Quilt Festival Frenzy

I am home after three days devoted to quilts, viewing, making, and otherwise being immersed in, at PIQF in Santa Clara. One of the great things for me about this is that it takes place about 20 minutes from my parents' house. So, I stay with them and then get to enjoy the show for a few days. PIQF is so huge, with such great things to see, that I'd hate to try to do it in one day. As it is, I get overwhelmed seeing this many amazing quilts in one place.

There were scads of gorgeous quilts. I quickly became overwhelmed and didn't take as many pictures as I probably should have. Plus there were wonderful quilts that just always had people crowded around them, so I never did get a clear shot.

Here is one of the ones I consider among my most favorites:



I find that I am drawn to different sorts of quilts each year. I admire, but tend not to look at closely or take pictures of of the traditional or big applique quilts. Baltimore Album quilts leave me cold, although I am awed by the time and patience that making one displays. I'm also, at present, sick and tired of the heavy surface design stuff...you know, things stamped and printed and layered with fabric bits and organza on top of that and then layered more with stitching and different thread work and beads and other stuff attached. I know those techniques are probably fun to do and the look is trendy right now, but I find most of those very jumbly and not very interesting. There was a fair amount of that sort of work this show, and I didn't see any one piece that struck me really terrific. (But that's just me, and hey, I know my quilts aren't fine art either.)

By the way, I also noticed that heavy, heavy quilting is IN. I can't believe how many quilts I saw that were so heavily quilted that you noticed the quilting before you noticed the quilt itself. It made me admire all the more the quilts that used the threadwork and quilting to compliment but not overwhelm the quilt content. Anyway. I don't mean to sound nit-picky. There were lots and lots of gorgeous quilts.

This time, I just wandered around and looked at the stuff that caught my eye for whatever reason. Mostly, the factor that pulls me in is color. That, more than technique or content, is usually what gets my attention and causes me to look more closely. I did find myself drawn to the animal quilts, for some reason...Not for realistic portrayals of animals...This dog one was so colorful and full of detail (not to mention amazing applique) that it warranted a lot of close looking.



This dog quilt also captured my attention. I love how it is about the dog, but it is so colorful and has so much to look at in it. Very whimsical. I recall that it was made for a "blue" challenge...and I suspect that this dog was/is either a blue heeler breed or named Blue. (You can tell I pay way more attention to the quilt than the information on the card.)



Here are more favorites, for no other reason than I found them exceptional. I'm afraid that I didn't notice who made them, so my apologies. I guess being happily overwhelmed by the artistry of the quilt is my excuse.







Oh! Look at this! A group of quilt artists took a picture of Paris, cut it into strips, and made this panel of strips. Apparently there was one fabric that each artist had to use. My friends and I were guessing that it was one of the terra cotta colored bits which most of them used somewhere in the bridge stonework. I was especially amazed at this, as most of these group projects that I've seen turn out ugly and disjointed looking. I thought this was surprisingly cohesive.



I took this picture for Caroline. I will never make this sort of horse quilt, but I can admire it.



For some reason, I found myself noticing interesting and unusual borders. This was a pretty, but not wildly interesting, broderie perse type quilt. But I love this border, with the black buttonhole stitching highlighting the pieced edges.



Another intesting quilt and border treatment. You can just tell that this is a Japanese quilt, can't you? The detail was really amazing.



I also was interested in the border treatment on this. I thought this edge treatment really made a good (but not great) quilt into something much more interesting.



One of the special exhibits was a collection of small quilts (all about 18 or 20" square) by a group of artists from New York State. There were lots of interesting small works in that assortment and I spent a long time enjoying them. Here's one of my favorites. I loved how these narrow strings (each maybe 1/4 inch wide or less) made such great texture.



I have much more to say about PIQF, but of course I can't close this first entry without showing you how my first day ended: with margaritas with Melody Johnson and Gerrie Congdon at El Torito. After a long day of walking around on concrete floors (resulting in "Disneyland Feet" as my family refers to that tired leg/sore feet feeling), nothing is as reviving as a comfy booth, laughter with friends, and of course a large margarita on the rocks!



Our waiter kindly took this shot (notice how Melody is gazing at him with interest?). I'm still figuring out how to smile in braces...it just doesn't feel normal yet. But it was a very enjoyable dinner!



Oh, I have to add one more thing. I walked through the show on Thursday and Friday. Starting Saturday, the convention center was hosting other activities besides the quilt show. In the halls adjacent to the quilt show area was the "Bay Area UFO Convention." I'm not kidding! It was totally entertaining to sit (to enjoy a rejuvenating cup of coffee and rest the Disneyland Feet) and watch the folks coming in and going out. I actually saw one very serious fellow with a rather large wad of aluminum foil on his head. Seriously, I did.

I bet that the thought of a quilt convention was just as odd to them as the UFO convention was to me.

Can't you just see THAT as a quilt? "Quilt and UFO Convention"?

Quilty Travels

Ooh! I have earned this week, let me tell you!

I am leaving momentarily to drive down to Santa Clara, to spend 3 days at PIQF. I'll view amazing quilts, shop a little teeny bit (ahem), visit with friends, see Miss Melody, take a workshop with Robbi Ecklow, and have a grand time.

Then, I dash home, spend a day with husband and child and dog, then turn around and head off to Bishop's Ranch for a quilting retreat with a wonderful group of women.

So, basically, I have a vacation from real life and responsibilities for almost a whole week.

I shall return looking well rested and smiling!

Happy quilting!

I interrupt this blog....

... to make an important announcement. I've been reading blogs on the Artful Quilter's Web Ring, and I just have to say:

I LOVE YOU GUYS!

(No, I'm not drunk. Okay, I'm mildly nauseated from all the obnoxious legal pleadings I've been reading lately... but still, I'm overcome with the urge to hug my computer monitor because of you all.)

Truly, this is an amazing group of artists and women. Did you realize that the ring has 105 members now?

I'm absolutely blown away by the creativity and diversity of the women in this ring. If you hop through the ring, you can visit world-famous quilt artists and teachers. You can see work that you KNOW will be big, prize-winning work one day, while it's actually in the process of being made. You can see people making quilts for their kids and their friends and people they don't even know. You can watch as quilt artists explore still life art, color, design. You can get great inspiration, and you can receive feedback and encouragement on your own work.

And, even beyond the quilts and art shown on these blogs, you can glimpse the lives of 105 different and delightful women, from all over the U.S., the U.K., Scotland, Australia... You can see (or be linked to) virtually every quiz on the internet to find out what wine you are, what old movie you are, what movie star you are, what rock band you are, etc. (Ahem! I'm not naming names here but you quiz-linkers know who you are...and we love you for it!)

I love having you all appear on my screen and I thank you for everything you share with me through your blog!

Halloween Housez

For those of you who asked about how to make something like my little Halloween neighborhood quilt, here's the pattern that I used in making mine. It's by Jan Mullen, of Stargazey Designs.



You can purchase it, and others by Jan Mullen, here or here. I love her crooked, free-form style, and they're really fun to make.

Why lawyers don't like lawyers

I'm a lawyer myself, as I've mentioned before. But I've spent the last several days immersed in a case which is reminding me why I was so eager to get away from full-time courtroom litigation. It's not the clients (although they can be difficult). It's not the judges, although there's nothing more annoying than finding a judge who will do whatever he can to avoid making a decision. It's not the courtroom drama -- heck, that's a big part of the fun. Frankly, it's the lawyers.

Yep. I always said that practicing law would be great if you could choose your opposing counsel. Which you can't.

At present, I do the written work for my good friend and "boss" Bob back in New Hampshire. I'm a member of the NH bar, where I practiced "in person" for many years. Now, I write pleadings and briefs and deal with documents ... whatever I can do from this far away, at my computer, at any time of the day. It's actually a very nice arrangement, and usually it means I spend my work time doing the legal work I like best: the intellectual legal analysis in briefs and memoranda.

But these days, I'm spending my time writing about ridiculous skirmishes over discovery, which is the process by which lawyers exchange information about a case to prepare for trial. This ought to be a relatively straight-forward contract case, involving some machinery that my client wanted to buy and the other side wanted to make and sell.

