May-June Quilts and Mo Had a Party!

 

Hi everyone. I just can't seem to get away from posting on Fridays, can I?  And for someone who feels like not much got done recently, I seem to have a lot to share. But first---ugh. Spring chores--like cleaning the air conditioners, putting in the screens and so on. I try to do one chore each day.

Quilts: first up is this fun doll/ teddy quilt, mde for a friend's little girl.

I was inspired by friend Julie who makes adorable doll quilts for her granddaughters.

I had fun with the fabrics, no rules. I just couldn't make it the requested grey.

Used a few special to me fabrics. It was a smidge hard to actually use up the paperdolls and the honey jar bears.

And I've been saving the tiny seashells ''ditsy print'' for ages. Wish I had a lot more of it.

I tried to make the quilt nice but not too precious to use.

Worked on Cartwheels, but it is not pressed yet. 

Still piecing the backing. Ironing and pressing are  difficult for me to do now.

Mo approved both projects.

Streak of Autumn Lightning is complete! 

It's 50" square, a good size for me to handle and useful for display and stacking.

The quilting is so beautiful, by Lori C. of Quilter's Imagination.

I decided not to wash this quilt. I know the orange border has unstable dye. 

It's really very clean except for this one stain that looks like a needle prick bloodstain. I wish I had cut that section out before I finished the quilt.

I  had a woman on IG tell me to put the bloodstained quilt in the freezer for 24 hours to remove the stain. How would that even work? And my frozen foods go where? I was baffled.

Note the subtle color changes with the various double pinks used.

Previously when I have posted pics of the vintage PA Mennonite [?] top, I have gotten verbal eye rolls and shrugs because it is, yes, extremely bright. But it is a genre colorway of that area and period. And it is going to look fantastic in the fall with pumpkins and gourds in my big wooden bowl. Trust me. No shabby white or minimalist grey Autumns planned here.

I have finished the hand applique of my Marsh quilt's crows. Just have to machine sew their branches.

Deck sewing time is always productive. What will be next? [I have not touched my May planned stars though. I think the sheer numbers of 8 big stars and 4 giants put me off. I will now tackle one at a time]. I can work on my Gathering Love Pineapple quilt*; or knit? I haven't cut my TQC Tiny Handsewed project at all. I am held back by the notion of marking the seams, color me Lazy. Here is blog friend Penny's adorable version. She does such beautiful work always.

*As with my long-ago set aside lighthouses quilt, I may never get back to Gather Love, I can't at the moment imagine a time when we will all joyously sit at my table in friendship and love. Changes and Covid have defeated that dream.

Every day I sew at the machine I try to make an hourglass or two for my next year's Antique Block Challenge.  if indeed Lori does one. see this year's, on Humble Quilts 

 https://humblequilts.blogspot.com/2022/05/humble-quilt-antique-block-challenge.html

I ''got gay'' as my dad used to say when one got carried away by reckless enthusiasm [nothing to do with LGBT / LGBTQIA+ , like rainbows...]. And so, besides the red/ neutral triangles, I decided I'd do a few other colors sprinkled in.

At first last week I thought omigosh, disaster, stop that! right now! But today taking the pics in different light I kinda like the other colors.

Here is just red/neutral for comparison.

I think Giraffe at the Pyramids is so funny and cute, I have been saving him for years.

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Wednesday was Mo's Adoption Day anniversary. Eight years! He has certainly been a dear companion and quilt advisor, if not the cuddliest pug.

There was a party hat, scrambled eggs breakfast!, jerky sticks, and doggy ice-cream. No guests, Covid has changed that sort of fun. Not that Mo cared.

And the day was gorgeous! [for anyone new, this is our view from my deck during sewing hour with Mo each summer.]

more doings soon!~

have a good weekend.

love 

lizzy 

gone to the beach....

PS I have to share this, poor photos and all. I was very thrilled to see that there is a new osprey nest near my house. I was out with L and I noticed a hovering ''hawk'' or osprey near the main / only/ road. Then I spied this nesting pole, now set up near decrepit power lines, either by the power company or county? The nest visibly had a mom sitting on it, daddy flying close patrol nearby. I hope we can get back for better pictures. Oddly it is so close to the road but somewhat inaccessibly located on the edge of a town beach park, for which we have no passes or access during the summer.

