Bouncy Ball

Bouncy Ball by Cathy Tomm

This week is Quilt Canada and it is in Halifax N.S.. I got a quilt finished and entered in the Canadian National Juried Show back in February this year. The show opened to the public yesterday (I forgot) so now I can show you my quilt. I named it Bouncy Ball. Only my quilt is going to the show not me. I am home on soccer duty.

Artist statement: My Dog and I have discovered the joy of competitive agility together. Our new found passion, that is as fun and fast as a bouncy ball. His favorite toy to train with is a Hol-ee Rooler, a ball with large holes made in a rainbow of colours. I chose the traditional block, the Greek Square, to convey the round ball shape with its many holes. Pieced with scraps and freehand quilted on my long arm machine. Hol-ee Roller is a resisted trademark of the J.W. Pet Company, Inc.

Width 72" and Height 96"

 I used a wool batt and did lots of different quilting patterns on it. I have not hear if it won any prizes, I have a few friends at Quilt Canada so I think they would have told me if I had gotten any.  That is OK. I have gotten many prizes in the past years. I think this was my 12th year I have quilts at the Canadian National Juried Show. Friday night update: my friend Kathy says she saw a ribbon on it today. Now to wait and see what. Thanks Kathy

Now some of you in blog land maybe thinking 'did I see you start this'. Yes. I did a few blocks in January and February for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge 2012. I was loving it so much I keep sewing and did the quilt very very quickly. I may have to add this to our Saturday Scrap links that we do each week.

Just a sample of some of the quilting I did.

Lex and Cathy getting there Agility Dog of Canada title.

It was only last month that Lex and I got our first title in Agility. This weekend in Medicine Hat many Agility friends are competing in the Regional for Alberta and NWT. I wish them luck and know I am thinking about you, keep on course fast and the rails up.  We are not ready do that level of competition.

Arley's Big String Quilt

This is a very large string quilt made by my Aunt Arley (smiley quilter). I got the machine quilting done for her a while back but forgot to ask if I could make a post about it. She has done the string piecing on the old phone book pages, the way that Bonnie Hunter does. I love the sashing the nine patches and the three bars. I did a quilt with this sashing years ago but gave it way to me sister in law.

I have quilted this one with leaves and loops in a medium green thread. This quilt has a wool batting in it and I believe it is to be her new Winter quilt. It is so large that she had to get me to quilt it form her, her frame is too small for it.  I should help keep Uncle Dave warm and cosy. I have added this to the String Thing Along.

I must tell you my Aunt Arley is the one who pointed me toward the Quiltville web site. She is the one who has been doing the mystery quilts and made me think I should try this or that. It is so much fun to have a fellow quilt buddy to point you in the direction of new quilts to try. I am so lucky to have so many good quilter's in the family. My mom Betty, Aunt Arley and my other Aunt Myrna are all great quilter's that I have. Now to get one of my sister in laws to sew. It is fun to influence our friends and get them to be as bad as we are, starting new quilts or shopping for more fabric.

Tuesday once was Bee Group ( more ladies to get into trouble with) day, So I love to show some quilting off. Some of our Bee group has planned a road trip to the Red Deer Quilt show on June 8th (and 9th). We will stop and shop on the drive. This show has a big market mall with shops across Western Canada. I best get some more customer's machine quilting done so I can go shopping.

Design Wall Monday RRCB 1 and 2

It is Design Wall Monday over at Patchwork Times. I do not have anything new on the wall yet but I do have some new patchwork on the big ironing board. I have steps 1 and 2 of RRCB done. What is RRCB? Roll Roll Cotton Boll is the mystery quilt Bonnie Hunter at Quiltville did back in Nov of 2010. Yes I am way behind. Well I did not start it till this year. I was seeing the quilt all last winter and made sure to print it out. I believe the pattern is going to be in her new book coming out in July.

Block mapping out my new colours

Bonnie had given a colour way of red, brown, pink and some green. I did not want to do those colours and since I was starting this knowing what the quilt and block was, I picked new colours. I wanted Lime green, navy, turquoise and purple.

I had a couple of hours one night last week to sew for myself. I worked hard on my string blocks. The next day I ironed my string blocks and found out I had very bad tension on my machine all the time. Look at those bad stitches. They are easy to unpick, just pull. But what a pain in the #$%*. I still have at least one more block to fix. Then I have about 12 more blocks to do yet. Finally I am seeing the end of the strings. We needed 60 string blocks. Then they are cut in half and four are sewn together.

Agility Results Today

Lex and I have just gotten home from our first outdoor agility trial of the season. We had a very good day. Lots of fun, hot dogs, and wagging tails. We passed our first ever Gamblers class. This class require to do some work further out from your dog. I was starting to think we would never pass one. We did great. We had to make our own rout and get enough points, then when the whistle blows we start the clock on the final gamble and we got it without any trouble. The other classes we had some faults like a rail and he jumped off the table too soon but he was very good over all. He did all that I asked and did not get distracted at all. I also did not get lost on course and was a good handler too. He is sleeping at my feet as I type.

