Well, beat me with the wet noodle! I hadn't realized it's been more than a month since I'd updated the blog! Guess I should update the March list, even tho I posted thruout the month. I did get my list finished, except the curtains...matter of fact, it's still on the list of undone! April saw a bunch of new stuff started. I now have two...yes two! Judy Niemeyer's patterns going together. Everyone (or so it seems) at  the guild is doing Desert Sky. I didn't particularly like that final pattern, but one of the gals was doing it more like a New York Beauty & I really liked it, so am doing something similar. The other one is Bird of Paradise, one of her older patterns. I have everything cut out now & awaiting assembly.  I also got a light bulb moment on a UFO that's about 6 years old. I started a lonestar quilt & had titled it "Texas, America's shining star", but my imagination & talents didn't match for quite awhile, so it got put up. Along came an applique pattern called "Liberty". It is the head of a bald eagle. So, I decided to put it in the lower right corner of the lonestar & put the lonestar in the upper left corner & do something else around the rest of it. I sent this idea to another longarmer. A few weeks later, she emailed me telling of her conversation of me putting the eagle in the middle of the lonestar! OK, lets take a look at it that way. WAY COOL! Now I just had to figure out the rest of it!  Think, think, think......jumped off the internet & saw my screensaver! There it was! The new name for the quilt??  "All gave some....some gave all"  Sorry, no more details, you'll have to wait for the reveal on this one!!
I also saw mechanical problems with Queenie in April. Her stitching got all out of whack & after talking to the tech, we ordered a new "Y" cable to the encoders. Sure enough! I had a broken wire to the forward/backward encoder, causing her to skip stitches & make for some really funky looking stitching! All this on a Queen sized Eleanor Burn's Nite & Day quilt that I wanted to put in the Terrell quilt show!  It took me 4 full days to get the stitching out of that quilt! Now it's back on the UFO pile for now.
At guild, we had decided to do these little thread catchers to go into the goody bags for the TAQG rally in July. We only need 500 of them! So, I headed up the gals to sew them. I did 25 of them & may have to do more to fill in the gap of others not doing theirs. They're quick & easy to make, so not a problem there.
I've finally gotten to get back to Queenie. My good customer, Cheryl, sent me 2 quilts to be done & I just finished them. First is a scrappy from the Quiltingboard mystery series.

The next one is a paper pieced one that she made for her new granddaughter. I had a fun time quilting it! I love it when Cheryl says "do your thing & make it pretty"!

Well, that's the latest from my playroom! Stay tuned for more later as I have another customer quilt going on Queenie tomorrow!

 

Well, here's one that wasn't on the March list of things to do. A customer quilt came in! This pinwheel quilt came in from a new customer in Delaware. It measured 97"X97".  It was her 3rd quilt - ever! The last 2 were done about 3 years ago, so, in essence, this was her first one.  I got it on Thursday & had it done & back in the mail today (Monday). How's that for a fast turn around??

Well, it's been a little hecktic around here, what with Spring Break for the kids, but I have managed to get some quilting done!
I did finish Delectable Mountains. I did finish the QOV & is now hanging in the dining room.
I've also done the 2 T-shirt quilts. Somehow I had a few of doing them & found out they really are easy to do once you get the shirts stabilized. Here they are!

That's Doug from next door holding his & the other went to his sister as a housewarming gift.

 

The other thing I accomplished is the small quilt to go to TAQC for auction.

I used Derwent Inktense pencils to do all the painting. It was really fun to do & not hard at all. This one, along with "New Heart" are going to be auctioned at the rally for TAQC in June.

 

I also started a Judy Niemeyer quilt. Linda, in our guild, offered to teach "Desert Sky" to the members of our guild, but I'm doing "Bird of Paradise", so took it to guild & got it started. Believe it or not, I'm actually following directions! One of the gals is doing her Desert Sky differently than the rest & I really like how hers is turning out & may go back & do one like it. She did the light & dark of each color in each of the blocks, turned them into circles & it really looks sharp with a black background. They look more like a Mariner's Compass the way she's done it.

 

Went to the Dallas Quilt Show too. Test drove other longarm machines. Found out my skills have outgrown Queenie! Time for an upgrade! I've narrowed it down to 3 machines. Tin Lizzie, Handiquilter or APQS. Decisions, decisions!!  Lots of beautiful quilts at the show, lots of vendors to spend money at & just had a great time!  The Tyler Quilt Show is tomorrow, so will go to that with one of the gals from the guild.

