More quilt show...

The first two and very bottom picture are from the fabric challenge pack last year. Shades of gray. There were 5 inch squares and a couple fat quarters. The very top one belongs to Karen. The middle one with penguins belongs to my cousin Max. The very bottom sailboats one is mine. 

The other two are older tops that were finally finished. The log cabin goes way back, but never took a completed picture. The other is a Bonnie Hunter pattern called Double Delight. 

Quilter couple

Bob and Jean are a couple that come up to Blue Earth, Mn. from Iowa to attend the BEVQ meetings. While setting up for the quilt show, Bob said that he saw I was blogging again! I took pictures of their quilts, but not all of them. I know I missed some. 

And one more...

Block Swappers

There are 12 of us in block swappers. We met up last winter to exchange blocks. We all got these blocks to work with. 

I found them rather addictive. I made more houses. I left off the chimneys so the exchange blocks were different. 

These were mine. I think the rule was happy colors. 

This is my finished quilt at the quilt show. One last picture. Me and my cousin Max. We both made quilts from the 2016 row by row experience. They are the same but different. It’s hard to get pictures in the hallways at the quilt show. 

my cousin's scout quilt......

My cousin Gwen started a quilt this past summer. Actually TWO quilts. One for her son and one for his friend. Her idea was to use all these boy scout words.

She went out and bought Tonya's Word Play book and studied that.

She quizzed me about making letters. 

And then she started cutting and sewing.

She didn't stop until she had all these words!

She flew in from New Mexico for the weekend and brought all the words for one of the quilts.

We laid it out on the motel room floor. So the lighting isn't very good. It is actually brighter in real life. The background is whiter and the words are red, blue, brown and black.

Gwen is at the filler stage. 

Her husband wants her to make some fluer-de-lis emblems.

She thought pine trees in the gaps.

I thought stars, so she has a few of those from me.

We thought maybe a few American flags here and there.

She would like to add gold/yellow but isn't sure how. My mom says yellow stars mean a fallen soldier. So she threw that idea out. 

I just had a thought....what if the background of the stars were the gold and not the stars themselves. 

What else? What are we not thinking of?

Austin, Minnesota, home of Hormel and Spam....

Last weekend, Karen's baby was married up in Austin, MN. It was also the weekend for the Quilt Show here in town. Karen left me three of her quilts. I took a picture of them before taking them over to the show. We missed the show on Saturday, but I did help set it up Friday night. The lighting in the gym is awful, so I have no pictures. 

The reception was at the Hormel Historic Home. We were in the banquet hall behind the house, but the house was open for us to go roam around. Beautiful old wood work.

I love Spam, so that is what I had for breakfast Sunday morning...

Scrambled eggs and Spam. We talked about going to the Spam Museum.

But only stopped long enough to find a geocache and take a picture. 

I want to go back, it looks like a fun place to visit!!!

There is a cache at the rest stop on I-90 headed west. We stopped and I went walking in the woods. There was no clear path, just heading in the right direction with the GPS. Bushwhacking through bushes and fallen trees. I went alone, tractor joe stood on the edge and waited for me to come back out.

Cache found, we got back in the car to continue our ride home.

It was cold and rainy outside. The windows were all up and the heat was on. It took about 15 seconds for tractor joe to accuse ME of stepping in dog poo.

Right about then, I started to smell it. It was a horrible, gagging smell.

I needed to roll down the window for fresh air.

Even COLD fresh air was welcome at that point.

AND....it wasn't me! He had stepped in it himself. If he had gone into the woods with me, this might not have happened. We pulled off at the next exit and he did some major scraping. The rest of the ride home was much more pleasant.

I made 16 more of these string blocks. I have no idea how I will use them. I added them to the stack. 

local quilt show.....

On Friday evening, I helped set up for the quilt show. It took a couple hours.

Then Saturday afternoon, we took it all down.

They say there were 97 quilts.

None of mine were there.

I just took pictures of quilts I liked.

It sounds like it will happen again next year.

It goes along with the Fall Festival that the Community Club puts on.

Karen and I have a new goal.

We want to do Bonnie Hunter's Mystery

I think it starts right around the US Thanksgiving

...and have them hanging up next year.

It seems like such an easy thing right now, after all, next years show

is a WHOLE year away.

No sweat.

Bonnie's fabric choices are here.

progress....

Here is the ice box from Aunt Meta's basement. Tractor joe loves it. He washed it all up when we got it home. He wants to use is out in his shed. But not yet. His personal Men's Crisis Center is still a work in progress. So, for now, it is in the garage on top of the cupboard out there...just sitting there looking pretty.

If dirty, ratty old yarn make you queezy....

look away from the next picture.

close your eyes 

or something.

The old quilt is a flimsy now. I took out all the yarn. While I was snipping and fighting the creepy crawlies from having to touch some of the dirty spots, I was also able to find the spots that the stitching is coming loose. Not many areas at all.  I will be able to fix them with no problems.

(I hope)

One of the baskets had two frayed areas of fabric. 

I will make a fabric band-aid that will blend right in.

(I hope)

Just needs a washing. I can't bear the thought of messing with this until it is cleaner. I gag to easy when it comes to dirty fabric. 

