Sunday Sundry 11-20-16

It's been a rough couple of weeks, folks. I am continuing to process.

I read a beautiful thing this past week on the blog The Irish Aesthete. Click the link to read the short post in its entirety (and enjoy the accompanying photos of gorgeous garden paths), but the essence of it was this: 

"...For all its failings and foibles, the human spirit is resilient. So too is the urge, the need to create beauty, even in the midst of turmoil and disorder. The determination of previous generations to overcome adversity, and to find the beautiful in the midst of ugliness can serve as our own inspiration."

Yes.  Let's continue creating in our own unique, expressive, beautiful ways. Finding inspiration, starting conversation.

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In addition to the Quilty 365 daily circle project (which I admittedly do not do daily, but often 3, 5, or 10 at a time), I put together this little half-square triangle piece from the leftover cut-off corners of the Precious Gems quilt top.

This piece is only about 36 inches square, so I'm thinking of adding borders or some such thing to bring it to a size I can use as a backing for that quilt top.

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Other things I've been doing:

—Rearranging some things in the sewing space.  I sew in the basement and share the space with the usual basement dwelling items of a non-sewing nature. I recently bought a few things at an office rummage sale, and I've swapped out an old desk and two old 2-drawer filing cabinets for a 4-drawer cabinet and a standing-height table for the computer.  There's really a mishmash of  stuff down there, and it's a constant work in process to organize, purge, and ponder use of the space.  It'll never look like something out of House Beautiful, not even close, but I'm happy enough with recent improvements.

—Scanning old photos and memorabilia.  A military historian within the family reached out to us recently regarding my late father-in-law, who served in the the 7th Armored Division during the Battle of the Bulge.  I needed to delve into the information I had, and since I was in the middle of reorganizing anyway, this has led down a new bunny trail, one I'm happy to take, but it is a bit overwhelming.

—Waking up at odd hours of the early morning and not being able to sleep...3:00 a.m., 4:30 a.m., 5:00 a.m.  On the plus side, I got a photo of the Supermoon a couple hours before sunrise. 

—Discovering new music.  Like the latest release from Dawes, and The Muddy Magnolias.  Whew, those girls can sing!

—Watching Versailles.  Because I'm still not over the fact they killed off Athelstan on Vikings, and Versailles is easing my George Blagden withdrawals.

—Generally, just being grateful.  For all of the above and more.  For the mild fall weather (up until this weekend), perfect for walking.  For homemade beef stew and apple crisp.  For friends and kind people.  For laughter and tears.

There is much to appreciate as we head into Thanksgiving, and every day.  What comes to mind for you?

April Circles for Quilty 365

It reigned purple in my sewing room in April.  That was the plan and color I'd chosen for the month for my Quilty 365 circle project.

Three weeks in, there was the sad news of Prince's departure from this world.  His music was part of the soundtrack of my life.  "Raspberry Beret" and "Let's Go Crazy" were among my favorites, but there were so many more.  His talent, vision, musicianship, creative genius, and supreme funkiness will be sorely missed.   

"If you don't like

the world you're livin' in

Take a look around

at least you got friends..."

Back to the circles, it took some creativity to come up with 30 purple dots.  Purple is one of those colors I don't tend to have a lot of in the stash, but since I'm a saver of scraps and strings, I managed to scrounge up enough to cobble together.

Back in the '90s, I decided to paint a bathroom a lovely shade of lilac.  Afterwards, when shopping for towels and rugs, I found out how hard it was to match purple.  Too gray, too bright, too blue, too dark, too grapey.  I finally went with tan/cream accessories.

Which happens to be my background square color scheme, so we're good.  Perhaps the point of purple is to defy the whole matching thing.  Mess with attempts to pin it down.  Just when you think it's this, it's that.  I admire that rebel quality.

So we have grayish purples, muddy purples, happy purples, sad purples, grapey, spring-fresh, and quirky purples.  And so on.

Another fun factoid about my experience with purple.  Once in a while, I'll get a whiff of something—a flower, a piece of candy—and I'll say, "It smells like purple."  I didn't know this was kind of weird until my husband commented that he didn't understand what I was talking about.  What does purple smell like?  Well, not like grape, as one might imagine.  More like a certain clover, which is also the same (in my mind) as what purple gumdrops tasted like in my childhood.  Later in life, I found out this may be a form of synesthesia.  I do have number form synesthesia, when it comes to visualizing calendars and timelines, but there are other types as well.  

