what I am doing today (and yesterday)

Just a peek into my inner fabric addict. I am having so much fun with Inklingo and Ping. Both hand sewing. Tell me again why I have so many sewing machines? Actually the Tumbling blocks are partially assembled on my machine. I stitch the first two diamonds of the cube by machine and then when I have a bunch, I sew the inset seams by hand. I am sure there is some kind of rule against this but it hasn't stopped me yet.
And there is the ill fated BE wreath which I started before I began machine appliqueing the other blocks. I rescued and I will finish it- and you know, I think I will finish it and it will blend ok.
O and the string block, inspired by Patti and Hanne and Bonnie Hunter on her Quiltville site. I do have a tub of bright strips but I am rarely in the mood to do them. If I do one a month.....in a couple of years I will have used all my strips.
My sampler blocks are waiting for a setting. Perhaps on point with and alternating plain block. I will have enough of the collection of fabrics to make the setting blocks with. Perhaps in a square in a square color set...hmmmm. We are drawing to a close with this and I have so enjoyed it. It will be such a pleasure to have this quilt in my life:)
So -a good combo of hand and machine, piecing and applique. A healthy variety for the ADD queen apparent.-o and there is that other tumbling block that i keep looking at on the wall -but I really do like the one with the one inch sixty degree triangle...also in Linda Franz' Inklingo Collection.
And I am swapping neutrals with my nickel swapping and swapping strips of one inch diamonds with my Inklingo group this month and should be getting back someDear Jane Spring Fling blocks in a month ....ssssooooo there you have it--from the woman who said she was going to swap no more.
So that is what I am up to here in cloudy NY. Going to the east end for the afternoon, a little shopping a little eating a little visiting.
I have been keeping up with the Finding Water reading and the morning pages-a few lapses here and there. I am really enjoying reading Julia Cameron again. I find I have alot in common with her. The twelve weeeks are going by very fast. I wish we could spend more time on each week. I may slow it down so I can savor it. But I have so much to do...I am hoping I did not forget...o yes the dolls, tba at a later date.....
bfn
bye for now-m

12by12by12 March

Thaw. This image is the Lady of the river, thawing in the spring. You can see the bits of vegetation still imbedded in the ice and all around the world springs to life.Made with fabric bits, lace,netting, a block from Dear Jane, crayon and thread coloring.

checking in and Thursday pic day

Did morning pages. That is about all.
All my spare time has been spent in my sewing room which is how I like to spend it.Between work and sewing I do not have alot of idle time. I am not generally an idle person.I mailed out all the stuff I needed to mail in the last week so I am feeling pretty unencumbered.I still have dollies to dress but I doubt if I can make the deadline of April one for the contest. Maybe if I spend Sunday working on it.
Basil thinks he belongs upon me when I sit here on the couch with my computer. Note how his arm is wrapped around mine. Usually, when I am talking to you, this is where I am. This picture is for Thursday's Create a Connection-picture day! I am a little late as usual. It is nice place for bloggers to meet and make connections. Each month there are swaps and different hosts to keep it lively. Link is in title.
Another create a connection exercise:
1-Jana's create a connection stuff:-Random things-I am allergic to cats, my first job was filling up pill capsules used to make swirly designs in bottles(think lava lamps) in Dorchester, Massachusetts in 1969 and once I stepped barefoot on a frog. I can't think of anything more important.
2- I hate board games, I read voraciously and have a pretty keen memory though not photogenic-is there such a thing as audiogenic? I hear your voice once and I will remember it. I collect lots of things! Sewing machines( I have ten) fabric paint yarn thread glass tea friends experiences books paper books, books books......books ideas children hahaha
3- I love to try new things all the time so if there is an art medium I have not tried, hmmm , maybe architecture or spaceship designing.
I love to paint and write and make quilts not necessarily in that order.
how-to website? www.quiltville.com, www.quilterscache.com

to hershey bar

Linda can you email:)me- your address is bouncing!! Thanks for stoppong in a visiting my blog!

