Heidi’s Wedding Shower

Recently Heidi was the guest of honor at a lovely bridal shower.

Heidi is my first grandchild.

Its hard to believe she is getting married even though she is 26 years old!

She is opening the gift from me. I often use fabric to wrap gifts as I have a never ending supply and the recipient can use the bag for something.

This wall quilt I gave her is a companion piece to the quilt she picked as her choice for Christmas this past year.

Heidi with her sisters.

Heidi with her mothers.

I have to thank Julie, Heidi’s godmother for sharing these pictures as hers were so much better than the ones I took.

We are all looking forward to Heidi and Nate’s wedding on September 6th!

Second Largest Quilt–Jubilation

This is the second largest quilt I have ever made. The only larger one is the bed spread/quilt I made for our king size bed.

It started out to be 108 inches square and after quilting ended up 104 inches square.

Quilting a quilt this size on a domestic sewing machine is a major challenge. Quilting this one was MORE than a major challenge.

I had planned free motion quilting for the curvy lines on the background. I had machine trouble doing that so the entire quilt had to be done with the presser foot down, stopping and turning each time the lines changed direction. I had less than two weeks to quilt and finish this quilt in my spare time as I was working at the time. I still am amazed when I look at this and see how I was able to quilt it so beautifully, even with the challenges I faced.

I finished it in time and it was hung in my husband’s new office until he retired. It was quite impressive in the space. The office had proper lighting and no exterior windows so the quilt is in mint condition.

The pieced sections were made with a variety of solid commercial fabrics. They were cut with a special triangle shape ruler which was new at that time.

I sketched the design of the quilt but couldn’t complete it as I had no source for fabric that shaded from light to dark gray. When I learned more about dyeing fabric I created the grey fabric.

I had to dye several batches to get enough to complete the quilt.

We don’t have any wall in our house that is large enough for this quilt.

It is available for sale. It would make a perfect piece of art for an office or a home with high ceilings. I can see it in a log cabin out west!

Dining Chairs Finished

I finally finished recovering all 4 dining room chairs. I am pleased with the way they turned out.

I would be more pleased if I had read the information thoroughly when I ordered my staple gun. I somehow assumed it was an electric staple gun…aren’t they all???

Oh, no, this was manual and took more strength than I had, especially since I was dealing with the padding which was on the underside when I used it to staple the fabric.

Lesson learned!

Bow Ties For Business

This is a quilt I made for my son’s office.

I used the origami bow tie technique to create the ties. Each tie is different.

For the background I chose shirting fabrics.

The border is charcoal gray wool flannel.

Bodacious Blossom Completes The Studio Stairwell Display

This is the 5th quilt we hung last weekend. It is the largest of all of them and has won awards. There is a great variety of different quilting designs on the background and the rest of the quilt has been quilted with similar designs in the similar segments.

I did learn an important lesson when quilting this.
Of course I quilted the center designs first. 

when quilting the background with a variety of quilting designs, it is better to start the quilting at the bottom of the quilt  rather than the top. Your quilting improves as you work and people see the top more often than the bottom!

All of the fabrics were hand dyed by me.

Simple Interchangeable Quilt Hanging System

I have been asked how I hang my quilts over the studio stairwell.
This system works so well and I can load the quilts from an area that is not too high and them “roll” them over to the steepest point.

This view is from the bottom of the stairs looking up. You can see the tracks they hang on.
The tracks are traditional closet door tracks.

This close up gives you a better view of the tracks themselves. The tracks are attached to the ceiling.
It would also be possible to hang another set of quilts behind these as there are two tracks---think hanging closet doors and how they bypass each other.
See that black hole on the wall? That is where we previously hung a large quilt. My DH stood on the railing and leaned over the stairwell to hang the quilt. He told me to grab his ankles if he started to fall…..fortunately he didn’t as I would never have had the strength to hold him up. The quilt stayed there for many years as I was not open to a repeat performance the way he hung the quilt.
When we were ready to put up these closet tracks it was done with proper scaffolding and proper ladders and at the same time that quilt was taken down.

The vertical dark line you see in the track is where we joined two tracks to get the length we needed.

