Fabric Selection

I decided to reward myself for finishing the Quilts for Kids quilt top by making a doll quilt. Yes, I changed the thread. I will eventually have to change it back to finish the Quilt for Kids.

As I told you earlier, I am making a nine patch doll quilt that Kathleen Tracy submitted to the Fairfield site. I've given you a link already, and will give it to you again when I show the finished quilt. I grabbed a box of scraps, and added some additional scraps from the next box, and brought them downstairs where I sew. When I came downstairs, I made the decision that I should just use what I brought down, instead of going back upstairs for more scraps.

I really like the quirky combination of fabrics that make you think that someone dug deep down their scrap bin to find the fabrics to use in the quilt. Quirky is good, but of course, the wrong combination of fabrics can also ruin a quilt, so it was kinda scary. Of course, I had to weed out the ones that wouldn't work on the quilt. If my fabric combination is ugh and not quirky, please don't tell me. I don't want to know.

Anyway, I am done with the blocks, and have put the rows together. Just have to put the quilt together. I thought I would show you where some of the fabric came from.

All of the greens in the nine patch came from one quilt, but I can't remember which one! Okay, I remember. I made Orange Juice on the Patio quilt. I can't find a picture of it though.

The olive comes from the album quilt that is on the header.

The centers are from various places, including the Trip Around the World, and some fabric that was reserved, but hasn't been used yet, for the Jane quilt, and from these two quilts:





















The yellows I used as a background are both from other people. One of them came in a box of scraps I received from a fellow quilter. The other yellow came from someone at work to make a prayer quilt. Both the yellows were used in the prayer quilt and this one.

The setting triangles were already triangles in my scrap box and they were just the right size! I think I may have rejected them because I cut them the wrong size for the project, or maybe they were the wrong color. I don't remember what project they were intended for, but they fit just right in this quilt.

I cut two squares for the center, but was really unhappy with them. The directional prints are facing the wrong direction. I cheated and searched my Jane quilt fabric (not called scraps until the quilt is done) to find
two pink squares that were actually used in the Delectable Mountains Quilt:



The brown border fabrics was used in a quilt for my mother, and the blue one has been in many blue quilts, including the star one shown above.

Eventually I will show you the finished doll quilt.

Grocery Shopping

I think I've told you before about the conflicting dietary restrictions in our family. Low fat, low salt, low carbs, vegan, no MSG, no BHT, no hydrogenated oils. Everything my daughter is willing to eat can be written down on one side of one piece of paper. I know, because that piece of paper is hanging on my refrigerator door.

But now I have freedom. I can eat anything I want!

Unfortunately, somewhere along the way, my body decided that it wanted to come up with some dietary restrictions of its own. No tea, which is a hard one for me because I really like tea. I can drink the herbal stuff though. That one has been around for a while. The new one, and it is a big one, is wheat. I think that my body is rejecting wheat. I decided to make sure it was wheat by trial and error. I am going to cut it out of my diet completely and see if that makes me feel better. I also want to try to reduce the salt in my diet without increasing the fat.

I took my coupons to the store. There was one that gave you $7 of if you buy $70 worth of groceries. I worked around the store looking at labels to avoid wheat products. You know what? I eat a LOT of wheat. I was able to find very few things that I could actually buy. Even the frozen food that didn't have noodles had wheat of some kind. I couldn't use my $7 coupon because I couldn't find $70 worth of things to buy.

My bonus buy, one I wasn't expecting, Snickers was 2 for $1.00, and I had a 50 cent coupon that was doubled, so free chocolate! Today they have triple coupons. Snickers doesn't have any wheat.

Since I need frozen foods to pack for lunch, I decided to make my own. I did buy a big family pack of chicken breasts, and cooked them all yesterday, along with four cups of rice. I only made two things - Garlic Lime Chicken and Stir Fry - I figure that I can make large batches each time I make something, I will eventually get variety. I saved a batch of each to eat, and froze the rest. I made it all at the same time, so it didn't really take much more time than it would have to just make a smaller batch.

The one thing they don't mention on the saving money blog is that you have to have organized plasticware in order to do this project. I haven't organized my plasticware for a couple of years, and somehow the matches have all walked away. I worked it out, but I didn't want to leave the food out too long, so put it in the freezer as quickly as I could find a match and wash, fill, and label it.

A picture of chocolate is better than a picture of plastic anyway. And it matches my new blog colors!

