I'm At It Again!

Do you ever get bursts of mad creativity resulting in all kinds of sewing energy and there's nothing you can do but give into the flow and sew, sew, sew?  I'm having one of those bursts right now.  I put together a Mod Mosaic scrap quilt top and quilted it (yep, those of you who know me personally will gasp in awe and amazement that I ventured beyond quilting by checkbook for a second time!)  And I put together my string block quilt top and pieced a back for it and will also quilt that...

You want proof you say?  Here you go:  exhibit A on my kitchen floor.  Gotta love that spray baste stuff. 

And, I jumped into a new quilt top.  I was looking at my favorite blogs and saw this tutorial by Katie from the Blue Chair Wonky Log Cabin.  One minute I was thinking about how cute the Wonky Log Cabin quilt was and the next minute I had a pile of fabric on my work table, in the colors of Spring and Easter and all things scrappy.  The blocks are made in 4s (4 pieces of fabric cut up at a time and then the fabrics are mixed up within those 4 blocks.  I decided that I would not repeat fabric from one set of 4 blocks to the next, so my initial pull had to be followed by rooting and rummaging for more fabrics.  The blocks will be 12" finished and I will make 30 of them for a 5 x 6 layout or 42 if I want to go the next size up.  Not sure I can stick with the "no repeat of fabric" if I go to 42 blocks.  We'll see what happens!

I have to say it's really fun to root around in my stash and pull out fun fabrics.  No need to shop for fabrics.  I'm making a small dent in the stash and creating something fun and in the happiest of color combinations. 

Here are a few photos of my progress:

I hope you get a sense of the quilt that is being borne here - more to come as I complete the blocks and add even more colors to the spring mix.

Aaaaanyway, that's it from the Robertson household.

As Promised - more QUILTCON

In my last post I gave you an overview of content and controversy.  I wanted to move on from there and show you my most precious experience:  a class with Yoshiko Jinzenzi.

I stayed in Austin until Sunday for this class.  I have been taken by her design and purchased her book but to meet her in person...  She combines simplicity (a dot or dog or square on fabric) with a knowing of what makes sense to her.  She is so modest and so willing to share that I am taken aback and in awe of her. 

 

 

Having the opportunity to be in a sewing room with her was amazing.  QuiltCon made this happen and I am so grateful!

 

And I have to say that meeting up with the joined Bay Area peeps for dinner was wonderful.  We are so close and yet so far (travel time).  I'm wondering if we can't create some "meet ups"  that don't involve travel to a distant state?  If not, good luck to Lauren who is moving to Japan.  I hope she will stay in touch and, of course, start a Modern Guild where ever she is in Japan.

 

And a few more quilts:

 

 

 

 

This last quilt was People's Choice for best in show.  I agree 100% that this quilt from simplicity of piecing to beautiful quilting was the winner.  What do you think about this quilt?

 

Aaaaanyway, that's it from the Robertson household.

 

 

Back Home After QUILTCON - So Much To Think About!

I have returned home from QUILTCON.  What an amazing experience - thought provoking, overwhelming, uplifting, controversial, hectic, inspiring and much more.

 

 

 

 

 First, I must say that the organizers (the board) did an amazing job and should be commended for how well this first time event ran.  The classes and teachers were wonderful.  The quilt show could have used a little polishing (many, many comments and questions about the categories that quilts were in and the criteria for the categories).  The lectures ran the gamet from thought provoking to inspiring to controversial.  I am certainly thinking about my voice as a quilter and where I fit in.

As a result of one particular lecture, I have thought a great deal about the concept of Modern Quilting.  I hope that Modern Quilting will focus on inclusion rather than exclusion as it finds its definition.  It was disturbing to listen to a lecture on what Modern Quilting is and hear a view point that was exclusionary and rather demeaning towards other quilting styles.  It felt all rather highschool-ish and clique-ish in a mean girl sort of way.  It certainly was controversial and blogs are alive with discussions related to that viewpoint.  If it had been presented as this speaker's personal viewpoint, I think that would have helped.  Unfortunately, the talk was presented as a definitional, factual lecture - THIS is Modern Quilting.  THAT is not Modern Quilting.  Again, it was thought provoking!

Jacquie Gering gave a moving lecture on her quilting journey.   I loved her description of her family as "Makers".  She was followed by Denyse Schmidt who was the keynote speaker and gave a wonderful presentation on her quilting and design journey.   