If you look closely at the top of the left quilt you can see the closet hanging bracket and the S hook we made to hang it from a clothes hanger.
The S hook goes through a hole in the bracket and also through the hole in the hanging bar for the quilt.
I love this method of hanging and the fact that I can change quilts on view often and easily.
When I want quilts to hang farther down the wall and not at the ceiling I attach a length of fishing line to each side to make them hang lower. If you look at this post you can see one that was hung lower:
http://quiltspluscolor.blogspot.com/2015/08/changing-quilts.html
No one even notices the fishing line.

Modern Quilts On Display In Studio Stairwell

I always said I didn’t GET Modern Quilts and what qualifies.

After studying them a lot more I think both of these fit the parameters.

On the left: For Never Plaid

On the right: For Never Plaid 2

Both of these quilts were a challenge to piece as nothing is straight and the blocks were different shapes and sizes.

I eventually make them fit together and make cohesive compositions.

When Greg was hanging them he noticed the casing on the back was lower on one side than the other. It took me a moment to remember that these are NOT squared off on any edge!

Quilts–Up Close And Personal

Sharing the view of the quilts on the studio stairwell did not necessarily give you a great opportunity to see each of the quilts well.

Perfect Harmony is the only quilt I have ever shibori dyed fabric with a plan to make a specific quilt. It worked amazingly well.

The title refers to the harmony of the shibori pattern and the quilting design. I’m so glad I have it in my stair well/office area in the studio so I can look at it often.

Rambling Rose uses so many different techniques and also a variety of types of fabric.  It was created over several years as many of my pieces are.

These are two of the 5 quilts hanging in the stairwell area of my studio.

Messy Monday In My Studio

I needed to find one special quilt and also some quilts to hang on the stairwell.

While I was doing that I decided it was a good time to get the quilts in a logical order and put away where I could find them easily.

Not an easy task, but I’m handling it!

This is one view of some of the piles of quilts. You may wonder why I haven’t piled them all neatly.

1. Actually I wouldn’t have enough floor space to do that.

2. It is easier to see what is in each pile as I can see parts of almost every quilt.

3. A quilt is less likely to get creases if they are scrunched rather than folded.

So there you have it and I am serious about what I just said.

Another view where you can see the bed I pile a lot of my quilts on so I can keep them flat while I store them.

I have already found a few places to store some of the smaller quilts.

I did not disturb one of the piles of quilts on one of the 2 trolleys under the bed. The other one is a work in progress!

I expect this to take a while…but hopefully days, not weeks!

New Gallery Of Quilts On Studio Stairwell

My son Greg was able to hang the 5 new quilts last night.

Although the picture is a little dark, they look great.
They are much more colorful than the last group.
Change is good.
With the exception of the largest quilt all of these are "relatively" new quilts.
I will try to get some better photos that are truer to color.

Changing The Quilts

It is time to change the quilts I have hung on the stairwell to the studio.

You can see the quilt that are hanging now. They will be replaced by the 5 quilts that are hanging on the railing.

It's always fun to have a new view and it is good for the quilts to rest.

In many instances another reason to change them is to prevent fading. 

When I built my studio I had lowE windows installed. I also has tubes to prevent fading put on the fluorescent lights. This has worked well in the 20 years I have worked here.

Vintage Knit Dress

I am guessing I knit this dress in the early 1970’s. As I have been doing recently I knit it without a pattern. I had a limited number of skeins of a very expensive boucle yarn.

By taking my body measurements I was able to knit the dress with the amount of yarn I had.

I crocheted the edges with a cream colored yarn that was the same weight.

I even put an invisible zipper in the back of the dress, not an easy feat.

Knowing how knits can bag out I lined the entire dress. I matched the color of the lining to each part of the dress. I took darts in the lining so it would fit the body like the knit did. All seams were finished with an appropriate seam finish.

I covered a padded hanger with the same yarn to help the dress keep it’s shape. I had enough left to make a cord that could be used for a belt or used to accessorize it in another way.

This was a much more complex project than the knitting I am doing now.

I feel it is an heirloom that I hope someone will treasure.

