Summer Trip 2017 - Big Horn National Park

Dear Readers,

So Celeste and I had woke up in Deadwood, SD and were planning to do a hike or two on our way to Powell, WY the second airbnb of our trip...Powell is between Yellowstone and Bighorn National Parks, close to the North East side of Yellowstone.  I was constantly amazed at how beautiful a country we get to live in and how much wide open spaces are still out there!

After breakfast we drove to our first real hike Roughlock Trail near Lead, SD.  It was rated an easy hike of about 2.1 miles up and back hike.

After that hike we drove through Big Horn National Forrest where it was snowing (!!) on the 28th of May!

I was sure we were not getting the second hike in as it was so bad, but about a half hour out of the snow, it was nice and dry so we took the second hike of the day at State Line Trail near Grass, Montana by the Bighorn River.
This trail, while short, less than a mile,  was very rocky so I really relied on my hiking poles.  Celeste started calling me Two-poles Turnage and I was calling her Mountain-goat McKeon as she was capable of scampering up the mountain while I was using my poles to get up or down best I could.

See that white speck? Almost at the edge of the scrub brush...  That is my car!

After the hike we headed to the our next Airbnb in Powell, WY.  We were met by a very nice girl and a lot of beautiful Huskies!  She showed us the puppies and let us pet them.  I spotted a robins nest with 3 babies in it and pointed it out to her.  She knocked two birds out of the nest before I knew it and the huskies got them.  :(  Said they didn't like birds.... Anyway other than the bird drama it was a good night.

Tomorrow .... Yellowstone day 1!

Summer Trip 2017 - Mount Rushmore

Hey Readers,

There are going to be series of posts on a trip I took with my daughter, Celeste.  They are not quilt related so if you are looking to read about quilts...look for posts that are not titled with Summer Trip....

For everyone else....

We took this trip at the end of May and the beginning of June.  I don't like to post to social media when I travel.  But I don't want to forget this trip as it was a trip of a lifetime!  So I decided to blog about each of the days adventures.  Every day we took a hundred or more photos, but I am going to limit the number I include to my favorite 10 to 12 photos.

I had driven to Denver and got there on a Thursday night late.  I was late coming in Thursday as there had been tornado warnings on the interstate, so I had sat in a Hampton Inn lobby near the Kansas Colorado border for about an hour and a half waiting for the weather to clear.

Friday I ran a number of last minute errands, bought a couple of books on CD for us to listen to, bought a rain jacket, socks, bought a new camera, picked up our national park pass, filled the car and just got ready in general.

Saturday morning Celeste and I got up fairly early, loaded the car and hit the road.

We drove to Mount Rushmore and did the hike around it even tho it was raining off and on.  This hike is rated an easy hike and is fairly short...  6 tenths of a mile.  It is a loop trail that has a lot of stairs!!  Even tho it was short, I had to rest a time or two...but pictures needed to be taken anyway.
Wink, wink!

Took a lot of pictures out of the car window...If you zoom in you can see the profile of Crazy Horse.

First view of Mount Rushmore..you can see the storm clouds rolling in but we pressed forward anyway.

After entering the park, you can really get a good view.
 

As you do the hike around there are points that you can get the best view of each president.

Here is a photo of a sculpture of the guy who was the designer...it is an amazing monument to see and to see the story of the process to sculpt it was amazing.  Definitely worth the trip...

After we left Rushmore we were headed to the city of our first night in a Airbnb.  On a whim we stopped at a drive through animal park.  While we saw a lot of neat animals, it was painful as the you crept along at about 2 miles an hour...

Our first airbnb experience was a good one.  Although the first place we rented was  studio... I need to confess that I am a noisy sleeper and Celeste is a light sleeper, so that is not the best combo.  We quickly came to the conclusion that we were better with accommodations that gave us separate sleeping quarters.  Fortunately we had only booked two places that were studios...so the rest of the trip should be more restful for Celeste!

First day on the road was a success.  Next day heading to Big Horn National Park.  :)  That will be another post!

TWO, (count'em) FINISHES

Dear Readers,

I finished two quilts since I posted last.  TWO!!  That has to be some kind of record...at least for me.

I picked up the quilt for Laura and Will Temple from Betty Lewis and did my first flanged binding.  It  was a good way to get in on quick as I only had one day to get it bound.  I had planned to take it Birmingham on our next trip, but I had thought I would have more days between pick up and delivery day...it just didn't work out that way!

I had posted a photo of it, before Betty quilted it, and lots of Facebook friend had suggested names.  When I got it back and looked at it, I decided "Hip to Be Square" would be it's name.  We have had a lot of rain in Missisissippi this last month and my fence is not tall enough for me to hang the quilt on it so I hung it on a rail outside the welcome center in Columbus...all is good except they have some convince outlets that prevent it from hanging straight.  The pattern is called Sassy 16 from the book Bust your PreCut Stash.  I changed the background from solid to scrappy and used a jelly roll for the colored parts.  I didn't measure it but it is about 93 x 75.

Here are a couple of shot of the binding and Betty Lewis's quilting!

The second quilt was a baby quilt for a first grandchild that a dear friend is having.  I did an eye-spy quilt and put number fabric on the back as she used to teach math....she teaches Chem and Physics now.  I used Pat Yamin's Eye Spy Templates to fussy cut each of the hexies.

I quilted this one by stitching in the ditch around the eye-spy blocks.  Then free motion quilting on the border.  I did a swirling star thing there.  This one finishes about 50 by 47...

Here is close up of it.

While we were in Birmingham I asked my dad to tell some stories...here he is.  The video is 3-4 minutes long.

Happy sewing...

