Bordering on lunacy

OK, I am still figuring out this Wacom tablet. Wish I knew how to draw straight lines.

So here's some options.

Kathy K's Quilt Run Charm Quilt

The San Diego Cruisin' Quilt Run included 18 quilt shops this year. Kathy and her daughter went to each shop. The shops gave charm fabric pieces. The fabric is quite varied, as you can imagine. So Kathy decided to make a quilt of half-square triangles using a blue fabric on one side of the HST and half of the charm square on the other half. She found some light blue fabric that was perfect for the sashing and borders. Red dimples fabric in the cornerstones and here it is. The quilt is flat, square, well-pressed and perfectly pieced. I wish all my quilts came to me in this condition. LOL. She wanted an edge-to-edge and fell in love with the Circle Lord Swirlz template.


I think that the circles are a nice contrast to the straight lines in the piecing. It really just provides texture.

I used QD blend batting. The thread is PermaCore Camel on top and Signature Spiced Tea in the bobbin.

Night Garden

I don't garden as much as I once did but I still enjoy the beauty of a well-planned garden. We live in a planned community in the country. This is California so land is at a premium. I have a half-acre but that still leaves me with some bit of nature outside all my windows. We have a problem with gophers in our community. I've lost over 300 bulbs, Allium, Lilies, Paperwhites, Daffodils and Amaryllis to these voarcious eaters. We also have some weather considerations that factor into my garden plan. Due to the winter lows, sometimes 30's and the summer highs, I had to be careful about plant selection. It doesn't sustain the cold so most bulbs do not propogate well. Tulips will not bloom a second year but Daffodils, Lilies and Amaryllis are willing to bloom and thrive but must be planted in pots to protect them from critters. I wanted the Clematis and Peonies that you find in New England. I wanted the Rhododendrons that I have seen in the Pacific Northwest.



I have a Sweet Autumn Clematis that is a huge mane of white flowers on my back fence. I nursed a Peony for 4 years and only got leaves. sigh. I found a Rhododendron (Anna Kruschke) that will bloom in our area as long as I keep it shielded from the summer sun which will toast its leaves. I have had flowers on one of my Rhodies for 3 years. This year my potted Rhody rewarded my diligence with blooms. There must be 20 blooms on this plant. The color is not my favorite, I love the ones I have seen in Washington state. But it makes a large long-blooming flower that opens a bit every day for over a week.


A few years ago I planted a giant Angel's Trumpet vine (Brugmansia). It blooms 4 or 5 times a year with this huge white fragrant flowers. The entire plant is toxic so I planted it with my grandchildren and pets in mind.


I love the spreading waves of lavendar and have it planted in several places in my garden. Blue is not an easy color to plant in a garden so I was pleasantly surprised to find Ruellia (blue flower) in the Native plant section of my local garden shop. It does not need constant watering which is good sine we are always in or on our way to another drought in southern California.





I have 3 vines planted on my patio fence, only about 12 feet long. The first vine to bloom is the Potato Vine which covers the fence with profuse pinkish white blooms starting in March. Some people like the fragrance of the Potato vine, I am not one of them. But they put on a great show. When they are done blooming, I start getting Honeysuckle vine. The Hummingbirds love this flower and the fragrance is lovely. The Hummingbird Moth also loves the Honeysuckle vine and stops by for night-time drinks of the nectar. Sometime in May, the Passion Vine that hosts my butterfly garden starts blooming and continues to bloom until October. No fragrance but what a show of purple.


As summer approaches, I will have white Rock Roses, Cannas, Cleome and Queen Anne's Lace, coneflower, Butterfly bush, lantana and many more flowers.

Yes, Another Sampler

It's her first quilt.
It's for her mother who is having surgery.
She made a nice label.
She could only afford an all-over.
She wanted flowers in the E2E.
I think she will like how it turned out.
Because of the various blues, from bight blue to pale blue, I used King Tut Mirage (which are tonal blues) on the top. The back had blues also but these were leaning more toward aqua so I used PermaCore Brazilian Blue. The customer provided her own W&N batting.

Little Miss Muffett

Little Miss Muffet, sat on a tuffet,

Eating her curds and whey;

Along came a spider, who sat down beside her

And frightened Miss Muffet away.


Except in our Madison's case....along came her brother who wanted to sit on her tuffet.

Quilt Auction

Months of planning went into this biennial event for the Friendship Quilter's Guild of Poway, CA. There were 95 quilts up for auction as well as some wonderful Silent Auction Gift baskets. This is our biggest fund-raiser and it was well-planned. Guild members donate their quilts or quilt tops which are quilted and bound by other guild members.



I donated 3 quilts plus quilted 5 or 6 of them for the guild. Setup started at 8 AM with us setting up tables and quilt-hanging racks. Some of the larger quilts. including some bed-size quilts were hung on racks so people interested in bidding on an item could see the front and the back of the quilt up close and personal.




As bidders arrived, they were issued an auction paddle and given the auction docket showing the quilt number, name, and size. After the crowd had a chance to view the quilts, the quilt were taken down, folded with the number facing out and lined up for presentation by the auctioneer. Our auctioneer was Jim from Central Sewing. He is a seasoned auctioneer. I was assigned to be his spotter even though the auditorium was fairly small. I did not know that the spotter is supposed to run from bidder to bidder and whoop and holler to get the bidders fired up about the bidding process.


When Jim explained this after the auction, I had an Ah-Ha moment back to the Audacious Auction at MQS 2008 when the spotters were CEOs of the companies that build those big quilting machines (APQS, Gammill, A-1, Nolting) The theme of MQS 2008 was Tropical Paradise so everybody was wearing Hawaiian shirts, grass skirts and coconut bras. Picture these executive dressed up in a grass skirt running from one side of the huge banquet hall to the other holding up quilts for bidders to bid on. I laughed until I cried. It was certain audicious and so much fun. It is a don't-miss event.


We also had our raffle quilt on hand for the raffle. The winning ticket was drawn at the end of the auction. There were also door prizes galore. I bid on and won a pink footstool in the silent auction. It is the perfect size for my 2-year old grand-daughter, Maidson.




We had stations set up for the silent auction, the cahs-out and quilt retrieval station and of course, a refreshments station loaded up with all manner of baked goods and water bottles.