It's ALMOST winter!

If this isn't winter, I'm not sure I want to be in Iowa next week! Fred has scooped a winter's worth of snow from in front of the store. He just brought in more ice melt and he's looking at me sideways when I say I love the winter!! Winter is a VERY productive time for me and I don't feel the least bit guilty just sitting and sewing. However, it really should have come three weeks ago, so I'd be ready for Christmas. Now I have to cram too much stitching into too few days.

I think I can come up for air!!

I did not fall off the face of the earth, though I have nearly drowned in projects, both BIG and small in the past month. We have had the 3-day. 5-state, 12 store bus tour, the South Iowa Shop Hop, the AQS show, our annual Quilt Camp Retreat and numerous speaking engagements! It's all fun and it's all work, at the same time. I know I have the best job, so I try not to mumble where anyone will hear me. I'll work my way backward so you know I haven't been slacking...no trips to the Bahamas. Last night I spoke to the Knoxville Quilt Guild. Great food (as always), Great people and a Great pet-themed party. And to boot they listened patiently until well past all our bedtimes. Fred and I arrived home just after midnight. We chatted and watched for deer all the way home. I'm always pumped up after teaching or speaking, so it takes me a while to come back down to earth. Good thing I'm only addicted to fabric and coffee. Oh, yes, and there is that need for chocolate.

And before that was the weekend. We went to Camp Wesley Woods for our annual Retreat, just me and 29 of my closest friends. It was so much fun and as always, so much food. It takes a lot of fuel to quilt day and night and day and night and day!! We have already booked next year's Quilt Camp at Indianola, Iowa, for November 12, 13, 14, 2010. Plan to join us. I promised a Christmas Quilt Project. I'm writing it here, so someone will remind me. Who's in charge of that?

If you didn't get to the AQS Show, you missed a good one, again. What an inspiration! Just makes you want to quilt something! Anything! Everything! And it makes me think I can do it all. Kelly, from the Quilting Connection in Ames and I committed to the Husqvarna Viking Booth for next year. So we'll see you all there!
The day after AQS was my family's Thanksgiving (yes, we've had our turkey) November 1st, so Mom and Dad could get gone to Texas. We had 45-50 people at our house, actually at our Barn for dinner. I know what you're thinking, Joyce doesn't actually cook, so Fred did all the work for that dinner. You're right. And Pot Luck from a family of really good cooks. I sew, they cook. My life is good.

Tomorrow night is our Patches & Pieces Quilt Guild meeting, we'll be making our final plans for the Comfort & Joy Quilt Show. Another Good one, I'll bet!! And I LOVE the lighted Christmas Parade. For me, that's the beginning of the season.

More later, I promise!

ahhhh!

Is it Christmas yet? This year is absolutely flying by! We did the bus trip, the shop hop and now on to the AQS show in Des Moines and our retreat at Camp Wesley Woods. By then, we'll be gearing up for the Comfort and Joy Quilt Show, which commences just before the Lighted Christmas Parade. See It is almost Christmas!! Some of us need to get started on projects...or we could just finish last years and tell people we're ahead of the game. Our Artsie group is having our retreat in the wilds of Union County this weekend, so maybe we can all get some projects finished, between the laughter and and the eating. Just getting together and relaxing would be enough, but oh, no, we actually have to try to teach each other new techniques. With friends like this, who needs quilt magazines. I took a poor picture of the Camp Quilt include here. I call it Squared Away. It's an easy charm and jelly roll quilt, just the kind of quilt to stitch up in your jammies at Quilt Camp.

We lived to tell about it!

3-day, 5-state, 12-store Bus tour has come and gone and we are so excited. It was so much fun and we met so many wonderful people. Our Bus had a great time. The first night they went out and bought "tubs" to put in the belly of the bus for their purchases!! And these are some of my BEST customers. I was worried until they came home Sunday night and bought fabric at my store, too! So many addicts. Now, on to the South Iowa Shop Hop. Give me a few more days to recover and I'll get back on the road to blogdom.

I've become a Sewing Machine!

I've totally abandoned my Top 5 List and have begun to add projects like CRAZY! I've nearly finished the bright flowers of the "Strippers on Wheels" Bus trip Quilt. And the 24-Strip quilt that will be our personal pattern for the bus trip is DONE! I'll include a picture of it here to inspire you all to come see it for yourselves. I've also begun an applique pattern (yes, I remember, applique is not my favorite). And Sunday, I designed the Quilt Camp quilt. It's going to be a fun one this year. Sew, sew, sew, just see if you can add more new projects than me this week!! There's your challenge.

My little Grandgirls have started school this week, so that limits our sewing time together. We'll just have to sew faster on the weekends.

Is there LIFE after DYING?

