This old quilt...

This is a quilt I brought home for safe keeping, while my family member is away from her home. At some point, I hope to do some research on this quilt, as it appears to be quite old. The tan fabrics appear to be faded out. Overall it is in fairly good shape with just a few stains and crease marks. There are twelve blocks with the same design and a border on all four sides. Unfortunately, I have never seen this quilt before, so I don't know any of the history of it. Is this what will happen to your quilts some day??


Not a stitch of quilting happening around here...too much going on with caring for my dad, as the pins in hip are moving and he is in quite a bit of pain. At this point, we have a full time care giver in the house so I can go to work each day. The best part of all is that they keeping asking for housework to do and they have dinner ready each evening when I come home...I could get really use to this!!!

UFO's...will this happen to yours?

Have you ever wondered what will happen to your quilts and UFO's? This set of blocks are from Mother in-law's home...which unfortunately she will never finish. There are approximately 60 blocks, with about 25 layered and quilted on individual pieces of muslin. My challenge will be how to finish those...do I try some method of joining the quilted blocks or do I take them apart and set them in a traditional manner. I'm leaning towards taking them apart, as the batting is very thick poly batting and the blocks are a variety of sizes. These blocks along with three other quilts came home with me for safe keeping. The others will appear in a future posting. Since I would like to finish at least a lap quilt out of these blocks for her quickly, they are moving to the top of my project list.


Once again, a wild few weeks in my life... The Saturday before Christmas, my mother in law went into the critical care unit of the hospital, 1,000 miles from my home. My son and I are her only relatives, so soon I took off to drive south, as the airports were closed in the Northwest due to the snow and ice. Due to the bleed on her brain, they discovered a mass on her brain, along with the one on her lung which was discovered this summer. So we now have entered a time of palliative care heading towards hospice, along with the loss of independence and no longer living in her own home. After finding a new foster type care home for her, moving her furniture in, securing her home and lots of other tasks, I am finally back home

So, as I close this short post, as I am on a 15 minute break from homework...I leave you with a few questions:

1) What will happen to your UFO's and quilts?

2) Have you completed your Advance directive or Power of attorney for health care...if not, now is the time to do it so your wishes are clear to everyone.

3) Do you have a financial power of attorney, will or trust in place? Thankfully, my mother-in-law did this several years ago, which has made this transition so much easier.

4) If you were suddenly unable to take care of things at home, would someone know where to find your records, checks, valuables, secret hiding places, etc? I've spent days going through every closet and drawer and know that I am still missing items...oh my the story I could tell...

5) Have you hugged your love ones and told them how much you love them today?

Wishing you all a wonderful new year full of lots of quilt projects!!

Wild and Crazy times at our house!

Wow, what a wild and crazy week it has been. First, we are thrilled to have Michael (far left) here for a few weeks, home from Iraq! What a great blessing for all the guys to hang out, play X-box and eat all the food in the house! My son (middle) has been blessed to have this group of guys as friends since we moved here his senior year in high school. Now that they are in college and the Army, it is always a special time when we can gather together for a steak dinner, even if it was a bar-b-que in the snow!
On Sunday morning we woke up to big fluffy flakes of snow. We only see a little snow every three to four years, but so far this one is much more than normal. After the snow we have had ice, with freezing rain and lots more snow predicted for tomorrow. My 12 minute drive home from work took over an hour this evening as the roads have melted and frozen into sheets of ice.
I made a quick stop at the grocery for more food...feeding five guys for days requires more milk and food than you can imagine! With the threat of being stuck at home into the middle of next week, it was time to stock up!
Jessie is the latest addition to our crazy life, joining us this evening. She is the wonderful dog of a good friend, whose husband was admitted to the hospital for emergency surgery. Since the hospital is 45 minutes away, she will be staying there overnight and needed someone to take care of the dog. Of course, five guys would love a dog! But what she doesn't realize is that I'm afraid they may never return the dog!

All Hail Cesear King of the house

Last weekend, I couldn't figure out what the lump was inside my shoe...after shaking out my shoe, I realized it was a little present from Cesear the king of cats of North Carolina! All Hail King Cesear, King of cats...or at least that is what he would like you to believe!!


