Countdown: Just How Many UFOs Do I Have?

Mustering up a bit of courage a few weeks ago, I decided to follow Gayle’s lead and count my unfinished projects. I really wanted to know just what I’m in for as we head into the New Year 2008.

Since I have been focusing on my existing stash and some of my unfinished projects, I was curious to see just-how-many things I had remaining.

When I had counted and categorized, I wasn’t discouraged or terribly surprised, but I can see that I have another year (or 3) of UFOs ahead of me.

Works In Progress (Projects I’m involved with now)

1. Harvest of Patchwork (This top is continuing to grow and will be finished as a queen size bedquilt. The top is composed of FOUR UFO projects so far: 9 Sampler blocks, 8 Maple Leaf variation blocks, Snowflake blocks, and 4 Flying Geese strips.)

2. Springtime At Bloomery (Full size; in quilt top form with pieced backing; ready for machine quilting in January 08.)

3. Dance of the Sunbeams (This wallhanging is still getting hand-beading embellishments.)

4. Amish-style Crosses and Losses (This small quilt is being hand quilted.)

Squares and Blocks

1. Sampler blocks (created by quilters in a Quilt Pro study group)
2. Baltimore album blocks (Flowers, wreaths, and original Scherenschnitte blocks are finished and the center block needs to be completed. Still undecided on the sashing. To me, this is so traditional and boring that I don’t know if it will be completed in a traditional Baltimore fashion.)
3. Scherenschnitte Hearts Encircled (appliqued tie dyed cotton on black, will be small wallhanging or pillow)

Wallhangings In The Works

1. Black and orange Hexagonal
2. Blue Compass Star
3. Compass and Flowers
4. Delectible Mountain
5. Fantastique
6. Twisted Star
7. Progressive (made by me and some friends)

Tops

1. Friendship Album (full size)
2. Uncrossing The Hoodoo (full size)
3. Twin Sisters (full size)
4. Optical Illusion (small wallhanging size)
5. Kaleidoscope (small quilt size)
6. Kyoto Kimonos (small quilt size)
7. Four Slant (lap quilt size)

Tops Made By Family Members

1. Mother’s Flower Garden (made in the 1950s, needs matching Nile Green solid cotton to finish edging before hand quilting.)
2. Great-grandmother’s Dresden Plate (Full size, made in the late 1940s or early 1950s. Only needs to be hand quilted.)
3. Grandmother’s Split Rail Fence (Queen size, made in early 1980s. Will be machine quilted.)

Repair/Restore

1. Grandmother’s Flower Garden (Full size hand-quilted; made for me with my dress scraps and used until almost worn out. Full repairs are needed and the family consensus is to repair the quilt, not cut-it for other patchwork items.)
2. Vintage “H” quilt (Small size, hand quilted; functional quilt made in the vintage era; will repair and cut down since one side is tattered.)

Set Asides (Partially Quilted)

1. Amish-style Center Diamond (wallhanging size, hand quilted)
2. Triangulation (Small quilt, machine quilted and only border quilting remains)

Baggie “Background” Projects

1. Thousand Pyramids (Full size scrap-basket quilt, mostly medium to dark hues)
2. Scrounged Plaids (Using plaid samples and freebie-style/scrounged plaid cottons)
3. Charming Nine Patch (Using 4.5-inch finished blocks with plain ecru as alternate patchwork)
4. Scrappy Squares (Using 3-inch scraps and leftover fabrics)
5. Purple Stars (Hand pieced 8-pointed stars with 2 different fabrics in each star, block size about 6-inches)

Whew! Of course, this doesn’t include any antique or vintage quilt tops, or any antique or vintage pieced blocks…..But there they are in list-form. That’s my countdown heading into 2008. What’s YOUR countdown?

Happy New Year everyone!

Making Christmas Ornaments

Decorating the Christmas tree with special ornaments is fun. Most of our ornaments have a small memory we can associate with. Some of the ornaments were gifts, some were made by me, and some were made by family members, including my boys.

I love the small stained glass ornaments that I helped the boys make one year. They were too young to create detailed ornaments back then, but the little stained glass kits made with plastic beads were ideal for them.

The plastic beads were used to fill small metal frames. After the frames were filled with the beads, the ornaments were heated in an oven. Once cooled, the ornaments looked alot like stained glass.  These ornaments are put on the tree every year now. With the small lights strung on the tree, these little ornaments glow warmly like the little memories that they are.

I thought I would share a few more crewel and cross-stitched ornaments. The Peter Rabbit ornaments came from a small kit (a Dimension kit) and they were made in 1979 for my first son, Jason.  

The cross stitch ornaments were all made in the 1980s and the designs were found in several ornament design books. I have made about a dozen cross stitch ornaments in all.

Wonderment Through The Years

Christmas is only a week away. When I was young, I would get so excited at the thought of our family gathering and a visit from Santa Claus. My parents would drive to visit our family. A trip to my grandparents’ home was a journey that lasted between 8-10 hours and was oftentimes in snowy conditions.

When we arrived at our grandparents’ home, we were met with good cheer, wonderful aromas from the kitchen, Christmas decorations, and bright holiday trimmings, including a large Star of David mounted on the brickwork of my grandparents’ chimney. After a long day’s journey that would end in the evening hours, my brother and I would begin to watch for that large Star of David, knowing that it marked our grandparents’ home. My grandfather made the Star, and it was our beacon. Once spotted, we knew we were really there, at our grandparents’ home, filled with love, comfort, familiarity, and the beauty of the holiday season.