Baltimore Elegance Block

Crossed stems with slightly wacky yoyo roses.
Fortunately I am not a perfectionist but as the day progressed and I finished the stitching and made the roses and centers I began to really like this block inspite of its flaws. It is an earnest sort of block-a block that means well. And I do like it . Really I do.

Pussy willows survived the freeze!
Will look for hyacynth and daffodills later when I actually leave the house. My plans to embark on a journey to the post office and beyond were abbreviated when Mike came home and we had lunch together. I do love lunch and procrastination. Anyway later we will go and do errands and flower hunting.
Last night a friend called me and asked me if I would let her treat me to breakfast for my 21st anniversary. I had actually forgotten I am 21 years sober today-and it is spring and life does not get any better than this.
My daughter has told me that her some of her friends talk about their parents drinking and she does not share that experience.She says she understands that I can not drink. O but I can! I tell her, but I choose not to, because I love my life the way it is. When I was 26 I decided to change the path that my life had taken and I never looked back. May all your lives be as blessed.
My friend Hedy, who still remembers my anniversary.

icy garden

The snow was hardened so that I cold walk across the top and not break the crust.
Icy bunny and pussywillows

crock pot

Onion soup-five onions and up to a stick of butter-eight hours later, the onions are carmelized and you may add the add the beef broth.I buy the kind in the carton and use one carton. Cut up french or italian bread and greyere cheese or use swiss if you must and pour the soup over it- and melt it all together in the micro wave. If you wish you may broil it to make the cheese melt but it works just as well in the microwave
II
one cut up chicken (you can remove skin if you like), chicken broth (canned or carton does not matter) to cover, jar of pasta sauce, canned mushrooms (i use those tiny cans and the whole mushroom caps since this allows dh to remove them lol, if you like
six or eight hours later, make pasta and serve chicken cattiatore
III
beef cubes-bottom round or bought stew meat, carrots and onions-some peas if you want to add at the end-
can of tomato sauce, worsteshire sauce and ketchup(how much is up to you-we like it spicy) -six to eight hours
make egg noodles and you have goulash with a kick-add jalepinos if you really like it hot.
You can also delete the veggies and used chopped meat and call it sloppy joes or josephinas.

favorite things post

List your favorite(s):
Flower to look at:peony, black eyed susans, cone flowers, roses tulips, forget me nots clematis lilac thymus rosemary chives
Feature of your favorite animal:purrrr, paws
Item in your kitchen: italian pocelain sky blue tile
Item of comfy clothing: (or outfit, if you feel the need!)pjs
Thing to recieve through the mail:blocks from my swap friend
Color on your favorite animal:grey
Food to cook: (be forwarned, we may be asking you for the recipe if it sounds good! lol) crock pot stuff!
Ringtone style:vibrate
Wild animal (or fantasy creature, if you're so inclined):elephant
Outfit to dress a little girl in:what does she like?
Thing to do with snow:walk in it
Weather:autumn crisp but not to cold or cold drizzly days to saty inside and sew.

pincushions that make me smile

I have been keeping up with morning pages-even writing them in the car as I am being driven there- and artist dates. I have been working way too much. My artist dates have been very boring. I admit I haven't been taking them very seriously. I did not get to making my Faces page this month. Things just piled up on me and I had to jettison a few of my projects or go bone crazy. I think I am invincible sometimes and I am really quite sensitive and fragile.
I am so annoyed that blogger is not working for me. I think it has to do with this picassa thing that they are incorporating which doesn't work on a macs. I haven't been able to upload pctures which makes me ornery. Will I have to resort to changing blog hosts? Are they kidding me???
The title link will take you to a really really really fun pincusion site. I hope you like it. Makes me want to go buy embroidery (which I remember giving away by the bundle heehee) thread. Maybe I will hold off on the thread.
I am going go to sulk now.

