Wednesday Weather Report #179 - 10/21/20

After last weekend's frost and the voluminous rain this week, it appears it's time to bite the bullet and put my ADK chair away for the winter. I know, it's also time to rake leaves but we need to dry out first...

This week's hexies show that we have definitely moved on to fall. Yet we also have a few snow showers predicted for next week. The temps aren't really supposed to be that low so I won't hold my breath on the first snow of the year.

October 14 - 20, 2020
59 - 69 - 46 - 57 - 55 - 49 - 47 F

Eek! I bought myself a birthday gift! I've always stayed away from BOM programs as they seem expensive but when I saw how many different Tula fabrics were included in this kit (that I wouldn't have to buy individually) and the color placement was all planned out it was a no brainer for me. It'll be an easy project with little thinking on my part. Sounds like a good plan for what I'm sure my favorite (and only) brother will now call an "over the hill" quilter. LOL. 

And I'm wayyyyy behind on sharing but over the Columbus Day/Indigenous People's Weekend I finally pulled the papers and spray basted this doll quilt. The colored triangles were a swap from Hexie Club and then I added my own neutral to bring it all together.

So many papers to pull.
And now to press them all for reuse.
I have 2 more kaleidoscope projects planned.

It's always a bonus when you have the perfect
 sized batting chunk just waiting for a purpose.

I couldn't resist - it matches the colors on the front perfectly and it's cats.
I really could have just started and stopped with it being cats. Right?!

Feline Friday - 8/30/19

Did you know?
I'm famous!!!

The Arts Council put my close up in their latest newsletter to advertise Momma's upcoming hexie exhibit with her hexie friends.

Then the local weekly paper did a quick story after Momma did a hexie demo at the Farmers' Market, also with a nod to the exhibit which will be hung next Wednesday. They totally spelled my name wrong but I guess it doesn't matter.  Well, it might matter if my neighbors see my picture and try to call me and I ignore them. Maybe they will just think I'm ignoring them like I usually do...


=====================================================================
For anyone nearly local - Please come to Momma's exhibit. I hope you'll pose with my pawtrait!

Arts Council for Wyoming County, 31 S Main St, Perry, NY
Gallery Hours: W 9-6, RF 11-7, Sa 10-3

Exhibit is 9/6/19 until 9/28/19
Opening Reception (with snacks and club members present)  is 6:30-8:30 on Friday 9/6/19

Hope to see you there!

Wednesday Weather Report #36 - 1/24/18

I'm afraid I haven't accomplished much in the last week, sewing-wise. That is mostly thanks to the start of my EMT refresher course. This year I am "challenging" the class - that means I can take several tests and if I do well enough I can test out of portions (most?!!!) of the class. I did well on the practical/skill challenge but I am still waiting on the results of the written exam. We were told we would have the results by tomorrow...I'm trying to be patient...

I know - it's a horrible picture but I already had them bagged
when I remembered that I needed to photograph them.
Sorry!!!

When I wasn't studying or catching up on the much ignored housework, I was working on Kaleidoscope parts. As you may recall, my Hexie Club exchanges basted hexies for our birthdays. This year we are doing the Kaleidoscope block.

I am gifting each birthday girl 8 large and 4 small purple triangles. My goal is to have them all basted by the end of this week so that I'm not scrambling last minute to get them done.

And of course, I finished my hexie temperature rosette for the week. I apparently missed the 2/3 mark and I'm not quite to the 3/4 mark but I'm thrilled to say that I am now 69.2307692 % done. Woot! Woot!

17 - 19 - 32 - 43 - 41 - 41 - 36F

I am once again behind on sewing the rosettes to the background squares and I doubt I will have much time to catch up this weekend as I have an 8 hour CPR class on Saturday. Funny thing is, one of my challenge exams was on CPR/AED/etc and I passed it. Am I the only one who finds it ironic that I will be trained after I passed the exam?

Sew....how are your temperature rosettes coming? Are you thinking of joining in? It's never too late to jump in! If you're making a quilt this year have you thought of making another next year so you can compare the 2? I'm starting to think but in rather vague terms...

