Special days and colorwash....

Do you like colorwash designs? It is not as popular a techique these days, as it was a few years ago. Recently, I had a friend say that she didn't enjoy creating colorwash and was not going to make anything ever again that required using two inch squares. I quite enjoyed this technique once I got the hang of it. At first, I had lots of trouble sorting values of fabric, which is the real trick to making a great colorwash. This particular pattern was also made easier, by using a fusible grid to lay out the squares, prior to sewing. The pieces stuck on the grid but were moveable prior to heat pressing them in place. This Colorwash quilt was made for my grandmother to celebrate her 85th birthday. The central medallion block has 30 X40 2 inch squares. The quilt resides in my home these days, as my grandmother passed away in the fall of 2003. Sometimes I wrap myself in it, when I want to feel close to her again. She loved the quilt just like she loved us all- all encompassing and unconditionally.

You may have noticed that Mars the cat likes to test out my quilts- She was not at all interested in the cat mats, that I posted about last post. We were quite surprised by that, as she is often the tester of all my quilts. Here she is on Elizabeth's quilt, before I finished binding it. Notice the perfect donut shape Mars made and how neatly she fits in the circle areas! This quilt for Elizabeth is now complete- including the label which I put on this afternoon.

Winter has arrived here in Alberta- Last week was very cold and we had indoor recesses for the whole week. The temperatures dropped and the wind came up - when those two combine, it means long days for everyone at school. We play lots of movement games, dance and use the smartboard to keep us busy during our break times. I was glad to see the mercury rise today and am hopeful that my kids can get outside to play.
This morning, Bruce saw this hare hopping about in our backyard. He is a big fellow and often likes to reside under our deck in the backyard. He is pretty hard to see but you can find him right under the post that is close to the bottom of the antennae. We live fairly close to a ravine and the river valley and often see hares hopping about the neighbourhood. There coats change with the season- white in winter and brown in summer. Mother Nature has some amazing tricks for helping keep animals safe from their predators.

When I was digging around in the scraps upstairs, I found these little treasures. Here is the first thing that I ever remember sewing, besides a half apron which I also still own. I made the kangaroo stuffed toy in Grade 7. One day when I was looking in some old patterns in a second hand place,I found this pattern and had to buy it. I doubt I will ever make the toy again but it was nice to have the pattern as a keepsake. I have no idea where the toy is - long gone for sure. The other patterns are some embroidery patterns that my mother liked to make, when I was a kid. She did beautiful hand embroidery and taught me a number of stitches like French knots and lazy daisy, as well as the necessary running stitch. I haven't embroidered for a long time but you do see lots of beautiful stitcheries in quilts these days. Perhaps I will do some embroidery yet. Hmmmm... The last pattern is my tree pattern that I started before Christmas, which I had misplaced. It is now with the rest of the quilt bits so I can continue when I get a chance.
When I was at my parents, I turned these two beads into pendants that now can be worn. I love the colors that the artist used to make them. I have left my camera at school, so I can't show you the finished project- Sometime soon, I will try and take a photograph of them. Beads are such a fun distraction when I don't have a lot of time to play. Quilting takes a block of dedicated time before you have finished product. Beading is a great alternative to feed my creative juices when I have less time and feel the need to make something.

Here is a link to an earlier post that I wrote about my beloved Gran I think of her often and miss her presence in my life. Just recently, one of the other bloggers posted about pink cake- I stayed with my grandparents many summers on their farm. While I was there, we regularly took food to my grandfather, who was working in the fields. My Gran was a fabulous cook who could make something delicious out of a few basic ingredients. One thing she often made was white cake with pink icing decorated with coconut. It looked so pretty and tasted pretty good too. Whenever I see pink cake I automatically think of Gran and her cake. Today would have been her 95th birthday...



Last evening,I was out to a Lunar New Year dinner. It was a fun evening that was a fundraiser for a local service group, the Rotarians. The money raised, was going to help women who were in need of a safe living place. For dinner there were 10 dishes. All were delicious with some interesting ones like shrimp with peaches, and a three seafood dish. They also had ginger beef and singapore noodles. Part of the event was a silent auction as well as a live auction. I did bid on a few items but was not the winning bid for any of the items this time. I went with some ladies from my school staff, great fun was had by all. Some of our students created some dragon pieces to be auctioned at this event. This lunar New Year is the Year of the Dragon. The Rotarians awarded some individual prizes to the various school students, as well as a donation to the participating schools. Their generosity is much appreciated.