But in the hands of this other lawyer -- known affectionately here as "The JERK" -- it has deteriorated into a procedural nit-picking contest. Here's an example of the sort of thing I've had to waste my SUNDAY (ahem! a day of rest! fun with family! quilting!) dealing with:

We sent them "requests for admissions." That's a document where you make a bunch of statements and the other side is required to either admit they're true or deny them. You can use them in all sorts of useful ways at trial. Anyway, here's a typical request for admission:

"Smith invited Jones to bid for the job of manufacuring a prototype machine."

And here's a typical answer from the JERK: "Smith objects to this request as worded, in that Smith is not sure what is meant by the terms "invited," "bid," or "job."

AARRRGH. Makes me wanna whack the guy upside the head with a very thick dictionary. I had a bit of entertainment imagining replies:

"Your objection to Request #2 is specious. (Feel free to look that word up in a dictionary. You DO know what a dictionary is, don't you?)"

or

"Here are the definitions of invite, bid, and job.I am happy to add three new words to your vocabulary. Knowledge is power, you know. Now, please respond to the request."

or

"How did you get beyond 4th grade, with such a limited vocabulary? Was your law degree issued by an accredited institution?"

Sigh. I'd really rather be quilting. Or cleaning my sewing area. Or cleaning the toilet, even. Feel free to post your suggested response to this jerk in the comments. It'll cheer me up. I have more of this to deal with.

Another UFO Off of the Pile

I love making crazy log cabin "kid quilts." They're fun, a great way to use up scraps, and they make bright, cheerful quilts. I've made a bunch of these for the local charity I support, the Valley of the Moon Children's Center.

On Monday, I was scheduled for my second lesson on my friend Veronica's Gammill Long Arm Quilting Machine. (She has not yet named hers, unlike those odd ladies on the tv commercial who are apparently better friends with their machines than with their human friends.) I'd practiced on a scrap hunk of muslin last time, and decided that this time I'd work on an actual quilt top.

So, I pulled out one of the crazy quilt tops I'd put together last fall. Yep, another one from that same batch of Halloween fabrics. (Funny, how far that pack of Halloween half-yards will stretch--and I've got enough left to make another quilt like this, probably.) Anyway, here it is, completed:



I just did a looping meander all over the quilt. I figured I'd start with something easy and get fancier from there. I apologize for the less-than-sharp pictures, but maybe you can see a bit of the quilting here:



Or, maybe not. Anyway, trust me, it's a looping meander that looks fine. I did get brave enough to write "Boo" a few times in the border, but that was as brave as I got.

This took me probably three hours to do on her machine...You have to bear in mind that changing the bobbin and stopping and starting and burying threads as I go is all new to me, so that probably slowed me way down...Still, I was delighted to have this done in one morning.

My view of the long arm quilting so far? It's a heck of a lot of fun. Threading the machine isn't as hard or tricky as I thought it would be...in fact, it's very much like threading your typical industrial type machine. The loading process isn't a fast one, but then again, neither is the basting process when you're going to quilt on a regular machine. I can see that if you take the time to make sure it's all straight when you put all the layers on the rollers, then all goes smoothly as you quilt sections and roll it up.

Also, it's clear to me that if you've done a fair amount of free-motion quilting, then the long-arm won't be that hard. I think a lot of what people have a hard time with is figuring out how to get an overall continuous line pattern to cover the area uniformly, and how not to get backed into a corner as you're quilting. Those are the same issues you deal with regardless of what machine you're on, so if you've gotten good at that stuff, then the long arm stuff will be easier. Veronica, who had done no free-motion quilting before she got this, said that she found that the hardest part, and she's amazed that it's not hard at all for me. Another one of those practice issues, I believe.

Am I eager to rush out and buy one? No. This is suiting me fine to be able to use one from time to time. I'm not sure if it's a function of Veronica's particular machine or my novice status or what, but I find the machine hard to control when you move it at certain angles, so precision quilting right now wouldn't come out well. But maybe that's a matter of getting a feel for the machine and getting a lot of practice. We'll see. I have another donation quilt I'll take next Monday for my next practice session.

By the way, I was thinking to give this one away. But Caroline has pointed out that the crazy quilt I made for her some years ago is getting very worn and she needs THIS one to snuggle with on the couch. So, it looks like it's staying here.

Boo!

About 2 years ago, just after Halloween, I came across a great sale on Halloween fabrics and bought a bunch.



So, a year ago, I spent some nice quilt-retreat time making a fun Halloween quilt. I used a combination of Gwen Marston's and Jan Mullen's crazy houses, and made a quilt top, which sat in the closet all year. This past week, I decided to get it finished, so here it is. This is small, about 38 x 38 inches.



I had such fun with it, especially the crooked fence. My friend Rita contributed a piece of her wacky witch fabric, which allowed me to add a few cranky witches to the neighborhood.



Here's another.



I did a quick quilting job (so it's not the tidiest) but I experimented with quilting spiderwebs on the border, and I like how it turned out. At least you can tell they're supposed to be spiderwebs!




It feels good to finish something that's been hanging around in the UFO pile.

I think this will live for the season on the dining room table (with a centerpiece cleverly made of a hurricane glass lamp filled with candy canes -- I mean, corns! -- and holding an orange candle)...or maybe on the wall in the family room?

And I thought parenting was hard...

Who knew that baby penguins were so cute?!

I saw March of the Penguins this afternoon. (I couldn't get Caroline and Roger to come with me, so I went alone, party poopers that they are.) What a fascinating movie!

Penguin parenthood makes raising a human child look like a piece of cake. After all, we do it while living indoors, in comfort and warmth, with 3 meals a day. Of course, penguin babies don't talk back...

Goal: Organization

Yesterday was consumed by Caroline's riding lesson and a family gathering at my brother's house to celebrate his wedding. (It was wonderful to see my aunt, uncle and cousins...it'd been too long since we'd been together.)

So, today is a designated tidying and organizing day, with a reward at the end of it.

My goal is to tidy my office, the laundry room, and the hallway. In the hallway leading to Caroline's room (and opposite the door to the laundry room) we have a section of cabinets where linens and other miscellaneous things are stored. I tend to use the counter to fold laundry and put stuff that is on its way out (all those clothes Caroline is rapidly out-growing) and the piles accululate with amazing speed. It's astonishing how much better I feel about life when that area is all clean, so that's my plan.

We'll all head out to see the March of the Penguins this afternoon. I have been wanting to see this, after my friend Pat has raved about it so. You can see the wall quilt she made inspired by this movie here, on Gerrie Congdon's blog. It's been ages since we've had a family movie date.

Incidentally, when we got home last night from the family gathering, Caroline went straight to bed and Roger and I flopped down in front of the tv. Flipping channels, we stumbled across the movie "Sunset Boulevard," just beginning. Although we'd seen the famous scenes before ("I'm ready for my close-up, Mr. DeMille") neither of us had ever seen the whole thing. We sat, entranced, for 90 minutes. I do love old movies and thank goodness for Turner Classic Movies channel, which airs them without commercials.

I get by with a little art with my friends

When I sat down to write a post here this morning, I started in on how irritating my day was yesterday, and how many things went wrong. I wrote a few paragraphs, getting more irritated all over again as I wrote, and then it occurred to me: I wouldn't want to read that. I erased it all and went off to do errands.

Well, I came home after getting some things done and having lunch with friends and I feel much better. And instead, I'll tell you about the good part of yesterday.

In my art quilt group, the Pointless Sisters, we started our workshop with quilt artist Marilyn Felber. I wasn't sure what to expect, really, but I knew several things: She's highly respected by my friend and long-time quilter Janet Shore; some people I know who've taken classes with her rave about her and have produced amazing work in their workshops with her; and in her emails about what she planned to do, she said she would present the sort of master class she always wanted to find but never did.

Well, it was a wonderful afternoon. Marilyn is a calm, very pleasant woman who is great at asking questions, provoking ideas, and generating interesting thoughts. She had us go around the group and talk about why we were in quilting and what we wanted to get out of the workshop, and that was very instructive. Considering that we've been getting together for some time now, I learned stuff about others that I didn't know...It was very interesting to hear what others thought their strengths and weaknesses were as quilt artists. She looked at some work some of us had done, and her comments were kind and thoughtful.

The exercise she had us do was of interest to me not so much for the sewing exercise itself, but for the questions that she raised about the exercise afterwards. Here's what she had us do: We each chose a baggie of scrap fabric from an assortment Marilyn had brought with her. She told us to pick 9 pieces out of the baggie, and then with each of those, sew something to it from our scrap collections. We did that over and over, until we had 9 assembled pieces.

