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Archive for September, 2005

Disaster Area – Where is FEMA?

Friday, September 30th, 2005

I am feeling like myself again – headache is gone – cricket sounds in the head are gone – vertigo is gone!! But, I have discovered a disaster area in my studio as I have come and gone and finished projects in a stupor. Look! I’m not kidding.

Mess1

Mess2

Mess3

I had to get this sorted out and cleaned up or there will be no creating going on here. I set the timer for half an hour and dug in. I then took a 15 minute break. I kept going like this with time off to walk the dog and eat lunch.

Voila!

Tidy1

Tidy3

Tidy2

That is better, just don’t look under the table. Steve says it keeps getting more crowded here in my studio. He is right. I keep acquiring stuff. When we put the house on the market, I will have to pack everything up and put it in storage, take down the design wall and give up quilting until the house is sold. I am so looking forward to buying a house with a big studio and storage for all my stuff.

Tomorrow, I plan to make some stuff.

Some Nice News & Pointless Sisters

Tuesday, September 27th, 2005

Remember this postcard? It was purchased by Karey Bresenhan for the International Quilt Festival permanent collection. I just found out that it was selected for publication in Cloth, Paper Scissors in an article about Fiberart For a Cause. The other two postcards are by Virginia Spiegel who started the project and Pat Dolan, fellow artful quilter blogger. Woohoo! I am having such a good time!!

Purplerain

Today was Pointless Sister’s art quilt group. We had our first design class with Marilyn Felber. It was a great class and I feel that Marilyn is just what the group needs. One of our projects today was to select a bag of Marilyn’s scraps. We then selected nine pieces out of the bag and added one fabric to each one from our scrap stash. We kept at this for four times. Sort of a mystery quilt!! Some members whipped out the piecing in record time, but I had to design and analyze each piece of fabric that I added!! We are to finish adding fabric and perhaps make more crazy quilt blocks and then find a way to set them into a quilt top. I like that she is starting this class in a way that everyone can feel comfortable participating and learn.

Here is some show and tell:

Cathy brought this quilt that she made a few years ago for the New Quilts from an Old Block. She calls it Stumbling Blocks.

Stumblingblks

Patsy, who has seen March of the Penguins two times, made this rendition of the movie title.

Penguins

Here are two quilts from the always prolific, Selma.
A baby quilt commission:

Selmababyqlt

Paper pieced New York Beauty.

Selmanybty

I am still suffering from this sinus thing. I have such a clogged brain and am hearing crickets and it is getting very annoying!! It seemed to be getting better, but I think the flight home yesterday set me back.

Tomorrow, I must do sleeves and hanging dowels for my quilts going to the O’Hanlon Gallery and deliver them tomorrow afternoon. I hope that I can get some postcards done on Thursday. I am looking forward to some creative time.

Sunday with the Grandkids

Sunday, September 25th, 2005

We are having a quiet time in Portland with the family. I’m finally beginning to feel  some energy return. Yesterday morning we went to the Oregon Flock & Fiber Festival in Canby. The amount of yarn and roving available was overwhelming. It was so crowded and I was still not feeling great so regrettably I ended up buying nada. Mia and Milo enjoyed seeing the goats, sheep, alpacas and llamas.

In the afternoon, Steve and I drove out to Lake Oswego to look at neighborhoods as we are probably going to move up here in the next year. Last night, Steph  made a feast of turkey burgers, sweet potato fries and cole slaw, then we went out to Ben and Jerry’s for ice cream.

This morning Steve started the day reading the comics to Mia and MIlo:

Sunmorncomics

Mia took a ride on her pretty  hobby horse that her mom made for her. Isn’t Steph creative?

Pinkhobbyhorse

Then we took a walk down to Hawthorne St.:

Capoppy

Mia found a California Poppy!

Milo

Milo took a rest before he took off on his self-designed par course:

Milotwirls

Twirling on a pole

Milohangs

Hanging from a bicycle rack.

Miloruns

He sprints to the finish!!

Mia

Mia was usually ahead of us and had to wait for us to catch up:

Miawaits

We saw these purple things on our walk:

beautiful hydrangeas:

Hydrangeas

these wonderful flowers with bees – can  you spot the bees?

Bumblebeeflowerjpg

This house that was for sale, but had been sold. I’d like to meet the person who painted the house or who bought the house!!

Purplehouse

Almost home:

Almosthome

This afternoon we went out to look at more neighborhoods in Portland. We really like Eastmoreland which is near Reed College. Tonight, Jack and Steph are on a date and we are babysitting.

Tomorrow we head home, but with lots of excitement about the possibility of moving here and having more quality time with Mia and Milo.

Made it to Portland

Friday, September 23rd, 2005

without an eardrum bursting. The new antibiotic is working! Grandkids are great medicine!!  We are going out to dinner without them tonight – grown-up time!

For lack of anything else, I am posting this (and I swore I would never do another one of these!!)

QBASIC screenshot
You are ‘programming in QBASIC’.  This programming
language (of which the acronym stands for
‘Quick Beginners’ All-purpose Symbolic
Instruction Code’), which is so primitive that
it cannot easily be used for any purpose
involving the Internet nor even sound, was
current more than a decade ago.

You are independent, in a good way.  When something
which you need cannot be found, you make it
yourself.  In writing and in talking with
people, you value clarity and precision; your
friends may not realize how important that is.
When necessary, you are prepared to be a
mediator in conflicts between your friends.
You are very rational, and you think of things
in terms of logic and common sense.
Unfortunately, your emotionally unstable
friends may be put off by your devotion to
logic; they may even accuse you of pedantry and
insensitivity.  Your problem is that
programming in QBASIC has been obsolete for a
long time.

What obsolete skill are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

Really Bad Brain Cramps

Thursday, September 22nd, 2005

I suffer from chronic sinusitis. And usually once a year I get a doozy of a sinus infection. So guess what – yes – I am miserable. I have vertigo and buzzing in my head that won’t stop and a headache that nothing touches. I have been on amoxicillin since Tuesday with no help. Now they are switching me to Zithromax. So I must run to the pharmacy and get packed to fly to Portland tonight to spend the week-end with the grand kids and Steph and Jack.

I have been plugging along on my Saint’s quilt. Here is the top, finished. Janet had some of that pointillist fabric in lots of colors. I printed the words on strips of this fabric on my Epson. Then, I did a border in a rainbow. Kinda like it. I don’t know when I will get the quilting done. This is the biggest quilt I have made in awhile. It is 56" wide and and 45" tall.

Saintsofgod

It looks as if the photos in the orange and fuchsia sections do not show, but they do.

I’ll check in from Stephanie’s with pics of Mia and Milo.