CCCQ

I went away for 2 weeks and forgot to take my camera so was not able to take pictures of these blocks I completed until I got home.

CCCQ # 19

This one really is an orangey colour but I like it. It was quite straightforward until I realized that I had stitched down the center part then had to connect the leaves. It was a bit tricky but got it done.

CCCQ # 14

This one had me scratching my head for a bit until I realized that I had printed the pattern off at 120% and it would not fit onto my pre-cut 13 1/2 inch square. I had already stitched on the leaves and did not want to redo them. I like it also.

CCCQ # 17

I was happy to finally complete this one. Now I understand why Carole (find here blog here  ) suggested we swap a different block. I will be happy to never do this one again. But then, it does look pretty good, sort of.

Now to get on to # 20.
Blessings,
Chris

Gift in the Mail

This arrived in the mail from Wanda before I left for New Brunswick.  Find here at this link.
It  is beautifully appliqued and she sent nice note. Thanks Wanda.
I still have to mail hers out even though I completed it several weeks ago. Oops. I think I am scared to write in the center with a permanent black pen. What if I make a mistake? Then I would have to do it over even though it is a simple block.

Blessings,
Chris

40 Bags in 40 Days

I have 2 friends on facebook who took the 40 Bags in 40 Days challenge for Lent.  Here is the link .
I have been following their progress and thinking of a hundred reasons why I can't do the same. One friend is a full time high school teacher. The other is a full time mom of 2 preschoolers. I am retired. How difficult should it be for me to find time each day to de-clutter and de-crapify one area in my house? Other than I have a bad hip and standing on my feet for 2 minutes in a row is a challenge.

We  live in a very big house. It is an 1840's farm house and has many rooms, including 5 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, 1 kitchen, 1 back kitchen, 1living room, 1 quilt room and 1 laundry room. It also had 2 hallways and 3 sets of stairs. One stairway leads to the basement. I shutter to think about these 2 rooms. There is 1000 square feet of dirt floor and when it rains, well, lets just say we do not need a sump pump. If we put in track lights we could have a hydroponic garden down there. One stairway leads to the 1880's addition which has 2 guest rooms and a bathroom, ever ready for guests and a place to display quilts. The third stairway leads to the main upstairs.

So, this challenge is not about cleaning but about de-cluttering and getting rid of stuff that has accumulated over the years. Ouch! I have been in the house for nearly 43 years and the house has been in the family for over 100 years.

Day 1 will be Monday April 7, 2014.  game-plan
Oh, wait. The accountant is coming to do the farm taxes that day.

Blessings,
Chris

Denine

My first born child was a girl – Denine. She was born with a rare condition called Cornelia de Lang Syndrome. Basically, half of her brain did not develop because of a stroke blocking blood vessels to her brain during the 8^th week of gestation when all her organs were forming. She was profoundly handicapped. She never learned to talk or walk or play or feed herself. She was totally dependent for everything. At 5 years, 8 months and 7 days, she died. As long as I live, I will never forget that day. Why?  Because that was the first time I heard God speak to me. Clearly. Distinctly. 

It was almost midnight Sunday April 1, 1979. She had been admitted to the hospital that morning because of difficulty breathing. That night, as I lay on my bed, I had my first vision from God. I was sitting on the maple rocking chair in the hospital holding Denine on my lap. Her body was very twisted and crippled so she did not fit very well in my arms. Suddenly, she sat up, turned and looked me in the face and said, “Mommy!” Then she died. And, I sensed the voice of God speak to my heart saying, “Your child is going to die. What are you going to do about that?”

My thoughts quickly went back a few years when Denine had been in hospital with double pneumonia. I recall crying out to God not to take her from me. She had been healed from the pneumonia and came home the next day. 

This time, I responded, “If that is Your will, then I accept it.” Immediately, I felt a joy bubbling up deep inside me and I fell asleep praising God. One hour later, the hospital called to say she had died. In the morning I had my second vision. My precious crippled child was WALKING away from me UP TO THE ARMS OF JESUS. She was wearing a pink dress. That was 35 years ago.

I had given my heart to Jesus several years earlier when God had used a twelve year old babysitter to show God’s love for me. I had come to the realization that God knew what was going on in my life. God had chosen me to be the mother of a special child. God had a plan for my life. My heart was changed and so was I. The depression I that I had been living in was replaced by peace and joy.

Recently, I was challenged to ask God to show me more into that earlier vision. Gulp.
So, I did.
God’s response to me was, “Denine is whole and alive and walking and dancing.”               

“Does she remember me?” I asked.
“Of course she remembers. After all, you are her mother and a mother never forgets. Neither does the child.”

Not long after Denine died, I had gone to visit my husband’s Aunt Grace (who died a few months ago at the ripe old age of 101). She shared a letter she had been given when her 9 month old baby had died 35years earlier. She carefully removed the letter from her wallet and let me read it. I realize now, that God used that letter written to a grieving mother 70 years ago to speak to my heart and to give me hope that one day I would see my daughter again. My child is in heaven, safe in the arms of Jesus, waiting for me. 

Blessings,

Chris

Making Lists

I am a list maker. I make lists. I make grocery lists and leave them at home when I go grocery shopping. I make lists of  quilts I am working on. I make lists of quilts I want to make. I colour code my calendar with appointments and homework assignments and babysitting gigs. I plan how to complete dear Jane in one month by choosing which blocks I will make each day.

