But this time I have an excuse

I've been moving at quarter to half speed the past month after having a relatively routine surgery. Two more weeks to go before I can be fully released by my doctor. So that's my excuse for not getting a lot done. I have, however, gotten a few little things done.

I decided to bead a little bit of fabric I had thread-played with about four years ago and then stashed in a drawer. I love this sacred hearts fabric and have hoarded little leftover bits for years. Since I had to stay still and rest for the first week after surgery, I pulled out the heart and some beads and got to work. I really like it which is good since I made it for myself.

I also read two novels during my week off, one by Robert Crais and the other by Carl Hiaasen. I love Crais' Joe Pike. I want to understand what makes him tick.

I also took time to walk around our property and photograph the wildflowers. While most of Texas is still in a serious drought, the conditions have improved and we've been seeing rain about once a week. It's often just a light drizzle, but at least things are green and blooming.

We get a few native foxglove every year. They love the rockiest hillock on the property.

Not sure what type of daisy this is. They're tiny flowers.

Another daisy type flower. Fewer but wider petals and bigger across.

The first of several of the yellow flowers on the property.

I love how the petals curl back.

Native snapdragon? So pretty.

Tiny, tiny white flower stalks.

Native mimosa?

Native verbena. Beautiful interspersed with all the yellow flowers.

Texas Thistle before the bloom.

And my absolute favorite, the Mexican Hat. Perhaps because the brick color reminds me of mole?

Hope you are all taking time to accomplish at least the little things--especially the ones you enjoy the most.

Spring

There aren't enough hours in the day to do everything I want--or need--to do. My New Year's resolutions were shot by mid March, but I keep trying to catch up. Here it is, April 1, and I've only read one book so far. It was really good; In the Woods by Tana French. It was one of the books on my list of "to reads"--or rather, the first in the series of books by French on my list. I'd like to read the next one but haven't gone back to Half Price Books. I bought another book on my list for my oldest son Jake's birthday. How Music Works, by David Byrne, looks like a textbook for a music appreciation or music history class. I read a few pages here and there while Jake was home over Spring Break and I hope he brings it home with him at the end of the school year.

So I haven't read one book per month. And I haven't finished all the projects I said I would by this date. I am close to finalizing the layout for a co-worker's baby quilt. I'm sure I won't be done in time for her baby shower on Friday, but I will have it finished before the baby's due date of May 30.

Since I last posted an update here I have done the following, though:

Attended every one of my younger son, Sam's track meets. He has placed in the 100m and 200m dashes at every meet and once in the long jump. Friday is the Jr. High district meet in Brownwood and should be competitive and fun.

Taken a couple of days off during Spring Break to spend with the boys and hubster in downtown Austin at SXSW. That was fun--some strange to fabulous music and great people watching.

Worked in the garden. I have one hollyhock ready to bloom. I planted a few herbs and am holding off on the tomatoes and peppers until these weird little cold snaps end. I hung up another two bird feeders and have kept them full of bird seed. I trimmed the crepe myrtles and planted two new rose bushes. I also bought two purple sages (cenizos) at Wildseed Farms in Fredericksburg last week since we were there for Sam's track meet.

Celebrated Jake's 18th birthday (had a cake delivered to his dorm in Tucson), my Mom's 74th birthday, my Uncle Ramon's 53rd birthday, my father in law's 80th birthday, and my 49th. Mom and I joked that next year we can celebrate our joint 125th birthday.

Got a handyman to come out and replace sagging posts in the carport with really stout ones--no more anxiety that the next big windstorm will knock the whole thing down.

Not too bad considering I have the day job in downtown Austin M-F. I think I'll update my list for the next quarter of the year, April through June, and then compare the list to what I actually did. It helps me see that I spent my time doing important family stuff. Happy Spring.

Feeling Productive

Yes, I am actually feeling productive. Doesn't happen that often. I think I like this feeling.

As I mentioned yesterday, I decided at the last minute to make my boss a wine bag from a pattern in a magazine I'd just bought. Well, I finished it today--and early too--around 2pm. I think it looks super nice. It helps to have beautiful hand-dyed fabric.

I, of course, did not follow the directions faithfully. I used a satin stitch on the handle edge instead of a bias binding edge because the pattern calls for a really thin binding edge and it was a bear to get on. After a couple of attempts I gave up and decided to just satin stitch it. It still looks nice. The handles are not as firm as they would be with the binding edge, but I loaded the bag with a couple of bottles and it held up well.

