Still grading papers. I should be finished Monday of next week. So, for your viewing pleasure, I've posted some more photos. The first is what little I've gotten done on the binding of my Red Sea quilt so far. The rest are more photos of flowers, ending with my lovely Sinbad looking very festive in his new ribbon (a cast off fabric trimming). I'll try to get some photos soon of my owl wall-hanging. I've finished the leaves and need to start on my flowers. AFTER I get done with my grading.

 Red Sea quilt binding. One corner done!

 Campanulas from Mom's garden.

 Pink peony from Mom's garden.

White peony from Mom's garden. Ignore my  freckled and liver spotted hand underneath.

 Seven Sisters rose from Mom's garden. Can you guess why it's called Seven Sisters?

 The same group of seven blossoms in one clump.

 More American Beauty rose buds from my husband's rose bush. They look almost black before they bloom.

 American Beauty blossoms. Theyre a deep, delicious red.

An arch of my Gertrude Jekyl. Just SMELL those blossoms. You'll never smell a sweeter, stronger rose, ever! Go ahead - stick your nose right up to the screen and sniff. You should be able to smell them from there.

Sinny wearing his new ribbon. Doesn't he look sweet?

'Til later,
Debbi

Excuse number 437...

I decided last night that I really MUST get the bindings put on the four (or is it five?) queen/king quilts that I have finished and waiting. That was my plan. I cut the 2" binding strips for my Red Sea Scrolls quilt. So far, so good. But then I decided that I needed to look at the quilt for just a moment before I started sewing my strips together. I don't even remember WHY I needed to look at it. Anyway, I flopped (yes, flopped is the technical quilting term for that maneuver) the quilt onto the cutting board for just ONE tiny moment, and... Yes. You guessed it. Tessie.

*Just TRY to make me move and see what happens.* Well, finally she did move. I then tried to move the quilt away from the table. Nope. It seemed to be caught on the bottom. So I looked under the raised flap of the cutting table. Yep. You guessed it again. Maxie.

This photo only worked because of the flash. It was actually pitch dark under the table, but this is what I found lodged in the quilt when I flashed the camera under the table. Finally, Maxie gave up and wandered in search of a dark place that would actually stay dark. So I reached for my strips to sew them together. Yep again. Callie.

Callie had built a nest with my cut strips. At that point I gave up. I had no idea where Sinbad was, but I was sure whatever he was up to would have stopped from sewing, so I decided not to take a chance. I went to bed. Sigh.

Just another pretty rose I've been enjoying in my garden.

'Til later, good luck in your own sewing room!

Debbi

Red Seas and Harvest Times

How fitting. Mom's feathers remind me a little of scroll work. Maybe instead of Red Sea, I should call this quilt Red Sea Scrolls, do you think? I like it!

 The outer edge triangles have half designs.

 A full design on a light square.

A distance view of the pattern.

 A complete feathered circle on the red squares as well.

A really good photo of the feathers on a light square.

Yesterday, Mom finished quilting my Harvest Time Mystery Quilt from two - or was it three?- years ago at the Q.U.I.L.T. Retreat to the Hills. She did a great job, as usual! Here are some photos, starting with the backing.

I actually had to buy fabric for the back of this quilt. I couldn't find anything that was the right color or feel in my stash. This fabric came from Digital Quiltz in Eureka Springs, AR. John's sister was clearancing out the shop after John's passing earlier this year. Now I'll think of John and Martha every time I see my quilt. That will be a nice memory. The photo shows the colors a little darker than they actually are. The flash on my camera phone didn't go off. Camera phone photos, you say? I know, but I was in a tearing hurry this morning, and it was the best I could do if I wanted to get something posted today. I broke my husband's car Wednesday, so he had to drive me in to work this morning. That means that I was on his time schedule instead of mine.

This photo is actually a little light, but it shows off the quilting nicely, so I included it. Isn't the quilting beautiful?

Way too dark of a photo. I hoped to show one of the butterflies in the red square, but oh well. You'll just have to use your imagination.

 Again, a bit light on the colors, but you can see one of the cute little butterflies in the green.

Entirely too dark without the flash again, but a great shot once more of some of the quilting.

A look at the overall Turning Twenties design that we were given for our mystery quilt. I chose the inner border design to give it a bit more challenge then used a wide outer border to feature my lovely focal print fabric. Fairly accurate on the coloring in this photo.

Ooh, I caught one of the red butterflies with this shot!

 Another view of some of the pattern. This photo shows the colors the best. Aren't they lovely and warm?

