Honey, I shrunk the parents.....

We had a wedding last weekend. It was down in Davenport, Iowa. Well actually the wedding was in Illinois, but the reception was in Iowa. We crossed the Mississippi a couple times.

Anyway we stopped for photo opportunities. 

So, the wedding is over, but the gift is not done yet. I won the April blocks at Block Lotto. They are green to blue in color. I decided these would make a great wedding quilt. At the wedding all the bridesmaids were in blue dresses. It was meant to be!

I am adding a 2 1/2 inch strip to two sides of each block. The stars dance around on the quilt.

I am putting this at the top of the list of things to finish.

These are June's blocks at Block Lotto! 

a trip to New Ulm....

We went up to New Ulm, Minnesota on Saturday. We were meeting up with my mom, three sisters and a brother-in-law. My mom grew up here. It is where Grandma and Grandpa lived. 

It was time to decorate graves. 

Ernest was mom's uncle. One of my sisters asked,

"What did he die from?"

Mom said, "Old age"

Silence for a minute. Then the math was worked out.

WAIT, he was only 56! Old age? We sisters are right around that age!

Really?

My mom starts laughing and tells us she doesn't remember for sure. Then we were told more Uncle Ernest stories. We listened to more stories at each grave.

We mostly watched. Mom would take a large screw driver and pound it in the ground. Then she would stick a small bouquet of artificial flowers at each stone. Nothing permanent. But enough to make it pretty for Memorial Weekend.

For as long as I can remember we always went over to this grave. It is a little boy who drowned when he was 6, back in the 1883. We leave a penny under his shoe. 

Next stop, The Sewing Seeds Co. featured in the most recent Quilt Sampler magazine. My intent was to buy a little bit more wool to add to what I have. Maybe even make the quilt they have in the magazine.

It is darn cute in person.

I bought the wool and was happy.

But then my youngest sister spots a quilt on the wall and falls in love.

It is soft browns, greens and pinks.

I study how it is made.

I think I could handle it.

They had one kit left. It was 30% off. She keeps saying how much she loves it.

So back to the counter to buy that too. It will be her 50th birthday quilt. I have about 2 years to make it for her.

And she LOVES it.

Then we went to Schell's Brewery. I had brought a quilt along to take pictures of. This quilt was also up in Duluth last year when it was just a top. It is well traveled already.

We walked around the gardens looking for a spot to drape it. This bench might work.

There was also a wedding party getting pictures taken. The groomsmen are standing on the steps of the house. When they were finished we headed up there.

I thought this troll looked like he was saying, "all this for a quilt picture?"

This one has rounded corners. I think this is how I will be doing binding from now on.

We weren't done here yet. After all it is a brewery and the biergarten was open.

This is where I got grumpy.

It was fun sitting here with my sisters.

It was fun seeing the peacock. His blue was gorgeous.

It was really cool when he opened his feathers and strutted around.

But I was ready to go.

My mom had stayed down in the car while we took pictures and drank beer. I finally walked back to the parking lot to talk with her! I was ready to go. Everyone else was happy.

Including tractor joe. I watched him walk back up to the window to buy another beer. 

What was he doing??

Stop! We need to be going!

And I got grumpier. I could see it was a HUGE mug of beer.

I could see my sisters shaking out their cups. I told my mom that it looks like they are going to share that last big mug of beer. And they did. They giggled away at their grumpy sister down in the parking lot. They were having a fine time drinking tractor joe's beer so he could have the mug.

In the end, I had to agree that the souvenir mug was a nice idea.  I like it.

We made one more stop before heading south.

More Schell's beer and the Leinenkugel's just sounded like it might be good.

I haven't tried it yet, so I don't know.

3 finished quilts.....

This is a disappearing pinwheel block made from 10 inch squares.

Last years jelly roll derby.

A t-shirt quilt. The flying geese were made using left over t-shirt pieces. 

All have rounded corners using bias binding. It is my new love.

blocks, blocks blocks....

I have 3 quilts finished with binding, but no photos yet. I tried something new to me. Using bias binding and rounding the corners. I like it. I took the left over binding at finally put some on a few potholders too!

I won these blocks last year at Block Lotto. I saw a layout similar to this and thought....

that is what I will do!

