Out With the Old In With The NEW!

Goodbye Sweet Cruella! You've served me so well.

Hello New Sweetness! Finally!! There is so much to learn with this new-fangled machine. I'm loving it already, so quiet, and easy. I will master the auto needle threader sometime soon. Maybe even tomorrow, we shall see. As you can tell from the picture, Rexie thinks its a very nice new paperweight.

I've finished my doll for the Guardian Doll Challenge for Quilting Arts Magazine , now to send her off across the country. She did end up with a rather Big Head, but she is a Guardian after all. And she reminds me to Take Time. Note she is equipped with a star wand to bonk me on the head if I forget this. Slow down and Take Time.
Oh, and for those who are superdooper observant you will note that she is made out of.....scraps, why of course! But from what project? Oh the Ugliest Blanket in the World of course, see post below. Felted wool is just lovely to bead on, really much nicer than other fabrics I've used.
And I used lots and lots of beads gifted to me from my former neighbor and fabulous bead artist, Virginia Clark. I wish she had a website to share with you, her stuff is really something to behold. Oh, and the perfectly sized star wand is from Artchix Studios.

One Image Game

Here is the view of my worktable covered with stamped cards from the One Image game I'm playing in. Thirty people stamped or applied the same image to 30 postcards, self addressed and postage-stamped them, and sent them to our game host RedDog. She runs a mixed-media group that I'm in, called Traveler's H'Art. Each artist then got one of each postcard to play with. And we get the completed arted-up versions of our original stamped cards back in the mail. This is FUN! But also hard. As Chimpy McFlightSuit would say "Hard Work, it's Hard Work." By the way, this is why I need both a wet studio and a dry studio. Or at least space for a wet desk. So hard to combine the two. I have to completely clean up and put away each thing to work on the other. Otherwise, stamp ink and glitter and paint get on my quilty stuff. Sigh. Poor me.

Lunaea's card, her one image was the moon. Boy is it hard to photograph black and sparkly stuff! But if you know Lunaea, you know she needs sparkly.

RedDog's image was the seated 50's woman. Words are "Sigh...why can't i just relax and have fun like mary?" Had a bit of an eeek, when I was dabbing water on the water colour pencils, the ink from my words went away. Not sure if it was the slick paper or what, but I faked it with a pen re-do.

The words are "Get an eyeful", the one image was the empty mason jar. Used watercolour oil pastels on this one. It was a nice bumpy watercolour paper too.

The words are "Reach for ART", one image was the large hand. I think this is my fave so far, and I must get that big hand stamp. I love hands, hands and eyes or both together.

ECO's one image was the square Keppler journal. My stamp smeared a bit, but I think it looks like it is spinning in motion.

One image was the super girl and shooting star.

One image was the girl with the satellite head. The background stamp is made of exces stamp strips left over from cutting out new rubber, glued down to a base. I can't throw anything away, can I?!

One image was the circular celtic knot design. Not done with this one yet. That's some of my handmade paper in the background.

Last Week's Works all in one lump

Round Robin for Nadine (mine is on left) I later unsewed when I remembered they were supposed to be blocks not a completed strip, duh. At least I remembered this before sending them on to Delores. Now on to the next person's, Diane sent fabric with hers, deep brown and blues/whites, so we shall see what I come up with for that....

Cut up Felted wool sweaters. These sweaters have been around my workroom for a year. I read about recycling old sweaters by washing and drying them to felt them, then sewing together in an attractive warm, couch blankie. Soooo, after months of collecting cat hair (ewww) and being washed and dried many many times, they were definitely felted! Some did better than others, they started out thicker, and higher quality wool yarn. One sweater was burgundy, one was each, one blue with white and blue stripes, and another dark grey. Not the best colour choices in the world, but that was what was available at the St. Vinnies the day I bought them.

So here it is....drumroll....The Ugliest Blanket in the World, but oh is it cuddly and warm, and my kids are fighting over it. Not husband though, he is slighty allergic to wool. The trick will be to keep it away from Zelda the dog, who sheds so much it will turn white instantly...

Straight and narrow challenge quilt, more quilting done with a decorative stitch in a varigated thread, and trimming of edges. Still not done though.

I'm taking a Celtic knot sweatshirt workshop with Quilt University. These are my four fabric choices on top of the celery green sweatshirt.