And here's the list of books I need to start gathering so I can try and make my way through them this year. I'm a month behind and I am really stretching myself since I usually like easy reads. These are "serious" books on the whole, with non-fiction and fantasy thrown in for good measure. If I absolutely hate one I've started to read I've given myself permission to switch it out with a fluff book (say, something by Robert Crais or Carl Hiaasen).

Home, Toni Morrison

Mortality, Christopher Hitchens

Mr. Penumbra's 24 Hour Bookstore, Robin Sloan

Wild, Cheryl Strayed

How Music Works, David Byrne

Why Jazz Happened, Marc Myers

The Stonecutter, Camilla Lackberg

Broken Harbor, Tana French (this is the fourth in the series so I'll start at the beginning)

Dearie-The Remarkable Life of Julia Child, Bob Spitz

The Black Count, Tom Reiss

2312, Kim Stanley Robinson

All Yesterdays, Darren Naish, John Conway & CM Koseman

Now, where do I start? I think I'll try the Tana French books since they're murder mysteries. Hope I can find the books at a local library. I don't like buying books for myself anymore--they're so expensive and so many of them are so pedestrian. I do love buying books for kids and for my sons especially.

You know another thing I dislike? Sundays. It puts me on the verge of a new workweek and I find it impossible not to start planning what I need to get done. Oh well, three good things are happening this week. (1) The junior high track season starts for Sam, my baby, on Wednesday afternoon. (2) My firstborn, Jake, celebrates his 18th birthday on Friday. Such a big birthday and he's away in college in Tucson. I'm taking a big birthday box to the post office tomorrow. So glad he told us today that he plans to come home for Spring Break--hmm, to see us or to go catch as many bands as possible at SXSW? (I know the answer.) (3) I get to deliver the quilts to the triplets, A, L and J.

So there's a lot of good to anticipate this week as well as all the work. I hope you are anticipating a great and productive week yourselves. Hasta luego.

Keeping up with my New Year's Resolutions--sort of

I resolved to finish one project and read one book per month in 2013 and I finished three projects this month--the triplet's quilts--but I didn't read any books. Maybe next month I'll read two books to catch up. Because I know I have more than one project I "need" to finish in February. Which may be a bit tougher than usual given that track and field season starts mid-February. My younger of two sons runs track. Last year he was the 7th grade District Champ in the 100 meter dash. This year he's running the 100m again but also trying the long jump. So we'll be traveling once a week to his meets from February 22nd through the first or second week of April. Then there's baseball season. Although my older son isn't playing ball in college, I still plan on catching a few Liberty Hill High School games. They are so much fun!

I am currently washing the two boys' quilts to get ready to deliver them--perhaps tomorrow. So excited about that.

First is Baby A's quilt

Then Baby L's

 And then Baby J's

I used the quilt pattern, "playing tag" from the Winter 2011, Quilts and more magazine. I bought some of the feature fabrics at Stitch Lab in Austin and some of the other fabrics are Laurel Burch fabrics from my stash. The binding and backing fabrics are Kona solids (I usually buy those at either Hancock's or Joann's fabric stores using their great coupons).

My list of projects for February has changed somewhat. I'm going to start working on the big sisters' quilts. For Sister R, I plan on using the Sawtooth Star block with University of Texas fabrics. For Sister S, I have a beautiful set of pink and brown cowgirl fabric I bought about six years ago. I am still looking for a nice pattern to use for that quilt. I am going to make the girls large lap/twin coverlet size quilts.

Finally, I have started cutting out the fabrics for a last-minute birthday gift for my boss. And it's not that I'm sucking up--I just truly appreciate having someone intelligent, knowledgeable, calm and professional for a boss. She and her husband are big wine drinkers so I plan to use a pattern for a hostess wine bag (from the Winter 2013, Simple Quilts and Sewing magaine) and add a couple of bottles of wine. The green stripe and purple fabrics are hand-dyed yardage I bought at the Austin Area Quilt Guild's 2010 Quilt Show from Herb Moreland, a fabric artist from the Hill Country. I just love those fabrics. The light purple fabric is a commercial fabric from my stash. My goal is to finish it this weekend. Which means I have to say good-bye for now. 

Next time I hope to have photos of the wine bag and the list of books I plan to tackle this year. Until then, I hope you keep making progress on your projects and resolutions!

