August wall hanging

Finally! I stopped working on this series last July when we moved. I finally got back to work on it and finished August.

No name comes to mind immediately for this one though. All the others seem to have a built in name but this one doesn't.

I'm open to suggestions.

Train! Train!

The train is the Cumbres-Toltec that runs from Antonito Colorado to Chama New Mexico. It's a coal fired, narrow gauge steam engine. Bill and me at Antonito before we got on the train. We took the trip that runs to Osier and back to Antonito. That's still a good day's ride. It took from 10am until 4:30pm.

There were several stunning views like this one.

Christin taking a picture of herself and grampa.

She's comin' round the bend!

We came out of a tunnel and BAM!! heart stopping canyon views!! 750 feet to the bottom!!

88 blocks!

I got 88 square in a square blocks done saturday. I used a new tool called a prep tool.

I used it to trim off the triangles so they matched up with the squares. I think the blocks still need squared up though.

This is my most favorite block. No two blocks are the same. These quilts really give me the opportunity to use up scraps and make all sorts of interesting fabric combinations.

progress!!

It feels so good to finally make real progress on things!! Even though the Carpenter's Wheel is in the list of things that are done the binding wasn't put on it yet and I got that done yesterday. I'm not in a huge hurry to get it done so I'll finish the binding next week when I go for the guild meeting. That way I don't have to drag the machine with me to sew for 3 or 4 hours.

I also got the top of the Midnight at the Oasis quilt done yesterday!! That's real progress! I got one corner on the wrong direction so I'll have to take that off and turn it around but that's a 15 minute fix. It's going to be a totally stunning quilt. I'm thinking because it's a very straight design that it needs feathers in the quilting. I should have taken a pic of it yesterday but I didn't think about it.

I think next up will be the butterfly kisses BOM in the original fabrics and two of the square in a square quilts. My husband's neice said she likes darker colors. The butterfly kisses original is darker colors. I didn't actually care much for the original fabrics but I loved the pattern so I went ahead and bought it. I had started a square in square for the great neice but she's just barely 3 so there wasn't a huge hurry and then she had a baby sister. If I'm going to make two of them I might as well go ahead and do them both at the same time so I've started cutting for the second one. When I get the blocks sewn I'll mix the blocks with the first set so they'll each get an even bigger variety of fabrics in their quilts. Mom and dad and 2 daughters will all have a quilt at the same time that way and I'll get rid of one I'm not all that crazy about. Works for me!!

more fabric store rantings

Okay so now they're saying "there's nothing close to me."

And then I search for them and find out there's 41 quilt stores in a state the size of New Jersey they can't drive to because "it's too far."

Don't people drive in those little tiny eastern states? Is 30 minutes so excessively far you can't go by yourself?

Hell, I drive 10 miles *one way* just for GAS!! I drive 96 miles *one way* to go to my quilt guild meetings and to sew for the afternoon with friends.

Sad, sad, sad, the ways people will put limitations on themselves and then turn around and whine about it.

controversial views

Apparently I hold some rather controversial views on fabric buying. I expressed surprise at how many people list walmart as a fabric source on a message board and got the standard "it's all I can afford" and "it's the only place within spitting distance" whines in return. I call bullshit. Every LQS puts fabric on sale and this isn't the horse and buggy days, you can drive farther than 10 minutes to get to a store.

I bought fabric for 3.50 a yard friday at a LQS. That's very affordable. Anybody that's posting on a message board is also perfectly capable of buying fabric online. I have bought fabric as low as 3.75 a yard online. And you don't even have to have a credit or debit card for most of the places. You can send them a check or money order.

Bullshit I say.

They say they don't need the quilt snobs telling them otherwise. I say they're shooting themselves in the foot buying fabric at walmart. Walmart demands its manufacturers lower their price by 10% every year. Once you've offshored the manufacturing to some country you can get away with 10 cent an hour wages the only way to lower costs is to start lowering the cost of the goods. That means cheaper quality griege goods and cheaper dyes. Then you lower the quality of the printing process. When the manufacturer has lowered the cost as far as possible then walmart just stops buying from them and finds a new manufacturer in another country that can pay 5 cents an hour and starts all over.

People will put their own neighbors and friends out of work just to buy cheap Chinese goods and then turn around and complain they can't afford anything else when their own good jobs left for China.

Yeah, I know it's controversial and an unpopular view. But ya know, I don't care. If everybody cared more about where their goods came from than how cheap they could get it this country would likely be a whole lot better off. Walmart has not done this country on any other country any good. If anything it has seriously hurt this country.

I've lived in poverty. Don't tell me "I can't" I know better.

Quilt class rebel

I belong to this big guild that only meets four times a year. The class in October is the Orion Star. The quilt shop owner here is giving the class. She wants everybody to purchase a $200.00 kit to take the class. But, the colors are UGLY. Or at least I think so. So I told her I would take the class but I want pink, yellow and orange. She said she would see if she could pull the fabric off the shelf in those colors. The off the shelf kit would include the backing fabric but it would still be $200. But. But. Even if I had to buy all the fat quarters at 2.50 that's still only 70 bucks and I know I can get quality backing fabric for a really reasonable price.





So, that means she's charging each person at least a $100 bucks for a class fee. I don't know about you all but that seems pretty excessive to me. Especially considering I took two classes from a national quilt teacher in April for $60 total for both classes. And this class is a sew on this line, cut on that line, remove paper class.



She called me back the other day because her store is never open and you have to call and make an appointment to shop there. When I called I didn't get an answer and I'm not driving all the way over there if she's not going to be there. So, when she called me back I told her I had taken a look at the fabric in my stash and I would rather make the quilt from my fabric stash and for her to figure out how much to charge me for the pattern and the Thangles and a class charge. She said she thought she could do that. I'm not paying more than 40 bucks. I don't mind people making a profit but I think she's gouging people.



Then two days later at the other guild meeting she totally ignored me.




I pulled these from my stash. I need one more orange. I have a couple I can still choose from if I can't find one that goes in this range better. The fabric they're sitting on will be the main border and there's an orange and a pink that I have enough of for an inner border and the binding. I *know* she doesn't have near the selection in these colors in her store that I have right in my own stash.