lovely batiks and one little sand colored scrap. The light colored one at the bottom right was my own hand dye, from pouring pink, orange, yellow to blend as it moved down the yardage.
I think I liked it best, layered on peltex stabilizer, un quilted...
the quilting lines I usually just love, distracted from the softness of the piece to me
threads used, prismacolor pencil and of course specs!
I broke a needle and said, what happened? Turning it over I saw the backing had caught the threads and made quite a messy thread ball! I removed all those and continued to quilt
I love my specialty couching threads, used this to finish the edge by carefully zigzagging over it
a carefully cut out flamingo... just because that water needed one standing in it
I carefully cut out the fused flamingo, and then cut up the leftover pink fabric to make these, with a green scrap
oooo pretty, what will they become?
Joy's Table Scraps challenge this month was the prompt snowflakes
sparkly white fabric fused onto sparkly fabric
I found this scrap from a discarded printed vest fabric, hmmmm
cut a piece from it and to make it long enough I had to piece some in...
Inspired by nature this morning....
the finished quilt sits on my bedside table for January
14" X 19" "whee!"
Loved the little words
The curve was a little hill for those wacky snowmen to slide down!
a bit of careful sewing of bits to continue the hill. some hearts quilted in for love and fun.
Again I was careful cutting the snowflake out of sparkly fabric, and the bit left behind I fused to a blue scrap to make a little mug rug with
6" square
just a quick little thing... the backing for both quilt and coaster make me smile
I like silver metallic threads on white fabric for quilting lines. Note that binding. Yep straight from the blue scrap bin and return to the future, a millennial fabric from 2000
I am tired y'all, but still need to do the round robin prompt of signature blocks tomorrow, to go with my sunflower center. Check back to see that one!
flamingo, snowmen, pink flowers on green scraps.... it's fun to live a creative life isn't it
I just love this little wagon that sits on our entry armoire!
I had real kid sized one as a child. Did you? I remember kneeling in it, steering with the handle pulled over my shoulder, bumping along on the old sidewalks in front of our house. I also remember being wheeled around by a family friend who sometimes did yardwork for us, in his big dirty wheel barrow! He'd tip it back and forth, bumping me in the air over the yard. I loved him! I bet I had on my pedal pusher shorts, plastic sandals with my little white socks, my hair in tight pig tails.
I liked this video of a young woman who tries old cookbook recipes... this one is for hawaiian banana bread made with pineapple and coconut.
We had all the ingredients, one going south banana, leftover pineapple, organic coconut...
fragrant, delicate flavor of fruit, perfect for slicing, a quick bread no yeast. 4 thumbs up on this one
Creative stuff
I am doing 3 challenges this week, all to be done in one week. This is one done and dusted, full pics on Saturday's creativity round up post
speaking of the weather
cuckoo. crazy. We had 3 snows and extremely cold weather last week, and now it's all melting in the sun and we're headed up to mid 60's in the shade. In the Colorado foothills of the rockies in JANUARY
Listening
I might be the last to discover this little family of musicians but wowza! be my baby....
Raized Wrong has lots of videos... in lurve!
Prompt this week:
does your family play games? what kinds and are any of them new ones
this year? Cards? board games? puzzles? action games like darts or
horseshoes etc?
now we're a family of two for games, as Milo might just eat game pieces
back in the day, our family card game of choice was, "oh hell" and many a night we all gathered around the table laughing as we played. I remember the summer of pinochole, when I stayed with my sister's family for a month. Now, dh and I love to play cribbage, a mix of cards and board.
I have many memories of childhood watching my parents, aunts and uncles playing poker. They played for chips, and I mainly played with the chips listening surreptitiously as you can hear a lot as a child if you're quiet...
I loved board games as a kid, shutes and ladders, monopoly( I was the iron, or the boot) , yahtzee, and as an adult, Trivial Pursuit, Pictionary,
puzzles, yes please jigzone, jigsaw planet online take the place of actual ones now, but I started as a wee girl, with the giant wooden pieced puzzle you wedged the piece into it's place on a wood board, then moved up to all kinds of puzzles until it had to be 2000 pieces!
computer games, I like " fruit zone" a matching game like mahjong, yazy triple, and the dash games where you work in a hotel or diner.
Milo's Moments
Milo: yes, I'd like that big piece of bread that you left on the counter smelling like Heaven!
Doggie please???
HMPH! I never get anything good around here!!!
