Henrietta

I have talked of our turkey Wilbur before. Now I have to give Henrietta her due. Henrietta came into our lives about the same time as Wilbur. She was a white domesticated turkey. I usually like the brown ones the best (they look like turkeys should look!) but Henrietta had great personality and you found it hard not to like her. She lived in the same pen with Wilbur and another white turkey Esmeralda and led a quiet and calm life. That is until our neighbor’s dog came into the picture. He had a taste for turkey that he couldn’t satisfy and made many attempts on our poor turkey’s lives. Esmeralda took care of him in the end but that is another story. One day after a loud commotion outside I ran out to check on them and Henrietta was gone. I figured the dog had finally won his battle. I drove down to our neighbors but he was no where in sight. Life went on without Henrietta. Now I had always been told how dumb turkeys were. I had heard stories of how they would drown themselves in heavy rains, etc. Henrietta was soon to prove this was all myth. It had to have been about a week later when I came home from work to find Henrietta sitting on our front porch. I didn’t even know it was her at first. She was covered in mud and no longer white. She had obviously been through a lot but was not harmed in any way. I could only assume that she had flown from the pen and been lost for the duration. How she found her way home I will never know and what is most amazing is that she let her presence be known by waiting for me at the front door. Henrietta went on to live a long (in turkey years) and fruitful life with us. Since that time with all our turkey friends I have been fascinated with anything turkey. When I saw this turkey fabric I knew I had to make a quilt out of it! We no longer have turkeys but Indiana now has quite a few wild turkeys and I am able to enjoy them every so often. Last week while running one of the kids to school there was a Tom and two hens just past our house, he was in full strut all fanned out. A gorgeous site to see and a safe one, turkey season had just closed the previous weekend!

All Quilts tell a story

I am a true believer that all quilts tell a story. I look at my quilts and know all the stories
surrounding them. Thinking of this I decided that I would go to my stack of finished quilts and without looking pull one out and see if I could remember its story. Well it is a recent quilt so I remember the story well!
It starts out like this, many moons ago I was fortunate to have been a stay at home mom. I spent most days the same, cleaning in the morning then doing some sewing. After lunch it was the little ones nap time and I would sit and enjoy the quiet and hand quilt. I originally started out with a hoop. One weekend I was at an auction when an old frame with the original rollers came up. I bought it for $25, took it home and set it up. It took up one whole end of the living room but no one complained. I enjoyed sitting at the frame every afternoon and getting my couple of hours of hand quilting in. After the kids were all in school I went back to work and I just didn’t have the time anymore to get any hand quilting done. My frame was pulled a part and put away. I started finishing small projects on my machine and the larger quilts were sent to my friend Carol who does excellent work on her longarm. A few years ago I went to a quilt retreat in January with my great traveling buddies. One of the girls (Roseanna) was hand quilting on her gorgeous Dear Jane quilt. She let me sit down and take a few stitches and I was hooked again. I knew that starting out with a large quilt was a bad idea. It would seem endless to me and I would never complete it. So I decided to make some smaller quilts and hand quilt them. This has worked wonderfully for me. I have completed quite a few. Lori Smith and Jo Morton have excellent little quilt patterns out that fit me to a T and I have been able to enjoy hand quilting again!

Liberated String Piecing

This is my Liberated String Pieced baby quilt. This is my first project after reading Gwen Marston’s book. It was oh so easy and a lot of fun. I had collected 30’s prints for awhile. Each year I make my daughter Mariah a quilt and some of the earlier ones were done in these prints, mainly because she likes bright quilts.

I had a bunch left over and knew I would probably never use them so this was a good project for them. I had fun doing this and can see more liberated string pieced quilts in my future!

