It's been awhile since I've posted

I guess that means I don't lead a very exciting life. Rather than doing many art quilts I've been working on trying to use up some of those many scraps that I can't seem to throw away. I've been making child-sized quilts to donate to my guild's Sunshine Quilt project for children. I'm now working on #7 and still have enough scraps for probably two more.
























It's also the time of the year when I make a throw size quilt with my second grade class. This is the tenth year I've done this. In all but 2 years the quilts have been given to a resident of our local care center. Folded in half it can be used as a lap quilt and open it's large enough to cover them when they lay on their beds. Two years the quilts were raffled for local fund raisers. The first raised $1800 for our new playground equipment and the second raised $450 for a project to purchase snack food items and cards, etc. to send to the soldiers in Iraq from our school. This year's quilt will again go to a care center resident.



















After initially complaining about it being a 'girl's project', the boys love doing the machine sewing and hand sewing as much if not more than the girls. You can tell by the photo that they all seem pleased with their product. Here they're shown with a handprint that they hand quilted around. I then mounted them in embroidery hoops and sent them home.

Happy New Year!

I haven't been doing much creatively as of late. Too many other things and not enough time to do a good job or think about what I'm doing. I spent much of Christmas vacation from my elementary teaching job trying to use up some of the many scraps I can't seem to toss and using some of the old fabric I have stashed away. I used them to make 3 small, child-size quilts to give to my local quilt guild's project where the quilts go to children who have been in an accident or removed from a dangerous home situation. I still have LOTS of fabric to use for something along this line.
I am working on a couple of small, more artistic projects of which I'll post pictures later.
I am also an avid bird-watcher so my husband and I have taken some time to search for the few winter birds around this winter. I did add two new life birds (both gulls) in two days time, but had to drive 2 1/2 hrs. for one and 5 1/2 hrs. for the other but well worth it and if you watch birds you'll understand this. If not, wellllll... Today I'm trying to see how many I can tally for the new year of 2007. Thus far I'm up to 14 seen from my warm kitchen window. I'd hoped the snow yesterday would have brought in more species than it has. Maybe it's time for a short walk outside and some very fresh air as a bonus.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We're off to my daughter's soon. It's the first time in many years that I haven't had to cook and clean for a group. Kind of nice to look forward to taking it easier this holiday. It's quite foggy outside, though, so I hope it clears before we have to make the 1 hr. drive there.

I finished the last of the Christmas postcards last night. I'll only send a few to people this year since most will be tossed out anyhow with the regular Christmas cards after the holidays. I've included a photo of a the last two here. Now maybe I can work on something larger again, although the pcs are addictive since they are so quick and varied.

Christmas Cards

Christmas will be here quicker than I'd like. This year I decided to make a few people a fabric postcard for their card. Hopefully they'll decide it's special enough to keep more than just a couple of weeks. I'll try a couple of more before resorting to the usual store-purchased variety for most of those on my list.

The Jabberwock

The latest challenge for my Fast Friday Fabric Yahoo group was to make a quilt in one week that depicted the poem The Jabberwock by Lewis Carol. Talk about difficult! When first read it appears to be a dark poem but since it can mean different things to different people I decided to construct a quilt that wasn't quite so 'dark'. I chose to interpret the challenge and to depict the Jabberwock as winter roaming through the forest, settling in, and darkening all things bright and beautiful for several months. I also decided to use brighter colors to show winter as a season beautiful in its own way.
The leaves seem to be hung on the branch not willing to let go of autumn but one by one will fall to winter's rath, as one is depicted as doing. The chilly winds are blowing across the quilt with a mix of the first snow flakes.
Then since I also belong to a Tiny Textiles Yahoo group with the challenge piece not to exceed 10" in any direction I decided to make this a small quilt to fit this group's parameters, too. It's due on October 31st so the two worked together well. The quiltlet is 10" x 6 1/2" in size.
Today's weather is anything but wintry like. But it sounds as though it will be the last since Halloween is to be quite cool again. We plan to clean out our small pond this afternoon and bring the fish into the basement for the winter. Washing my car is also in the plans. Not often we have 70+ degree temps this late in October.

