Pansy Lap Quilt - Finished Flimsy

When I was in a local fabric store a month ago, I fell in love with a pansy fabric that was marked down to clear it out as there was less than 2m left on the bolt. I was then on the search for the perfect pattern that would allow me to showcase the gorgeous print with minimal cutting. I found the pattern I was looking for in the Dec/Jan 2011 issue of Quick Quilts (page 14 - Manor House designed by Kari Nichols). This one finishes at approximately 53" x 70"--a perfect lap size.

I am working on the "reward" system right now. If I finish an old UFO, then I get to work on a reward. A reward for me is a simple project - something new - something that will qualify as quick gratification because it is fast - something that I can finish quickly so my reward doesn't turn into another UFO. This pansy project was my reward for finishing my Christmas Patience Corners to the flimsy stage.

I wasn't quite ready to call it a night last night when I had the lap quilt finished so I made this matching candle mat (still a flimsy). This is Sandra E. Andersen's design and is called Candlelight.

This is a picture of the mountain that I can see from our living room window. We woke up to a light dusting of snow on the ground this morning. The snow on our lawn was gone before noon, but the snow remains on the nearby mountains.

Patience Corners Christmas Quilt - Flimsy

My Patience Corners Christmas quilt is finally finished to the flimsy stage.

This quilt finished at 95" x 107".

The inspiration for this quilt was Finn -- http://finnleah.blogspot.com/. I started this project in December 2006 shortly after Finn's post about her Patience Corners quilt. http://finnleah.blogspot.com/2006/12/as-per-normas-request.html The scrap fabrics are all from my stash -- many leftover from larger projects -- and the border was one of my bargain purchases at Liquidation World in December 2007. http://silverthimblequiltingarchive.blogspot.com/2007/12/stash-busting-efforts.html

Thanks for the inspiration Finn!

Patience Corners Christmas Quilt

I finally finished putting together the blocks for my Patience Corners Christmas Quilt.

Next up................a red inner border and a poinsettia outer border.

I want to start a new project as a reward for finishing this one so the borders will be going on soon.

I am back to working on the "reward" system. :)

It isn't Christmas until the train comes to town!

Greeting the Canadian Pacific Holiday Train (http://www8.cpr.ca/cms/English/General+Public/Holiday+Train/default.htm) has become one of our families' Christmas Traditions.

The CP Holiday Train travels across Canada stopping at many communities along the way to share a short Christmas program and to collect money and non perishable food items for local food banks.

This year the weather cooperated--it was a night without wind, rain, and snow.

These are some of the pictures I took of the decorated rail cars.

One of the boxcars holds the entertainers. This year's entertainment was provided by, The Odds. http://www8.cpr.ca/cms/English/General+Public/Holiday+Train/Bios/default.htm

Even the jolly red guy made an appearance!

New Pattern and an Old UFO

I have been working on a new pattern: Right Angles by Anne Wiens of Sweetgrass Creative Designs. The pattern can be purchased from quiltwoman.com at http://quiltwoman.com/Right-Angles-Quilt-Pattern.aspx

I finished the washing and pressing of the yardage and initial cutting to kit up this project for construction today. Then today after having my morning coffee, I was ready to assemble. Tonight I have a finished flimsy.

In hind sight, I should have used a darker brown to give the design more definition. However, this was the brown I had in my stash. I was determined to shop the stash and not purchase any fabric so IIWII. I have some ideas that I am exploring to extend the snow on the branches in the inner panel out to the borders. I will machine quilt this piece first and then explore the embellishment ideas further. After getting the flimsy done, I dug out a very old UFO. This is my Finn-inspired Christmas Patience Corners. http://finnleah.blogspot.com/2006/12/finally-something-quilty.html I started this quilt back in 2006 after seeing the Patience Corners quilt that Finn showed on her blog. I have the borders attached to my squares and this much of the top assembled. It should not take much longer to get this one finished to the flimsy stage.