An InLinkz Link-up

HeLP for Hexie-aholics - 7/17/17

Hello and welcome to our monthly Hexie Linky party!!!

For a change of pace, today I thought I would share the gifts I gave and received for our Hexie Club Brown Bag Challenge.

As you may recall, last December seven of us exchanged brown lunch bags with scraps of some of our favorite fabrics. They needed to be fav fabrics because the person who received your bag would be making a secret project to gift back to you at our Christmas in July party.

I received Linda's brown bag which included a number of blue and green fabrics plus a smaller white piece. I eventually came up with (ie, modified/stole from the evil website) an idea to use honeycomb shapes to make a blue/green panel for a vinyl mesh tote bag.

Of course, I had help from my Snoopervisor who has a very fluffy tail.

Eventually I completed the 2 honeycomb panels and then machine appliqued them to white fabric.

The panels were then added to the white mesh totebag. I modified a totebag pattern I've made many times to accommodate the size of the honeycombs which created some of it's own issues. "Next time" I make this pattern I'll put it together a little differently to make my life easier :)

Cheryl received my bag which had purples and B&W fabrics. What can I say? They were scraps on my cutting table and they spoke to me.

It was hard to get a great picture but basically she covered a stretched canvas with more of the purples and B&Ws surrounding the edge. I would love more of the cat fabric!

Now I just need to decide where to hang this little beauty!

And just to tease you with a little project I'm working on...

I'm very proud of my frugal use of these fabrics. It's so much more frugal than how I started the project. Could I, should I, be a little more vague on details to entice you? Bwahahahaha!! I'll show you in a few weeks when it actually looks like something.

Ok - now it's our favorite time to share projects. We are looking forward to seeing your project no matter if it's new or old or even just a project in the design stage. Any paper shape counts.

An InLinkz Link-up

Design Wall Monday - 6/12/17

Unfortunately I can't share the hexie project I'm working on with you. It's a surprise for hexie club - earlier this year we exchanged lunch bags of scraps in order to make something for the fabric owner and the item needs to be finished by our July meeting. I'm not sure if my person reads my blog so it's just better to keep it a secret until after the meeting. It's real pretty, I promise!

Instead, lets catch up on some recent projects and happenings...

The most exciting thing last week was meeting Ruth from The Yarnarian!!! I can't remember how long we've been emailing between our blogs but it's sooooo fun to meet another blogger. I've met 2 bloggers now.

We spent the morning exchanging gifts, sharing show-n-tell and gabbing on and on. Then we walked to down town Canandaigua, NY to a crepe place for lunch, Yumm!! We spent the afternoon stitching in the hotel lobby while Ruth's husband checked on us periodically during his conference. It's too bad he's retiring and won't be attending more conferences in NY so that we can meet up again. On the other hand...any time I'm down to NYC I have an invite :)

Here's the 2nd of my red and blue rosettes for our hexie club vet quilt project. It's not my favorite fussing cutting design but I was using scraps and this is what I had. Now to fussy cut the third rosette...

And two weekends ago, I cleaned all the surfaces in the Quilt Lab and then did some trimming and stitching.

I fussy cut purple and oranges to make a (future) Quatro Color quilt. I have the perfect purple and orange batik for the borders. I'm thinking this will be a good backup project to take camping since it fits so nicely in this yellow bin from Harbor Freight.

In an effort to clean up a box of blue, yellow and orange fabrics I am saving for my pieced hexie project I put together these 14 sets of pieced squares to make "cog" rosettes. These are going with the other blue and yellow/orange sets I had put together for my camping trip coming up soon. Between these and the Quatro Color I have plenty of work. These go together pretty fast so I'll still probably throw in a couple other projects for a change of pace.

Matched with center reds and papers all marked.

Oh and BTW - remember the adage to measure twice/cut once?

I highly suggest to READ THE DIRECTIONS TWICE then measure twice and finally cut once. I had cut all the strips for these blocks to discover they were too big when it was time to sew. Luckily they were too big and not too small but it wasted a lot of time to trim them down later.