Mama: well I made the family oat pancakes this morning and you had a big one with almond butter on it... then at lunch we gave you some of our veggie burgers, that you LOVE in your little red bowl like all your treats...
Milo: that was hours ago! Years in dog time! I can hardly remember what they tasted like
Mama: could that be because you ate them all so fast?
Milo: oh stop mama! You know I am a delicate gentle poodle!! Now, about that bread...
Please let me know what monopoly piece you were, and games you like so I might get them.
and visit these folks to see their likes this week... let me know to add your link in if you do a post too!
clockwise from top left: round robin center block, project quilting finish, RSC feathered star, RSC EPP block, and my mantra these days
calendar page from years ago
I went from languishing and uninspired to having several ongoing challenges and projects going at once...
spinning dishes
remember this trick from the Ed Sullivan show? (I'm ahem, of an age)
plus, I hope to also do Joy's table scraps challenge, and a friend and I are working on our drawing skills by doing prompts together. It feels good to be creating again!
My goal this year was to focus on my writing, both essays, autobiography and creative writing of fiction.
on the sewing front this week, I made the second of two planned blocks for rainbow scrap challenge each month, in the chosen color. This month, dark green and a feathered star block.
I got the pattern from the book,Precisely Sew and after deciding it might be a fun way to focus on color, I looked through my extensive stash of fabric and didn't have enough of a white with multi color to go behind all the blocks. I found this on sale at FabricShack in Ohio.
there was 1 yard left of extra wide backing which is about 2 1/2 regular yards!
I decided while I waited for the fabric delivery, I pieced the four segments with white, I was very excited to see the fabric in person, all the colors, shapes and birds!this will look fun on my blocks!
On the knitting front, I'm finishing up another pair of wool socks for DH.
As for drawing and painting, they seem to go hand and hand for me. I used my personal junk journal made from scrap paper and beads to write in this week, (because it was handy) trying out the game connections that Judy told us about on I Like Thursday...
then decided to try gesso to cover the writing and firm up the flimsy copier paper on this section
No migraines from it, yea! I picked up the brown paper from a chocolate while waiting for gesso to dry and folded it and cut it like a snowflake... then stuck it on the gesso, and rubbed more on the surface with my finger. I was surprised to see the detail that developed as it dried, and loved the texture!
well, I have to play with these items again, so see what comes of it!. On the other side I painted a little Valentine with the watercolor set that now seems to live on the kitchen table
kuretake impressionist collection...LOVE it
the gesso provides "tooth" meaning some texture for paint to cling to on even thin paper
I wanted to test some colors, so I did some petals, and then inked inside them with doodles
While visiting another I Like Thursday post, at CanadianNeedleNana, she had yet another lovely photo that inspired me... I love her photos, this time a cozy scene with her husband reading with pup Ned
I felt something seeing her photo, and feel something
looking at the painting. Drawing is an exercise in seeing.
I grabbed a pencil, and sketched the scene. I didn't realize it was a water soluble not graphite pencil, so when I dabbed on some color it dissolved a bit. it's more distinct in person , and I went on to write a little fictional story the scene inspired.
safe and sound
by LeeAnna Paylor
Oh my gosh it was a cold one today, up on the mountain. He
layered on every warm item he could, got Ned, and headed out to
do the needed chores. Blustery winds tried to whip off his scarf
and hat, frost bit his exposed nose, but he managed to do the
work.
Ned resented the dog coat and boots, but there were scents to
sniff, and things that needed peeing on.
The two males went about the property together, The man thinking
of a fireplace and cup of hot tea, the dog thinking of a
fireplace, a mans leg to snuggle against, and dog things.
They came in the house, pulled off snow covered coats and boots,
both man and dog stood in front of the fire for a bit, thawing.
The man looked down into a pair of big brown eyes and said, shall
we fix a snack and rest a bit? The dog wagged his tail to say yes,
I'll have what you're having.
after their snack the man took up his usual place on an
overstuffed easy chair, tilted back a bit, pulled the chain on his
tiffany lamp for some light and took up a paper to read. Ned
settled against his man's leg, and sat,
sighing that big labrador sigh, blinked looking at nothing, happy
after his romp to be inside and warm and safe
Writing makes me happy, words coming together to create a feeling or mental image, connecting one to another. I will share some of them here. My wish for all of us is to use our creativity with abandon, enjoying it and expressing some part of ourselves.
