Sailboat Quilt is DONE!!

One of my goals was to, before my surgery, finish hand quilting the sailboat quilt that was a customer's quilt.

Well...I MET THAT GOAL!!!

This quilt was HAND PIECED by a lady in her 80's for her great-grandson.  I've never met the lady that made the top, but I work with her daughter...who is the grandmother of the little boy that this quilt is for!!

It is twin-sized and those adorable sailboats are JUST PERFECT for a little boy!

I put the binding on it this past weekend and washed it.  Today I made a label for it...just because.   I don't usually make labels for customer quilts, but since I know this lady used to hand quilt and can't now, I felt a special kinship with this quilt.

I will be delivering it to my co-worker on Thursday.  I truly hope it meets with both her and her mother's approval!!

Loretta

A Diagnosis...Now for the Treatment...

Quote for the Day:

"I was going to have cosmetic surgery until I noticed that the doctor's office was full of portraits by Picasso."

~Rita Rudner

Since about Thanksgiving I've had progressive numbness of the last two fingers on my right hand as well as the outer 1.5" of my right palm.  

No, this is not my hand...but it shows the area that is numb ALL DAY, EVERY DAY...

As the symptoms got worse, I was pretty sure what it was, but had to have a visit to a neurologist and have a nerve conduction test, or EMG, done to make the final diagnosis and get treatment ordered.

Yesterday was that day, and I do, in fact, have Cubital Tunnel syndrome...just as I and my primary care provider thought.  The neurologist has ordered a custom splint for my elbow and has referred me to an orthopedic surgeon so that I can get the surgery to correct the problem.  

Unfortunately, there is no surgeon at the hospital I work at that does this type of surgery, so I will be having it at West Virginia University Hospital.  It is more nerve-wracking for me to have the surgery amongst strangers than if I were having it among my friends and co-workers.  :(

In the meantime, while I am waiting to have my consultation interview with the surgeon, I am frantically trying to finish up the quilt that is in my frame so it will be done before I have to have surgery.  I am on the final stretch...

I have already made sure that I finished the other quilt that needed to get done in a timely manner...the baby quilt for our new grandson due in June!  That quilt is completed, but I can't post about it yet, because it is a gift.  Once it has been gifted to my daughter, I will post pictures!  :)

Loretta

Even MORE Quilt Updates...

Quote for the Day:

"I hope to live all my life for my art, 

without abandoning my principles one iota."

~Gustave Courbet

This quilt update is about my customer's Sailboat Quilt that I've been hand quilting.  

I am almost finished with the second of four rows of sailboats!  I would estimate that I'm about 40% done with the entire quilt at this point.  

Here's a close-up of one of the most recent blocks that I've worked on...

Since the quilt isn't that big, I loaded it into my frame "sideways"...that's why the boats are on their sides.  Maybe we should name the quilt "Titanic" since the boats are all on their sides???

Loretta

Minty Fresh!!!

Quote for the Day:

"Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art...

 It has no survival value; 

rather it is one of those things that give value to survival."

~C. S. Lewis 

Yesterday I put a message on Facebook asking where, this time of year, I could get a mint plant to grow indoors.  A couple of people responded that I could get some cut mint in the produce section and root that.  But one friend said he had a lot of mint and all I had to do was come over and get what I wanted!  :)  

I immediately went over and he had already dug up a root ball for me!  Now that's a friend!  :)  Thanks, Jeff J.!!!

I came home and planted a small part of the root ball in a container for the kitchen...

...beside the aloe plant in the window over the sink...

...and the rest I planted outside between the Autumn sedum and chrysanthemums.

Jeff also blessed me with an 18 count of fresh eggs from his free-range chickens!  :D   It's nice to have friends like that.  I gifted him with a jar of blackberry jam made from the blackberries from my back yard!

I've been quilting on my customer's sailboat quilt and am now ready to roll the quilt to the next section in the frame.  I put a line on the picture so you can see how much is done.  Everything to the right of the line is complete!