Terry

Throw Pillow Cover and fabric shopping

Dear readers,

I was kitting stuff up to take on a massive road trip this summer, and I decided to make a throw pillow cover for a pillow form my daughter had.  When I had visited last I noticed she did not have a cover for it, so I measured the form.

One of the quilts I was kitting up was another mountain quilt that she wants.  I am doing it in various grays and off whites to light golds.  Well as I was cutting the 8.5 inch squares I cut some random sized strips to make pillow cover.  So since it was 22.5 inches cut 16 6 inch squares of workbook paper.  I had decided to put a black strip down the center and the grays on one side and the neutrals on the other.  This ended up making an asymmetrical block.  So you know what that means...lots of arrangements.  I was really liking how these were looking so I think the mountain quilt will be great!

So I quilted it and used a piece of gray for the back...

I am on my road trip now and day 2 required some stops for fabric acquisition.  I am also working on a baby quilt for a teacher friend's first grand!  It is going to be an eye spy quilt as I have a bunch of those cut out, but she is doing the nursery in soft colors and I spy quilts tend to be very bright and busy.  So I wanted something softer for the back.  I was riding down a state highway in Kansas and saw this ,,,    

That has to be a quilt store...stopped in to a delightful store in the middle on no where...and found this fabric for the back...the numbers are still bright and cheery but softer than others so I bought it...

Later in the day I saw a billboard for a quilt shop in Hays,  Kansas so I stopped there and found a few fun fabrics to go in the quilt...the baby is being born into an army family so I thought the camo fabric and army men had to go in the quilt.  So nice to find a partly done project that can be finished in a bit to be a quilt!!

I may get to do some more shopping today, but I left my windbreaker at home and am going to need one...where we are going the high is 68!!  

Sew on!!

Improvements??

Dear Readers,

Hope all are having a great week...This has been the end of the school year for me so it has been busy.  I have just done a few completions of things and am getting ready for a much needed vacation with my daughter to the western part of the US.

When I got my quilt, Shadows of Kilimanjaro back from the Mountain Quiltfest Show I also received the judges comments.  She marked it down as some parts were quilted heavier than others.  So I decided to quilt the white blocks....I wish I had come up with a better pattern but it is what it is...I have given it to my daughter to hang in her apartment since she has hiked Kilimanjaro.   I didn't think the quilting showed up in the photo of the whole quilt so I included a couple of close up of the blocks.

I also finished making the flanged binding for the Jelly Roll quilt.

The final project that I worked on is the Possum Town Quilters guild challenge.  We are doing a Mississippi bicentennial quilt since it is our state's 200th birthday.  I chose to do Mississippi Blues.  There was a list of suggested topics for squares.  The challenge is to create a 9 in finished block  using 3 of the 5 fabrics given.  I thought the blues would be a good one to do.  So my idea was to make a background of blue squares,  and I kind of wanted a Howlin' Wolf on it as he was from the Golden Triangle.  So first I made the background, using some of the blue in the packet, then sent it to Lauren, a friend from the guild and asked for suggestions.

She sent me a few wolves and the logo from the Blues Trail.  That made me think of a state silhouette.  So I printed the elements and put them on the background.

 I liked it but they were a little too big.   So I took it to work and shrunk the elements down a little and then the scale was better.

So I was going to hand sew them down, but then I got intimidated by the narrow pieces and the corners of such small elements, so I decided to fuse them down.  I zig-zagged around each element to be sure it would be secure.  I had a thought while I was giving exams, to write the names of some of the famous blues artists on the outline of the state like it was a trail.  So when I got home a printed a list of blues artists from Mississippi and picked out some to put in the border.  I am happy with the final result.  The other two challenge fabrics used is the brown for the wolf and the cream for the guitar.  I did mess up and put the fuse stuff on the wrong side of the cream color, but decided I liked it like that as it softens the print on that piece.

 Celeste and Blake came for my dad's 88th birthday.  It was nice to see both of them.  When I was taking Celeste back to Memphis, we stopped at a whole in the wall restaurant for an Ethiopian meal.  It was really good.  I wish I could tell you it's name, but it was really good.

May not post much about quilting as I am going to be off the internet for a bit...but if I get a chance to post I will get back on!!

Sew on,

Terry

Jelly Roll quilt update

Hey readers,

I finished the top of the jelly roll quilt!!  Whoop, Whoop....now to work on kitting up projects for the summer time.  I need to get a better picture, but here is what it looks like with the borders on.  I have not finalized a name or scripture to go on the back, so if you have any suggestions put them in the comments!  Tomorrow I will call Betty Lewis and see if she can get it quilted for me.

Hope you have a big week and all goes well for you and yours.

Sew on,

Terry

Jelly Roll quilt

Hey Readers,

I found out last week who won the Modern Christmas Quilt...Linda Kay Barbour, mother of my across the street neighbor and very sweet lady!! I was so excited to find out she won the silent auction for the quilt.

The other day I was on Facebook and Stitchin Heaven in Texas was doing a live broadcast and said if you left a comment you could win a prize, so I said "Hi from Mississippi" and next thing you know they called my name and sent me this book!  

My latest project is  a quilt for William and Laura.  William is Anne's nephew and Laura is his fiancé'.  They are getting married in June.  My project is out of the book Smash Your Precut Stash!   I am doing the Sassy 16.   The pattern designers called for all the background to be the same fabric.  I chose to do it a variety of creams and whites.  

 So Friday we were out of school for Good Friday and my car had a recall on the airbags which is a 5 hour repair.  So I packed up my Featherweight and the project and took it with me.  So I sat there and sewed 168 flip and stitch corners and made strips of the  16 patch blocks.

I need to get going on this so I can get it to them by wedding day...hope I make it!

Terry