Tme lapse?

The yucca flower is growing so quickly we don't need time lapse photography.  You can practically stand there and watch it change.

 We noticed the flower stalk kind of followed the sun, and was pointing west at the end of the day.  Yesterday evening it began opening flowers. 

This morning the flowers have opened even more and they are really rather dazzling for our dry, arid climate. 

Spring has also brought out the invasion of the Miller moths.  Seems our milder winter has made their migration earlier, and they are plentiful.  I'm happy to have enticed wild birds with regular feeding that like to eat moths as well!

Utility sewing

Our sun room is done, done.  Dale tiled the window sills.  We had some leftover blue tiles and a bit of turquoise, from previous projects.  

I sewed covers for the window blockers.  We use two-inch rigid foam insulation to block our windows, covered with fabric.  The first few I covered, I used quilted fabric, but found it really isn't necessary and we don't need the extra bulk.  Dale has been trimming the blockers as each part of the finishing process moved along.  Now that the sills were done, I could make the covers.  

 I had intended to do fabric art for the large south facing glass.  Getting the foam covered became more important as it kept "bleeding" styrofoam, and artful covers are on the back burner.  Function sometimes takes precedence.  

You won't be seeing the covers for the tall windows--I have one more to do, and hopefully it will go better than the last three.  I've just really been making do with what I had to work with.  We are really able to control our indoor temperatures blocking the windows at night during the winter, and part of the day during the summer.  Even though the sun room wasn't completely finished it provided most of our daytime heat during this past winter!

Our yucca baccata is going to flower this year.  It's amazing watching this flower coming up.  I was pulling dead leaves and weeds carefully from the base of this plant, and accidentally leaned my head into one of the "leaves," and can attest to its sharp point!  Ouch!  I came inside bleeding!    

Quilts delivered

We went to town yesterday and had another good day.  I was able to get four quilts done to deliver along with Dr. Kaufman's granddaughter's quilt, which I only did the quilting and binding for.

Pat made this great BQ3 with the same fabric she sent to me a while back as a "challenge."  There was enough of it left to use as a border for a pillowcase to go with the quilt. 

I put this top together at the retreat in Phoenix, and then added the borders this past week.  I think the blocks were from Yetta, via Sharon.  As always, great to have friends help with this cause.  My friends ROCK!

 Looks like it's going to cool off this weekend.  Perfect weather for staying indoors and getting going on the next batch of quilts.  Found out that this quilt is going to be raffled off for a service dog for diabetic child.  Thanks Lucille!

A couple more done.

I haven't been as productive with the quilts for Dr. Kaufman, but I managed to get a couple finished this past week.

Pat made this BQ3.  It's such a great pattern!  

I also finished this scrappy quilt, which was a bit of work, but I like the look now that it's done.  Would I do another...probably not.

The backing was just a little short so I added a couple of strips to widen it.  I used Grizzly Paws pantograph by Dave Hudson, which like most of his patterns, flowed nicely.  Since it was a scrappy quilt, it benefited from some scrappy binding.

Finally...

This quilt had been up on my design wall since before I went to the retreat in February.  I do like the looks of it, but would probably not do another.  I don't love to piece, and this has to be be cut out in its entirety and then assembled in strips.  It was a tedious process and I'm glad to be done with it.  I'm hoping I win something on Festival of Scrappiness!  Lots of good ideas for using scraps.

Now I need to finish enough blocks to make this into a quilt top.  It's been on the design wall, let's see, since October when Pat last visited?  

  We picked up this little cabinet for the sun room.  It was just too hard to pass up at Savers on senior discount day--30% off.  We are now shopping for a some kind of sleeper sofa that will fit, since the space could double as another place to house guests.

Seems like spring is here to stay.  We've had warm, sunny, though windy, days.  A gorgeous sunrise Sunday morning. 

Moving in!

