twenty six years

St Patrick's Day is a fine day for a wedding.

red cross

This May I celebrate the 30th anniversary of my graduation and becoming a nurse.
I've always wanted to make a red cross quilt. As I researched it, I found there is some tension out there as to copyright of the symbol.
I went with a very primitive, utilitarian look--not sure how to quilt it yet. Probably very plainly.
I used Kona Cotton white and my crosses are from reclaimed plaid and striped shirts.
The blocks finish 4 1/2 inches, 3 inches wide finished sashings.
Top size 57 by 74.5 inches.
I love being a nurse. There is much in healthcare that leaves a lot to be desired, but when I am at the bedside, or preparing a student, I know this was the right calling for me.

cheddar top

I have the top put together from Lori's project. When I started it, I thought I might go on to make a larger quilt. Now, not so much.
I love it; if I do make a larger one I will bump up the size from 1 to 1 1/2 inch grid as it got more fiddly than I wanted with my odd pressing issues.
Also, vacillating between hand or machine quilting. Machine is winning at the moment.

houses

Over at Bumble Beans she is collecting house blocks for a homeless project. I made these with stuff that was already out--of course one is purple because we live in a purple house.
Check out her project and consider spending a few minutes making a couple of houses. (As you know, it is easier to make two blocks than it is to make one.)

cheddar

Lori over at Humble Quilts posted instructions to replicate an antique doll quilt.
What a delightful pattern.
Mine is still in pieces--I have run out of my background and have been having fun substituting other shirting fabrics, especially bits with animals in them.

my daughter the election judge

Eve served again as an election judge. The city has worked hard to have a high school student serve in each precinct. The goal is to have some technologically savvy people there along with the regulars, who in our precinct are the same ones I've seen since the late 1980s.
Eve learned all sorts of Chicago politics trivia at her training.
She asked if it was ok to accept free lunch (it is a 14-16 hour day) from the alderman. It is permitted, but she got a lot of envious comments from workers at other polling places who do not get lunch.
She also discovered our precinct used to be in a bar until too many elections had the judges getting drunk so they moved us to a church.
Also, they stressed that all election judges are equal as the long term ones try to bully the high school ones.
Her favorite instruction is that at 0700 they are to throw open the door, and even if no one is around, they are to loudly announce, "The Polls are Now Open!"
Kind of a great ritual.

it is growing!

I had it sewn together, measuring about 48 by 57, and Seth asked if it was going to be bigger. It did look ok, but now, as it is growing, it is looking great. I am running out of my blue striped shirt parts and may have to cross the street to my neighbor to ask for the sleeves back that I gave her.

a twelve year old depicts winter

stripes

Several sites have had variations on Kaffe's design. For what I am working on, I used thrifted shirts. The trimmed down size of the squares is 9 1/2, 6 1/2, and 3 1/2 inches, so they finish 9, 6, and 3. I make them oversized because they distort, especially the 9 inch ones. I'm at the point of setting them together, then deciding if it needs to be bigger.
Seth asked if I had a plan for this quilt as he kind of likes it.

mom's birthday

We gathered in Iowa for my mother's birthday--we all made it and got photos of mom and dad with all 9 grandchildren.

buttons

In my grand search for ways to use the buttons salvaged from thrifted shirts, there were several examples of filled ornaments. I used the smaller 2 inch clear glass balls and my tiniest collar and cuff buttons, added a bit of lavender hem tape, and made these for my nieces and sisters and one for my neighbor.

er nurses

Both Andy and I worked Christmas day. Andy talked with an Emergency Room nurse, and asked if things were chaotic there.
"No, Christmas is pretty orderly in the ER. We get the cardiac events after people eat a big dinner, followed by the renal cases who ate too much ham. Then a bit later, the overdoses from people who went out to spend their Christmas gift money."
Gotta love those ER nurses.

Merry Christmas!

nine patches quilt

A gift for my mother's new years eve birthday.
The nine patches are 3 inches finished, small squares 1 inch finished.

