Librarians love us

At the risk of ticking off relatives who can’t stand the jumping around, and everyone else as I do this before actual work, here’s the Emma library story.

We were at the library twice this week. They started the summer reading club and we had arrived just after everyone else in charge of that had gone on their lunch hour. The meeting was the next day, so we could sign up then.

As a side note, Meaghan & I hadn’t realized it was lunchtime, and joked that as long as Ron (at home) had bread and peanut butter, he wouldn’t starve. When we got back home, Ron was just finishing up his peanut butter on toast.

Anyway! They had a book sale. I filled two boxes full of romance novels, not even looking at most of them, just going for particular covers. They color-code certain lines, so I grab the ones I know I like. That’s how I got this:

Funny enough, but it would have been even funnier (and serve me right) if I had read it already. I lugged home two boxes and gave them $13. Meaghan didn’t find anything. I also checked out a couple quilt books.

Next day, we hustled there bright and early (for us), got there just in the nick of time. Boy, they start on the dot for story time… anyway, it was a Canada Day theme as it was Tuesday before Canada Day. After the story, and the singing (that’s when Meaghan escaped upstairs), the library helpers asked all the kids stuffed in the basement what they liked best about living in Canada. Some answers were:

“my sisters lives here”

“it’s green”

“it’s big”

“it’s nice”

And then she called on Emma in the middle of the crowd. In a clear voice, with perfect enunciation, she volunteered her answer.

“Because it’s better than the United States!”

And beamed.*

I slid just a little further back into the alcove nearest me and watched all the parents giggle and cover their semi-shocked open mouths. Then we had the chaos of craft time and nobody pulled me aside for anything. We made a toilet paper roll beaver, and had 12 pairs of scissors to share with something like 57 children.

Then I got Emma all signed up for the club where she promised to read thirty whole books all by herself, by August 12th. They are going to let us come back for next week’s meeting too.

* the beaming was because she Followed The Rules and was Being Quiet, not shouting her answers and also raising her hand at the appropriate time. “Wasn’t I quiet when she said to be quiet Mommy? Didn’t I do good at raising my hand?” “Yeah honey, you did great.”

Out of order

Look at that! The storyline here is becoming all out of order, episodes are mixed up, network negotiations are at a standstill, and I think there’s a writer’s strike.

Oh wait, it’s just me and my blog.

But what’s a gal to do? An Upcoming Features, that’s what.

Spreading Grampy Around - our lovable family all gets together with the Toronto branch and heads out on a day trip where we go out to dinner, then try to covertly spread ashes in the ocean. Bonus scene: we reveal why we don’t give Addison crayons.

Up at the movies - Mom and the girls go see Pixar’s latest tearjerker, UP! We sit behind the paper’s movie critic, who spends a good twenty minutes talking to Emma about movies.

Loving the Library - a library book sale, the summer reading club, and how Emma answered the question “What do you like best about living in Canada?” The answer left other parents in the room shocked while Mom hid.

Canada Day - My mom thought I was kidding when I said she could be in the parade. I wasn’t. How long did I do face painting for this year? After that, we hit a flea market that was just wrapping up and they didn’t want to take anything back home. What on earth did we find?

Also, tune in for the spin-off: Sarah, the college years.

Quilty Fabricy bits

Seems weird to be right into quilting when the weather is getting increasingly hot out there. But I can hide in the living room, the Cave we call it, where it is still cool and blissfully dark.

Oh, but I need a light for stitching.

This quilt I kept having endless issues with. In an effort to use up some scraps, they were far too short for any speed strip piecing techniques. I would up spending more time fiddling with strips and ripping out seams than I did putting blocks together. I forged through until I got 16 blocks, then I stopped. It’s lap sized or wall hanging sized. It still needs a border, and then quilting. Not sure how I’m going to quilt it yet, or even what color thread. Then I think I may sell it.

I am quilting my daughter’s quilt, on my mother’s quilt frame, with my grandmother’s tools. I have decided that while I like speed piecing techniques, I adore old-fashioned patterns and quilting. I like some machine quilting as long as it’s on a small machine. I don’t like long-arm computerized machine quilting. It makes the quilt look store bought, and then I think what was the point in that?

And I am cursing myself over Sarah’s quilt. When I pieced it together, I had a new serger and sewed many of the strips together with that. then decided to hand-quilt it. If you don’t just go “ow” I’ll tell you why: serged seams are bulky and stiff. My stitches mostly skip them entirely. And there is a lot, as I also pieced the back. Yes, I have learned a ton of stuff since then.

There’s two stacks of fabric waiting to be cut for quilt tops. One, the old soft florals for Ron & I, another, reds and yellows with white. Can’t wait to see it. I keep swapping out fabric until I am satisfied, and I have an idea for the block layout, but I’m not sure I can pull it off without overthinking, and I don’t want to mess it up either.