 Callie (on the far right) was trying to help me lay out this quilt.

Okay, so I'm now up to five large quilts to bind, right? Aaauuugh! It's a good thing I have July off because I think I know what I'll be doing! How exciting. At least I know that I'll have a couple of quilts to enter in our guild quilt show next April.

Back to grading...

Deb



Another quilt top finished!

On the cutting board -

After being stuck for weeks trying to decide on a border, I finally settled on what I wanted and got it finished today. I wanted the outside to be softer looking than the middle pattern and not too busy - as in, not peiced. I know the fabric itself is busy, but isn't it pretty? : ) The stripe is not as bright red as it looks. It's actually more dark watermelon than bright red.

 Another shot of the border design.

On the bed -

The quilt will easily fit a queen sized bed. In fact, it's a bit long, but that's a good thing! My husband is 6' 3" so he needs a really long quilt. Plus, our four cats always tuck us me into bed at night, and man, do they hog the covers!!! I have to pull them up over my head before Tessie comes to bed if I don't want her to drag them off of me to make a cozy nest for herself at the foot of the bed.

The design comes right to the edge of the bed with the borders falling naturally off of the sides. The end, however, falls a little long. I think a deep tuck under the pillow will solve this problem. : )

 Another view from the other side. Yep, I still like it.

A slight pillow tuck keeps from distorting the diamond shape, but I'm going to need a deeper one to pull that bottom border up where it should be.

A quick word about my photos -

My husband bought me a fantastic Pentax camera (very professional and fancy), but the photos are too large to download onto the blog very easily. Instead, I make do with my lovely little Casio pocket camera. It's not as sharp, and the colors are not as true, but at least the photos download. Plus, I spend more on my fabric than I do on my house, so my rooms are small and dark and my sewing room is the old remodeled garage. It does make it challenging to photograph my quilts well. Lastly, I see lovely photos on other blogs where quilters have taken their quilts outside to take advantage of natural light. How I envy them. Have I mentioned that I live on a small farm? With four dogs, an outdoor cat, and a couple dozen free range chickens? There is nothing flattering about chicken poo on a quilt. : ( 

It doesn't help either that it's been raining for a solid week. Now that it's lighter after work, maybe I can start getting better pictures. I'll try. In the meantime, thanks for bearing with me.

Back to work on Monday -

I'll be spending this weekend catching up on grading, so I probably won't be able to do much more quilting until next week. I'm really pleased with how much I've been able to get done on Spring Break with four (and sometimes five) cats and one husband constantly under foot. If students weren't so annoying about demanding that their papers get graded on a timely basis, I would be able to get at least one more borderless quilt bordered this weekend. Oh well, I bordered four large quilts and bound one large quilt in one week. How's that for productivity? *Broad smile!*

'Til later...

Debbi

Resolution! I figured out how to border my Red Sea quilt.

Upcoming:  Photos of the completed Red Sea quilt. I'm cutting and getting ready to sew on the final borders.

Next:  Maybe the blue and cream quilt? Again, all it needs is borders. (I am such a border coward!)

Be back soon!

Red Sea Quilt dilema

It's time to make the borders for my Red Sea quilt. I had lots of red triangles left over from my half square triangle blocks, and I didn't want to throw them away. I decided to cut some cream triangles to finish my HST blocks.

One soda pop later, I had a load of little blocks waiting to be sewn together. The plan was to sew these squares into long border strips for an interior border. Unfortunately, the darn things had a mind of their own. They just kept sewing themselves together until they made their own little quilt.

Now I have to decide how to border both quilts. I've chosen the fabrics for the Red Sea quilt, but I just can't seem to decide what I want to do with them. No wonder I have so many UFOs. I get to the borders and freeze. Shoot. : (

This is one of the books I bought last year. I had not seen it before, but it has some rather cool looking patterns in it. It's called 256 Fat Quarter Quilt Blocks, and it's published by House of White Birches.

On page 65 of the same book, I found this pattern for a placemat. It has a single heart made in a way I had never seen before. I'm not a heart person, but I love odd looking patterns, so I decided to multiply one heart into a full sized quilt.

I've posted this photo before, but I finally finished binding it today. Yippee! Oops, I still need a label. My least favorite part of quilting. It's such a downer to get a quilt finished only to discover that there's one more thing to do. Oh well, there's always tomorrow.

Stay tuned. There are several more patterns in this book that I intend to try out. I can't wait to finish a couple more UFOs so that I can start a new quilt. My eyes keep roaming to my stacks of fabric. Sigh. Just a few more weeks.

'Til later.

Debbi