Garden Views

Phew - the last three weeks have been way too busy, but I have survived.  It was all good stuff, however took up a lot of time - ie DGS's swimming lessons, visiting cousins from out of state, minding DGS 2 while mom gets a little special time with DGD Lily, and guild stuff and Friends stuff and time with DH - LOL not much time for quilting.  Through it all trying to get a last hurrah from my spring garden before the HEAT descends on it.  So here are some pics of the last of it:  I have enjoyed it and credit mostly goes to the weather that has allowed us to have quite a few cooler days than normal (anywhere from 4 to 10 degrees cooler than normal).  Here are the last of my rose geraniums - more on those later.  Located uphill from our carport in a mostly sunny spot.  These might have bloomed longer, but I was not able to prune the old blooms off.  Now here are some lilies that my husband moved while making the new wall around our planting area out front.  He just plopped the bunch under my Cecil Bruner (not even planted) and I was waiting to move it to when he was done.  However, I forgot and in their time in that location, they decided to bloom.  Aren't they lovely!  I think I will leave them there.  Next is the planting along the north side of the house.  I've started to plant wildflowers there and sweet peas.  The sweet peas didn't amount to much (planted too late) but I will get some seed.  I like to plant in this area cuz then I can see the flowers from my hallway.

Lastly, just to the left of my carport we have these lovely white white epiphyllums that are just blooming away!  These flowers open in the early morning and have such a delicate scent to them.  It is just glorious to go somewhere in the car and have these to view as I am backing out.  I love flowers!

Design Wall Monday - 6/7

Well, jury duty is postponed for later in the week so I will do this now to get it in before they call and say come in.  Our system is set up one day or one trial.  I didn't get to work on the dresden scrappy. Instead I have a blanket of belief for our soldiers angels project on the design wall so to speak.  I'm part of the binders.  They want all the binding done by machine because these quilt will get a lot of wear and they don't want them to come apart in the washings or use.

Thread Painting

Well didn't get much done on the scrappy coverlet as I attended a thread painting workshop by Phyllis Binkley and wanted to finish doing the sample.  I thought it was going to be a landscape class after her lecture and trunk show.  She had so many beautiful quilts that looked like photographs!  You can see her work at:  http://www.landscapeartquilts.com/  So after her presentation, I signed right up.  Come to find out the workshop she gives at guilds is a thread painting class. You have to go to her house to do the landscape part.  All you bring is some scissors and photos.  Since I had already paid and said I would come, I stuck it out and I'm glad I did.  It may not be the kind of technique I use often - I like to make bed, lap and baby quilts - not so much wall hangings.  But she taught me that I can do this.  So here is my sample.  We wrote right on the cloth (notes to remind us how we did the different techniques) and it made me feel much more confident about using the machine to do more on my quilts.  We learn machine beading, embellishing with thread, marking perspective, blending material and thread, coping with metallic thread, 3-d work and lots more.  What do you think? Well, looking at the pic I think I should learn to use my macro so you can see more detail.  So much to learn!