 |
| Top row |
Chris
Saturday, May 10, 2014
Dear Jane Update
If I just stopped playing games and reading blogs I could complete this thing faster. I finally finished all the triangles for the top row. I did #7 over since the first one was too yellowy and did not blend in. So I am down to 25 triangles and 2 corner kites to go. No pressure. I did 2 today and will complete a third before its time to feed my just turned 1 today granddaughter sleeping over night at the farm for the first time. After all, it is Mother's Day and her 2 older sisters are sleeping over at the other Gramma's. Oops! shes awake now so its bottle time then back to Right Side 12.
Blessings,
Chris
Chris
Tuesday, May 6, 2014
40 Bags in 40 Days Progress
(The word ladders shows up so I can share this)
Three years ago our daughter flew home for 5 days at her father's request to orchestrate clearing out 2 bedrooms of accumulated crap. My husband told me I needed to have a plan. My daughter said, don't tell me what needs doing. Tell me what it will look like when I am finished. My response with a sigh was that each room would have only a bed, a chair and a dresser. We were close. Each room has a bed, a chair and 2 dressers.
Our daughter is an amazing person with great organizational skills. She recruited the help of 2 close friends who just happen to be professional cleaners and as a love gift to us, they spent 3 mornings totally clearing out and hauling outside the most incredible amount of stuff. Nothing left with out my approval. They set up selves for my quilting hoard in one of the now cleared out bedrooms - the white room since it is not painted - in a very large walk in closet with 4 sliding panels that are each 4 feet wide and 7 feet high. It is full. I was busy working on a research paper for school at the time so was down here on the computer out of their way until they called me to sit and make decisions on what quilt fabric was to go and what was to stay and I had to answer immediately as they held it up in front of me. Within 10 minutes they had 8 big boxes of the cheap stuff I was never going to use. I let my quilt group sort through that and the rest was donated. I had most of my UFOs in project boxes already so now these are neatly labeled and sit on shelves awaiting my attention - not going to happen anytime soon. I have since purchased new mattresses for some of the beds so guests can sleep in comfort. It was time.
I had wanted to put in new windows for years but there was way too much stuff blocking access from the inside to allow workers to get in and do the replacing. One year ago we finally did replace all 22 windows in the house. Now we can open any window in the house whenever we want and the upstairs windows can now be washed from the inside. No more ladders to remove and replace storm windows.
My 40 Bags in 40 Days is up to day 12. I started the day after Lent was over since this is not a Lenten project. And since this is my challenge, I am not bound by rules that I have to do exactly 1 bag each consecutive day. Among other stuff, so far I have cleared out a big bag of old socks from the laundry room, worn out cassette tapes from a kitchen drawer that is now filled with place mats and hot pads, expired stuff from several kitchen cupboards when I was looking for sunblock and a glue stick from my quilt room. The glue stick got a wave of response on my facebook wall but, I spent an hour putting away a lot of gadgets and tidying up so I could begin completion on my Dear Jane quilt and I decided to stop using UHU glue since it does not wash out so nicely after all. I have switched to Elmers. I decided not to post before and after pictures, partly because I am too embarrassed with all the clutter and junk, but mostly because that would take precious time away from quilting. And as I was putting away a large depression glass dish in the china cabinet, I opened the lower doors and drawers to see what was inside and glory be I found the original manuscript for Denine's story and am now persuing publishing options. Interesting what you can find when you respond to a dare like 8 one hundred dollar bills. End of story.
( But wait! It was supposed to be Quilt Ladders. Oh well. Too late now.)
Blessings,
Chris
Three years ago our daughter flew home for 5 days at her father's request to orchestrate clearing out 2 bedrooms of accumulated crap. My husband told me I needed to have a plan. My daughter said, don't tell me what needs doing. Tell me what it will look like when I am finished. My response with a sigh was that each room would have only a bed, a chair and a dresser. We were close. Each room has a bed, a chair and 2 dressers.
Our daughter is an amazing person with great organizational skills. She recruited the help of 2 close friends who just happen to be professional cleaners and as a love gift to us, they spent 3 mornings totally clearing out and hauling outside the most incredible amount of stuff. Nothing left with out my approval. They set up selves for my quilting hoard in one of the now cleared out bedrooms - the white room since it is not painted - in a very large walk in closet with 4 sliding panels that are each 4 feet wide and 7 feet high. It is full. I was busy working on a research paper for school at the time so was down here on the computer out of their way until they called me to sit and make decisions on what quilt fabric was to go and what was to stay and I had to answer immediately as they held it up in front of me. Within 10 minutes they had 8 big boxes of the cheap stuff I was never going to use. I let my quilt group sort through that and the rest was donated. I had most of my UFOs in project boxes already so now these are neatly labeled and sit on shelves awaiting my attention - not going to happen anytime soon. I have since purchased new mattresses for some of the beds so guests can sleep in comfort. It was time.