4 - Block quilts

I have long been a lover of 4-block quilts. It all began with the purchase of Gwen Marston’s Rose and Tulip book. I loved each and every quilt in that book. I have always said that if I could only keep one book that would be the one. Not long after purchasing that book I took a 4-block class from Terry Clothier-Thompson. I have spoken of her before and how she has been such a great influence on my quilting. At this point I decided I would attempt to accomplish a 4-block quilt every other year. I have really kept to this promise. A couple are still just the 4-blocks. I envision some fantastic border with them but I am short the fabric, so they sit. I made a list this year of a few UFO’s I definitely want to finish within the year. They are both on it so I will need to pull them out soon. This is one I made a year and a half ago. I took it to my quilter last year and got it back a few months ago. I know what my 4 block will be this year, it is a pieced one so I plan on working on it at our retreat this fall. I have 2 others down on paper that I designed myself so I hope to accomplish them in the next couple of years.
A little history on 4-block quilts; they were most likely to have been first constructed by those of German descent. As these people moved within the United States the designs spread with them. The 4-block setting was at it’s height in popularity between 1820 and 1870. Cloth production had boomed by 1830 and large pieces of fabric were readily available. Many of the block designs had Pennsylvania-German characteristics such as brightly colored fabrics, Fraktur-style tulips, feather vines and urns of flowers. Our first centennial in 1876 was commemorated with 4 –block; quilts using a single eagle in each block. Very few pieced 4-block quilts have been found in state documentations. The most common pieced patterns would be Blazing Star, Rocky Mountain and 8 pointed stars.

Princess Diana Exhibit

I and 3 friends drove to Dayton, Ohio yesterday to the Dayton Art Institute to see the Princess Diana exhibit. I didn’t know what to expect but the exhibit was fabulous. It starts at the beginning of her life and ends with her funeral. There were 9 galleries featuring different times of her life. The last gallery had many of her dresses. One of the galleries had her jewels and tiara and another her wedding dress.

Many of the galleries had home movies playing. The Royal Wedding gallery had her wedding on and the Condolence gallery had her funeral on with Candle in The Wind playing. It was all very moving and really let you see what a remarkable woman she was in her work with charities.

It has been raining here for 3 days and is to continue through the weekend. I am hoping that all the ballgames will be cancelled. If so I will finally be able to get into my sewing room!

Going to see Princess Di's gowns!

I didn’t get all my gardening done this past weekend, but I did get a really good start on it. We had baseball games both Saturday and Sunday so that really cut into my time. I am really happy with how it is turning out.
Sunday afternoon we drove over to Illinois to see our oldest son’s team play baseball and then we all went out to dinner together for my birthday. It was a really nice day. Those days with the whole family are few and far between anymore.
Since arriving back from Paducah I have been really excited to sew again and have yet to get the chance. My husband hit a deer the end of last week. It really did a number on the Jeep. We are still waiting on the adjustor to get the verdict. At this time it is not drivable, so I am driving the 40 min to town each morning and taking him to work. I then go to my work, go home afterwards, await our middle son’s phone call to come pick him up from practice, drive the 25 min to the school which is north, then head back south to pick my husband up from his baseball practice (he is a high school coach for another school). It is making for some long days and no sewing. After we get the verdict on the vehicle we will either buy a new one or rent a car to hold us over until the Jeep can be fixed. We have asked them to please not total it. So I am keeping my fingers crossed.

Now for some fun news, if all works out for me I am heading to Ohio on Wednesday to the Dayton Art Institute to see an exhibit of Princess Diana’s gowns. A group of my friends are all going and it sounds like fun! It is a long drive over for us, but we plan on hitting a couple of quilt stores along the way.

