Flag Day

It is standard procedure for our household to display our flag on the appropriate days. Since we have been in our new house Ron has taken down my hanging plants and hooked our flag on the two rings that held the plants. We have a nest with two baby Purple Martins in the corner, right next to where he usually hangs the flag. Also to avoid having to remove the plants each time, we made the decision to put up a bracket for our flag... then Flag Day arrived and we had not taken care of that project. At 7:30 this morning we made a quick trip to Walmart and found a flag pole, complete with bracket and a new flag in one package.  Took about 5 minutes to get the bracket attached to the house and the new flag was blowing in the breeze before we headed off to church.

This is my latest project which started out as a panel.  I know, it doesn't look like much more than a panel at this point. 
The outer border was not part of the original panel and the star sashing and inside mini border were 3" strips running on both sides. I should have taken a photo before I started cutting.  I needed to change-up the panel before I started the quilting.
The intent was to use material I already had on hand. I will have to post a picture once this is done and hanging in our "smallest" room.

My attic window quilt has been complete for a while already.  This one has not found a new home yet, but is neatly folded in a stack of my completed treasures.



Below my Springtime Critters was assessed by Cabbage, my resident inspector... this one got her stamp of approval.
The back was almost as nice as the quilt top.

One day in June...

First, since it has been a while since I last stopped by here to update... the geese have flown the coop.  They did not all leave together.  Original family was seven, then there were only four, and finally one.  It has been a couple weeks since we last saw that lone goose.

This picture was not one of my originals, but I saved it when I ran across it online... because it made me smile.
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Someone made the comment the other day that I should have a GoPro hanging around my neck so I could catch on camera when I get into some of the situations that seem to follow me around. Made me think how easy it is to snap a shot of what is going on cause my phone is usually not too far away. Most are not picture worthy, but could add a smile the next day or week when I look back.

It was not the first thing I did today,  but I remember when we were having breakfast that I mentioned it might be good to mow the lawn this morning before it got too hot outside.  A little later when I heard the lawn mower, I thought it would also be good to get some weeding done... my flower beds out front were looking pretty crowded.


My flower beds are looking better than they did yesterday, but they still need to have some sprucing up.  I have tried to be good about watering, which is very important if you want anything to survive here in the summer.  With the empty spaces more defined after my work this morning, maybe I can get inspired to find some new plants to add some new color.

The hummingbirds actually like the purple one on the left... but I don't even remember what the plant is.



A couple weeks ago I got Ron to help me put up some lattice work on one end of the porch.  It is basically to create a frame for the Queen's Tears plant in the macrame plant hanger I made. First macrame in a while and I was very impressed with the end result. Soon I hope to have a couple more made for the other Queen's Tears that still only have a chain and hook.


I actually got into another project after lunch today, but there is another whole story that goes along with that, and I am likely to be less busy tomorrow... besides this is long enough for today.

Egyptian Geese

We have been watching this family for a while already.  The "babies" are almost as big as Mommy and Daddy now. Really cool to see them on the days they get water time. They dive under and pop back up, sometimes several feet away.  Mom and Dad are very protective and they actually are not in the water as often as I would have expected. Without a good lens on my camera, this shot would not have been possible as they keep their distance from human interaction. Of course there are neighborhood cars driving by fairly close sometimes, and they seem to be okay with that... until you slow down to get a closer look.  That is when you hear the warning quacks and the babies start scurrying away.  So respecting their "safe distance" is a must. Meanwhile I think the whole neighborhood is enjoying as this winged family grows.  Mom and Dad have been around for a while and it will be interesting to see if any, or all of the young ones stick around.

Cast Iron is amazing

Cast Iron comes in many shapes and sizes.  This John Wayne pie pan is one of my latest additions to my growing collection.

I started accumulating more pans than I could find a place to store, which inspired my husband to build me a mini gridwall in an otherwise unusable space. I have pans stored in other places, but this new gridwall does a great job of making the more frequently used pans easy to access.
It is quite amazing to see what a cast iron pan can do for a recipe.  I have several recipes that I have made for years and found cast iron typically takes the end result up a notch or two.
Cast Iron has been in my kitchen for a long time, but somehow it seems like I just discovered an amazing new friend.  In the past couple of months there has not been many days that I have not used at least one of my cast iron pans. 

My quilting is not quite as active in recent months as I have often been, but I still get a little quilting squeezed in here and there. It is hard to get the full effect of this work of art without seeing it in person, but this quilt hangs on a wall 18 feet off the floor, and previously the lighting, (bright overhead fan/light) was not the best to accent the quilt's true beauty.  My husband decided to install a small bar track light to help illuminate it. We don't have the new light on that often, but especially in the evening visitors can now experience this quilt, should they notice.

Quilt Shuffle

This is Seamus.  He was the finishing touch for the new look in our guest bathroom... that was until we went to retrieve my Purple Spin from the quilt shop.  When we got home I was envisioning a good place for the Purple Spin would be over the front door.  Ron asked me to consider his vision of seeing "the turtle" over the door where everyone could see him.  It didn't take me long to agree that over the door would be the perfect home for Seamus.


With his position over the door, the detail is up out of range to inspect very close, but when it was in the bathroom... the size of the bathroom didn't allow anyone to back up and get a good look at the whole picture.

