Time to Focus

Hello Everyone,

 

This quilt, Country Sunshine is going to be my main focus for the next few days.

 

We've postponed our time away to take care of some major printing obligations.  All bids have been received and scrutinized, and the orders have been placed.  Whew......I'm exhausted and drowning in paperwork. 

My DIL took this picture of Jess at Wednesday's summer league game.  Complete focus on the catcher's mitt.  Complete focus and look of determination to deliver a great pitch over the plate.

I'm going to adopt that same determined look and focus on Country Sunshine and try to knock this one out of the park! 

Soon,
Lynn
 

Where Do I Begin?

Hello Everyone,

 

Life has been a whirlwind of activity making it almost impossible to carve out enough time to create a post.  One of these days I'm going to show you my hour by hour daily schedule so you can see the craziness.

 

My one bit of sanity this week was being able to spend the day with my Sew'n Wild Oaks girls on Tuesday at In Between Stitches.  During the summer everyone is so busy, or they break themselves (that would be you Paula), so consequently we had a small class. Quality not quantity right?

 

Irene is making wonderful headway on her Kim Diehl Journey's End quilt.  The border is fabulous.  Irene is painstakingly arranging her fabrics so beautifully.

 

Kristi is keeping up with her Moda Blockheads quilt.  I LOVE IT!

Laurie is pattern testing Huckleberry Hill for me.  The white paper over the top block is the potential appliqued border.

Rose is making my Heartfire pattern. The fabric she selected lends itself well to this design.

Bonny is making my Heritage pattern.  She loves the block layout sheet to keep herself organized while making the blocks.

Wendy brought in the first quilt she ever made.  She started this the first time she came to class about three years ago.  Well done Wendy!

 

She loves the Ohio Star block so much that she has all of the blocks made for a large quilt for her son and new wife.

 



They just returned from Paris, so look at the panel that Wendy is going to incorporate on the back of the quilt.  Perfect!

Now to why you haven't been hearing from me.  We've been going to summer Little League tournaments.  Last night Jess pitched and he also played catcher......not at the same time! We won 17-12.  He had a grand slam on Sunday and we missed it!   Because on Sunday we were hosting our youngest grandson's birthday party at our house which included his baseball team in attendance. I lost count at 10 kids in the pool.  It was like counting a swarm of cats.  Nice group of very well behaved boys and one girl from the team.

Now to quilting.......not much happening on my design wall.  Stay tuned for the arrival of a major quilting catalog in your mailbox soon. You will see that I've been busy working with printers. ordering plastic bags, ordering and folding block layout sheets.  Holy smoke, I'm astounded at the amount of orders.  I had to pick this double chin off the computer keyboard when another Purchase Order arrived yesterday.  I thought this must be a mistake.....it wasn't.  We will be turning our kitchen table into a sweat shop next week.  I promise not to break any child labor laws while getting all of the purchase orders filled.  If I feed the kids enough pizza and ice cream, and throw in a few swimming breaks, they are good to go for hours. 

Soon,
Lynn

More Country Sunshine

Hello Everyone,

 

This is what's on my design wall....Country Sunshine blocks.  This is one of my favorites.

 

 

It all begins with my block layout sheet.  I made the components that run through the middle of the block, the Flying Geese, Double Flying Geese and center section, then put them on the sheet to keep myself organized.  This time I got a little smarter when I made the sheet with the addition of pressing arrows.

 



 

In reality, we could have a little less sunshine here.  It is supposed to be 106 degrees today.  The grand kids have taken up residence in our house and pool. It is amazing just how much food five, very active kids can eat in one day!  It is also amazing how much sunscreen they use.  I'm so glad their parents have drilled this into their brains.

After auditioning several fabrics for the sashing, I decided on this old fashioned red.

I still haven't decided just how large or small this quilt is going to be.  I know I love making the blocks and I don't want to stop!  I'm already dreaming of the machine quilting on this one.

Stay cool today, and try to enjoy the abundance of California sunshine.

Soon,
Lynn

Scrappy Leaves Class Was In Session

Hello Everyone,

 

I spent a fun day in the classroom at Cloth and Quilts in Turlock on Monday.  