I had wanted to put in new windows for years but there was way too much stuff blocking access from the inside to allow workers to get in and do the replacing. One year ago we finally did replace all 22 windows in the house. Now we can open any window in the house whenever we want and the upstairs windows can now be washed from the inside. No more ladders to remove and replace storm windows.
My 40 Bags in 40 Days is up to day 12. I started the day after Lent was over since this is not a Lenten project. And since this is my challenge, I am not bound by rules that I have to do exactly 1 bag each consecutive day. Among other stuff, so far I have cleared out a big bag of old socks from the laundry room, worn out cassette tapes from a kitchen drawer that is now filled with place mats and hot pads, expired stuff from several kitchen cupboards when I was looking for sunblock and a glue stick from my quilt room. The glue stick got a wave of response on my facebook wall but, I spent an hour putting away a lot of gadgets and tidying up so I could begin completion on my Dear Jane quilt and I decided to stop using UHU glue since it does not wash out so nicely after all. I have switched to Elmers. I decided not to post before and after pictures, partly because I am too embarrassed with all the clutter and junk, but mostly because that would take precious time away from quilting. And as I was putting away a large depression glass dish in the china cabinet, I opened the lower doors and drawers to see what was inside and glory be I found the original manuscript for Denine's story and am now persuing publishing options. Interesting what you can find when you respond to a dare like 8 one hundred dollar bills. End of story.
( But wait! It was supposed to be Quilt Ladders. Oh well. Too late now.)
Blessings,
Chris
Friday, May 2, 2014
Thursday, May 1, 2014
Denine: Why is She so Stiff
The doctor explained that according to the development graphs, her head should be a certain size at a certain age. And if it was not, there was a problem. Perhaps her brain was not growing as quickly as it ought. Up until this time, eight months, she had been gaining weight progressively. We discussed the possibility of admitting her to a Toronto hospital for extensive testing. Since we lived a long hours drive away, we asked if she could he admitted that same day. He would see what he could do.
We
found our way to the hospital and went through the usual channels of
admittance. Why do they always take so
long? They gave her a hospital gown and sent us to a waiting area. Six hours
later, we were
informed they had a bed
ready. So we were escorted to the
allocated room and then began the second phase of admittance.
What
specific problems have you noticed? What
does she eat? Does she sleep on her
stomach or back? What does she not like? When did she laugh first? etc. etc. etc.
She
was finally settled in for what we thought would be 3 days of extensive
testing. We were wrong. She got pneumonia while she was there. She also cut her first four teeth in
hospital.
Towards
the end of the three weeks, the doctor was going to do an operation. They felt it was necessary to insert a shunt
from the brain to the stomach. I
understood that this would be a small tube to drain cystic fluid that was
putting pressure on her brain. The date
and time were set. We waited at home and
waited and waited.
The
doctor was supposed to call after the operation. He did not.
After waiting all afternoon by the phone, I called him at the
hospital. After a long wait on a. long
distance line, he finally came on and said "Oh, we didn't do the operation
this morning. We shaved the top of her
head and drained off some fluid and filled it with air and discovered there was
no pressure being put on the brain so we did not do the operation. You can pick her up tomorrow." And he gave us a time to meet him at the hospital.
Were
we so unimportant that he could not call us to tell us? Or was he just too busy?
We
arrived, at the hospital at the appointed hour and had to wait for him. After
awhile we were ushered into a small classroom with a blackboard.. The doctor preceded to quietly and simply
explain the type of brain damage Denine had.
How severe it was. And what he
would recommend that we do.
It
appeared that very early in my pregnancy, about 8 weeks, that the fetus
suffered a stroke of some sort, blocking blood vessels to the brain. As the organs were in the formation stage at
the time, there was a reduced blood supply to the brain that was just beginning
to form. He then drew a diagram of the
brain on the board and started to cut out pieces here and there to show which
parts had not formed. By the time he was
finished, nearly half the brain had been removed. The vacant parts were filled with fluid. They thought there was pressure but there was
not.
This
was such a very rare thing that there
was no documented record of it having
happened before. Her condition was so severe there was no hope
of getting better. His
recommendations were rather drastic. He
said, "If I could have my way, I'd take this child away and never let you take her
home." I think he wanted to spare us what he knew was
ahead. He was wrong.
We
gathered Denine and her things and prepared to leave the hospital. We had to pick up a prescription at the
pharmacy downstairs. Fortunately we had
enough money on us. It was not cheap.
Tuesday, April 29, 2014
Beyond The Cherry Trees Fabric
I figure that if I am going to spend the next 2 years or so hand appliqueing then hand quilting Beyond The Cherry Trees, then I better find a lot of green that I can live with. And so I did.
