Snowballs in California

So I thought I'd be one of those people. What are they called? Oh yeah, organized.

HA!

So I made a list.

A list of all the quilts I have, in various stages of completion.

Everything from ones that only need a backing, (Sultry quilt) to ones that only exist in my head (Dog quilt).

My last count was pushing 30.

30!!

That's obscene.

I need to whittle that down, finish some things.

So naturally, as one of those, what are they called?

Organized people.

Oh yes, as one of them, I decided... to start another quilt!!

I've joined this challenge

Cause THAT'S what I needed!

But, yes, I think it's exactly what I needed.

Isn't it pretty?

I'm debating what colors to use. I'm in the swap, so one of the colors will have to be cream/white. But red? Green sounds pretty. ORANGE sounds nice! But maybe it'll be red after all.

It's all up to the quilt. Whatever it wants to be.

It's an interesting pattern to me, because while it IS scrappy, there's not a lot of value changes. All the reds are pretty much the same value. Can I find a gazillon of the same type of red?

I guess we'll find out!

Gnome Sweet Gnome...

I am not a joiner.

Never have been.

I think it's part of that "Not belonging to any club that would have me as a member" thing.

So why has my sewing cave been infested with these Gnomes?

I am not a joiner.

I like Heather Ross as much as the next person, but I haven't collected every scrap she's ever made.

Like some people.

You know who you are.

But I did have a religious experience when I walked past my first bolt of Heather Ross Goldfish.

Ask my friend Jennifer. She can tell you.

The first thing I noticed was how incredibly soft it was. My hand brushed against it and I stopped in my tracks.

Then I saw the goldfish.

Come on.

THE GOLDFISH!!

You know what I'm talking about.

That has to be the cutest fabric ever made.

The names! Oh the names of the fish.

Swimmy.

Spooky.

Splashy.

BJORN?

I was in love.

But that hideous creature raised it's head.

"What would you DO with it?"

Do with it?

What WOULD I do with it?

So I didn't buy it.

Didn't buy yards and yards of it when I had the chance.

When it was sitting right in front of me.

I bought one fat quarter.

ONE!

One small square of the cutest fabric ever.

You can still find if it you want.

This one sells for $39 a yard.

Hey, I'm not knocking it.

I might give in and buy it someday.

But what I DID buy, was some little Gnomies from this lovely seller.

And I think I'll be back for some others.

So little Gnomies,

surrounded by a ring of white, and then a ring of sumpin else.

Then more white, and more sumpin else.

It's not original. Not particularly complex. But hopefully it's cute!

I have to tell you, it was so much fun picking out fabric for this! I've sort of become lazy and relied on the pre-cuts. It's a no-brainer when the whole fabric line is laid out in front of you.

But it was a kick picking out all random fabrics for these little guys.

I wanted green and red, those are the obvious choices, but then it screams CHRISTMAS!

Hmm... I like Christmas, but I didn't want it to be a Christmas quilt.

Per se.

Ok, I just wanted to say "Per se".

So what to do? Add some blue from his little shirt, and some black for ZING! from his little boots.

I think the black is going to make the quilt.

By the way, does this drive anyone else insane?

When you've only got a half yard, or less, it gives me such a tick in my eye when it's this far off grain.

THAT'S ALL! That's all I gotta say about that.

Now back to those Gnomes.

The Dog Lady Returns! (Dum da da dum...)

Remember the Dog Lady?

I hope so.

It was yesterday.

You might want to up your Ginko Biloba if you don't remember.

Well apparently in all her spare time, she thought she'd make some other quilts too.

In all her spare time.

HAHAHAHahahehecoughcoughglbrx...

The spare time when she wasn't quilting every single AKC breed of dog.

Like ya do.

So look at this!

It's a big ol' African animal quilt.

"Africa - The Lion Lurks"

Huge.

Gorge.

Fab.

Marv.

I can't even complete whole words.

Toooo beautiful. Just too, too beautiful.

I didn't get a picture, but there are fantastic lions quilted into the corners.

But wait!

Act now and receive...

YET ANOTHER INCREDIBLE WORK BY LINDA HIBBERT!!

"Studio Safari"

I know what you're thinking. And yes, yes I DO love that flamingo!

Loooove him! (singsong voice)

But I also love that giraffe! Look at the movement in his skinny little legs!

And don't get me started on the hippos.

