One Flower Wednesday A growing garden

Another flower.... Two of the best things about Hexi sewing are that they are very portable and always a conversation starter.  Some folks say they do not have the patience, but really, I find I gain patience... I am not just waiting in a long line to check out, but working toward getting another Hexi basted!  Makes me happy, stolen moments add up! 

The light color is not as light as it appears in photo.  It has small coral dots in tiny flower shapes.

Have a great week!

Quotable

"You ought, perhaps, to include a larger allowance of prose in your daily study; too much poetry may be unsafe."
Ms. Anne Elliott to Captain Benwick in Masterpiece Theater's movie based on Jane Austen's Persuasion

One Flower Wednesday, becoming routine

One Flower Wednesday is now part of my routine... a happy part.  I love going to participants' blogs, looking at their truly inspired and exquisite work, reading their captivating thoughts and ideas, admiring their great photos and absorbing their warm kindness.  Here is the link to Karen's wonderful blog where we all post our links... enjoy!
Journey of a Quilter  Click on One Flower Wednesday tab & follow the numbered links to other posts.

Last night @ Kernersville Bee, two ladies were working on Grandmother's flower garden hexi's.... one using tee nintsy templates... maybe half an inch?  the other using 3/4 inch hexi's.... she said she'll need over 2 thousand hexi's... but then she completed a Dear Jane quilt in a year, so there's no question she'll succeed.  I wish I'd thought to take a picture... next time.

For now, here is my latest flower for my garden: 

I'm venturing into scrappy with a lighter value center & the darkest on the outside.  This will be a lap quilt, so I only need 32 [corrected math!] double-row flowers.  Seven rows: four rows 5 flowers wide and three rows 4 flowers wide and their connectors of course.

Thanks for stopping by & hope your week is a great one.

Sew Original Block of the Month 2011 to date

We've been rocking along for 7 months now with a great Block of the Month group at a local (fantabulous) shop:  Sew Original.  Click here: Link to Sew Original's website

Since this is the 150th anniversary of the start of the US Civil War, I chose to use the reproduction fabric colorway.  Here we are so far... (sorry @ poor photo quality & wierd rotation.)

I was surprised to find I had collected quite a few reproduction fabrics prior to this project... it is the movement in the fabrics I love.

Thanks so much for dropping by!  Hope you have a great week.

Through the Looking Glass.... KAL Clue 1 completed

Well, you would have thought I had never knit lace as many times as I knit, unknit, reknit this project.   Never the less, part 1 done.  The green-yellow stripes will come out.  They are what are called "life lines."  When knitting a pattern with yarn over's and combination stitches, a defensive move is to periodically run waste yarn through a row of stitches that ends a section which contains no errors.  Then, should one have to rip out, you can safely rip back to a place that has no errors and also maintain the integrity of the stitches and pattern.

So I am ready for Thursday's gathering at Knit Picky for Clue # 2.

O BTW... had a really wonderful visit with my oldest Grand-daughter this past week-end; she is beginning her studies at UNC-Charlotte.  We couldn't be more excited.  She will do well!  I did count the hike up the 10 (yes, ten!) flights of stairs to her dorm room as exercise!

Happy Stitching! 

Through the Looking Glass KAL with The Unique Sheep & Knit Picky

One of our wonderful LYSs (Local Yarn Shop) Knit Picky is hosting a KAL (Knit ALong) using fabulous yarns hand-dyed by a couple of Indi Dyers known as The Unique Sheep.  One of these talented ladies began her career here in Winston-Salem.  Her color sensabilities are sublime and her production of high quality yarns is most reliable.  They have brilliantly created a line of hand dyed yarns in which a gradual color progression is dyed into the yarn... you select the set of skeins (4-6 in the set) which take you across the colorway, including value changes sometimes... no fuss, no muss.  The biggest decisions you have to make are: which fabulous set will you choose; then which of the the range of values will you use at the beginning of your projects, and finally, how many blended rows (if any) to use between the skeins.  Easy peasy.

Here is photo of the beginnings of my gauge swatch with the full range of the gradients:

The KAL kick off party was last night... and as always with those gals, it was fun with fab food, door prizes, and celebration.  We are all making a shawl... with or without beads and or nupps.  Here's photo of project from Ravelry: Janine Le Cras's pattern 

How many hours do I have in a day?  I really need more than others have since I have tons of interests, and am not fast in execution.... Still, it was great to see all these wonderful folks again.  I am looking forward to our gatherings... (every other week to keep us on track for pre-Christmas finish.) 