Hot Air Balloons

Below left: Looking stacked at different heights
Below right: Wakefield, NE from above



For the past 3 years my small community has hosted a hot air balloon festival. Last year was a washout due to rain and strong winds. But this year was perfect! The balloonists were able to fly both Saturday morning and again Saturday afternoon. To me, there's nothing more spectacular than seeing those gorgeous balloons lift so gracefully up and into the blue sky. We've had a family of balloonists stay with us the past couple of years. Lovely family and we enjoy talking to them and learning more about hot air ballooning. If I was 20 years younger I'd have to have one! My husband, Richard, helped out yesterday morning and was rewarded with a flight with the balloonist, Wayne, in his hot air balloon, The Wild Goose. He quickly discovered why I think they're so wonderful. Yesterday afternoon I was fortunate to fly with Wayne. The patterns and colors from above are unbelievable! One floats along in the peace and quiet with only an occasional rush of propane when he fills the balloon with more hot air to keep it
afloat. Wayne said he thought floating at one steady altitude was boring so we were up and down. Once we skimmed the tops of the corn stalks with no harm to the corn and then with a rush of hot air lifted up again. It's an awesome experience and I'd recommend taking a flight to everyone if you haven't had this wonderful experience!













Top left: Inflating 'The Wild Goose'
Top right: Looking up at the parachute from inside the basket.
Below left: Night Glow
Below right: Balloons in the distance at varying heights

More Work

The apple harvest is winding down giving me more time to be a bit creative, I hope! We've never had so many nice, tasty apples before! I've cut, peeled and sliced 6 gallons into the freezer for use this winter and eaten countless others. Every day for the past month I've taken apples to my students at school (the reverse of students bringing apples to the teacher) for them to eat for an afternoon snack. They were disappointed when I told them yesterday that there would be no more snack apples.

I've completed a few more postcards. Since I'm trying to make each different I sometimes have a creative 'block' but with only one more to make to reach my 24 I think I can do it!

Above left is "Primarily Colored" and right is "Copper Sun Rising".

Since I live close to the Mighty Mo (Missouri River) I thought I'd try a small landscape depicting this sometimes majestic rambling river. Only a few spots remain as they were when Lewis and Clark made their way to Oregon on it.

8 More Postcards

I finished the second set of 8 postcards for the exchange today. They're fun but I think I'll have to take a breather to finish other things before completing the last set of 8 and sending them off to the recipients. I have to learn to say 'No' to more projects, but they're so much fun!
Hope you enjoy looking at these as much the first 8.

More Postcards

Since I'm doing a postcard exchange I need to keep busy making them until I'm finished. With these 8 I am now 1/3 finished! I want each to be different so I can challenge myself to try new things and each recipient will receive a 'one-of-a-kind' piece of art from me.

Small Quilts

I've enjoyed doing some small quilts recently. They are fun and quick to create plus they give me the opportunity to try a different technique on a small basis.

These are two postcards I've made:





Grapes of Plenty

Nebraska Sandhills Sunrise

These two I made for the Tiny Textiles Challenge:

That Blazin' Sun

4 1/2" x 7"

Newest Star on Broadway

6" x 9"

Wild Friday Night

September 16, 2006

Weather-wise anyhow. Lots of thunder, lightning, hail, buckets of rain. One bolt of lightning banged right overhead and we wondered all night what it hit. This a.m. we couldn't find a thing that was touched so I'm wondering if it wasn't lateral lightning? It was loud and the entire yard was white. Today and into tonight we're under a tornado watch.

I finally finished a queen-sized bed quilt I'd begun last winter but got very tired of all those points and repetitiveness of the pattern. The past few years I've gotten more into smaller wall and/or art quilts. Not that they're any easier to complete, but more satisfying as I work and finish them. Last week I finished a 24" x 36" quilt for Project Kid Comfort that depicted Hans Christian Anderson's fairy tale, The Nightingale. Who knows what is next?

I'm thrilled that I will be taking some art quilt classes at QSDS next summer with Esterita Austin and Katie Pasquini Masopust. I've long admired their work and couldn't believe my good fortune to find them both teaching at the same time. That bright spot will help me get through our long, cold, prairie winter not far off.