For some reason big nests like this make my skin crawl, seem icky, but I love that these once endangered birds are proliferating again here.

                                          

Beach, sky, flowers

Out and About - New T-Shirts and some Sidewalk Peeping

 

Hello hello! It is soggy here after last night's big rain. Wet June has arrived. Last week we had one very hot day and I suddenly realised that my old ratty summer tee shirts, three years old at best! were no longer acceptable as post-pandemic I now run into people as I walk Mo. Somehow when hiding behind behind a mask and wearing a winter coat it doesn't seem to matter what one wears, but now?  

And as for now, I am very confused: Covid is rampant here especially among vaccinated people; do I get the fourth shot or not. Masks are not mandated but suggested strongly; articles are appearing saying that people who refuse to wear masks are self indulgent, self entitled narcissists! Well, oops, I am no entitled Karen person, I don't think, but I do hate wearing a mask--- I can't breathe, they trigger my severe claustrophobia/ panic attacks, and with the eyeglass fogging, a mask makes my vision even worse.

Of course in the throes of needing summer clothes I forgot all that and L and I trundled off to Old Navy in her new  SUV, lah di dah.

The store looked neater than it usually does, which was nice.

And not crowded. I did wear my mask.

I loved seeing the 4th of July tee shirts!

Oh such memories that brings back, of my kids being tiny and every summer they'd get a new 4 th of July Tee. 

I wish I'd saved them all, I'd make a memory quilt.

So here is my haul!

Six t-shirts, 2 tank tops, 2 summery roll up pants [hems roll up], and  beachy top for $150.oo, includng NYS 10%-ish sales tax.

Yes I know the clothes are rather cheap and not quality or even ''cool'', but they are cool to wear and suit my needs.

Tees:

Tanks, cute frilly hems.

Pants, one washed chino, my fave. And one washed linen.

[the shorts selection was odd---sizes small, XS, and 4XL---nothing in between.]

And here is the adorable beach top. 

I know it's too gaudy and my kids will hate it if indeed they see it, I know it's too young for me. But I love clothes like this. "Boho". And if I never wear it I will save the fabric, a hand blocked India cotton print. Mango and raspberry--delish!

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Back home, now that it got cooler again, Mo and I have been enjoying our walks despite year two of local roadworks and pothole fixing. Hope to get to the secret walkway soon, but for now we take a different route, especially as poor Mo has been so unwell.

More iris. These are the kind I especially recall from my childhood, the two tone version. We played baseball in the fields of an abandoned farm and though the house and barns were gone, the flowers remained, daisies, black-eyed susans, lilacs and iris especially. We'd dig the iris up and bring them home for my dad to plant under my mom's climbing scented dark pink rose bush. My brother moved those iris around for years, he may still have some.

These are weeds, but this variety, the striated blue, are so pretty. 

We call them snake wort.

Wild millefiori rose, small but form pretty berries and smell good too.

And the first week of June is rhododendron week in the northeast. 

I am not a fan of purplle rhodies, but up close they really can be quite lovely.

The budding hydrangeas look hopeful, so green.

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Then I put the transitional pink quilt on the bed for a week or two. It's a flea market rescue and finish you probably recall. I enjoy studying the fabrics, like this block using ''double pink'' calicos and plaid. The pinks vary and even when the same classic pattern, the colors are different. Everything was used.

Oddly I always thought this quilt was a Chimney Sweep block, but it is not. This is the blue May quilt---Chimney Sweep or Album , you can see they are not the same at all.

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And I have my summer sewing box all set up and ready for deck time afternoons, as soon as I finish getting the deck ready for use. Waiting for a friend to put in the umbrella and help sweep and for new white canvas windscreens [July!? $$$$]

I was thrilled this morning to see the first coreopsis in bloom. Carefully deadheaded it should bloom all summer.

Have a great weekend.

                                          

love 

lizzy 

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

no IG art class this week due to Queen E's Jubilee, so I computer drew my iconic beach walk and roses instead. It got very few likes on IG but I love it.

and from Nicky in SA, via Penny, her lovely autumn beach  and evening sky.

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