Sunday, September 15, 2019

Slow Sunday Stitching. Buhl-Bushong, Sweet Land of Liberty

It's time to link up again for Slow Sunday Stitching at Kathy's Quilts.  I do so appreciate this weekly link up and seeing what everyone has been doing.  

 I've been doing a lot of slow stitching this week.  First I finished this month's assignment for Sweet Land of Liberty.  

I've gotten 4 of these Buhl-Bushong blocks put together.  I am paper piecing the crowns, and the rest is hand applique.



 I have 4 more to put together today for my hand stitching.


I'm also blanket stitching these pieces for a penny rug called O My Stars.  As this is one my list for the 2019 Finish-A-Long for Quarter 3, I am trying to get these done too.  



I'll be linking up with Kathy's Quilts for Slow Sunday Stitching.  Pop on over and see what everyone is up to!

My grandson Jaeger this week was kind enough to make room in his already crazy schedule of school, water polo practice and water polo games to come help me put my Handiquilter back up.   I bought one of the Handiquilter frames right after they came first came out.  It involved taping some rails to a table and then attaching the units that hold the rails with clamps.  At the time they did not have any machines to be used, and I bought a Juki TL 98E.    DH elongated the rails, so I can quilt up to about 92 inches.  When it is up, it is in my dining room.   The rails are attached to a laminated particle board and it resides in my guest room when not in use.  And also the banquet table it attaches too.  I need some help getting them out of the guest room but I can set everything else up by myself.  

I had put everything away in August because we were having a family dinner, and then I thought I was going to have Bunco here last week, as it was my turn to have dinner and Bunco.  But our Bunco disbanded this month, as members have other activities they need to do.  So I've been trying to get Jaeger to help me get my tables back out.  I'm back in business now, and quilted one of my friend Nerissa's quilts yesterday, and will be ready to load the other one up.  



Thanks so much for stopping by!
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Saturday, September 14, 2019

My Dance Card is Full!, Buhl-Bushong, This is a New One

I have fallen in love with another quilt project, this time a BOM through Sentimental Stitches called the Ella Maria Deacon Quilt.  It starts tomorrow, September 15th, 2019.  It is a beautiful vintage quilt from 1841-1842.  Gay will be releasing 4 blocks a month, at a minimal cost of $2.50 a month.   It will be done over 21 months.  I think taking on this project,  my dance card is now full!  But maybe not.  

On the Buhl-Bushong Quilt front, I have gotten 4 blocks done, and 4 more crowns prepared for the applique.  I'm really happy the way they came out.  They aren't perfect, but at least my points are pointy.



Several weeks ago, some former coworker friends came over for breakfast.  I had asked Nerissa to bring the quilt top she was making for her daughter.  Nerissa is a nurse, and decided she wanted to make a quilt for her daughter for Christmas, the year her daughter started college.  It never got finished. Her daughter has now graduated from college.    Nerissa is not a regular quilter, has not taken lessons, it was just something she decided to do.  I told her I would finish it up for her and quilt it.  She actually brought her daughter's and another small top.  The seams are all 5/8 inch mostly.  She has pressed the seams open, which is nice.  But apparently her tension was off. 

 She started out putting borders on her daughter's quilt, sort of log cabin style.  She would put on one border, and then go to get the next one on, and she didn't have enough fabric, and then would start another one.   This is the quilt top, very low volume prints and hard to photograph.  You can see the corners here on both sides.  Yesterday I took all the borders off to start over on that.  Her tension was way off, so it was really easy to take these off.


This was the second small quilt she brought over.  No major problems, I thought.   I  got it on the machine and started quilting it, a simple meander.


This is the new experience part.  I am quilting along and all of a sudden I came to an abrupt stop.  I was about 2 rows from the end.  Apparently one of her loose tensions was in this block, and I got stuck in a pocket.  In fact, I quilted myself into a pocket.  I had to loosen some stitches to get my quilting foot out!



Luckily I didn't go very far.  I picked that stitching out, ladder stitched that seam together, and finished quilting it.  Today I plan to bind this one, and machine stitch it down, and then put the borders on her daughter's quilt and get it loaded up.  




I was in the middle of writing this post, and DH got up from his nap.  I have an October birthday and he has already gotten me a new phone.  I was talking to him about some Accuquilt dies I wanted to get, so he gave me $$ to buy the Storm at Sea die, and the Sea Life applique dies.  I also have a November anniversary, so I joked I would almost be at Christmas on my gifts now!   I have a very supportive husband of my habit, and he spoils me to pieces!  We will be married 44 years in November.  

 That is all for now.  Time for me to think about preparing us lunch.  Thanks so much for stopping by!

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Wednesday, September 11, 2019

My Favorite Quilt Block Blog Hop, My Day & Giveaway






When Carla of Creatin in the Sticks asked bloggers if they would like to participate in the My Favorite Quilt Blog Blog Hop, I jumped at the chance.  Welcome to my day to share my favorite block.  

My favorite block is a basket block.  Doesn't matter what kind.   I love baskets, am a basket collector, and love basket quilts.  

I have baskets hanging from the ceiling, on shelves, and baskets holding fabric for certain projects.  I also  have a basket on the couch at night beside me with my current hand stitching project.






I was in several blog hops earlier this year in which I finished up UFO's which had basket quilts as the theme.  There was the All about Strings Blog Hop also hosted by Carla of Creatin in the Sticks.  I had some old, old swap blocks of baskets that I made string triangles to set them upright.  These were pink and brown Civil War Reproduction fabrics.



