Thimbleberries Completed

Two completed tops.

Finished piecing at least.

This is the Thimbleberries 2007 club quilt done half size with variations. I really made it my own. Used some printed blocks from the Lazy Crazy Quilt. Those are the couple blocks that look like applique.

I changed the setting a little bit and also the borders. But all the other fabrics are from the club collection. Have no idea when this will get quilted as I would like to hand quilt it.



Then this is the finished Quilter's Garden which I started when I started this blog. It is shown on my husbands bed which is a regular size so you can see it isn't really very big.

I really like the green print in the center setting blocks but like one of the gals said, maybe Mar. That if the center setting blocks were the beige it would show of quilting better.

Well My DD was home overnight and she is very good with colors etc. She has quilted but got waylaid with kids, working and going to school. I showed it to her and she liked it but--" The center setting blocks should have been the beige as the blocks would have shown up better."

But it's done and put in the basket to be quilted later. One of these day I shall show my basket of tops. No dinky little basket like Kim's



DD and I went over to a cousin's house for a family reunion as she wanted to see a couple of her cousins. We drove separately so she could hop on the interstate easier and get on the road home, other side of DC. 95 miles. She wanted to get to the dedication of the church's new organ at 4. She left at 2 . Takes 2 hours. But not today. When I got home about 45 min. after she left DH asked me if those were my shoes by the door. Nope, DD's. So I called her cell. She was stuck in traffic going up the mountain about 10 miles from the house. I asked her to please call when she got home. 6:15 she finally calls. She had gotten to the church for the finger food but there were still a lot of people there. It took her 1 1/2 hours longer than it should have. No way to get off of those crazy roads. She'll get her shoes the next time home.

It was a beautiful day here in the East. Low 70's and I found a couple trees turning in the yard. That's for tomorrow.

The Star Garden

By Nancy E. Turner

I just finished reading this wonderful book and just had to tell you about it.

This is the third book she has written about Sarah Agnes Prine.
The first was These Is My Words; the second was Sarah's Quilt.

I recommend starting with the first one as they each take up where the other leaves off.

Kim recommended These is my Words to me last year saying it was about the settling of Arizona in the 1800s.

This interested me since my Mother was born in Florence Arizona in 1894 and had told about it and the troubles her family had. Finally left after losing 3 little brothers to the Flu. It left the youngest boy with a very raspy voice. My Grandmother wanted to leave that awful place, so they went back up to the San Joaquin Valley where my grandfather had been from.

He settled in Turlock and homesteaded.

So these books really hit home for me. Such a good story about our country and the trials that the settlers had.

Hope you enjoy as much as I did.

My friend Kim

Since Kim keeps talking about me in her blog, I figured it was time to tell a little about how we met and why 2 women of a different generation have become such good friends.

First when Kim first joined Quilters Hollow of course I saw she was from Sacramento. Well, i was born just about 100 miles south in Turlock. So number one thing in common. I still have a sister living in Santa Cruz and have tried going out about every couple years to see her for a week. So when I said I was going to visit my sister, Kim said how about meeting in San Jose and she'd show us a couple Quilt shops. So it was arranged to meet at this quilt shop
right as you get into Csmpbell.

This is Kim on the left. Me in the middle and Kim's friend and fellow Hollow member, Nancy. My sister took this picture of us. Great shop. Found a lot of TB on sale.

From there we went in Kim's car to Sunnyvale to a wonderful shop which is now closed..

Then we drove to a place where we could park and look at the Mini quilts that Kim had been in charge of. They were all in and I had her name. She had not unwrapped her package. But did and this is a picture of her holding the 12" "Trip around the world" that I had made her.


Later Kairle, who is the owner of the Hollow wanted to get some others to help her a little and asked Kim and I to take over the swaps and other activities, as she didn't have time. Why she picked us, I don't know, except we were probably the ones that talked the most.

In this process we found out that our birthdays were a week apart. I'm a week Older plus several years, Then when one would make a comment about something invariably the other would say almost the same thing. Really weird. But then you already know that Kim is weird.
I can't write the stories like she does though.
We both have two children, a boy and girl. But mine are both married and I have 6 grandchildren

We then met again 2 years ago at the Thimbleberries retreat in Mn. 17 Hollow members were there that year. That is probably the last time I will be able to travel as I can't leave my DH unless someone else stays with him.

Then this year for my birthday Kim sent me this quilt. I had commented How much I liked it.
Boy, was I surprised. What a Gal.
We email a couple times a day.

