Valentine Collage #5

Here is another of the Valentine collage series. Of all the ones I have posted so far, which one should I donate to the auction (or which is your favorite)?

Valentine Collage #4

Valentine Collage #3

Another Valentine Collage

The quote says, "Let your heart be your compass, your mind your map, your soul your guide and you will never get lost."

I have completed six of these Valentine collages. I will put one up each day. They are for sale but I haven't decided yet which one I will be donating to the Valentine for Aids auction.

Time Well Spent

I must apologize for not writing for a few days. This week Anna is on a week-long school field trip, which means I have been trying to make the most with my free time. She left Monday morning and will return Friday afternoon. They are only about 2-1/2 hours away in McCall studying at the McCall Outdoor Science School. Her teacher has been posting pictures on the internet. And although Anna does not appear to be in her "group", it is fun to see how things are going there.

This is the first time Anna has been away from both Frank and me for more than one night. She was very excited to go, but on Sunday, she also admitted she was nervous. She was going to miss Big Cat, her favorite animal that has traveled with us everywhere (and our website namesake). It was the first time he has not gone with her overnight. We thought it would safer for him given how many sixth graders would be there. I told her not to worry, Big Cat would be with us. She said, "Well, I'm going to miss you, too." I said, "Wow, you're going to miss us?" and she said, "Well, duh!" She was also going to miss her hamster, Clare.

While she has been gone, I have been trying to spend my time well. I have been working on the, aforementioned, online class and I have spent some time working on a series of Valentines collages. Here is one that I have completed. One will be donated to the local Flying M Valentine for Aids auction, in which I have been participating for about 10 years now.


The quote says, "Where we love is home, home that our feet may leave but not our hearts." Hmm, I guess that is pretty appropriate for this week while Anna is away. A little bit of our hearts are in McCall right now.

Affirmation Card #3

Here is another one of my affirmation cards. Making them as a little piece of art really makes it more exciting to me.

Affirmations

With a last minute decision, I decided to sign up for one of Alyson Stanfield's online classes. It just started and is helping me set goals for my art and inspiring ways to achieve them.

One recent assignment was to create some affirmations for myself. Alyson showed us a few of the cards she made one year by hand (not on the computer). There was no requirement that it had to be anything creative, but I thought it would be more fun that way. So here are two that I have made so far.


I'm hoping if I repeat them enough, it will become true (especially that second one!).

Resolutions?

Well, I've had almost an entire week to think about resolutions/goals/intentions. Each of those seem a little bit different to me. Resolutions seem like guidelines for what you want in your life. Goals seem to me to be more specific with, maybe, a time-line as well. Intention feels like how you intend to act toward the previous two. I haven't looked this up in a dictionary. These are just my definitions.

I've been reading on blogs and in papers about resolutions, etc. Some people also like to choose a word to guide them through the year. This year I have decided that my "intention" is to Be Open. That's two words to guide me and it can mean many things.
Be open. . .
to new ideas,
to new opportunities
to creativity
to transition
to change (is that the same as transition?)
to mistakes
to others
to yourself
to accept peace and simplicity in life
and so on and so on.

I also have "resolutions" which include working more on my art. I definitely have goals. They are usually a to-do list and concentrate on the smaller or more specific things. But I don't think I need to list them all here.

Flannel Frenzy

Here is another UFO finished. Sorry, the pictures aren't so great. Another flannel quilt that was already pieced and sitting in the closet. I was able to do free motion quilting on this (although it probably would have been better to just stitch in the ditch). The seams were flatter and the back is one piece. I did loop-de-doops around the trees and in the border with a variegated red, green and white thread. You can see a little better in the second photo.



Have you been noticing a trend here? I think I had a flannel fetish some years ago. I still have a flannel quilt to finish for Anna. The blocks are ready but it is not pieced yet and the border needs to be made. I also had a flannel quilt in mind for my own bed. I have the fabrics and had cross stitched some center squares for a log cabin design, but nothing is pieced yet. In addition, I have another flannel quilt that you quilt as you sew. I'm not sure if I have any fabric cut for that yet or not. I'll have to dig it out and see. If not, I might abandon that one.

Yes, I am trying to finish up my old projects. I frequently get stopped at the quilting stage, with these more traditional quilts, after the top has been pieced. I don't know what to do with the quilting and doing these bigger pieces is really not fun on my regular machine (the flannel ones get heavy, too). When I finish these, I won't be making traditional quilts anymore, unless it is an extreme, rare case.

This year my intention is to really focus more on my artwork. I want to get the old stuff finished up or out of the way so they won't be looming in my brain anymore and I can move on to new things.

Welcome 2009 . . .

. . . welcome a new beginning, new opportunities, new friends, new ideas, creativity, simple things, love and peace. Happy New Year to you!

It's Done

This quilt is done. Another UFO finished. It is a quilt to be used. It has also been pieced for years and has been hiding in the closet. It is flannel and was a class I took at a local shop. I did not put batting in it since it is two layers of flannel and pretty big.

