An Alberta Heat Wave.... There are lots of beautiful flowers blooming around the neighborhood- though its hard to keep them from drying out, in the heat wave that has hit the prairies. We are in the 30's C(90's F) which is pretty hot for here and it appears that the weather is to stay that way for the rest of the week. With the humidity, it feels like over 40 degrees C- very hot. We had a rolling power outage this afternoon - something that has never happened before. You realize how dependent one is on electricity. Every technological connection relies on power!!!! The Alstroemeria ..are looking pretty nice- they stay fresh for a nice long time as long as you change the water regularly..

I thought I might post a photo of the individual blocks in the lattice quilt. My blog friend Sio from Scraps and Thread tales posted a basket weave quilt that she had made, on her facebook page not long ago. It got me to thinking about the construction of the lattice quilt's individual blocks. Her quilt reminded me of the lattice quilts, but she pointed out a couple of differences- like she had 3 strips rather than two, and the weave was continual, whereas mine formed squares that intersect across the quilt.

Here is the second lattice quilt all quilted up- I am glad that I quilted it last week, instead of trying to quilt it in this heat wave. My quilting machine is upstairs in the gables of the house, so even with the overhead fans, it would be quite hot up there. It makes such a difference to a quilt when one gets the edges squared. This one has been squared now.

I finally got some of my spring bunnies put to bed, and decided to leave the buffet fairly plain. It has a Monet pattern on the tea set - the one with the red poppies in the fields. I love the Impressionists, and thought this set looked like summer. My mother gave me the lovely Battenburg lace runner to me a couple of years ago.. It has a wonderful elegance about it!

You have probably figured out that I don't do things in half measures- I have been busy knitting some more of the frilly scarves- They are so easy, and great fun to do, while I am watching a movie or a favorite TV show. Like all knitted things, the yarn makes the difference between them being more lacy, or having a thicker texture. They do have some gorgeous yarns out there to choose from with some stunning color combinations.

From the vaults: Not long ago, someone asked me when I started quilting, and how many quilts have I made? Do you know when you made your first quilts? What keeps you quilting? I don't actually know how many bed sized quilts that I have completed, but I am thinking that I am somewhere between 75 and 100 bed sized quilts. I tried quilting a few times - the first when I was a teenager before the time of rotary cutters and acrylic templates. I have one Dresden plate pillow block from that era. It didn't stick- The second time I tried quilting, I made a queen sized log cabin in a day quilt(Eleanor Burns pattern) in 1987. It took me over a year to get that quilt made- I used a double layer of polyester batting in it, because I wanted it to be warm LOL. In 1996, I moved to the school that I am currently working. I also took up quilting seriously. This sampler quilt was the result. I chose all the blocks from books like Quilts, Quilts by Diana McClun and Laura Nownes and Ruby McKim's 101 blocks. I took a beginning quilting course that summer from a lady named Pat, who happened to be a kindergarten teacher. Not just any kindergarten teacher either- She moved into my old classroom as the new kindergarten teacher, when I moved on to my new school. Talk about one of life's six degrees of separation!!!! The following summer, I finished this sampler quilt and met a mentor teacher named Linda. I have made quilts ever since. I have appreciated Linda's ongoing support and guidance over the years, especially when I would get stuck. Thank you, Linda for being a great mentor and friend. We all need other quilters who inspire us and teach us some of the techniques. I continue to be connected to a group of ladies that love to make quilts. I don't know how many I will actually get completed this summer, but I hope to get 3 made- we shall see.. It will depend on how long this heat wave lasts...

In the next couple of weeks, our two good friends will celebrate a special birthday- This quilt was made for them a couple of years ago. We just wanted to wish Happy Birthday To Valerie and Alister. We hope that you enjoy some great times with loved ones to mark your special birthdays. You are most treasured friends!

Darlene is a quilting friend from the Connecting Threads quilt forum. She decided that she would like to try her hand at blogging. She is off to a grand start- Do go and visit her- perhaps leave a comment. It is always nice to meet bloggers from different parts of the globe. Darlene comes from a farming community in the province that we both call home. Jane has a master schedule for a Red White and Blue blog hop that is going on right now. On some of the posts, there are giveaways and on all of them, there are some fabulous blocks/projects to view. I have seen a reference or two, to a Think Christmas blog hop, that is going to start soon too. One of the things I love best about the blog hops, is that I get to meet some new to me bloggers. They, too, provide some new ideas that act as inspiration for me... Enjoy your summer days if you are living in the Northern Hemisphere. Stay warm, if you are living in the lands down Under. Warmest regards, Anna

The Colors of Spring...

