Counting the days - WIP Wednesday

Wow, it has been well over a month since I posted a WIP Wednesday progress report.  It got me thinking that a weekly progress report is somewhat silly.  I already have the report at the end/beginning of the month outlining my finishes and goals for each month, do I need a weekly report?  Do I even really have that much to report weekly?  Nope!  Especially with the kids out of school for summer.  I am counting the days until school starts.  I feel like I am getting nothing done at all.  Thus, I plan on only posting a WIP report somewhere in the middle of the month.  That way it will be a true progress report on my goals and my projects.  Who knows?  Perhaps when school starts it will actually be chock full of WIP's then!

This Wednesday...

Completed Projects:

• Bee Blocks - Simply Solids July and August
• Star of Africa - One block done!
• June for Jen item (only a couple months late) - my sewing mat is done!  I will post finish pics on Friday

On-going Projects:

AKA - "stuff I plan to touch this week or next".

• Bee Blocks & BOM blocks - Lucky Star BOM (4 blocks), 
• Star of Africa Bee - 4 blocks to do
• Swoon - 2 block done!  Oooh, this one is going to be good.
• Commission quilt - I have most of the fabric and the pattern, need to start cutting it.
• QAYG bag - I'm puttin' it on the list!  I really want one.  Like now.

Back, Back, Back Burner:

These will likely be touched sometime in the future - I should really rename this category to "I want to remember that I have these projects, but realistically they won't be touched till 2015 because I'm too busy doing other stuff"

• Beginner Quilt Along at Quilting Gallery - Finally basted this one!  I'm hoping to get the SID done this month.
• I picked up 3 charity quilt "Kits" from the last guild meeting I attended.  I was under the impression that each kit had a top, batting and backing and were all ready to be basted and quilted.  Well....that wasn't exactly the case.  They all have tops, but two need to be trimmed and squared up, and all the backings need to be pieced.  One kit was already spray basted and it looked like someone had started the quilting, but ripped it out.  Unfortunately, the thing had sat folded up for so long that everything shifted, or maybe it was basted improperly to begin with.  If I had quilted it as is, there would have been horrendous puckers on the back.  The backing also doesn't fit.  It is way too small and doesn't even cover the size of the top.  Long story shorter, all of these need some work before I can quilt them.  Sigh.
• Handstitched Medallion quilt - Yep this one is back on the list.  I finished up all but the final border (which of course has the most hand quilting).  I've even already made the binding for this one in anticipation of the final step.

This week's stats:

Completed projects - 1 plus blocks
New projects - 2
Currently in Progress - 5 ish

Don't forget to link up any blocks you have been working on to the Building Blocks Tuesday post.  It stays open for a whole week.

And as always, thanks for reading,

Jen



Linking up with

 

Lanky palm trees - Building Blocks Tuesday

I'm starting to chip away at the 5 blocks I owe my Star of Africa bee mates.  Here is the block I have made for Brinda who asked for trees.

I have shared previously that I grew up in South Florida.  Now, I live in Southern California.  What do those two places have in common?   Palm trees.  There are a bunch of different kinds of palm trees, but the ones you see most frequently here are so funny looking.  I think they are "Mexican Palms", but regardless of their name, they are ridiculous.  They can grow up to 5 stories high, and yet have such skinny trunks that you wonder how they can support themselves to grow so high.  And they are everywhere!  Just google "California palm trees" and look at the images that come up.  They line many a street and are even planted in highway medians.

I couldn't resist putting the Hollywood sign in the background to my palm trees.  It is an image that comes up frequently when I think of people visiting Los Angeles.

What have you been working on this week?  I want to know!  Link up your fabulous blocks.  You put a lot of hard work into them - show them off!  This free linky will stay open for a whole week.

Rules:

1) Please link up only to the page in your blog showing your wonderful blocks, not just the blog homepage.  Flickr pictures are also OK.
2) Make sure to put your blog name as the description so people know where they are going or the name of your block!
3) Please grab my button and post it in your blog post or sidebar.
4) Visit other linky participants!

Thanks for reading!

Jen

Inspirational Sunday 1 - via the International Quilt Festival in Long Beach 2013

Ah where to begin.....there were so many beautiful quilts at the show.  Usually I try to group the quilts into categories for sharing - modern, applique, subject matter of art quilts, etc.

This Sunday, I would like to start off by sharing a few quilts that I thought were exceptionally striking to the eye!  Nothing like BIG visual impact to kick things off.

This one is called "Wrath" by Dianne Firth of Turner Australia.

You could spot this one from across the convention center, but it was the up-close view that was interesting. It did not look pieced, at least not how we would think to do it.   It is actually torn strip collage, machine stitched (where I am not sure) and machine quilted.  I expected to see seams at each turn of an angle, like a log cabin type of construction, but what I saw was raw edges.  The straight-line quilting really helped everything stay in place and helped define the straight edges.

The quilter says this about her inspiration, "From an environmental perspective, but using a human term, wrath can be used to describe the uncontrollable forces of nature that wreak havoc on humankind through fire, flood, cyclones and other disasters.  The colour red is symbolic of these forces and the fractured circular motif is symbolic of the turmoil."

The next one is like a big floral bulls-eye...

It is called "Flower Extraordinaire" by Jean Smith of Naples, Florida.  It is pieced, beaded, and free motion quilted.  She says, "I have been designing and creating quilts with fabric rays radiating from a center point.  I took my technique to the next level using an overhead projector, freezer paper and 400 scraps of fabric.  My flower grew on my design wall with circles and prairie points."

One thing I liked seeing upon closer inspection is that the rings don't line up perfectly.  I think it adds to the visual impact and feeds the radiating feel that she was going for.

I hope you don't get tired of seeing flowers on quilts!  One of the larger exhibits was spring themed, so there were lots of flower quilts!  In fact, I think I will share a few more next week!

Have you made a quilt recently with big visual impact?  Tell me about it.

Thanks for reading today,

Jen