I don't smell other colors, as a rule.  I think it'd be really cool, though, if I did.  In a fabric store, would the smells all blend together?  If so, would it smell like brown?  And as I'm thinking about what brown would smell like, I'm remembering the modeling clay from my childhood.  I spent a lot of time with my nose within a few inches of modeling clay as a kid.  Not Play-Doh; for some reason, I just wanted to eat that stuff.  Modeling clay came in sticks wrapped in cellophane.  There were a few basic colors in a pack, but after a while, they all got mixed together forming a big hunk of brown.

But enough about my childhood eccentricities.  Who knows, maybe my brain got rewired when as a tot I stuck the silver butter knife in the electrical socket and woke up several feet away seeing stars.  And I do remember those purple stars!

With January's blue circles, February's red/pink, March's green, and April's purple, that brings me to a total of 121.

Linking to:  Quilty Folk

January Blues for Quilty 365

It's time once again to party with the Quilty 365 quilt along.  I'm linking up with my first month's worth of circles.  Thirty-one days' worth of blues.

I decided to do one color a month for my circles.  It was really fun to poke through the stash and scraps to find blue fabrics that caught my fancy.

Admittedly, I didn't make just one circle a day.  I did several at a time when the mood struck, and that turned out to be a good way of working for me.

A couple of my favorites from the month were the fussy cut house block...

And the bluebird.

But honestly, I like each and every one of them.  There is part of a repurposed '80s dress my sister gave me, a thrifted shirt or two, fabric from friends, and others with their own special story.

February's colors will be red and pink.  I haven't made one yet today so I better get busy.

Pop over to Audrey's blog, Quilty Folk, to explore the links.  It's fascinating to see the creative variations on the Quilty 365 theme.

Of course, when I think of the blues, I think of some great music.  I recently saw the band Lake Street Dive on Stephen Colbert's late night show.  Here's an earlier bluesy song by their amazing lead singer, Rachael Price.  Ooh, I'm telling you, that girl can sing! 

Media, Music, and Movies

Read any good books lately?

Dad reading to great-granddaughter Cali on Thanksgiving Day.

I enjoy a good story, but I'm a multitasker, so I tend to listen to a book while I'm sewing, walking, or doing dishes.  

I caught up on a few of the classics this past summer via the collection of free audiobooks available on Loyal Books and Librivox.  These are read by volunteers, and some of the readers are very good, others not so much.  As I discovered a particularly good narrator, I'd see what other books he or she had read and listen to those as well.

Recently, I resubscribed to Audible in a special 99 cents a month, "we want you back" deal.  It was an offer I couldn't refuse.  Especially since I wanted to pick up the audio versions of a couple of the Outlander series books I didn't have yet.  Davina Porter narrates the Outlander audiobooks, and she is a delight, voicing all of the characters in such an authentic, credible way.  With the series on TV, I've started relistening to the first couple of books again.  I've found myself wondering, as I watched the Starz TV series, did it really happen that way in the books?  Some things no, or not exactly, but they are getting the essence of it right and it's been extremely well done so far.

I've also really gotten into podcasts the past couple years.  Some favorites are Serial, Startup, Reply All, Mystery Show, and Surprisingly Awesome (the last four can all be found on gimletmedia.com).  

I could name about a half dozen more  that I regularly listen to, but if I could recommend just one today, it would be Serial.  The second season is in the works and should be starting soon (I hope).  What is Serial about?  From their website: 

Serial is a podcast from the creators of This American Life, and is hosted by Sarah Koenig. Serial tells one story - a true story - over the course of an entire season. Each season, we'll follow a plot and characters wherever they take us. And we won’t know what happens at the end until we get there, not long before you get there with us. Each week we bring you the next chapter in the story, so it's important to listen to the episodes in order, starting with Episode 1.

I'm not usually a huge mystery or crime drama fan, but the story in Season 1 was so compelling, I was hooked after the first episode.  Apparently, I wasn't the only one to feel that way.  The podcast was so successful, it's going to become a TV series.  If you haven't checked it out already, you can catch up on past episodes online or on iTunes.

In movies, I watched a little-known gem this past week called A Little Chaos.  It's a period piece, or costume drama, about the building of one of the gardens at Versailles.  

Ultimately, it's a romance starring Kate Winslet and Matthias Schoenaerts (yum) as landscape architect Andre Le Notre.  The latter actor is the main reason I rented the movie.  He captured my attention in Far From the Madding Crowd, and I'm catching up his body of work to date.  To my surprise and delight, though, I found out in the first scene that the movie also stars Alan Rickman as King Louis XIV.  Be still my heart!  Alan Rickman could read me the phone book.  Stanley Tucci also has a fun role that gives the film some levity.  I really enjoyed the movie and watched it twice, in fact.

