Nine Patch Friends

A few years ago, 3 friends and I went to visit another friend in Denver.  While there we went to see an exhibit of Amish quilts from the collection of Faith and Stephen Brown at the Denver Art Museum.  We were all fascinated by the "Nine Patch Crib Quilt" so decided to do an exchange of 9 patch blocks and see what we all could come up with.  Our only rules, if I remember them right were to make 5 blocks of 6 different solids for each person in the group.  There were 5 of us so that was a lot of blocks.  We were to use solid black in the same position and the finished blocks were to be 3".  A couple of the gals threw in a zinger or two which was fun.  I made extra blocks and remember I didn't use all the blocks I had - have no idea how many 9 patch blocks ended up in the quilt.

I finally got my top pieced together a couple years ago then ended up putting it my stack of UFOs as I didn't know how I was going to quilt it.  I did have fun arranging the blocks and love the light squares floating in the middle of the quilt. Three of the gals got their's pieced and quilted right away, don't know about the last gal but here I am getting mine finished now.

I pulled it out this last week and am working on machine quilting it now.  Have to get it finished by Thursday so it can count towards my 25 yards used for our guild challenge this year.

Happy Quilting,
Lynn

Split Nine Patch - Hippo Trails

Here is the finished Split 9 Patch quilt I have been working on since last fall.  It is all machine stitched except the back of the binding which I finished hand stitching down on Saturday night.  It's name is "Hippo Trails" and is 53" x 64" - a lap quilt size for covering up on the couch.













I did do a feather design in the outside border - guess I have a one track mind and I can do feathers pretty easily so went with what works.

Now I know you are all are wondering how I got that name but if you look at the backing you might figure it out.  Look carefully at one of the fabrics on the left side towards the top - yes it has hippopotamus on it, thus the name.  As you can see I pieced the backing from several different fabrics, wanted to use up some of what I had on hand and these all worked well together I thought.

Got to get busy on another quilt today.  Our guild challenge this year is to use 25 yards of fabric from our stash and that means finished projects.  I am up to 20 yards so pulled another wallhanging top from my UFO box and will try to get it quilted and bound by next Thursday so I can meet the challenge.  You might not hear much from me before then since I will be busy quilting besides the other things that life throws at me.

Lynn

Tiny Teddy Bear has a Boo Boo

When we attended the music program of our older grandson the other night the younger brother pulled this tiny teddy bear out of his mom's purse.  It is about 3" tall so it pretty small.  It is one we gave him for Christmas but now the teddy had a problem.  He was about to loose his head.

M. asked me if I could please fix it for him because he really liked it a lot.  I was very serious and told him I could fix his teddy bear by doing surgery on it.  The teddy bear has a magnet in it's tummy and one on each of the legs so is fun to play with and he also takes it to bed with him.  We zipped him into my purse pocket so it wouldn't get lost and I brought it home with me.

Today I performed the surgery and gave him a little more stuffing in the tummy as well as sewing the head on again.  As soon as I was done with it I put it back into the zippered pocket in my purse so I won't forget to take it next week when we go up to watch him play T-Ball and can give it back to him.  I can't wait as 4 yr. olds just make me smile.  M. loves to play T-Ball and told me he was really good so don't want to miss his game for sure.

He has played 4 games already but we have not been able to go up to see them.
 
Lynn

Spring in Nebraska

That is a pretty broad title - Spring in Nebraska.  It could include many things...new calves, track meets, rain storms, flowers, home grown vegetables, fresh air and many more things.

I have been picking asparagus for about a month now and love each and everyone I eat.  As a kid I hated it, just hated it.  Of course I was a picky eater then and "hated" a lot of foods.  My mother had a huge garden which included a large asparagus bed and it produced and produced each year.  I am not sure when I decided I liked it but now I can say I love it.  I like to roast it in a hot oven with a little olive oil sprinkled on it plus maybe some thyme or other herb.  I can just taste it now...mmmm.  I have to go out and cut it about every other day so have had lots of meals of it.  I am sorry John doesn't like it but then again there is more for me to eat. 

My iris are starting to bloom too.  This one is such a dark orange color.  Isn't it beautiful?  I have quite a few colors of iris most of which were given to me by my mother, again the fantastic gardener - veg. and flowers.  At one time I had over 30 different colors but over the years some have died or didn't survive the move here.  I love them but wish the blooms lasted longer.

Lynn