Just a drop in the (green) bucket

I started piecing my big green quilt, Emerald City. I work in what I call units, making them different sizes and shapes. When I dyed my fabrics for this I dyed seven different shades of green and six light to dark gradations of each shade. For this first unit I used the lightest and darkest of Lime Green.


I thought it would look better if I mixed the shades, so for this next one I used a bluish green with a yellowy green. I think it's much more interesting and will continue to mix and match from now on.



This one has Bright Green with Yellow Green windows.
The way I work is that I piece lots and lots of units and put them up on the design wall as I make then until I've filled up the space for the size quilt I want. Then I take them all down and try to fit them together like a puzzle. I have to make "filler" strips to make them fit. I may add very narrow strips of purple or orange or fuchsia to spice thing up, but that's a long way off.

This will be another of my Configuration quilts. I have a link in my last post or you can go to my website and see some in the Abstract gallery.

This and That

My Woman's Club Meeting was cancelled today because of more SNOW. This is getting monotonous. The schools are closed AGAIN and since we go by the school system's closing and delays, we're rescheduled for next Tuesday. The good thing is that it gives me a free day and I'm going to start on my green quilt. You may remember that I dyed 40 yards of green fabric a few weeks ago. I plan to make another city quilt in my configuration series, this time Emerald City.

You can see a small quilt of the series here and more on my website on the Abstract page.

I plan to make this one quite large and since it involves a lot of piecing and quilting, it will be awhile before it's done.

I finished my jacket yesterday. It is marginally improved by the top stitching and buttons, but I do not love it. I threw the pattern away, knowing that I would never use it again. Oh well, on to bigger and hopefully better things.

Aggravation!

Remind me not to make another jacket in the near future. Are you listening, Ruthie? This jacket has given me so much grief. First of all, working on this bargain fleece from Joanne's was no treat and then adding slithery velvet to the mix just made it worse.

Next was the sizing. If I buy a top or jacket in the store, I am almost always a size 8. But I went by the measurements on the back of the Simplicity pattern and made a 12 and it is still too small. The fronts are supposed to overlap and button. Not gonna happen, so I will just leave it open. I'm going to sew on the four buttons I bought, two on either side for a little trim. It still has to have topstitching all around the front and collar and I have to hem the sleeves.

My success for the day was the Oxtail Bourguignonne I made from a Bon Appetit recipe. It has taken all day, but I just snuck a taste and it is delicious, well worth the effort and I will eat it all week.

Wordless Wednesday

I'm still here

Just a little something to let you know that I'm still alive and well and working. This is going to be part of a cute little fleece jacket with embossed velvet collar and cuffs. I embossed the collar yesterday and just draped it on my dress form and it has inspired me to go on. I love this velvet! As you can see, it embosses to a wonderful silver color. The fleece is the burgundy color. Ignore the raggedy edges; it has to be sewn to the under collar. I'll post the jacket when it's done. Hopefully soon!

And again!

I showed this table and chair set on my deck in my last post covered with snow. That was last Friday. I went out yesterday and cleaned off all the white stuff from the table and chairs, but not the deck. According to the weather guy on TV we got an additional 24" last night. Now it's hard to see were the table begins.



View of the street from my front porch. The piles of shoveled snow are over my head.

View from my front door. We all got a recorded message at 6AM from our mayor saying that the city was closed and all unnecessary vehicles on the road would be ticketed until 12 noon.
Thankfully, it has stopped snowing and now the big clean up begins! I'm not going anywhere today. A good day to get in some studio time.

Again?!

It seems like we were just getting over the holiday blizzard when we got clobbered again yesterday. Not quite as bad as the day after Christmas, but we got about 12 inches, I think.

It was very pretty snow to look at from the comfort of my home. I had gone to a meeting in the morning and came home about 1PM in light snow. Within a half hour of my arrival, it was coming down fast and furious. I timed it just right.

This is one of those twirly things that look like the ball is going up and down when the wind blows. I love the way it looks when it's snow covered.

I spent yesterday and today undecorating from Christmas. Ugh! Not my favorite job. But now it is all put away and cleaned up and that's a good feeling.

Challenge #2

I had enough of that purple dotted fabric left from the challenge (see my last post) to make a second. I decided to go with the brightness of the fabric and play it up instead of down. The strips are pieced in and the circles are fused. The name came to me right away, "Shazam!", and like the first one it's 12" square. I think we can only submit one piece and I may like this one better. What do you think?

You can hardly see all the quilting I did in the background. I went around all those little circles with purple thread.