Saturday Evening Quilt Cam!

I'm in the mood for simple string piecing after the Jamestown Landing workshop in Centreville, VA yesterday.
I've cut some foundation squares and grabbed some handfuls of green strips ---I want to make simple green string blocks ---an idea is brewing.
Are you ready? Bring a project, come hang out!
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An Autumn Walk ---

All the way up to Pennsylvania and back --- you cold see where the leaf-turning was taking place – the farther north I got, the more color there was!

Of course, that meant the farther south I got on my return – the more color I left behind.

That doesn’t matter – all I could think about on my drive home was enjoying TODAY and perhaps getting out there and stretching my legs for an “around the neighborhood” walk.

My hip pain has diminished --- Physical therapy has helped tremendously, and I am religiously doing the exercises that help balance my muscle function to hopefully keep things more mobile and free from pain.  It’s been a year of frustration as my body, which rarely fails me, has constantly reminded me that-- no, I am no spring chicken any longer, and the things I used to do without thinking, become things I do with GREAT thinking and some limitation. 

I think the most important thing is to keep doing what you CAN do, at whatever level that is. 

This afternoon – it was once around the neighborhood!  I delighted in the warmth of the October sunshine, stopping to linger at the bridge that crosses the creek that borders my back yard.  There isn’t much water in it right now, but when it rains hard, this little creek becomes a river.

I looked up through the trees, watching dappled sunlight filter through leaves of yellow-green.  Soon these trees will lose their canopy of foliage, leaving only bare limbs behind through the winter.  But for today, the sun is warm on my shoulders and I walk on --- my ear buds in my ears, my music playing as soundtrack to this beautiful afternoon.

Up a hill, down a hill.  Fallen leaves gather in the grass at the sides of the road.  Smells of Autumn on the air.  There are a few flowers still struggling to display the last of their colorful summer splendor.   Here and there marigolds and mums survive, showing forth a valiant effort on their part.  Soon they will be gone too ----and we’ll find ourselves eagerly waiting  for spring and their re-emergence.

This is home for me ---but I’m glad I took the chance to come home for even one short day before heading out again tomorrow!

I’m going to sew a bit before dinner --- and this evening, watch for QuiltCam about 9pm Eastern.

See you then!

Jamestown Landing in Centreville!

Say hello to Polly Monica!  There is a little photo that has floated around the internet both on facebook and in pinterest ----THIS is “THE” pillow!

 Polly made this pillow and it has made the rounds like wildfire.  Now I know who made it, and held the genuine article in my hands!

She said she drew out the words on the fabric, and then “scribbled” over them using her sewing machine and black thread to make it look like it was more hand stitched.  One thing is for certain, “NEVER underestimate the power of a WOMAN with a SEWING MACHINE!!”

I’m home --- for about 36 hours!

I left Centreville about 4pm yesterday, with strict instructions and a hand written note on how to AVOID the pitfalls of the DC area, and the horrific conditions of I-95 southbound on a Friday afternoon.

I did NOT even turn the GPS on until after I had reached Fredericksburg using the "alternate route" I had been given and knew I was on the fast track to making it home.

The reason being?  Besides the fact that I’d prefer a couple nights in my own bed any day --- there were some tax related papers that I forgot to sign before leaving for Pennsylvania, and I need to sign them before heading to Floyd, VA tomorrow afternoon.  Floyd is only around 2 hours north of where I live, more toward Roanoke on the western side of the state, away from the I-95 corridor --- so it really wasn’t “That Much” out of my way to just come home, unwind, unpack a bit, reorganize ---and recharge before heading out tomorrow afternoon.

Will I sew? I hope so!

The one bad thing about leaving on a Friday evening for a long drive home is ---OF COURSE there is nothing like quilt shops or antique malls open ----and I was not going to stop for Salvation Army or Goodwill either ---just GET HOME.  It will be the same thing getting up to Floyd tomorrow – Sunday! Nothing open….no pictures of vintage machines or quilts in antique shops….

I can say ONE thing --- this trip has been good for my WALLET! LOL!

We had a great time in class yesterday.  We spent the morning sewing string blocks like crazy, and after lunch we moved on to broken dishes units and started to see things coming together. 