Tomorrow we have a niece( she turns 30) and a nephew(turns 20) celebrate birthdays. Happy Birthday to both of them. How is it that I am old enough to have nieces and nephews that are in their early thirties... Yikes time does indeed fly by.. Next weekend we will go to our great niece's baptism.. January is full of special days it seems...

I have been having some trouble commenting on some blogs and finding that somewhat frustrating- not quite sure what blogger is doing or how to solve it. Does anyone have any idea what to do? In most cases I can get to the blog and read the post- I just can't leave a comment on their post... the screen is just white All suggestions gratefully appreciated..

Time for me to go and get finished some cutting for my new quilt project. I have had most of the quilt cut for a couple of months now and this project has risen to the top of my pile..Perhaps next time I will have begun to sew some of the pieces together...
Wishing you joy,
Regards,
Anna

A New Year - Wishing you Joy......

I have been meaning to write a new post all during the Christmas vacation. I can hardly believe that I have been back to work for almost a full week without a post written. The Christmas break was quiet but full. One of the surprises of this winter is that our winter, so far, has been mild(warm temperatures have set new records on a couple of occasions) and we have very little snow especially for January. We recently returned from a trip to my parents who live in Red Deer(100 miles south). This is a photo of the local community gold course. As you can see there really isn't much snow! The golf course is down in the river valley and the skyline is some highrise apartments that over look the river valley.
One of my favorite quilters is Ruth McDowell who I had the privilege of seeing a number of years ago in Calgary. She recently offered this book " Art and Inspirations" on her website for a very reasonable price, so I put it on my Christmas list of books. I was very happy when it showed up in yesterday's mail. I believe that it is out of print except from Ruth, and I am thrilled to own my own copy. Do you have quilter's that make you want to explore new techniques? get quilting? start a new project? What are your favorite quilt books? There are so many wonderful quilters that are inspiring. My favorites include Jinny Beyer,Paula Nadelstern, Carrie Nelson of Schnibbles patterns, Kaffe Fassett and Ricky Tims. There are many other talented quilters out there. Who inspires you?

You may recall that our son Kevin, and his girl, Roseanne moved to Charlottetown,PEI over the summer. As travelling across Canada is quite expensive (especially during the Christmas holidays) they were not able to be with us during the holiday season. On Christmas Day,we enjoyed some face time with Kevin on my husband's I phone, which was a particular hit with my parents. It can be quite mind boggling to see the technology at work. Kevin was able to assist my mother with a computer problem from 4000 miles away in the blink of an eye- but I digress.. During the holidays, Kevin built a cat tree for their cats, Freddy, Lucy and Lily. They sent me some fleece, batting and measurements and asked me to make some cat mats for the cat tree. You can see that Dusty approved of them. She reminded me of the Princess of Princess and the pea fame laying on top of the five mats. I wonder if his cats will be as fond of them?
You can see that Dusty leads a hard dog's life in our house! My dear friend, Lou made me some beautiful quilted things for Christmas. She gave us this pair of navy batik pillowcases that are perfect for our bed. Don't they match our quilt perfectly? The quilt pattern is a feathered star that I made many years ago now- Each block had 150 pieces in it. I altered the design so that it became a medallion quilt with a chain border. It seemed easier at the time LOL...

Lou also made me this fabulous thread catcher with a sunflower pincushion. She has been exploring free motion quilting and did a wonderful design on the bag in variegated thread.

