Quilters With Heart!

This morning I woke up to an email from Julia, the subject line stating “Scrappy Nut Here!!”

I wasn’t sure if she was referring to me or herself, but just the title made me smile and I quickly sat down with my tea to read what she had so sweetly taken the time to write:

I just was forwarded your wonderful link and have enjoyed reading it so much!

One thing I have realized also - and I have been a quilter since 1965 and am 68 yr old - it there is NO WAY on earth I could use all of my scraps...no way. And I do not have a long arm, so you can see my point better.

WHAT TO DO WHAT TO DO??? After a dear friend died, I was the one who was asked by the family to handle the 'quilt stuff' and dispose of it as I saw fit. She had quilted for over 50 years! MERCY ME, you should have seen what I had! Thinking of Mary, my friend, whose heart was generous and kind to all, I decided to package up scraps and supplies and send them along up to the extremely poor super rural Mountains in Northern TN and Southern KY. That got the ball rolling.

My husband and I volunteer at an ALL volunteer local food pantry. If you can not buy food, how can you buy quilt fabrics of any quality? This idea started a new chapter in scrap-giving.

Still with TONS of Mary's fabrics, I made up small boxes and large newspaper plastic bags of scraps to place on our pantry's FREE TO ALL SHELF. You would have thought gold nuggets were on those shelves. Ladies started to cry! One lady walked back to say, God Bless you all, I have not been able to get fabric for years!

So on it goes now, I have a laundry basket sitting next to my cutting area and scraps go into that. Then into those plastic bags (which are free each day!) and on to folks who realllllly can use them!

Yes, I have cut some fabric up for my own projects. But have decided the Lord has blessed me with good things, and I should share those with others when I can.

God bless you

Julie

Julie, you are the one who has blessed me with this story. Thank you SO MUCH for your giving heart to help quilters find their joy when they have so little! You have blessed them abundantly. The one thought that got me to tears was the lady who walked back to say “I have not been able to get fabric for years!”.

There are so so so many ways to give, and “loving your neighbor” doesn’t only mean the person immediately next to you, but can be in your same town as well as across the world.

There is something that giving does --- instead of leaving you with less, it fills us with more. And the other “holes” in our lives somehow seem less significant, less deep or empty.

This box was sent off to Golden, Colorado yesterday! It’s contents? Two humble little quilts on their way to Japan. And while working on these quilts, There were two tornados that hit very close to home here, one in Virginia, and one in Sanford, NC ---creating quite a bit of devastation as well. I had to quiet my heart that I was doing the right thing sending these so far across the world, when there is need for love and comfort so close to home.

It feels like the “Old man with the star-fish” story, you know? “You can’t make a difference” he was told….his reply as he threw one back into the ocean—“I just made a difference to THAT one!” And because my heart was turned toward the people in Japan as I was finishing these up, that is where they are going. From the moment I started putting these together, these quilts already BELONGED to Japan.

The color is bad on these pics….nothing like hotel room lighting to turn EVERYTHING a sickly shade of yellow! But here is the bargello bound in scrappy greens and ready to send. It’s a tandem project between Tammy from MD and myself. She supplied the top, I removed the skulls (LOL!) quilted and bound it. Thanks for teaming up with me Tammy!

The sampler was also a “group” project of sorts…((Ewwww..this yellow lighting is bad too!)) I won the blocks in a block lotto, so they were made by many friends. Randy pieced the center for me from the blocks, using my double pink fabric. I bordered, quilted and bound it. Together, quilters can make a difference!

Here is the address to send your quilts to:

Send new quilts of any size from baby to adult to:

Dana Jones
Quilters Newsletter
741 Corporate Circle, Suite A
Golden, CO 80401

• Mark your box: “Quilts for Japan.”
• Send quilts as soon as possible and no later than April 30, 2011.
• Enclose your name, address, phone number, and email address with the quilts.

Oops…forgot to do the last bit myself! I did put an address label on the outside, but I forgot the phone number and email address?!?!? Oh well ----

Beyond The Bougainvillea (Free Kindle Book!)

It’s like this..do I wait til tomorrow to post this, because I’ve already written a post today? What if it isn’t free TOMORROW? But is today? So I’ll post this now!

Beyond The Bougainvillea ((Yeah, I really had to watch closely to spell this one right!)) is free on Kindle, and maybe some other formats too.

Book Description
She found her place in a turbulent era of deep passions, heartbreaking sacrifices, and grand dreams.When scholarly, smart Mary Margaret is sixteen, her father marries her off to a drunken neighbor in return for a tract of land. The year is 1924, and Mary Margaret's motherless childhood has already been hard as a farm girl on the desolate prairies of North Dakota. Abused and helpless, the new Mrs. "Marge" Garrity seems destined for a tragic fate.But Marge is determined to make her life count, no matter what. Her escape from her brutal marriage takes her to California, where she struggles to survive the Great Depression and soon answers the lure of the state's untamed northern half. There, embraced by the rough-and-ready people who built the great Ruck-a-chucky Dam on the American River, she begins to find her true mission in life and the possibility for love and happiness with an Army Corp engineer of Cherokee Indian descent.Author Dolores Durando knows Marge's world very well. She grew up ninety years ago on the plains of North Dakota.