Every time we walked past I said "I love those hippos!"

The quilting is just phenomenal. Such movement.

So that's it for the "Dog Lady".

The "Dog/Lion/Zebra/Giraffe/Flamingo/Hippo Lady"

I guess that wouldn't fit on her name tag.

There's lots more pictures from the quilt show, but maybe tomorrow I'll sprinkle in some pics of things that I'm working on, and you won't notice the difference and think they're from the show too.

My own private quilt show!

I bet I'm gonna win a ribbon!

The DOG Lady! (I thought I was the dog lady?)

Ok now. Everyone got a cup of coffee? Tea? Everybody cozy and comfortable?

Here we go.

Her name is Linda Hibbert.

(Better pictures on her website)

I think she made half the quilts in the show.

The sign attached to her "Best In Show" quilt reads:

This quilt is about 40 feet long.

All dogs.

Have we met?

Do you know me?

I love dogs.

I mean...

I LOVE dogs.

More than most people.

Mmm... puppies...

Let's start with the Terriers, shall we?

I had to sing the song from "Best in Show" when I saw this one.

Too cute. Let's move on to the Non Sporting pups

Eee! Look at this little face!

They have little sparkly gemstones for eyes. It really makes them feel alive.

Herders!

Puppypuppypuppypuppypuppy...

Yeah, I had pretty much lost it by now. I wanted to rip them down and roll in them. I wanted to go home and hug Miss Pep.

I wanted to adopt every dog in every shelter.

I know some people don't care for Chinese Crested dogs, but they would if they saw this guy! And look at that Chihuahua!

Did I forget to take close ups for these lil' guys?

Dang it.

Look at that Boxer! And that Mastiff at the bottom!

I swear, you could just feel his jowls.

Sorry, I was a little shaky by now. Ha! Just kidding, it was my crappy camera.

The SPORTING GROUP!

Look at this little girl! And she's black, like the Princess!

Awww... Isn't that amazing? Where does she find the time? How does she make the patterns? How long does it take her to pick out the fabric? And can I be her apprentice?

What? You're tired of dogs?

Impossible.

But ok, how about a turtle? A Sea Turtle.

A stunning Sea Turtle.

A "Hawaiian Green Sea Turtle"

by Cheryl Spalding of Portland Oregon.

It says "This quilt was designed from an original underwater photo using a reverse applique technique. The background fabric is hand dyed and it was free motion quilted on a long arm machine. It took over three years to complete."

Ooooooo...


Ahhhhh!!!

Incredible. Just incredible.

I have no words.

PIQF, Ya'll!!

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh Poodles.

I had SUCH A WONDERFUL DAY YESTERDAY!!

My friend Ceci and I went to the Pacific International Quilt Festival!

I don't even know where to start.

Where can I start?

Should I tell you about how many GORGEOUS quilts we saw? (over 400) Should I tell you about all the fabulous fabric I bought? (Oh yes)

Should I tell you how exciting it was? How NICE everyone was? How sweet it was to be there with Ceci, who now has the makings of her very first quilt?

I know!

I'll start with my celebrity encounter.
Is it still an "encounter" if you stalk the person?

Dudes, I met... Julie, from Jaybird Quilts!!!!!

OMG, OMG, OMG!!

I geeked out like a 13 year old at a Twilight premiere. Or like some 40 year olds I know at a Twilight premiere.

And let me tell you...

She is the sweetest, kindest, most adorable person on the planet.

She's just cuter than crap, with a sexy Kathleen Turner voice. (Well you never know what bloggers sound like, do you?) We chatted for a few, and compared camera issues, (which you'll notice in all my blurry pictures) and she graciously posed with me for a picture. She was all fresh and beautiful, and I was sweating like a horse.

Love her blog, love her quilts, and love, love, love her!

Thank you Julie!

So on with the quilts!

I don't even know where to start, so I'll start with the ones that made me squeal.

This first one is "Into the Woods" by Ann E Rauen.

And she's from Santa Cruz! Oowah! Oowah! Local girl made good!

Oh Lord, I hate my camera.

So she's made a calendar crazy quilt. I'm telling you, the detail is unbelievable.

We spent a very long time in front of this quilt, and were still seeing new things.

My pictures just so do not do it justice. It's all embroidery, and ribbon embroidery, and the details!

THE DETAILS!

So gorgeous.

