LibbyLu

 I have been wanting to talk about my granddaughter's first efforts at sewing. A little older than two years old and loving to go to the fabric stores as well as quilt shops made for an interesting and fun time with her. Above  you can see that she was already interested and willing to listen to Mimi, so she did not get hurt.

But let's get back to the quilt shop. I wanted to make a quilt with LibbyLu and she wanted to choose the fabric herself, arrange and rearrange the three inch squares every evening, test out the response of her dolls by placing the squares on the carpet and laying her dolls on top, only to get up the next morning and do it all again. 

Finally, it was decided and I put it together on the machine. About this time her mother weighed in with concern that there were six red squares touching each other and perhaps it would be nicer if the red could be scattered over the whole quilt. LibbyLu and I reminded her that this was her quilt and she had spent a long time coming to a final decision.  I stitched it together with her on my lap making sure I did everything right. Then as you can see in the above photos we tied the quilt together. It was a time I will always cherish. She is fourteen now and not interested in quilting but I think that will change. Perhaps she will make a quilt for her first child, or maybe she will quilt for the reason I do. Maybe she will do it for the shear joy of producing something beautiful. You know it doesn't matter what she does for her heart as long as she does something. Have you made a quilt with a child? No? Oh you have to. Don't forget your boys. Many of them like this experience.

Aunty Green Alive and well

 The photo above is part of the bottom row below the large center block. I continue to be surprised at the variety of fabrics as well as design. This lady was a girl after my own heart as I just love to use as many fabrics as possible in my own work. The above circles use a fabric that looks a little the original so pleases me.

 This corner block uses both vintage look fabrics as well as a contemporary look used to make those interesting flowers. I like it. I cut the flowers with a seam allowance and used the fabric to turn under rather than drawing a pencil line. Cool!

 I suspect that you already know that I have been using a lot of flowered fabric to construct a look of floral bouquets. What you may not have picked up on is that I have used the same template over and over. The lines in the fabric have a kind of fool the eye appearance. I do love this technique and plan to use it again!

 The original quilt uses a fair amount of a broiderie Perse' look in the applique. I confess I have had a lot of trouble finding this fabric. The red flowers above have been cut from a nice cotton print with little hint of the chintzes we would ordinarily used. I am pleased however with the substitute and will probably use it again.

Okay, I have the center medallion framed and now two sides and a corner. For a couple of weeks I will be setting it aside to work on my "Baltimore On the Prairie" project for 2013 in Omaha, Nebraska. Are you going? Have you been? Oh please, treat yourself. With Tresa Jones as coordinator,
teachers: Nancy Kerns, Jeanne Sullivan and Rita Verroca, award winners all, not to mention myself, I can promise you a wonderful adventure. There is always a fabulous trip to the International Quilt Study center in Lincoln. How can you possibly stay away. I would love to see friends and love to make new ones. I hope to see you and please come introduce yourself and tell me you found out about this here! I can hardly wait for this year in September and am so honored to be asked back for next year. Thank you so much for coming by. I know my personal life gets in the way of my posting on a regular basis and some of you may give up on me. Please believe I treasure your interest and right back at you. I do look at your blogs. You are so talented. I hope to see you soon, Nadine

A really nice find

I have been away for awhile but should be able to share some more of my work on the Aunty Green quilt later this next week. I have no idea where the time goes. In any case I did make a really nice find recently at a local antique shop in my city. I purchased my first Singer featherweight sewing machine more than twenty five years ago. Over the years I found another and inherited one from my husbands aunt Bea. She bought it brand new and it was the only sewing machine she used. That one I passed to my daughter because she was a blood relative and because I wanted her to experience the ease of using a sewing machine that has little or no problems over time.

So, when I found another Featherweight I was delighted. I bought it, took it home and cleaned and oiled all the right places and sat down to sew. Works just beautifully. It was born in the forties. As far as I can tell the only part not original to this machine is the foot pedal and that is just a later version.

Recently my daughter opened a shop on Etsy. There she sells beautiful pincushions and up to now I have been offering my album patterns. I have decided  to offer my new find at the shop. If you want to know more and have another look just click on the Etsy sign on the right side of my blog. I hope you like what you see. I know you will love this machine. No plastic parts!

I invite each of you to share a featherweight experience with me and other readers. More later.

Volunteers

 Don't you just love a volunteer. I know I do. I have done a lot of that in my life and know it is so important to have people working with you who are dependable. Now you may be wondering what the fellow up above has to do with volunteering? Well, every evening for the last two weeks he has come out to sit on the top of his nest box to keep an eye on me. I am thoroughly enamored of these beautiful Missouri blue birds. Up to now I have only caught a flash of sky blue, orange and white as these gorgeous creatures as they whisked through the air outside my sewing room. Now as an aside, and  before my daughter brings it up, I am planning to share my beautiful space very soon! In any case, I just checked and he is once again sitting on the bird house. A volunteer!

My favorite kind of volunteer however often occurs in my garden. The sweet little violets you see above started showing up five years ago. I never planted a single seed but expect that the birds brought them in. Perhaps the guy up above? In any case they arrive and I let them flourish just where they land.

