Flower quilt

I've finished two more blocks for the Flower Quilt.  That's eight completed.  They are small, just 6" square, so I'll probably need 64 blocks to make it a decent size.  It's a fun project because every time I learn how to do a new flower, it becomes a new block.  The flower always sits on a green centre patch, and the rest of the block is shades of the colour of the flower.

This flower was made by gathering up a wired ribbon on a smocking machine.  

This block was inspired by two things:  I found a faux ultrasuede jacket in a lovely shade of eggplant.  It had a long zipper and two different kinds of gimp trim that matched exactly.  Cathy K. showed me how to make a zipper flower.    

The stems are in a raised stem stitch.  The curves came from  a heart-shaped piece of plastic canvas.   For  raised stem stitch the horizontal stitches need to be measured and marked very accurately, the plastic canvas holes worked perfectly.

You can see the other blocks on Flickr - see my side bar on the right or click here.  I didn't realize that I haven't blogged about this project before.  My inspiration came from Alison Aller's workshop at last Spring's Adventure in Connecticut.  In her class we made flowers and leaves and drooled over her most beautiful flower quilt.  

All About Angels RR - Wendy's block

Wendy's block after Debbie's and my work.  Debbie worked on and around the silkie.

One little angel

Two little angels

Three little angels

Swirls and roses

Scallops, pearls and sequins

Wendy's Angel block is small and pretty.  It's going to be the cover page for the blocks in her Angel DYB RR that she is also participating in.  What a great idea!  I loved working on it and could have finished the whole block, but I had to leave some room for Joyce and Laurie's work!

Home again....

Well, it's almost a week since I've been home from the Retreat in Estes Park, Colorado.  What a great time I had again.  It's my third time attending the CQI Shenanigans and it was as much fun as the previous Retreats.  There are loads of photos of the scenery, the 8-bedroom cabin, the activities and eye candy on other blogs.  Check out Kerry's here and Janet's here.  


Lesley brought the Sendai blocks to the retreat and we were all amazed at the variety of imaginative designs, colour and stitching on the many blocks donated to the cause.  Lesley is a master at putting together and she had several quilts made up from the blocks.  You can see the individual blocks here on Lesley's Flickr site.   Kerry has photos of the some of the made up quilts here .


I was amazed at the variety of cherry blossom trees that appeared on the blocks and that was my focus with my camera.  I've also included a fir and a purple blossom tree.

Colorado bound......

I'm all packed and ready to roll.  Leaving tomorrow morning at 5:00am by car to Buffalo to catch a flight to Salt Lake City to visit my Crazy Quilting friend Cathy.  We'll spend some really crazy days together, then drive through Wyoming to Estes Park in the Colorado Rockies for our Annual CQI September Shenanigans. From next Wednesday until the following Monday, we'll all stay in a big chalet with some old and some new friends.  


I'll report back in about two weeks!
   

East End Cake Decorators

The next meeting of the East End Cake Decorators will be on Sunday, September 25th, 2011, at St. Margaret in the Pines, Lawrence Avenue East, Toronto.
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This is the first meeting of the 2011/12 year, and membership dues of $25 are due in full at this meeting.
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Yvette Belfonte will demonstrate the gelatin bubble and sugar glass.

For those wishing to participate, the following is a list of things to bring.


Water balloons (these are really tiny - check any dollar store)
Toothpicks
Duct tape
Unflavored gelatin
Small microwave bowl
Styrofoam block for drying
Small paint brush
Super Pearl dust

Hope to see you there!

The Rib-Off

The Day Family

Annual

This has become an annual event in Mo's side of the family.  We all used to go to the Labour Day Long Weekend Ribfest at Burlington's Lakeshore Park.  But gradually more of the family participated and the lines at the Ribfest got longer, so we decided to do our own.


Each adult couple provide either one or two racks of ribs and their special sauce (many special secret ingredients) and take turns at the barbeques at Gary and Bonnie's place.  Voting takes place and there is a winner and a special Rib-Off plaque for 1st place.           

Mo and I adding our sauce.  Mine is very spicy, his fairly mild.

Too much fire!

Nine different saucy ribs.

One of each, then cast your vote.

Winners!  1st Jimmy (middle), 2nd Bonnie & Gary (left), tied for 3rd Mike and Ben.

Thanks Gary and Bonnie for being great hosts to this Annual event.  Same time next year....????

Flowers - finished

I'm finished.  I took out the little bit of coloured flowers and kept it all green at the bottom.  I also  took Sharon's B's suggestion of using buttons for the flower centres. I was lucky that I had three the same size in the right colours.

More progress - flowers

I've finished the petals on this 5 1/2" x 4 1/2"  piece of embroidery for the Sumptuous Surfaces course.  This is our final week and I'm trying to finish on time!  I have some long green leaves to add, the raised stem stitch border to complete, and to decide the centres of the flowers.  I also need to make up my mind about what to do along the bottom - just green foliage or green with some small flowers.  I'm leaning towards just green.

Sumptuous Surfaces

We got to use colour for the second project in Sharon B's Sumptuous surfaces.    

I chose an analogous colour scheme and picked these threads. 

It's not easy for me to draw a design out of my head, but I kept it simple and was satisfied with this.  It's about 6" x 8" and it's on the same linen as I used for the rabbit.

Now I'm having fun!  The edge is going to be a raised chain. I'm filling in the petals very heavily, with any stitch I can think of!

All About Angels RR

I am in another CQI Round Robin - All About Angels.  I have a thing about angels, so I was extra happy to sign up for this RR.  At Christmas my tree is decorated mostly with angels that my children have given me as gifts over the years.  I can't show you that, but above is a picture of my front door and the angel wreath that stays up all year.  All of them are hand made, the top one my daughter made in kindergarten many years ago from a styrafoam egg carton.

I also had a run at ATC's, and traded with Margreet and Annet (second and third from the top). 

This is my contribution to Debbie's block:

A row of tiny angels.  The halos are bullion stitch.

This angel has centre stage.  Her wings and face are mother of pearl, her hair is needlelace.

In the lower right corner I tried some heavy duty sumptuousness!

Sumptuous Surfaces

I've been taking Sharon B's Sumptuous Surfaces on-line course.  This little stone bunny rabbit is the subject of my first project which we were to work in monotone.

Here he is with suitable sumptuous surroundings!

Tone on Tone DYB RR - Rita's Block

This was my first DYB experience and I really enjoyed working on the small (6" x 6")blocks, and having a whole one to do myself.  The blocks I completed all turned out differently, even though three of them were beige tones.  

Here's Rita's block finished.  

Top left section, each of these are about one quarter of the block.

Top right section.

Bottom left

Bottom right

Cheryl's Tone on Tone DYB RR

This is Cheryl's Tone on Tone finished. I really love to use my scalloped ruler, and I did here on the bottom section with the chain and roses. You will see it pop up in many of my blocks! 

Tone on Tone DYB RR - Ritva's Block

This is the DYB I did for Ritva.  All her blocks were beige tones.  

These little beads look like berries.

My button and bead cluster.

A gathered lace flower

Grape vine

Monster Rose - Part 2

Two more layers of petals have been added to my Monster Rose.  I'm still using the same sized cutter.  I added five petals onto the previous six petals, tooling them a little more at the edges.  Five more were added with a slight curl.  The rose is now 2 1/2" from side to side and the same measurement high.