Surrounded by Color

Since my surgery on the 15th, I have been surrounded by color. It has been grey, rainy, cool, and dismal outside, but not in my house. :-) Wouldn't the soft colors in this close-up make a pretty quilt?

I am tired and sore, but I can honestly say that I am doing great. I haven't had any desire to read or do any quilting, so I have watched hours of mindless TV. I wish I had kept track of how many Hallmark holiday movies I have seen. At this point I could write the scripts for them!!!  I'm not knocking them as they are a pleasant enough diversion.

I did see a blog post at the end of last week on  "English Paper Piecing Hexagons and Grandmother 's Flower Garden Blocks" on a Quilting Life . Her white, grey, and black background is bright and modern and I was hooked. I ordered the pdf of the pattern and have begun working on the hexagons. This blogger also has a number of YouTube tutorials including one on English paper piecing. I've got six made so far. :-) I enjoy hand stitching and these are fun to work on.

Have a colorful week.

A Speed Bump on the Road of Life

The other day I was doing some errands at The Launch in the Hingham Shipyard when this scene caught my eye.

At today's meeting of the Crosstown Quilters our speaker was David Sirota from Manchester, NH, whose hilarious talk was entitled "What Makes a Quilter Tick." Laughter filled the hall as he is one very funny guy. He mentioned that besides teaching at guilds locally, he is an instructor at the Mancuso World Quilt Shows which are held around the country. If you ever get the chance, sign up for one of his classes. We hope to have him come back to our guild some time in the future to teach a class.

I was deeply touched by words of support and encouragement and by the many warm hugs I received from members. Why? Well, I had informed the members in an email last week that I have been diagnosed with breast cancer. Since I am president of this guild, I felt that the member should know why I will be missing a few meetings, and I knew that I would be added to some prayer lists. 

This is my second time dealing with breast cancer; the last time was eleven years ago.  At that time, I had a mastectomy and chemotherapy. On this Thursday morning, I will be having another mastectomy. This time, the cancer was found very early, so God willing, this surgery will preclude the need for any additional treatment. . . that is my hope.

So, may I take this opportunity to ask, are you up to date on your mammograms??? No excuses. If the answer is "no," please call and make an appointment today. Early detection can make all the difference. And one more thing, I know that I will be fine, but I sure wouldn't mind if you sent some positive energy, good wishes, and a few prayers my way. :-)

A Little Bit of Stitching Going On

I fell in love with this Autumn wall hanging kit when I saw it in the Shabby Fabrics catalogue. I could have simply purchased the pattern, but the colors were so perfect that I purchased the kit.

Here's the wool stitched pumpkin that Carole from My Carolina Home offered as a stitch along as one of her Autumn Jubilee projects.

I also managed to make two breast cancer comfort pillows. Nancy H. from our guild brings them to our local cancer center. They are used by patients having any type of chest or abdominal surgery, and they are much appreciated.

In the front are three pillowcases for Anne M.'s group which coordinates quilts for the children of service men and women who are being deployed. The older children prefer  pillowcases. You may find directions for the breast cancer pillows and pillowcases here.

Finally, last Wednesday my cousin Kristin and her girls came for Ladies Lunch. We went to the Strawberry Fair  in Norwell which was a hit with the girls. Though it was far too early for any real Christmas spirit, we made our annual visit to The Christmas Place in Abington where the penguin band was tuned up and serenading early shoppers.  The musical penguins are guaranteed to put a smile on anyone's face. We normally visit a bit closer to Christmas, but that would not be possible this year.

Gazebo in Autumn

This gazebo is not too far from my home. If you follow my blog, you have seen many images of it. I have to say that this is one of my all-time favorites. I drove by this spot the other day and though I had my iPhone with me, I went back home for my 'real' camera, and I'm so glad that I did.

After church this morning, I photographed this rose. Believe it or not, there are more buds to come unless Mother Nature has other plans for early November. :-)
 

 Then when I turned around, my neighbor's maple tree was positively aglow. Blue, green yellow and red . . . a very colorful morning. The foliage had been somewhat blah, but a few cold nights have brought forth a bit more color.

Have a colorful, joyful week.

Hancock Adams Common

The other day I went to lunch with friends at a local restaurant and this scene caught my eye.  Along the wall separating a smaller room from the main dining room there is a wall with wine racks. The sun was hitting this grouping at such an angle that the bottles positively glowed.

