Beads.Love 'em, hate 'em.

Shoot me if I ever try something like this again.   While I love the results (and of course I don't mean to literally shoot me), I'd be nuts to do this again.

This is called "Right Angle Weave" - size 8 beads, 50 of them in 3 rows.  4 beads form a circle and you do 6 "circles" across and then start the next row.

The finished bead when the above figure is sewn together, end to end.   I have it on the end of a small pair of Fiskars spring-action scissors so you can see just how small it is.

This started out to be a beaded scissor fob project in a small group I'm in.   I won't be doing many of these - the beads are too small, my eyes are too old and my hands - well, just forget them.

I like it, but can't do very many of them.

Play Day

OK, so I haven't done any of my goals..no binding, no organizing beads etc.  

But, I did make this cool card today.   I saw a demo of this at Genesee Valley Quilt Club and had to try it out.    I used 2 5 x 7 sheets of peltex fusible and fused fabric to both sides.   The 2 cards are held together by ribbons, pierced at the top and then tied so the card flips up.

This is the front.   You'll soon know that I love and have a large stash of butterfly-themed fabric.

This is the inside, after flipping up the top card.

Detail of the butterfly.  Stitched first with thread, then colored with pastel watercolor crayons, then used a wet stencil brush to make the "watercolor" feature, then highlighted with pigma pen

This is the back of the card.   Cool, huh!

Knitting Fun

What is this?   

If you guessed a head of Green Cauliflower, then
you're wrong!!!

It's a skein of yarn - that looks like this when unwound.    It's called "Marshmallows".

This is how it looks made into a scarf.   One skein took about one hour to knit this scarf.   Cool, huh?

Goals

Goals for the week:

1.   Binding on the large Shadow Box Quilt
2.   Finish small quilt based on glass cabachon made in RAFA small group
3.   Organize Beads - (ugh - no small task)

Challenge Quilt

Our guild challenge this year was to use colors of fabrics that begin with our initials.   We could even find paint chips, or whatever to verify our choices.   Some people were very creative.   Some found the paint chips first and went from there, I found the fabric first.....and worked backwards.    Here is my picture - I'll explain my choices below:

I saw a picture similar to this on a calendar.   I knew I had this fabric so I then cut out tree branches to hang OVER the water (some people thought this was upside down) so they would appear in silhouette.   I called it "Sunrise over the Water".  The crystals represent dew drops that are falling from the tree into the water.   I quilted in circles around the crystals 

to represent ripples in the water.   The rest is quilted to show movement in the water. 

My initials are E-M-J-R.   My colors are Emerald, Ebony, Mantis Green, Jade and the binding is the exact color of a nail polish by Nicole called "Respect Our World".

There was a saying on the calendar by Lao Tsu:  "If we let go of what we are, we become what we might be."   I like that and used the dew drops or crystals to represent that saying.

Prize or not...........I really love this quilt!

Another chilly day and boy is it cold.  I am brightened however, by my beautiful amaryllis plant sitting here in the window by my computer.   2 of the 4 flowers are opened and so I am posting some pics.

This is a view of the whole plant.

Followed by a close-up of the flower:

Could this be a quilt?   I love taking closeups of the center of a flower.

Finally,   my little frog, sitting on the edge of the pot, anxiously awaiting the flowers.

This week's big accomplishment (so far) was to finish my challenge quilt for our guild challenge which is due on Jan. 16.   Woo hoo - 10 days ahead of the deadline!!!!   The big joke in guild is that everyone is still sewing on the bindings at the turn-in meeting!!!!   Bug, I digress.   I'll post a picture after it is turned in (not that I expect anyone reads my blog and will actually see it before then).

I hae another quilt almost finished which coincidentally could do for the challenge.   I had not intended it for such, but maybe I will turn it in anyway.  

The challenge is to make a quilt using colors of our initials.   We can be as creative as we want in finding colors - such as using paint chips that begin with our initials.   I even found a nail polish.   Woo hoo!!!

My goals for the weekend (quilting wise):

     1.  Finish that other possible challenge quilt
     2.  Put the binding on my large bed quilt
     3.  1/2 hr. per day decluttering that messy quilt room

Free Motion Embroidery

Don't you love the trees?   I did this with free motion embroidery.   The design was drawn on water solvy stabilizer and then I put that between 2 layers of tulle and went to work with embroidering free motion - following the pattern.   I used many shades of green, and in some cases a really brighter shade in the bobbin and then adjusted the tension so the bobbin thread would pull up and show on the top.   Hence - the sparklies!!!!   I made them for a specific small quilt but when I tried to add them, the quilt was very adamant and told me they didn't belong there.   So, now I hae a couple of appliques for another quilt.   (Yes, my quilts do talk to me)

OK, so I'm still a novice at adding pictures to my blog.   This should be the other ornament.    (I haven't figured out how to delete pics after adding them - if there is a way).

Beaded Ornaments

Through my quilts and specifically my art quilts, I've discovered that I really like beading.   This year I did 2 ornaments using store-bought Christmas balls (purple of course).   They ended up being WAY more work than I thought they would be - but aren't they pretty and so sparkly on the tree???

Christmas 2009

Christmas with the Kiddies - I made Samantha her Sarah Palin shirt after copying a newspaper article about her visit with Sarah Palin, onto printer fabric and fusing it to a T-Shirt.  She loves it.   Aaron's quilt was made in 4 days - I didn't get much notice that is what he wanted.   But I had to do it - because Grandma's just do those sorts of things.  Jacob didn't have as many specifics - but he loves to read and got books.

My daughter is inspiring me to keep up with my Blog.   I can't believe my last posting was in October.   I've made quilts since then and taken photographs since then.......no gardening however, except on my windowsill.  I'll try to get some photos and posts added.