Right before the break, I took this quilt for Elizabeth to school to spray baste. Once the holiday festivities were over, I had a number of days to play and visit with friends. During the vacation, I was a home body most of the time, and had some dedicated quilting time. In the close up, you can see that I made some spiral flowers in her quilt blocks.
I still need to bind the quilt but I am pleased with the way that it quilted up. I took it to my folks to show them my latest quilting project. Hopefully, it will get finished this weekend so that E can enjoy snuggling with it. It is a good double sized quilt in size.
A while back a local quilter was looking to trade some fabric so I ventured up into my scrap bin to find some things for Michelle. I have been quilting for quite awhile now( fairly steadily since 1996) and the scrap bin often gets over run with bits from various projects. I periodically play in those bags, and cut up strips for scrap quilt projects. but somehow the bags take on a life of their own... They remind of Strega Nona's pasta bowl that continues making more and more pasta until there is pasta everywhere
Michelle and I spent a lovely afternoon with her two little girls at Tim Hortons. Nothing more Canadian than going to Tims for coffee or tea and donuts.. The little girls were wonderful and it is always great to get together with another quilter. I hope that Michelle and I will get a chance to meet again. Do check out her blog and see some of the things that she is busy creating... You can find Michelle'sblog here.

While I have not been commenting on many blogs lately, as the New Year arrived I was reading posts about words that would describe your hopes for this New year. I found this little quilt like Christmas card and loved it. The word Joy is a word that resonated with me. Living life with Joy, and finding joy in daily life, seems to me a great way to live.

Life can sometimes be very challenging. Recently, some dear friends both near and far, have been struggling to cope with the loss of loved ones. It is hard to find ways to live with joy during those difficult days. While there is no way to take away the pain of the loss of a loved one, my wish is that there will be things in one's daily life that can be a day brightener. To me, that is what living life with joy is about- finding the little things that helps to lift one's spirit even if only for a brief time. As we begin this New Year, may you find things that help celebrate the day.
Warmest regards,
Anna

Dear Santa

Dear Santa,
You know that I have tried to be a pretty good girl this year. I know that I should have written my Christmas list before this but somehow December has flown by and I haven't got around to thinking about anything that should go on the list. Well maybe one thing that I am dreaming about...
My friend Carolyn and I visited a local sewing shop a couple of weeks ago and I got to drive a Handi Sweet Sixteen quilting machine.. Oh my my.... if you were a little richer Santa, I would be adding this cool machine with the drop leaf table to the top of the list. It was one sweet machine to work on with a table set at the right height and the needle facing directly in front on me... I don't think it would fit under my little tree(shown in the photo here) I guess I will have to keep on dreaming about it...( In truth, I don't have anything on my Christmas list.. I feel fortunate to have so much when others are struggling to meet their daily needs.)
One of the things I did this past week was to take E.'s quilt to school to spray baste it. It sure makes it easier to quilt without having pins every few inches..

We had our Christmas concert on Wednesday. One of the students wore this beautiful medallion necklace- Just look at that great design - all those seed beads to wire into place...It was a very beautiful to look at and would have taken a long time to make....
A friend gave me this gorgeous Christmas poinsettia. I love Poinsettias because they were my wedding flowers. It is my husband and my wedding anniversary on Boxing Day(it is sort of a holiday here in Canada) I had silk poinsettias in my bouquet and we had poinsettias and white mums on our tables.
I think I mentioned in my last post that I would celebrate a birthday in a couple of days after the writing. I received this lovely wordle in a frame. It says such kind things about me - I was really touched by her gift.
A couple of friends had babies so I managed to get the binding on these two baby wraps. I loved the wild jungle print of the first one.
The second one was such a sweet looking fabric- I loved the pale green and with the pink minkee inside.
For most of this month we have had poinsettias sitting on our table. Can you see the beautiful Riley Blake jelly roll here in the photo. I won it from Kiera of Its sew Kiki..It is a pretty jelly roll and I am sure it will make something beautiful. Thank you so much Keira!
It has been a bit of struggle getting into the Christmas spirit this year but I did get this cute little handmade felted reindeer- He has such a handsome face and I love his ivy harness too
One of the things I have put up every year is our Christmas village. It is old fashioned looking, with houses of day's gone by, a church, some local stores and even a bus and a car stuck in the snow. It is quite pretty all lit up!

Today was the last day of school before the break. We made some Christmas decorations and had a popcorn and movie party in the afternoon. This past week was a busy one at school with many Christmas concert rehearsal and the busyness that comes with the final days before the break. My students were so excited when Santa came to visit. we have enjoyed lots of special events that deviated from the regular routine so it will be nice to return to the regular schedule in January.
I am not much of a baker- my mom and sister are much better bakers than I. I had not done any baking, so this evening I made a couple of squares and made some nuts and bolts. I will make a ham spread dip and one more square tomorrow before we head to our family gathering.
We will go to visit my parents and take some treats to share.. I still have some wrapping to do ... Christmas has kind of snuck up on us...
Wishing you and yours a wonderful festive season. Take time to enjoy the colors and sights of the season.
Warmest regards,
Anna

A Season of Birthdays...