I'll finish today's blog with just a few photos of quilts in the show.  More to come, I promise!

Aaaaaanyway, that's it from the Robertson household.

Traveling Shoes Were On Again in January

I wanted to share with you a little of my birding trip to the West Indies (don't those two words ...West Indies...evoke mental images of old sailing scooners like in the movie Master and Commander - The Far Side of the World, sailing for days and then coming across an island in the ocean...exotic vegetation and scenery, beautiful people, all rather romantic and far, far away?) 

I'm here to tell you that Trinidad and Tobago are rather far away as they are about 7 miles north of Venezuela, but sailing through the sky is much faster than the way Russell Crowe went about it in the movie.  We flew to Miami and then on to Port of Spain, the capital of Trinidad.  Here's a view from the airplane:

The West Indies were first a Spanish colony, then the French took over and lastly the British. They drive on the "wrong" side of the road like the Brits and have a lilting, almost Jamacian style of speaking.  Everything moves much more slowly in Trinidad and Tobago.

Luckily for me, my friend Sarah's husband does not like to bird, so she and I get to traipse around the world looking at birds and animals in strange, far away places. So far we have been to Ecuador, Eastern Africa and now Trinidad/Tobago together. We're planning another trip to South Africa for the fall.  But I digress..

Our guide picked us up and took us to Asa Wright Lodge high up in the northern range of Trinidad.  After we left the little city of Arima, we quickly changed over onto unpaved roads that became narrower and narrower - with hair pin turns that made it impossible to know whether someone was coming from the other direction - which they usually were!  I did alot of flinching on the way up, but I suppose got use to it through the course of the time we were there because that was the only road back down and we were often going back down to go to various birding locations. 

The lodge was formerly a coffee and chocolate plantation in the 1800s and early 1900s (how good does that sound?)  and they still grow and roast their own coffee for the guests.  The main building is gorgeous in a very understated old world way with a beautiful veranda that looks over the valley and island.

Here's the hallway leading back to the Anteroom, the Anteroom and then the veranda:

All meals are taken at the property in the main dining room (although a lunch was packed if you were going out for the day).  Tea was served every day at 4:00 p.m. on the veranda and then came Rum Punch at 6:00 p.m. with dinner in the main dining room (family style) at 7:00 p.m.

Here's a peek of the dining room at breakfast:

And this is one of the cottages although not the one that I stayed in:

Our cottage was 21 more steps up that walkway, right under a massive tree full of screeching Yellow Rumped Oropendulas (large vocal birds that make beautiful hanging orb like nests - the guys make the nests and then the gals come and check out the work.  Sloppy work does not get you a partner!  The gals want high quality construction before they will give a guy the time of day.)

Trinidad was lovely except for the chiggers - nasty little biting things they are!  We met some very nice Brits while on the trip and we were all staying in the same place in Tobago, so it was nice to have the continuity of people to talk to and have dinner with.  Next blog I'll show you a little of Tobago and the Blue Waters Inn. 

This trip, of course, is why I have done so little sewing.

Aaaanyway, that's it from the Robertson household.

A QuiltCon Hello!

Are you going to QuiltCon?  The Modern Quilt Guild has asked bloggers who will be attending to introduce themselves with a photo (my grandson Mason and me at Thanksgiving) and reveal 5 things you might not know about ourselves.  The Modern Quilt Guild.

Well, I'm going to QuiltCon and I'm a blogger, although lower case blogger as compared to the well known Bloggers, so I thought I would join in the introductions and here goes with the 5 things you may not know about me:

1.  I have a Labradoodle named Boo (o.k. you probably know that...) but before Boo I was the companion to 3 Dalmations (not all at once - sequentially).  That's about 30+ years of Dalmations.  It wasn't until I got Boo that I knew what it was like to have a nice, friendly dog who didn't beat up on the other dogs.  What a breath of fresh air!

2.  I was born in the midwest (St. Louis to be exact) and went to grad school at University of Missouri at Columbia.  Before I went to law school, I was a scientist working for USDA.

3.  I collected antique quilts for years and still have a small collection.  I came to quilt making from quilt collecting.  I made my first quilt in 1972 (I am pretty sure that is before many of you were born!)

