Cold Snap and Scrap Attack, and Some New Free Motion Designs of My Own!

Like everyone else, I've been glued to my TV watching the aftermath of the horrible storm in Oklahoma that happened this week.  My mom's side of the family are all originally from Oklahoma, but none of them, thankfully, were affected.

State of Oklahoma

One of the best things about quilting your own quilt is that you can stitch anything you want into it.  I love stitching little "hidden messages" into my quilts.  I've been trying to finish up my "Scrap Attack Quilt this week, and decided to stitch the state of Oklahoma into one of the blocks.  It's hard to see, but it's there.

Topo Map

Cells

Protozoa

Spirochetes

I decided that since this is a scrappy sampler quilt, that the quilting should be as well.  It was also a great excuse to practice some of the designs I have wanted to try but didn't want to commit to a whole quilt. Here are some of my favorite designs.  A few are from Leah Day's website, but I'm trying more and more to create my own.  I made up some "cells", "spirochetes", and "protozoa".  I love Leah's "topo map" design, and will for sure be doing this again, as well as my very own new ones  I also attempted a "stream bed", and tried again to learn to like pivoting designs, but alas, I'm afraid I really don't like them.  Hate to admit it, but I really don't like traditional feathers either... not even enough to attempt them, but maybe my next design will be real feathers :-).

I also decided that I'd try to use a thread that doesn't "match" the sashing, and like how that turned out too!  I'm hoping to finish up the border and binding today or tomorrow.

Finally, here's a shot of our garden that I took last night as the sun was going down.  We had a record cold snap last night, and got a good freeze, but luckily our efforts to protect everything worked.  A few weeks ago we had record high temperatures.  I can't help wondering if the massive tornadoes and our record temperature extremes are related to global climate change.  I believe that they are.  We as a family have taken many steps to try to minimize our impact, but I sure wish governments would step up to the plate and address this most important issue.

Finishes, WIP's and Bangladesh

First of all, I have a finished Deer / Elk block from the Forest QAL.  I think this is my husband's favorite, and I tried to make it resemble our local elk...

I also finished up a ribbon board to use to display some of my fabric postcards at a local art show.  I forgot to get a finished picture before dropping it off at the local art center, but I'll try to get one soon.  I also have some of my quilts in an upcoming quilt show. I've already helped register quilts, and plan to help hang them later this week!  It's one of my favorite week-ends of the year!  Thanks to efforts to finish up my quilt tops, I had a record number of finishes this year... something like 11 or 12 in all!

That brings me to my May A Lovely Year of Finishes goal...  I will work on what's now my oldest WIP, my "Scrap Attack" quilt that I finished up a year ago!

Finally, and most importantly, I've been thinking a lot about where my clothes come from after the recent devastating garment factory building collapse in Bangladesh.  I can't help but think of all of those mostly women, with families of their own who paid the ultimate price for our cheap clothing.  I've tried for years to buy clothing made in the USA, or used clothes from thrift stores.  I make clothes for me and my family as well, but I can do better.  I have a fair number of clothes made in China or, yes, Bangladesh.  Over the years, it has been harder and harder to find USA-made clothes.  I can find them though, and hope everyone will start looking a little closer, asking questions, and seeking for fair trade clothing.

I've bought clothes from USA made American Apparel, Pointer Brand, and Jody California.  Some New Balance shoes are also still made in the USA.  I often find USA made clothing in smaller scale stores... ranch and home stores, mom and pop stores, and even larger chain stores like Bi Mart.  I've decided to start again making more of my clothes and my family's clothes in the future.  Sure, it's easier and less expensive to buy discount clothing in stores, but I can't keep paying the ultimate price of exploitation, and dangerous, even fatal working conditions of these sisters, mothers, wives and daughters..

Ombré Quilt

First of all, I really want to shout out a very big thank you for all of the wonderfully smart, generous ladies who have helped me out on the computer part of this blog!  Thanks to Amy, and Beth recently for explaining how to take anonymous commentators off my blog, and thanks to Debbie for helping me get signed up for Instagram and telling me how to browse from my computer via Web.stagram.com.  Thanks also to Kit, Shanna, and Marlene.  You all have taught me so much about blogging and computers!!  I'm very grateful!!!

Speaking of Instagram, I'm now on there as "Solar Threads".  I don't have a smart phone, but did get an ipad mini for Christmas, which has a camera, and the ability to finally get on board!  I can also now get on-line when DH is using our shared computer, or we're using it's monitor to watch TV.

Finally, here's my finished 2013 Project Quilting top for this weeks' challenge.  The challenge is to use white and one other color.  I knew immediately that I could use this to scratch another project in my "project file" off of the list.  I've been wanting to make an ombré quilt for a while now.  I originally wanted to make a bed sized quilt, but this mini may be all it takes to get this itch scratched and move on.  I also have my most full scrap bin, blue, totally under control again!  Between my log cabin cat quilt (yellow and green), my Purple Haze Quilt (purple), the Low Volume (cream and white) and this one (blue), I have literally done a scrap quilt journey through the colors.  Sadly, my orange and red scraps are all in one bin that has never become full.

While scrap quilts aren't my favorite to make, I do really enjoy revisiting fabric that I've used in the past.  This has blue fabric that I used to make a quilt for my Father-in-law, a gift box for a dear friend, clothes and projects for my boys, and even some fabric that a sister-in-law just gave me a few weeks ago.  Fun!!

The squares in this quilt are about 1 1/4 inches, and let me tell you, this was a bear to iron straight!!  It took a good long while to piece together as well!!  I plan to quilt it simply and try out an "invisible" binding for the first time!!  I'm hoping to get it done by the Sunday deadline!!  Stay tuned to see if that happens!