I started out trying to free motion quilt it. I did one tree and decided that that was not going to work. The seams are too bulky (the back is pieced with leftover flannel pieces) and it was not sliding around well. So I just stitched in the ditch and just enough to hold the front and back together. It is so large it fits on Anna's bed.

2008 is done as well. I'm not much in the reflective mood right now. Usually my review of the year seems to happen in the Christmas letter. It was a pretty good year (despite the economy). Tomorrow is a new day and a new year, a new slate to fill. See you next year!

No More

The igloo is no more. We had a very warm day yesterday, around 55 degrees, and the snow is gone.

Christmas decorations are no more. Yesterday I managed to get everything down and boxed up again. This year I wanted to have everything put away before New Year's day so we could start the year anew.

2008 is almost no more, as well. How do you transition from one year to another? Right now is the time when I have the urge to finish old projects and get organized for the new year. But, as is apparent by the amount of projects in my closet, the urge to finish doesn't always translate into action. I am working on another UFO (unfinished object) and hope to finish it soon.

Ready to Ride

We have finally received a good storm of snow, about 4-6 inches today. (I'm sure that is nothing compared to many areas around the country, but we are happy to have it.)


There is even enough to go sledding down the street. On the torpedo, we have sled racer #1: Lisa.

On the Glad-a-boggan, sled racers #2: Anna and Frank.

On your mark, get set, GO!

O.k. I couldn't take a picture while I was racing, could I? This is Frank on another run. Anna only went a couple of times because she didn't like having to walk back up the hill again. Instead, she threw snowballs at Frank and me as we went by!

Happy Holidays

I hope you all had a wonderful, relaxing, safe holiday. We did. Frank and Anna managed to finish their igloo/snow fort on Christmas Eve. I think it is still holding up.

I Did It!

I finally finished this Christmas quilt, with hours to spare. This was a UFO (for those not in the know, that means unfinished object: you know, one of those projects you start and then it gets put in the closet and forgotten for years). It is not a gift for anyone but ourselves.

Several years (or more) ago, I did a block of the month type thing at one of the local quilt shops. We could do it in either batik or traditional fabrics. I chose the batik and had a brilliant(?) idea that every time I made a batik block, I would also make one with Christmas fabrics. In the end, I had nine sampler blocks. I kept all the fabric together so I could use it to finish the quilt.

I pulled it out and decided to make a couple more blocks and put white blocks in between. I wanted it big enough to use as a lap quilt. It's pretty scrappy and the quilting is very simple. But, best of all, it is done! (By the way, the batik one has been pieced for years but has yet to be quilted.)

Here it is hanging on the railing. Not the best decoration, but festive anyway.


While I was finishing up the binding on the quilt, Frank and Anna have been outside building a snow fort. That big storm we were expecting never came. It has been snowing a little for a few days, but some usually melts. We have enough on the ground with which to do something. So Frank built a box so they could make nice blocks for a snow fort. More pictures to come when they are finished.

Santa Quilt

It's safe to show you this now. These are some cross stitch Santas that my mother-in-law has been doing for years. While visiting one time, she brought them all and asked what she should do with them. Of course, I said make a wall quilt. So she left them for me to sew together.

I did not get it made for last Christmas but was determined to get it ready for this Christmas. I finished it over Thanksgiving this year and was trying to get it packed up and sent so quickly that I forgot to take a picture of the actual completed quilt. This is just a picture of it up on the design wall. I also added a red border around the green.

Yo yo Flowers

In a previous blog, I asked what I should do with the yoyo flowers I had made. Here I finally made something with some of them, a headband. What a beautiful model I had to pose for me.

Snow?

Today was the last day of school for 2008. Anna was hoping to get enough snow last night to start the break one day early. Nope, we only got a little bit. They had a good time at school with caroling and class parties, anyway. It did snow some more later in the day and at one point it was snowing and the sun was shining. Very hard to get that in a photo.

We are expecting a very big storm around Sunday evening. I'm planning on a grocery run tomorrow to stock up before it hits. Fortunately, Anna won't have school and Frank won't be going to work next week. We can hunker down in the house if we have to.

More Making

Anna and I stopped by Michael's yesterday to get a couple of things. I saw these really cute beads. I bought some and made myself some earrings today.

Still Making Stuff

I love making crafty stuff for the Christmas holiday. Several years ago, I bought a kit to make snowflake ornaments, like these above, with Anna. Then, I found the wire forms by themselves and bought a bunch, thinking I would make them with Anna's class.

This wire was very hard to turn the loop on the end so the beads didn't fall off. So I ended up using silver pipe cleaners twisted together for the kids. It worked better for the, then, third graders. But I had a bunch of these leftover.

My sister made her own versions this year, so I decided to dig these out and just make up the rest of them. I think I will take them to my yoga class and let everybody pick one (although I'm not sure there will be enough).

I'm not quite done with the holiday making yet. One more thing for giving and then I want to work on a Christmas quilt for myself that is a sampler of blocks I had done several years ago. I'd really like to at least get it pieced so I could drape it over my stair railing for decoration. I'd also like to make a Christmas wall hanging for myself. I've also had the pattern and collected fabric for several years now. Stay tuned, it might just happen!