Quilts For Kids

I haven't been able to add a weekly post to Amy's Sew and Tell, but finally this week, I can, and so I did!

I forgot to take a picture of my King Fu Panda quilt, but Mary has made one just like it, so look here. The only difference is that mine didn't have a binding.

I'm now making a quilt with the same colors, but with dogs. Since I'm using red thread, it is limiting what other things I can work on at the same time. You know, because it is so hard to change the thread.

There's snow on the grass today. Whatever happened to spring?

I changed my blog banner again. Yes, yet another UFO coming to haunt me. The blog now seems seems more fall like than spring like, but I can never keep up with seasons and holidays anyway.

Health Care Debate

Don't worry, I'm not going to be debating health care on the blog. The great health care debate has been going on among the politicians, and come to us as interpreted by the media.

Politically, I don't believe in the ideals of either of our parties. There are parts and pieces I like about each party. So I feel that they should be able to talk to each other and think through reasonable, reasoned, solutions.

Everyone I personally talk to about politics, for the most part, has the same opinion as I do. But a lot of my friends on my facebook account, many of them are strangers and befriended only for game playing purposes, have a different opinion. I really think that part of the reason we pick a particular side or another is because of the influences of the people around us. I think that's why everyone seems to think that everyone has the same opinion as they do.

This is such a hot topic, that I wanted to make sure I understood both sides of it clearly, from regular people, so I could come up with my own, reasoned opinion about this. I have an opinion, and I don't think it is going to change much, but I want to make sure it is properly thought through.

Yesterday at lunch, I broke taboo and asked my lunch mate about his opinion. As we were talking, another man walked up, and I asked him. Both of them were on different sides. Perfect, right? Now we can get to the bottom of this.

I understand why the the politicians can't come up with reasoned decisions. They were both civil, but both of them had higher blood pressure after the debate. They probably both went away thinking that the other one was selfish, viewing the topic only in terms of themselves and their loved ones, and whatever would work best for them.

I think I should just stick to talking about quilts. I might bore them to tears, but they'll be able to maintain their blood pressure. Who knows, it might even be able to lower their blood pressure.

Copycat

Okay, I'm a copycat. Paula changed her blog, using blogger's new Blogger In Draft feature and I decided to do mine too. It's hard to let go of the old, but there are so many beautiful templates out there. I did it pretty quickly, and I'm not sure I'm completely happy with it, so be sure to let me know what I can do to improve it for you.

New Beginnings

I've been putting things off lately, "this has to wait until after the gathering." We had a family gathering on Friday. Then "it has to wait until the plane leaves." The plane left yesterday, and my daughter is now in back to school mode. It didn't hit me until mid-afternoon that she is on the other side of the world.

The "until" is over. Which means all the to-do things can now be done. Except that I don't want to.

There are all those unfinished quilts that want to be finished, and a car that wants to be pampered, and paper that wants to be recycled, a body that wants a new diet and exercise plan, a house that wants spring cleaned. And that long list of quilts to make that resides only in my brain likes to come out from time to time to make sure none of them are forgotten.

I don't have a recent photo to show you so I pulled one out from a year ago. Sigh, another unfinished project that is taunting me.

I was reading Kathleen Tracy's blog, and she mentioned that she was offering a free doll quilt pattern on the Fairfield batting website. You have to click on the picture to get the pdf. I figured that a simple nine patch doll quilt would be just the right medicine. (Please don't ask about any unfinished doll quilts - they will get done eventually.) A small quick project I can fit into my big quick Quilts for Kids projects.

I think the pioneer days ladies had it easy. They could look into their scrap baskets and look at the size of the pieces and use whatever they had. Now, we have to weed out our scraps that don't fit the mood or scheme we are using. Is this too bright? Too modern? Too whatever. I have to say that all of the fabric I chose is too wrinkled.

It's in the ironing pile.

Happy Spring

The last batch of pictures I uploaded to my computer were snow pictures. That seems like a lifetime ago. I thought I should take some nicer pictures. Lots of promise.




I received another four kits from Quilts for Kids. I was thinking I was going to share them, knowing there was a possibility that I would be making them all myself. My mother's sewing machine is broken, so I think I am on my own. I already want to make something for myself, so I'm pretty sure my quilting pace will be picked up, so I can fit it all in. It's going to be a busy spring, so don't hold your breath waiting for a finished quilt!