This weekend I have spent relaxing after a busy few weeks of writing report cards. They are now completed and in the hands of my principal, who also has read them. In between writing, I have tried to get a little quilting and blog reading done, not to mention playing that crazy game "Farmville" on Facebook.
I am not sure why I spend so much time trying to create a fake farm, but there it is...I know that it makes my mother laugh to see me farming my farm...
We all have things that we do that we find amusing/distracting or, are our so called" guilty pleasures". When I get up in the morning, I listen to a local radio station called CKUA . The early morning show is called "Rise and Shine" and is hosted by my favorite radio voice. Her name is Alison Brock. She asks people to send in request songs that she calls " Guilty pleasures".. The other morning she played "Walking on Sunshine" by Katrina and the Waves. Do you have some guilty pleasure song that takes you away from your day to day life? one that makes you smile? or one that you want to get up and dance? I digress...
My sister in law, Margaret celebrated a birthday today- She has a few quilts that I have created for her and her husband. Here she is holding her " Trip around the World" quilt that resides in her summer home in Newfoundland. The one on the table is a mate to my sister in laws quilt.. It belongs to a friend of mine that lives in Manitoba.. Have you ever created more than one version of a quilt when you make a pattern? I could not decide on the color combinations so I made two..
I have enjoyed playing with the Ricky Tims convergence pattern. Last fall my sister in law and her husband celebrated a special anniversary so I thought they would enjoy this quilt...
My favorite of her quilts is from my quilt photograph vaults. This one is one that I called "the Secret Garden".
" The Secret Garden" by Frances Hodgson Burnett was one of my very favorite books as a child. I made this quilt for Margaret around 2003. She is a distinquished professor in the library school at the University of Alberta. I knew I had to make her this quilt. The pattern came from the Australian Patchwork and Quilting magazine in the early 2000's.

This past week,our god daughter Elizabeth celebrated her 16th birthday. I really wanted to finish this 10 minute block quilt for her, but so far have only managed to get her top done. I still need to decide whether I will add some fancy quilting with variegated thread in the big spaces. The blocks are large (20 inch) in measurement so I am thinking they may need more intricate quilting... Hopefully over Christmas vacation I will get it quilted... I used two layer cakes (24 pieces each) from Connecting Threads for the blocks.
From a distance, it is hard to see the multicolored background on the black batik. I love batiks and I will have used every last scrap of this one to make the binding for this quilt. I am not sure what fabric I am going to put on the back of this quilt.

A friend of mine just celebrated a special number birthday. A few weeks ago when I went to the bead show, I found this lovely little thread bear. He is made of Thread Play on felt and was quite a handsome guy. Perhaps one day I will try making one myself. If only I could add more time to my day (and additional energy too)..

Yesterday I got some quilting done after my school work was completed- I finally added the borders to the tesselation quilt that has been hanging around all fall.
I finished this blanket wrap for a friend's nephew. There are so many bright and cheery fabrics to use for children and this one certainly fits that description..I love how soft the purple/blue minkee is on the inside. I hope that he will enjoy the bright colors while sleeping in the baby wrap.

Over the past 10 days there has been a wonderful Henry Glass blog Hop that shared some wonderful projects, as well some family traditions, recipes and information from the various designers who participated in the hop. While the hop is over- you still can access the projects as well as enter to win some fabulous prizes on the Henry Glass blog site. Check it out on this link for the Henry glass blog hop. You will need to collect all the special words from each post.
Victoria at Bumblebeans is giving a chance for a Baby Go.. I have been looking at that cool cutting tool for awhile now and trying to win one - I have been lucky a number of times these past few years so I can understand that it might not be my turn.. Whoever wins it, will love playing with the die cut designs. Victoria has a wonderful blog - do check it out..