The Writer's Almanac from American Public Media

The Writer's Almanac from American Public Media
awesome podcasts...omg this is awesome! Follow the lnk for free podcasts from itunes-if you love Garrisin Kiellor check it out. I am enthralled and thrilled. I MISS poetry, I MISS being around other writers.
The chapter from finding water this week is about allowing ourselves to be supported by friends. Well if you have ever been in a Nar Anon meeting you will hear what happens to your friends when your kids starts using. You can kiss life as you know it good bye and that is about all I am going to have to say about that. For now.
So I need to find a writing group, preferably poets, preferably women, who don't question why my stuff is so sad. I write about what I have lived. It is not fiction. I do not write to make any one else sad. It has been how I transform pain into art which=joy.

Another one of my mother's paintings. It is stored at my grandmothers house with some others. I guess I should have brought it home with me but I could not carry it. I could not bear the awful weight of it. Today we received an envelope from her with a video tape called "the Santa Tapes" in it. A black and white video remastered interview from 1975 of a department store Santa. Well I just cain't wait to see this one. She does not enclose a note, nor salutation. She spells my name wrong. With a Y.
I thought I was going to have Friday off so I could sew some sampler squares but I have been asked to work and I can use the money so I will be working straight through the weekend until Monday. Man o man. I hope I can hold up:) However I have printed up some freezer paper patterns and I will get to them one of these days..
Sentimentalstitches
a fun new web site with lots of great links and free patterns for those of us who think we will live long enough to actually make all of the quilts we think we need to make.

Love these blocks!

Aren't these the finest blocks! They just cheer me right up. How can you have a bad day if you get these blocks in the mail?

home at last

Blooper sampler blocks. The middle one was done with water soluble foundation paper and it left the block wrinkly and shrivelly looking. The outer blocks were the second attempt at a block using Seminole strip piecing and I could not for he life of me get the dimensions right.The middle sections are supposed to be equal and square! So all three go onto the blooper pile.
The hearts are keepers. The one on the right has been embellished using my machine decorative stitches. I think it looks way cool. The leafy one is not yet stitched, just fused. I think even simple stitching adds to the block.
On Friday I will do some more sampler blocks. I got my February batch from my trade partner and they are stunning and I think they deserve a whole post to admire them.Coming soon....


Home from work, home from errands. Bloody cold out the wind is howling and I have to go out once more to pick Jay up at the train. Then I am in. I did not do my morning pages, nor pick up a needle tonight and I did not cook either because Mike wanted Chinese food. One of those low energy days, tho I did go to work and that is sometimes all a body can do.

the past-a peek

On the second shelf is my great grandmother's hat block. I credit her with my interest (actually more of a passion or obsession) in sewing. At least the seed was planted, as I watched her make me a jumper for swimming. Apparently I had arrived in Florida with out swimming attire and she set about to fix that. She told me, as I watched her, about ironing the seams open and even about matching gingham checks. It was a blue and white garment, shorts on the bottom, strapped shirt on the top. One piece, like a kids overalls. and it was lined. I think I must have found it beautiful because it has stayed a clear memory all these years. Anyway, my mother, whose little painting you can also see here, gave this hat block to me.
Some one made hats. Was it my great grandmother or her mother? I am not sure, but it was somebody and this is their hat block. Now people probably use plastic ones, or styrofoam. This one is solid heavy wood, perhaps from a hickory tree. Ladies generally don't even make their own hats any more, for church, or gardening, or just to walk down the street, capped by the artfully arranged chapeau. No. Ladies do not wear hats to the same extent as they used to wear hats, as a statement of their station, as protection from the sun, as an elegant and delicately balanced (pinned in place with one of those long and potentially dangerous hat pins) accoutrement. But I wander. My thoughts have a mind of their own. (Groan, ouch, hahaha.) I have not seen my great grandmother in many decades and I do not recall if she ever wore a hat in my presence. But I can recall her voice, reminding me to always, always iron open my seams.

On the design wall

Here are the blocks in progress from 'Ping' and my 'Baltimore Elegance' (or maybe I should call it 'Altantic Elegance'). The two fused blocks , the ship and the hearts, are waiting for me to do the machine applique and the ping is needing to be hand appliqued to the back round. Tonight I am basting some more petals and threading my needles for tomorrow. And waitng for Bailey to get home from her school trip.