Saturday, May 23, 2015

Saturday finishes!

The day started early here at Wazoo. I had to have Kay's quilt done by 10:30, and I decided at the last minute to add the words MOULIN ROUGE  in one border. I had most of it done by 10:00 and was working on the red outlining of the words when they came. I finished the quilting while chatting with Kay and her husband, and completely forgot to take pictures of it finished! Oh well, Kay is adding embellishments, and may have the quilt at guild on Tuesday, so I will take photos then. So sorry!
Here is the picture of the quilt before I started
Mr Wazoo finished his quilt early, too, so we were off to the grocery store before lunchtime.
This is a new pantograph we recently bought. I like it.
Beautiful birdie backing
It was a glorious day here in the Georgia mountains, a sunny 75 degrees, no humidity, and a gentle breeze. Fabulous! Tim did some gardening while I started the laundry (yuk) and then quilted and got the binding made and sewn to the scrappy trips quilt from last week. It has a bias stripe for the binding; quite jolly!
My scrappy quilt, all finished except for hand sewing.
Edge to edge pattern, Quirky.
The back is a sheet from Walmart. Simple label.
Now, it's time for sweet corn, a piece of steak from the grill and a baked potato! Yum!
Happy weekend to you all!

My next project. Blocks made and on the design wall!

Friday, May 22, 2015

Fun with quilting at the Wazoo studio!

Mr Wazoo and I had the machines humming today; him with a customer quilt and me with the quilt for an AQS award winning quilter! I could be intimidated by it, but the quilt is so beautiful, I loved working on it all day.
Stitch in the ditch and backgrounds done!

Kay painted all the background images!

Toulouse in his gloryTomorrow, I will finish the outer border, and perhaps the lighter skin areas. I am having the maker look at it first to see if she wants quilting on those parts. It is difficult to quilt over skin areas in quilts. Skin doesn't have lines all over it, so is a challenge to portray with thread on fabric. That is why Kay's quilts are such masterpieces. She can make a realistic portrait from snips of fabric. I am in awe.

Her face is really well done in fabric!

Hand shading and quilting

Where I left the quilt for the night...she looks like she is offering me some wine!
This is the stock photo that inspired the quilt. It reminded me of someone...

No, not Molly!

Cristina Hendricks!

Oh yeah, totally off the subject...we had a turkey in the back yard this morning. I tried to take her picture, but she was skitterish and ran into the woods when I came outside. I will be watching for turkeys now, as well as the elusive hummingbirds!
Now...where's my wine?

Thursday, May 21, 2015

Scrappy top finish

Today was guild sewing day, and we were all like a hive of busy bees. The ladies cut backings and battings for the quilts made at the Sewcial, and I sewed up another 2-3-2-6 to be quilted later.
When I got home, I spent a couple of hours sewing the remaining blocks and putting together the scrappy-trip top.
Scrappy trip quilt top
The UPS man finally arrived at 6:30 with my customer's batting, so tomorrow I will be at the machine early, working on the custom quilt that needs to be done now!
A sneak peek at a small part of the quilt I start on tomorrow
My friend in Wisconsin dyes fabric for fun and did this wonderful duvet cover with her daughter. It is called ice dyeing. I had never heard of it, but think it is absolutely beautiful!! Something more to think about...
Ice dyed duvet cover
Ice dyeing in progress
Finished ice dyed Tees

Meanwhile, Mr Wazoo finished this pretty bargello and got it in the mail back to the customer. Everyone works hard at Wazoo! 

What did I do this week?

I haven't been blogging this week...mea culpa! Many of you may not know that I have fibromyalgia, and sometimes I have a bad time with it. This was the week. Everything goes on like normal, but I feel like a 100 year old woman trying to swim in mud!
Quilting is my therapy! I have seen signs that say that, but for me, it is reality. Standing at the big machine was harder than usual, but I did get some work done. Plus, the hand sewing helped me relax in the evening. Thank goodness for quilting!
So, here is what I did this week. Not too shabby.
I finished this bird quilt. The quilting was just fun.
I did some trapunto on all the parrots
In the border, some little squares and lots of straight lines.
I got out the 2 1/4 inch bin and sorted red/ light/ dark
Then, I sewed the strip sets and tubes...
Made the blocks...
I am playing on the design wall as I make blocks
I have great scraps!

Tim did his part this week, too. (thanks to a couple of rainy days)
What did you do this week? I hope you had some quilting therapy!
Molly laid low with me this week. Thank you, Molly!
She sleeps with her flea toy

Sunday, May 17, 2015

Odds and Ends

I had a very good day yesterday. The morning started with a customer quilt too big for Mr Wazoo's machine. I'm beginning to really like the 'modern' quilts. They can call them modern, but everything old is new again when reinvented through new eyes. This simple single Irish chain is modern because of the background and chain fabrics. Unconventional, but sophisticated and lovely.
                                         

The second quilt is also on the modern side, but more conventional than the first. I love the poppies!
After finishing up that quilt, I decided to dig through the pile of UFOs and finish something of mine. I chose this 9 patch pizzazz that I started in a class I taught as my sample in progress. Usually, I will have samples of the quilt I am teaching both totally done and in progress, so I can show the students how it is assembled along the way in class. This one just needed borders, so I played around with the two fabrics and ended up here. I like it, and will quilt it later...still a UFO.

With about an hour and a half to quitting time ( I try not to go beyond 8 or 9 hours in the studio) I pulled some fabrics from the stash and made another 2-3-2-6 charity quilt. Fast and fun! All quilted and binding on, I will add it to the hand sewing pile.
I had just enough of the vintage sheet from Goodwill to do the back!

After supper, I hand sewed the binding of three charity quilts while watching  An Affair To Remember on PBS. One of my favorite movies with Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr. Sentimental and sweetly kitchy. Today, I will be in the studio after cleaning (yuk) the kitchen and vacuuming the upstairs. It has to be done, and alas, I have no maid!
Have a swell Sunday!

The rose bush is going crazy! And the scent is luscious!

Mountain laurel in the front yard. 

Aren't the flowers pretty?

The rhododendrons are coming on, too!

Even our transplanted Christmas tree is bigger!!