Today, I  played around with this photo in the Moku Hanga iPad app which renders images to resemble Japanese wood block prints. Pretty cool . . .

Since I was in Quincy Center on Friday, I thought I would photograph the John Hancock statue at the Hancock Adams Common in front of Quincy City Hall. I had posted a photo of John Adams in an earlier post.

 

The sculptor did a wonderful job capturing the signature of this merchant and patriot.

Hancock is at one end of the Common and John Adams at the other. The common is across from the Church of the Presidents where both John Adams and his son John Quincy Adams along with their wives are buried.

It really is quite well done.

I do wonder, however, why it is the Hancock Adams Common and not the Adams Hancock Common??? They were both towering founding fathers, but Adams was our second President. You might have thought his name would have come first. . . . . . 

"Wrapped in Comfort" - Scenes from Our Crosstown Quilters Guild Show 2018

As promised, here are just a few quilts from our show last weekend. This octopus quilt was made by Donna as was this lovely hand embroidered piece, "Over the River and Through the Woods." I have seen it done in redwork, bluework, and in tones of brown, but in black is was truly amazing.

*** Click on any card below a quilt to read more info in a clearer, larger format. ***

A wall of red, white, and blue BOMs (blocks of the month) . . .

 

 

 

 This music theme piece was quilted with gold thread which was striking, but unfortunately, it doesn't show up well in this image.

Don't you wish that you had stopped by? There were ninety-eight quilts on display. What I tried to do was show you the diversity of the quilts shown; I would love to have been able to show them all!!!

So, if you are not a quilter, the next time that you see a quilt show advertised, by all means stop in.  You will be amazed.

Quilted Autumn Wallhanging

What a wonderful weekend it was!!! "Wrapped in Comfort," the Crosstown Quilters Guild Quilt Show this weekend was a great success judging by the smiles and comments of visitors to the show. Tomorrow, I will post photos of some of the quilts that were on display.

Saturday afternoon, there was a family birthday party for my thirteen year old triplet cousins.  My, how the time has flown.

For today, I thought that I would post about this recently completed autumn wallhanging. Last summer,  I attended a workshop sponsored by the Quilters Connection Quilt Guild in Watertown featuring renowned fiber artist Betty Busby from Albuquerque, New Mexico.  The two-day workshop took place in a non-air conditioned old brick school on two of the very hottest days of the season.

One of the activities was creating leaves. We gathered real leaves, painted the veins, and stamped then on a sheet of Evolon, a microfiber product. The stamped designs were colored in using Inktense pencils. We then applied aloe vera gel or plain water to blend and make the colors deeper. My tablemate had brought some Lumiere paint which she graciously allowed me to borrow, and I lightly brushed some on the leaves.  (I even bravely added a few more 'sun-kissed' mini streaks to the leaves after completing this piece.)

I had begun the project by pulling autumnal colored batiks, but soon realized I would need more to make the curved strip piece that I wanted for the background, so it was back to my stash to find more. Surprise, surprise, I had enough in my stash.

We had made various sized leaves, but I chose to work with a smaller size in this piece. (These leaves are truly much prettier in person.)

After completing the background, I arranged and stitched the leaves. This close up will give you an idea of how I quilted it.

All in all, I was very pleased with the piece and happy that I had finally used the leaves.  :-)

I finished reading another book this week, The House at the Edge of Night: A Novel by Catherine
Banner which I do recommend. The setting is a remote fictional island, Castellamare, off the coast of Sicily. The characters include: the doctor Amadeo, a collector of fables and stories; his wife Pina, a woman of grace and intelligence, his daughter Maria-Grazia who struggles to keep the family's bar and only source of income thriving, and her soldier husband Robert who washes up on the shoreline and falls in love with both Maria-Grazia and the island. This multi-generational story traces the lives of the island inhabitants through the course of the 19th century. At first somewhat isolated from the forces of the outside world, they gradually become more and more influenced by the world beyond their shore. It's a novel of beliefs, customs, rituals, superstitions, and traditions.

Will you like the people of Castellamare? Yes, some more than others, but you will come to know them all well.

I would warn you that it is definitely not an easy book to get in to. I had read about this novel on another blog. That blogger had spoken glowingly about it attributes. Frankly, for the good first fifty to one hundred pages, I was considering ditching it and couldn't imagine what the blogger had seen in it. But, I stayed with it and ultimately found it worthwhile.