My cleaning lady wants a list every time she comes. I often forget to make one or make one and forget to give it to her. She likes to have a list to keep her focused and to have that sense of accomplishment when she checks off a completed task. If I do not leave a list for her when I am not there, she will start several tasks and inevitably find an old cupboard of hoarded stuff to remove, dust off and replace in a most artistic manner, short items to the front, taller ones behind, every label readable. It drives me nuts. I do not allow her to touch my quilting stash or my office desk or bookshelves. I would never be able to find anything. It drives her nuts. She is not a professional cleaner, just a girl I am helping by providing her with a bit of work and a bit of cash. In return, she blesses me by doing some of the heavier cleaning that I have been unable to do in recent years. It is a win/win. And, she is making a quilt, slowly, steadily.

Problem is, I spend more time and I have more fun making the lists than actually doing the activities. When I was in school, I had to get to class on time, hand in assignments on time, get to appointments on time. I had gone back to school after my kids grew up and have completed a BRE and MTS all the while getting up before 5 each morning to milk cows as I started each day. I no longer milk cows, except on rare mornings when no one else is available to help my sweetie husband.

Now I am doing a self paced online doctorate with no deadlines. I spend more time quilting than writing and often more time reading blogs, dreaming and drafting than quilting. Sigh. Although I do make sure I am home to watch that blessed little baby grand daughter that comes over 2-3 days a week. Snuggling grand babies is about the most important work I do these days. And the most rewarding. I am visiting my pregnant daughter in New Brusnwick for 2 weeks and left my camera at home so cannot boast about my quilting progress. She is on bed rest for another 3 months until baby arrives but that is not stopping us from making a quilt together. I cut, she pins and sews. It is a wedding quilt for a nephew in August. A disappearing 9 patch. So simple. She has about 1to 1 1/2 hours of usable energy each day and lays down the rest. We watched the entire season 1 of Downton Abbey on Friday. So now I know what that is all about. And, since she has netflicks and a big screen tv, we just watched Call the Midwife. I first heard about that show at Q@F last week. One of my quilting friends is a doula.

I am stitching on 3 CCCQ blocks and jotting down ideas as they come. Making lists. Like which quilts I am going to work on in the next few months. I will be returning here for June when the baby arrives and must have some stitching to keep  my hands busy.  I want to want to want to complete Dear Jane, except that I have not done any work since the retreat in October when I sewed up half a corner kite.  I want to complete the GO real fast quilt. I have all the blocks completed and 2 quilted. But it will have to wait again until I get home. I want to start one of the Di Ford quilts that I am so adoring.  And I have started the Ben Biggs BOM which I am doing by machine applique to get it sew up each month. Sigh.

I am a list maker. I make lists. I make grocery lists and leave them at home when I go grocery shopping. I make lists of  quilts I am working on. I make lists of quilts I want to make. I colour code . . .
Blessings,
Chris

Quilting Injuries

I went to Buffalo New York shopping yesterday with a friend and we visited 4 quilt shops. And I only bought fabric in 3 of them. However, I did find a 1/8 inch bias tape maker. That will be fun to try out. My right leg kept cramping up as I was driving. Getting out each shop and walking helped stretch it out a bit.
It appears that  I injured my right knee, at least my massage therapist said it was inflamed and that I should ice it.  And how did I do that? Working on my Go Real Fast quilt. I have been using the knee lift to raise the presser foot as I use both hands to turn the fabric as I stitch around all those lovely flowers and leaves.

The knee started hurting last week when I was spending an hour or 2 every day appliqueing. I tried using my left foot on the foot petal and that worked up to a point. Like when I came to a point and had to change direction and lifted the presser foot with the right knee and forgot to let go of the gas petal with the left foot. I had to do some unstitching. The gadget really is great because it allows me to use both hands and make faster progress. At least I do not have holes in my fingers right now from pricking my fingers so often.

I am off to New Brunswick tomorrow to visit my pregnant daughter (how wonderful those words look) and hang out with her for 2 weeks. She wants to make a queen size disappearing 9 patch for a wedding quilt for August. Now, considering that she is on bed rest for most of her pregnancy guess who will be more than helping? 
Blessings,
Chris

Progress on GO Real Fast Quilt

These are the final 4 blocks for this fast quilt that I started almost a year ago. Although I had researched lots of books and patterns, I ended up doing the traditional blocks in freestyle after having cut out lots of shapes with my GO dies.  I was looking for some inspiration and took the idea here from the Beyond the Cherry Trees Quilt but found a picture on a note card that gave me this layout.

Cherries

 Then I started stitching down each individual wretched little cherry and kept having problems with my machine. This is what I was finding on the underside. Now, I had the machine cleaned and serviced a month ago just as I was starting this machine appplique and I could not figure out what was going wrong.

Nests

So, I decided to check under the throat plate and discovered this big mess of lint. Ah hah. So, I cleaned it out using the special brush.

Lint

Then I found this red thread tangled up in the bobbin area. Sigh.

So, I got some tweezers and carefully removed it and proceeded on with my machine appliqueing. Until I had it happen again several times.

Thread caught in bobbin area

I finally decided that as I kept switching from 0 straight stitch to narrow zigzag every circle and it was messing up, the problem seemed to be not having a long enough top thread before taking the first stitch. It did not happen when I just moved the needle to the next spot without cutting the thread.

Using a press and cut mat to center the background square, I laid out the oak leaves in a circle. It needed something else in it but the acorn on the die was just too big for my liking. I actually found an oak leaf and cherry pattern in a book. I did notice one is missing.

Oak leaf and cherries

Flowers in an oval

Here I was making skinny stems to give the illusion of a circle. I cut out strips from the left over bits after running my custom made leaf di through the cutter. The bottom one turned out more round than the top. I am learning as I play. That is a wrinkle on the top stem.

Orange blossoms

Instead of changing thread colours all the time, I am stitching all the greens first then the reds.
Just have the creamy centers to do. And oh yes, most of those cherries.
Come to think of it, there are no cherries on the Dear Jane quilt.

Blessings,
Chris