When we gathered together, she asked provocative questions:

Did you like sewing piece by piece, without knowing what the end was going to be? Do you prefer to know before you start what the end result will be?
Was it stressful having someone yell out directions to you while you were working?
Why did you sew the shapes you sewed?
Why did you choose what you picked out of the baggie? Did you choose for color, pattern, etc?
What made you add what you did to each piece? Were you driven by a desire to make symmetrical pieces? Different pieces? Did you pull fabrics at random or aim for something cohesive?

It was, for me, an exercise in noticing what drove me to do what I did. Interestingly, after we all put our pieces on the floor in front of us (we were sitting in a circle), I would have been able to identify who had done which pieces for over half of the groupings, I think.

Also, funnily, almost everyone had the feeling that they had done something "wrong," when one of the key points was that the exercise directions were so vague that there was not any "wrong" way at all. The sense that somehow there were unspoken "rules" we were violating was a very strong one in each of us! That alone was a light-bulb moment for me.

So, now the task -- if we choose to accept it -- is to take those pieces and make something bigger with it. We meet again in a month.

I think this will be a very productive series of workshops!

Random Monday Thoughts

1. Oh boy, today's the day I go to Veronica's house to meet her long arm quilting machine and get my first lesson! I'm bringing a huge hunk of muslin to learn on... For future learning projects, I have a stack of quilt tops made with scraps to be donated to the local children's center. I'd be so happy to finish these off and give them away!

2. Simply Quilts seems to have really good, art-quilty shows on Mondays. I find it interesting that the newest shows are featuring really interesting contemporary quilters and new techniques. Nowadays I don't watch the rest of the week, but I always tune in on Mondays.

3. I can't imagine getting a tattoo. I find them totally unattractive. It makes me feel old and untrendy, but there you have it.

4. I want my bathroom back! We're in the waiting-for-the-tile stage. Last night I would have loved a long soak in our huge bathtub, but no such luck. Sigh.

5. Tomorrow is the first lesson with Marilyn Felber, a Berkeley quilt artist who is going to come and do ongoing workshops with my art quilt group. The first task is to bring scraps and sewing machine. I hauled out my large scrap bin and will just bring the whole thing. Wonder what we'll do?!

6. What's your least favorite word? (Do you watch Inside the Actor's Studio? At the end, interviewer James Lipton always asks guests the same series of questions, to which they reply as if they had no idea he ALWAYS does this and as if they just thought of the answer at that moment.) This is one of the questions, and the same word -- or non-word -- springs to my mind: Irregardless. I HATE when people say that.

7. What to have for dinner? When I was a kid, my mom would ask that, with a tired sigh. I used to think, "What's so hard about that?" But now, I know! It's the relentless need for a decision. I'm trying to use my crockpot more, as I love having dinner made by 10am.

Happy Day

We had an exciting and happy day in our family yesterday. My brother Gregg got married to his girlfriend Kitt. It was the perfect day for an afternoon wedding--warm and sunny. The wedding took place in the backyard of a friend of theirs, on a deck with a lovely view of oak-covered mountains.

The wedding was especially exciting for Caroline, who served as a flower girl. She took her job very seriously:



Here is the wedding in progress:



Gregg and Kitt are very happy, which makes all of us very happy. I love this shot of them, with Gregg being typically silly.



And Caroline, relieved to have her job over with, posed with Uncle Gregg and Auntie Kitt.



Afterwards, we had a wonderful dinner at a restaurant in Tiburon called The Caprice. We dined on fabulous food (caesar salad, grilled salmon, garlic mashed potatoes, sauteed herbed squash) in a room which was right on the SF bay and looked right out on Angel Island. It felt like being on a boat, without the rocking.

Afterwards, we enjoyed champagne and the most amazing chocolate cake (filled with chocolate mousse) that you could imagine.

A grand time was had by all, and we are all wishing the newlyweds great happiness.

Mental Floss

Laura posted a comment asking about a magazine I listed, called "Mental Floss." It's a quirky little magazine with all sorts of information in it: oddball facts presented in a funny but educational way. Here's what the publishers say about it:

"Mental Floss" is built on a simple premise: People love to feel smart. But no one has enough time these days to achieve that admirable goal. That's where mental_floss comes in.
We take the chore out of learning by presenting information in a way that's quick, simple, quirky and fun. By covering everything from black holes to the Dead Sea Scrolls, then drenching our pages in facts and trivia, we've created a magazine that is winning tons of fans and creating buzz across the country and around the world.

It's entertaining, little tidbits of factual stuff (history, science, entertainment, general trivia) presented in a fun way. This month's cover article is "the 20 Most Annoying People." You can find out more about it here.

Fun Surprises

Ooh! Ooh! Two fun things happened today.

First, my friend Lissa called this morning and asked if she could come over with her friend Veronica to see my collection of quilts. Lissa had heard about them from a mutual friend and has been wanting to see them. I said, "How about today?" and they were there within the half hour. We had a fun visit, talking and laughing and looking at quilts. Veronica is a quilter, and Lissa is an energetic, crafty woman who hasn't yet made a quilt but wants to try one after she finishes sewing curtains for her new house and slipcovers for her furniture. Funny, but she doesn't believe it when I tell her that if she can do curtains and slipcovers, she won't have any trouble with quilts.

But the exciting part? Veronica lives right here in my very town, and has a Gammill long arm quilting machine in her garage that she doesn't use as much as she thinks she should. I threw caution to the wind, and asked if a) she'd be willing to teach me, and b) if she'd then rent me time on her machine. She was thrilled with the prospect, and we're on! My first lesson is next monday!

The second fun thing was that my afternoon cleared up unexpectedly, so I decided to pull the fabric for a small new project. It requires autumn colors, and I discovered that I don't have any hand dyed fabric in the brown range. Well, it was such a warm day that I pulled the already-mixed dye out of the outside fridge and set to mixing some miscellaneous browns in small tubs. I can hardly wait to see how they turn out. Results to follow!

Gemma, the now-7-month-old-puppy, was reasonably cooperative. Only once did she pull a piece of fabric out of the water-soak tub to drag it across the lawn!

I Can't Get There From Here

Oh, the things I've meant to accomplish this week. But every time I head in the direction of actually starting one of them, even, something gets in the way. Like...

...this cold that won't seem to go away, and makes me tired all the time

...the need to shop for a dress for Caroline to wear to my brother's wedding THIS SATURDAY and for which we had like 2 weeks' notice

...the various construction guys coming and going unexpectedly from our master bathroom (we still have no shower and a general mess. Today they came at 7:45 AM to whack the rest of the tile off from the shower and surround of the tub, as they weren't able to find the original tile to match the stuff they had to remove originally. You have no idea how conducive to productive and efficient work it is to have the sound of sledge-hammer whacking against tile all morning.

...surprise work projects popping up, so that when I sit down at my computer to work on the one I thought I'd do today, there's an email announcing a new emergency project needing an immediate response so I never did get to start the one I'd planned on finishing.

...the need to help my friend, whose mother-in-law died a day ago, by ferrying her child to an after-school activity and keep her here for dinner (this, the kid who eats ONE brand of mac-and-cheese --and of course it's not the one I buy -- and who will ask to see the milk carton her milk came from to make sure it's the same brand she always has at home)

...the call from school saying they need certain PTO paperwork that should have been done in June--under the former president's reign, btw, but what does it matter as it wasn't done and still needs to be done

I have great quilt ideas in my head that want doing. I'm going to go to bed early tonight so I can get up and maybe actually get something done tomorrow! (After all, what's left to sledge-hammer around here?)

Good news

I received nice news in the mail today. I'll have two quilts at PIQF in October:

"The Beating of a Butterfly's Wing"



and "Koi Pond"



As this is only the second time I've entered a juried show, I'm rather pleased!

Magazines, quilty and otherwise

I was thinking this morning, as I was tidying the bedroom and pulling magazines off of the nightstand, about how much I enjoy reading magazines and whether the assortment of magazines I subscribe to reflects a lot or a little about me. It probably says more than I'd like it to!

So, I thought I'd throw out this question to y'all:

What magazines do you subscribe to, and why? (Not just READ, mind you, but actually pay money to get delivered to you every month?)

