Heavy Equipment

What's that old old Beatles' song that starts out "I shoulda known better?"

Greetings from my first night at Asilomar. My sister snores like nothing you've ever heard before! (Heavy equipment...) She brought me earplugs, but they really don't help. I knew about this because we did a road trip to Sisters, Oregon a few years ago. So why, why, why?

Could someone explain earplugs to me?

In other news, there's a mountain lion here, and vicious raccoons, so you're not supposed to walk around by yourself here, and especially not at night.

Maybe some quilty content tomorrow if I ever get to sleep. - feel sorry for the people in the next room (and the ones upstairs, and the ones down the hall...)
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

I'm still here, and I have a design wall...

It's been a while but I've been plugging away at things! Saturday was the Faith Fancher Breast Cancer walk at Lake Merritt. Faith was a news anchor on one of the local stations and she lost a long and fairly public battle with breast cancer a few years ago. A group of her friends and colleagues formed a non-profit called "Friends of Faith" to raise money for medical services for women without other options -- this was the fifth annual walk and I've done four of them. Lake Merritt is a little more than 3 miles around and it's quite pretty! Near the beginning of the walk I had to stop and snap a picture of these white pelicans; I don't usually see them in the lake.
The walk always starts with a procession of women on Harleys...I finished my 2-at-a-time socks last night. Actually, I switched to one-at-a-time after the heels were done. Not at all happy with the wierd way the yarn pooled up the legs! (It's Aussi Sock in the Spanish Fiesta colorway)
And... what's on my wall? First is a little quilt top from a Schnibbles pattern called "Scratch"; I keep hoping to use up my relatively small stash of novelty fabrics, but somehow they never seem to diminish! I spent some time on Sunday cutting strips for three more scrappy baby quilts but again, it didn't seem to make much difference on the shelf.
These are some blocks I made last year with one of my quilt groups. We challenged each other to use neutrals but I decided to throw in a little bit of the teal. Then last week I saw the perfect border fabric while surfing online -- it's from Windham's "all that jazz" line. I think I might add a little sizzle strip between the neutrals and the border... what do you think?
and finally -- this is a little bit of fun from a couple of years ago when my seester was visiting and gave us a lesson in creating embellished fabric.
I hung it back up on the wall because a) she's arriving from Tasmania tomorrow and b) this weekend we're heading off to Empty Spools seminars at Asilomar where I will take a 5-day class with Rosemary Eichorn on collage and embellishment! I'm taking my camera and will try to remember to use it.

charity first...

A while ago I posted a picture of this little quilt before it was quite finished -- it has now been sent off to Priority: Alzheimers, and will appear one of these days on the auction or in Houston.

I made another one to try out a method of making these little "salt box" triangle & square combinations and it's been mailed off, too. Both of these measure about 8" x 10".
And, here's another project for those of you with "excess stash syndrome" and $12 to spend: it's called Iraqi Bundles of Love and it's sponsored by Kristin LaFlamme's husband who is stationed in Iraq. Find a large flat-rate priority mailing box, and some ribbon.
Place a large-ish piece of fabric on top of the ribbon -- this will act like wrapping paper. Fill the box with fabric, thread, and other sewing stuff (or yarn),
and then wrap it all up and tie with the ribbons.
It costs $11.95 to mail to Art's APO address. He and his group will distribute these bundles to local women who definitely aren't receiving these supplies from anyone else! My bundle was mailed off yesterday...

why am I here?

I'm having one of those days / weeks / months of just totally not wanting to be at work... doodling quilt designs on my notepad... making lists of things I want or need to do at home... sneaking in the occasional sudoku game online.   Help! Do you get into these moods, and how do you get yourself out of them?

 

A friend just invited me to go to a Jackson Browne concert with her next week. I love Jackson Browne and I haven't seen him for about 20 years. I went and checked out his website and YIKES! how did he get to be 60 years old?  Last time I saw him, the drummer didn't have a drumset, for some reason,  so he was using a series of cardboard boxes in different sizes instead.

 

This week: catch up on the ATCs I need to make (I have several designs on my notepad!) and gear up to finish quilting the big pink house.

 

Julie

 

Testing Testing

I traded up for the new blackberry tour today -- my 2 years were up and I got a good deal, AND it has a camera! So I'm just testing to see what happens when I send a photo to the ol' blog via email...
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

edited to add: I guess I should have rotated the photo before attaching it! This is Al working on a crazy little project involving a mascot for his sailboat -- Bandicoot. Don't ask why he's doing this in the living room...

knitty stuff

Judy is having a sock yarn giveaway, and the deal is that I need to show what I'm working on now -- so these are my 2-at-a-time socks so far. I'm not loving the technique, and I'm not loving the yarn... but I will persevere! I like the way the striping looks at the tips of the toes -- kind of random -- but I don't like how regular it gets after that. Ah well. It's only socks, right?

I'll show another picture of the Shakespeare in the Park quilt once the binding is on, but first you have to see the wonderful swirls that Darcie quilted for me... I might have to redcorate a bit to show this off!
And, I'm trying to catch up on the Friday Block Party, so here are a couple of the newest blocks for your viewing pleasure!

Now, back to the knitting -- I need to get another 20 rows done before my class tomorrow!

note to May...

May left a comment asking where the rose pattern came from that I used in the center of my round robin -- I bought the pattern on etsy.com -- it's called "Rosie's Rose"

May -- and others -- if you have your blogger profile set to "no email" then it makes it harder for people to reply to your comments! In fact I wasn't even able to see your profile at all...