Bruce and I had the opportunity to go out to the Art Gallery of Alberta. In the current exhibition, there are some lovely French landscapes that were painted prior to the Impressionist painters.
We also stopped in at a local pottery show on Saturday. There was some lovely Renaissance/Medieval music being played and some pretty pots to view. While I did not buy any pottery for our home, Bruce bought me a very handsome purse with flowers (an early birthday present as it is my birthday on Tuesday).
The weekend has been very pleasant - Time with loved ones, and time together, as well as time to quilt... Now if I could only get my laundry put away...
Have a great week - my week's projects- school paperwork, a haircut?, beading and perhaps quilting...Maybe I will bring out the Christmas village... Hmmmmmm...

To my American friends and family- a Very Happy Thanksgiving...
Warmest regards,
Anna

Amy's Fall Blogger Festival 2011

Each spring and fall, Amy of Amy creative side blog hosts a quilt festival to coincide with Quilt Market and the Houston International Quilt show. I have entered this festival a few times, because there are so many quilts to view and its fun to meet other quilters who inspire me to keep quilting.
This year, my fall quilt offerings are two Christmas ones that I made some years ago.I have also included the beginnings of a new Christmas quilt project. The first one is a paper pieced poinsettia pattern by Eileen B. O'Sullivan that I made around 2001. My wedding flowers were poinsettias when I married 30 years ago last December- it soon will be 31. We were married the day after Christmas, which we refer to as Boxing Day here in Canada. It was the first paper pieced project that I tackled and I still love it. The original pattern was meant as a wall hanging but I used the flower as a center of the quilt and bordered it out to be a nice sized couch quilt. I have since collected more poinsettia fabrics and one day I will make another Christmas quilt with them.

The second quilt that I wanted to share is double wedding ring quilt. I made it to honor my father's mother memory- her name was Olive and she was a quilter I am told. Unfortunately none of her work remains and I never knew her because she passed away before I was born. She was 43 years old. I chose the double wedding pattern because it was a traditional pattern that she might have made- though grandmother Olive's quilt would have been made with scraps and old clothing. My version was completed about 2003 and it does not have pieced rings like the original design.She would have traced her pieces on cardboard and cut it out with scissors. My center of the rings were not fussy cut. If I were to make one again with continuous rings, I would fussy cut the centers so that I could have had central flowers in them. It was one of the first template quilts I ever made- I used an acrylic template and a rotary cutter to cut the pieces.
Now, there is a wonderful machine called an Accuquilt Go Cutter. It has dies that would make the cutting of this quilt less challenging (and probably more accurate.) Perhaps one day I will own one of those machines...
I showed this wedding ring quilt in a local guild show a number of years ago. It is one of my smaller quilts - about a twin size and it graces our couch each Christmas.


This weekend I started a new Christmas quilt. On my last post I shared the pile of fabrics I collected to make my new quilt. On Thursday night I turned those piles of fabrics into 12X18 rectangles. The next step was to use Freezer paper and trace the design on to it. Once labeled, I then cut it into the various tree pieces. Yesterday, I shuffled the trees from one group to another set of 10 fabrics ( there are 10 red, 10green and 10 cream fabrics ) Once shuffled,one begins to sew them in the order given on the Pieces of the Heart pattern by Sandy Gervais.

The pattern's name is Tree's up- Lights on! When pieced together you end up with some wonky edges. I will later square up the blocks before putting them into a quilt. It will be awhile before this quilt gets completed as I have other projects to finish first. It was like making a jigsaw puzzle and one has to pay some attention to the shuffle order and the sewing sequence. It was fun and I will look forward to getting more of the blocks finished after I complete the fall school report cards and other school work.... One has to work in order to play you know...
If you like these kind of designs you can find more them by checking some of the Buggy Barn patterns as well as other designs by Sandy Gervais. The Buggy barn has a number of seasonal ones that include pumpkins, Santas and witches. Sandy has some fun hats and shoe patterns as well as other seasonal ones..

I hope that you enjoyed seeing my Christmas quilts. Click on the link and go and visit the other quilters who are participating in the blogging show. As always, there are some real beauties shown and some wonderful stories that go along with the quilts.

Thanks for dropping by- I hope you stop by for another visit..
Warmest regards,
Anna

A new project?