Here it is hanging above my bed.

Doesn't this look great over my DH's great grandparents bed.?

Kim left this comment when uploading these pictures for me.

That's all folks

Half Square Triangles

What do you do with all those pieces that you need to cut off when making flying geese or all the different style of blocks that I made for this Quilter's Garden? That is one thing I don't like about the patterns that Lynette Jensen designs. She does some of the steps in a way that you have too many discards.

I learned early on that I wasn't going to throw all those pieces away. So started to do as Bonnie does, sewing back across those little pieces so that when I cut them off I will have another half square triangle block.

Yes, after awhile you have loads of them so what to do--?

First I press them open then start to trim them to a usable size. I have from 1 in to 3 and a half inch. Stack in their separate stacks.

Here's the squaring up.

Then here is the little box with all the different sizes.

Here's what I made from them. Only added some small strips for orders.
made the sawtooth strips for the outer boarder.

Yes, and now it needs to be quilted. This will give me a little project to hand quilt while watching my one soap in the afternoon and the final week of baseball.

Unfortunately my Orioles won't be playing in the play-offs. Maybe next year.

Of course there is still loads of these HST to do something with.

I found It

Yesterday in the mail came the fabric I ordered from Cottage Quilts. They had several of the Fancy Free Line which is what the border fabric is. and it was on sale. We all like that. So I ordered 2 yards of a dark green which I already had some of. This light green print which had a little red flower in it and this plaid which just looked good.

Really came quick clear across the country from Fresno, Ca.


When I saw this light green and put it up on the board under the blocks it seemed to make those blocks pop out. What do you think?





Now I want to show another picture with two different beiges for the outer setting triangles . Which looks best? The light or the more of a gold? Then the plaid will be the inner border.





I don't have enough of the beige that I used for the BG in the blocks but do have two other light ones that I think I can mix them. I do have enough of the more gold. It was part of the TB club fabrics which I didn't use.


So what is it Ladies? Want to get going on this. Have other things to do for Christmas. Don't we all.

Quilters' Garden

The first couple blogs I did when I started this was showing the blocks one by one. But when I couldn't get the pictures posted by myself I decided to wait till I had them finished. Now I need help.






Aren't they different? The TB big book of block patterns that has these reprinted in shows the setting blocks as a light green floral sort of tone on tone, but I can't find that print or anything like it now, Guess I could look at other fabric lines, there is other lines isn't there?

I asked Kim what she would suggest, she did but suggested that I ask all of you. I'll put a picture of the border fabric I want to use. It's from the Fancy Free collection. I have ordered a couple other pieces of this collection in hopes that one will work for the setting pieces.





The Outside triangles will be a beige. Might not be the same one as I used for the BG in the blocks but all the beige work well together.

So help me please. I'm thinking that those large setting squares would be a good place for for feather stitching. I will hand quilt this.

Grandkids

I have 6 grandchildren. My daughter has 4. 2 boys, 2 girls, Now she has 3 of them in college this year. My son has 2. The two blonds on the right in this picture. They live in Colorado so we don't get to see them very often. This picture was taken this summer when they visited for a few days with us and then Their other grandmother had them for about 3 weeks. The other girl on the left is Ashley, my daughters oldest girl. She's in her second year at art school in Philadelphia.

Notice Chris has this blond hair. getting a little darker than it used to be. He's 13.

Well, last night I got an email from my son with a couple pictures. This one below

Chris said in the email, Purple Hair eeeeee!!!!!

I wrote back and said whats the story. Nothing he went to a salon to get it done. With his own money.
Now Why would a nice looking boy with nice - but long, hair want purple hair? Just like the hippies in the 50's.


Guess this is the style in the Mountains of Colorado. What do you Think?

My Challenge

A couple days ago Kim asked if We had done a challenge. It got me thinking about the best one I had entered in my guild.

I belonged to a Guild in Bowie which is 75 miles south, because my DD got me into it as she was going there. Every year they would have a challenge. This time they had lists of Nursery Rhymes in a bag and we were to pick out one and make a quilt to represent that nursery Rhyme. Mine was The Old Women in a shoe,had so many children she didn't know what to do. We didn't have any other restrictions.