Apparently, I seem to have fallen behind after the dying episode. I'm working on details for our 3-day, 5-state, 12-shop bus tour. I'm working on our Quilt Camp Retreat. Barb is working on the Fall Shop Hop quilt. And I'm working on the Fall Class List. I have managed to finish a couple of projects, so my Top 5 list has been reduced to Top 3 (OK, you know me too well to believe that story!) I've actually started 4 or 5 more projects.
The "Grandgirls" and I have been sewing together again. Kay wants her quilt finished before she starts kindergarten. That's next Monday! She will be taking a trial bus run on Thursday, with her Mom and Dad. Livvie just wants to make hers bigger and bigger.
We got a great new fabric line in from Red Rooster called Rhythm and Blues...turquoise, black and white. Come see!!

We dyed in the barn...

Yesterday we (our small group) dyed in the barn at our farm. Fred cooked, we sewed and dyed and chatted and inspired each other to get creative. Nothing like a gorgeous summer day in Iowa to spur creativity. The picture I posted doesn't show our old clothes or our old faces!! I did this to protect the guilty! We dyed pfd fabric, we over dyed printed fabrics, we dyed cheesecloth, lace and rickrack. Now we have to think of projects for our "new" colors.

Tonight I'm off to Clarinda to speak to their Quilt Guild on "Borders, Bindings and Backs, don't have to be Boring." I'm packed and ready to roll. Love talking about quilting almost as much as doing it.

Sunday Afternoon Stitching...

Gotta love those Sundays! I'm voting for at least two a week. The Grandgirls and I sewed and sewed and ironed yesterday afternoon. The seven year old assured me she was big enough to sew without me, so she did! Even figured out how to up the speed. They sew bits of fabric together and make long strips, which I straighten with the rotary cutter, then they sew them into rows. The bits of fabric are often swatches from distributors (why would anyone waste a two or three inch square of fabric). The girls love them and sort them by type: flowers, kids prints, outdoors, etc. But often by the time they get to the girl's drawer, they are wrinkly and need to be pressed. It has been my job, until yesterday. We had the safety speech and they took over my job. The 6 year old suffered (far more than she needed to) a burn on her hand. But Papa came to the rescue with a cold wash cloth and antibacterial creme. She's our accident prone drama queen!!

I got several new projects started! Wouldn't be Sunday without a new one or two or three. I put the binding on a large needle-punched art piece that needed bias binding. I sacrificed a great piece of fabric by cutting two bias strips right out of the middle. One of those pieces, we'll never see again and now it is two triangles. Guess I'll have to go shopping for one to replace it! I started a Halloween piece with the new "Scribble Monsters" from Clothworks. I'm adding border upon border to a really cute panel. A sample for my borders and bindings class at the Clarinda Guild next week. The other piece I finished the top of a great new pattern (yes, I know, a real pattern) called Trophy Case. Oriental fabrics with a free-form curved back made from the scraps.

County Fair

Brings back memories of last minute stitches and creative write ups, the smell of wet sheep and manure. Not so much different than today!! Last night we had our 6th or 7th annual Quilt Show and Tell: People bringing and sharing their old family quilts, their newly finished projects, and some in progress. It is always a joy to see what's happening out in the County. And the sharing is my favorite part...probably never got over kindergarten!
The 4-H projects are still near and dear to my heart, I know the work that goes into them, the un-sewing and re-sewing. It makes no difference what ribbon is received, the learning experience is just about the same. For me, it began a life-long love of sewing. Not cooking. The bench in my living room was my County and State Fair project in 1965 or 1966, probably my last venture into refinishing. I still love it, though it is far from perfect! I was always more comfortable with my sewing machine.
Tonight, we're trekking to Bloomfield to speak to the Quilt Guild. My chauffeur will drive me and my quilts in the big black pickup. It is always a pleasure to talk about quilts, almost as much fun as making them!! Tonight's topic is creativity. Quilting outside our boxes, stretching our skills...the only exercise quilters need!!

My Top 5 List

Actually this is a mere glimpse into my Top 40! I'm only willing to share 5 projects at a time. I figure if I put them out here for all the world to see, I'll feel compelled to actually finish some of them.

1. Mom and Dad's 60th Anniversary Quilt. It's a photo quilt with we 7 kids and our families.
2. Niece's T-shirt quilt with her gymnastics and track shirts
3. Binding on my "Bamboo" art quilt
4. Binding on a silk and wool needlepunch art piece
5. The baby quilt we started yesterday.

Today is the first day of the rest of our Blog!

What AM I thinking? Can I add this to my yellow tablet "To Do" list? Can an old quilter really learn to Blog? Do you even care what I'm thinking or doing?

"We" are designing a quilt as I'm writing this. By now you know that "we" means someone else is actually sewing! Barb H. and I had a brain storm, drew out a quilt and started cutting and sewing with abandon. We pulled Cindy C. into our madness and now they're doing the work and I'm typing with my best two fingers. This will be a quicky strippy quilt pattern to be given away when our September Bus Tour comes through town. Give us a few more days and I'll post a picture of the quilt, we think it's realy cute (of course) and it will make a great baby quilt. And everyone can use a fast baby quilt that can be made out of a jelly roll...in an afternoon...between customers. 9 months for a baby, 2 hours for a baby quilt!