And, a wonderful cardinals backing.

a twelve year old decorates for Christmas

Tableau by Seth

Mary--check
Baby--check
Trees--check
Stormtrooper--check

rick rack

I love the tutorial by amandajean on how to make a zigzag quilt with rectangles.
I used 2 1/2 by 4 1/2 inch rectangles and used up a lot of recycled shirts.
It is small--I may try to quilt it myself.
I am working hospice on Thanksgiving--hope to come home to a house smelling like turkey--if not, we will go out for Chinese food and I will cook after class on Saturday.
Later:(Andy cooked!)

a roof over our heads

Final day--Day 45
Next time we have a roof tear-off:
-Ensure the dumpster is delivered before they take even a single shingle off. We hope the neighbors will be speaking to us again soon.
-Plan on it taking 5 times longer than expected.
-Plan on it costing 40% more money than expected.
-Do not assume plastic tarps will stay in place.
-Prepare for sleepless nights imagining raccoons and bats and human ne'er-do-wells entering the house through the open to the sky attic, especially should Andy be out of town for two weeks of the tear-off.
-Wonder why the 15 year old part of the roof failed while the 100 year old part was still in pretty good shape.
But also-Delight in opening the attic door and seeing Venus in the southern sky through the new dormer.

Blogger's Quilt Festival

My favorite quilt to sleep under this fall is this one I made from scraps of many thrifted shirts and Red Kona Cotton.
Make sure you check out the other quilts at the festival--what a talented blogisphere we live in!

up on the roof

Roof tear-off began this morning. 0700. We will invite the neighbors over for a forgiveness pizza when it is complete.

nine patch

Working on this nine patch, using the method on the Moda site.
http://www.modabakeshop.com/search?q=patchtastic
I thought this was a lot of busy work for making the patches, but works well with the type of scraps I am plowing through. Also, with varying bits of time to work, it is a method that lends itself to easy pick up and stopping. I stay organized, an unlikely state for me in my usual disarray.
I am using 4 1/2 inch squares to start, ending with 3 inch finished nine patches.

Today was Eve's last first day of high school. A senior. She is recently back from visiting a bunch of really expensive schools out East.

another block party

The theme this year was a mix of speak-easy/untouchables in honor of the Johnny Depp movie about John Dillinger being filmed in our neighborhood. I still haven't seen the film, so I don't know if we actually made the final cut. Things start off by having candy thrown by a "Block Head" which used to be a kid with a box on his head, but has evolved in recent years to reflect the theme. We've had Elvis, a Pirate, Clowns, Olympians. This year it was this nefarious bunch of mopes.
Our block party has been held since 1955, one of the longest running in the city.

Our service project was the local food bank and my quilt brought in $321 plus about 2 dozen jars of peanut butter and jam.
I displayed quilts again off the porch.

Iraqi Bundles of Love

http://ibol.wordpress.com/
Here is my box for the Iraqi Bundles of Love. It is filled with some of my stuff plus much thread from the stash of a friend's mother.
How come everyone else's bundle on the website looks so pretty and mine looks like it just fell out of bed?

home again

This quilt, made in 2001, has hung in Andy's office for several years. He put up the one I gave him for his birthday and this one has come home.
It is fun to look at it again. I dyed all the fabrics for the top. My small quilt group gathered several times to dye fabric, and I was always pregnant or breastfeeding and couldn't participate. Finally, the stars aligned and I joined the fun.
We did direct wet application and I loved the resulting fabrics.
I chose a simple block to feature the fabrics and it was machine quilted by my friend Cissie Arvidson.

princess and the pea

We are getting ready for the roofer to do a tear-off and dorm out our attic. This means my fabric has been bagged up and we are throwing out lots of stuff that wandered its way up there. I have laid out finished quilts on a bed, Princess and the Pea style. I need to cover them with plastic before the dust flies.
I also see that many of the quilts are not quite finished--binding missing, a corner loose for a label, sleeves flapping from not being sewn down.


I love this quilt--I tested the pattern for Debbie Bookman--it needs sleeve and label. I think I gave it to Seth a few years ago for Christmas. Maybe his memory is as bad as mine and I can finish it and give it again this year.
See how unhappy he was the first day of grade 6.