Linda http://catsnqlts2.blogspot.com/ kept me company today as I sewed. Linda completed her flimsy--Prairie Window--on Friday and she is now working on her Christmas Patience Corners quilt. We have both had a chance to play with a new pattern, now it is time to buckle down and get these Christmas Patience Corners quilts finished and on the bed.

Back Yard Visitor

This was the visitor to our backyard today - a beautiful Flicker.

Halloween Quilt Projects

I started working on a series of Halloween quilts. I have a stash of Halloween fabrics left from previous projects, so I pulled them out and started working with them.

The first project I started was Scrappy Log Cabin by Two Kwik Quilters. I was anxious to try this pattern because a couple of friends from my Monday Night Quilt Group had already made lap quilts from the pattern with great success. http://www.twokwikquilters.net/id63.html

My Scrappy Log Cabin project is finished to the inner border stage. I have an idea for the outer border that was inspired by Gwen Marston and Freddy Moran in their Collaborative Quilting book. Because the blocks for this quilt are a bit wonky, I thought I would refer to the Queens of wonky piecing, Gwen and Freddy to find a suitable border treatment. I may consider putting some Linda inspired blocks in the corners of the Gwen and Freddy inspired outer border.

While I was putting the narrow green border on the Scrappy Log Cabin, I remembered that I had some leftover blocks from the queen size All About Me Halloween quilt that I made two years ago. I thought I might be able to incorporate these blocks into the back of the Scrappy Log Cabin. I started putting the blocks up on the design wall and I realized that I had more blocks than I remembered. In fact, I had enough blocks to make another lap quilt. So before I finished the borders on the Scrappy Log Cabin, I switched gears and assembled the lap size All About Me Halloween quilt.

I love the pumpkin border fabric on this quilt. It is a Debbie Taylor-Kerman fabric from her Spooktacular line by Henry Glass Co. If you double click on the photo you might be able to see the mice peeking out from under the pumpkins.

While I was working on both the Scrappy Log Cabin project and the All About Me project, I started to think about the new pattern I bought on my recent vacation to Alberta by Joanie Morrow--Contemporized Country Squares. I still had some Halloween fabrics left in my stash so I made 6 test blocks. The blocks are large--11.5 inches, but perfect to showcase a novelty print. I love the test blocks so I will definitely be making some more blocks from this pattern. Our little on-line group of quilting friends has started calling this easily distracted type of quilting, "serial quilting." I have heard some quilters refer to themselves as having some sort of attention deficit disorder which leads them to start multiple projects at once. I prefer to call this, serial quilting as I think it has a more positive tone. This is the way my quilting mind works--always thinking of the next project. After all, I started out to make one Halloween quilt and now I have three Halloween quilts on the go.

In the end it really doesn't matter what you call it as long as you have fun....right? And I am having fun!

First Sockeye of the Season

Sockeye season is open here in BC! We have not had a sports fisherman Sockeye opening for 4 years so this is a momentous occasion!

We love barbecued salmon, so to celebrate the opening, we had some fresh Sockeye on the grill.

My husband is the official chef when it comes to cooking fish.
Yummy! We tried a new recipe this time that used peaches in the grilling process.

There were a lot of smiles around this table!

Paddlewheeler Cruise

On the last day of our holiday, we took a paddlewheeler cruise on Harrison Lake. Harrison Lake is the largest lake in the Coast Mountains of BC at 250 square km in area--60 km long and 9 km wide at its widest point.



Harrison Lake has two large islands in the center of it; the largest being Long Island, 9.5 km long and 2.6 km wide, and Echo Island which is south of Long Island and 4 km long and 2.2 km wide.



We spent the entire day aboard this vessel: the MV Native. This is the view of Harrison Village as we looked back after leaving the dock as we headed to the Harrison River.

This is the point where the Harrison Lake meets the Harrison River. It is possible to travel from Harrison Lake, down the Harrison River to the Fraser River, and eventually the Pacific Ocean.

We watched a barge move its log boom.

