I watched Sharon Schamber’s free video on pinless, painless basting to see what she did differently and used her herringbone basting stitch on this mini quilt top I finished this weekend. Excuse the wrinkles on the top….it was flat when I basted it! I had folded it to bring along on the MetroLink with me and then remembered I wanted a picture 
I’m going to try my hand at quilting free-handed fans on this one.
Just a few more details and the kitchen will be finished. We still need to paint, install baseboards and hang curtains (that I have to make). We haven’t found the right paint color so I’ll be picking up some more paint chips this weekend. Here are some pictures. Daddy, what do you think?
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I’ve made a several hooked rugs. In fact, I hooked up my SIL’s rug kit for her and she gave me her rug hooking hoop. A great trade since she discovered she didn’t like rug hooking and I do! I have two rug kits that have been aging in my closet for several years so (see date in picture below) when the mood finally struck me last month, I pulled one out and got started. I’d forgotten how much I enjoy hooking. Here’s my progress so far:
I was browsing on the web and saw some tutorials on hooked rugs. I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me before, but many people use their rotary cutter to cut their wool into strips. I have a cutter but the blades I have are for much narrower strips and I like the look of wider strips but didn’t want to pay the cost of new blades. I have accumulated some wool so I’ll have to experiment a little
Wow! St Louis’ new City Garden is terrific. It opened July 1st and we visited it this on Saturday while taking in the fesivities for baseball’s All Star Home Run Derby and All Star Game which are July 13th & 14th. Here’s a link to an article about the City Garden from the San Jose, California Mercury News and another link from Kansas City. It was hot and way too humid to be walking around but the City Garden was quite fun. There is lots of lighting and I want to return and see the park in the evening sometime. There is a restaurant that hasn’t opened yet so maybe we’ll check it out too. I took lots of pictures and here are some of them.
There were two of these animated walking people.
Check out the three cops sitting there……there were lots and lots of police out and about because of the All Star activities.
This picture is for my brother and sister-in-law 
Really a wonderful place in the city.
At the First Saturday at the Quilted Fox we got to see three quilt tops made from the Foxey Fassett blocks.
The owner, Louise Georgia, put her blocks together with a wonderful Fassett border.
Another quilter, Jane Coons, added 2″ sashing with a Fassett fabric pieced in to connect the blocks. This one is already quilted and waiting for binding!
Both of the above quilts used the main and alternate blocks. The quilt below used only the main blocks but included some additional piecing.
I haven’t yet decided exactly how I’ll finish these and I have yet to complete the blocks from the last First Saturday, but I’m leaning towards the layout of the second quilt. The additional white space seems to calm the whole quilt down.
The next First Saturday begins in August and is Asian Surprise. Before we’ve never seen the quilt layout at the beginning so it was a surprise to see a drawing of the next one. The colors in each block will be different which is a signature of Louise’s First Saturday programs. I’ve signed up for the alternate block for this one so the expected finished size is 62 x 86. I typically don’t care for Asian fabrics but Louise’s quilts are always beautiful and make wonderful gifts.
I cut up some of the scraps that my SIL brought me and used some to make up a couple of 9 patch 9 patches. I want to make a quilt of these without sashing and maybe without borders.
I mentioned before I planted both sunflower (mixed colors for show, not seeds) and zinnia seeds. They have done terrifically well and the first sunflower has opened
The tomatoes are wild and bushy. They are taking over the small garden we planted and there are grape, cherry and yellow cherry tomatoes ready to pick almost every day. There is also one acron squash growing…..we planted both acron and butternut squash and the vines are growing everywhere, including into the tomatoes.
Now for the renovations. These photos are for my Dad whom we asked to help (meaning he’d do it with our help) do some kitchen renovations this fall when my parents come to visit. Well, our neighbors had their kitchen redone and we like what the cabinet guy did so much we decided to just hire it done. We are having the cabinets resurfaced, adding a pantry made possible by going from a separate stove top and oven to a range, adding a cabinet, and having the floor and back splash tiled. So, Daddy, here’s some pictures……maybe you can build me a raised garden bed instead
Before
Notice the shutter door? This is what we call the cave….you’ll see why in a picture somewhere below
See the two holes in the wall below the oven….needed to make sure the new pantry could go all the way to the floor
During
New cabinet where there was nothing previously.
New pantry, yipee!
Off with the old laminate…..
Here’s the cave all framed out.
On with the new laminate.
A while back I shared some pictures of Harriet Powers’ Bible Quilt. Now there’s a book out titled This I Accomplish: Harriet Powers Bible Quilt and Other Pieces by Kyra Hicks. I’m looking to get my hands on this book, if for nothing else than the 20 pictures that are included!
My sister-in-law, Connie, brought me a 4th of July surprise. She went to the Quilter’s General Store in Rockford, IL and filled a bag from their scrap bin. Lots of Jo Morton and Windham fabric and she even through in a couple of pieces of contemporary fabric, Woo Hoo!!!! Here’s the bag they have to fit in…with the top zipped closed.
Connie is the champ at getting the most fabric in the bag and getting it to close She also gave me this piece of beautiful red fabric. Too cool. Thanks Connie, you’re fun, fun sister-in-law!
I’ve FINALLY gotten the binding sewn on the Tiger Lily wall hanging and I plan to get the hand sewing done over the 4th weekend. This pattern was in the Better Homes & Gardens 2001 Quilt Sampler Top 10 quilt shops magazine and is from the Quilters General Store in Rockford, IL. I appliqued this project while computing to work on the MetroLink starting in Oct 2002, completing the applique in March 2004. I sewed the top together and sent it off to my mom to quilt. She took a while to get to it and then I let it sit and sit and sit. Why you ask? Because I didn’t have a deadline. It will be nice to have this project finished