And here's a close-up of the stitching...the good, the bad, and the, well, you know...

The problem is that the green checked material is very tightly woven and difficult to needle through so some of stitches in that section are not so tiny and even.

"If it can't been seen at 30 paces while riding a galloping horse, it doesn't matter."  Right???

Loretta

What's Going On In My World...

Quote for the Day:

"There aren't enough days in the weekend."  

~Rod Schmidt

What do you do with a slightly-too-ripe banana?

Add a serving of Greek yogurt and a cup of frozen berries...in this case, frozen blackberries from my backyard bushes this summer...and blend well...

MMMMMMMMMM!!  Better than any purchased smoothie!  Ever!

I've been working on my customer's sailboat quilt and this is a glimpse at some of the stitching close-up!

Last week, I started a new type of chiropractic treatment for my back.  It's called Atlas Orthogonal Treatment.  I've been in chiropractic care for 26 years now and I'm certain that it is the only thing that has kept me upright and working all these years.  It's also the only thing that has ever relieved the daily headaches I had before starting treatment.  

But with the severe arthritis in my back now, I can no longer take the hand's-on adjustments and the crunching and popping movements of traditional chiropractic.  A friend told me about the new technique and her doctor that does it.  I started going last week and am more hopeful about my future than I have ever been in the last 3 years.  If you live in the area, I highly recommend Dr. Lionette and his team at Enliven Chiropractic!  They treat with a holistic method that treats the PATIENT and not just the "condition".  

To help with my treatments, I've taken to drinking LOTS of water, watching my sugar intake, and have lightened up my purse from 10+ bag of "everything but the kitchen sink" to a little 2.5 pound
"only the basics" clutch-type bag.  

I put our phone in front of it for size-comparison purposes.  My old purse could have been used as a lethal weapon, but this new one...not so much.  :)

I have also purchased an exercise ball chair to use at my computer.  This helps strengthen the core muscles.

What I've really noticed with the new chiropractic care is the difference it makes in my right knee pain and stiffness.  Up till the day I started treatment with Dr. Leonette, I was using a cane to assist me in going up and down the stairs in my house.  Since my first adjustment with him, I no longer need it!  

With regards to my back and leg radiculitis, I'm not "pain free", but I do have long periods of time with no pain...sometimes up to 48 hours in one stretch, but most of the time it is in 4-6 hour periods.  

Now you can see why I'm feeling more hopeful now than at I have in a long time! 

Loretta

Fall Is Here...

Quote for the Day:

"Love the trees until their leaves fall off, 

then encourage them to try again next year.” 

~ Chad Sugg

Autumn is in full swing here in West Virginia.  The leaves are starting to turn colors and drop to the ground, the nights are getting cooler, and starting tomorrow, so will the days.  We've had a brief "Indian summer" (that's probably not a "politically correct" term, but I don't know what else to call it)  with lots of sun and warm temperatures, but tomorrow the highs are going to start only being in the 60's and lows in the 40's.  Andy mentioned today that he will probably have the coal stove up and running when I get home from work tomorrow.  

We live in town and are surrounded by mountains.  Here's the view off of my back porch.  You can see the leaves are starting to turn brown...

One of the trees on our new property...

The mountain to the south of us...

The "Burning Bush" on our neighbor's property is starting to turn brilliant red...

Now, in quilt news...

I finished up the Blue Ridge Beauty quilt on Monday and took it out of the quilting frame.  I sewed the binding onto the front and it is ready to be turned to the back and hand-sewn down.  I had planned to take it to a fiber arts group that I attend on the first Tuesday of the month, and get started on sewing it down, but this month I was unable to attend at the last minute.  It is currently folded up and sitting in a tote bag...without me getting a picture of it, yet.  :(    So you'll just have to take my word for it that it is done at this point.  I'll be sure to take and post pictures when the binding is done.  

Today I loaded a customer's quilt into the frame.  (Don't worry about the wrinkles, those are taken care of by tightening the rollers on the frame to pull the fabric more taut.)