Happy Scrappy Saturday - Last Yellow

Yellow Fruit Basket block

Today it the last Saturday of May. I have been working on my Rainbow Scrap Challenge 2012 and linked  to Soscrappy. I was trying to decide what else I could make with my scraps. I also have seen many blocks from the Farmer's Wife and the Sew a Long over at Barrister's Block, I have jumped in too. I see Bonnie Hunter is doing these blocks for her Jubilee Quilt. My friend Kathy S is working on this too, but not in a rainbow fashion.

Yellow Big Dipper

I know I am way behind on the blocks as they got started back in February. But this way I can just do what blocks I want when I want. I do not know if I will do them all but I will have a cute little stack of blocks. These blocks will finish up to 6 inches square.

Basket Weave in Orange and Yellow 

 I have done this one with both yellow and orange and the background cream. I think if I use a colour next on the colour wheel it will be easier to put this together. I am also going to use white and cream for background colours. I will have to go back and do some of the colours we did earlier this year.

Battlegrounds in Red and white background.

 Red was our colour for January.

The first four blocks for now. These blocks are from Farmer's wife but I am a Forester's wife and may have to rename it.

I have sorted my box of pre sewn triangles. Many have white or cream with them and so they can be used in these blocks. many are 2 half inches but some were 2 inches or larger. I thought it was a good place to start. I was able to Red Battlegrounds block with every triangle coming from here.

Lex the dog and I have an Agility Trial on Sunday. Wish us luck. Sounds like we will get good weather for it sunny but not to hot.

Quilted Spool Quilt

It is Tuesday and our Bee group is meeting at mom's house, today. I have a quilted another great quilt from a bee group member again. She loves feathers and wanted something special for this quilt. So of course what else am I to do but feathers.

I love these little feather wreaths.

This is the back of the quilt. I did a feather boarder on the red boarder but it did not show in the photos of the front. The spools also got the little back and forth like it is thread on each spool.

Bloggers Festival

I have added a link to  Amy's Blogger Festival. I have chosen my art quilt Crop Circles to the List of quilts. I feel I learned a lot making this quilt. I used mostly my hand dyed fabric and used free form cutting (no ruler) make it. I had to really think about how the parts were going together. I knew I wanted to make fields with the circles on it but also wanted to make it pleasing to look at.  It was what I call a brain buster. It took my months to do. I have left my images very large so you can view the details.

Crop Circles

Original design by Cathy Tomm

                      

Size 50” wide x 62” Tall

Statement: Fields of green and purple are cut by roads and encroached on by urban growth into some of the best farming lands. The myth of aliens leaving crop circles might be easier to explain then all the real troubles farmers have been facing. Urban growth, mad cow disease, chicken flu, fluctuating, commodity prices, rising fuel costs and increased debt plus all the regular weather risks of farming. Hats off to the real farmers from an Ag Grad

Techniques: Custom Machine Quilted on Longarm Machine, Hand and Machine Appliqued, Button Embellishment, Binding is multi pieced to repeat inner part.

Shows that Crop Circles has been juried into:

Canadian Quilter Association 18^th  National Juried Show  Finalist. Ottawa, Ont. 2006

Pacific Northwest Quiltfest Biannual Juried Show Finalist. Seattle, WA. 2006

American Quilter’s Society Paducah Quilt Show Finalist. Paducah, KY. 2007

Happy Scrappy Yellow Saturday Again

I have done more for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge this week. I have three log cabins done - I was hoping to get four done because I think four would be better than three. I was having trouble getting enough different pieces of fabric in each block, not sure I could get four. I have not thought about how I will lay out these log cabins. I only did one Red log cabin and three Pink, so I may go back and make more so I have four of each colour.  I will link this post up with SoScrappy today, if you want to see what other Yellow is going on today.

I did some major cleaning in my room last night. I have a friend coming over to sew today and I needed to find space for her. I should have space for three or four people but I have to much stuff. I have a second cutting area cleaned off.

I have my large 24" by 60" ironing board cleaned off. I have to iron those boarders next so they will not stay there long. Happy sewing.

UFO List Update

At the beginning of the year I wrote a bit about what UFOs I have and what I plan to get done. I also made a list of new projects I wanted to do. One rule I gave myself is no guilt for not getting something done. I have gotten lots of patchwork done so far this year and only a few finished so far.

Heart quilt got done in February. I started as part of the rainbow scrap challenge, red as January's colour.