Here's what comes to my house:

The New Yorker - I love the insightful commentaries on news, political and legal events (I adore Jeffrey Toobin), I'm amused by the cartoons, and I can't miss Anthony Lane's movie reviews

Quilting Arts -- Inspiration, ideas... Sometimes I'm disappointed that so much of the art in it looks the same, but still, it's the only art quilt magazine I know of. These, I save.

Mary Engelbreit's Home Companion - I love riotous color, and love to see artist homes and gardens. The photos always make me happy.

Cottage Living - I aspire to this sort of home, a comfy cottagey house with a country garden.

TV Guide - Because how else would I know what good stuff is coming up?

Mental Floss - This is our first year with this odd little magazine, sort of a mix of information and humor and trivia. Caroline even likes this.

Quilter's Newsletter - It covers the whole quilt spectrum. I enjoy it but read it pretty quickly. (And no, I don't save them. I tear out stuff that might inspire me for my "quilt ideas" file and then toss them.)

Cooking Light - Good recipes, helpful for making me cook more healthfully.

Food and Wine - We don't know why we get this -- we never subscribed and if it's a gift we have no idea who it's from. I skim through it.

People - Because it's a great guilty pleasure, a total escape. And I don't want to be one of those middle aged people who doesn't know who Coldplay is.

What comes to yours?

My motivation to create

Gabrielle asked us on this ring to consider these questions: What is your motivation to create? Why are you working in fiber? What moves to you to create?

Here are the thoughts that come to mind for me:

Color! Color! Color!

The tactile pleasures of fabric - color made tangible

The challenge: I wonder if I can make something that looks like this idea, or thought, or image...

The process of learning a new skill or technique

The quiet pleasure of putting something together, piece by piece

The fun and discovery in seeing how each new addition changes the whole (for example, the fun of seeing how a quilt top looks totally different with quilting on it)

The sense of participating in this centuries' old tradition, and taking a traditional aspect of women's work and evolving with it into something artful

Making something that no one else has made, that is just mine

Creative time

Gabrielle's post today is one of those timely messages, as it hits right on what I've been thinking about lately. I'm in another one of those phases where my non-creative life is really busy, and I simply need to attend to those matters before I can work on my creative projects with a clear conscience. Now, you have to understand that I generally am quite good at blocking out the "have to" things nagging at me, to make sure I do some of the things that are important to me. I consider these things vital, recharging activities. My happiness and sanity depends on them.

But even then, my creative time might mean sitting for 15 minutes to look at a few pages of a new quilt book, or making sketches for 10 minutes on a project that is on my mind. Sometimes, like now, that's all the time I have. I have work deadlines pressing, PTO business to take care of, household necessities to accomplish, not to mention a child and husband who deserve my attention, too.

Here's what I've been thinking lately: It's OKAY. I'll get back to it shortly, and it'll still be there. My life isn't an 8-5-at-the-office life, with evenings and weekends free, or the life of a full-time professional artist. I've traded those options for a flexible work schedule so I can be home with Caroline after school, be involved with her school during the day, keep doing legal work but at my schedule and to my choice, and generally adapt my work schedule to family needs. It's great, truly, that I have the luxury of doing this. And that means that some weeks I work from 9pm to 1am every night, or spend weekends at my desk to finish a project on a short deadline, and I don't get to make progress on a creative project.

So, there are times when I can't work on quilt projects. Rather than getting upset about it (as I have done sometimes -- you've read that here, too), I'm trying to just relax and know that there'll be time. I'll enjoy that fun time more for having earned it, and I'll be able to relax and know I can spend that time because I've gotten some other business stuff out of the way.

This week, I've been mildly stressed because the challenge quilt I've made for our guild's challenge isn't totally complete. It's that sprinkler one I showed you, here. After quilting and binding it, I decided I'd sew some beads on to add water droplets. As this is my first beading effort on a quilt, I totally underestimated how long this would take...and I'm only about halfway done with the beading. Now, this could be vaguely embarrassing as I'm the challenge chair person and I figure that I should have mine totally done. I keep getting these niggling "Oh my gosh, I need to finish, there are only two more days" thoughts. But then I remind myself: I've researched and written 4 long pleadings in the last few days, attended I don't even know how many school board related committee meetings, I've dealt with bathroom repair guys every day, I've managed to get dinner on the table at night, and Caroline is wearing clean clothes to school. I'm not going to worry if the beads aren't done. It's not life or death. It's beads on a quilt, for goodness sake.

So, here's my thought for today: I'm going to let my creative life be what it can be. Sometimes it can be a big part of my day and sometimes it can't. The creativity is there, in me, whether I have time to use it or not on any given day. It's not going to go away.

Saturday night in Berkeley

Remember these guys?



In case you don't, that's Kenny Loggins and Jimmy Messina, of "Loggins and Messina" fame. If you don't recognize them, you'd know their songs. "Danny's Song," "House at Pooh Corner," "Angry Eyes," "Your Mama Don't Dance".... these two are responsible for a long string of hits.

Well, they split up some time in the 70's. I've followed Kenny Loggins since then, and have seen him in concert a whole bunch of times. I just adore his voice, and now it's the sort of musical relationship that each concert carries a full load of pleasant nostalgia. My college roommate and I followed his concerts and saw him in southern California when we could. I saw him in New England when I lived there. In an amazing coincidence, he was performing on the night Roger and I got married at the very site of our wedding (the Mountain Winery, a beautiful winery in Saratoga, California with a great outdoor amphitheatre) so after our wedding, Roger and I treated our entire wedding party to the Kenny Loggins concert.

Anyway... Loggins and Messina have reunited for a tour, and last night they came to Berkeley. Roger and I were there, of course. Here's what they look like now:



Older, wiser, no less talented...But aren't we all. They sounded great... It was really impressive to hear how well their voices still blend, and it was a pleasure to see how at ease they seem together nowadays.

A good time was had by all. Me, I'm going to go download some of those old Loggins and Messina songs onto my Ipod.

Sound of a Summer Evening -- the Details

I've gotten a few requests to tell how I did this, so here goes:

I started with a large piece of batting, about 38" square, and stuck that up on my design wall. I added a large piece of dark green for the dark upper background (general evening foliage) and a lighter piece of green, for the lawn. I pinned those on.

Then, I sort of randomly cut shapes of bushes from a green hand-dye, a color in between the grass green and the dark background, and fused those over the gap where the lawn and background joined.

I cut small random clumps of a red hand-dyed fabric, and fused those on for flowers. Then, I fused the sprinkler and hose, until it all looked like this:





At that stage, I turned to the machine and quilted down the bushes and the lawn. (I did a sort of swirly loopy overall pattern on the bushes with a little loop in the middle of each flower, so they look actually sort of rose-like up close.) I didn't quilt on the upper dark background at that point.
Here's where it got dicey, because I proceeded to do what I knew I shouldn't do in the first place. (Isn't that always the way? I'm my own worst enemy.) I had this sort of irridescent, gently sparkly white nylon organza that I thought would make great water sprays. I applied Wonder Under to that. (I can see Melody shaking her head and wagging her finger at me...)

Then, I cut thin strips of the organza, from about 3/8" to 1/4" wide. Sitting at my table with the quilt spread flat in front of me, I gently cut snips off of an organza strip, letting them fall in a spray pattern. I'd do a bit, put a piece of Wonder Under release paper down on top, and fuse it down. Bit by bit, that's how I created the look of spray.

Now I KNOW that a man-made fiber won't fuse permanently or nearly as well as a natural fiber. I knew I was pushing my luck...But my thought was that if it held just long enough for me to sew it all down, it'd be okay. So I snipped and fused, snipped and fused, snipped and fused...You get the idea.

Well, I got it to where it looked just great. So, I loaded up my machine with white thread and started to stitch spray lines over the fused bits, to hold it down and create more spray pattern.

You know, you'd have been amazed at how efficiently the darning foot on my machine just bumped those little organza bits up and off of that fabric before the needle reached them! If I'd wanted to come up with a way to get them off, I couldn't have dreamed up a better solution. Of course, that was NOT what I was trying to accomplish.

So, plan B. Persisting in thinking that the fusing would work, despite the obvious evidence to the contrary, I snipped and fused a bit to replace the bits that had fallen off (and were drifting off each time I moved the darn thing.)