It was HAND PIECED by the mother of a co-worker for the grandson of said co-worker.  

It is an adorable quilt, but did have some "issues", but because it is hand pieced by the child's great grandmother, I chose to leave them in rather than "fix" them.  It will just be a part of the quilt's history.  Sometimes that is more important and endearing than "perfect".  

I did go through the back of it and cut off all the "dog ears" and some extra fabric that the maker left on.  Also, she did not press the seams as she went, so I spent at least an hour yesterday trying to figure out which way they laid best, spritzing them with water, and then pressing them down into submission!    Today I marked it, loaded it into the frame, and put the first stitches in it!  

It is a twin-size, so it should go fairly fast...I'm shooting for 2 months.  We'll see how close I get to that time frame!

Loretta

Updates From the Homestead...

 Quote for the Day:

Thought I'd update you all on a couple things going on around here...

First off, construction was started on our garage and workshop on the new property this week.  They were only able to work on them for 2 days this week because of rain, but things are moving right along, anyway.

Garage, street-view:

Garage, inside, looking from right front corner to left side:

Yes, this thing is HUGE for a garage...24' deep by 32' long!  :)  

The beginings of Andy's workshop located behind the garage:

The workshop is slightly smaller at only 20' deep by 32' long.  Still, though, plenty of room for storage of Andy's "stuff".  


Several months ago, a new client found me through the local quilt store and asked me to repair the bindings on 3 vintage quilts she had that had been passed down through her family.  I posted about the first one here.   I finally got around to completing the second one this past week.

This is that horrible red fabric that I posted about that just kept bleeding, no matter how many times I washed it.  The last time I rinsed it in vinegar, but it was still bleeding.  At that point I just gave up and went ahead and applied it to the quilt.  I have warned the customer that it bleeds and recommended that if she washes the quilt that she should use several color catchers to keep the red from bleeding onto the white.   

She has one more quilt that she wants me to repair the binding on, and when she picks up this quilt, she'll drop off that one for me to work on.  

And, last but not least, here is the latest update on the Blue Ridge Beauty quilt that is currently in my quilt frame...

This is the center block, meaning...I'M HALFWAY DONE!  woohooo!

You can see that now my lines of stitching are going in the opposite direction...following the layout of the quilt.



Uh-oh!!  Points that don't quite match???  Say it ain't so, Loretta!!  

Yep.  Just keepin' it real...

Loretta

Too Many Scraps!!!

 

When I finish a quilt, I always TRY to clean up any leftover fabric and batting from that quilt.  I go through and cut down the fabric scraps into strips of various sizes and store them according to size in my strip drawers.

I also save any larger, useable pieces of batting and then when I get enough, I sew them together.  Eventually, I have a piece big enough to use in a quilt.

I use my walking foot and a meandering, curvy zigzag stitch to join the batting pieces together using a 1.3 stitch length and a 6.0 stitch width...

This piece is about 50" X 50" at this point and I can either use it for a lap quilt or baby quilt, or continue to add to it till it is big enough for a larger quilt.

So Saturday, while Kathy's quilt was in the washer and dryer, I went to work cutting up the fabric into strips, and salvaging what pieces of batting I could.

However, when I went to put the 1.5" strips into their box, I dropped the box and it exploded onto the floor...fabric strips going every which way.  :(

The box was so full that I decided that I needed to use up some so that I could even get the lid back on the plastic shoe box that they are stored in.

I decided to pull out the "go to" project that I work on when I need to use up 1.5" strips...my Log Cabin blocks.

I ended up making about 25 blocks in all, but it hasn't seemed to even make a dent in the strip pile.  :(   I'll probably make some more and then just refold the rest of the strips and try to get them stuffed down in the box enough so I can get the lid back on it.


As a follow-up to my last post, I wanted to show you Kathy's quilt in its natural habitat...her bedroom.