Don't you love color? I recently received this box of yarn that I had ordered from Herrschenner's in the post. I loved looking at all the beautiful color combinations.I plan to knit them all into scarves to give away as gifts. They are fun and quick to knit. It is astonishing to me that the lacy ribbon yarn turns into this twisted frilly looking scarves. I wonder how someone could figure out something so clever!

I have finally got the blocks of the two lattice quilts together. The one shown here has 12 blocks in it. The second one is larger and both of them will be gifts for someone special. The second one has 20 blocks and both need stop borders and larger borders.

Here are a couple of border possibilities. I like the lattice look of the plainer brown but can't decide if it is too flat looking. I am leaning to use the red as a stop border but I do have other choices: like this gold that is sparkly, or a bright yellow, or deep green. It is sometimes hard to balance the central body of the quilt with the borders. I want the borders to hold the body of the quilt without overpowering it. I am still pondering...

Last weekend I finished up these baby wraps. The top photo shows what it looks like when the clover leaf wrap is opened flat. The wrap works great in car seats and strollers.

I love the fun fabrics you can find these days to use to make baby things. The inside of the wraps is minkee, terry or stretch velour. Minkee is my first choice but I only buy it when its on sale as it costs about 25 dollars a meter.

Here is my current scarf- I am not sure that I am going to give this one away. I love the purple and blue combination of yarns- If you could create a yarn what colors would you like to put together- I find these ones so soothing....

From the vaults: To Celebrate Mothers It soon will be Mother's Day. My mother and father have a few of my quilts but I wanted to share a quilt that I made for my Mother in Law Betty. Betty (aka as Mum) has been part of my life since 1979, when my husband and I began our life together. She was always warm and loving, and a woman of many talents. She enjoyed baking bread and doing crossword puzzles. She could play a great game of scrabble. I remember one winter that she took an English class at university, because is was something that she always wanted to do, and achieved the highest mark possible. She built a loving home for her 5 children and was welcoming to all who passed through their door. We spent many happy weekends sharing meals, watching shows on television, going to the occasional movie and concert, and listening to classical music. After my father in law had a stroke, it was harder for him to get around and they retired to the West Coast. We missed their presence in our lives, as their new home was 1000 miles away from where we live. As she got older, Betty found it more difficult to remember things. As time passed, it became apparent that she was experiencing serious memory loss. It was later determined that she had developed Alzheimer's, and could no longer manage independently. I wanted to make her a quilt that would brighten her room and so I created this medallion quilt. My husband took it to her in the fall of 2007.She loved soft colors, and I thought that she would enjoy this butter yellow colored medallion quilt with the matching border.

This is a doll sized version made to match her quilt. Don't you love the prairie points on it? I know that the babies look sweet all wrapped up in the coverlet.

Spring has indeed arrived here in Alberta. Things are beginning to green up and my forget me nots are blooming. I will soon have daffodils and tulips showing their beautiful faces in the front flower beds. Until next time,be well. Warmest regards, Anna

Some Spring Surprises....

Pink Carnations are such happy flowers and they are the current arrangement on our dining room table. These ones are such a rich pink color.
 One of the things that I love about carnations is that they will stay fresh for a couple of weeks before they need to be changed.

 Recently I managed to get rid of all the vestiges of winter in our house. I took out the bunnies and the other Easter things. I found this lovely antique bowl- not sure where I got it from but I thought it would look lovely with the Easter eggs in it.  Did you notice the black one with the hand painting on it. It is a Ukrainian Easter Egg. We live in the North Central part of Alberta. There were many Ukrainian immigrants that came to this area at the turn of the 20th century. There is a very large land mark Easter Egg in Vegreville. It is quite the landmark - Google it if you are curious to see what it looks like!

My sewing room is looking messy and somewhat forlorn these days. School kept me busy for most of the month of March. I have finished up all the reports and met with my families last week. Hopefully this week, as I am on spring break from school, I will get a chance to get back sewing and working on some quilts.
This machine is my quilting machine. It is a baby lock quilting machine which is quite similar to a Juki. It goes very fast (1100 stitches per minute) and is really easy to quilt on.
I don't piece on it - just machine quilt. My sewing room is in the gables of the house.