Also earlier this year, I was in the Quilt Qwazy Queens Blog Hop by Marian, of Seams to be Sew  and finished up another basket UFO, this time, a crazy quilt project in which participants had embellished the wool basket blocks I put together.




So for the My Favorite Quilt Block Blog Hop I needed to figure out which basket block I wanted to make. I got out some of my basket books and looked through them- but couldn't make up my mind.  




I even got out a project I have not started yet, and even have all the wool to make this basket quilt.  Luckily the squirrel did not convince me I had time to do this project!


Finally I looked online and found these 30 Free Basket Patterns in a post by Quilt Inspiration.  I decided on this one, Baby Basket, by Anita Shackelford for American Quilter with the free PDF download here.

I went ahead and made up this pattern with my Civil War Reproductions.  This measures 14 x 14 and I am offering it as a giveaway.  You just need to leave a comment to be in the drawing.  If you are a no-reply blogger, make sure you leave an email so I can contact you.   I will do the drawing on 9/18/19.  


I actually made two other basket block table toppers, sort of improv thing.  I basically took a bunch of my 2.5 inch squares and sewed them together, making 4 patches first and then sewing those together.  They amounted to 25 4-patches of low volume prints.  I then got some scrap paper and cut out a basket, crow, sunflower and leaves machine appliquing these down.  I made two of these as table toppers for when Bunco is at my house.



Thanks so much for stopping by.   The rest of the participants for today are as follows:
Wednesday, September 11th

The whole schedule for the My Favorite Quilt Block Blog Hop is below if you haven't had a chance to visit the first two days.

 Many thanks to Carla @ Creatin in the Sticks on putting this together


Monday, September 9th


Tuesday, September 10th


Wednesday, September 11th


Thursday, September 12th



Friday, September 13th
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Tuesday, September 10, 2019

Moment of Panic, My Favorite Quilt Block Blog Hop Continues

I had a moment of panic this morning.  Yesterday I had written my post for the My Favorite Quilt Block Blog Hop, which continues through September 13th.  

I went to check my scheduled post for late tonight and across all of my blog posts is this:


A long time ago, maybe in 2008 or so, I had a graphic design person designed a special header for my blog.  It incorporated one of my crazy quilt pieces that is framed and she designed a theme I love.  I had no idea how she did it, she just designed it and put it on my blog.  Apparently she must have used the above tinypic site, because they are closing up shop and my image disappeared overnight, and all my posts had the above image.

I have tried to salvage the situation this morning, and am not really happy with it, but at least I have that above image off.  




Meanwhile the My Favorite Quilt Block Blog Hop continues.

This is today's list of bloggers.  There are some great projects shown and have given me some inspiration of new things to try.  My day will be tomorrow, Wednesday, September 11th.

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Monday, September 09, 2019

My Favorite Blog Hop Starts Today!




Monday, September 9th


Tuesday, September 10th


Wednesday, September 11th


Thursday, September 12th



Friday, September 13th
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Sunday, September 08, 2019

Begonias, California Style 2019

This week was the National ABS Convention held in Sacramento, CA September 3-8 with the annual plant sale Saturday, September 7th.

 My daughter Katie and I attend every year and buy a bunch of plants and hope that we can get them to survive the winter here in Sacramento.  We browse the plants that have been judged, and see what plants we want to be on the lookout for.  We look forward to it all year, and afterwards we go to a French cafe in Sacramento called Cafe Rolle.  Granddaughter Klara also came with us and spent the day.


This year they had the convention week attached to it, and we came in at the end of the week.  The write ups touted having thousands of plants, but what we saw on Saturday was maybe 200 plants if that.  We surmise that maybe convention goers had first chance, and the public had leftovers, though not at all sure about that.  

 We still came away with many plants.  I got quite a few that were new starts that were relatively cheap.    I also am going to try a Maidenhair fern again.  I have bought them 2 years in a row, and I keep them for several months and then they dry up.  Going to try a different location this year.  My other 2 ferns thrive, but I am determined to get one of these to live this time!



These are a couple of the new starts that I am going to keep in the house for awhile until they get going good.  

This was another one called Begonia Kit Kat.  One of the leaves broke off in the car.  They had a real poor selection of this one.  My daughter grabbed one of them too.


These are a couple of my begonias out front that I have had for several years.  The smaller flowering one I got last year, and also the small reddish one on the right  that is sort of cut off I got last year.  It went through a rough spot over the winter but it is finally coming out of it.



This was a new one I got called Begonia Maiden.  There were several we have never seen before in all the years we have been attending this sale.



This one is called Cancun Christmas.  I love the leaves on Rex begonias so much.  My daughter doesn't have much luck with these but I don't usually have a problem.



And this one is called Merry Christmas.
This one apparently lost its tag somewhere.  So don't know the name of that one.


This one I have had for about 4 years.  It is called Begonia Dragon Wings.  I had another smaller one that didn't survive the winter last year.  When I know a frost is coming I usually just cover them for the night.  I tried bringing them into the kitchen one year, but they didn't like that at all.  


This was called Begonia Dicata.  This one and another one this year are from a nursery in southern California, called Kartuz Greenhouses in Vista, California.  I grew up in Vista, CA, and the street this is located on, Sunset  Drive my street ran into.  I don't recall that nursery being their 50 years ago though.  It was interesting that they had plants for sale in Sacramento.

After the sale, and browsing the prize winners in the show, we headed off to Cafe Rolle for a hot prawn sandwich, and I had a Toffee Creme Brulee.   Katie and Klara had the chocolate mousse for dessert.  

Such a great day, and so nice to get out of the house for a couple of hours!
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