Don't laugh....

(in no particular order) 
This week I am happy about:

1. I found good nectarines at Kroger! They weren't mealy and they weren't rocks. Just perfect, fragrant and juicy. I have been eating two a day because I know they won't last and they are my favorite fruit!


2.  I finished three customer quilts so far this week and am sending them home to their talented owners! Feels great!


3. I have still have one more year before my daughter starts learning to drive, I know it won't be long after that until she is off living her own life.


4. Coming home to yummy dinner smells issuing from my crockpot that I forgot I turned on that morning-- blissfully nice surprise!


5. My husband has two weeks of vacation coming up. *love*


6. Part of that vacation will be spent here:

7. Listening to Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix book on tape while I quilt. I read the whole series years ago but I am really enjoying falling into the magical world again.

8. My son, who now has feet bigger than mine- soon he'll be taller than me too and he can reach things for me.


9. New fabric at the store I am crushing on and will have to make something out of for a friend who is having a baby boy! I am attempting the Twister technique. Pictures soon to follow.


10. "The Farmer's Wife"blocks that are all over the quilting blogosphere right now all from this book. 


What is it about patchwork? It is just so cute! 
Hope you are all having a fantastic week too.

Design Workshop

I took a nifty class through my local quilt guild with Denise Green.  She asked us to bring in a "center"and a bunch of things that looked like coordinates and we'd play with them and build borders etc... on the center.  I had some experience with putting pieced borders on quilts but I had an inkling that the class might have some other good information and I was right!
Denise was a wealth of information and my fellow classmate and I had a great time with her all to ourselves! 

I started out with this fabric:

When we got it in the shop I immediately thought, "Oh I would love to play with that and some solids" so this workshop seemed like the ideal time to play since I had no pattern in mind! So off I went and gathered these:

I know not all of them are solids but the dot and the stripe were too perfect with the colors not to invite them to the party too.

Denise suggested several simple pieced border options in her directions. I like flying geese, so I decided to make some of those. I had this darn tool from I don't know how long ago still in the bag 

( can you believe it? *blush*) so I thought its time had come!  I pulled it out, ( brace yourself), READ THE DIRECTIONS and made flying geese four at a time with Eleanor Burns' method. Pretty nifty. Denise told me about another tool for flying geese called a "wingclipper" that is more versatile so no doubt I will have one of those in its package on my notions wall soon....

Anyway.

I pieced the geese together and with Denise's expertise in coping borders had a perfect fit for my center! Wah-lah! My fellow classmate came a bit more prepared than me so she got 2 rounds of borders on hers! We also gathered several other tidbits on making fast an accurate 4 patches and more. We made a pact to show off our products at the next guild meeting together too. 

The workshop was a really nice break for *me time*, I have otherwise been very busy with customer quilts.  Customer quilts are always really enjoyable for me each posing new possibilities and each unique but, then I have to send them home when they are done! It is nice to make something occasionally that I get to keep!

 Here is mine as of the end of class.  I really like it! It is happy and colorful and I have no plans for it whatsoever... should I add more borders to make it bigger? Or frame it on point and continue bordering to make it a quilt? or should I just call it done and quilt it into a wallhanging or pillow? It is about 18" square now.  Any thoughts?