Jamestown landing is a fairly straight forward quilt, just a lot of little units that require loads of variety --- and the gals were working on building their variety in their string blocks, and in their half-square triangle units so when it came to putting the stars together later, they had MORE different units to pull from.

In other words, with some quilts you see results quickly, and some --- it’s all about the variety even though the units are simple. 

Take a look!

		Jamestown Landing, Centreville VA 2012 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

If I get everything done that I need to today ----we may have time to do some QuiltCam tonight!

I’ve got treadle on the brain – my feet are itching to find that rhythm ---and maybe concentrate on some string units after spending time watching these ladies have so much fun yesterday!

Have a great Saturday, everyone --- it’s great to be home, even for just a bit over a day!

iPhone-o-Gram! Quilters! Start your engines!

The machines are revved up and roaring for our Jamestown Landing workshop in Centerville Virginia.

String blocks a plenty!

Scraps galore!

It's a beautiful sunshiny day. The windows are open, A gentle breeze wafting through.

It's another great day for stitching scraps!

We all send our quilter's salute to you.

Have a great day! :-)

Show & Share Friday!

There are some days that leave you with nothing to blog about – because you’ve blogged about it already!

How can that be? I “ALWAYS” have something to talk about!

Because ---I’ve had more lectures, both day and evening, than I have workshops this trip, so there are fewer slide shows to upload.

TODAY we have a Jamestown Landing workshop with the Centreville Quilters – but that slide show won’t be ready until tomorrow.  So what am I going to post today?

Show and Share!  I haven’t done this since Bali – and some really beautiful quilts have been sent to me, so I think today will be a good day to share them with you.

Carolyn S sent me pictures of her Jared Takes a Wife!

It looks great on the bed!

She writes:

Here are the pics.of my version of Jared takes a wife. It is going to my DD my youngest, who is also in the army reserves band. Now I have to figure out how I want to quilt it!

Beautiful!

Jeanne T sent a picture of her KING SIZED Chunky Churn Dash!

This looks like a magazine photo shoot!

She writes:

Hi Bonnie,
I just completed a king chunky churndash quilt and absolutely love it!   I used homespuns that were given to me by a fellow quilter and then tied it all together with the hourglass fabric.  Then, I decided to add a flying geese border (365??), yikes!
 
My friend quilted it in an edge to edge feather design.  This has now become the quilt of choice for my bed.
 
Thank you for sharing the pattern!

It looks just awesome on that bed, doesn’t it?  I’m ready to crawl in and take a nap!
 
I got an email from “ANOTHER” Jeanne –sending pictures of her Star Struck UFO! 
 

 

This Jeanne is from Michigan, and can’t you tell she is trouble with those sparkling eyes peeking over the quilt? :cD   I love the use of her blue and cheddar!

 

She writes:

 

Hi Bonnie,
I wanted to share my finished Star Struck quilt with you. You taught the class back inSeptember, 2010 for Saginaw Piecemakers Quilt Guild. (Michigan) I wanted to use the bonus hsts from making the blocks, but couldn't decide on a color that would separate them from the body of the quilt.

Finally, I chose a dark red as there were red specks in the cheddar pieces. I love how it turned out.


Thank you for being an excellent teacher and for loving scraps.
Hugs,Jeanne, Saginaw, Michigan

I do love the inner red border and binding – it really sets it off so nicely!

And finally, we have three quilts with a story from Mo B!

She writes:

Good Morning Bonnie,

 I just wanted to share a couple of quilts that I have made following your lead. 

The pink one is the result of your Virginia bound class in Naples Florida earlier this year.  I took the class but my little feather weight got a thread caught so I had to leave early cuz we just couldn’t get her to go.  She has since been serviced and all is well. 

I started out to make this quilt in batiks (only one block complete) however our guild set up a challenge for us to make quilts for a show for our local mall the theme became pink in honor of Breast Cancer Awareness month October, the month for the show.

Well I just went right to it and cut up all of my pink scraps of which there turned out to be many, I’ve many many nieces, had no idea I had made that much pink.

Anyway, this is the result of that bag of scraps as well as the pineapple quilt made using the trash to treasure template.  These quilts are going to the Children’s Advocacy Center after the show.
 