As for music, I heard a new song on the radio yesterday that I really liked.  It's by Tor Miller, called "Carter and Cash."  There's kind of a subtle '80s vibe to it that is pretty cool.  See what you think.
 

31 Day Blog Writing Challenge

I'm going to take a crack at the 31 Day Blog Writing Challenge hosted by Cheryl at muppin.com. 

It's been better than three weeks since I last posted, so some of this will be a bit of a catch-up.  I've let my blogging muscles go a little slack of late, so this challenge will be good practice in at least showing up and making a consistent effort again.  And hopefully we'll discover some new friends, get reacquainted with others, and have some fun along the way!

Now you may have noticed I've gotten a late start, since the challenge officially began on December 1.  But I just stumbled upon the link late last night, so for me to be here ready to go within 12 hours of that time seems "close enough for rock and roll" to me.

So what's new?  Well, this is one of three little projects I've got going on in the sewing room at the moment.  A couple of them are gifts, so I can't show those just yet.

A little string star table topper made with part of a charm pack of Blitzen that I've had for a couple years.  Love those aquas and grays together!

I didn't set out to make the star from strings, but I just couldn't seem to get the right combination of squares to work, so I just sliced them into strips and re-made 5-inch squares from the assortment, and then made the half-square triangles from there.

I also finished quilting and binding this wall hanging recently. 

It's kind of hard to see the quilting in the green parts—it's holly leaves. 

You can see them better from the back, maybe.

I hit the mother lode of Christmas fabric at a thrift store a couple weeks ago.  Most of those bundles was at least a yard.  Total price for this entire lot was about $12.00!

"Sleigh Ride" is one of my favorite Christmas songs (the Harry Connick, Jr. version being my all-time favorite), but I hadn't seen this version in 7/8 time until a couple days ago.  Pretty cool!

New Start

I'm not so much in a finishing mood lately, it would appear.  Rather I seem to be nudging each project along bit by bit.  Kicking the can down the road with a top here, a backing there, a couple of quilts basted.  Things will all come together in the end, but right now it's kind of like herding turtles.

Now I've started piecing a Scrappy Mountain Majesties quilt.  I had a little help with that this weekend when my daughter came to visit.

She got acquainted with Brother Everett by sewing a few blocks. 

She had the idea to group by colors on the design wall, which wasn't something that had occurred to me.

Today I made a few more blocks and shifted some of the blocks on the design wall, alternating them.  It's a subtle change while still keeping the flow by color. 

(Oops, I have one turned wrong on the lower right side.)

So we'll see how things continue to go, but I'm liking it so far!

Tonight I'll be rooting for Wisconsin in the NCAA championship game against Duke.  Go Badgers!

And speaking of the Badger State, I am enjoying the music of a new band from Milwaukee, Vinyl Theatre.

A Little of This...

Sometimes what seems like the logical order of things is anything but.  Or perhaps the logic is in the eye (brain) of the beholder (thinker).

At any rate, the Tea Towel Challenge flimsy had to come off the design wall for the 16-patch and X-blocks to go up.  It seemed to me that rather than continue with sewing together the 16-patch and X-blocks, I should (at long last) take the next step on the Tea Towel flimsy.  That was to machine stitch around the fused-on feathers (or leaves—again, eye of the beholder).

I used Brother Everett's blanket stitch for the task.  I wanted the thread to be fine with a bit of a sheen, and Isacord worked nicely.  Thing is, the programmed blanket stitch is a little wonky.  There is a little jiggle in the couple of straight stitches between the zigzag stitch into the body of the applique, which I couldn't seem to work out by fiddling with various settings.  So it is what it is, and thankfully that is mostly hidden along the edge of the appliqued pieces.

We did a little antique mall browsing yesterday and I found these Georges Briard trays.

I guess I now have an official collection of Briard trays.  Three's a charm.  Counting patterns, not strictly numbers.

You may recall that the tea towel in the center of the challenge quilt is a vintage Georges Briard.

Music for a Monday morning:  Grammy-nominated Jarle Bernhoft has talent coming out his ears.  I can barely fathom playing guitar and singing at the same time, but to record and build upon all those loops and keep it flowing in time in a funky song to boot?  Prepare to be amazed.

Plaid Peaks Finished

"The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry."  Sometimes that's not a bad thing.

The doodle I'd drawn to be free-motion quilted on this wall hanging just did not work.  

