The Final Result

Well, after months and months of piecing, ripping out, fusing, appliqueing and quilting, my latest quilt is finally finished.  It was quite a challenge in many ways but part of the enjoyment I get from projects I begin is the "figuring out" of how to make things work (which often means even more ripping).  I always come away with some lesson learned--even if it's "I never want to do that again."
So . . .Here is Summer Soiree (double click on the image for a little better view).  And now it's on to the next one.

I've Been Waiting For Five Years

Since we moved back to Charleston several years ago, I have been spectacularly unsuccessful at growing decent tomatoes.  My last garden in the mountains was huge and organic (lots of manure, compost, etc). There I had tomatoes coming out of my ears.  I canned them, dried them, cooked with them and--most especially--had tomato sandwiches--day after day and never got tired of them.
My yard in Charleston has sandy soil and there aren't many cows grazing in neighboring fields (what neighboring fields?) to provide that very necessary boost to fertility that will produce big honker tomatoes.  Well, AT LAST, this was the year.  These tomatoes are sitting on a dinner plate--not a salad plate--and I can tell you right now what I'm going to have for lunch today--with soft bread and mayonaise.
Whew, there's not many things I like better.  I think I've reached nirvana.

Hope

 The Challenge for our Art Group this last quarter was to write a Haiku poem and then create a quilt based on the poem.  A haiku poem is vert short--3 lines--the first line is 5 syllables, the 2nd is seven syllables and the 3rd is five.  Here is my poem:
Life's many circles,
Reaching to include us all--
Containing Love's Hope.
And so I named my quilt Hope.
I had made the the petal-type shapes in a workshop with Phillipa Naylor earlier this year and felt that they could be my starting point.  I then added circles--and more circles--that were connected to each other.

This is the quilt after it was quilted.  If you look closely, you can see the pins where it is being blocked in order to square it up before I add the binding.  Before I block it, I add a little synthrapol to coolish water and then immerse the quilt into it.  I swish it around to get it good and wet and then rinse it out.  I wrap the wet quilt in towels to remove the excess moisture.  Then I spread it out on the CLEAN carpet and start smoothing and stretching to bring it into square as much as possible.  I always need to block my quilts because of my tight quilting stitches.

 And this is the finished quilt.  You can't really see it in this picture, but there is a very tiny piping next to the binding, ala the Susan Cleveland method.
One thing I decided to do with this small quilt was to play with various elements as I went--and to just have as much fun with it as possible--using threads, stitches and techniques that I don't ordinarily incorporate into my work.

 This is some of the beading I did.  I sewed on the beads before I quilted.

And the background quilting is composed of jutting lines from variegated thread.  You can also see the gold thread I used on the red "leaves."

And the quilting with gold thread went well.  As a final touch before I quilted, I used my braiding foot and sewed down mettalic embroidery floss with red rayon thread.  This technique joined the four corner circles and, thus, encircled the other circles in the center.
All in all, I really enjoyed myself.  For me, one of the freeing and fun things to do is to participate in a Challenge and just enjoy the journey of discovery along the way.

NC Quilt Symposium and A Few of My Favorite Quilts

This past weekend, the NC Quilt Symposium was held at Peace College in Raleigh, NC.  It was the first time that I had attended the Symposium and it was a wonderful experience. 
Part of the Symposium is a Quilt Show by the participants and these are a few of my favorites.  The first one is Neutral Mini Braid by Judy Lilly.  She said that it was a real challenge to work with a gradation of neutral fabrics.  Evidently, the judges felt that she was successful!

 This pineapple quilt, Provence Pineapples, is made by Jane Hall.  She said that it was made from her collection of French fabrics that she had collected on her various trips to France.  Jane was also the co-chairman for the Symposium and always had a smile when people came up to ask her questions about changing classes, how to get somewhere, etc.  And she still had a smile on Sunday after all of that problem solving.

 This is It's About Time by Kim Frisk.  It's one of those quilts that you really have to look at closely to take in everything.  She said that the brownish fabric was rust-dyed and that was the first time that I had seen rust-dyed fabric used in a manner that I really liked.

 I loved the optical illusion of this quilt, Secrets of the Dark Matter by Renate Soltman and quilted by Bethany Pease.  Another one that you need to study for a while to take in all of the elements.

 And Amy Stewart Winssor always makes whimsical quilts and this one is no exception.  Five Thirty A.M.  tells the story of her early morning trip to the school where she teaches.  It's dark when she starts out but the church is full of light when she arrives there.

 I was drawn to this quilt, Puzzle Garden by Katie Greenwood, by the use of color and applique.  Katie took what is a fairly coventional pieced pattern and really jazzed it up with the appliqued flowers and wild colors.  What a happy composition.

 This is All Eyes Are On you by Jane Hamrock.  It is hand appliqued AND hand quilted--something I would not necessarily have expected with such a modern looking piece.  It is quite an eye-catcher.

 On Your Stars and Flowers by Naomi Durkee just caught my eye with its pleasing color palette and the addition of applique to the pieced star.

 And another quilt by Kim Frisk, Shadow E.  She said she started this as a class with David Taylor.  Didn't she do a great job of capturing the curiosity factor inherent in all cats?  And she really did a great job of creating a 3-D effect.

Finally, this is my quilt, Swamp Hibiscus.  Was I in for a surprise!  I won Best of Show---which was more than a little exciting--BUT I also won Viewers Choice.  Now, that was humbling.  A HUGE thank you to each person that voted for my quilt.
It was an amazing weekend.

A Thing Of Beauty Is a Joy Forever

 By John Keats.  If you want to read the entire poem:  http://www.online-literature.com/keats/463/
These are two of my favorite daylillies and they truly are a "thing of beauty" which lift my spirit each time I see them.  I don't remember their varietal names as I got them at a daylily farm in Georgetown, SC several years ago and have transplanted several times since.  The second lily has HUGE blossoms.  In this heat we've been having, it's been wonderful to see a plant growing that thrives with the sun beating down.

On a more serious note--I have a friend whose email was compromised this week.  She had to

open a new account but couldn't access her email contacts so was left with no way to let everyone know her new address.  In the course of the attack on her account, a letter was sent out to her friends asking for money to get her out of a bad situation--using a similar format that probably most of you have received that was obviously a scam.  It's not quite so obvious when it comes from a friend but, thankfully, obvious enough.  The point of this is to suggest that you print out your email contacts or save them to a cd or memory stick just in case you find yourself in a similar situation.  With all of the bad people lurking around the internet these days, you just don't know if you might be the next victim.