 In this picture I think you can see that they have planted themselves in orderly fashion along the bricks edging a large raised flower bed. I could say they demonstrate a certain intelligence but really it comes down to availability of soil. Between each brick that very thing exists.

 Now the rest of the photographs are not volunteers, but simply some of my garden. I have little time for my flowers so treasure the ones that pretty much take care of themselves. When we moved from California to Missouri I had plans to at last have a serious rose garden. Thank goodness I did not get an early start!

 The second year here I had delivered a whole lot of river bottom soil as recommended by a wonderful neighbor. he was right, everything I planted thrived in that bed.

Unfortunately flowers were not the only things that thrived in my yard! I had a sweet yellow rose bush. One afternoon as I drove up my driveway, I paused to admire that rose. Imagine my horror when I saw a lot of iridescent bugs feasting on the pretty yellow petals. I had no idea what they were but was having none of it. My daughter drove up the driveway and got out of her car to see me picking those bugs off the plant, throwing them down on the driveway and stomping on them. Of course that was not an efficient way to dispose of the nasty creatures. I persevered for a couple of years and finally admitted defeat. I hired a service to help the day we filled two traps to the top with what I now know is the infamous Japanese beetles. I also gave up on vintage roses and now have only Knock out Roses. They are bothered some by the beetles but if they eat they die and the roses begin rejuvenating themselves by the next day. Really! Would I tell you anything but the truth? I have come to care for each and everyone of you.

I hope you are having a lovely spring/summer. By the way another volunteer that has not shown up this year is Cleome. I will leave you to look that one  up and if you cannot find one ask and I will post a photo. let me know what you think

Done

Well, to be honest I am of course not finished with the quilt but the center medallion is now almost complete. I say this because I have a little adjustment to make in the corners. The loops are too long. How did that happen? I have no idea. Fortunately, it will be a fairly easy fix. But. sigh, I hate it when that happens. I will muddle through because I will always see if I let it stand. I am excited in any case. progress is always a good thing. if this kind of thing has ever happened to you drop me a line and share. Please don't let me believe I am the only one!

Trying to Say the Right Thing

I have struggled for the last few days over something that happened over last week and the weekend following. The beautiful young lady above is my granddaughter, Libbylu. LibbyLu has been a cheerleader for approximately six years. her plan for a long time was to go to college on a cheer scholarship. At one time her goal was to be a cheerleader and a surgeon. These days I am not sure but after all she is only fourteen and has a lot of time and living to do before she has to decide.

I digress, so will get to the point. A week or so ago LibbyLu dislocated both hips during practice. A trip to the Dr, ex-rays, etc revealed that she has a congenital malformation of her hip sockets.
Last weekend was the seasons first competition in Kansas City. The problem was that LibbyLu had been grounded by her primary care doctor as well as the specialist from cheer as well as track. She was and remains devastated .

Now LibbyLu was up front and center so her being grounded from performing was problematic. There was disappointment on all sides, for our girl as well as the rest of the team.

What followed was unbelievable from my standpoint. Many of the parents were pretty angry at LibbyLu as well as her mother. Many wanted LibbyLu to go on. "Can't she just go on this one time?" What could it hurt?" One of the girls told her she was just faking and also said that most of the parents thought so too. The assistant coach saw Libbylu weeping and turned away.

Now this is my point. Would any of those parents risk their own child for a trophy? Gives one pause don't you think? Even if we could separate from the fact that this is a possibly life altering problem for our girl, just what is more important. A trophy or honor?

LibbyLu was there last weekend to support here friends because it was the right thing to do. Did she learn anything last weekend. Sure, it seems she now knows where the unkindness comes from. We all know that children learn their behavior from their parents.

As an aside I would like to tell you that my daughter Kelly posted her own story this morning. A couple of cheer parents saw it and there was Libbylu in the middle again. If you were one who commented just know Kelly pulled the post to protect LibbyLu. Bullying is against the law in MO. I will be looking into that.

Slowly and Perhaps not Surely!

It is probable I think that many of you have not seen anyone work as slowly as I have on this project. I seem to be running a Tortoise and Hare race and I think we all know which is me. I would like to say however that slow or not I love this quilt and believe the original artist was ahead of her time. I believe she gloried in the making. Slow I may be but I can hardly wait to ove on to the next corner and I suspect many of you are thinking finaly! Me too, actually.


I thought I would share a close up because I want you to see some of my strategy up close. From the beginning I was intent on including some broiderie Perse work in this quilt. I so thoroughly enjoyed the roses in the center bouquet I intend to use the technique wherever appropriate. In addition, I would like to point out that the small flowers on the left have blue ultra suede centers.
Also I confess that the tiny flower in between the two blue flowers at the top also has ultra suede. The leaves are teeny tiny and I decided I would rather use the ultra suede that be unable to make that particular flower perfect because of the small size. Finally, don't you just love those blue flowers? Broidery Perse again. I cut the roses from fabric taking care to leave a quarter inch all around. I turned under one eighth leaving a nice eighth inch to frame the flower.

Please remember to share something you are working on. For me show and tell has always been more fun that anything else. Happy quilting.