January Walk

Hi! It was so delightful to get out for an afternoon walk today! If last week's temperatures ''plummeted'', this week they ''soared''.

A  friend from Arizona asked me if the extremes of weather here didn't bother me, and I said no. I like cold weather, I love a crisp January day just as much as I love a hot sunny day in July.

What gets to me is the wind! It was really blowing today and 45 didn't feel so warm away from my sunny deck.

But the fresh air and sunshine made me feel happy...

Big waves, rough chop today.

Yellow ball merrily dancing along the tide line...

Wind corrugations:

Outer dunes entirely reconfigured, maybe during last week's blizzard?

 

I had one of those disconcerting suddenly "lost'' feelings, when the landscape changes so dramatically in just a few days.

Not all who wander are lost, I tell myself, as I hike over the dunes searching for the path that leads over the dunes  to home.

I've mentioned here on my blog and in my Christmas story [top of page] that here at the beach, discarded once live Christmas trees are recycled as dune erosion protection.

The trees saving the dunes...

Sometime the notion works, sometimes it doesn't. But we all like the idea of our Christmas trees living on as the bones and skeleton of our dunes. There is a very large scar or cut in the high dunes. It has not yet recovered from H/ Sandy. The trees seem like a good plan!

Birds---sparrows or snow buntings----fluttered busily in the bayberry trees and live black scrub pines.

 

 

 

 

 

And then I headed back home for a cup of tea and some etsy listing. Here's my new tea infuser--- Fred the Tea Man. Isn't he so cute?

 

 

 

love

lizzy

gone to the beach~~~~

 

 

Polar Express and More on The Lost Quilt

Hi guys! As I sit here typing, my Weather Bug icon is showing the temperature dropping (plummeting! as the news guys love to say) and the winds are rising steadily. By dawn we're told to expect  9* with 50 MPH winds,
The Polar Vortex is comin' to the Beach!
This is BAD. I still haven't put away all my shorts. I am an eternal optimist. Shot down this frigid winter and hunkering down  with my sewing and some new books. What a treat to have a real book or two, instead of only words on my nasty new Kindle Touch thing. [hate-hate-hate].

Today I put away every single evidence of Christmas cheer, except the pink china which will wait til later. The tree is gone [to the beach!], the angels are back in their beds, the stockings are no longer hung. Neutral rules.

I'll add some blue and black later. I have my pink tulips to add a hint of someday-spring-will-come. And my cute red heart magnet that I use for a thimble wrangler.

 

Current project: The Lost Quilt. It should have a cuter name...ideas? You'll remember I didn't win it on eBay a few weeks ago.

I was sad. That week a friend and I happened to stop into JoAnn's Fabrics (we don't have a real quilt shop out here) and I was pleasantly surprised to find enough fabrics to inspire me to make my own version.

Isn't this toile amazing. It will be the backing.

Of course all the fabrics had to be treated with Retayne, then washed, dried, ironed.

I found some  authentic turkey red squares c.1875 in my stash to be the flower.

If you look closely, below,  you'll ses that there's a shadow fabric behind the red. I am auditioning double pinks for those areas.

 

 

Double pinks, one very modern, one antique.

 

I may regret the pink idea and will then have to change to a tone on tone calico.
I even found a red stripe [which photographed very oddly] that might work for the striped border. Another idea is to have the original ombre printed out on Spoonflower. Not sure it's a must-have so I bought the red and white stripe too.

original

 

 

 

possible, below/ right

 

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I'm a somewhat old-fashioned quilter. My dad taught me to sew and quilt when I was a very tiny girl, and he learned from his mother---long before rotary cutters were invented. So I don't use a rotary cutter. And I don't own or use Electric Quilt to tell me how to make a quilt block.

I make patterns.

You can estimate the proportions of a design like this, you can even print it out larger and measure the photograph. (36" x 36" = two  9'' baskets and an 18" central design which then has 1.5 '' borders and a 15" rose of sharon block, for example). You can see my scribbly notations, below.

 Then I make a scale drawing and make templates :

and/ or note the triangle dimensions, for in this case the baskets. You count on the diagonal---there are 6 segments, so the hs triangles must finish 1 1/2" to make a 9" basket on point. See?

 

 

I do use my printer to copy the templates onto freezer paper sometimes. I usually do needleturn applique, I only use freezer paper for big pieces, like the flowers here.

My machine quilter told me when she did The Porch Quilt, that I am not a very good appliquer, lol. (oooh, I was crushed!). So I am trying hard to be neat and do teeny stitches. I plan to sew earlier in the day so I can actually see these supposed stitches...

 

JoAnn's also had some really good sales and coupons, not just for quilt fabrics either. I picked up these beautiful home decor remnants for only a few dollars. I think they will be coffee table runners. Or accent pillows? I just love the soft beachy colors and the lovely linen and delicate embroidery.

 

 

 More projects are in the planning stage! Plus some finishes, aaaallllmost done.  And I have a big basket of French Farmhouse-inspired hearts to complete too, so if you like my lavender hearts, keep an eye on my etsy shop next week?

love

lizzy

gone to the beach...

 

 

Back to the Beach for the New Year

snowy beach

Hello! What a beautiful day it is today! Too bad I am snowed in. And oooh, is it cold. Same for most of us, I am thinking. I can't open my back door. I took this pix by sticking my phone out the 2" crack that the drifts allow.

Despite being stuck inside for today I am feeling re-invigorated by the gorgeous open and empty beach and I am trying to again have my daily hikes, to rebuild some stamina.
I have a new iPhone app called Map My Walk:

Kinda cool. I love the somewhat inaccurate map that clearly shows my meandering trail.
But MMW sent me a hilarious email earlier this week. Above the purple line it says"Hi, you kicked laziness in the butt in 2013. Bask in the glory." LOL. Picture me, like, basking, please.

Because if you then scroll down you can see I walked FOUR times with a total of 3 1/2 miles. Sure I just got the app...and I forget to use it sometimes...but before my sudden illness last July I regularly walked 3-5 miles six times a week! But if I look closely, I can see that even with this small record, I have walked further each day [inhaler in my pocket, sigh] and with faster times. Inspiration/ incentive indeed.

So---off to the beach.
Before the snow came: dawn, New Years Day. The year dawned so sweetly, so gently.

Note how the sun is so far to the east-southeast.

I took my annual New Years walk. Snow squalls towards New Jersey [below, far right] hint of the storm to come.

The big tankers all lined up, waiting for the Port of New York to reopen on the 2nnd.

Quiet ocean, smooth and flawless beach.

A beautiful sea duck, a merganser, I think, all by herself. (the males have a sort of mint green with their white patches.)

 

 

 

 A few treasures, finally! My pockets have been so empty. The black disk is a mystery. It must be man-made, shaped with straight sides, like a biscuit!

And a doggy tag. I hope only the tag was lost long ago and not the dog herself. ''Sasha".  Should I send it to the owner? Or use it on one of my found object bracelets? I can't decide.

Indoors today, I tried hard not to clean or dust or put away the Christmas stuff. Instead I am making lavender hearts and putting finishing touches on last year's quilts. Hot chocolate in my mug.

Wishing you all a cozy, happy weekend.

 love 

lizzy

gone to the beach..........

 

click to enlarge the photos, please....