New Projects

- Plaid quilt for Son #2 - Just started

- Hawaii Quilt (because the fabric is fun) started - 11 blocks

- Bonnie Hunter's Mystery from 2010 RRCB - I love this quilt, might need one - Started the string blocks

- Pamela Allen Class Project - Class is in April signed up and paid - Two wall quilts started

- 2nd Scrap quilt (start with scraps from Bad to the Bone) - Top done needs backing and quilting squares with shadows - need to name this quilt. photo below

- maybe 3rd scrap quilt - I started some log cabin block in the rainbow scrap challenge

- 2 Fabric Christmas Trees - Not started

- Tin box exchange with the Leduc Quilt Guild  - I got my 6 blocks done, waiting to draw for boxes

- Brightly coloured Fabric book - Not started

- Maybe another Mystery From Guild or Bonnie Hunter if she does another one next Nov.- Lady Bug fabric quilt needs one more boarder. Leduc mystery day in April. 

- A felted project or two  - I did some wet felting a hat and scarf

- Gift for Edmonton Guild Endowment Fund Raiser - not sure what yet - I got the beaded bracelet done. photo at bottom of page.

- Roll Roll Cotton Boll - I have started and not planned to.

Wow two things I plan to work on and not started. All others I have done some work on. I may need to add to the new projects list but not today. I am sure by fall I will have a few things I want to start again. 

I have also done a quilt that is at the National Juried Show. I will show that quilt to you at the end of May. 

Squares with shadows quilt top done in April. Again part of the Rainbow Scrap Challenge for April. 

UFO's to work on- I plan to work on some but not finish all. This is not a list of all my UFO's, Just some I plan to work on.

- Orca Bay Mystery from Bonnie Hunter - finish piecing top, quilt, backing, bind - Very little change

- Dog's Food Quilt - Binding only left - Done with dog on it now.

- Bad to the Bone - Quilt, bind - No change

-  Log Cabin Plaid Quilt - backing fix the hole, quilt, bind - No change

- Star Struck in Lime - Backing, quilt, bind ( got top done on New Years Eve) - No change

- Spider Web Quilt - Piece blocks together, backing, quilt, bind - No change

- Rainbow Scrap Quilt - more Blocks, and much more, not sure how big to go. - More blocks done, more needed

- House wall quilt - finish top, quilt, bind- No change

- Flower prints 16 and 4 patch blocks - make a plan and build a top - No change - not even looks at the box

- Old UFO class project thing - dig it out, work on quilt top - rename this - No change now I am not sure what this is I am talking about.oops

- Green Chevron - more piecing - No change

- Whole Cloth quilt from Karen McTavish class - Thick batt with wash away, cutting away batt, quilt, bind - No change

- Susan Shie class wall quilt - quilt, bind ( there are two of these) - No change

- Felted fabric under water scene - what to do next ? - No change

- Felted scarf -  more design work, and Where is it? - Done and then lost in two weeks time. 

- Gift for Laural - appliqué block, Need to find it first.No change

- Leaves hand appliquéd on Snow Dyed fabric (Should get a photo and show you) - No change

- Baltimore Hand Appliqué - more blocks, start another block - No change

Bracelet for the Edmonton Guild

Ok so looking at what I have done so far this year, I like to start quilt projects. I have done well to start and keep working on those new starts. I am not good to go back to the older projects. I should not have started RRCB of Bonnie Hunter's until I finished Orca Bay. But I love to build little quilt units into the block size. Not a big fan of sewing large rows together. Also I need to book my machine quilting in so I can finish some of my quilts. I quilt for others but forget to make time for my quilts. 

Must keep the No Guilt and have Fun motto. 

Arley's RRCB Machine Quilted

I have finished long arm quilting my Aunt Arley's Roll Roll Cotton Boll quilt. It was the mystery quilt that Bonnie Hunter had started back in November of 2010. My Aunt has done the last three of Bonnie's mystery quilts. I think this pattern is expected to be in Bonnie's new book that is due out this July if you want the pattern.  If you have not found Bonnie's web site go to  http://quiltville.com/ and check out some of her free patterns - I did my Star Struck from her web site.

The layout of the blocks, but the quilting dose not show yet. I believe this is to be my auntie's new summer quilt. She normally does her own quilting but this one is too big for her smaller quilt frame. I wanted to be sure the quilting I did was something she would not normally do herself. Make it different and special.

I took some extra time and made a good plan as to how I should quilt this quilt. I have three pages of small drawings about what I could do. I just loved this feather work I did. I have left this photo in a large formate you can double click and see the photo larger.

This photo is also in a larger formate and you can double to click to see the quilting more. I did mostly the curve echoing with other little loops and spirals.

I have started my own RRCB quilt. Here on the ironing board is some more of the string blocks I am sewing on the old phone book pages and a small group of the 600 half square triangles I need.

I had a correct guess on Saturday and yes I have started RRCB. I had printed the instructions last winter after I saw my aunt's quilt on here blog. I had changed some of the colours, so as I get to them I will show you my steps.