Piecing the hexie blocks also gave me the opportunity to work with some leader enders. I haven't worked on my puss in the Corner blocks in a long time so it was fun to make these as the scraps were getting trimmed from the Lab surfaces.

As a little ego thing - I finished another 5K on Saturday: I was the first finisher to walk the entire event (as opposed to alternating walking and running). Does it really matter? Only to me.

Even better...yesterday I went for a walk. Did I think I would go for such a long walk? Not quite so far but when I got to the Letchworth State Park entrance I thought I should go somewhere in the park.  Had I planned to walk so far I would have started much, much earlier, before it got to be so damn hot. This is about my worst pace ever but given the heat, hills and wind it's not bad. As I've said before - I'm in it for the endurance. I've got mountains to climb this summer!!!!

Happy Monday!

Linking to Design Wall Monday and Monday Making!

Design Wall Monday - 8/31/15

Last fall my hexie group did a fussy cutting challenge. We each bought a FQ of a fabulous red, white & black fabric and had to make a 3 round rosette using 1" hexies. At our December meeting we played a fun variation of a right-left game to exchange the rosettes and were supposed to make something of them by the March meeting.

Red/White/Black fabric in the center & middle round
 is from our fussy cutting challenge.
I lined the bag with the same fabric.

I just finished mine yesterday. LOL. I suppose being the 'lead troublemaker' gets me some leeway sometimes.

My original plan was to convert a cloth bag from the local grocery store but the project just wasn't calling my name. I recently found a youtube link to make a backpack using 4 FQs and this finally sang to me!

Be sure to print out the free pattern listed in the "more" section of the video.

I modified the size of the bag to finish larger based on another backpack I use often. I also used a half-yard piece of the solid red to eliminate one seam.

I gave my rosette a good last press before removing the papers and then spray basted it to the red. I also spray basted a chunk of batting behind the red before machine stitching the layers together and then trimming away the excess batting. It's a little stiffer than I would like but there was no puckering of the rosette and the final bag looks fab.

I stole the cords from a freebie/smaller backpack but I think they need to be a bit longer...next time I get to Joann's I'll buy a bunch of cord so I can make more. I looked at the local Walmart but it's being reorganized which means it's a mess and there are no other local stores w/in 50 miles. And speaking of Walmart - if you want to use grommets for your backcpack, don't get the cheapies at Walmart. Not. Worth. The. Money.

The end of Summer...

There are 5 things in my universe that signify the end of summer...

The Fair finished (1) on Saturday. Friday was our third annual hexie demo outside the Home Arts Department and just in front of the booth for the LQS. We had 9 members present, including 3 members who just joined a couple weeks ago!! We had lots of lookers and at least 2 new people stopped long enough for a little lesson and free starter kit thanks to paperpieces.com.

Yes - Zorro helps me hold the boxes in place every year. He's so thoughtful and helpful!
Can you find the photo bomber?

School taxes (2) arrived - now I need to pull out escrowed bills for the banks and combine bills into single envelopes for people who own more than one property by the end of this week. I took on the tax collector job several years ago to *help* pay my own property taxes but it really does cut into my hexie and walking time for the next 2+ months. I think I've figured out a way to get my walks in but I'm still working on finding hexie time. On the upside, I can buy hot school lunches for just $2. It beats bringing a sandwich from home...

This is the LAST rosette to need the inner sashing!!!!

Once taxes arrive that generally means it's my last summer Friday off (3) which is followed closely by Labor Day (4). There wasn't even time for one more camping trip (5) this year. Boooooooo.....

Did you link to the Small Town America post yet?? The linky party closes on 8/31/15.

Design Wall Monday - 7/27/15

Dang! How did it get to be almost August already??!!

On Saturday part of our hexie club did a demo at the local Farmers' Market. We handed out many free kits and several people tried it right then and there. There is at least 1 new hexiologist in the world because she came into the store while I was working Sunday and bought a bunch of supplies to make several Christmas presents. Woo Hoo! She has been invited to attend out monthly meetings so I hope she comes.