4.  I am a birder (a person who looks at birds through binoculars and gets all excited about identifying them) and I travel all over the planet looking at wonderful birds and animals.  I have been on every continent except Antartica in search of unusual birds.

5.   My grandsons call me "Maw-Maw".  I pretty much dote on them and love seeing the world through their eyes.  I feel that I learn so much more from them than they do from me!

I look forward to meeting as many of you as I can at QuiltCon, while taking classes every day, going to lectures, looking at the quilt show and visiting the vendors to see what I must have.  Whew!  I'm tired already!

Sneak Peek - Work In Progress Wednesday

I wrote this blog on January 17.  As I was working on it, my modem at my house went out.  Gone.  Never to work again!  I was leaving on my trip to Trinidad and Tobago the next day, so wasn't able to finish and upload the blog until today.  Luckily, the guy who works on my IT "stuff" at my office was able to come over and fix the problem while I was gone.

So, most of the blog is a little dated, but I still wanted to share it with you - hope you don't mind a little old news mixed in with the sneak peak.  As I have been gone since Jan. 18, I don't have any new sewing projects to share, so another reason to revive this blog!  Here we go:

Brrrrrr!  It's cold here (by Bay Area standards).  We're suffering through a cold spell with nights dropping to freezing or slightly below.  Our days have been in the 50s - again, much colder than usual.  It's really easy to become accustomed to moderate temperatures and when there's a slight fluctuation, react in shock!

On to quilty things.  On Saturday I went to Julie (Intrepid Threads) Grand Opening at her new shop.  Everything looked wonderful and the place was packed with happy shoppers.  Of course, I had to jump into the fun and pulled together some fabrics in my newest color combination of citron, navy and aqua. 

The purplish navy prints are Lux in Bloom by Art Gallery.  The solids are Kona and the dot fabric is Circle Elements.  Lux in Bloom has the most beautiful hand - feels so soft and rich!  I have started a new round with the 4x5 Bee (in the paper piecing hive) and wanted a new color palette, so here we go!

My sneak peek is the round robbin quilt top I have been working on for Mallory.  I have the last round on her quilt.  I added the outermost black and white borders, made the New York Beauty blocks and am now working away on the "connection" blocks to join the beauties to the quilt. 

Here's a quick peek:

 



My plan for the connection between the beauties is to work primarily with black and white with a touch of the teal to visually balance the rounds.  Obviously there is more to come!

Aaaaaanyway, that's it from the Robertson household.

2013 - Can It Be?

Looks like the world didn't end, so I better get sewing again!  I spent my entire holiday away from my sewing machine, so I'm in the mood to get back at it.  Did you have time to sew over the holidays?  Or were you spending your free time with loved ones, going to movies, eating, eating, eating...?

Time to turn the page from holiday gorging and lazing around to healthier and more productive pursuits (o.k. you got me - I'm trying to psych myself into eating less and working out by repeating healthy mantras!)  I'll let you know if it works!

I wanted to share with you some of my favorite projects that I finished in 2012:  

 

 



It's kind of nice to look back and see that I actually finished a number of projects!  I do, of course, have quite a few works in progress that need to be wrapped up.  My 2013 hit list includes:

     1.  Quilt Improv Top
     2.  Quilt Scrappy Mod Mosaic Top
     3.  Finish ABC Top and have it quilted (way to big for me!)
     4.  Finish Tokyo Subway Map Top and decide about quilting
     5.  Finish 4x5 Teal and Orange Sampler Top and decide about quilting
     6.  Finish Scrappy String Block Top and decide about quilting

I have promised myself, once again, that I will not join so many bees and swaps.  I have a bee and a round robbin in progress that I enjoy and I did just sign up for the next round of the 4x5 Bee, but that's it!  Time to complete some of those aforementioned WIPs and also to begin some new projects that I have my eye on.  I'm not good at New Year's resolutions and clearly I have issues with self-restraint when it comes to bees and swaps - however, I'm gonna try to put my money where my mouth is or something like that!  I also should think about self-restraint when it comes to fabric purchases.  I believe I have entered the questionable area between collecting and hoarding...

What about you?  Do you have WIPs to finish?  Are you going to dive into more bees and swaps or work on your own projects?  What are you thinking about creating in 2013?  I'd love to hear your ideas.

Aaaanyway, that's it from the Robertson household.