Machine Quilting

Today is Tuesday and normally it would be a 'Bee Group Day'. I have always liked to show you something quilting on Tuesday, so today you get to see one of the quilts made my a Bee Group Friend. She does great appliqué quilts. I forgot to take an all over photo but here is the details of the machine quilting I did for her. The star blocks got some cross hatching as she like the tradition look of cross hatching. I will say I have been doing quilting for her for so many years she just drops off her quilts and leaves it to me. I love that it gives me time to think about what I think will look the best. I know her tastes and what she likes and does not like. When I think about it I have know her for more that 15 years. WOW we are getting old together. He he.

Design Wall Monday Block Exchange

Good day everyone. I hope your Mother's day was a good one. Mine was. I did not get much time to sew because we were so busy.

Let us take a look at my design wall today. I have called this block "Alberta Fields". I have signed up for a block exchange with the Edmonton and District Quilter's Guild. Our guild and the Napa Valley Quilt guild is doing a quilt block exchange and the blocks are due in Wednesday. Alberta Fields is my block for the non traditional group and measures 12 1/2". I have used some of my hand dyed fabric and then added long stitches to the bottom of the yellow field.

This block is called North Winds. I have used some rose prints as the flower for Alberta is the wild rose. I kind of laugh at north winds, as I am sure in winter the ladies in Napa Valley do not look forward to getting north winds from cold Alberta. I have added today's post to the linky page on Patchwork Times. If you would like to see more Design Wall Monday go check it out.

I gave my Mother a new seam ripper for Mother's Day yesterday. Her's is on the bottom and mine is the one on the top (mine is an old one and was a test). I have been playing with polymer clay for years and find I go back to it sometimes. I made a cane of clay, black dot then white and black then added green and back to black and white again. I then slice disks of colour from a cane. Mom's seam ripper has a couple of larger canes and then the small size.

I also covered this little tin lid with the rest of the cane of clay. I drink tea and love to buy loose tea in these tins. I am not sure what I will store in my little tin now that the tea is gone. I may have to decorate the side of the tin next. If you want to see the cane work I did a post sometime ago on Cane work.

Scrappy Saturday Yellow

It is a Scappy Saturday and the month of May is Yellow. I did not get any done the first week but today I have a good start. I have added today's post to SoScrappy linky page. I have been a good girl and done many of these Saturdays for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge 2012.

Here is my box of well sorted out yellow straps. I have trouble deciding if some are yellow, brown or orange. I think sometimes to get the contrast we need for patch work we need to add a little of the other colours in.

I have a stack of 12 string blocks done. I have started a new quilt again. Last month was neutral scraps so I am a little late but I am sure you will forgive me. I did do a whole quilt top last month.

I have done the string block on old phone book paper, like Bonnie Hunter does.

I need to trim and cut my blocks like the above photo. I am wondering if some of you can guess what quilt I have started. I will give you a clue - there were many of these quilts on the go last winter.

Going to mom's now.

Machine Quilting

Today I had some good friends (and customers) come and pick up their quilts and I remembered to ask if I could post the photos I had taken. They of course have said yes go a head. Here is the sampler quilt made with so much great floral fabric. I love how she has used some of the different prints. The sashing is a strip and the dark rose colour for a the sashing star. Soft green and pinks are some of my favourite colour to quilt with. I have a quilt top in the closet that is a sampler and uses a rose print in navy and pinks. Some day I will have to quilt mine.

Because it is a sampler quilt I made each block's quilting a little different. I did not take photos of all the blocks but these two blocks gives you some idea of what I did. Part of what does not show up in photos is the quilting on the darker fabrics. I did some roses in the out boarder in the rose thread and then leaves and loops in the boarder in green thread.

I hope you enjoy seeing some of my customers work. I am planning to sew with Mom on Saturday as our mother daughter day. Then Sunday is going to be with my In-laws and my mom is with my brother's family.

Spring Is Here

I did some gardening today, so it must be spring. Here is the pond and rock garden area. Take a note at the trees in the far back. The leaves are trying to burst out. In three days they will be fully out. I love living in the country were we are so much more aware of the changing seasons. I got a few lily bulbs in the ground and some weeding done.

I have also put out some new wooden disks for stepping stones. They were left overs from my husbands work in forestry. He brought some disks home to burn in the fireplace but I am using some of the large ones for stepping stone. The one on the right has been outside for two years. The two on the left were from the same tree and the rings say the tree was 108 years old. Each of these disks have been sanded and then the rings counted and marked on the disks. The disks do crack and need to be replaced once in awhile.

This flower bed has lots of growing to do. The bottom photo is from last year and the one above is today. I hope they look just as good this year. I sit on the deck and watch the humming birds come to feed. 

I get to stay home tonight, so maybe I will do some scrap sewing next.