 

 

The other string quilt I made a few years ago, using my batik scraps.  It wasn’t until the other day that I realized that this quilt was guided by you as well.  I was going through my downloaded quilt patterns and I found the directions for this and lo and behold they were from Quiltville!  Who knew! 
 

 
I was a fan of yours before I even knew it. I read your blog now and I just love living vicariously through you.  It is my intention that there will be more quilts with your help in my future. Thank you.

Blessings, Mo B

Awesome Show & Share, ladies!  Thanks so much for sending the pictures to me and allowing me to share them with everyone else!
 
Have a great Friday everyone!

iPhone-o-Gram! Out to Lunch!

I found some time to grab a friend for lunch out in the beautiful October sunshine!

I picked my buddy Pat Sloan up at her lovely home and we drove down to Reston town plaza where there are a plethora of shops, boutiques, and restaurants!

We both agreed on Mexican and quenched our hunger for guacamole and chips :-)

I absolutely loved the painted vases at the front greeting counter! Just look at all of that color and pattern!

We spent some after lunch time walking around the plaza and enjoying the other passersby and dipping in and out of various shops to occupy our time.

It was the perfect respite in a very very busy sequence of days and I'm glad she had the free time to spend with me!

No matter how far, nor how near, quilting friends are the best! :-)

The Drive from #^*&^!!!

I swear the GPS in my van is possessed.  It seems to take the stupidest route to ANYWHERE ----

I had a $100 TomTom before I had this van with the built in one, and that thing NEVER got me lost.  It let me know when I was going over the speed limit ((Very helpful!)) and it told me when I was approaching a traffic light that had a camera on it.  ((Also very helpful))

Though I was never one to run a red light anyway, it was just a nice notification so that I could smile big as I drove on through.

Then comes the big purchase of Shamu and the built in GPS system.  I’ve had this van over a year and I am still not friends with it.  Sometimes we get along okay as acquaintences, but we have definite TRUST ISSUES!!

For instance, the old Tomtom could get me to the 4 H camp at Smith Mountain Lake no problem – right to the front door.  The built in one?  “turn by turn direction will not be provided to complete your journey, there are unmarked roads along the way.”  WHAT!?!??!

*SIGH*

So yesterday, I was amused when the GPS took me OFF of I-95, but I thought maybe it knew what it was doing.  ((What was I thinking?!))

I’m watching industrial areas turn into not-so-nice inner city areas, and I’m hitting every red light at 5pm…….

When I hit the first traffic circle and saw the cross roads were Lettered streets, the the other roads were numbered, it hit me….Oh my goodness! I’m in “THE DISTRICT!”

There was nothing I could do.  I couldn’t turn around, I’d come so far --- I had to keep going and trust that eventually I would get to my destination.  The afternoon still had enough light to it, and the sun was shining and I began to enjoy the colored row houses along the sides of the road, watch the leaves fall from the trees and flutter down the street along with the pedestrians as they made their way to wherever they were going --- while I sat at red light after red light after red light.

Grey, cheddar, red and yellow!

Row houses always enchanted me!  I love the turret “hats” on these!

Fancy bay windows hint of a more prosperous by-gone era.

Fighting traffic around a couple more traffic circles, I found myself in a familiar place --- Georgetown!!  I had been here around 2003 or 2004 when I came to visit DC with Randy and her daughter Rachel.  That had been a “flying” trip – I flew up from South Carolina, and they from California and we spent the week exploring DC’s monuments and the Smithsonians – and of course --- Georgetown.

It’s getting dark! Street lamps are coming on!

Before I knew it – okay – longer than that, because we were crawling through evening traffic and every red light --- I was on the Frances Scott Key Bridge – and finally:

VIRGINIA!!

It was definitely the wrong way --- the long way --- it took TWO HOURS longer than it should have to get me here, but you know what?  It was kind of neat too.  I was just sorry all the pictures were taken from the drivers seat of my car :c)

My schedule has been hectic.  Today is a bit of a break for me, I have the day time free – and a lecture tonight --- so I’m calling up my buddy Pat Sloan and hoping since we are both in the same place at the same time that we can catch each other for lunch.    After that, who knows? 

I’m meeting with the other guild ladies around 5pm for dinner, we’ll go to set up for the trunk show, and guild meeting starts around 7pm!  And we do it again :c)

Have a great Thursday, everyone!