Then, I remembered that in my vast stash of stuff, I had a bag of tulle in various colors. Luckily, I had a piece of dark green tulle -- just the right size. How often does THAT happen? I laid it over the top part of the quilt (covering the sprinkler on up), and pinned, pinned, pinned.

At that stage, I went back to the sewing machine and sewed white spray lines up and out of the sprinkler. I switched thread to that flat, irridescent mylar thread and did a few of those lines, too.

At that point, it looked good but was a god-awful, distorted parallelogram from the dense quilting on the spray lines with nothing in between. So, I went back with dark green, and quilted between the sprays and anywhere else there wasn't quilting, in the same loopy "foliage" pattern I'd done on the bushes.

Miraculously, it flattened out and the tulle disappeared into the green but held the organza bits down.

I blocked it on the bedroom floor for a day (which means I sprayed it with water and pinned it all down, square and flat). When dry, I trimmed to final size (approx. 35 x 35) and applied binding.

I'll do beads next, when I have a chance.

Sound of a Summer Evening

Our guild's challenge this year is "The Sound of Quilting"...the idea is to make a quilt inspired by a sound or noise.

Here's my effort: "The Sound of a Summer Evening." This is one of the projects where all sorts of unexpected things happened along the way...some good, some bad. It's no masterpiece, but as my goal was to have SOMEthing for the challenge reveal on Sept. 15, I'm satisfied.

This may be the first quilt to which I add beads. I have some small irridescent seed beads that would accentuate the white water "drops" so I'll give those a try.

Labor Day Weekend

Meals prepared: 9
Meals eaten: 6
Indulgent desserts concocted: 1
Company entertained: 2 adults, 2 children
Bottles of wine consumed: 2
Dishes washed: too numerous to count
Childrens' bedrooms cleaned: 1
Drawers cleaned out: 6
Loads of laundry washed: 5
Bags of clothes for Salvation Army filled: 2 large
Items retrieved from bags by child: 3
Puppy visitors entertained: 1
Mud puddles filled in: 3
Dogs bathed: 2
Sprinkler lines replaced to fix chew holes: 3
Quilt tops quilted: 1
Quilts bound: 1
Sewing rooms cleaned: 0
Magazines read: 3
Legal work accomplished: 0
Naps taken: 0

Philosophical Thought for the Day

Caroline made this observation today as we were driving home from the dog park:

"Mom, have you ever noticed that you can't lick your own ear?"

True Confessions

I'm going to make a confession to y'all, as I know that I'm just among friends here.

Here it is: I love soap operas.

Yes, I know. They're silly and over-the-top and trite and totally lacking in substance. But I love them any way.

I can genuinely blame this on my mom. She started watching "As the World Turns" the year that I was born, which was -- ahem -- over 40 years ago. For my whole, conscious life (and a hunk of my unconscious life) I've had "As the World Turns" as the soundtrack to my lunch-hour. Those long running characters are like family to me, in a weird way. When I lived in New Hampshire, thousands of miles from my mom and sister, it gave me great pleasure and an odd (I admit) sense of security to watch the Hughes clan on that show, and know that my mom and sister were watching, too.

And once you get hooked on watching a soap opera, it seems to me, one just leads to another. (I digress to tell a funny story about my grandma, a serious little lady from Italy whose grasp of English wasn't the strongest. Every afternoon at 3:00 she sat down to watch "All My Children" ...she planned her whole day around that entertainment hour. So, one afternoon, I was at her house and 3:00 rolled around and my grandmother got gingerale for both of us and we settled down to watch "All My Children." Only...wait! The credits were rolling, the show logo spilled across the screen...it WASN'T "All My Children!" It was "One Life to Live!" Some months earlier, it turned out, the station had changed its lineup of shows and slotted "One Life to Live" in the 3:00 time slot. And my grandmother didn't notice. Different characters? Well, those soap actors do have a sort of standard look to them. And different plot? Put them all in a hospital and it IS hard to tell which show you're watching. My grandmother didn't notice, and didn't care. She had her 3:00 show, and she just kept on watching.)

Anyway. Watching "As the World Turns" for all those years led me to watch "The Bold and Beautiful," which has always preceded it. (I'd turn on the tv to watch ATWT and catch the closing moments of each B&B episode...and we all know that the good stuff only happens at the end of the show. So, I got curious and started tuning in to see more. That show is about the silliest and subtly tongue-in-cheek show around (at least, that's how I choose to see that show's ridiculous drama).

Just so we're clear (I'm only gonna admit so much, after all) I don't actually sit down and watch, enrapt, for 90 minutes every day. What I actually do is have my VCR set to tape that time slot 5 days a week...and usually I end up piling up tapes so that I'm several weeks behind.

Then, when I'm sewing or cleaning my office or ironing I pop them in and let the shows roll over me. If I miss some stuff, it doesn't matter (heck, if I lose the tape and miss 8 shows it doesn't matter). And I get enormous pleasure of having it on while I sew. It's not worth my full attention, but I'll happily give it 20 percent.

This morning, I had workers pounding away in the master bathroom, and clomping up and down the stairs hauling wood and debris and who knows what else. So, I put my soap tape in the vcr and spent a lovely few hours working on my sprinkler quilt with my friends from Oakdale in the background.

It's pure escapism, but I love it.

The Sound of Quilting

That's what you could hear coming from my studio today, in more ways than one.

For the last few years, I've been in charge of the challenges for my quilt guild. It's a great guild position, by the way...you pick a challenge theme, announce it at a few meetings and in the newsletter, and you're good to go.

For this year's challenge, I wanted to find a theme that wasn't trite or overdone or boring. I wanted something that would appeal to the traditional quilters in the guild, as well as to the art quilters. I solicited ideas, consulted with friends, and came up with this theme: The Sound of Quilting. The challenge is to make a quilt (smallish, no larger than 36 x 36 inches) inspired by a noise or a sound.

It seemed like a good idea at the time. I figured I'd be full of ideas.

I mulled. I pondered. I thought about the theme each night as I tried to go to sleep, and each time I came to the same conclusion.

Who the hell came up with this stupid idea, anyway?

I can't beg off -- it's my challenge idea, after all. And it's due to be shown, completely finished of course, at the meeting on September 15.

For awhile I was going to illustrate the sound of a cat's purr. Well, I liked the idea of illustrating a cat's purr. The problem was, I couldn't settle on any image that actually portrayed the sound. I kept thinking I'd try to do the image of a cat rubbing up against someone's legs. But I'm not that confident in the drawing department, and I couldn't find an image that I wanted to work from, not for lack of trying. (I can't even tell you how many books on cats I've looked through at area bookstores, and children's books, even.)

A few weeks ago, on a very hot afternoon, I was out in the backyard running the sprinkler both to water the flowers and to entertain the puppy. I laid back on the lounge chair while Gemma ran back and forth through the sprinkler, and as I was relaxing and enjoying the cooling sound of the sprinkler on such a hot day, it hit me: that was THE SOUND.

Today was the first chance I've had to work on this project. And I'm off to a good start, if I do say so myself! Here it is so far:




Water droplets to come! I'm playing around with silk organza to fuse, and with an irridescent white thread... we'll see what happens next!

Funny, I can't seem to stop humming..."The hills are alive....."

No Child Left Untested

I had hoped to do some work this weekend on my newest quilting project, my quilt for the guild's challenge on "The Sound of Quilting." However, before I could work on that with a clear conscience, I tackled a project I'd volunteered to complete for a school board committee I'm on in my community.

I volunteered to write up a "Frequently Asked Questions" document -- with answers, of course -- about the government-mandated testing in our public school district. Once a year, our kids take state and federally mandated tests, and we parents receive notice of their individual scores. And twice each year, the State of California releases school scores and rankings, which are published in our local newspaper.

Whenever any of these events happens, all sorts of questions and comments fly around the school, because no one knows what to make of them. The numbers are confusing, and it's not clear what they mean for any child, for any one school, or for the school district. So, we folks on the communications committee figured that we'd try to clarify matters.

So, I've spent hours -- literally, hours -- reading information from the California Department of Education, statistics, and various entities' analysis of how the test results are tabulated and what the results mean.