Have a great week-end!  I know I'm going to be stitching..... applique (Hop To It), sewing (Sew Original's Civil War fabrics Block of the Month) and Knit Picky's KAL (Through the Looking Glass.)  for breathers I better get out in the yard & tame the weeds!

Hop 2 It

We have wonderful teachers here in Winston Salem.  One, named Kathleen, has been my teacher since 2006.  She teaches quilting and applique, plus so many fun little projects: needle keepers, pin cushions, applique roll keepers.  I am often in two of her offerings, one being a monthly workshop in which we are currently working on a quilt called Hop To It.  I think she may have 4 different groups doing this quilt.  Many local blogs are showing images of our projects.  Here is a link to the designer's website:  Edyta Sitar  And here's a photo of my 7th block.  The fabric the block is resting on is fabric I will use for the widest border... I have a very dark aqua to use for the inner border.

 

Here is a close up of my Bumble Bee, perhaps the black sheep of her skeep?  (don't you just love bees?)

I'm thinking I may add some little embroidered antenna....

I am happy to say that I have completed all the blocks (1-7) she has taught us... working on Block 8 for September workshop.  I have started on the sashing (square in a square.) [More photos later.]

Thanks for stopping in... Happy Sititching! (or knitting or crochet...etc... etc)

The beginings of a garden...

The weeks just come flying in!  I still need to add many things to the blog:  web links in many places & the lovely One Flower Wednesday badge, blogs I visit etc..... Plus, I think the colors can obscure the fonts... but I can't remember how I set it up.... patience, patience she says to herself.  Perhaps I can spend some time this week-end rather than trying to fix it after work... (a bit later:  I messed with template... so the writing shows up now, but I hope to get my own background added.... inch by inch.)


Now to the reason I'm here.... these flowers are so very much fun to make....  I have included flower # 3 with her older sisters in a photo as they audition their future connector fabric.


I can see clearly (or more precisely NOT clearly) that I really must learn how to take photographs if I am to continue blogging..... I always thought the light was good in my studio, but the camera needs more.... (sans shadow.)  Still, I love this project....  I treat it like dessert (or like I OUGHT to treat dessert)  do my other handwork first, then relax with paperpiecing....

See more folks' Hexi flowers at Karen's Fine Blog

 Hope all's well in your world.... good luck tending YOUR garden, in whatever medium you grow.  b

One Flower Wednesday... week 2

So, can't believe another week has gone by.  Just a quick post today... more later.  Hopefully, this link will work which is the fabric line I am using.   Gypsy Rose Fabric line  C ya next week!

One Flower Wednesday... first post

As I mentioned in yesterday's post... I know nothing @ using bloggin applications, so bear with me... or perhaps check back in a month?

Apparently I am easily frustrated... based on this reaction: "O kay... so what's the deal with not being able to format where the photo goes? Also, I saved it as properly rotated, but Blogger doesn't care, it flips it.  Oh this is painful."  (a bit dramatic, but there's the juice!)  I think I better run the demo & get some of my fabulous blogging friends to give me a tutorial.

Well, at anyrate, live & learn (we can only hope!)

So, I have Fig Tree's fabric line called Gypsy Rose in jelly roll, pre cut 10", and some yardage that I've been using for applique.  (When I figure out how, I'll add link or photo of the fabrics I mention.) The jelly roll cut works great with 1" precut hexagon paper templates... so that's what I am using. I've been messing around with different combinations and like the 2 row flowers.  At first I was using the dark coral for all centers, but to enable me to use up more of the fabrics, I decided to be scrappier, with differing values as center, row 1 & then row 2... I most likely will use the darkest value brown fabric that has scroll in green & peach for the connectors to lend resting places for the eye.

Because I have a lot of projects going, I am not confident that I'll consistently get 2 row flowers completed weekly, but I'll at least get a 7 hexi flower completed weekly and try to get several of the second rows done each month.  Adding row 2 almost doubles the sewing... to make the central flower uses 7 hexi's, row 2 adds another 12.

I really do love this English Paper piecing technique using differing colors... it is an adventure as each piece is added.  Thanks for dropping in!

Blogging Take Two

O key Dokey... So, I want to participate in a Grandmother's Flower Garden Quilt along (One Flower Wednesday) and I can't figure out how to use Flicker, so I'm resurrecting the 2008 failed blogging venture... bear with me... there will be no formating, decent photos or links for a bit... still, everyone starts somewhere... and I want to do this English Paper Piecing quilt along with this great group... So today is the can I even get back in day venture... Tomorrow, I'll try to down load a photo... (poor one, not the phone's fault.) So dear ones, patience, patience.