July and August

I made up a pincushion pattern and submitted it to a quilt magazine. I haven't heard from them yet. A local woman, who has been published, said that is a good thing, as they tell you right away if they don't like a submission. They may still turn it down, but since they haven't told me no thanks, someone still likes it.

I saw a picture of an owl necklace on the web somewhere. It was sort of cute, but I dont wear jewelry. The owls were flat. One day, I got the inspiration to make round, stuffed owls that were simular. I made up a pattern, and after some false starts I came up with these owl pincushions. I took the first 3 pairs to my quilt guild meeting. I was asked to make and donate 12 pairs to a fundraiser in September. The guild is trying to setup a quilt museum. So I made up a lot of owls.




On July 28th I was on my way to a job interview, and worrying about what to say, etc. and got into an accident. It totaled my car, broke my ankle, various bumps, scrapes, sprains, and cuts. I hit my head and my forehead swelled up like a Klingon (without the bumps) and my eyes turned the most horrible shade of black. Over the next two weeks, the bruse sort of melted down my face. I had red eyes for a few days. I just have a little reminder in a few places now, but I still have a swollen area above my eyes, look like a neandertal. And I have to wear this stupid black boot thing for another 3 to six weeks. The doctor said the xray yesterday doesn't show a lot of healing.

It's my right ankle and I haven't been able to sew or drive for 3 weeks now. It's a good thing I got the owls done. In fact, they were in a box on the seat of my car, when I had the accident. I was going to deliver them after the interview. I still haven't gotten them delivered. There is a guild meeting tonight, and Nyda, my sister, will drive me over so I can deliver the owls. I need a job, but even if I got another interview, I can't get my dress slacks over the boot, and I can't drive. Sorry for the pity rant. I'm feeling like crap about this.

I have been working on hand embroidery. I saw a metal dragon wall ornement in a gardening catalog a while back that I liked. I put the picture in my files, and after the accident, I enlarged it up to about 18x24 inches and transferred it to a piece of black linen. I used gold colored pearl threads couched down with a gold colored sewing thread and outlined the whole thing. I haven't decided if its done or if I want to do a fill stitch or couch it all in the gold pearl. I only used it because I had a lot of it left over from a store I had about 10 years ago. The store lasted less than a year, but the inventory will outlast me. I have a big tote full of DMC floss and another full of linens. I always check there before buying any floss. Nyda kitted up a new cross stitch pattern the other day and only had to buy 3 skeins of floss.


While I'm pondering on the fate of the dragon, I got out my Nemisis, Teresa Wentzler's Peacock tapestry. I have been working on this for about 12 years now, off and on, mostly off. I think it is beautiful, but I can't seem to make any progress with it. I work from the bottom up and I am almost 2/3 finished.




I recently moved my room around so I have my sewing desk in front of the window. I think I like it better here. I also was able to get rid of one desk chair, and it leaves me a larger space to move in. I just have to turn around and I'm at the computer. I don't have to walk around the sewing desk to get to the computer.

I'm Back

I hadn't realized it has been so long since I posted. This has been a weird summer.

We finally planted the garden June 9. the first time we had 3 days without rain. The tomatoes were 2 feet tall and so were the peppers. The looked so good. Lots of baby tomatoes and peppers.






Just 3 days later, we picked the first ripe tomatoes.



Then on June 17, there was a frost warning. We could cover the peppers, but what to do for the tomatoes. My sister uses long lenths of pvc pipe to stake them. We decided to slit the bottom on large plastic garbage bags and slip them down the pipes to cover the plants. The next morning the peppers were ok. The tomatoes looked a little frozen, but for the most part looked ok. Later in the day, I looked out at the garden and the tomato plants were black and drooping down to about 8 inches above the ground. Gone. We still had 4 greenhouse tomatoes in the greenhouse, but these outside plants never recovered to produce anything but small stunted tomatoes.

Who expects a killing frost on June 17?!!! The joys of gardening in Idaho.

We have been gettiing some wonderful tomatoes out of the greenhouse. And cucumbers.
We have just started gettiing summer squash. Peas are usually a thing of the past by now, but ours are not ready to pick yet.

I still do not have a job. I've been living off my savings but that won't last too much longer. I have been working on some sewing projects.

Red/Green Crazy Quilt Square

I finally finished a crazy quilt square. It took me longer than I thought it would. I always seem to have 3 or 4 projects going at the same time. Even though it was a green/red color scheme, I didn't want to do it as a Christmas block. I did the spider with some black beads and a black sparkly floss, but it didnt show up well, so I ripped it out and did it over again with the purple and silver beads. All in all, I think it turned out OK.

Surprise on the patio

We have 70 degree weather today, so we spent the morning cleaning up part of the yard. We decided to barbecue some hamburgers for lunch. After pulling the patio furniture pads out of the shed we opened the barbecue and SURPRISE:




Some birds had decided that they had found a perfect place to make a nest.






After we cleaned it out, we let it run for a few minutes and cleaned the grates before we cooked.

Greenhouse

My sister, Nyda, has been starting her plants from seed for several years. Over the last 4-5 years she has invested over $3000 in her greenhouse. she covered it with greenhouse film the first year. We get so much wind here it tore the film apart in 2 years. Originally the greenhouse was 8 x 12 feet. Before we put the fiberglass on, we added another 4 feet, making it 12 x 12. It's still not big enough. Last year, Nyda added the propain heat. We had tomatoes until November, last year.

I took these pictures today. As you can see, the tomatoes need to transplanted outside, but it's been too cold and wet until this week. Hopefully, by the weekend we can move them out.

This A-frame stand was setup in the house, in March, with lights hanging above the seed starting trays, until it got warm enough to move them out to the greenhouse.



The hanging plants on the left are cucumbers, on the right are fuschias started from tiny plants about a month ago. The fuschias will hang on the patio this summer, the cucumbers stay in the greenhouse along with 4 large pots of greenhouse tomatoes.



Tomatoes and below them, peppers.



The outside of greenhouse, attached to garage. My studio is on the other side of that wall.

New quilt tops,quilt, flying geese

I have been piecing flying geese blocks. As I was sorting through my stash, I found that I had a lot of small pieces, 1/4 yard or less, that were related by color, either violet, purple or green, and all mixes. I found speed piecing instructions on the web. I couldn't find the original site, but it is also here: http://www.quilterscache.com/H/Howtomakegeese.html
I used method B. I started putting them in a shoe box and when it was full I had enough for the two quilts shown.

The stripped quilt is double bed sized. I found the lilac print and the pink in my stash. I used white on white prints for the white.




I used the leftover blocks to make the smaller quilt. Its about 55 x 66 inches. I didnt put the outer border on at first, but it felt unfinished. Adding the darker boarder framed it and it looks better.

Help Identifying image.

I copy images from all over the web to use for inspiration. I want to try to make a quilt out of this striped star image, but I can't remember where I got it. Does anyone know where it came from? I'd like to give credit if I make it into a quilt.