Irish Chain Quilt Piecing Complete

I feel like I have given birth to a HUGE quilt. This is a pattern by Eleanor Burns who I think is a wonderful teacher. I saw this quilt on the bed of a friend when I stayed at her lovely house. I decided to do it in blue and yellow...sort of scrappy with fabric from my stash.

It went together quite well. I have never done a Seminole broder before but this was not hard at all. Her directions were excellent. I think I found an error on the cornerstones but figured out the right size to cut those squares.

Now I am hoping to quilt this on my new Janome that I bought in Paducah at the big quilt show. I will put it away for a bit so I am sort of tired of working on it. I will have to rearrange my whole sewing room so I can put a table behind the machine to help support the weight of it.

Bird Families

Our lovely New England like weather seems to be a thing of the past. Yesterday was almost HOT and today already has that humid sticky feeling. 2 of the blue birds left the nest yesterday. I did not see them anywhere but could peek inside and see that 2 were left. When I checked early today the nest was empty.

A Mother Plover (I think that is the type of bird) and Father were screaming Sunday and flying all over the yard. I had to take a look outside and see what the fuss was all about. There were 3 tiny chicks in the driveway scurrying all over. My husband caught one to relocate it away from the street. He had a hard time holding onto it without squeezing too hard.

I am still working on my Irish Chain quilt Seminole borders. This techinique is not hard but time consuming. I took some time yesterday to go through things in the sewing room closet. I gathered all my small pieces of batting into one plastic type tote box. I will work on that again today.

The Search For Enough

We live in a wonderful country and a booming economy. Advertising cries out BUY ME. TV shows show an obscene amount of goods on their decorating shows...especially HGTV. This can cause people to get into debt way over their salary. Buy me now and worry about paying it another day. It becomes an endless cycle of debt and the necessity of working so many hours. But does it buy happiness?????

It makes me wonder why are we buying all this stuff? Our houses have gotten much bigger and our families much smaller. I see huge houses that are empty all day long. Everyone is so busy making enough money to pay for them. How do they have time to even enjoy them?

Super Saturday

This weather is truly wonderful. We are usually into HOT and humid but not right now. And right now is all we actually have. So I will enjoy another beautiful day.

I took this picture yesterday in the backyard. This is the residents bluebird's second family. I can see some blue on the wings of the 4 babies. They will soon be leaving the nest. The parents are the very best. Occasionally they will rear a third family according to my book but did not do that last year. Time will tell.

I redid all the mistakes on my Irish Chain blocks yesterday and started sewing the rows together. There is still a lot of work making the borders. This is a pattern by Elenore Burns. She gives very detailed directions and IF YOU FOLLOW them all is good. I sometimes get the pressing direction wrong and have to redo that.

Summer Bliss

Today I have a long summer vacation stretched out ahead of me. When I was a student I never even considered that teachers would like having the summer off. I guess I thought they loved being in the classroom.

My last official tour ended yesterday with a group of children attending a camp. They were in no mood to learn history so I had to try to make it just a fun tour for them. They were a bit rowdy but then kids should not be little soldiers either.

I have a picture another guide sent me of a view coming into the dock of the Maryland Dove.

So I must work on controlling my spending so that I can continue with a wonderful part time job. My biggest area of weakness is fabric. I guess it could be much worse.

Today I will work on the big Irish Chain Quilt. I discovered a mistake made twice in 31 blocks so I have a whole bunch of ripping and resewing. I considered just leaving it but decided not to. I am trying to work on slowing down and enjoying the process. Mistakes are part of that. I hope to sit outside in the shade and get that done today.

Perfect Morning

Welcome to all who find themselves in my little corner of the web.

Today is one of those days where it is good to be alive. The day is cool to start, the birds are singing and the sun shining. It is day to maybe turn off the news and turn onto the beauty all around us.

I hope to share a picture with you of one of the hummingbirds that come to our house.