Here are a few of the points I've learned through this process:

1. Pretty much every public school kid has to take the tests, even if they don't read very well or speak English very well. This makes a heck of a lot of sense, since they have to read the test to take it and it's only offered in English. Guess how much those scores are going to reflect what those kids really know?

2. It's really hard to figure out what a less-than-proficient score for your individual child means. Has the teacher actually taught the grade-level content by the point in the school year when your child takes the test? Does your child not take multiple choice tests well? Were the questions worded in a confusing way? Did your child just get tired, taking multiple-choice tests all day for a bunch of days in a row? Or does your child really need work on specific areas?

2. California's tests are designed to match the state's academic content standards for each grade. This means that if your kid is just a bit behind in mastering first-grade level reading and math, by second grade most likely he'll be further behind when measured against 2nd grade content standards....even if he's making excellent progress for his learning speed and ability. This also means that the gap will probably widen every year, without huge intervention. And, of course, there's virtually no government money available for intervention. Heck, our school barely has enough money these days for xerox paper.

3. The school scores listed in the newspaper, and from which parents try to compare their school with other area schools, aren't really comparable because they're based on a complicated calculation that includes weighting for a number of variables. Each school has a different number of "English language learners," socio-economically deprived kids, for example, so the weighting for the scores has different impacts. This means if you try to base a comparison on the few statistics reported for each school, you're basically comparing apples and oranges. The only way to get even close to a valid comparison is to compare the full set of numbers... and how many folks will do that, or will understand the numbers if they get them?

4. To calculate the school's score, the kids' test results are calculated school-wide, AND by various subgroups (race, English learner, socio-economic status, disability, etc.) For a school to be deemed to meet its official "growth target", EVERY different group has to show comparable improvement. This means that even if the overall school score has gone up a lot, if every subgroup hasn't also risen by a comparable amount, the school score is treated as NOT meeting its growth target.... with various penalties imposed as a result.

5. These government testing mandates only apply to public schools. So, there's no way to see how private schools are performing or how your school compares to other area private schools.

6. Under the federal "No Child Left Behind" law, 95% of of all students -- and 95% of each subgroup -- must participate in the testing. This means that no matter how well the students who were actually tested did, if that statistic isn't met across the board because students were sick or parents opted to keep their kids home, the school will be deemed not to have met its annual yearly progress.

7. Under "No Child Left Behind," a school that hasn't met its "annual yearly progress" for two years in a row is designated a "non-performing school" and sanctions that worsen every year are imposed. There is very little funding -- if any -- to help a "non-performing school" improve. This means that once a school is "non-performing," parents think it's a "bad" school and move kids to other schools...with the result that the school receives even less money through the attendance-related money that comes in from the government...Which means that the schools that need the most help end up with decreasing funding.

8. In some states, including California, the state and federal reporting requirements don't match, and the progress demanded by the state is different from the progress demanded by the federal government. This means that a school can focus on one area and show great improvement under one scheme, while failing to meet the growth target under the other scheme.

Frankly, in an effort to answer questions and reassure parents of the signicance of the testing process, I'm discouraged and dismayed and even less confident that these improve public school education.

That said, I'm wholly committed to public school education, and I am amazed and awed and delighted by the wonderful teachers who dedicate themselves to our kids. My daughter's school has an impressive group of truly devoted teachers, and I know that there are many, many more great teachers at other public schools. It's just too bad that the very testing processes that are designed to help our kids get better education are likely to drive these great teachers away from the profession.

An anti-rant

I have nothing against political rants. Like many others, I'm thoroughly distressed with our president (I can't even bear to listen to him) and political matters and the position of the US in the world, andI understand the inclination to rant about it all.

But because I'm so distressed and stressed about the condition of things at the moment (you know, the world, our country, my state, my local community, my daughter's school...things like that) ranting just makes me feel more stressed.

That's why today I'm recommending two insightful, well-written, and thought-provoking blogs to you. When I read these, I feel calmer somehow, more focused on what's important.

The first is Treppenwitz, a blog written by David Bogner. David is a young father and husband living in Israel. The title means "literally, 'the wisdom of the stairs'... The striking reply that crosses one's mind belatedly when already leaving, on the stairs. " In his blog, David discusses fatherhood, marriage, and life in Israel. It's fascinating quiet reading, and David is insightful about current Israel events. I think what I find most appealing about reading David's blog is that his accounts of life in Israel -- which of course include references to the current political climate -- is that it comes from the perspective of a sane, normal, family guy who is experiencing these events as part of his daily life.

The second blog is one called "Real E Fun" by a blogger writing under the psuedonym Zinnia Cyclamen in the U.K. Zinnia is a funeral celebrant, trained and accredited by the British Humanist Association. She blogs about the people she encounters in her work, and the interactions she observes as she's participating in their lives to celebrate a deceased person's life. Now, I know this sounds weird and dull (and directly contradictory to the title which sets you up to expect a party girl's blog or something) but it's fascinating. The entries are beautifully written, with wonderful simple brush-stroke descriptions of people in a way that speaks volumes. I come away feeling that what's most important is to value and respect and love those we hold most dear...

Which is the best antidote to bad politics, I think.

The butterfly has landed!

Here's the butterfly, done! (Well, mostly...the sleeve isn't fully sewn.) I had a big quilting day yesterday and got way more done on it than I thought I would.

This is actually straight and square, not that you can tell this from this photo.

Here's a detail shot...it shows the quilting a bit more:



Some of you might remember how stuck I was once I got the butterfly wing itself done. I fiddled and fiddled with the background fabric, trying to find the right one. I finally settled on this green, but then it just sat while I tried to figure out what to do about a border.

I'm learning that the "letting it sit" process can be an important one. I didn't know what to do about it, so instead of rushing to just finish it any old way, I waited. And one day, after I bought some black organza "just because," it dawned on me that it would make a good shadow for the wing.

Then, fortuitously, I happened to see a Simply Quilts episode where the featured artist showed an easy way to do this off-kilter setting. And it just seemed right for this.

So, here it is. I'm happy with it.

Hooray, hooray, it's Family Day!

In our house, August 19 is Family Day. That's the day we officially adopted Caroline in China, and we celebrate it joyfully every year.

It's hard to believe that 9 years ago today, Caroline officially became part of our family. Really, until then we were a couple. And Caroline made us a family. Don't we look blissfully happy?



That picture was taken at the orphanage in Chongqing, China, the very day we met her.

The events that led us to adopt Caroline weren't easy. We dealt with unexplained infertility for some time, and explored some domestic adoption situations that didn't pan out. It was an emotional time for Roger and me as a couple. But when we learned about the process of adopting a child from China, it seemed like the clear and right path for us.

In retrospect, it seems like the time flew by. But that wasn't how it felt at the time, of course. It felt like the paperwork was endless, and complicated. We sent papers all over the US to get them stamped and sealed as necessary, and then were in awe when they came back to us from the Chinese Consulate in San Francisco, stamped and sealed some more, with impressive Chinese characters and a red satin ribbon attached. We were so frustrated we could have chewed nails when the federal government shut down for 4 or 5 months over a political budget mess...Remember that? Our papers sat on someone's desk at Immigration all that time, and there was nothing we could do about it.

During that time, it seemed that I saw heavily pregnant women everywhere, and I felt pregnant as well...I even gained a few pounds!

Finally, after our papers went to China, we got our "child assignment" and received this picture of our as-yet-unseen daughter:



This was our first glimpse of Caroline. I framed it in this frame, and kept it on my desk at work. We made zillions of copies, carried laminated ones in our pockets, and sent them to everyone we knew. (It's funny to me that I see that same serious, contemplative expression on Caroline's face at times, even now.)

And then we waited for clearance from the Chinese government to travel to China. If I thought the waiting was hard before, it became harder when we had a specific child to picture and wonder about!

Roger and I handled things differently, not surprisingly. He got into the excitement of traveling to China, and he researched sites to see and read all about the places we'd be going. Me, I didn't care WHERE we'd be...I bought tiny clothes (pink, pink, pink!) in various sizes, as we didn't know how big she'd be by the time we got there. Would she be on the small side? We knew she was going to be around 6 months old, but we didn't know whether she'd be underdeveloped. I took clothes and diapers for 3 months, 6 months, and a year. Would she accept normal formula, or be lactose intolerant? I took regular and soy. Would she be sick and go through extra diapers? I took enough diapers so she could have diarrhea for the entire time and I wouldn't run out (that's a LOT of diapers). (We were told we could not count on being able to find powdered formula or disposable diapers.) Would she need medication? We took a medical kit (an amazingly complete little pack put together by an international adoption agency out of Texas) that had sterile hypodermic needles, various creams (for lice, scabies, etc.) and antibiotics. We even took duct tape, hearing disaster stories of luggage tearing. We were well prepared and well stocked.

