Today is my birthday

Now normally I wouldn't make that the title of a blog post, but I just had to share this poem from friend Sue V. in Illinois wrote me, thank you Sue! I think it's fabo in your words!

Happy birthday our Julie H.!

Happy birthday to the gal who always has a smile
A cheerful note, a caring tone....
She makes the day worthwhile

Here's wishing you the best of days
From morning thru the night
A stack of fabric, spools of thread....
Whatever your delight...

May this day be warm and sunny
But never oh too hot!
May you find just what you wish for
And may it hit the spot!

For birthdays come but once a year
From them we can't steer clear
Counting numbers, OY to that!
A sneer, a guffaw, a jeer...

Happy b-day dear Julie
Happy b-day to you
I hope today is sunny
And your b-day skies are blue
I hope you enjoy the memories
Have cake and eat it to
And one more wish from this here state
(This one is just from me)
>From "corn" to "spuds" .....a birthday smile
May your day be all it can be!

Have a great day!!!

Sue V.

New Quilt Top and a Light Experiment

This was a rough day dealing with a leaking hot water tank that ruined a couch the floor below it and all the chaos that comes from working on plumbing. However during all the commotion we managed to finished Lisa's college graduation quilt top! She designed it on EQ5 (even though I have 6 & 7 both here they are not installed!) Now to get it quilted...This is the school guinea pig we are babysitting for the summer.Tonight we went to test the theory that florescent tubes would glow under high voltage power lines. It worked! We leased some farm ground recently that has power lines coming from the dam headed to Montana. One picture is with a flash and one without.

Organized Sewing Room

This was a major undertaking. I was so frustrated by all the "stuff" I have and spent over a week reorganizing and going through everything. We have a big unfinished rec room and my room is in a corner with one small window covered by a deck. I thought I was going to get to move into the rest of the basement but that didn't pan out, so I took a small portion.This is an 8' by 7' design wall, flannel covered Styrofoam. It is movable and is standing in front of my project shelves.
This is my boxes of fabric containing pieces 1/4 yard to 1 yard long along with some projects. I was standing in the doorway of my sewing room looking out.

More stuff outside my sewing room.

Sisters Quilt Show

I haven't had much time to post pictures, but I have been having a stupendously marvelous fabulous time in Sisters, Oregon. We head home in a few minutes but I will post a picture or two. I just randomly picked a few and I will have to edit descriptions later.

Hooray for the Red, White and Blue

In keeping with today being with the 4th of July I am showing some patriotic quilts I have. The first one is the oldest of the group. In the early 90's there was a block contest at a local shop. They sold you a packet of f abric and you made a block (adding one or two fabrics if needed). I was the lucky winner of the blocks and this was my original design for a setting. I purchased additional fabrics to finish it off.This next quilt is from a set of blocks I won. Now I feel bad that I can't quite remember the story, but I think they were from one of the first WASIQ retreats in Leavenworth WA and my friend Deb gave them to me because they were too "white". I know that sounds strange, but she was more into the muddier colors, creams, etc. I love this quilt!This quilt is one of my favorites. It's called Old Glory and I had ordered it as a BOM. Several people I knew bought the book and made their own versions, at least two of them were hand quilted. Mine is hand appliqued, but machine quilted.This mini was from a swap last year on the Quilting Gallery blog. It was a spring swap and my mini came from Holland! It just happened to be our patriotic colors and the windmill is so cute.

Quilt Contest

I entered a quilt contest on Quilting Gallery called Friendships. The voting is open through Sunday. The first quilt I made using this pattern is shown on my webshots. I couldn't find a picture of it here, although I know it's on a CD somewhere so click on the link!

I have shown this before, but we are revisiting it. When my friend Deb saw the above mentioned quilt in 2008 she fell in love with it. That surprised me as she was not a big batik fan. For her birthday in 2009 I made her this version of the quilt. I used a very, very thin batting because with her emphysema she couldn't handle weight on her. Also in 2009 I pieced my own queen size one. I quilted it this year and hadn't shown a picture of it finished yet so I've included it below.This is my queen size version followed by a quilting closeup.