Fan quilt ready for quilting

I took a new class this past week and will take the second half this Friday night, so I thought I should get this quilt ready for quilting this weekend before the next one has to be done. The colors did not really come out in this picture, but the background is a pale lavender. It is such a soft color and it looks so peaceful for this quilt.The border fabric is the same one I used for the fans. The dark border on the inside is a fabric I had in my stash.

Every time I go to take pictures outside, it is windy. I always forget how the wind is always blowing here! Stack and whack was a ton of fun and really easy. I think I will keep the quilting kind of simple and do it mostly in the light parts of the quilt.

Today Ken made some repairs to the chicken coop. New roof, some walls replaced. It was an all day job, but at least it will be like new for my girls!

Halloween in April

Today was a five hour class called Slice and Dice at Pieceful Quilting in Riverhead. What a great time we all had making these quilts. I used a bunch of vintage Halloween fabric to make this for Ken.

Don't you just love these fabrics? I plan to make a bunch of these for other holidays and some babies I know are on the way. We just LOVE Halloween here and I make things for it all year long. These colors were great to use today. Some of the other ladies made quilts with deep colors which were gorgeous. They looked like real stained glass. It is so cool to see how all the quilts come out different even though it is the same pattern.

I promised myself I would start it and finish it today and it was easy to do. Tonight I am working on an old project I want to get done. During the Christmas vacation, I made a list of all the things I had to finish and so far I am making some serious progress. Of course, I always find something else I just have to make, so I tell myself it's ok, as long as I get it done in a few days. :)

The ark is coming for us...

When we had all that rain on Monday and Tuesday, our little town was overwhelmed. These two cars were left in the road because they got stuck in the water.The water at the river was almost up to the road by Wednesday and is still there. The Red Cross had to come in to help some people who lost their houses. We never had anything this bad before. Our neighbors are still having water in their yards at this time.

The water covered area is where the grass usually is. This tree is where Rob's garden is in the summer.

View of the river from the road on the first day of rain.
My neighbor's backyard! The water went into his garage.

Well, I guess the ark isn't coming after all. At least we have canoes. They are tearing up our road AGAIN to fix wiring and pipes that are always getting flooded when it rains. It's a mess.

Spring projects

This weekend I made a table runner for Easter. I found some cute Easter fabric in the attic and then embroidered this cute little chick with flowers onto a pale lavender center.

Some adorable Easter fabric I used for a new apron. It is the cutest vintage fabric. I got some for me and some for an apron that was ordered from a friend. I will get hers done tomorrow so she can have it for Easter too.

This is the other side of the table runner. I just loved the little chicks!

This is my apron. I have a million different patterns for all styles of aprons, but this is my favorite. Something about it just reminds me of an old farm grandma who loves nothing better than to make cookies for all the grandkids! Maybe that will be me someday:)

You know how sometimes you just buy something because you "have to" have it? Well, this little trim is one of those things. I saw it when I was in the attic and knew it was perfect for the pockets of my apron.

If you don't hear from me again soon, it's because we have washed away here on Long Island. The rain is coming and coming and bringing fierce winds with it. The river across the street is creeping closer to the road every hour. It's probably already 20 feet onto the grass and we have two days of rain left.

Oh, about a month ago I decided I had gotten fat enough for one year and marched myself into the nearest Weight Watchers to start the program. It's not really hard at all and I don't feel deprived in the least. So far, I have gotten rid of 12 pounds!! YAY!! Maybe I will wear shorts this summer after all.

A chicken loving convert

My sister-in-law and brother-in-law (Kenny's sis) came to see us for a few days last week. I took one day off so we could spend a full day together. What a beautiful day it was too!! Temps in the high 60s and lots of bright sun. I cleaned the chicken coop and gave them new straw in the morning while everyone else got ready for the day (we planned to go for a walk at the wildlife refuge, go to the ocean and then to lunch). When Pat came outside, she said she had never held a chicken before, so I handed one of my new girls to her. It was true love for both of them! :) My in-laws loved watching my hens line up to lay eggs and listening to their incessant cackling and clucking. They took the eggs laid that day home with them to enjoy for breakfast.

Do you stack and whack? It's fun!

Last month I signed up for a class in stack and whack. We had to get fabric that had a repeat at least six times, which I did not totally understand (except for the times I did wallpapering at our house), but the owner of the quilt shop I visited knew what I meant, so I picked out this fabric for the project and it was good. For stack and whack, the goal is to cut your fabric in six layers (all at one time) so that when you piece it together later (mine was going to be a fan), it will look like a kaliedescope.

This is one version of the fan that I cut out. I love the way it all lined up so well. If you know me, I am not always worried about perfection (a little tug, or some steam from the iron goes a long way to making things fit), but I had to make sure the layers were all perfect before cutting. It was not too bad actually once it is all pinned to match the exact same spot on all layers.

See how they all look a little different? Some look like vines going across the fan and others have a bigger design across the top. You use a see-through template so you can see which part of the fabric you are focusing on.

Our teacher, Alice, helped me pick out the background fabric for the blocks. I wanted it to look really soft and elegant when it was put together, so she immediately found this very pale purple and it looks great. Across the top and bottom of the fan will be a tiny, tiny bias binding that I made out of dark purple. It should make the blocks stand out, but not be too loud.

Another block. Honestly, when I came home from the class I wanted to start cutting up all of my fabric to make stack and whack designs. You can do stars, squares, and all manner of cool stuff with this. My quilt is actually pretty tame compared to some of the fabrics the other women in the class were using. They were making some awesome fans with their fabrics. I will be putting this together on Friday at the next class where we will finish the tops.

Kitchen dishes quilt and a swim for the dogs

I made a promise to myself to get a lot of projects that I either got kits for or fabric for, done this year. This is called Kitchen Dishes which was made with Jennifer Chiaverini fabric (a favorite author of mine). The manager of the quilt shop designed this quilt for her fabric line. I made it over the vacation and finished putting it together this weekend. Mitered corners!! I have not done this in a while, but a quick look at some directions online and it was a snap to do.

Working with these colors during the snowy days and nights we have had was really a great thing for my eyes and mind! :)

The plain colors are a tone-on-tone print which is pretty to use in this quilt.

Kenny and the dogs worked at the farm (shooting preserve) today at a big hunt. They retrieved about 62 birds between them and were a little dirty when they got home, so Kenny and I took them to the river to clean off. They are shaking the cold water off now.

They are just like polar bears sometimes. Even though they worked all day, they were nagging us to throw the bumpers (training tool-they are orange) for them.

We got about 8 inches of snow the other day, but it is melting away now. It's a slushy mess at this point and gets pretty slippery when you walk on it. The weather channel is warning of another potential snow event this week, but it might blow away before it gets to us. Wouldn't that be unusual?