It has to be enjoyable for me, this piecing together of fabric and pattern and color and shape, so they all work as a whole. I see it in my head, this quilt. The hard part is getting it out.

Not sure if I want to hand-quilt a third quilt, especially a big one. But either of my machines are to cranky to machine quilt with. My mom will be loaning me hers to try, as an instructor told her it would do machine quilting quite well. If it does, and I get the hang of it, I’m sure I will be doing all mine and mom’s too.

tally:
- one quilt on the frame (Sarah’s blues and pinks)
- 3 finished tops needing to be sandwiched and basted, then quilted (blues, baby and navy/yellow)
- 3 tops in process (purple pinwheels with Nanny’s dress, Amish sunshine & shadow, rainbow stripes)
- 3 stacks of fabric waiting to be cut (faded florals, red/yellow/white disappearing 9 patch, green florals for triple Irish chain)

Oh wow, that’s ten. I’ve got it bad. Right now, I’m mostly trying to use up the stash, and picking out fabric combinations and trying to be inspired.

Minor tweaks

Over the weekend, I saw a LOT of family. (more in the next entry) Some of them complained - and rightly so - about the lack of latest Flickr photos in a prominent, above-the-fold area.

Actually, it was more like “Where the heck did your pictures go? Sheesh, bring ‘em back will ya?”

So I’ve tweaked the header just for you. I need to tweak it further, as I’ve never liked how the thumbnails link to just a small picture. I want it to go right to the Flickr page.

EDIT: I updated the plugin, so now it does that! So click on any pics above.

Anyway, we had a busy weekend. You can look at the pictures with captions and comments over here.

May I always have time to quilt

Meaghan sorted my fabric for me.

It’s not all my fabric: this pile is just the large pieces of quilting cottons, the ones I have plans for or need to be inspired by, or have to look at to check against another piece. The “in use” pile.

Not to be confused with the container of just flannel, the large bin of scraps which may have large forgotten bits in it, and the other large container of knits and non-quilting type fabric. Oh, and the bin with in-progress projects that had to be put away for a while until I feel like working on them again.

Meaghan’s making a quilt too.

Hers is six-inch squares, finally making use of a stash I got through a long-ago swap. All greens and purples, we hunted and tore and cut our way through my entire stash of fabric so she had as many different pieces as possible.

There is a dearth of some colors in my stash. You can see from the top photo - hardly any reds, minimum orange, barely any yellow. But a riot of pinks a healthy amount of greens and look at all that blue. I blame my mom for that, as she frequently hands over fabric.

It’s funny, I look at the pile and see the quilts I *want* to make; an Amish sunshine and shadow, maybe one really bright and one more subdued. I think I have enough for that. Realizing I have enough florals to make another quilt exactly like the one I have planned for Ron and myself. Queen-sized, old-fashioned florals in soft colors. I am going to have to pay for decent batting on that, as I want a certain look to it after I’m done quilting it. Or the long piece of white that reminds me of the finished spinning spools blocks tucked in a container. The large stack of blue and while fabrics inspire me to do an entire quilt in nothing but blue and white prints. And I don’t even like blue much, but this I know will be gorgeous. It makes me want to do more two-toned quilts, maybe a yellow and white floral with white. Or better yet, my mind wanders, a two-tone quilt in just solids, preferably a red or yellow with white, the block choice showing off something special - a curve, or a pleated part perhaps. Drunkard’s Path or Ohio Star.

I love piecing the tops, whipping them up quickly. The quilting part I can do, it just seems to never get set up. I took my .. er, I mean my mom’s quilt frame down to Rose’s house. Rose, you know Rose. Rose said she’s be happy to quilt for me, she loves it. One of the few things she can still do. She’s young at heart, can’t get out much and poorer than the church mouse. But her eyes lit up as I set up the frame in front of her favorite chair, made sure she had some quilting thread and promised to bring the needles too. “Well would ya lookit that!” she keeps telling her husband. I brought her a couple tupperware containers, a couple glasses to replace the last of her that broke when her hand shook so bad.

The phone rang. It was her husband, tired and worn. “I hate to tell you this, but you’ll have to come pick up your stuff and take it back. Rose had another mini-stroke, so she won’t be able to quilt.”

Yes, she’s fine now, yes she’s home resting comfortably.

I think when I bring the frame and quilt back I’ll set it up somewhere instead of packing it away again.

More weekend stuff.

I uploaded a bunch of pictures to my flickr. I seem to do them in batches.

And I’m annoyed at ebay buyers. I sold a small pile of stuff, answered a HECK of a lot of questions about shipping (yes, I’ll combine) and then after they won, I sent combined shipping charges, no payment. I sent a reminder. No payment.

If it was one person, that would make sense, but out of 4 buyers, two have neglected to pay after a week. Both for multiple items. One won two auctions, the other won 4.

I may have to threaten them with neutral or even negative feedback.

But! I sold an item on etsy! I was pretty happy ’bout that.