Catching up

I haven't been posted much since going to Florida for the submarine reunion and then going to my mother's to help her get moved to Detroit. We had hoped to put my mother on a plane last Wednesday, but things didn't get set up in Detroit in time for us to do that. Instead, Jerry & I came home on Wednesday (and it POURED rain all the way from Florida to South Carolina). We are going to drive back down to my mother's on Tuesday to help her pack her suitcases and then we'll put her on the plane on Wednesday the 31st. My brother will have everything lined up for her at the retirement home in Detroit (hopefully!)

Besides taking care of the issues with my mother, we've been finishing up the remodel of my quilt studio. We have one final inspection to have done and then I can move all of my junk back into the room. I'm having trouble deciding where I want everything to go, but I'm anxious to get moved back into the room and to get all of my assorted sewing stuff out of the rest of the house.

Jerry and I went to the fair this afternoon and when we got home the kids were sitting in the living room waiting for us. What a nice treat to find them here. They'd come over for a belated birthday celebration for Jerry since we were in Florida for his birthday last Sunday. They'd taken Noah & Hayden for photographs earlier today and already had the photos to share. I think they're WONDERFUL, but then again I'm biased.

Rolling over

Here's Hayden with a big smile after rolling over for the first time. She's obviously proud of herself!


We've been in Florida since Wednesday. Until Saturday we were in Jacksonville where we attended a reunion of the USS Grant, one of the submarines Jerry served aboard. On Saturday we drove down to Venice where my mother lives. She hasn't been doing very well lately and has spent some time in the hospital due to bone breaks from falling. We need to get her moved closer to family so she's going up to an assisted living facility in the Detroit area. There she'll be close to my brothers and her grandchildren. Jerry and I spent the day weeding through the accumulated stuff and packing up some boxes.

Today is Jerry's birthday. I'm sure he would have preferred spending the day doing something else! Happy birthday honey!

Pretty little girl

We had Hayden try on the smocked dress that I made for her. The neck size is just right but the sleeves sure are puffy!

I think she's so cute in it.

Work in progress

I can't believe that I've actually been sewing, what with my sewing room being dismantled right now, but I have. I ran across a pattern in a French magazine (QuiltMania) for this top and just decided it was something I wanted to do. I've always liked quilts with some dimension and used some Australian fabric fat quarters for the blocks.

I started this on Thursday and finished today - which is really speedy for me! Here it is in progress with all the blocks pieced.



















Once I finished piecing the blocks and adding all the borders it was too big for my design wall so I had to put it on the floor for a photo. I don't usually work this big (it's about 64 x 75) so I don't know what I'll do about the quilting. I might try to find someone to baste it for me so I can quilt it myself. It was fun to do. I think I've named it Aussie Shadows.
(photos are clickable for larger view)

Two cuties

My two favorite grandkids! Aren't they cute? Can't wait until Hayden has more hair so she can wear bows!

Dyeing again

I've been doing some more dyeing. I'm going to be taking a class that calls for a six to eight step color gradation and tried it out in fuchsia. I think a couple of the colors are too close to see any difference. The blue in the photo is an over-dye of something I did in lesson one of my dye class.









These are also over-dyes. The one on the left started out orange and I dyed it in a combination of blue and hot pink. It's interesting how the color came out. The pink was a one color attempt at tie dye. I think I did it wrong. The blue was from lesson one and I over-dyed it with a purple. The last one was a yellow that I over-dyed with green.

I'm still trying to find an easier rinsing method!

Fractured Flower completed

(clickable for larger view)
I have finally completed my fractured flower quilt (here's where I first talked about it). Starting in the upper left and going clockwise my segments were made by Sandra Burket of Texas, Roberta Ranney of Missouri, Rhoda Forbes of British Columbia and Diane Becka of Washington.

The deadline to finish was today and I just put in the last stitch this morning. I wish I'd quilted with a different color thread. I had trouble finding the threads I wanted because of having my studio all packed up for the dormer addition.

After seeing how some of the others have completed their quilts, I'm feeling like mine is pretty ordinary. Once the photos are posted on the QuiltArt web site, I'll post a link so all of the quilts can be viewed.