Then, I thought some more....

What if I put sashing between the blocks instead. It will be a nice way to use up some of the skinnier strips of black and white fabric around here. 

The Tula Pink Project...

(mini group through the guild using the 100 modern quilt blocks)

I got them out over the weekend.

These are the first 18. Some I love, some I don't.

The next 8 for the May meeting. Finished! We bumped it up to 8 a month. They are rather addicting. So I continued....

These are June's grouping. Number 53 didn't get done. I'm thinking about making them more arrow-like instead. But I boxed them all up again.

And they look way better in person.

test pattern class....

I have never done a class before. Our local quilt shop, 

The Quilted Forest, hosted a test class with  Terry Atkinson. We are given the raw form of the pattern and told to follow the directions and sew. Are things worded right? Do we understand what it says? Find mistakes. 

And Terry is there to answer questions.

One was for a quilt pattern called Wanderlust. It calls for 1/2 yard cuts. Last week I called the quilt shop and ordered some solids. Shelly (the owner) sent me a picture. Yep, they look good and I bought them over the phone. She brought them to the class. That was pretty slick.

The first pattern was for little bags. It has 6 different sizes. 

My friend, Karen was there too. OMG, how cute when we finally finished. Karen's is the top one and the perfect size to hold the Clover Wonder Clips she had bought. These clips were pretty handy and I think I will buy some too.

The afternoon was the quilt pattern.

Karen went with text prints and dark arrows. Mine will be solids with white arrows.

We were in two classrooms. Late in the afternoon Shelly started hanging finished blocks (or near finished) along the front of the classroom. 

Here is the other classroom's collection. I'm not sure why they had less.

Shelly and Terry

They were busy getting there own pictures and taking selfies. This was a really fun experience. It was only one day, not too expensive and not too far to travel! There were about 30 of us all together. I listened to others talk about quilt retreats. I am still not sold on the idea of going somewhere for several days. I must not be a social sewer. I would rather do it at home.

 I would do another day class like this one again!

We also stopped in the quilt shop before we went home. `

Terry did the classic pattern for Yellow Brick Road. I have all those grays to use...and they could end up in that. 

Maybe.

The patterns will be coming out in May.

there must be something to blog about.....

I went through pictures on my phone to figure out what I have been doing and working on...

Yesterday was pi day, 3-14-15. If you found a puzzle cache, you would get a fun souvenir badge for your geocaching profile. So while out about yesterday, we found a few. My favorite one had you shine a flashlight into a hole in the box. Numbers appeared on a mirror and these were used to open a lock so you could sign the logbook. 

I also found a dead raccoon. Ick. No logbook to sign with that.

March BLOCK LOTTO blocks! 

I have figured out what I am going to do with the sunrise blocks I won last summer!

I want to make a large sun for the center. Using what Sophie said and did [HERE]

I started making a pattern...and that is as far as I got.

At least I know what I will be doing, It will be fun when I actually do it!

I tried machine quilting. I just eyeballed it, so my curves aren't uniform. My question is....what is the best way to mark the lines for nice uniform stitching?

making gray frames......

Last fall, 12 of us made 2 blocks for an exchange. They all have the same gray background and a solid.

We exchanged them in December.

January was spent setting these.

I had 7 strips of gray fabric. Each was 2 1/2 by the width of fabric. I found this frame in the book

Setting Solutions by Sharyn Craig

In the book it is for a finished 6 inch block. I had to do some math...

One strip made one frame with a little left over.

Each block would have its own gray frame and I went on a gray fabric shopping spree,

buying some here and there.

There will be another gray quilt in my future, I now have a ton of gray!

At first I was going to do a 4x6 layout. I changed my mind and made one more block so it could be  5x5. The background is different WOW fabrics. Some repeat, some don't. The block finishes at 14 1/2. They haven't been sewn together yet.

I started sewing Tula Pink blocks from the book 100 Modern quilt blocks.

They are pretty easy to make.

They are made with cherrywood fabrics. I'm pretty much following the colors from the book. If the block has a big chunk of print fabric, I am inserting these shoo fly blocks instead.

I am not in love yet, But I am thinking that by the end, as a group, they will all look awesome!

I snapped this the other day at school. I love all these circles! It would be a cool quilt.