Hooray! Top done!

Good morning, superfriends!

I've finished another top!  This time, it's Molten Glass.  I mentioned it a little before, and put the hammer to the forge and knocked it out.  Here it is, sprawled out in the yard outside the forge, relaxing after being put together.  It had a hard time, you know, being wrestled around the forge between the layout board and the machine!  When I laid it all out in the sun, the batiks looked like damask, and made the entire thing look almost shimmery - which is fabulous! 

The black offsets the red corner squares nicely and gives it a little separation that it needed.  It's all of 123" x 123".  Should provide plenty of drape for my bed once it's all quilted - having an 18" mattress can sometimes be a pain!  When I am done with Boston Molasses, this one will go on the hand-quilting rack to be done.  It's too big for Frank!  Besides, I am going to quilt phoenixes into it - that being a theme with me.  So hopefully I can get Boston Molasses done faster than a snail laying tracks and get this one on the rack. 

In addition to Molten Glass, there was yardwork this Sunday, trimming down the great green wall to allow some breeze through.  We left the honeysuckle alone, but took out a lot of the trash trees that are growing up through it.  We've still got work to go in the weed garden, but we made a good start.  (Oh, golly, the weed garden... low growing cedar that's in terrible shape, some kind of monster shrub that just eats up everything, a few small oaks, a few small pecans, and lord only knows what else!)  If the light is good later, I will try to take pictures. 

Today it's all rain and storm - the sun is usually up by now, and it's as dark as night right now.  Rain is a good thing in Texas during the summer, though, so no complaints from me!  (Does make me want to be out in the forge, doors open, working away).

This week will be working on the next top - Crop Circles - and trying to start work on Bostom Molasses Flood again.  And trying to track down quilt pattern publishers.  Or go to etsy.  We shall see.  Etsy might be the first and easiest way to go. 

And - on the 23rd - Class #3.  So there's prep for that to do still.  I am always excited about the classes!

Oh!  This past weekend we made a few more quilt stores we hadn't hit before, too - those that are a little further afield.  And most of our travel was backroads, which was nice.  Saw lots of horses and cows, and a handful of goats.  Found some goat fabric - been looking for some for a while, now, and was thrilled to get some finally!  And took a few pics.  If I'd remembered to upload them, I would post them!  (So, tonight, then!  Along with pics of Crop Circles layout, at least!)

Until later, superfriends!
S

Back into the Forge

There is much going on in the forge these days.

Finalizing another pattern and developing another, planning for a few more classes in the next few months, and sewing - always sewing!  (Mind you, we also moved a little tv/dvd player out there when we are, so there's more light and movement.  Right now, lots of shows about ghosts.)

I am working on three quilts right now: Crazy Diamonds (half blocks done, a quarter pieced top), Smoked Glass, and Death By ??.  (The ?? ... I have't figured out the death by part).  Smoked Glass is a Sea Glass variant, obviously, and more pictures will be forthcoming this evening. 

D has really buckled down and started plowing through the quilts!  She's finished up Asian Blocks, the tops for Yurt Door and for Lattice, and for Sea Life (maybe to be called Aquarium).  Now she's working on another variant of Sea Glass.

So, we're busy busy!  I still miss my cat, and bringing her ashes home was tough.  I will look to the top of the stairs for her head for a long time to come.  But it's getting better.

And I have ideas... oh, I have ideas.  Which to me means I am coming out of grief and exhaustion and moving on.  And that is a good thing.

S

Sunday Finish Line (Almost, Anyway)

Today was a day of finishing things (or getting close, anyway).  Yesterday was spent rampaging around East Texas, hitting estate sales and quilt shops with abandon.  Some success was had, and some non-success.  Got ignored at a quilt shop by two employees.  Completely ignored except for a glance up at us.  Really?  Are we too young??  Eh.  We didn't buy fabric there.  Bought it elsewhere, where the clerks were nice and said hello and such.  No big loss, really.  Found some lovely material for D's next quilt - she's designed one of sea life, and found the perfect material for the background.  Hooray!

So today D. worked on the sealife while I finally got a quilt on the mid-arm (my Middie Frank) and got busy.  Mind, this is my FIRST quilt on Frank.  It's definitely a learning experience!  But I could tell that by the end of it I was already more skilled than when I began, so that is very gratifying!  Here they are, Isaac's Storm and Middie Frank, hanging out together.  Oh, and look!  Scissors!  (I can NEVER find them when I need them.  I think I own a dozen pair, and STILL lose them all the time!).

So after four hours of standing and sewing with Middie Frank, Isaac was complete!  Hooray!  Except... I forgot the binding.  And don't have enough of the wave border fabric to make binding.  So... that will have to wait until tomorrow.  But that's okay.  I actually got work done, and ALMOST finished!

It's uneven in places, but here's a close-up of my very first attempt at Middie Frank.  Since this is Isaac's Storm (named after the book of the same name about the Galveston, TX hurricane of 1900), I thought I would quilt a spiral - the whole hurricane/cyclone thing.  It went PRETTY well.  Some of my arcs are a little flat, and some of them twitched a little, but since it's my first go, and I am not entering Isaac into competition, I am not concerned.  I finished a quilt on Frank!  That alone makes me almost giddy!

Tomorrow will be working on Texas Blue Jay Summer.  All I lack are the bluejays... they are in progress, and when I have them done, I will show them off!  I promise!  And I need to get a good pic of the other colorway for Isaac's Storm up, because of the OTHER thing I almost finished!

My first pattern is done, complete, printed, and so forth!  It's actually for Isaac's Storm, and I am hoping to get it to distributors soon.  So wish me luck!  (I don't expect to get rich, but it would be nice to have some patterns out there that are recognizably ME).