In Grandpa's Garden

Growing up as a child I had a love of flowers. I first thought (after the initial I want to join the army and be a police woman) that I would like to do something with landscaping. I know this love of flowers came from my Grandfather. They lived in town but had a large backyard. This yard was filled with gorgeous flowers, and fruit trees. His flower garden was quite large and had a white picket fence surrounding it. It had walkways throughout and was quite lovely.
As a teenager I purchased a small plastic type greenhouse from a neighbor. Tore it down and hauled it home then re-constructed it. I didn’t have much luck with it. It was way too hot inside and most of my plants died. It was at this point I realized that I didn’t have a green thumb. But I wasn’t giving up! Upon graduation from high school I enrolled in the Indianapolis School of Floral Design. I loved working with and creating flower arrangements. I knew this was the work for me and gave 100% to my schooling. Upon graduation I found it difficult to find a job in the Floral Design field. Even though I had some talent at it, all the local shops wanted someone with shop experience. So I never did land a job arranging flowers.
Early in my marriage I found much enjoyment in growing herbs and flowers. I would dry them and then make wreaths from them and sell at the local craft fairs. Then my children started growing and getting busier and I no longer had the time for this. Now you wonder what all this is leading up to. Well it is leading up to my big weekend. It amazes me that a job I once loved, once thought I could do the rest of my life is now a job I don’t even want to spend a weekend doing. A few years ago a friend of mine gave me a bunch of perennials. She told me to plant them in areas around the house and by the time that Jess graduated from high school they would be spread out and look gorgeous. This did happen, but now 2 years later a few of the plants have taken over and it looks like one big patch of weeds. So, the big plan this weekend is to pull all these plants out. The ones I want to save I am going to move behind the house. The rest will go to the mulch pile. I plan on planting blue hydrangeas where the old plants were. I have a white hydrangea that I love and I have to put no work into it. That is probably why I love it! I have put this project off long enough and need to get it done! So that is what I will be doing this weekend! I wonder if that path in life would have worked out for me and if it would still be something I enjoy doing everyday. I guess I will never know.
The quilt above is a Pat Sloan pattern. I call mine In Grandpa’s Garden. I was contacted a few years ago and asked if I would make a quilt to hang at the White River Gardens in Indianapolis. It was to have a garden theme. I only had a few months to get the quilt completed so I went with a published pattern that I thought fit the bill.

Liberated Quiltmaking Book

I wanted to add a quick note - On my trip to Paducah I found the Liberated Quilting book by Gwen Marston at a quilt shop in Effingham, IL. It was only $19.95. I have been searching for this book for sometime now. I know that Tonya has been greatly influenced by this book. She had 3 more on her display. If anyone is interested you can google Angie's 9 Patch Quiltshop in Effingham and give her a call.

More on Paducah

This is Dawn, myself and another internet friend Betty at Hancock’s in Paducah. A friend of mine took this picture and sent it my way. I believe Dawn has the same picture but this one she was a bit closer when taking the picture.


This is Dawn shoveling through the flat folds at Hancock’s.


This is myself and Dawn following my bad day. Of course I have a wine cooler in hand to chase the tension away.


To answer some questions asked. I loved the quilt show. There were a lot of traditional quilts this year with wonderful quilting both hand and machine. Not many quilts with words. But I did like the quilt above! I am always drawn to quilts with words on them.


My favorite quilt was “Sunday in the Park with Mittens” by Nancy Brown. It was full of different breeds of dogs. So much fun! I didn’t buy a lot because I didn’t need a lot. I have kind of been in a funk lately due to the mass of stuff in my sewing room. I have come home with a new feeling of excitement about sewing again and hope to get in there and do some sewing soon. I have been re-organizing a bit each morning before going to work.

Home from Paducah!

We had a fantastic trip to Paducah. It was a ton of fun and great to meet up with Dawn! She is a wonderful person! I did really good with not buying much. I thought it would be hard, but ended up easy. I guess there was just not much there that caught my eye. I did find some backing fabric for a quilt for my daughter and I purchased quite a few books. Other then that just some smaller stuff that I had on my list to purchase. Now on the other hand Dawn did really good in finding stuff she needed. We had to pack it around her on the car trip home since our trunk was full!

Dawn gave me some great gifts! First she gave 13 of us a mesh zippered bag to hold our tools in. She gave me a smaller one also. I absolutely love mine! Thanks Dawn! Then she gave me a clover thread cutter and the holder for the cutter. I have wanted one of these but had yet to get one. She told me it was for my birthday this week. I love it, thanks!
I did the unthinkable. I forgot my camera. I left it laying on the kitchen counter. So I didn’t get any pictures of us or the quilts. I am sure Dawn thinks I am pretty forgetful. First I forget the camera, then one day I left the coffee maker on at the condo for 15 hours and worried about it the whole time. Then I lost my debit card. I was fortunate to realize it quickly and was able to call it in. All in all it was one great trip and I am looking forward to next year already!