 Before we went to retrieve the Purple Spin from the quilt shop, I was considering selling it because I thought I really didn't have a place to hang it. I really liked the quilt very much and did not want to have it sitting in a stack of finished quilts. Turns out some quilts just have a way of working themselves into the perfect spot.

Now the Purple Spin is quite happy taking over the bathroom.  It isn't necessary to back up to get the full impact of the color scheme.

Purple Spin

Quilt of the day is my Purple Spin. It was mostly completed at a quilt retreat I was at this past winter.  I had lots of input regarding the fabrics, and a couple of donations from other quilters.  Added the borders after I got home. There was a quilt shop owner that just happened to stop in at another retreat I was at after I had it totally done. I brought it to the retreat to inspire my quilting buddies to see it finished. The quilt shop owner wanted to take it to her shop for inspiration for her customers.  Stopped by that shop last week to find it prominently displayed behind the main cutting table.

I love the whole process of making a quilt, which means I have many more quilts around than I can display and/or enjoy.  This quilt is about 50" square... if anyone is interested in purchasing this quilt, leave a comment or send me an email.

My turtle is taking a little more shape.  I actually glued Seamus to the background.  Boston was sitting right in the middle of Seamus' shell until I was ready to take the picture... she was done posing just before I snapped it.  A couple more days and Seamus should have a whole new look.


My morning glories are starting to be glorious... although I have been warned, my sister had to pull most of  hers out because they were overtaking her flowerbed.  I planted these on the outside of the fence on the far side of the house where there are no other flowers in the flowerbed to overtake.

One of my little side projects is to make shorts from t-shirts to put in the Operation Christmas Child boxes.  We have made string backpacks and pillowcase dresses for the girls and they all  fold up and fit nicely in these boxes, but never got around to making any shorts for the little boys.

A friend that is in the screen printing business donated some of her extra t-shirts and I found a source online for some drawcord elastic that finishes off these easy to make little shorts.  With the drawcord waist there should be no sagging shorts.

This is what was left of the Key Lime Pie I was inspired to make after watching an episode of The Kitchen on Food Network.  I have made a key lime pie before, but this time I bought a mesh bag of those little key limes and had enough limes to dress it up nice and pretty. Of course there were enough limes in the bag to make two or three of these pies. Forgot to take the picture before it was cut into, but it still looked pretty cool. 

Bag of Bags

Pillowcase come in all sizes and shapes... I came up with this one, not to be a pillowcase, but a bag of bags.  I have several shopping bags that fold up pretty compact to make them easy to carry to the store.  Problem is to remember to take them into the store when you get there.  A couple weeks ago my dear friend gave me a bundle of mesh sacks to put your produce in.  I determined that if I made a sack to carry all the shopping bags and the new mesh bags... I might remember to actually use them. Quick to make and a stash buster.  So far it is working pretty nicely... I have remembered to use my shopping bags, more than a couple times already.

About a year ago I went to a quilt show and found a booth with some awesome quilts.  They made it sound like an easy process, so I just had to have one of the patterns... of course it cost way more than I should have paid.  When I got home and had a chance to sit and go through the instructions on how this quilt was done, I put it aside and determined I would have to wait until I felt like spending enough time to figure out how to proceed.  Fast forward a year and I was no further with figuring out the pattern... then I get an email from a local quilt shop that they were going to have a class on the process by this designer.  I jumped at the chance to get past the intimidation of this pattern.  Signed my friend up with me and the adventure has begun.  Downside of my pattern, that I have had for a year now is... it is one of the larger patterns.  My friend's quilt is probably one third the size of my sea turtle.  It would have been so much easier to start off small.

The process is broken down into two classes.  The first class was to explain the process and show some finished samples.  We were given homework to be done before the second class, which is to be about a month later.  These are art quilts, which is something I have not really thought about doing before.  It has taken me out of my comfort zone, which does not mean I am having difficulty doing this, but I am having a problem playing by the rules.  I can think of lots of ways to do things different than we are supposed to be doing them...




This process uses lots of Steam a Seam 2... and lots of cutouts.  The instructions basically have you fusing everything.  Not previously having a great love for fusing, I was reluctant to add SAS2 to all of the background pieces. I grabbed several scraps and started piecing them to make my background by sewing them together.  One of the homework instructions was to put SAS2 on the background pieces... but DO NOT fuse them in place.  All the pieces are supposed to be sorted and brought to class to begin the construction process.

With my background having no stability, as it would as fused background, I thought I needed to stiffen it up a bit, so I used full strength liquid starch and my backyard lawn for a dryer.  After I pressed the semi finished background, I found the hole which will be covered by the turtle, had an unstable edge, so I basted in another piece of fabric to make the background one whole piece.

One of the neat features of SAS2 is it is repositionable, and only becomes permanently fused when you use steam in the pressing process.  We were instructed to temporarily build the main character of the quilt on a stabilizer called Pattern Ease... but only to prep the background pieces... I am now potentially in hot water... I am quite sure.

Once I filled the hole to semi stabilize the background... I figured I was already in trouble, so I cut the turtle out and will be ready to start embellishing at the class.  I have more than a couple bags with cutouts of fish, shells and flowers. It is still another week before the class, so if I am already in hot water... guess I could start embellishing.