As a mother of 3 sons, now young men, I have continued much of that tradition, filling the holiday with excitement and joy. To share the Christmas holiday with my family has continued on through the years. Now, with the addition of grandchildren, there is another generation to share the holiday. At our home, wreaths have been hung, some of the carved Santas have been placed around the house, Poinsettias are scattered among the evergreen trimmings, and the Christmas tree has been decorated. 

The countdown has begun: there are 7 days until Christmas.

Last week, the girls came over to help decorate our tree. I had already strung the lights and had asked my daughter in law to bring the girls over to help with our tree. My step granddaughter, Morgan, was dutiful as always. She stayed very focused and was busy hanging some of our ornaments. She did a great job placing them just-so, where she could see them at her level. Morgan was especially fond of the ornaments that had been made by my boys when they were young. It was a joy to share some of the history of several ornaments with her.

My granddaughter, who is just 15 months old, was more interested in other activities. Hanging ornaments didn’t get her attention at all. She found a small, empty ornament box and was content holding it while she literally walked in circles around the living room. (I wish that I had that much energy!)

Over the years, I have made many Christmas tree ornaments, knowing they would become small treasures that would be passed on to the boys as they matured and had families of their own. This one below, in crewelwork and embroidery, is worked on both sides and is stuffed. The ornament was made in 1983, the year before my second son was born.

Christmas is a time of reflection for me. There are family stories, photographs, and special occasions that are part of the Wonder of Christmas. 

Decorating the home for the holiday season brings the past into the present for me. The pair of Christmas candlesticks that my grandmother gave me will bring forth her image, and her spirited laughter soon fills the air around me. A slice of Prune Cake will take me back to the home of my other grandmother who lived just down the road from them. Sugar cookies with glistening sprinkles reminds me of my own children and how fast their hearts beat as they shared little secrets as Christmas approached.

Even listening to the radio brings the past into the present: hearing Handel’s Messiah takes me back to my college days when I was a member of the College choir, and I absentmindedly begin singing again. Then I hear, “Jolly Old Saint Nicholas” and remember when my son, Ryan, sang that song to me when he was only 7.

Those bygone days still live with me. They are some of the special times that I cherish, and I am thankful for the joy and holiday wonderment I have been given through the years.

 

We wish you a Merry Christmas. May your holiday be filled with happiness!

Shining Ice

When cold and wet weather brings a Winter ice storm, the after-the-storm results in our countryside home is one of magical beauty.

Shining ice can be seen in every direction, from the trees in our woods, to a grassy area, and down to our stream that glistens with a frosty edge. Living in the Shenandoah Valley, we are blessed with the ability to view the mountain ranges nearby and after a snow or ice storm, the Blue Ridge and Allegheny Mountains have a very different and exceptionally beautiful appearance.

Once the back roads are safe to travel on, I love to wander around looking at the shining ice and how it affects Nature. One of my favorite places to visit is Morgan’s Ford, a low water crossing over the Shenandoah River, near my home. 

The past few days have been an interesting weather-mix of gray, fog, rain, and then ice. Despite the stormy weather, there was plenty to do indoors.

Most of my weekend was spent painting the dining room a bright white. White is not a color that I have ever used in a room before and I felt like Tom Sawyer whitewashing walls. I am now realizing just-how-nice that large white wall will be to hang quilt tops when I’m not able to use my design wall.

This morning, I used my new bright white wall to pin up a finished quilt top to photograph. This quilt top is a reproduction album quilt and it was hand-pieced by members of a quilt guild that I used to belong to.

The close up blocks are where four blocks meet, showing the different fabrics used to assemble the quilt. Each guild member was given a packet of fabrics and each fabric was only used once in an album block. When the block was finished, I asked the guild member to sign their name on a piece of paper. Once the block was returned to me I traced each person’s signature with a Pigma sepia tone pen.

The quilt was inspired by a historic quilt that was documented by Linda Otto Lipsett in one of her books, and decided that I needed an album quilt for my own collection. Made with many reproduction cottons, calicos, plaids, and stripes, this quilt is one of my unfinished projects that I plan to hand-quilt. I also have the border to add, a mitered 5-inch or 6-inch border. 

Despite the gray fog, the rains, and the ice storm, I’m already reaping the benefits of my labor. Between the shining ice and the bright white walls, the weekend is a memorable one. And maybe those bright white walls won’t be so bad….

Gray Fog, Gray Quilt

Awake before the dawn, I can see that there is heavy fog outside. My neighbor’s outdoor light has been transformed — its illuminating brightness has dulled with this fog. Now, when standing at the window looking out, that light appears to be a distant star on the horizon.

I love how fog blurs images and softens edges. I also enjoy seeing how color is changed when fog is present. The thick, misty nature of gray fog reminds me of the Amish-style quilt that I have been hand-quilting now. This, too, is gray — not only in the plain square blocks, but there is some grayed tone to each of the solid colors chosen for this quilt.

The quilt is made as a traditional Amish-style reproduction quilt, using the patchwork block that has been attributed to pattern designer Ruth Finley. The patchwork block is known as either Crosses and Losses or Fox and Geese.

My quilt measures 40″  x 52″ and I am hand quilted it. Similar to many older Amish cotton quilts, this quilt has a thin cotton batting, so there isn’t much loft.

 

Feather wreathes are being hand quilted in the solid alternate gray squares. Parallel lines will be quilted in all of the outer half-squares (those next to the border). Outline quilting is in each of the patchwork blocks.

With the gray fog still hovering, this is a perfect morning to spend time hand quilting a gray Amish-style quilt.