Coastal Shop Hop

Yesterday, a group of us went on a 'creative crafting' shop hop - usually we just go to quilt shops on the big So Cal Quilter's Run..but this one had a bit of a different flair..there were a couple of quilt shops, a couple of bead shops, a couple of gifty type stores, a couple of yarn shops and one that had scrapbooking supplies too..

Most of the day we were hugging the coastline and it was quite overcast as it usually is at the coast in the spring...it was nice hopping weather! Not too cold, not too hot..and not too bright...

Starry Night Hollow...a very interesting Quilt Shop..in a house! The gardens around the house were so pretty, I asked if I could snap some shots...

Notice the gate in the picture..it has a quilt attached to the gate!

The poppies are starting to really bloom out around the freeways - these two shots were taken thru the car window as we were going down a freeway ramp (which is why they are a bit blurry):

I think there is some blue lupine mixed in there too...

At one of the shops...I found wool roving in a vast array of colors..the lady asked me what I was going to make with the wool and I said I wanted to try making some felted animals - she said 'I have just the book for you!' and indeed, it had to come home with me:

if you follow the link to Amazon, you can see more of the pictures inside the book..the animals are sooooo cute!

First Picnic of the Season

DH and I ate our dinner out in the back yard today..kind of a picnic of sorts! We had little hot dogs with mustard, diet soda and steamed broccoli... The back yard is very green and trees are starting to leaf out.. the lemon tree is full of blossoms (and lemons!):

We are trying to figure out what this tree/plant is..its a 'volunteer' along with about 20 more of them in the back yard..they lost their leaves during the winter and are the first of the trees(?) to leaf out..right now they are about 15 feet high...so I don't think they are weeds (I hope not anyway)! Our best guess is some sort of oak..but if anyone knows for sure, please let me know...

They are directly under where the birds sit in the trees...

Neighbor's horse is enjoying the fresh air and has munched all of the grass he can reach from his stall...

The moonrise over the trees:

Arizona Retreat 2009 - Part 2

We had a grand time at there retreat..I worked on my string blocks for the Hearts Garden Quilt (its been in a few posts!)

Here are some sample blocks..

I THINK I am done with all of the blocks I need for the back and hopefully I can start working on putting the quilt together now..I need to design a quilting pattern and start tracing it, get some sashing strips cut (need to figure out if I have enough of the green fabric for the sashing left over), and lay out the back so I know which block goes where..

I also worked on the batik landscape that I made in a class at Road To California in 2008...I wanted to add a tree to the landscape..and that involved cutting the landscape..I have been putting off doing this for MONTHS! But..one of the ladies at the retreat encouraged me to 'just do it'...and so I did...another of the ladies gave me a wonderful strip of fabric for the border, and another let me dig thru her bag of scraps, looking for fall colored batiks to make leaves for the tree...I appliqued most of the leaves on the trip home. I have been working on embroidering on the seams as well...

Some of the fun stuff we did:

• learned how to make cathedral windows blocks
• one of the ladies taught a class on how to maintain your Featherweight sewing machine - she brought one that she auctioned off and another of the retreaters went home with a real treasure!
• Patrick Lose, a fabric and pattern designer that lives in Arizona, came to be our guest speaker...you can read about his take on the retreat on his blog...
• we had 'Secret Sisters' again this year...that was a blast again.. My SS gave me lots of wonderful goodies - including an organizer basket that I have wanted for a long time and lots of material and my very favorite tea (Stash Chai Spice)...I gave my SS (not the same person) batiks, a pink pincushion, a glass nail file, dark chocolates and a laser leveler (she said when she got home that she had to carefully explain to her DH that No, the leveler was NOT going to live in the garage, but in the 'forbidden room'!) In case you are wondering what possible use it could have for quilting, its used to square up large quilts...
• Went shopping several times at the 3 Dudes Quilt Shop across the street

Here is what my workstation looked like..before the madness and flurry of activity started! It looked considerably less neat as time wore on!

Arizona Retreat 2009 - Part 1

Well..I am FINALLY getting around to starting to post about the retreat..it was a couple of weeks ago now!

I went with another lady that lives a couple of hours north of me..its much easier packing when you don't have to worry about overweight bags, seperating out the liquids and just how much you can haul around! I took way too much, as usual, but I did find a use for most of it! Fortunately I took a couple of extra tote bags..judging from prior years experiences..I knew I would need them..and indeed, they came back stuffed to the brim!!

On the way over, we did not stop much..but did see some cool cactuses and wildflowers in bloom..I posted on the forum as we were driving that we had seen them and Sophie asked if I was going to blog about them, so..when the driver needed a break, we stopped at a rest stop and I went running around, looking very 'tourist-y', snapping pictures of cactuses, wildflowers and trees! We got a few more shots on the way home...

And, Old Glory, flying beautiful in the breeze!

Beaded Kaleidescope

Back in 2007, I took a class at Road to California from Nancy Eha on making beaded Kaleidoscopes...I finished the beading of the kaleidoscope in late January, but did not get around to designing and working on the quilt until late last year...

The frame for the outer ring is made of Timtex..but that was not strong enough to support the extra beading that I did in the outer ring, so I cut a very sturdy cardboard ring and that is sandwiched inside - that made it sufficiently stiff! I was going to picot bead around all of the edges but after I saw the effect of the outer ring, decided that would be going overboard.

This is a picture before the wires were sewn down and the outer ring beading was done:

And...here it is - Done! I just need to figure out how to hang it...any suggestions on how to hang it, especially if I entered it into a show, would be welcome!

What to Do With Class Sample Pieces - Make a Tote!

The third day of Road classes was free motion quilting - and we made a cute little zipper pouch out of one of the pieces..but that left TWO more quilt sandwiches that were still just sample pieces...One of the ladies at work suggested I make them into a tote..so that's what I did!

(sorry about the picture being a bit washed out..but otherwise you would not see the quilting...)

I used some of my precious stash of Laurel Birch animal fabric..because the black background matched the black sampler pieces (matching black is more difficult than you would think!) AND it had red in the design - the hardest part was cutting into the Laurel Birch fabric and wondering if I would like the end result!...It's made so that it's completely reversible and I thought I was going to like the black on black side better, but when I turned it inside out to show DH that it was reversible, I was charmed by the red on black..especially with the white bobbin work!

I am going to try to find some Laurel Birch buttons for the strap area..I think that would look cute!