I wish a had another word for "unbelievable".

Look at the bears! LOOK AT THE BEES!!

THE TINY, TINY BEES!!

This must have been silk ribbons, because the sheen was just sooo beautiful.

And these were just the center pieces. The work on the surrounding "crazy" area was intense. We spent a while hunting for the spider webs in her work. They're good luck, you know.

There's puhlenty more, but I did mention something about fabric, didn't I?

Every year we go camping in Pismo Beach, and every year I try to go the 50 miles more to visit The Creation Station.

It never works out.

So when I saw them at the show, I lost my mind and started scooping up fabric the way people scoop up shrimp at a buffet.

Ahhhh... fabric. Now I have to take this inspiration and get to work in the sewing cave.

Up tomorrow: The Dog Lady!

SEW and Tell

Well THAT'S better. Not perfect, it could probably stand to have a couple more brown pieces near the bottom, but you know what? I'm ok with this. I am! I AM! Sorry, that wasn't directed at you, it was directed at the voice in my head that's telling me exactly where the next brown piece should go. I'm done. That's the problem with random, it's never really all that random, is it? We say we'll leave it to chance, but if we pull out two of the same thing, we put one back, don't we? That's the fun of quilting, I think.

So there's that. Isn't it pretty fabric?

When I first showed it to the Sweet Baboo, he really liked the colors, and wanted it to be our summer quilt.

Not that we'd need one today, it's somewhere in the neighborhood of fifteen gazillion degrees. Celsius. How hot is the sun? I just Googled it and got ten different answers, so I'm going to say that the surface of the sun is whatever the temperature is today in Boulder Creek. Which Google also tells me is 91, so clearly Google is broken. Someone should look into that.

Back to Neptune! No, not the planet. That sounds like a bad movie starring Tim Allen. Back to Neptune! (cue action music)

I meant Neptune the quilt. More of a Poseidon kind of thing, although did you know that the planet Neptune was named that because of it's blue color? And some giant storm spots. And the old man with a long beard and a huge Trident that they could see with their telescope.

True story.

Ish.

It's not very big yet. I think it's going to need some more rows. And columns. They're 10" blocks, so it's roughly 40" X 60", give or take a seam allowance. I don't think you can really see the circles that the pattern makes quite yet, but I didn't want the blocks to be too small, because, and you might not know this, because I love Neptune fabric so much. I didn't want to chop it up too small.

Because I love it so.

And while we're playing Show and Tell, here's the signature quilt that I'm making for my ex-boss.

If you've been following along at home, you might notice that it's much, MUCH smaller than 192 blocks. It's not that he doesn't have 192 friends, I'm sure he does. It's just that I have the attention span of a fruit fly. A fruit fly with ADD. Although I'm going to try to fight it and add on a couple more rounds. His party is, oh, let's see... SATURDAY!

So I really should get a move on. Nothing like a deadline to get the juices flowing! Or, you know, to push you into paralysis, so that all you can do is stuff Xanax into your tube of cookie dough as you lie on the couch watching Law and Order marathons. It could go either way.

Here's my Sweet Baboo, he's so helpful. Not only is he my official hanger, he also went to Kmart early this morning to get me a new memory card for my camera. a 4GB memory card! And a Mountain Dew.

I'm so spoiled.

Neptune Love

I love Neptune!

I just wanted to get that out. It's so pretty, and I love how Tula Pink hides cute little sea motifs in the prints.

So clever.

I've been so busy lately; weddings, funerals, parties, work stuff.

It was nice to finally get in there and cut up my Neptune stash.

It's so hard to cut into that stuff that you love, isn't it?

I may have mentioned... I LOVE Neptune. I've been obsessed with it for quite a while, but I'm also obsessed with fining things on sale. So when Fabric Depot had 14 prints 40% off, I jumped!

Then I waited, and petted it, and arranged it in different configurations...

I went through a bazillion pattern choices before deciding on the "Kaleidoscope" block.

Mmm... nice pile of cut pieces.

Sew them into pairs,

sew the pairs into halves, sew the halves into a block.

Oww! Check out those points!

I can brag now, because the points when I sewed the blocks together aren't that hot.

C'est la vie.

So many bigger things to be upset over. I can't waste my energy crying over wonky points.

That doesn't mean I'll be showing you them any time soon though.

A girl knows how to hide her flaws!