Baby Love Quilt

The piecing is completed on the Baby Love Quilt.  I like it.  It's bright, but has a few mellower colors to tone it down.  I'm going to finish the backing soon and with any luck there will be time available on the long arm at Bayside this weekend.

I think my next trick is to spend some time practicing machine quilting on my home machine.  It would be nice to do some work at home as well as at Bayside.  It's funny, because I know there are quilters who would rather use their home machines and I am afraid to because I learned how to machine quilt on the long arm.  Okay, so maybe that is only funny to me.

Friday in the Garden

It was a beautiful Friday until it rained like crazy and ruined my dreams of taking my new bike out for a ride.  I did get some pictures of the elusive yellow rhododendron before the skies opened and ended the fun for everyone.  Other pictures are at the updated link on Spring April Flowers to the right.

I love this light yellow rhodie.  It looks almost good enough to eat.

This pink on is favorite of mine also.  I love how it glows in the light.  (And has withstood its rather unfortunate placement near the deck which results in the pine needles being swept on it.)

This hosta is slowly uncurling.  I didn't see the water drop on it when I took the picture, and it was a nice surprise to see it here.

This azalea is so bright it almost hurts to look at it, but it sure does add some sunshine to its corner of the yard.

The blocks are finished - no, really, they are this time.

I'd get so much more quilting done if I didn't stop so often and admire my handiwork...

... and if I didn't keep encouraging this sort of behavior.

The blocks are finished - well not really, but close.

Here's the thing, when I work on a quilt I have the TV on in the background.  Usually, its some kind of history show or Discovery Network special on the most disgusting job that involves robots or busting myths about disgusting jobs involving robots.  Tonight, in preparation for my trip to Amsterdam, I watched Masterpiece Classics' production of The Diary of Anne Frank.  I've been crying for about ten minutes and am beginning to wonder if I can handle touring her annex next month. Sorry, maybe this isn't the appropriate thing to blog about in my quilt update.  Tomorrow will be much better and more sarcastic, I promise.

But, as you can see, the blocks are coming together really well.  This puppy is going to be bright.  Two blocks down - eight to go.  I'm going to go hug the cat army.

Soaking in the sunlight

Session is over and life is back to normal here at Cat Army central.  Tonight after work, I took some pictures of what is currently blooming in the yard.  The Daphne lost lots of its leaves during the cold snap over the winter but still managed to produce flowers. She is a trooper.   Other pictures are available here.  Sadly, Sammy is not featured in the pictures even though he was wandering around in the yard with the rest of the troops.  Sam has never forgotten me taking a picture of him inside the house and using the flash, which apparently he really, really didn't like.  He has an incredible memory or a great capacity for holding a grudge.

Saturday night quilting

I have recovered from my brush with the endodontist on Thursday. I will have more dental adventures in the future when I get my crown, but for now all is well in the world. Except that isn't entirely true, because I'm on antibiotics and can't drink alcohol until I am through with them. Since I can't have a nice glass of red wine, a Shiraz is what I would have had tonight, I thought that I might as well stay busy and do some quilting. I'm making a total of 40 of these triangle blocks. Twenty of them are done with green as the large triangle in the block and I will repeat this with blue as the large triangle in the next batch of twenty.

I actually think that the way I did this was easier than using the template, but don't let those people at The Quilter Magazine know that I've gone rogue. I sewed the triangles to the strips I made earlier, cut those down to 4.5 inch squares and then sewed a smaller blue triangle to complete the square. I can't believe those poor fools wanted me to use a template. Ha. I say it again, Ha.