We arrived in China on a Sunday, met up with the other four families we'd be traveling with, and got to meet our babies on a Tuesday. It was an astonishing emotional day, as you can imagine. But every child in our group was beautiful and healthy.

From there, we had almost two weeks of official errands to run to process the adoption... A visit to a health clinic for the most cursory medical exam you could imagine, official photographs for Caroline's passport, interviews with officials, and last, the interview at the American Consulate in Guangzhou so Caroline could get her visa. In between, we did some site-seeing and marveled at our new baby.



We also tried to nap whenever possible. China time is exactly 12 hours off of east coast time (we lived in New Hampshire when we adopted Caroline) so our bodies were in shock. Plus, guess what: babies wake up in the middle of the night!



But she was the cutest baby in the whole world. She gazed thoughtfully out at the world from her stroller as we pushed her around the streets of Guangzhou.



We tested her as a future hat model, but she wouldn't have it and second after every hat picture, she'd ripped it off.



Our day at the American consulate got us the papers to bring her home with us. Note her patriotic red, white and blue attire (well, the blue is hidden in this picture). (And isn't it cool that they had cribs in the American consulate waiting room? Baby swing chairs, too!)



Ah, it was a wonderful experience. I came home feeling that if I could travel in a foreign country with a brand new baby for two weeks, I could do anything.

And here is Caroine now: big and beautiful and smart as a whip.



I simply can't believe it's been NINE years.

We're processing papers to go again, and get a sister for Caroline. So we'll have TWO family days to celebrate, and two beautiful daughters to enjoy.

Meanwhile, we're celebrating. Chinese food for dinner, of course!

Getting in Touch with Your Inner Fabricholic

When I've seen my friend Rita lately, she's had a calm and happy smile on her face. Wondering why she looked like the proverbial cat who ate the canary, I asked what's she's been up to.

"I've been getting in touch with my fabric," she replied, grinning.

Rita explained. She's got several workshops coming up: a trip to Art Quilt Tahoe in late fall, and our fall retreat at Bishop's Ranch in October. In preparation for them, and before she headed out to shop for the materials on her supply lists, she decided to take stock with what she had in her stash. She's been sorting and stroking fabric. She was having such fun fondling her fabric that she decided to wash and iron it all so she could stroke it and gaze at it some more.

"I love what I have!" she announced, happily. "I've found stuff I forgot I had, and I still really love it!"

So, she hasn't sewn a stitch, or designed any new projects, or fused any fabulous quilt tops. But she's having a marvelous time.

Gee, I wonder what's in MY closet? And can I get Rita to come over and iron it?!

A Word about Thread

I've been quilting on my butterfly quilt lately (I know, I know, you want pictures... SOON.) And I've made another discovery, late to arrive at knowledge that others have long known.

I've been using Libby Lehman's "Bottom Line" thread in the bobbin. And it's wonderful! And a bobbin lasts FOREVER! I'd swear this thread has magical properties which make one bobbin just go on and on and on. It's great stuff! I'm going to have to stock up on colors.

On the top, I've been using Aurifil thread. Having been turned on to Aurifil thread by Kathy Sandbach a few years ago, I've ordered it since then from That Thread Shop. Now, a few of my local shops carry it in some colors, which is handy. I buy large cones of grey Aurifil thread and use that for most piecing projects. It's 50 weight, but it feels thinner to me, which I like. And it's virtually fuzz-less, so it doesn't mess up the bobbin case nearly as much as other thread does.

I know a lot of people use heavier weight thread for quilting. I do too, sometimes. But these days, I find myself liking a finer quilting line, so the texture of the quilting shows somewhat more than the thead itself. That's what's working well on my current project, anyway.

Today, Caroline is home sick again (and miserable about missing pony camp for another day), the dishwasher repair guy is due, the bathroom demolition guys will be back shaking the house as they rip the tile off of the shower... and my teeth feel like they have steel bands wrapped around them putting pressure on my whole head. (Oh wait, they DO!) So, it's clearly not a day to concentrate on legal reseach. I'm going to give it all up and just quilt.

B-Day

No, that's not because it's my birthday..."B-Day" is "Braces Day"... the day I've been counting down to for the last few months, as I've squarely addressed various dental issues.

You may not appreciate what a big deal this is for me. I've had a rather severe phobia about dentistry for all of my adult life. But over the past two years, I've managed to overcome a lot of it (thanks to a great dentist and his willingness to sedate me and otherwise accomodate my fears) and I've gotten everything that needed doing done.

Now all that's left is to straighten my teeth. Sigh. I grew up with very straight teeth. As an adolescent, I had great, straight teeth while my friends suffered through years of braces. I guess I was smug.

Because, during my late 20's and all through my 30's, my teeth suddenly started migrating forward as if their goal was to leap right out of my mouth. Some of the movement is due, I know, to the years when I nightly ground and clenched my teeth... The stress of my trial lawyer days acting itself out on my poor little teeth.

Anyway, I was weirdly excited for today to come, because it marks the beginning of the end of dealing with something that has become a big issue for me. And they're on! It's a very strange feeling, this mouth full of metal. I'd take a picture, but the wires look all twisty and crooked because my teeth are all crooked! You'll see the final result if you hang around for about 2 years.

So, smile for me, and then go brush and floss!

Dog Days of Summer

Gemma had a great day today. Her friend Sadie, accompanied by her friend Connor (who is exactly Caroline's age) came over to play this morning. Sadie is a "Golden Doodle," which is a cross between a golden retriever and a standard poodle. She's very charming.



Sadie is also the same age as Gemma (approaching 6 months old now), about the same size, and about the same energy level. Conveniently for all of us, Sadie's owners live around the corner from us so we get together frequently for doggie play.



They are well matched in their play. Sometimes, Sadie pins Gemma...



And just as often, Gemma pins Sadie.



They do take frequent breaks for refreshments.



They're always a constantly-moving blur of running, rolling, and romping...But if someone opens the screen door coming out of the house, they freeze. Can't you see the thought bubbles over their heads, "FOOD?!"



They're such friendly dogs that they decided to help Connor tie his shoe.



So, a good time was had by all. I got to sit, watch, and read my novel a bit, which was quite pleasant. We sent Sadie and Connor home tired and happy. (I did have to call Kim, Connor's mom, to apologize for sending Sadie home with muddy feet and brambles in her fur-- they had one big romp session back against the fence, in the bushes, until I got them back out on the lawn.)

Gemma was exhausted. And remember the novel I was reading? Gemma spent a bit of the afternoon enjoying it, as well.



You'll notice that she's the type to go straight to the end of the story. Wouldn't you know...she couldn't have chewed up the pages I'd already read!

Ebb and Flow

In these phases, when my non-quilting life consumes most of my time and I'm not getting any quilting time, I never quite know what to write about here. When I write about family stuff, I worry that the quilting folks among you will be bored silly. (As if you aren't most of the time here anyway, but I ignore that worry.)

Unlike some folks -- whose inner artistic contemplations I admire -- I don't typically have interesting philosophical thoughts and revelations about the artistic process. I'm thinking about what to make for dinner, whether Caroline has outgrown her school clothes, how I'll find time to finish the motion I'm supposed to be researching, whether the puppy needs more exercise and should I take her to the dog park, why that laurel bush in the corner of the yard has yellow leaves, and the question that almost always lurks in the back of my mind: Can I take a nap?

I try to remind myself that these outwardly unproductive times can actually turn out to be productive. The inability to find time to work on quilt projects seems to make my mind more eager, and I find myself coming up with new creative ideas and even, sometimes, solutions to creative problems that have been plaguing me. So, I guess I should consider these periods in my life as part of my own creative process. If not for the ebb, there wouldn't be flow.

