Happy Spring

This first day of spring here in the Northwest is  pretty typical March.  Early this morning it was dark and stormy.  Then it was beautiful and sunny.  Then it got cloudy again and now it's sunny, with clouds racing by.  It's been blowing like 60 (as my grandmother used to say) the whole time.  When these pictures were taken, there was a storm blowing off to the east,

mostly clear skies overhead

and a new little storm coming in from the west.

Don't like the weather now?  Just wait 10 minutes and it'll be all different.

For me, spring isn't complete without the smell of daphne.  Our old one didn't make it through a cold snap a couple of years ago, so we bought a new one last weekend. That spicy, sweet aroma  just shouts "spring" to me and I run out and sniff it several times a day.

I belong to a small quilt group called "Quilters on the Edge."  Our latest project was portraits of our members.  We each had a set of black and white 8X10 photos of each of the seven of us.  We each made two blocks of each person, one to keep for our quilt and one to give back to the person whose picture it was.  Does that make sense?  We each ended up with a set of portraits of all the members that we made and a set of portraits of ourselves made by each of the other members.

It turns out that seven blocks creates a challenge for putting the quilt together.  I haven't seen any of the other quilts yet so I'm not sure how others solved the problem.  I enlarged our logo and added a woman falling off the edge.  She might be me.

Each member supplied the others with a background fabric and off we went.  My portraits are obviously very simple.  It's amazing what one can do with just three or four fabrics for each face and some paint for eyes.  I learned a lot with each face.  I started with mine - upper left corner.

The small group challenges all of us, which was the point, but has also formed a bond of friendship that's an added bonus.  Quilter girl friends are such a blessing.

Judy, second row, left, created the original logo which I changed up a bit to fit the space.

We'll be showing all our quilts at the Metropolitan Patchwork Society Show on April 26 & 27.  For more info on that, look at the Metropolitan Patchwork Society Facebook page.  Barb and I will be there as vendors with our quilt patterns and quilt rack pattern.    

Which brings me to the MOBquilts website.  The new site is up, but still has a few issues.  I will be getting help to deal with them and let you know when it's fixed.

Today would be a great day to fly a kite and if I had one, I'd probably give it a shot.  When I was a kid, back in the Jurassic days, they magically appeared in little neighborhood markets about now.  I don't know where I'd even look this side of ToysRUs.  Think I'll just quilt and listen to the wind howling around the house.

Happy Spring!

Candy













 

Reviving a Broken Resolution

There once was a resolution to blog more.  And it went down the drain in record time.  Things just kind of got busy, you know?  Now it's March and the days are longer and there's a bit more sun and my spring energy is back.  I got to get out of town a couple of times in February which was worth dealing with the back-up of house and quilting when I got home.  

The first trip was skiing in Deer Valley, UT.  This one was taken in the evening when the sun was setting.  The snow, the weather and the company were all great.

Last weekend we spent on the coast outside Jacksonville, FL.  Imagine two days of mostly sunshine, palm trees and gentle breezes and one day of tornado watches.  I read, I lounged, I didn't take pictures.  Everyone needs a weekend like that once in a while.

Yesterday, Barb and I went to the Rose City Yarn Crawl.  We hit 13 stores in 8 hours.  I knit on occasion; Barb is much more fanatic.  Like quilt stores, each shop has its own charm and personality. There were so many textures and colors and ideas and friendly, helpful people. Also, one shop had some gorgeous felted art that just blew me away.   Barb is visiting 5 more today to qualify for the grand prize.  I don't know about her but I started asking if it was time for bed about 5 minutes after dinner.  I only bought one skein of yarn for a scarf, but I fondled a lot of yarn. Got some really cool ideas.

And finally, I finished a quilt that I will be teaching at Let's Quilt in the summer. (Let's Quilt moved from Oregon City to West Linn in January.  It's much closer to my house and I'm so excited.)  When I finish writing the pattern, it will be available on the www.mobquilts.com website.  

It's called, "In Honor of Blue Star Mothers."  It's more traditional than my usual, but I was in the mood for it.  As always, I learned a couple of things while making this.  And I can always use another patriotic quilt.  

Next time:  Why I love my small quilt group.  

Enjoy spring! 

Candy