We've also got Marti Michell in the neighborhood doing a trunk show tomorrow night & a retreat this weekend. Can't do the retreat, but am going to try & make the trunk show! 

 

Well, srcatch one of March's off the list! Just finished quilting Delectable Mountains! I pieced this top a couple of years ago & put it aside to do on MY longarm! Well, it still took awhile, but it's finally quilted!

Well, I'm a little late posting the February report, because the internet service was being switched! Sorry bout that!! But we're back up & running with a much faster speed than before & can now upload/download a whole lot quicker than ever.
February list:
1. QOV - finished & hanging in dining room.
2. Customer's baby quilt - done & delivered
3. 2 Scrappies - one done & delivered, other on design wall
4. New Year's QOV - all pieced, awaiting quilting, bought backing for it.
5. Delectable Mountains - loaded on Queenie now
6. Santa - finished piecing, awaiting quilting
7. Wholecloth - still designing, threw out origional design & started over.
8. Coloring baby wholecloth - gave up & put it aside
9. Grandmother's Flower Garden - I'm getting there!

I also did a few not on the list!
Red Bird - finally got the binding on it!
Baby quilt - bound
Forever in our hearts - quilted & finished
Placemats & table runner for dining room table - complete!
Here's the table placemats & runner

And here is Forever in our Hearts:

Now on to March's list!
1. Finish & deliver scrappy
2. Deb's curtains ( been putting this off awhile!)
3. Day & Night - get it quilted & sent off
4. Delectable Mountains - is loaded on Queenie right now, get 'er done!
5. New Year's QOV - get it quilted & finished, sent off
6. Doug's T-shirt quilts - this turned into 2 quilts, get them done & delivered
7. Do the new mystery on Quiltingboard - it's a table runner & I'm making 2 of them.
8. Two small quilts for the Guild
If time allows, knock out at least 1 UFO.

The UFO pile is slowly but surely dwindling. I think I'm down to 3 of them. That's for piecing, then we have the quilting & binding to do on them to finish them up. I'm getting there! But it looks like I'm going to be spending more time on Queenie this month than anything else.
I'm also helping my neighbor make a Storm at Sea king size quilt. This will be his 1st quilt! Right now I've given him the homework of cutting all the pieces out. Then the sewing begins! This is not an easy pattern for a first time quilt, but he insisted, so here we go! Will keep everyone posted as to progress.
Til next time.............Happy Quilting!!

Yesterday was a fun day in the studio. On my "to do" list was placemats for the dining room table & kitchen island. Since it's nautical themed, I chose a simple anchor for the center & rope around the perimeter. Dug out some light blue batik & started drawing out the area & stenciling all the placemats (all 10 of them!) Then got to thinking I needed a table runner for the center of the table. What to do? Think, think, think......I thought I'd use the anchors & rope like on the placemats, but the runner is going to be 60" long. Hmmmm....... Well, lets go explore my library for ideas. Oh! Mariner's Compass! I'll put that in the center & anchors on either end with the rope surround! Cool! Then I remembered an interesting tutorial I had seen on Quiltingboard.com just last week about a dresden plate with spikes! Off to the computer to find it. In the tutorial, all the spikes are the same length. I wanted more of the Mariner's compass look, so I varied them to two sizes, tall & short & alternated them. Here's the result!

Well, I see it's been 3 weeks since I posted anything! Didn't realize I'd been without the main computer that long! I could have posted with the ipad or laptop, but it's a real pain!

I correspond regularly with some other longarm quilters. Some have blogs, some don't. Anyway, a couple of us have been taking classes on Craftsy to better design & quilt. One thing about quilting, it's never a destination, it's always a journey! And we so enjoy the ride!  What a couple of us are doing is designing wholecloth quilts. Not huge ones, but nice wallhanging size. Or at least  mine is! The one element we have in common is roses being used as medallions. We all admire Irena Bluhm's techniques, but want to take it further. So, instead of piecing quilts, we're painting them!

Here's a sample of the painted center. Not perfect, but it's a work in progress. I did several samples & did each one with a different technique. The one I like the best is the Derwent Inktense pencils. But instead of using water to turn them into ink, I used a fabric medium. The water made the colors bleed too much, but the medium kept the ink right where I wanted it.

I'm already on the 2nd draft of the quilt. Too many aspects of the 1st draft I wanted to throw out, so I started over. Here's a corner from the first draft that has the possiblity of staying in the quilt. With some modifications, of course.
Stay tuned! There's more to come!!