It has been a few more crazy weeks with too much homework, family crisis and of course work, ... there haven't been any positive or quilting topics to post. Who wants to hear about kidney stones, trips to the ER and visits to the doctor, etc., so I haven't posted. I had hoped to spend even half a day over the long Thanksgiving weekend in my sewing room, but it just didn't happen. Perhaps over Christmas or New Years. I do have some Christmas quilt photos to share next time!

Coming soon to a mailbox in North Carolina

Coming soon to a mailbox in North Carolina will be a box full of fabric for my sister! I'm just back from a quick visit to her new home, after a conference in Florida. We spent five days, resting, taking walks, enjoying the geese on the lake and playing in her fabric stash. We picked out four projects from fabrics we had purchased during our Tokyo trips for her to work on over the next few months.. Of course, there is always something else you need, so I promised to send fabrics from my stash. On top are the various black scraps for a simple Asian fabric quilt. Then there are the three inch squares for a pagoda project similar to my August 20th post. A bit of cream and gold for an inner and outer border and then the red accent fabric for the Asian squares.Every Tuesday and Thursday, my sister (below) and her friend (above) spend the day stitching and having sewing lessons for her friend. While I was there I did a quick lesson on machine applique using three different stitches and two different methods of preparing the applique. Then we practiced making half square triangles, for an upcoming project. Wish I could spend every Tuesday and Thursday sewing with them!!
My sis (above) took quite a fall last week while in Iowa, visiting her daughter and my special favorite niece! So yes, she really does have black eyes... thankfully there were no major injuries. Unlike my dad who fell just a few days before, fractured his hip, had it pinned and is now in Rehab.

Today, I had a good afternoon in my sewing room, working on the 9 patch pizazz on the design wall which was previously posted. Have three of the four sides ready to stitch. Am hoping to wrap it up next weekend and will post pictures when it is finished. I also stitched the binding on two more quilts while in North Carolina...watch for pictures during the Christmas season.

Long Arm quilters

Isn't this a great bag? Two of my quilts came back from my favorite long arm quilter this week, in this great bag. When I take new tops to Jean I'll use this bag and get a credit towards thread. In addition, by taking a picture of the bag I'll be in a drawing for a batting credit.

Over the years I've used several long arm quilters...I actually got a total of five quilts back this week from two quilters. But my best quilts go to Jean, because her work is so magnificent! I so appreciate the care and creativity that Jean uses with every quilt. For more information check out her web page www.santiamriverquilts.com

Once you are on the web page, scroll to the bottom of the page and click on the link to see more of her work on various quilts on Webshots. If you enter Jeanne in the search box, you will see the four quilts Jean has completed for me.

This evening I attached the binding to the front side of the Hot Shots quilt. I'll post a picture soon...but we must have some sun light in order to get a good picture...since the rain has started, it may be a while (or next May as those who have lived in Oregon would understand).

School is keeping me busy, but I have managed to complete the binding on two Christmas quilts and am hand stitching the binding on a third Winter Snowman flannel star. I have 6 more waiting for the binding to be hand stitched down and two more that need the binding cut and then attached. I'm not sure why I continue to attach the binding by hand to the back...probably an old habit that I just need to break by trying some other methods. The quilts seem to just stack up at this point, since I rarely sit and watch TV.

Time to go watch some Beaver Football & stitch away on some binding!

Searching for pattern

While traveling this summer, with permission at a quilt shop that was closing in Long Beach, Washington, I snapped this photo. They were out of the pattern and would not be ordering any more. I was thinking it would be a great way to show off some of my favorite Asian fabrics. Any one have ideas on where I might find it? I was thinking it might have been in Asian fabric magazine, but haven't found it, yet.

Life has been a bit crazy since my relaxing vacation that seems so long ago...school has started...I'm in a graduate level finance class that is more than a stretch for me...you know they just didn't cover all those ratios in my undergrad Art degree...plus it's been over 30 years since I've done algebra!! Many nights I wonder why oh why am I doing this, when I would much rather be in my sewing room!!

I've made a few quick trips for work and checking in on family. Had a brief visit to family in LA, which included a funeral and several visits with another family member that is ill. It's so hard to see someone who was so vibrant and full of life change so much.

I have two quilts to pick up at the long arm quilter...can't wait to see them in a few weeks...promise to post pictures as soon as I can! Sorry to say, my postings will be less for a bit longer, until this class is over...I'm sure you don't want to see pictures of calculators and text books!!