Judy Martin Books

Judy Martin has one of the best monthly newsletters, really funny, and always has good links to interesting non-quilty stuff. This month it was mailboxes. Anyways, her books rock! Very clear instructions, and innovative yet traditional blocks, lots of stars, which I love. And she put one of her latest books that I never had gotten around to buying on huge sale, so I thought I'd pass on the info.

Here's what she said: "Whatever the reason, the people have spoken with their wallets and said
$21.95 wasn’t going to get it done on a scale large enough to rid me of my remaining thousands of books. I have lowered the retail price of Piece ‘n’ Play Quilts to $7.95. That’s about 64% off! For the price of one single pattern, you can have a 96-page, all-color book with 12 complete patterns, including quilting. It’s a good book, and at this low price, you can afford to find out. Then you can afford to buy multiple copies and give them as presents. "

Oh and also, I swear by her point trimmer tool for making binding strips.

While I was there ordering Piece 'n' Play, I also picked up two of her other books that I've always wanted (so much for saving money by buying on sale, hah!!), The Block Book, and her Ultimate Rotary Cutting Reference. Judy's big concentration in teaching is on being accurate first, and not having to trim away extra to make the block the right size. And I need all the help I can get on learning that!

Puzzle of the Day

Hey, my quilt is puzzle of the day today. It makes a hard puzzle, took me 5:55, which is about 2minutes more than usual on this size of puzzle, go see how fast you are. This week is featuring all quilts, so every day will be a different quilt artist.

German Poo Protestors

Just thought you all would appreciate this one. Wonder what Condi will say about it?
Police hunt poo protesters
Police in Germany are hunting pranksters who have been sticking
miniature US flags into piles of dog poo in public parks. Josef
Oettl, parks administrator for Bayreuth, said: "This has been going
on for about a year now, and there must be 2,000 to 3,000 piles of
excrement that have been claimed during that time." The series of
incidents was originally thought to be some sort of protest against
the US-led invasion of Iraq. And then when it continued it was
thought to be a protest against President George W. Bush's campaign
for re-election. But it is still going on and the police say they are
completely baffled as to who is to blame.
More at: http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_1248811.html

Classic Pin-up

Since we are getting closer to V-Day and all, try this quiz to find out which Classic Pinup you are. Here was my result:


You're Lili St. Cyr!


What Classic Pin-Up Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

Tsunami Quilt Block

Tsunami Block got finished off and sent to Marta in Spain. Hope it gets there by 2/14. There may be time still for YOU to do one. So get off the computer and go do it. Here is the info again, at the Tsunami Quilt 2005 . And there is a Flickr website with photos of lots of the blocks submitted so far.

Ladybug

A 3"paper-pieced Ladybug for Adrienne, just because. She likes ladybugs. And she made me one a while ago. So there she is. I hardly ever do paper piecing, but I always like how it turns out. I forget how to do it if I don't practice occasionally! Use or lose it rules in my brain these days, DO NOT ask me any calculus or statistics questions. Oh and this green fabric that I used was soooo soft, almost sueded. Pet, pet. I got this pattern from a page of Mini-Block swaps , that's a good page of minis, cats, swans, a snails trail, and insane pineapples. Oooh, I gotta put that on the list of rock band names for Zach, Insane Pineapples.... the list is getting longer. He better keep practicing that guitar huh?
If you have any suggestions for me to add to the list, let me know!

Marie's Angels

So, Marie was first with her Swamp Angels, aren't they great? I need to get mine made up and sent out to the Mavericks that are in this swamp. We call our swaps, swamps because of a typo years ago, but it suits us I think. This block can be found in Alex Anderson's book Simply Stars

Sexy Rexie

Rexie picture taken by Zach. He's getting good with the camera, I love the framing of this shot. What a beautiful cat we've got, thankfully he puts up with us hassling him with cameras. I think he looks a lot like a breed called Ragamuffin , maybe who knows? He was a pound kitty and we are blessed to have him in our household.

First Iris of 2005

First Iris of 2005! I love irises. I won an iris drawing one year after voting for my favorite at the iris show at the mall. There were so many beautiful varieties. Some were brown and purple or yellow and white, ruffled and not. Sigh. But they haven't come back in a few years. Maybe this year? Here is a photo gallery at the iris society website, beauty! Oh and please disregard the gigantic dandelion growing behind it. Time for some weeding now that it isn't quite so mucky in the backyard.

