Turned on the computer this morning and everything was GREEN!!! I have never had this happen before. I did what limited amount of tricks I had up my paltry computer skills sleeve (powering down and back up, checking settings for desktop, checking the pathetic manual) to no avail. Our friend who is a tech person by trade is coming by tonight to see if it is the monitor or a more serious ailment. My very hilarious (NOT!) husband said it sounded like I had picked up the Kermit virus. Hmmmm...I guess time will tell. Meanwhile, from this side of the screen everything looks sickly!!! So glad I bought the service contract on this computer...In a few days DH and I will be heading to Phoenix and Tucson for a little vacation with our snowbirding friends. This may or may not be my last post for a couple of weeks so I thought I'd post a couple of photos of works-in-progress. The little purse is one I am working on for my dear little friend who just turned 5. I still need to line it so her important "valuables" won't fall through the holes LOL. The second photo is of my Chocolate and Cherries string quilt I started this weekend. I did find the large floral border print for Birds of a Feather but after laying it out beside the quilt, I decided I needed an inner border--so back to the quilt shops I must go! For the teal snowball/Hawaii quilt, I have a small Susan Winget black splattery FQ that I think would be nice and would represent the black sands of Hawaii. I have looked on the internet and in a couple of local quilt shops around here for some yardage of it, but to no avail. May have to come up with something else. If anyone knows of any "musn't miss" quilt shops in Scottsdale, Phoenix, or Tucson, feel free to email me. I hope to have time to hit at least one or two. Stay warm.
Does my title sound like code today? I'll start with Great Read. I scored this wonderful book at my library the other day and have been engrossed in it (between sewing) ever since. Of course, Gwen Marston is my favorite quilter, but the book is about Mary Schafer. Mary was an extraordinary quilter who helped carry on the quilting tradition in the 50s, 60s, and beyond--when quilting was at a low point popularity-wise-- till the Bicentennial revival of interest. Gwen befriended her and has helped to bring her amazing work to the attention of us who might not have known about her. The book describes their friendship and many of Mary's other friendships with quilters--mostly through letterwriting and pattern round robins. Many of her quilts are in museum collections. They are truly magnificent. Also so very touching is the story of Mary's early life and hardships. A most terrific read, an inspiration to all quilters, and just a lovely book. Thank you, Gwen!!! I think I will need to purchase this one! Next up, WIP Wednesday. Regular readers of this blog may remember this string quilt work-in-progress from a very early post. It has been buried in the tub of UFOs for a while. I dug it out this morning with renewed interest, partially because I am so "string quilt manic" right now and partially because I need to purchase border fabric for BOAF and for the snowball quilt before I can go any farther on those. I adore string quilts and could happily spend the rest of my quilting days just doing those, I think! Last photo today is of the four new string blocks I made for Heartstrings (see sidebar) to go with the four I made earlier. Will be sending those off soon.
After reading about the wonderful Heartstrings project on Mary's blog, I couldn't wait to make some string blocks to contribute. These are fun, fast, and so-o-o addictive. I definitely plan to make more! And a giant thank you goes out to Forest Jane for designing the sidebar graphic---and especially for helping me link it to the Heartstrings webpage. Things I Love About Quilters: they share, they play nice, they help others---and they are way smart! Thanks again, Mary and Jane!
...and all ya do is look at the pictures!!! A great big duh-slap to my forehead. Patty left a comment about my Birds of a Feather dilemma (me whining) that I had to do the dreaded set-in seams. She brilliantly suggested I do partial seams instead. Well, hmmm.... Went to the book and guess what, that's how the Blackbird girls instruct you to do them!!!! Maybe I should learn to read directions....