As I look back I am amazed that I was able to take on such a complex project 40 years ago.

I never was afraid to try to create something and I feel that is why I am where I am today with my creations.

Reupholstering Dining Room Chairs

I just finished reupholstering the seat of the first of four dining room chairs.

I was bound determined NOT to buy any fabric to cover them. I knew I had to have something that would work.

I found just enough of this fabric in an obscure bin on a top shelf.

I felt the room needed a little more green so this had just enough.

This was the original covering. These were “new to me” chairs I purchased on eBay.

The covering was slightly soiled so I decided to recover them.

The fabric I used was a lightweight linen fabric. Dining room chairs don’t get a lot of wear and tear so this should be just fine.

Amazing what one can do with a staple gun and a hammer to hammer in the staples that are sticking out.

I’m Knitting–Black And White Shawl

Recently I was wishing I had a black and white shawl to wear when I went to restaurants where the AC was freezing cold.

I pulled out some orphan skins of black and white yarns and decided it would be a fun relaxing project to knit.

I knit without a pattern most of the time so it took me a while to come up with a plan.

I am pleased with what is happening.

It is very lightweight, yet it will keep me warm as it traps the air.

I am about one half done and will be knitting more on it today.

Sun Printing Without The Sun

I find it is more convenient to do my “sun printing” in my studio than outside.

Because the effect is really created by the way the moisture evaporates it is not necessary to have sun to do it.

It is a widely held belief that one needs a certain Brand/Type of paint for this to work.

I set out to test a different paint and it worked just fine.

I painted a large circle in the center of this fabric and then placed some foam pieces on top of the fabric while it dried overnight.

On this one I just placed two different shaped foam pieces on the different colors, but placed them paper side down.

For this one I cut up some foam shape into smaller pieces and used them to create a design.

I used a 50/50 cotton/poly blend for these pieces. It is not necessary to use PFD fabric since I am not dyeing.

I applied the paint to this fabric and then let it dry wrinkled up.

I will be doing more experiments with this paint using different fabrics.

I found there were variables that gave different results.

Some of them were how thick or thin the paint was, how well I had mixed the colors if I was using two colors to get a new color, the way the resists made contact with the fabric and how I brushed the paint on to the surface.

As per so many things there is no one RIGHT or WRONG way to do things, just different ways.

It’s a fun easy way to create your own fabric.

If At First You Don’t Succeed,Try Again!

This is my second try at knitting a square basket. I had no pattern to start with so it was trial and error.

The first one is OK but this one is so much better.

The first one was larger, higher and had a design flaw that didn’t let the cuff fold over as nicely.

I think the second one corrected all those problems.

This is one of those projects that can be knitted without paying a lot of attention as you work.

I don’t know if I’ll be making more of them, but I probably will.

I still have no idea what I am going to use these for, but I am guessing I’ll figure something out very soon.

Even though the violet one had a few issues it will still be useful.

TBT–What Were We Wearing Then?

My friend Molly and I (and a few others) were talking about sewing yesterday.
We even may have the same Pfaff sewing machines purchased many years ago.
I wanted to share one of the dresses I made over 55 years ago today.

I had wanted one of my granddaughters to model this for a picture but only one of them is tiny enough to possible fit this and she has not been around.
It is pink chiffon over pink taffeta with pink lace for the bodice. Considering the fact it has been packed away for almost 50 years it still looks pretty good.

And the back view with the big pink chiffon bow. Of course I wore this with a pink Alice Lon Petticoat I made with 8 yards of nylon net.

I sewed this on this exact sewing machine, my Mom’s Singer 201. It now has a place of honor in our guest room. When that was our bedroom it lived in there and that is where I did all my sewing. I had it brought downstairs so if I wanted to do some simple sewing for a short time I could just walk in there instead of heading up to the studio.

Here I am in the dress waiting for my date.

My date and I ready to head to the dance. Notice the corsage I was wearing..those were the days we all got a beautiful corsage to go with our dress from our dates.
True confessions: A group of girls used to get together and rent a country club and we each got to ask our own dates. Then they would take us out for dinner after the dance! So if you were part of that group it didn’t matter if you had a special boyfriend or not, you could ask someone!