I went over to Amazon and read the reviews --- many many 5 star reviews, one saying:

I don't recall ever having being moved to tears on the first page of a novel, nor do I recall reaching that point at least half a dozen more times before reaching the final page. That did happen as I read Beyond the Bougainvillea, and it happened quickly, because I could not put the book down!

Okay, so we download this one too, because isn’t that what having a Kindle, or a Kindle App for your phone is all about?

The paperwork day has been majorly successful –I’ve nearly caught up on all that was waiting for me to do. I just might stitch tonight!

There is a border section for the hexagon medallion calling my name! The question remains…this is one of the side “fill in” units that I have drafted here –There is the option to do SIX of these fill in units to turn the quilt into a giant HEXAGON before filling in the 4 corners…and I’m not sure what I want to do yet. I guess I’ll just do the TWO sides, and see if I feel any more inspired with how to execute turning this thing into a square, and then into a rectangle!

Think Pink!

While on my road trip, I got a voice mail reminding me that I had a mammogram yesterday at 4pm! I guess there was no better way to celebrate my return home, than by heading straight to the imaging center and taking care of “the girls!”

This cartoon cracked me up….and I know all of us of “a certain age” can relate! It doesn’t take long, it’s only a “BIT” uncomfortable, and you know that everyone in the waiting area is hating it just as much as you are!

My imaging center has moved---and they USED to have tea/coffee/cookies while you wait…NO MORE! And the magazines were old and dog-earred, so I took care of some email on my phone, and began reading one of the latest kindle uploads on my phone as well.

This is my plea to you, that if you haven’t had a mammo in a while, GO DO IT!

I spent some time flipping through the pics for Saturday’s 1/2 day Scrappy Mountain Majesties this morning and editing them down….after having MY mountains squashed flat, it seemed only fitting!

		Scrappy Mt Majesties, Kingston, NY 2011 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

These gals got a HUGE amount done in just a 3 hour class! It will be fun to see what quilts they turn out with their blocks—there was a lot of fun arranging going on!

I have some great pics from the antique malls I hit on the way home, but that will include more editing down, and I’ve got a LOT on my plate today to get things in order after being gone 13 days! So…I might get to doing that tonight for tomorrow’s post. Stay tuned!

But I DID take a 3 mile walk last evening just to see what has greened up, sprouted out, and bloomed brightly while I was gone!

We have LEAVES!!! This is the most amazing change of all…and I can’t tell you how GOOD it feels. I really miss the color green in the winter time.

You can see the dogwood at the end of my drive still in blossom…the leaves will only get thicker as spring moves toward summer, just tucking my sweet little cottage house in amongst the foliage.

This was one leg of my 3 mile walk….isn’t it a beautiful stretch of road? That hill at the end is quite steep, really gets my heart pounding. ((Yes, I keep telling myself how GOOD it is for me!)) And when I reached the top of that hill, I was greeted by this beautiful sight:

Just look at this mass of gorgeous pink color! There are lots of white azaleas around, and some redder ones too, but it is the pink ones that just make me giddy!

It’s just a MASS of gorgeous blossoms! I also loved seeing the wisteria just dripping purple where it was blooming in the woods around the area too. THIS is what a North Carolina Spring is best at! Color, and smell and ---oh, I love it!

The past few weeks I have received comments on why I would post the pics from “some” classes, but not all. Some are impatient to have their own class pics posted, and on a long journey, I might teach the same class 3 times in a row, as what happened on the TN/NC/AL trip in March. It isn’t that I don’t think all class pics shouldn’t be posted, it is that there is more going on in my life than JUST posting class pics….if I miss a class posting, because I have decided to write on something else going on in my life, please forgive me.

Editing down lots of pics for a slide show takes time that I find myself very short on. I want to post things that I find might be interesting for you to read, and if it is all the same thing, the same class over and over and over, I’m afraid I’m going to lose readers – I’m trying to find balance between posting about life, and the quilting. So I ask for your patience and understanding. There is a lot going on behind the scenes in my life that you don’t see here, that I don’t post here. And finding a place and a way for it all to fit is not always easy.

It’s kind of like the feeling you get when contemplating getting OFF the fast moving train, only knowing that if you do get off, it is moving so fast you’ll never be able to get back on it again.

Still Homeward Bound! ((Free Kindle Book Too!))

I have to admit I putzed a bit on my way home! You know the pull of antique malls and historic sites! Not to mention that the road was tiring in and of itself --- it seemed like everyone is headed somewhere for Easter week! The truck stops were full, so were the gas stations along the way! Oh, this state’s gas is 5 cents lower than that one, so we must stop here behind 40 other cars to SAVE a few cents per gallon before crossing the state line! ((like it matters now?!))

I was one of the ones who waited to cross the state line to fill up, because it saved me TIME waiting in line…I’d rather pay a bit more and be in and out of there in a flash, than wait around for 10 cars ahead of me to fill.

