Field Trips in Fiber - Adventures in quilting, hand dyed fabric and fiber art.

WIP Wednesday and New Postcards

Nothing exciting to report on the WIP front, but here's a WIP recap just to do a wrap-up for the week (and a to-do list for the upcoming weekend):

• Anne's Snails Trail Quilt
• My nephew's graduation quilt
• Winter postcard exchange for the Stitcher's Guild exchange
• Binding on a baby quilt for the Quilt Studio service project; and
• Preparing for my postcard class this weekend.

I also have some new postcards to show....

New Postcards

I can't believe I got all of these done tonight but I am so glad to have this off my list!  I will be hosting a 4 month Postcard Swap at Quilting Adventures starting Friday, February 2. I decided to send the participants a card prior to the class. These will show some of the materials and techniques that can be used and I will use these cards as the basis for the discussion in the first meeting. As I said in a previous post, I decided on a monogram theme and I got the idea from a card that Suzanne sent me. The funny thing about this is that of the participants in the class, there are only 2 initials – C and D! Here are some of the cards.

 To make all of them, I started with fonts in Powerpoint. I printed the selected fonts in the largest size possible and them enlarged them further on the copier until I got the size I wanted.

Weekend Guest and a Little Bit of Quilting

Not much sewing this weekend but it was a wonderful weekend!  My nephew (the one getting the music quilt) came to visit.  He is going to study music in college so has to audition at each school.  One is here in town so he came to stay with us for a day.  He came in Friday in time to meet up with his Grandmother (my Mom) and Great Aunt for lunch and then I took Friday afternoon off to take him shopping.  Have you ever had trouble getting a teenager to spend money?  Me either, until Friday.  It went something like this:

Me:  Since you are here I want to spoil you so we are going to go spend some of my money.  What do you need?
Him:  Nothing
Me:  OK, then, what do you want?
Him:  Nothing
Me:  let me explain the rules of this game again.....we are going shopping you better pick some stores to shop in!

We finally got him a couple of bags of clothes - he only buys on sale - and I think he was happy.  I even had to convince him that he could buy more than one pair of jeans!  We should bottle him and send him to Aunts and Grandmothers everywhere!  He has just grown up to be the nicest young man and we thoroughly enjoyed his company.  I really want him to go to school here but I know it's not his first choice.  The whole visit just warmed my heart and you have never heard a teenager say "thank you" so many times!  No, I am not on drugs,it really happened!  LOL

By the time we returned from the school yesterday I was exhausted!  I didn't get back to sewing until this morning.  I decided to work on Anne's Snails Trail that has been on the longarm frame for over 2 weeks.  I am doing "very casual" feathers in the swirls of each trail.  The light trails will have the same feather design in all of them and I am using a light thread. The dark trails have different feathers in each trail and I am using a darker thread.  I am still horrible at feathers but they are getting better.  You can see the progress in this shot of the border.  I decided that the border needed to be really funky with every kind of feather I could think of.  I should have this done by the upcoming weekend.

First I have to finish some postcards for my fabric postcard club meeting this coming Friday.

New Postcard and Update

I received this lovely card from Lynne Thursday.  It's from the Stitcher's Guild Winter exchange.  Thanks Lynne, your painting is beautiful!

Meanwhile, I did get the Blue and White Snails Trail quilt top done.  Now I need to get back focused on the longarm.  I two quilts that have to be done before I can quilt my snails trail.

WIP Wednesday

I almost decided to skip the WIP post because I feel like my projects are bit out of control!  But I decided that taking a few minutes to write about it might help me regroup.  These are all of the project "open" now.  Clockwise from upper left is:

1. Anne's Snails Trail on the longarm. I had finally gotten comfortable with my casual feathers on this when I heard dripping in another part of the basement.  Quilting stopped as we went on a search for the source of the leak.  The plumber has been here twice.....so far! LOL
2. This mess reflects 4 or more fabric postcards in process that need to be done Sunday.  I am hosting a postcard club at Quilting Adventures in Richmond.  I want to send the participants a card before the first club meeting next Friday.  I decided to do a monogram theme and will send each person a card with their initial.  I got the idea from this card that I received from Suzanne in December.
3. I am still moving blocks around on the blue and white snails trail quilt.
4. and finally, I ordered a few additional fabrics to complete my nephew's quilt.  The new fabrics are in the wash as I write this. 

Now what will I go work on??