We finally are moving things into the sun room.  March winds have arrived with a vengeance, and I haven't gotten my plants repotted and ready for the sun room.  But I did quilt some decorator fabric and make a new cushion for the bamboo chair we found in a thrift shop in Colorado Springs. 

The chair itself was in surprisingly good shape owing, I think, to the incredibly ugly cushion it was sporting--crumbling Herculon fabric.  Blech!  I kept the cushion only to use as a pattern for the new one. 

The stove is an antique which fortunately comes apart in many pieces which is how it's managed to accompany us through all our moves.  We've never vented or had a fire in it, but it makes a great place to put plants.  We need new speakers which will get mounted on the wall instead of sitting on the old stove.

Delivery day!

I was able to finish up one more quilt.  Yetta made this beauty, which is nice and long and will be good for a teenager, I think.  

 Thanks to a little help lot of help from my friends, I have this nice stack-o-quilts to deliver today. 

 Our weather has been just gorgeous, warmer days with little wind.  We'll have to get busy and start moving stuff into the sun room tomorrow after spending the day in town today.

Fronts and backs

I got two more quilts finished and ready to deliver, but still had enough time to load one more on the longarm and I'll finish it today.

Dee put this top together at retreat.  Some people are all about productivity there...me, not so much.  She is a master of the "I Spy" novelty quilts, and fortunately for me, also generous.  

I used some Tony Hawk fabric for the back, which was just a bit shy of the width of the quilt, but I added some stripes to make it work.  It's nice to have a more boy friendly quilt.

Pat has been cranking out the BQ3s.  This one was with a focus fabric featuring kitties. I used my new Jig Saw pantograph from Dave Hudson.  It's an easy one that flows and I think I'll use it a lot for kid quilts.

 
   Pat also had the perfect backing with this print of kitty words.

 I still have two more BQ3s from Pat, but will be taking a bit of break from donation quilts to get some sewing and quilting done for the new room.

What the heck?!

I was filling a bobbin with invisible thread (monofilament poly) and when I was done, I heard a pop.  The top part of the bobbin blew off!  That's a new one.  This was the result:

 I tried to salvage the thread...thinking I could just rewind it onto another bobbin, but it wasn't happening and instead tangling into a mess.  And of course I haven't thrown it away thinking it has some art potential!

I finished another couple of quilts, and am on target to have six by Wednesday.  This is the appliqued top from Sherry.  I used So Fine on top and this is my first time, as far as I can remember, using it.  I can see why some professionals use it so much.  Although I quilted pretty densely, it is a light thread and didn't make the little quilt stiff.  Added a lot of texture without overpowering the applique.  

 I didn't notice until I took a close-up picture that the little clover block lost it's brown center in the wash.  I used fusible and machine stitched another center for it.  

Pat M. had given this to us a while back, and I got it finished up.  It's such a bright, cheerful quilt!  Thanks friends for all the help!

 

Close to moving in...

Dale sealed the sun room floor, and today he put up the baseboards--although they are not boards but vinyl.  We got a stash of these at a Habitat for Humanity store, and they have been especially good for our irregular adobe walls.  They follow the contours very well.  We would be moving in were it not for the smell of the floor sealer.

After working with the Baptist Fan boards, I needed a change and decided to freehand this small piece that Yetta, one of the retreat attendees gave me.  It was very well pieced by hand, and she had acquired it in the Midwest somewhere.  Nice to get it finished.  

 As usual the hardest part was how to fill in all the space.  I need a class in what to do where.  

 It was good practice as now I've loaded a small quilt with appliqued blocks.  The swapped blocks were given to me by Sherry, a new retreat attendee, to put together for our cause.  I had to take a picture of the back of this applique block. 

These are the most perfect hand stitches I've ever seen, so exact, and if it weren't for the buried thread tails they would easily be mistaken for machine stitching.

Of course I'm struggling with how to quilt the whole thing, and I'll be happy to go back to my pantographs for the next quilts!