I decided to make it Sun Bonnet Sue. What a time I had finding some fabric with children on it to cut out and applique on. These were like dolls and different dresses. I ended up using everyone on the half yard of fabric I bought. It was fun. Then of course had to put a quilt in it. Very Tiny. Thought the tumbling blocks made a good border. What they do is put them all out at the meeting . No one was suppose to know who made which one. Then everyone voted on their favorite.

I see from the label this was in 1997 and I won

1st place viewers choice
1st place applique
2nd place design

Not bad. This is the little story I put on the label.

There was and old women "SunBonnet Sue"
Who lived in a shoe
She had so many children
She didn't now what to do.
They helped her make a Quilt and went out to play
Sue hung the quilt up for all to see
The children were so proud as could be.

I had to stop going to guild when my husband became disabled and the gas started to go up so high

Did you say Mini?

My Churn Dash Mini

Before I got this web I was making a lot of minis and selling some at the quilt shows I did and Antique shows.

When I first got back into quilting in 1990, my DD gave me a subscription to the NEW Miniature Quilts magazine.

I made many from those patterns. This being one of them. I had it at our Local quilt show showing it. I wasn't there at the time but DD was and a lady wanted to know if I would sell it. She had a doll bed it would just fit.

At the time I hadn't wanted to as it really wasn't easy to make. Those blocks are 2" finished and the HST are 3/4 of an inch. Sure used up few scraps.

But I thought, well if she wanted to pay my price for it I could make another. She did so I made another. The quilt is 11 1/2 x 13. I have it photographed sideways to get just the quilt. I made it in 2001.

Then I have another one which is Autumn Leaves. These blocks are only 1 1/4 ' square. The whole quilt is 10 x 12 inches. Fun to make.
Made this one in 1998.

Autumn Leaves

They are both Hand quilted.

My New TV

This is what I did on Sunday.

My old TV screen went fussy and no picture. Fortunately I could still use the web.

You see I don't have a computer but what used to be WebTV, Now is MSNTV 2 Much better. That little box next to the TV is it. I use a wireless keyboard and mouse. Just don't have the monitor and all the other problems that you do on the computer. Most of our stuff is stored at Sunnyvale and we get upgrades every so often. Some times good some times not.
This all goes through the TV and it's my monitor. I can do everything excpet play the CDs etc. and of course upload those pictures.
Any way on Sunday, my DH said why don't I go to Best Buy and get a new TV like his. Yah we got him a new 26" HDTV about 6 months ago and of course he had to get it hooked up to the HD and sports channels.

After I saw how nice and slim that was I had it in my head that I was going to get one also. My cabinet has just so much room. The old TV took that whole top and I kept the MSN box on top.

So it took me all day, between watching the Redskins WIN and getting dinner to get this all hooked up. Boy is it nice. The screen that I see now is so much better. I guess because of the size. It is 19" my old one was 20" but square.

Also you see I need my own TV as I like to watch the baseball games and DH doesn't. In fact most of the time he has his muted. Says he can't understand most of it. Bad ears even with hearing aids.

Finally we - Kim and I have got this thing worked out with the pictures. I send to her and she uploads. From what I can find out, when they, Blogger, changed to let video's uploaded, it took our ability to upload pictures. I did find all my pictures I had put in and they disappeared. They are in the Picasa storage.

Thanks for visiting with me and for the comments.

Quilting project cont.

Here is the BOM from Joann's that I put together and my Husbands home health care nurse really like and wanted to buy a quilt. I said I would get it quilted for her. So this is my on going quilting project.


Kim was finally able to put these pictures into the text so I will publish this and delete the ones at the bottom of the whole list of posts.



This is a closeup of the border. Bishop's FAN. I am half way around. So another couple weeks and I should have this done.

My Ongoing project

Hopefully I have found how to upload to the text. Above is a picture of a BOM from Joann's which was given to me in all the packages including the finishing blocks and borders. It was fun putting together. I am not one to buy kits.

One thing I found was Joann's is really good. When I got down to getting the setting triangles into place, I was missing one large one. Found their website and emailed. Within a day I had an answer, Yes, they had one and would be mailing it right out. What a relief. This was a 2004 BOM.

During the time that I was piecing the blocks and putting them up on my design board, my DH was having home health care nursing twice a week and she seemed to really like watching it being made. Then one day she asked if I ever sold any quilts. she wanted one for her Queen size bed. During the next few days I looked to see if I had any that was big enough that I would get rid of. UGH Got to be careful as my DD is a little possive.

