The Return of Stonefields

 

At some point after I moved to the Northwest, the instructions for the Stonefields quilt by Susan Smith got stored in one place while the blocks went in another. I have brought them back together so I can work on this quilt. As I was hunting for light fabrics for the microspools, I would encounter fabric I thought would go well with Stonefields. I was completing the blocks in order, and stopped working on it  during the booklet for Month 4. Shown here are the blocks for Month 1.

And if you are interested in how a brain works, here is some brain imagery of my brain while completing a simple cognitive task. Yes, it is worrisome, but fascinating.

Link to brain scan: https://twitter.com/___GreenTea13/status/1428948687963660290?s=20

Kawandi and Kats

Yesterday I took Sujata Shah's class on making a Kawandi. It was sponsored by Portland Modern Quilt Guild and held over Zoom. We were advised to make a placemat, but that seemed too civilized for my lifestyle. Obviously, I needed to make something Molly could hide under or sleep on, so my Kawandi is about 30 inches square. (And yes, please ignore the straight pin. I didn't know pins were frowned on until too late in the class and I had already earned a demerit on my permanent record.)

Yesterday Molly tested the Kawandi to see if she could hide under it, but today she preferred to be on it because that made it much harder for me to sew.

Here is a closeup...of Molly.

And just like that, even before I can make it all around the border, the Kawandi is infested with cat patchwork.

Aqua

Here are my aqua diamonds/chips and today it was quite fitting because we had rain...okay, sprinkles. And I have to say it was a nice change of pace for here in the Northwest...and yeah, don't hold me to this in November. In any case, its the right color for August at the Rainbow Scrappy Challenge.

And out in the front yard, we are celebrating purple.

And last, but not least, WHO just went off to the Oregon State Fair?

Cooling Off

This Saturday I am attending a virtual workshop with Sujata Shah sponsored by the Portland Modern Quilt Guild. Since the project involves handstitching (like boro), we are advised to use soft fabric. This sounds like a good use of my stash of deconstructed plaid shirts. However, digging around in the plaid made me think I should make a plaid quilt...so I'm working on a plan...no squirrels involved.

Meanwhile, I feel the microspool quilt winding down...despite the fact that I'm not close to being done. Each microspool has a background fabric, and I cut "a few" different ones and choose a background for each spool.  At this point, with each spool matched to its background, I am at least past the phase of cutting the background bits. 

Next, I stack the spool bits with their backgrounds and take them to the sewing machine.

Here is a small sample from the last batch of a hundred or so microspools.

And here is the neglect that accrues when I make microspools. After Buddy's recent trip to the vet for a teeth cleaning, Buddy now prefers neglect. That said, the vet assistants adored Buddy and gushed about how sweet and adorable he is. This is in contrast to Molly who they described as "wiggles and squirms" which is vet assistant code for "I'm glad I had my tetanus shot." Also, when Molly came out in her carrier after her visit, everyone in the waiting area had to put on ear protection.

Dreaming in Color

 Here is some nice cool breezy aqua to counterbalance the hot dry brown of the Northwest. I am sending Angela of SoScrappy and the Rainbow Scrappy Challenge this bit of color levity to counterbalance the dangerous crazy she has to navigate as a teacher in Florida. We do have our crazy in Oregon too...a county commissioner suggested our governor fund more hospital beds rather than require people wear masks. And yes, the hospital beds would be in a different county...the same county where I drove to get my vaccination.

Now this is more my kind of crazy.

Feeling Scrappy

 The color for August is Aqua (and I'm including teal) according to the Rainbow Scrappy Challenge. Because a quilter can't live on microspools alone, I decided to dive into the blue/green scraps and pull out the scraps to use for making chips and bitcoin (whatchamacallits).

And then my scrap universe expanded because I received a delivery of scraps from Wanda's (Exuberant Color) Pop-up shop. It's called a Pop-up shop because you have to hover near your computer the day the shop opens, and then you have to pop into the store and dive into check out to avoid the terrible message that an item has sold. (This is all occurring between 9:00am and 9:01am on the west coast.) This photo shows the scraps just after they came out of the bag.

Here are the scraps after they have been sorted into 16 different configurations. The row on the bottom are an accumulation of common bits that will become microspools. I had so much fun that I had to call my sister and confess that someone with too many scraps bought a bag of Wanda's scraps and that I must have some kind of disease. My sister suggested that the disease must be hereditary because she had bought a bag of Wanda's scraps too. 

And on a more serious note, here is Molly watching "bird videos for cats" on her iPad. She started to paw at the iPad and then scratch and paw some more and this made the video switch to one showing "mice videos for cats." She then settled down to watch mice dart out of holes in a wall for food.

I was explaining to Molly that outside cats live a much harder life than "indoor only" cats, and that outside cats don't get to watch bird videos. Molly suggested that if I can take a photo of her watching bird videos, I have too many devices in the bedroom. 

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