 

The class began the process of making Scrappy Leaves......and it is a process.  Scrappy Leaves was designed by Ilene Bartos and is in her Maple Leaf Quilts book.

I had the girls begin by making a large swatch sheet to organize their backgrounds.

We had two husbands accompany their wives to the class, since they drove a considerable distance to get there.  So what do you do with husbands in a quilting class?  You put them to work!

The men meticulously glued the fabrics to the large, gridded sheet of paper. 

Once their work was done, they headed back to their comfy chairs in the reading room, and promptly fell asleep.  This quilting stuff is hard work!  They were such good sports and fun to have in class.  This picture shows you the great selection of books the shop has to offer.

Once the sheets were done, leaves started being born around the room.

The smaller block on the sheet is a small swatch of the leaf fabric.  This method really helps plan out this quilt and keeps you organized.

Making the leaves is a piece of cake once you decide on the placement.

Thank you all for such a great day.  You are all well on your way to making a stunning quilt to display proudly.

Soon,
Lynn

Country Sunshine

Hello Everyone,

 

How about some Country Sunshine this morning? The quilt with no name finally got a one over the weekend.  There is going to be a lot of yellow in this quilt, so the name seemed appropriate.

I've been quiet on the blog lately since I've either been gone or preparing for the Wilder Clan Father's Day celebration at our house.  We've also been in the small town of Ripon for our granddaughters softball tournament.

Last Thursday I spoke at the Pieced Together Quilters group from Castro Valley. What a nice group of women!  They were so friendly and they laughed heartily in all the right places.  We had a great time visiting their guild.  I'm going back in August to present a two-hour Patchwork Math class to the entire guild.

My friend Lynnette, (one of my Sew'n Wild Oaks girls) was able to join us for the morning.  She was a big help folding, and packing the quilts up.  How do you like my lectern?  Sometimes you have to improvise, and the upside down garbage can with my bin on top work out perfectly.

Gail was also there helping with sales and she's my "Vanna" during the talk.

 

Speaking of Country Sunshine.....we went to our granddaughters fast pitch softball tournament out in the valley on Saturday.  California is experiencing an extreme heat wave, and both the fans and girls roasted during the tournament.  I drank so much water Saturday I was afraid I would float away! It was only 104 degrees when we were there on Saturday.  Yesterday, it was 106 during the game.  It is supposed to be like this for the entire week with the highest temperatures hitting on Thursday.

 

 

This morning I'm off to Turlock at Cloth and Quilts to teach Scrappy Leaves.  It's going to be a good day to stay inside and quilt.

Soon,
Lynn

Sew'n Wild Oaks Was In Session

Hello Everyone,

 

My girls gathered together at In Between Stitches on Tuesday for another day of fellowship, conversation, laughter, and yes, some quilting took place too.

 

Barbara G. is working on Snowball Blossoms by Kim Diehl.  This pattern in a free download on the Henry Glass site by clicking HERE.  This is a beautiful little table topper that can be used throughout the year.

 

Suzanne is just finishing up a project from Kin Diehl's Simple Whatnots club.

Gail is working on her Walk in the Park quilt.  She is using black on all of her frames as a unifier.  Her blocks are beginning to stack up!

Barbara B. has her Spoken For flimsy ready for the quilter.  Except for the border, the entire quilt was made out of her stash.

Judy is working on, and almost finished making her Heritage blocks.

Lynnette is making good progress on her Grammy Squares quilt.

Meeke is also making Grammy Squares.

Barbara B. loves Halloween.  This little owl is one block in the pattern.

 

Pat is working on her wool project from the Patriotic Blog Hop.

 

 I love the simplicity of this block.

Isabelle is turning this pile of flying geese......

 

....into these for Harvest of Hope.

Jeanne is well on her way to the 120 little baskets to be included in For The Love of Baskets.

Valery is almost finished with Bird Walk by Material Girlfriends.

Valery finished the machine applique on this block yesterday.  I think I heard a sigh of relief when all of the stitching was completed!

Another day well spent in the company of quilters.  There was learning, sharing, visiting, eating and lots of stitching going on.  Thank you girls for being so much fun!

Soon,
Lynn