Making Progress

I am making slow but steady progress on the triplets' quilts. I sewed the binding to the fronts of the quilts and now only need to hand sew the finished edges to the backs of the quilts. I like how they are looking. After that all that's left is making and sewing on labels and washing them. And the babies are still--well--babies.

I also cut fabric for part of the blocks for a co-worker's baby quilt (due in late May) and for part of the blocks for a boss's retirement (March 31st). Finally, I have decided on making Sawtooth blocks for the quilt top for the triplets' big sister. She wants a University of Texas quilt. She is a huge football fanatic and is even getting ready to play in a boys' league. She is one tough cookie. I still need to decide on a pattern for big sister number two's quilt. I have the fabric but haven't settled on anything beyond that.

My goals are to have the boss' quilt as well as the five kids's quilts done by the end of February. I have five weekends (including one holiday weekend) to get this done. Gotta keep pushing through. Can't wait to see all the finished products and hold them--you know part of the reason I love quilting is the tactile pleasure I get from holding my quilts. It's not all about color and pattern.

And guess who I just heard from? My cousin A, the triplets' mama. I get to babysit them on Saturday so A and her hubster, D, get a little respite. And I get to play with three almost 6-month old tykes!

Dyeing with Jean

I started off my new year with a bang by taking a class this past Saturday with Jean Dahlgren on fabric dyeing using low immersion techniques. Jean spent the morning teaching us the basic vocabulary and techniques of fabric dyeing and we spent the afternoon playing.

Here are the results of my first try. I am so excited to get the chance to add more layers of color and design to some of these samples. I've also already picked out several to quilt. My husband wants me to make some toss pillows from some of the samples. Can't wait to get started.

Oh, and please excuse the quality of the photos. I wanted to get these photos up so quick I just used my iPhone to photograph them on the kitchen table. As you can tell, I didn't press the fabrics either. They were still warm from the dryer.

These first two are pretty plain, although the one on the right  has interesting pink arrowheads. I definitely need to overdye the one on the left because right now it reminds me of Pepto Bismol.

This looks like traditional tie-dye. Could use more color in the white areas. More layers!

I love, love, love the sunflower on the left. I think I want to hand quilt it with great, thick threads and try a bunch of different embroidery stitches on it. The one on the right, although pretty, needs more work.

These two above and the one right below remind me of sunspots. I like them very much.

 And now I move from the reds and oranges through yellow to green and blue.

 I got the yellow rings on the one on the left by wrapping marbles in the fabric with rubber bands and dipping the marbles in yellow dye. The turquoise spots were just scrunched up pieces of fabric held together with rubber bands.

The fabric on the right was pleated along the long edge and dipped in turquoise on one folded edge and in green on the other folded edge.

I folded this piece of square fabric in half along the bias to create a triangle and then folded it another four or five times. I poured the blue dye over the folded edges only.

The windowpanes on the right were the result of pleating in both directions.

 These two make me think of a coral reef or an otter looking up while swimming through a kelp forest. I love them.

These two are again more celestial in nature with the one on the right much more intense. An exploding red dwarf?

And finally, this is the experiment with the fabric "kissing" the drops of dye on a thick plastic sheet. Then I covered the white spots with turquoise. Beautiful.

It was so much fun creating these one-of-a-kind fabrics. Next time I think I'll take notes and pay attention to what I'm doing so that maybe I can reproduce what I like.

French Knots and Machines in Need of Repair

I began working on a small piece (9" x 11 3/4") for the Austin Fiber Artist's non-juried member's wall challenge called "Outrageous Red" that will hang at the Tokyo Electron corporate offices as part of AFA's exhibit there from February 7 - March 8, 2013. I decided I want to do a sacred heart (sagrado corazon) piece. Since taking a stitch class with Mary Ruth Smith a year or so ago, I have been in love with French Knots. So my plan is to create this piece using almost all French knots. This represents about 5 hours of stitch time.

This is going to be interesting. So much work to do before the January meeting. However, I may have more time for this hand work given that my machine is way overdue for a cleaning and its annual maintenance and it began showing it last night. I was making good time quilting one of the triplet's quilts when the bobbin thread started jamming. I am about 3/4 of the way done with the quilting.

I really thought I'd be able to get all three quilted this weekend, but no luck. This is so frustrating. I guess I should bite the bullet and take my machine into the shop. On the bright side, maybe this means I need a second machine. Always the optimist!