5 Of My Ice Tapestries

I hung these 5 of my Ice Tapestries on my design wall today.
I had a guest who I wanted to show them to.
She also got to see the rest of them.
She was impressed!
We went out for lunch at Seibert’s Pub built in 1880. It still has the original crooked porch, etc.
She loved the vintage ambiance.
Didn’t get a picture of the two of us as we had so much to talk about since we hadn’t seen each other for a long time.
 
I did get a picture of this sign that was hanging above the booth we sat it. Pardon the glare but I think you can still read it.
I have no idea of the date this sign is from. You can see it had  other names over the years.

Hooker Lake Hotel (now Siebert's Pub). Notice the Corner entrance to the bar area (which at the original build was probably NOT A BAR, since Salem downtown was a DRY town) and the center entrance to the main room and the staircase to the rooms. Siebert’s Pub is located in Salem, WI. Siebert’s was established in 1880 and has created a lot of history over the years.The building has gone through numerous transformations from being an ice cream parlor, hotel, insurance and real estate office to a local tavern that is known by many…to name a few. The building still holds a lot of character and is now a friendly, small pub with great food and staff and mostly great patrons. Siebert’s has offered a great fish fry for many years and is also known for the Reuben sandwich.
This is what it looks like today.

Washington Park High School Class Of 57 Ladies Who Lunch

I had a great time getting together with 3 of the other ladies who were at our 57/57 Class Reunion in Florida this past winter.

We met at the Olive Garden in Racine and we were there for close to 3 hours. Fortunately they weren’t busy and they didn’t mind us taking up a table that long.

Even though we had all been together a few months ago we still had a lot to talk about.

Of course we talked about our school years and adventures, but soon the conversation switched what is happening in our lives today.

What fun to be able to continue friendships after 57 years.

Back row: Pat Davidson Maranger, Lynne Crane Leithleiter and Barb Tesolowski Coleman

Front: ME

We had such a good time we’re planning on doing it again soon!

What Is It Going To Be?–THIS!

It’s a basket! It is about 6 inches square and high.

I had seen similar knit baskets so I experimented and this is what happened.

I’m pleased with it, although I might try again and make it smaller.

I used two strands of Nature Spun Chunky yarn to knit this and used about 8-9 ounces.

I haven’t decided what I will use it for. I could store potatoes in it.

But I could store just about anything else in it too.

I have a feeling this is not the last one I’ll be making.

Sunrise At Cedar Key At Visions Art Museum

My quilt is part of a show at Visions Art Museum that opened last night. I am pleased to be affiliated with Visions.
Here is a link to a short video from the opening. I was not able to see my quilt in the video.
https://www.facebook.com/quilt.visions/videos/10207257744828395/
This silk quilt is 14 x 14 inches. It is for sale for $250. Half of the sale price goes to support this museum. They do not have an online presence to sell the art at this time. If anyone is interested in purchasing this they will sell it and ship it once the show is over. Buyer pays shipping.
My quilts get to visit a lot of places without me….I don’t fit in a shipping box!

What Is It Going To Be?

When my friend Judy visited this week she told me she had been knitting.

I love to knit, but haven’t done any for a few months.

I decided it WAS time to knit something simple. I found yarn in my studio for this project and worked on it last night and this morning.

It’s the kind of thing one can knit and watch TV or visit while doing. You can put it down and pick it up without trying to remember where you were.

I am not using a pattern…..which is the way I usually choose to knit.

SO, what do you think it is going to be?

SO Great To See This BFF

My BFF Judy Sorenson Sattersten visited me this week. We go back a long way.

Living where we each do currently it’s hard to coordinate a time to get together. We both agree it was far too long since our last visit and plan on getting together sooner next time.

If you wondered about the Sorenson name, we have tried to research and see if there is a relationship from way back in Denmark. There are just too many similarities in family resemblances that make us feel there has to be some common relationship at some time in our heritage.

We each wore pink tops and pink shoes. Such a coincidence as I can’t remember the last time I wore pink!