I spent the rest of the weekend working on projects for the fair. This girl loves a deadline and with the fair in less then two weeks we are definitely in deadline mode! I'm pretty sure this is the furthest behind I have been in years.

I started these blocks in Bonnie Hunter's class last October. I have all the star blocks sewn together and the 2 end borders are almost done. I think the table runner will be about 15" x 48" when it's done. I picked a green for the background but I have yet to pick binding fabric yet.

You can see the green for the runner in the rear left, under the remaining 2" of gold.

And I spent a lot of time stitching this dolly quilt (for the doll/cat bed!!) - it's too bad my math skills stink and I didn't have enough hexies basted to finish last night. Maybe if I blow off mowing the yard yet again, I can finish tonight. ..

Design Wall Monday - 5/18/15 - For the Love of Hexies...

Today I thought I would share a group design wall!

Nearly 3 years ago I started a hexie group at my LQS. We started with just a couple gals at each meeting and we now regularly have 14 at each meeting. We would love to have more join us but we're going to need to find some more chairs first!!! LOL.

Last year we were asked to demo at several different events (Farmers' Market, Wyoming County Fair and Fall Festival to name a few) and I was hoping we would be demoing again this year so I told the girls it was time to think of an official name and pick a logo.

We eventually settled on "For the Love of Hexies..." and picked a logo after which I had the harebrained idea that we should make a table topper of some sort for our demos. We picked a focus fabric (for colors) and I had each gal make 2 logos in her color scheme. 1 logo is for the table topper and she has to make the other logo into something for herself. The results of this and our fussy cutting challenge will be the main portion of our exhibit at the Arts Council for Wyoming County this September.

At our regular meeting (5/1/15) we had this:

And last Friday we had a special meeting where we ended with this. It might be a little hard to tell but it's in 6 larger pieces.

I am so excited to see this coming together!! There is 1 more yellow logo coming to make this a triangle. That way we can have the majority of the topper on a folding table and drape the rest over the front to grab people's attention.

Some of the girls took pieces and parts home to finish adding the black diamonds/triangles so when we have our next regular meeting on 6/5/15 we can put the  pieces all together and fill in the sides (you can kinda see it there at the bottom: 3 black hexies and 1 colored hexie to match the center of all the logos).

If anyone is local or swinging through Wyoming County in Western NY on the first Friday of the month, we would love to have you join us for an evening!!

HeLP for Hexie-aholics!!!!

Hello, my fellow Hexiologists!!! Today is our monthly installment of Hexie Linky Party (HeLP) for Hexie-aholics!!!

Why the 17th you may ask....'cuz 1/17/71 is my birthday and 17 is my favorite number. Purely random as far as all y'all are concerned :)

If you've been reading my blog for a while, you may remember that I am the Head Troublemaker for our local hexie club, recently dubbed "For the Love of Hexies..." This past summer we each bought a half yard of this red/white/black fabric and were to add any other RWB fabrics we wanted in addition to fussy cutting this fabric. We would then bring our rosettes back to our December meeting to exchange. Luckily, I won the rosette I wanted most due to the pieced hexies.

Our next step in the challenge is for each of us to make our rosette in to something and bring it back to our March meeting for show-n-tell. These finished projects will be part of our display at the Arts Council in September.

I'm still deciding what to do with my rosette. I don't need another pillow and don't know that I have time to really add enough to become a table runner. I was thinking doll/cat quilt size maybe. Any suggestions?

Ok -  here's my favorite part of HeLP - what are you working on??!! Feel free to link to any project old, new or still in the dream stage; just be sure to link to an actual post and not your blog in general.

An InLinkz Link-up

World Wide Feline Hexie HeLPin' Hoppin' Friday!

Hello!! My name is Squeaky and today is a VERY special day here at sarah did it! – not only is it the day I become famous for hijacking hosting the World Wide Blog Hop but it’s also Feline Friday and HeLP for Hexie-aholics!! Holy Schmoly I’m tired just thinking about all the activity!!

Just in case you’re new to this part of the blogosphere, let’s start with Feline Friday.

