What I Have Been Working On

The Leominster Art Center, where I display some of my quilts, is having a special show in October, featuring works with Autumn Colors, sort of an Autumn in New England theme. I didn't have anything appropriate to display, so I started something new. This is what I was dyeing some of those fabrics for, and last week I started constructing the quilt. Here is my initial drawing.

And  this is a scaled-up version with some sketches of details.

Then, I drew a simplified version on parchment, and started auditioning fabric.

Using fusible (the same roll that gave me so much trouble on this quilt), I began building the scene. Oddly enough, the fusible gave me no trouble this time. 

I continued to add more, including the hairpin turn in North Adams.

Then I carved some stamps, to add texture to some of the areas. These included several buildings, a couple grasses, and some stylized asters. I also attempted the Lions from Williamstown, Ma. What I have heard is that these lions were designed by the same woman who designed the Vietnam Memorial, but I don't know if that is true. They are gorgeous, though, and provide a very majestic entrance to a trailer park! My stamp did not do them justice.

Then I got brave, and stamped the buildings onto the fabric. I have never put paint on a piece of fabric after it was already in a quilt before. I was very nervous. It's not perfect, but it is good enough. Next time will be better. 

After that, I built and added gravestones, to represent one of the many old graveyards to be found travelling west on Route 2.

There is more to come, so stay tuned.

Purple Horse Bag

This new bag is finished. Well, almost. It still needs a button, but I don't have the right one on hand, I will get that this weekend. The pattern is the smaller version of this bag that I made for myself.

The fabric on the front pocket is from a vest that was given to one of my girls many years ago. They had no interest in it, but I could not let go of the fabric. Now a piece of it has found a home.

It gets a little wilder on the inside, and has lots of useful pockets.

I'm working on two more, which I hope to show you soon.

Now I am off to North Adams, to pick up a load of stuff from First Daughter's apartment. Hard to believe that she graduates from college next week. WHERE does the time go?

Catching Up

On Good Friday, Second Daughter and I went to North Adams to get First Daughter from school, and bring her home for the weekend. We stopped quite a few times to take pictures. The rivers were running very fast from all the rain we had had in New England. This is the Conneticut River, from the French King Bridge. This bridge won an award in 1932 for its beautiful steelwork, which you can't actually see from the bridge. The view is always wonderful though, and changes alot with the season and the light. In the fall, tour buses stop here.

Here is a shot of Second Daughter taking pictures of the Cold River. Her camera is nicer than mine, and she takes much better pictures, but I don't have access to them to show you.

On Saturday, First Daughter worked, Second Daughter played miniature golf, and we finished up the day with this. 

On Easter, there was egg hunting, there was thankfulness that the Easter Bunny did not raid the papaya treats, there was a tasty dinner, with spinach salad made from the first spinach from the garden,  and there was lots of this.

(Yes, this really is Easter, not the Fourth of July!)

On Monday, Second Daughter was home from school sick. Don't tell her I put this picture here. She won't be happy!

And while she called the doctor, I took First Daughter back to school. The water was still high, and amazingly, there was still a littler snow in the mountains, to let us know it is only early April. I didn't get a picture of that, because there was no safe place to stop.  This is the Cold River, again.

  

We had a great weekend, and hope you did , too. Finally on Tuesday, I was able to get back to the sewing machine. More on that in the next post.

What Goes On In A Bunny Brain?

Sometimes you just have to wonder what are they thinking? Although she is not eating her pellets (she is nibbling at hay), so far today Ginny has been caught eating:

1. cardboard
2. basket (actually a bunny toy)
3. towel
4. safety cover for lamp cord
5. strap to The Man's laptop bag

Oh, and I did just remove her from a quilt before she sank those teeth in.Do you think she might be part goat? Maybe I'd better hide the tin cans. 

These are the blocks from yesterday, all sewn together. It ended up slightly too narrow to my eyes, so I added a border on one side. There will be a vine with stylized flowers placed on top of that border, but I haven't gotten that far yet. This was option number two. First, I thought about adding a strip of horizontal pieced logs down one side, separated from the body of the quilt by a narrow white border (1 inch). Hopefully, I have made the right choice.

It may be a few days before I can show you the final result, since I  travel to North Adams tomorrow, to bring First Daughter home for the weekend. That means Second Daughter will have to let ME have the car! Hah!

I Bet Those Mountains Were Beautiful, If Only We Could Have Seen Them

Yesterday I returned First Daughter to school, for her last semester as an undergraduate. Despite the constant snow, it was just warm enough that the roads were only wet, and the visibility on the road was fine except for top of the hill in Gardner, Ma., and in the problematically named Florida, Ma. 

The usually spectacular views along Route 2 were pretty much invisible, however. We tried to take some pictures.

The Connecticut River was out there somewhere.

The Berkshires were out there somewhere.

North Adams was out there somewhere.

We found it eventually. And by the way, if you ever see this sign:

take the warning seriously. Unless your driving Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, and are using this as your runway!

Now off to sew, at least until Second Daughter comes home from her half day of mid-terms....