I measured this one and found if I added the 6 in. dark green border it would be big enough for a queen. Asked her if she would like it and her eyes lite up. Well, I also needed to get it quilted. So set aside the one I had been quilting and started. She wasn't in any hurry, But by winter. So I have taken a couple pictures of the quilting. Hope they show up. I am on the outside border. Have about 2 sides to go so in another month ought to finish.

Seems I'm not able to find the photos that I finally got upload. Where could they be? Is there a certain place I need to click to bring them where I can put them where I want?

So I am going to put them at the bottom where I had the first ones. So go clear to the bottom of the other posts and look if you want. Hopefully soon I'll get this figured out.

Argh!

As Eileen mentioned below, she's given me rights to her blog so I can upload some photos for her, but I don't seem to be able to edit her posts to add the photos--just create new ones. I think we'll have to do something different--any suggestions? I'll write to my buddy Marcie who helps her dad with his blog and find out what they do.

In the meantime, although Eileen has these photos posted at the very bottom of her blog, here are the two photos she referred to in today's post (9/5/07):

Pint Size Version of the Thimbleberries Club Quilt:



Cactus Flower (Thimbleberries Quilter's Garden):

Day Out

Today is my day out. I go to Curves and then my weekly hair appointment and any shopping I might want to do, or what my DH wants me to do. I had some Florescent lights to return to Wal-Mart, Then I had to stop at the grocery and pick up some things. Lowe's to return some gutter covers that we didn't use. Since it was the first of the month of
course I had to go to the Credit Union to take care of some business, Geeze, nothing for ME. Nope then to the Seafood Resturant to pick up some Soft Shell Crab. A favorite of DH. For those of you not from along the Cheaspeake Bay, The Blue Crabs at a certain season shed their shells and at that time they are call Soft shells and you eat the whole thing. He likes them fried and on toast. I'll take a crab cake any day.

Enough about that. I'm hoping to get Kim to put in a picture for me since I don't seem to be able to. I did find the place to give her permission to post here. Since she always seems to be talking about me I guess I can talk about her.

It's funny how we got to be such buddies. Yes, I'm old enough to be her Mother. We found out we had so much in common. Our Birthdays are a week apart. In July. We were asked to take charge of the swaps etc on the Hollow and it seemed everytime I posted something , she comes along and says almost the same thing. She had helped me immensely with working the Juki for quilting and if you can teach someone to do this through the internet she has done a terrific job of it. Course I still try to get her to try some hand quilting. After all if you can applique, why not hand quilt?

I want to show you what I am working on now. Hopefully she will be able to put a picture in for me. You will be able to see what I did with the Thimbleberries quilt for this year. I also did it half size or Pint as some say. But am still waiting for the final large floral print to use on the border. Half and half if it looks right.


When we get this going right I want to show the rest of the blocks that I have done for Quilter's Garden. The fourth one is Cactus Flower.


I have the sixth one cut out so will probably get it sewn up this evening.

This and That

Hopefully the picture I want will come here. We have an old stump in the yard that every year gets all this fungi growing. The picture i had put in yesterday went in the wrong place. I just have to learn about this.

I also uploaded yesterday block which is called Star Gazer, it ended up at the very bottom. I'm going to put in the third one will see where it ends up. Kim has been trying to help me but I can't seem to find the pages that she says where the things are.

This next block is called Bleeding Heart and I really like this one. Seems all I get is a pop-up which I think is MSN blockers. Can't take them off.

We are having the best weather. Cool 70's but going up. To bad everyone has to go back to work.

The Beginning of Fall

WOW, I couldn't believe that I got 17 comments on my very first post. But then when I saw what my dear friend Kim had written. I can see why. Thank You one and all. I probably have visited your blogs at one time or another.

Now I am having problems in getting pictures where I want them. I don't have a computer but MSNTV 2 and I can't do everything that the computer does, but try. I put at the bottom, which is the only place I seem to be able to upload too, other than the heading., A picture I took yesterday around a stump in the yard. Seems every fall we get quite a showing of fungi. This is just a small clump.

I wanted to also put in my next block but until I can get this figured out. Now I see the fungi picture has appeared up on the sidebar. That's where I want to put my picture. HELP.

You made me do it

Here I go, I've been all evening setting this up and have written this a couple times and it keeps disapearing. This time I think I might know enough to finish.

Wanted to show you the first block I have finished in the Quilter's Garden. Thimbleberries ,of course., I will be making these along with the gals doing the other BOM.

The first one is Bachelor Button