Every Friday, my sissy, brother or I host a little linky party, called Feline Friday, just for us kittehs. We have furrrriends who stop by often and some we haven’t seen in a while…it's always fun to see what they've been up to!

We also have HeLP for Hexie-aholics on the 17^th of every month. Why the 17^th you ask? Cuz it’s Momma’s birthday and hexies are her favoritist thing in the whole world. Some of her furriends even made her Head Troublemaker she likes hexies so much. Momma likes her furriends to share their projects, both new and old of any shape or construction method at this linky party.

And then there is the World Wide Blog Hop. Have you seen it? All those humans were posting about their creativeness when Sally from The Objects of Design wondered why there were no cats involved?! I mean we do rule the ‘net, don’t we?! She invited me to join and I immediately said yes. I did wait until a Friday to post tho…I am a Feline Friday Gal!! LOL!

 So let’s get to the hop questions…

1.       What am I working on?
Do you mean besides my tan and a good nap?  You’re funny!

2.       How does my work differ from others of it’s genre?
I think Sally said it best: “Squeaky seems to enjoy a scrappy colorful look yet has a somewhat hidden modern edge balancing a lot of white with lots of colors. Very trendy! “

3.       Why do I create what I do?
Really, I just like to support Momma in her work. She creates such pretty stuff and I cover it with my furs to protect it! Momma is still working on this fussy cutting project for her hexie club where she is head troublemaker.  I don’t think I have enough furs on it yet so that is my project for the weekend!


4.       How does my creative process work?
I just look around for something to do. Sometimes there are hexies to furr, sometimes I need a good stretch and sometimes there is a new cobeweb to explore.

 

And what is the bestest part of a blog hop? Finding new places to explore of course!! I'm still working on finding more links for you but lets start with Leia. She's misunderstood cuz she has beautiful furs but lives in a house with an increasing number of little people which can make her a teeny weeny  cranky. I can understand - in fact, I run and hide when Momma's nephews come over.

Ok my furriends - it's time to share on this special day. We only going to have one linky party for both HeLP and Feline Friday so please link up your hexie projects and your felines!!!

 

An InLinkz Link-up

hexie update

I don't think I showed you the third Value Proposition block after I finished it. You might recall that I didn't care for it much while I was making it but I've changed my mind and don't mind it at all!

Last night I also finished the fourth rosette. I'm going to have to use the teal & gold sparingly - It doesn't really read as a dark to me since the gold reflects light and I haven't used any other gold fabrics yet. Of course, I could solve the problem by using more golds. That would mean I need to buy more gold fabrics. Go on - twist my arm!

I also recently finished my May BOM butterfly. You may recall that I bought the purple shot cotton and the wild circle fabric at the Amherst quilt show back in April. I finally found the perfect project and had a ball working with the shot cotton. The picture just doesn't capture the magenta/blue color variations as you move the fabric back and forth. Can't wait to find some more shots!

Last but not least is a group project for Hexie Club. Every month we play a FQ game where we end up bringing a different FQ home for our stashes. Recently I have been trying to get the girls to do some fussy cutting and it was suggested that we could do a group project this fall. After some brain storming we decided to make a rosette (similar in shape and size to the Value Prop rosettes) with everyone using the same fabric plus what ever else we want to add. At our annual Christmas party we will play the game with our rosettes instead of a FQ. Then we have to make the rosette in to something and bring it back to our March meeting. I'm excited because there is a lot of fussy opportunity in the fabric they chose.

I didn't take a photo but I did work some more on my twisted hexies at lunch today.

The next big decisions will be what hexie projects to take camping this summer. I know I'll over pack but who wants to be hundreds of miles away with nothing to work on? And this year I am also over packing audio books since the library near the campground isn't camper friendly. I might even be able to get ahead on my reading challenges. woohoo!

HeLP for Hexie-aholics

Hello and welcome to another edition of HeLP for Hexie-aholics, our monthly Hexie Linky Party!!!

