out and about NYC

Park Avenue Snow Woman....
You wouldn't expect Park Avenue to have a frosty corn cob pipe,
looking snowman would you?

Friday night, a walk to dinner in Times Square...
Seems there should be a batman signal in the sky...


Visiting my hubby at work...
Seeing the new works by James Rosenquist

And lastly, snowmen, our style...
We go to our roof to play in the untouched snow...
It's so quiet and lovely up there... and what a view!

lessons for all

While B is hanging out in my studio making her homework project for Prairie days...

I threw a few strips on the wall to play...

Her project was more fun to watch growing....

Her theme was Pioneers, I shown her examples of folk art, and quilts made in the 1800's, and she decided a quilt was a good way to make her project...

So, hmm, how does one make this project easy enough for her to manage on her own?

WONDER UNDER, charm squares and yarn... to the rescue!

She cut out her shapes, and with wonder under, ironed everything into place...
very little sewing... except for back ground, and binding...

Half way through the project she realized it was supposed to be in 3D... so we had a lesson from a pack of pre-cut charm squares and how to draw a cube..., a few seams, easy peasey,
a 3D house now appears...

She has already completed one quilt on her own, and has started her second,
(click here & here)
so that was not a problem... She sewn the squares together making the house like a cube to stick off the face of the quilt... (enough to make kathy york proud! have you seen this?)

When she made her first quilt, she loved machine quilting it... But this time I taught her how to tie a quilt. She got creative on the thread choices to make some plants growing in the field

And constructed home furnishings for inside the house...

She enjoyed sewing on the binding, of all things... she thought folding the corners was like origami... I can't tell you how confusing I thought bindings were the first few times I did them, but she had no problem...
It's funny, the things I find the hardest in sewing,
like machine quilting and bindings are not difficult for kids to learn.
Sewing a straight line... keeping the fabric smooth while sewing, is much harder...

But I have to say,
She did a pretty darn good job!

Also, thank you to my mother, she called while B was pushing the needle through the fabric to make the ties... she couldn't get the needle through, and mother said, give her a pliers to pull it through... and so I did... and it worked!

I Probably would not have thought of that.

Thanks Ma!


Now just to get B to finish the circus quilt...
And,
Does anyone know any good books on weaving?
She LOVES to weave... and I need to find more info for her, she wants to do bigger projects...

And thank you to Nicole and Janet for these
very sweet houses! I just love how these are all turning out!

Wanna help too?
Block gather, click here>

Blocks will be gathered til April 30th...
so keep them coming...

thanks!

Creativity

"Creativity shows its colors serendipitously.
You never know when it's going to arise
or what will awaken the wonderful beast."

Ken Vinton art teacher and author

When does creativity hit?

only when your playing?
or

When you are staring off into space
watching the snowflakes come down?



in dreams?

(Thank you Nellie, Shelly, Penny, Ros!!)

in the shower?

in the car?


House Block gather


Out of the blue?

Let your mind wander today...

(if your in the north east,
really,
what else can you do today in a snowstorm?



ha!

T, P and M

Using today, a snowy, wet, confusing day
as inspiration....

Texture, Pattern, and Movement

Play day number two.



How can you include texture



pattern,

and movement?

****

Pattern you can practically feel,

texture that confuses,

or movement that stops you dead center.

These thoughts crowd my brain today...


Time for another play day...

Perhaps with Layers?
Quilting?
Embellishments?

Soft color?

Loud color?

What if you throw it all into the pot?

Take a chance.

Explore.

create.

MAKE ANYTHING.


And perhaps stay in doors like Erin is in her block
for the BASICS home gather!
thanks Erin!

the power of play

Thoughts for today....

PLAY

Play , explore, throw caution to the wind....

Brings Spontaneity, Inspiration, and the flow of creativity....

Push the limits,

try something new,

Discover!



encourage outside of the box thinking...

Find out who you are creatively,

heal,

grow,



Fail,

Triumph,



Create.

Be happy.

PLAY.

Random acts

I've been working on two particular quilts for the last 2 weeks, trying to get them done by Monday.... So Today I thought, goody! I'll get a whole lot done today...
Well... I was jones-ing to just play in my scraps... and do something that I don't have to think so hard about....
It's nothing fancy, but sometimes you need to just doodle...
Whether it's Drawing doodling, machine quilting doodling or
playing with scraps doodling...

So I did a little of everything...

Remember when I did the 3 MINUTE CHALLENGE?
Just like when you take an art class, you WARM UP with some 30 second drawings...
1 minute Gesture drawing,
The same aspect can be done to loosen your creative juices...
That's what this did for me today...

Go ahead, I give you permission to PLAY in your scraps today!
;-)

Ran down to get my mail and Look what was in my mailbox!

Random acts of kindness, does it get any better?
Thank you Brenda, you made my whole day!

HOUSE GATHER: Darlene sent in two cat houses! I love the littlest guy on the right...
Don't they all look good together?? Keep 'em coming! (click here) we need many many more.

DONE!! It's washed and drying on my floor as we speak! (below)
One quilt left to finish by monday...
You have no idea how hard it is for me to work, two weeks, on the same project...
I have three other ideas in my head that are screaming to get out...
and two BIG projects I need to tackle asap...

But for today. I'm thrilled to have the waverunner #1 complete!

And, the most useful bit of info I have been given lately...

Even though I've been sewing for years, sometimes the obvious isn't so obvious...

Use a self threading needle when you need to bury your Start & Stop quilting threads...

And the little leather finger pads, work a million times better than a thimble for me!

Ok that's two things...

Got any other useful tips to share with everyone?

Values

Many people have asked about Values when choosing fabrics...
here's 2 good tricks if you feel you don't see the difference in values of fabrics...

either:

take a photo of your fabrics, and turn them into black and white images on your computer,

or you can buy a red template viewer...
sneak peak viewer
Looking through the red you can see better if you have dark, medium and light values
(great to take along to the quilt shop when your choosing fabrics...)

A good way to see if you have good overall color...


I just got the binding added to the first waverunner... my fingers are worn out from hand quilting through an already densely machine quilted quilt... But it was worth it...
Hoping to stitch than binding down tonight...

I started machine quilting on that rocking chair quilt, (feels like grandma's house) ... then of course I fell back on hand quilting... I just prefer the look.. especially on big blocks that need some definition... my fingers are not getting a break this week... I bought some of those little stick on pads for your finger but I haven't tried them yet... guess that would be a good idea!

ADDITION: Kia is in the other picture above with me sewing.. Jenny Egg is there too(by my upper hand), but since Kia was getting all the blog love I had to add this picture of Jenny Egg sun bathing... She looks so goofy with her hair cut...

I've gotten my mother back into sewing! She's taking classes at Cottage quilts, and her teacher, Lynn, very kindly sent these along for me to make into charity quilts.
They were blocks that she had made in her teaching classes...
They should be fun to put together into something!

I love the bow tie block... a favorite out of the whole bunch!
Thank you Lynn!
They will be put to good use!



I snapped this last weekend, as we were driving to another Chinese New Year party ...

The new Museum in the Bowery, NYC...

I don't know if the always have this sign up, but I like the sentiment...
click image to see larger!

And lastly, two blocks from Mary on the left (love the patchwork fabric in there)
and two from Marianne on the right.
Marianne also included the little baby quilt below! AWESOME! Thanks Ladies!

BUMBLE BEANS BASICS HOME GATHER BLOCK TUTORIAL .CLICK HERE
collecting blocks through April...