We were in search of pictographs. We found them on this rock.

You really need to know where to look for the pictographs as they are faint and not easy to spot.

After locating the pictographs, we turned around and headed back to Harrison Lake. If you look through the opening in these trees towards Harrison Lake, you can see two islands that are faint in the center of this photo. These islands are Camile Island (smallest island on the right) and Marguerite Island (larger island to the left of Camile). These islands were named for Miss Margaret de Gusseme who managed the Harrison Hot Springs Resort from when it first opened in 1926 until her death in 1946 and her sister Camile who was the hotel's assistant manager. Margaret did a lot to promote the Resort worldwide. The Island to the left of Camile and Marguerite is Echo Island. Only the tip of Echo Island is visible in this picture.

These purple buildings are part of Elfinlau (aka Purple Palace). Elfinlau is a bed and breakfast on Echo Island in the middle of Harrison Lake that is only accessible by water. http://www.elfinlau.com/

The rock on the left side of this next picture is Echo Rock. As we sat in the bay here, the Captain let off his boat whistle and we heard an immediate and clear echo return to us. In the upper right hand corner of this picture you can see Owl rock.

This is a close up of Owl rock.

It was surprising how many homes and cottages are located on the shores of Harrison Lake--especially given that many of these homes are only accessible by water. These residences are located in Cascade Bay which is on the east side of Harrison Lake.

The air was smoky the day we cruised the lake. You can really see the smoke in this picture. The mountains are almost totally obliterated from view. The smoke is from the many forest fires that continue to burn in our province.

We had a great time cruising the lake. Our only regret was the amount of smoke that made it hard to see the distant mountains.

Alberta Holiday - Part II

We left the reunion location in Alberta on August 2nd--the Monday of the August long weekend. We headed home via Kelowna.

While in Kelowna, we had opportunity to check out the local quilt shops. First up was Findlay's. http://www.findlaysvacsew.com/ This shop is primarily a sewing machine dealer. They have a few nice shop samples and some yard goods, but the selection is limited.
Our second stop was Linda's. http://www.lindasquiltshoppe.com/

As soon as we parked, my husband noticed the sign.....

.......and made some comment like, "It looks like you only get 15 minutes here!" As he laughed, I had him turn around and look at the parking stall that we had parked in....

................"Correction! I get 1 hour here!" Now who had the last laugh? LOL

Seriously, an hour would never have been enough time to do this shop justice. The staff here were fantastic. I was treated to a tour of the shop, including the classroom.

As it turns out, one of the ladies I had travelled on the bus trip to the Sisters' quilt show with 5 years ago is a regular teacher here. I was thrilled to see Laurie's quilts. We'll have to see if I can get back to Kelowna sometime in the future for one of Laurie's weekend classes.

I loved this picnic display by the front door. They used food fabrics as the food on the table--too cute.

This African panel was one of the purchases I made at Linda's. I have been collecting African themed fabrics for a while to make a quilt for my daughter.

This ruler was also a purchase made at Linda's. They had a sample in the shop made using this ruler. You fuse two fabrics together and then fold and use the ruler to make the cuts. Once the fabric is cut, you fold the pieces and you end up with a Seminole pieced look.

By this time we were hungry for some lunch. I asked my husband what he felt like having for lunch. He replied that he could really go for Wendy's. Well, wouldn't you know it, in the same parking lot as the Wendy's was another quilt shop. http://www.cottagequiltingonline.com/
This was a nice shop, but it didn't have near the selection and samples as Linda's.

Then we headed out of Kelowna down the Okanagan Lake. We stopped at Agriculture Canada's Research Station in Summerland. http://www4.agr.gc.ca/AAFC-AAC/display-afficher.do?id=1180620561099 They have a gorgeous display garden there. The view of the lake would have been incredible had it not been for the thick smoke from the forest fires in BC that blanketed the lake and obscured the view. None the less, we enjoyed walking around the gardens before getting back in the truck and heading home.

This was a great holiday!