Went out yesterday for more paint. The bottom sides of the chairs got a coat of red and the table now has yellow on it. Tractor joe picked this color out. He was very pleased when he saw it painted up. He thinks this should be the color of the swing. I agreed.

No standing there fighting, I mean debating what color it should be.

We just agreed, it should be yellow.

It will look nice painted yellow.

We need cushions yet. I did start sewing some.

But, that isn't what I ended up with.

I made myself a bag and a bunch of snap happy bags. They are made with an old measuring tape that is cut to size. It snaps shut. So cool. I laid them on the swing. 

This is about what my cushions would look like, only bigger, if I had actually made cushions. I'll get to them yet.

The Jurassic Park quilt is SLOWLY coming together.

I forgot to lay it out this morning for a picture.

Next time I lay it out and work on it, I will take a picture.

Aunt Meta's things.....

A couple months ago, my mom asked tractor joe if he wanted the gun cabinet out of Aunt Meta's house. He said, "OK"

So when were up in Minneapolis, we went to her house to get it out. First we tried going down the stairs with it. To tight, had to bring it back up. I was ready to leave it.

But, NO, tractor joe wasn't about to leave it. There is a balcony type thing over the sunroom. We brought it out there. The plan was to tie it up and lower it over the railing. 

It worked pretty slick. We put it in the truck. Then off to my sister, Jen's house.

Late last summer we had taken this old ice box out of the basement at Meta's. We had no way of getting it home that day, so it sat in Jenny's garage all winter. It got loaded up on top of the gun cabinet. 

I am thinking of painting it and turning it into a bookcase. It isn't very deep. Wide books wouldn't work, unless you turned them so they were facing out. Right now it is out in the shed waiting for something to happen. 

While we were packing up the furniture, Jane said we needed some blankets to protect it.

She pulled this out of a cedar chest.

"here use this!"

I thought it was one of those tied, whole cloth quilts I remembered from youth.

(make face and gag, YUK)

But it wasn't. 

There were basket blocks on the other side. Now I have no idea what to do with it.

What do people do with old stuff like this?

Can the backing, batting and ties be removed?

The front seems okay, can it be re-quilted?

what I want to make, and what I want to finish up......

Gwen sent me this picture of a quilt she has finished. She layered a 6 inch square of denim from old jeans with batting and a backing piece cut 2 inches bigger. Sewed a simple X to hold it all together.

She sewed the blocks together with the back sides together. Then flipped it over and top stitched the backing fabric down like binding. A quilt-as-you-go technique.

I can't find the pictures she sent of her work in progress, a visual of what she did. 

I love this. I have SO many jeans set aside for cutting up. Some are already cut up...but I never had a plan for them.....Was ready to toss all of it as I was de-cluttering. Not anymore.

I was never sure how to use them.

I do now.

I am so excited.

But first I want to finish up some other things.

Like this top........

It is the last of the hearts I won at Block Lotto and flowers made using another block lotto block we made last summer. This is as far as I got yesterday. There are 4 more sections ready to attach the sashing and sew together like one big 9-patch.

made by others....

My sister made me a postcard for Christmas. I loved the way she cut the pictures to make the letters in the words claws. After she finished it she thought...wait, we think of cats as having claws, not dogs, oh well.

It is just way to cute.

This quilt was made by a mom who has a visually impaired son. She collected fabrics that all felt different. He may not see all the colors, but he will feel all the variety.

Lots of different textures.....

...including some white fur fabric. 

She said there were pieces of white fur flying around for days after she cut and sewed it in. I think she also said this was the first and last time she will use fur in a quilt.

Famous last words.

One of my goals today......rig up some wire outside, hang quilts and take pictures of my quilted presents. 

They need to be wrapped for Christmas Eve gift opening.

Now is not the time to dilly-dally. I am off to find the hammer and a couple nails.

& clothes pins...

where did I put the clothes pins?

the quilt show here in town.....

The gym was full of quilts last Saturday. Big, small, old and new. 

When I went to collect my quilts back, I quick took some pictures.

I am not sure who owns this one.

It reminds me of my grandma. It is tied the way hers were. I never liked the bumpiness of them when I was going to bed at her house. I didn't like the embroidered pillow cases either. That bumpiness on the edge would bug me.... 

but it sure is pretty!

This one is really old. It belongs to a friend of mine. She says her great grandma made it.

There were four ladies sitting and waiting for the quilts to come down, so they could take theirs home.

I walked around grabbing pictures of different quilts laying in the bleachers.

I know this one is Karen's. It is the only one I got a picture of. She had more there, I could kick myself. I didn't get a picture of my favorite one. Dang.

This one and the next one are mine. It was made for tractor joe to hang out in his men's crisis center. (the fixed up hog house or shed)

I have never shown this one finished on the blog. It sat with no binding for a LONG time.

I know Doris made this one.....

and this one. She makes all bed size quilts.

She doesn't "mess with that little sh*t"....(wall hangings)

This still isn't a nice picture of my geocaching quilt. I miss my clothes line.

At least you can see my colorful striped binding.