  
She has a queen-sized bed but the quilt is only a twin-size.  So she has it laying over the top of bed as a coverlet.  Doesn't it look great with the other purple bedding?   I'm so happy that she loves it!  I wish her many, many years of sleeping under it and enjoying the love that her great aunt put into it.

Loretta

Another Customer Quilt Done!

Quote for the Day:

"Friendship is sewn with love and measured by kindness."

~author unknown

I have a quilt finish to share with you!  YIPPEE!  :)

I was asked by my neighbor (and friend) to hand quilt a top that her great aunt made back in the 1940-50's range.  We aren't exactly sure of the time period because it has both feedsacks and shirting fabric in it.  (There used to be a shirt factory in town and people could go and buy the "ends" or scraps that were left over, so when you find a quilt or quilt top from this area it is not uncommon to find it made with the leftover shirtings from that factory.)

I took Kathy shopping with me to find just the right backing fabric.  Since she loves purple, we picked out a very pretty purple 1930's feedsack reproduction fabric to compliment the age of the top.  I put the quilt into my frame on March 17 and finished up the binding yesterday, May 4!   That's a record for me, but truth be told, it was only a twin size!  :)

Yesterday, I washed the quilt and today I delivered it to her.  The problem, though, is that she wasn't home!  :(  But her husband was, so I left it with him.  He said he would be gone by the time Kathy got home, but he would drape it over the back of the couch so it would surprise her when she got home!  :)

I quilted it in diagonal lines and put a nice cable in the border, but unfortunately, the cable doesn't show up well because of the print.   I used Hobbs Tuscany 100% cotton batting.  It needles like "buttah" and gives such a nice, antique-looking crinkle to the quilt after washing.  :)

The next quilt to go into the frame will be another twin-sized quilt for another customer.  Then I have 3 quilts of my own that need to get done.   :)

Meanwhile, we've been burning brush and debris on our new property every evening, so that is keeping us/me busy!  It is looking sooooooooooo much better!  I'll do a follow-up post on that soon, too!

Loretta

Another Project Done...

Quote for the Day:

“Focus on the journey, not the destination.

Joy is found not in finishing an activity but in doing it.”

~Greg Anderson

Over this past week, I've finished another customer's project.  This time it was just replacing the binding on a vintage quilt.

A lady contacted the local quilt store in Clarksburg, and asked if there was anyone that could do repairs to the applique and binding on some vintage quilts that an aunt had made.  Janet, the quilt store owner, contacted me and asked if I was interested.  I contacted the lady and told her that I didn't do applique, but I would gladly repair the binding.

I met up with her and talked with her about the quilt.  These quilts were made from a kit back in the 1930's-40's and the fabrics are all solids.  It was going to be difficult to "match" the solid blue.  She insisted that she didn't want a reproduction print used because she wanted it to look like the original, so that greatly decreased the options of fabric to use.  

I was able to find ONE fabric that matched...a sky-blue batik.  And wouldn't you know...there was only 1 1/4 yards left on the bolt...it would take 3/4-1 yard for the scalloped binding.  Wow.  That was close!  LOL

The old binding came off easily because it wasn't put on well to begin with.  From there, I just added the binding to the front of the quilt by machine, as usual, flipped it over to the back and hand stitched it down.  

Here's a picture of the new binding up close to the original blue fabric that was also used for the scallop in the middle of the quilt.

I think it's a pretty close match!  :)

The applique still needs repaired, but she'll need to find someone else to do that.  Are any of you local quilters interested in doing the repairs???  Let me know if you are and I'll put you in touch with the customer.  :)


Since I don't have a quilt in the frame right now, we are taking this opportunity to start the switch-a-roo of rooms upstairs.  First step is to move our bed into what used to be Erin's-room-turned-quilting-room.  I've purchased a rug this week to put down on the hardwood floor and it is currently in there "relaxing".  It'll take a few days for the roll-up marks to relax out of the rug so it will lay flat. 

Until then, we've got heavy items around the edges, coaxing them to lay flat!  LOL

I'll post more pictures as the transformation takes place!  :)

Loretta