As part of our Hexie Night at the LQS, we have a Birthday Club. When it's your birth month, the other hexiologists give you basted "hexies" in whatever color you have requested. Last year was our first and we exchanged 3/4" hexies - you'll recall the pillow I am making with my purple hexies.

This year we are exchanging 1.5" 6-point diamonds. I bought the papers a while ago but they were too small for my intention at that time and they got put in the drawer while I worked with a bigger size. Now that we are going to play with the 1.5" diamonds I decided it was time to make something with them - not only as a sample for the girls to get ideas for their birthday diamonds but also because I've had this picture pinned for some time and I wanted to do it in EPP (the original was done with paper piecing and not with diamonds).

I'll be adding diamonds of a darker orange around the outside edge.

Please don't ask what it's gonna be when it grows up!

Ok, Now it's YOUR turn to share an EPP project of any shape or vintage!!!! Don't forget to link to a specific post. Let me know if you need help linking properly or fixing a link. I'm looking forward to seeing all of your projects!!!

Design Wall Monday - 4/14/14

This weekend was another busy one! Not only did I finish both an audio book and a paper book that were due at the library today but I also did some raking outside in perfect summer weather. Both yesterday and today are overcast and 80F! Yeah, we went straight from Winter to Summer but rumor has it that Spring will be here tomorrow, when the high will be 52F and the low 16F.

I even went to a not-so-local quilt show. I decided to go to the show partly cuz it was out of my usual quilt store range (I was hoping for new "stuff" to buy!) but I also felt it was a test run to their usual meeting site. And why would that be important for a guild 90 minutes away? Because my fingers, toes, eyes and legs are all crossed that I get into at least one of Bonnie Hunter's classes at their annual seminar in September!!!! I might have to miss one of my camping trips to the Adirondack Mts but I have been waiting for these classes since I first saw them on Bonnie's blog around 3 years ago. I'll share show and shopping pictures tomorrow.

Last but not least, I have been working on a sample for our next Hexie Club meeting. I am seriously considering adding 6 more hexies in place of the blank papers so that it's not just another round hexie topper. I am thinking the ends will be the large red flower but I'm not sure yet.

Don't forget to stop in this Thursday for HeLP for Hexie-aholics! Looking forward to seeing what all y'all have been working on!!!

Hexie updates and Twist to the 60s with Batiks Hop

Some of you may have heard I dabble in something called hexies. It's just something I tinker with once in a while. LOL! Constantly is more like it!

We have a monthly Hexie Night at our LQS - either working on our own projects or swapping fabric squares to all make the same project. I also sometimes teach new patterns or pieced hexie designs. We play games, have holiday parties, bring snacks to share and we also have a birthday club. At the meeting in their birth month the birthday girl receives (7) 3/4" basted hexies from all the other girls. 


On the bottom row, due this month, are batiks, 2 reds and earthtones.
On the top row, for future months, are red, green and purple.
Forgot to photo the whole stack of purples for my own birthday :)

I know one of the first recipients of red hexies found the perfect black fabric with tiny red roses. She has the roses in the center of each hexie rosette. I haven't seen what the other girls have made yet. My birthday is just around the corner and I'm looking forward to my purple hexies. I'm also making some of my own since I'll be making this pillow I found on Pinterest and I'll need quite a few hexies:

 

Click picture for Pinterest link!

And this is a new project - which was hidden on my design wall photo from Monday. I know I need another new hexie UFO like a hole in the head but one of the days shortly after Pepper died I just couldn't get my act together and decided to peruse Pinterest, evil website that it is, to get out of my funk. It worked!

This project will have fussycut black on white and white on black fabrics just like you see in this photo. I have ordered diamond papers that will fit in around the star. When a number of stars are put together, the bright fabrics I'll use for the diamonds will look like tumbling blocks. I guess it's the black mood I was in versus the brightness of happier times? I'm still working on a name for this project... Suggestions??

Yikes! Almost forgot to remind y'all to visit today's Hoppers!
I *just might* have mine done in time for Friday!! Wootwoot!

Gracie Oliver Arts
How ART You?
Creatin in the Sticks
Sew Peace to Peace
Meadowbrook