 Neither did Plans B and C.  They seemed doable on paper and on the practice pad (below), but on the piece itself, not so much. 

After picking out the stitching for about an hour last evening, I finally just slapped on some blue painters tape as a straight-line quilting guide and called it a day.  Thus was quilted Plaid Peaks.  Sometimes it's best to K.I.S.S. (keep it simple).

The free-motion quilting was good practice, anyway.  I'll keep the ideas in mind to try again sometime.

Overall, I'm happy with how the wall hanging turned out.  The plaids were thrifted shirt scraps left over from a recent project.  

I'd been thinking about using some of the shirt buttons in some way, and how I ended up sewing them on was an impulse decision.  I'm okay with them for now, but if I wake up tomorrow and come to my senses am of a different opinion, they can be snipped off.

I do love plaids.  Must be those Celtic roots.  I've got a weakness for men in kilts too, but that's another story.

I've got my amp for sale on Craigslist.  A guy came over to check it out the other night, so I had to get out my guitar and make sure everything was working and sounding okay.  He played harmonica (and didn't buy the amp, said he'd think about it).  Meanwhile, I kind of enjoyed playing my guitar a little bit again after having ignored it for a couple years.  The next day, everything was still sitting out, and as I was listening to some music on YouTube, I picked up the guitar and figured out how to play this song.  Fortunately, the chords were pretty easy for a rusty gal with no callouses on her fingertips.  But holy harmony, these folks can sing a pretty, melancholy song.

Sunday Sundry 11-23-14

It's not often you thank someone for making you feel small, but that's exactly what I did yesterday.  It was all in good fun, of course, an effort on my part to make conversation with the very tall, dark-haired, nice-looking young man shopping for groceries at Walmart.  He was 6'10", which gave him a seven and a half inch advantage on me.  It's rare that I have to look up when I'm talking to someone, brothers, uncles, and nephews notwithstanding.  It felt pretty cool.  And yes, he did say he played basketball, but I didn't get details.  Too busy staring, I guess. ;)

My current tall girl problem is finding pants that fit.  I recently logged onto JCPenney.com to do a little pants shopping, only to find out they have discontinued their ultra-tall size. 

Now what am I gonna do?  As if the pickin's weren't already slim.  I haven't sewn myself pants in a long time, but I guess I'll probably have to start again.  I did find a pair of navy unhemmed pants at Land's End and ordered them.  They're just long enough to turn under a quarter inch, basically the serged part, and maybe squeak by—if they haven't shrunk already.  I washed them in cold and they are hanging to dry right now.  We'll see, but I think I will probably have to face facts and fine-tune some pants patterns.
 
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I was pretty stoked to find this item at the store recently.  Gluten-free chicken noodle soup!  What?!  Noodles?!  That I can eat?!  In a convenient can?!

Wait, what is that saying?  Oh yeah.  If it seems too good to be true, it probably is.

Notice anything missing from this picture?  Someone was apparently sleeping at the noodle switch.  There was not a single "whole grain brown rice rotini" noodle in the entire can! 

Faster than you can nuke soup, I fired off an email to the company, complete with photos.  They gave me double my money back at the store, per their policy, which was sort of beside the point, but okay, fine.  Interestingly enough, there were no more cans on the shelf when I went back to the store, which I hope was indicative of a product recall, not more soon-to-be-disappointed soup eaters.

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Let's have some happy talk, shall we?  Have you been watching "Finding Your Roots" on PBS this fall?  Love that show.

Last week's episode included an exploration of actress Tina Fey's ancestry, which revealed that her several times great-grandfather was John Hewson, an important quilt textile maker during the time of the American Revolution!  How cool is that?

Link to Article on Hewson in Folk Art Magazine (p. 61-71)

In her inimitable way, Tina admitted she tried to make a quilt once, but apparently "didn't get the quilt gene."  You can watch the entire episode online HERE.

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I eeked out a log cabin mug rug this week.  Still playing with the corduroy and flannel scraps on the cutting table, but I'm about done with them now.

My sewing mojo seems to be in a state of semi-hibernation.  I'm trying to be gentle with it and go with the flow, or lack thereof as the case may be.  I'm sure it'll wake up in due time.

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What would a random post be without some music to play us out? I found so many interesting options this week, including:

• a couple of interesting covers
• a two-guy band, Royal Blood, a bassist and drummer who can rock it out
• new music from Counting Crows
• or my personal favorite (below), from the soundtrack of the movie Chef, which I give two thumbs up, the movie and the music!