I found Hobby Lobby for the first time and remembered to take along a couple of coupons and bought 11 yards of Kona Snow for the background. These are some of the colours that I will be using. A bit of French General. A bit of Primitive Gatherings. That solid green looks a bit bright beside all the rest.
Now to decide if I should prewash all the fabrics.
And just to make sure I have enough, I bought the rest of the bolt of the green. About 12 yards. This will be more than enough to reproduce this green and white antique quilt that hung in Mary's Quilt Shop if I should forget all the work I have to do and impulsively make it.
In the meantime, Dear Jane is coming along nicely toward the finish line.
Blessings,
Chris
I found Hobby Lobby for the first time and remembered to take along a couple of coupons and bought 11 yards of Kona Snow for the background. These are some of the colours that I will be using. A bit of French General. A bit of Primitive Gatherings. That solid green looks a bit bright beside all the rest.
Now to decide if I should prewash all the fabrics.
And just to make sure I have enough, I bought the rest of the bolt of the green. About 12 yards. This will be more than enough to reproduce this green and white antique quilt that hung in Mary's Quilt Shop if I should forget all the work I have to do and impulsively make it.
In the meantime, Dear Jane is coming along nicely toward the finish line.
Blessings,
Chris
Monday, April 28, 2014
Antique Quilt
I visited Mary's Quilt Shop in Bedford Pennsylvania this past weekend and saw this gorgeous President's Wreath Quilt. I think it was made around 1860. The 3 colours here are all solids and quite bright for being 154 years old. There are 9 of these blocks on a white ground. This shop is owned by the Mary Koval who travels the world showing her antique quilts and designs reproduction fabrics for Windham from her collection of quilts and antique fabrics. I did buy a fat quarter of each of the orange, green and red.
The orange flower centers are reverse appliqued. Everything is done with white thread. Why have I spent so much buying coloured thread over the years?
There is a simple curved stem around the border with buds and leaves and corner flowers. Now what really got my attention once I was allowed to touch the thing, is the binding treatment. The quilt is layered over a very thin batting, maybe flannel I am told. Take a look at that binding. It is turned over from the back, turned under a mere 1/8th inch and stitched down and still holding after all these years.
There is a lot of hand quilting on it including circles along the border. I wish . . . sigh . . .
Blessings
Chris
 |
| President'sWreath |
The orange flower centers are reverse appliqued. Everything is done with white thread. Why have I spent so much buying coloured thread over the years?
 |
| Reverse appliqued flower centers |
There is a simple curved stem around the border with buds and leaves and corner flowers. Now what really got my attention once I was allowed to touch the thing, is the binding treatment. The quilt is layered over a very thin batting, maybe flannel I am told. Take a look at that binding. It is turned over from the back, turned under a mere 1/8th inch and stitched down and still holding after all these years.
 |
| Border |
There is a lot of hand quilting on it including circles along the border. I wish . . . sigh . . .
 |
| Circles quilted on border |
Blessings
Chris
Sunday, April 27, 2014
CCCQ # 20
This past weekend my husband and I went to Bedford Pennsylvania for the annual Blue Halter Sale where we were selling 4 of our Guernsey cows. During the youth auction after the banquet Fri night, I was sitting at the back of the room with a portable light stitching on this block which I finished the next day at the cattle auction. One of the ladies sitting with us asked about the block and when I told her the story, she says, "I am from Chester County! My Family has lived there since the 1790s." Now she is trying to see if she can find any connection with the Criswell/Smith families. So, I gave her my blog info and we shall see. Most interesting is that Sharon posted maps the other day from Chester County 1850s.
While in Bedford I took time to look up Mary's Quilt Shop, which was a few blocks from the cattle sale and I got to look at and photograph a couple of antique quilts as well as purchase the rest of the bolt of a poison green with black dots. Then went to Hobby Lobby for the first time ever on the way home and bought Fons and Porter's marking chalk pencils and 11 yards of Kona Snow for the background for my soon to be started Beyond The Cherry Trees Quilt. I am a happy girl. I found everything on my list.
And Dear Jane is not neglected and alone now. I have discovered this indescribable rush inside as I am connecting coloured triangles to pieced and appliqued triangles. No one told me it would feel this way once I got to the outside border. Quilters need to know . . . there is this magical ecstacy (almost as good as ch . . . no . . . better than chocolate) after the stress and drudgery of multi-pieced 4 1/2 inch squares.
I . must . go . and . tell . the .whole . world ! !
Blessings,
Chris
 |
| CCCQ # 20 |
And Dear Jane is not neglected and alone now. I have discovered this indescribable rush inside as I am connecting coloured triangles to pieced and appliqued triangles. No one told me it would feel this way once I got to the outside border. Quilters need to know . . . there is this magical ecstacy (almost as good as ch . . . no . . . better than chocolate) after the stress and drudgery of multi-pieced 4 1/2 inch squares.
I . must . go . and . tell . the .whole . world ! !
Blessings,
Chris
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