I'm always drawn to new quilt books, and I'm lucky enough to belong to a guild with a massive library. Last week, I borrowed Velda Newman's two books and I've been reading them with great pleasure and interest. I've been thinking (in a general way, not a grand philosophical way) that LARGE quilts have huge impact. See? Not a huge revelation, but a small thought that if I'm going to take the time to work on something that I want to have a big impact, perhaps I need to consider the final size a bit more. Velda Newman's work is an obvious example of this...her work would be stunning even if smaller, but huge, it's breath-taking.

Remember my quilt "Smoke Signals?"

I really like how this turned out, but it's not that powerful. It's small, 29" x 38". I keep thinking I'm going to enter it somewhere, but I haven't...and in part, I think, it's because it doesn't strike me as big enough. Not just in size, but in impact.

Last year, I had a quilt in Pacific Quilt International...which was a big deal to me, as it was the first time I'd entered anything in a juried show. It was "Red Threads":

This is another quilt I'm proud of. It is one of my first wholly original designs, and it was my first effort at something realistic. It's also not very big, about 39" x 41". And, while I was thrilled to have something hanging at PIQF, I was disappointed to see it hanging. At that show, and most others, they hung the small quilts all together, fitted together almost like mosaic tiles on a long wall. There were tons of great, smaller quilts. But in that setting, you lost the impact of any one of them.

So, I'm thinking that the next quilt I do needs to be bigger.

And while I've been pondering that small but useful thought, I went with my friends Pat, Janet, Rita and Gerrie to hear a talk by San Francisco quilt artist Marcia Stein yesterday. You might know her work...she does wonderful, graphic portrayals of scenes and images that are realistic yet simplified in a dramatic way. Here are a few of my favorites:

In one of those synchronistic moments, she mentioned in her talk that she was heavily influenced by a class by Velda Newman and decided to make her quilts large to give them a strong impact.

Well, okay. I think I'm getting the idea. And I'll be ready to work on it, any minute now, as soon as I have time to turn on the "flow."

So much for solitude...

I've mentioned here how summers, while they're lots of fun, are stressful for me.

In summertime, both Roger and Caroline are at home all day, every day. And, while this has some nice advantages, it also makes me crazy. You see, I work from home, so my work schedule is totally thrown out of whack. Plus, I'm the sort of person who needs some quiet and alone time...and the lack of it makes me stir-crazy after a while.

So, I've been looking forward to next week. Roger starts school on Monday, and Caroline is signed up for an all-day pony camp, which will give me from about 9:30 to 3pm at home alone to get work done and get a bit of time to myself. (Just between you and me, I was planning to celebrate the occasion by avoiding all work on Monday and spending the day quilting my butterfly.)

But some things are not meant to be. This morning, workers started tearing apart our master bathroom, to repair a construction defect that has caused leaking and requires replacement of the shower and flooring. That means there will be workers in the house for two weeks, they estimate. Perfect.

That's okay, I thought, I can still spend the day sewing on Monday.

Not.

Turns out a work issue is rearing its ugly head, and I have a conference call that promises to be a 2-hour thing. And tuesday morning I get my braces put on, so that morning is shot.

Sigh. There is nothing to do but just deal with it. And enjoy it while it's happening, yes?!

One Thing Leads to Another

Do you ever have one of those days where you set out to do one chore -- one simple, little, easy chore -- and before you know it, you've made a huge mess that overwhelms you? That was my day today.

I set out to clear off the top of the dryer in the laundry room. Our laundry room is upstairs, which is handy for all sorts of reasons, but it ends up being a sort of "catch-all" place for clothes I don't know what to do with. Usually it's stuff that Caroline has outgrown, or needs mending, or the like. Well, as I was doing that, I decided to take advantage of one of the cupboards over the dryer, which held a bunch of stuff I'd decided to give to the Salvation Army.

So, there was this nice, empty cupboard...which seemed like the ideal place top put the batting that is sitting on the top shelf of my closet. So, in the process of pulling the batting down, I pulled a bunch more stuff down too, which led to a cleaning of the entire walk-in closet. It all exploded out into the entry to the bedroom, looking like this:



And of course, I had to sort stuff, so it all spread to the bed:



Well, as you can guess, the day was shot. I got it all put away by about 3, and loaded a whole bunch of shopping bags full of clothes and shoes into the car to take to Salvation Army...

I was tired but happy with my progress. And I'm pleased to have found a good, out-of-the way place for the batting. However, if I start complaining about needing batting at some point in the future, will one of you please email me and remind me to go look in the cupboard over the dryer?!

Butterflies in my Stomach

Remember this butterfly wing I was working on a long time ago? It's been sitting in my basket of UFOs in my office/studio, waiting for me to figure out what to do with it. I'd attached the butterfly wing to the green background, but there it sat.

And suddenly, last week, the solution became clear. My uncertainty about how to border it -- indeed, whether to border it at all -- evaporated. I had a clear plan, and lots of excitement.

But no time. It's been frustrating.

But today, Roger drove off to take Caroline to her riding lesson...I worked for a bit and got another project done and sent off...and then cleared the table and got to work.

I'm very happy. It's coming along nicely and I'm ready to put the layers together and start quilting!

But I'm not going to show you until it's all done. Besides, it might change some between now and then. Still, it's been a happy experience to have ideas and rough concepts gel into a "yes, THAT" decision, and then finally get time to execute it.

My favorite things

What with work obligations, and family activities, and the post-vacation catching up on things like garden and laundry and such, I've not had any creative time and I've not even dug my digital camera out of my backpack where it nested while we were in Tahoe! So, I apologize for the picture-free series of entries here. I'll get back to normal shortly, I think.

In the meantime, I'm posting this list of some of my favorite things...because Caroline was watching "The Sound of Music" earlier this evening and the song stuck in my head. Please post on your blog, I'd love to see what you'd say!

So, in no particular order, here are some of my favorite things:

The sound of a rainbird sprinkler on a hot summer day

A hot bubble bath

Clean cotton sheets on the bed

The smell of library books

Stencilled and calico china buttons

Japanese quilting magazines

My waterman fountain pen

Watching Caroline riding horseback

Tulips

Peanut butter and rasberry jam sandwiches

The view from our bedroom window, across a few rooftops to vineyard-covered hills in the distance

Rainy days

The crunch of snow underfoot

The smell of chocolate chip cookies baking

Playing "yatzee" with Caroline

The scent of the summertime air in Lake Tahoe

Shiny red dishes

My round, pink teapot

Listening to Roger play his guitar

Scones with orange marmelade, and earl grey tea

The hum of my sewing machine when I'm free-motion quilting

Gemma's wild tail-wagging greeting in the morning

Sparkling water, cold and blubbly

A fresh, juicy peach at the peak of summer


I could go on and on. What's your list?

Still Waiting

"Still Waiting," by Sharon Malec

A few months ago, I bought this gorgeous small quilt through the "Keiko and Friends: Art Quilts" exhibit curated by Laura Wasilowski. I simply couldn't resist it. Sharon Malec is a very talented quilt artist who is known as "the Dog Lady" because of her great dog quilts and designs. And this one really called out to me.

My sister, Laura, has had a wonderful, quiet black lab named Libby for about 13 years. She rescued her after Libby was found, staked to a tree behind an empty house. It was apparent from her behavior that she was a young dog, and sweet, but that she'd been badly abused. So, for the past 13 years, Libby has been my sister's shadow. For quite a while, Laura had a job where she could take Libby to work with her. Libby rides "shotgun" next to Laura in her truck, and where ever Laura is, Libby is curled up quietly nearby. When Laura had to travel, we or my parents would keep Libby for her...and this quilt represented what we usually saw, then--Libby's back, as she sat gazing at the door or a window, waiting for Laura.

When I bought this lovely quilt, I wasn't sure whether I was going to keep it or give it to Laura. I really wanted to keep it -- but, after all, it's an amazing likeness of Libby (especially since Sharon Malec has never seen her). I've had it tucked away, and figured I'd decide at some point.

Well, this past week, Laura had to have Libby put to sleep. Libby's been pretty frail for a while now, with back problems and doggie delirium setting in. It was looking like she had a brain tumor, and things were going to plummet fast. So, we all had our sad goodbyes. Laura's doing okay, but she misses her so much.

And of course, it became very clear that Laura needed this lovely art quilt. I gave it to Laura tonight, and we both had a good cry and then went out and threw balls for Gemma.

I've sent my deep thanks to Sharon, for creating something that has become so meaningful to both me and my sister.