As well as having a busy time at school, we had a wonderful surprise visit from our son, Kevin and his girl, Roseanne. He is going to school in Charlottetown PEI . They moved to Prince Edward Island at the beginning of August. PEI is about 4000 miles from us. Kevin was on mid term break so they thought they would surprise us. We were gob smacked when our front door opened and we heard Kevin's voice and footsteps at midnight. They were here for nine days and it was a blur of activities and times out together. He also took a. side trip to visit my parents in Red Deer, who were thrilled to see them both too. We enjoyed having them here and look forward to the next time they can return. 

One of the things that we did while they were here visiting, was go out for a very nice brunch with my sister in law, her husband , their two daughters and their spouses,and the lovely baby, Annabelle, who will soon turn one
. I took this lovely candid of the two of them, in the restaurant. While they were here visiting, they announced their engagement.

What a lovely ring he chose to express his love for her. I love this photograph of their hands together. His large hands remind me of all the men from my mother's family- We hope that they will be very happy together for many years to come. The wedding date is yet to be determined.

 

A photo of the four of us together. I am the shortest one and I am not that short,( 5'5') but compared to the rest I am a little low to the ground. LOL

One of the things that Kevin brought in his suitcase was this new cat house/tree. He designed and built it and then took it apart and put it back together when he got here.  Mars heartily approves of her new perch. My husband has since, bought her a basket for the top, that she can often be found sleeping in, during the day. The morning sun streams in the window and she can observe the birds and squirrels from the large living room window. You can see that she has a food bowl inside the enclosure. She can climb inside to  get to, but our dog, Dusty, can not.
Mars can not jump as well as she used to, so this is a great arrangement for her. Now if she could just convince Bruce that she does not want any other kind of food but regular Whiskas- everything would be perfect in her eyes. They are having Whiskas wars- so far, my money is on Mars. She managed to leave the designer cat food in the bowl and eat all the Whiskas food  bits without even leaving drool on the designer cat food. She definitely has her own preferences!

 I have finally decided to make one larger one of the lattice quilts and one throw size quilt. I have enough fabric to make 9 more blocks and that will be enough to make one 4X5 and the other 3X4. I am still hunting for the perfect border but I am sure I will find something that will work. I know that it looks black in the photograph but it really is a deep chocolate brown. I have been trying to get started on it this week, while I am on break, but so far I keep getting distracted by other things. I have managed to do some cleaning and get rid of old papers and clutter in one room. I still would like to tackle my clothes closet but we shall see. One of the joys/ challenges of living in a small old war time house is that the closet and storage space is really limited. I drool when I see those houses with walk in storage- I don't even have a broom or linen closet!

 As there is not much quilty content in this post,  I thought I would pull a quilt from the vaults. I made this quilt about 5 years ago. This quilt belongs to Gary who loves the sea. If you look closely at the prints you will see that all the fabrics are nautical in theme. It is a variation of yellow brick road with an asymmetrical mariner's compass on it. He recently celebrated a birthday so I thought it might be a nice one to share. I designed the layout and the compass block is paper pieced from a Carol Doak pattern.

I am still trying to figure out how this new layout and posting works with Google Chrome. I have moved the pictures around as  I type and am not sure where they are going to end up.

 Last weekend I went out to find a few things for school and I found this Starbuck's cup for Bruce. It was in a second hand shop and was the perfect sized cup for him. Now if it only came with a lid. Drinks and computers can be a bit of a hazard ....

It is very late here so I will say good night. I hope that life is treating everyone well and that spring has sprung in your neck of the woods ( if you live in the Northern Hemisphere) .We have had a couple of spring snow storms but the snow is starting to melt off again and it won't be long before there are lots of mud puddles for the little ones to play in - I can only hope that the school fields are dry, before we return to school next week.
Warmest regards,
Anna

Flora and a Quilt Workshop...

If you have visited my blog before, you are probably aware that I love flowers. Presently in our home, we have a few kinds of flora blooming. These beautiful pink lilies are from Valentine's Day. They are stargazer lilies, and have some pretty babies breath with them(The babies breath has stayed reasonably well, considering Mars the cat's, penchant desire to eat it. She also used to like to eat any dried flower bouquet that she found in her travels around the house! Aren't the lilies pretty? The Christmas poinsettia does not seem to know that her season is over- she still looks gorgeous. I love the pretty pinky- red edges to her leaves..
And not to be left out, the Christmas cacti in our kitchen window continues to be covered with buds and blossoms. The flowers are fantastic- this photo does not do their rich color justice!
Below are some of the lovely things that were on the table waiting for me, on Valentine's Day. Bruce and I had a wonderful dinner at a local Cajun House. The food was yummy and the company divine. One thing that he found for me was a new issue of the quilt magazine, The Quilt Almanac. It has some terrific patterns in it. A couple of them piqued my interest.