CQFA Row Round Robin

So here is the first CQFA Row Round Robin that I received from Nadine. Beautiful Asian fabrics and a curvy/square block, what shall I do to contribute a row to this great start. Hmmmm. That's why it is up on the design wall, so that it can talk to me...

Straight and Narrow

This is the Straight and Narrow Challenge piece that I made on Friday and Saturday. Not sure if it is "done" or not, but I'm liking it so far.

Keiko and Friends

I made "Thanks Debbie! " out of blocks I started at a CQFA meeting where Virginia Schnalle taught us the circle technique from one of Keiko Goke's fabulous books. Debbie gave me some of her fabulous hand-dyed fabric to make the blocks, thus the title.
So this little quilt (only 14" x 10") got sent off to the Keiko and Friends show that Laura Wasilowski is hosting.

Almond Tree

Almond tree in bloom just this week. And check out that blue sky! Every year this tree has bloomed in January. And every year just as it blooms, we get the biggest storm of the season and all the blossoms get knocked off and we get zero almonds. This year I *told* the tree to wait, to not get fooled by the unusual warm week of weather, which was then followed by a big windy storm. And check it out, it listened this year, hooray! Maybe we will have some almonds to fight over with the squirrels this year??

Feeling Blue Round 2

Feeling Blue first layer is on! And sent off to Adrienne. That's a lot of blue! And so far only one repeat from the blues I used on my base blocks. But then Jaye has several boxes of blue fabrics if I'm not mistaken .

Book Learnin'

I've found that I do some of my best learning from books. So, there is a new one that I've read recently and would like to blab about.
If you are at all interested in getting beads onto your fiberworks, I highly recommend the brand new book EMBEADERY by Margaret Ball. You can order it from her at: http://www.flameweaver.com/embeadery.html
She knows her stuff, the directions are clear, and the pictures actually help you figure out what you are doing!
Oh and she has a great blog too, with lots of examples of her wonderful art: Fiber Fantasies
Also, check out her tip page with good instructions on how to make face cabochons and other stuff too.

Meme-i-liciousness

Diane at Going to Pieces emailed me today with the cheery "You've been memed!", excusemoi? Que? Oh, I see a rite of initiation in this blog-o-sphere bidness.
SO here goes....

The Music Meme

1. Total amount of music files on your computer? 1 File, one lonely little file - The one and only song I've ever downloaded "The Zephyr Song" by the RedHotChiliPeppers. I use this computer to play Yahoo Launch Music Videos or my custom radio station, it comes with my DSL package. So the files aren't actually stored on my system. That's one of our favorite family things to do, sit around the computer and play a bunch of videos for songs we like. IMO, much better than letting my kids watch MTV. Although I can only watch Weird Al Yankovich so many times :(

2. The last CD you bought was: The Killers "Hot Fuss" a newish band that I dig or Power of Soul a tribute to Jimi Hendrix or Itzhak Perlman reDiscovered Violin Sonatas. One of those. What can I say, I'm an eclectic listener (understatement of the century).

3. What is the song you last listened to before reading this message?
"Stand" by REM, this is the preferred riding to school music right now. We always have an uptempo song that we listen to, since there is NEVER any music on the radio in the am.
Zach is in charge of putting the cd on the right track, since he remembers stuff like that. I'm just lucky to be able to start the car and back up without hitting our other cars in the morning. I really don't wake up fully til 11am.
Oh, and last night I listened to the soundtrack to the musical Wicked while helping Alex learn longdivision. We love that song Popular.

4. Write down 5 songs you often listen to or that mean a lot to you:
In Your Eyes by Peter Gabriel, (that's "our" song, first one we danced to at our wedding 15 years ago this march!),
the entire Moulin Rouge movie soundtrack, because it got me through a bad year and kept me working at my art
Sting's Sacred Love, the disco remix, because it gets me up off my rear to dance and the lyrics are hopeful.
XTC's Dear God, just because it rings true and makes me cry every time.
U2's All That You Leave Behind, either Beautiful Day or Peace on Earth or Grace or...shoot the whole thing, I can't pick.
And just because I can't stop, Dave Matthews Band's Grey Street because it perfectly describes me when I'm down in the pit of depression walking the legendary black dog.

How do you like all those amazon links? Tempting eh?

5. What 3 people are you going to pass this baton to and why?
Dara at DaraMusing because I know she loves lots of different, interesting music
Karen at ChaoticQuiltArt because I know she needs another thing to focus on today
and Rayna at studio 78 because I love love love her work and she is new to the artful quilters blog ring.