SO, I still have a few hours to go, but by the time 11:30pm rolled around I was feeling pretty road weary!

While unwinding before sleep last night, I came across this little book –a freebie for Kindle—that sounds interesting to me! It’s called Heir To The Everlasting, and at first glance, I thought it might be some religious fluff fiction, but upon reading the description, it did sound good:

Book Description
The Pulitzer-nominated author of EARL IN THE YELLOW SHIRT turns her acclaimed talents to an epic story of three generations of Southern women at Big Eddy, the home place they love.

HEIR TO THE EVERLASTING begins at the turn of the last century with the beautiful, determined Pinkie Alexander, strong-willed matron of the Alexander clan. Come Hell or the high water of the south Georgia river which gave Big Eddy its name, Pinkie will ensure the survival of her family on their beloved land--a place where the family cemetery guards the spirit of the past, and where secrets, as well as the dearly departed, are buried.

Follow the lives, loves, mysteries, deadly feuds and steely courage of the Alexander women through a full century of joys and sorrows. HEIR TO THE EVERLASTING showcases the culture, language and daily travails of their time and place with vivid storytelling skills and Janice Daugharty's love for "the working words."

And for Quilty Content—I have a couple show and shared vintage quilts for you to see! These were brought for me to view at Poughkeepsie’s guild meeting a few nights ago.

DOn’t you love this with the blue background? I just LOVE solids mixed with prints. It’s so springy—I feel a baby blue background coming in my near future! What’s so funny about this one is Lori emailed me asking me what I had called this design on my website. It’s one of the first patterns I ever uploaded back around 1996 or 1997 – I did it as a charity quilt workshop for my guild, and that is how it got there in the first place. Traditional recognizable patterns thrill my heart! I don’t feel like I always have to re invent the wheel to make a great quilt…and this one used everything! If you want to make one yourself, you can find String X directions HERE!

Here is a close up of that gorgeously wonky fan quilting! Aren’t these scrap bag fabrics WONDERFUL!??

And THIS string quilt was too fun for words! It is TWO SIDED!! The prints in it date into the 60’s but many are earlier—a true scrap bagger!

I loved this 60’s piece with the heart flowers..it reminds me of a dress I had when I was a little girl!

And it was quilted fun too…in a large stright-set cross hatch!

I can only imagine how difficult it was to quilt this two sided thing with all its seams --- let's just say that sometimes, even the best intentions leave puckers! I think there is a life lesson in that, somewhere, don’t you? This one however, did NOT quilt out!

I’m still sure that this quilt gave a lot of warmth and comfort through cold winter months, not to mention what memories each of these fabrics held for the maker!

This was the reverse side! It had a lot of blocks with VERY LARGE pieces in it…something makes me think she was tired of piecing the ones with all the little bits…LOL!

So off I go on my last leg back home to Wallburg, NC! I need to be home – I’ve been gone too long!

Homeward Bound!!

This is a quickie post.

Mostly because I am exhausted tired – and don’t have the energy to edit down all the class pictures from yesterday’s Scrappy Mountain Majesties workshop ((No, NO ONE made them in 3” size!!)) and I want to get my stuff packed, the car loaded, so I’m ready to hit the road home extra early. This is my route home..how far I get in one day depends on the weather and how I feel! AS I write this post, the rain is coming down pretty heavy –I’d like to get as far as I can, so I’m leaving as early as I can!

Yesterday ((Saturday)) was a whirlwind as it always is when you are doing double duty in a short time span, and there is someone who snuck out before I could even say goodbye!

City Quilter Grace came all the way down from Maine to take the Pineapple Blossom workshop, and to stay for my lecture today….the book table was mobbed after the lecture, and she snuck out for her long drive home while I was dealing with that, and getting set up for the half day class that followed!

Grace, if you read this….it was so wonderful to finally put a face and a voice to your name…we’ve emailed for years and years! And thank you for the delicious blueberry jam! YUMMY!

There were no further gifts of Millenium Y2K fabric…..but I was gifted a VERY COOL Thing for taking bobbins to class! I usually use that blue round thing that holds a lot of bobbins, but what to do if you are traveling, wanting to keep your supplies small??

Look at THIS! It’s a pedicure toe-separator ((I’m not sure what they call these..what is the proper name for this thing?!? it’s a …..THING, you know?!)) AND…it can hold 4 bobbins of thread TOGETHER!

I know about the little pony tail holder things…but those are small, and the bobbins still roll around in the bottom of my bag, and I lose the hair thingies…but THIS…this has GREAT potential! And the best thing is..they come in pairs! One for you, one for a friend….

And I also have been gifted “Heaven in a bag” ---

Have you seen these? They come from Costco. and OH…are they decadent! But don’t let the “natural source of antioxidants” make you think that you don’t have to be accountable for how many you consume! 1/4 cup has about 180 calories..which is about how many I left on the table top there. These things are SO good, that you have to measure out a serving, and LOCK THE BAG AWAY!

Mine will be riding in the “way back” with the quilt bags so I’m not tempted to down the whole package while driving back to NC!

I promise to get caught up on the class pics as soon as I get some free time to do so!