I have been looking for a new quilt pattern to use with a coffee cake of batik fabrics. ( A coffee cake is just like a jelly roll -2 and a half inch strips only in comes in a box.) Don't you wonder who came up with all these different names for the precut fabrics? ( jelly roll, honey buns, layer cakes, turnovers, etc) I rarely buy precuts, but I really liked the colors of the batik coffee cake, they were a great price and I thought they would make a great quilt for someone. It will, if I ever find a pattern that I like, to go with the fabric. One of the reasons I think that I have struggled with it, is because I usually choose the pattern first, and then, find the fabrics to go with the pattern. Reversing this process of fabric before having the pattern, has really mixed me up.... So I am still looking... What about you- what do you choose first - the pattern or the fabrics?
Mars loves quilts but it appears she also liked the Raggedy Ann and Andy dolls. Perhaps she just wanted to lay on Elizabeth's quilt one more time?
I was so happy to have finished Elizabeth's quilt and was able to give it to her before spring time. I hope she will enjoy it for many years and know she is wrapping herself in a loving hug. To me, quilts are like wrapping the people we love in the warmth of a big hug.
Last week, a dear friend and colleague, Peggy celebrated a special birthday. She is a special lady and my classroom partner. We are so fortunate to have her at our school and I celebrate the many gifts she brings to us all. Happy birthday, Peg!
I thought it must be time to show you something new- This is my new project- it is a lattice scrap quilt that I started in the fall and then ran into some cutting issues (or so I thought) I am left handed and sometimes,I find using the angles on the ruler a challenge. When I laid the first pieces of the this block together, I was sure that I had really done a poor job of cutting. This past weekend I went to a quilting workshop, and got some assistance from my friend and mentor Linda. She had me sorted out in less than 10 minutes. Before I knew it, I was off sewing happily for the weekend. The net result was 25 blocks. I am still toying with my layout choices. I don't know whether to make one big quilt or make two quilts - one bigger and one twin. There is a hitch- not enough fabric for borders if I make more blocks. I am not finding it easy to find something to put on the outside of the blocks that will not take away from the central design.. Decisions , decisions... While I was busy making blocks, some of my other quilty friends were making some wonderful pieces...Wendy is going on a trip to China soon. She went looking for a travelling bag and couldn't find what she wanted, so she came home and created this lovely piece. The fabrics are gorgeous and its a great design... Have a great time in China, Wendy!
Here is one of the quilts that was worked on at the workshop. I love the colors that she chose- its a limited palette and the quilt turned out beautifully.
Linda worked on some blocks for a new quilt- she used every shade of green imaginable and they all looked great together..
One of my quilty friends found this very fun piece in a local thrift shop for the princely price of 3 dollars. It is such a funky design - Someone created such great liberated trees ...


Spring has yet to appear - the groundhog did warn that there could be 6 more weeks of winter, in some parts of the country. It has snowed the last couple of days, but the temperatures have been so mild, so it is melting off quickly.
Work is about to get even busier. This week, I am busy with some assessments with my students, after which, I need to complete the second term report cards. Next week's agenda includes our annual teacher's convention. The convention is always a great time: a chance to see old friends, attend some good sessions and to play in the shopping area.

Recently Bruce and I went to see the Titanic exhibit at the Telus world of Science. The exhibit had crockery and items that they had brought up from the sea floor off the Titanic. In April it will be the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the ship. We all got to pretend to be passengers on the ship and were given a passenger's ticket- I was one of the fortunate ones. My passenger's ticket was a baby that ended up being the last living survivor. Bruce's boat passenger's ticket was not so fortunate, and did not survive the boat's disaster.. We also saw the Imax film Titanica which showed them retrieving the items from the ocean floor. It was a fun way to spend a Sunday afternoon!

There are new giveaways on the blogs and lots of interesting posts to read. However, for the next couple of weeks, I have to focus on my work- I will stop by when I get the chance. I appreciate the comments that people do leave- please check and make sure that you leave a return address so it is possible to reply to any questions or comments. No reply blogger will send a response into the internet ether so you may need to adjust your settings.

Take care of yourselves until we cross paths again.
Warmest regards,
Anna