Fall is the season for Mums and this spider like Mum currently graces our dining room table. My husband returned from a weekend trip to Jasper and commented on how much it had opened while he was gone. This bunch of flowers is over a week old and still going strong.. Do you have a favorite cut flower for your table? Sunflowers are my favorite flowers but they do not last as long as some others like carnations, alstroemeria, and these very pretty mums.. I don't have any new quilts to show you just now, so I thought I would share one of my earlier creations.. This very bold black, red and white double Irish chain belongs to my parents. It dates back to 2000. My parents use it in their guest room and the colors are still just as rich. I call it my art version of this design because of the bold colors.

One of my projects today was to go upstairs to find some fabrics in my stash for a new quilt. I was looking for traditional Christmas colors(red, green and cream) While I was searching, I found this old crazy quilting Christmas stocking project. I had begun to do the embroidery and added the embellishments- if I get some time, perhaps, I will add a few stitches to it, now that I have unearthed it from the boxes upstairs. Why was I looking for these Christmas fabrics? You see,I am going to a quilting workshop this weekend where we are going to make a very funky tree pattern. I needed to find 30 fat quarters of fabric (or equivalent). As you can see there are some cream fabrics but not near as many as the red and the green fabrics.I have a tendency to buy color and not very much neutral fabric.. I was lucky that I bought the fat quarters with some browns or I might have had to go and buy creams for this project LOL
Here are plenty of Christmas reds- There is more red fabrics in the boxes upstairs but I brought down the fabrics that did not have big bold prints on them as I don't think they would work for this project. There is a red piece that has red scottie dogs that is quite old.
It was a bit of a challenge to find Christmas green.. Some of the pieces from the stash are very old(the scottie dogs I used to make a baby bunting bag for my new born baby son who will be 24 at Christmas). What is the oldest piece of fabric in your stash? Like the reds, there are other greens but some had busy prints, and others were on the yellow end of the spectrum. Now, all I have to do is press the 30 + fabrics and have them ready for Friday night.
While Bruce was gone to Jasper, Carolyn and I ventured out to another little craft sale. This time is was to a hand made lampwork bead show. I brought some pieces to add to the bead treasure chest but, most of them are for Christmas gifts so they will have to stay hidden for awhile longer. I did buy this very fun fairy pendant and a pair of earrings that I admired. I added the pandora style Halloween beads to a bracelet chain. My school kids are going to love Frank, the monster.

Recently, I asked Carolyn if she would like to attend a local guild meeting. I had not attended one for quite awhile, and thought it might be fun to go. I must have had on my lucky shoes or something because I came home with the guest prize that was provided by one of the local quilt stores. I also had the lucky ticket from the book draw. I was happy to share my winnings with Carolyn. She is a talented quilter who is quite interested in art type quilts. The book was more about techniques that would be used to make art quilts- besides sharing ones winnings is always fun.

And some very fun Halloween things that came from Carolyn. The buttons are very fun and I know my kindergarten kids will love them when I get them sewn on my Halloween vest.
I entered a giveaway contest quite awhile back that was hosted by Oz Jane. It is a lovely Australian quilt address book (the book is from Homespun magazine)and I had been thinking that I need to put some of my addresses in one spot, instead of in a bunch of different places. It is a lovely book,Oz Jane, Thank you.


Since I posted last, my beloved celebrated his birthday and we went to see a 3 D Peter Gabriel concert movie. It was very cool- you felt like you were sitting in the orchestra pit. If I reached out, the 3 D glasses made you feel like you could almost touch the people on the stage.
Last week, I managed to get the fall cold that my students had, and have been busy with school projects. The fall is flying by and it soon will be report card time. Bruce has been away some, with work related things so I have been keeping our home fires burning.
I am still working on finishing the cutting for my fall quilt. Most of my current projects are bits and pieces of things that, hopefully, one day will be quilts for some special people in our lives. It is always tricky for me to balance work and play- I spent time with good friends this weekend (time well spent) and did school work too. I am off to do some more school work before this evening is over. I am facing some work deadlines so my quilting projects will have to wait a bit longer...

I hope that wherever you live in blogland, that you are having some good times with family and friends and still getting some time to feed your creative spirit.

Warmest regards,
Anna