Well, lookie there

I hardly know what to talk about first.  It's been a busy week!  I know it was stressful for some people, but I was able to let go and settle into my routine and let that routine give me comfort.  Subsequently, while I was focused on what I was doing, I got a ton of work stuff done that I'd been putting off because it was hard work.  And, this week, I'm ready to take on some new challenges.  

I'm going to start with my batik maple leaf blocks.  I've cut out enough variety that I could start piecing some blocks and figuring out how they're going to work, how seams should be pressed so the blocks will lock together when I join them and to make sure I was going to like blocks made out of multiple fabrics.   

I definitely like them.  It's going to take a little more focus making them with multiple fabrics because I'm using the darker fabrics in pairs.  It's going to be harder to keep up with that if I'm assembly line, mass producing the blocks.   But, using them in pairs gives me really nice symmetry in the block and I think I can make it work, even assembly line piecing.  Now, I've just got to find the time to do it.  

Speaking of maple leaves, our tree looked on fire last week with the sun shining on the maple leaves.  I love this tree, but it is getting old and we need to get another tree in the ground near it.  

I took the Sheila Frampton-Cooper class yesterday.  Yes, I had the day wrong.  Right up til Friday night, I was prepping for a Saturday class.  The coordinator asked us to try the link and I did and it came up as a Sunday meeting.  I wrote the coordinator (and embarrassed myself) before she pointed out that I had the day wrong.  

The class was a lot of fun.  At one point, when I was trying to piece my first curve, I wanted to give up.  I wasn't interested and I couldn't do it.  But, fortunately,  I stuck with it.  I even figured out what I was doing wrong and the rest of the class got much easier.  In this class, I learned to stack two pieces of fabric, cut a curve into them, then sew that curve together, without using pins.  The gray section is where I started.  The green section was much easier.  

That goes against everything I believe as a piecer, but I got it to work.  Don't think of these as blocks.  They're intended to have their square corners cut off and other pieces attached that will later come together as a beautiful work of art.  Maybe.  There's no planning in Sheila's style of quilting, except choosing a color palette, and deciding whether you want to start with a focal point and build around that, or whether you want to make inspired sections, and then create sections to join and coordinate them.  You make the pieces you feel inspired to make.  I'm going for the make sections and join them later plan.  My color palette is reds and greens, with grays as a background.  We'll see.  It figures I'd have a project with a deadline that will keep me from much of this work for a while.  

Also, this made a mess of the studio.  I was cutting one piece at a time, so I had to cut from a lot of pieces of fabric.  I'd cut a strip, then toss the rest to the side.  I have piles of unfolded fabrics and a stack of strips on the cutting table.  Oddly enough, that pile became my inspiration.  I'd lay my section down on the cutting mat and a color would jump out at me from the pile as the next piece.  The next challenge is to start using up some of the scraps for smaller pieces.  

And, finally, I made much progress on digging and dividing the iris and daylilies (spell check needs to add the word daylilies because I can assure them, I will never intend to use the word dallies...ever).  This is easy work right now because the soil is so dry.  When I started building this garden, the soil was all heavy clay, but now it's a great, loose, well drained soil mix, with just enough clay to help it hold water.  

I'm adding in some new things that will bloom later than the iris and lilies and will hopefully give me color most of the summer.  This spot got really, really green this year, without any flowers for months.  Next year, I believe it will have a series of colors (at least that's the plan) for all season bloom.

I just realized that I garden like Sheila quilts.  hardly any plan, except to have something in bloom all year round.  

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(VERY BIG HAPPY SIGH)

Now, if we can just survive the series of lies that trump and the trumpettes are telling their followers, everything will be fine.  I didn't really understand cancel culture, and read several articles about it last week.  The trumpettes say that we are trying to cancel their culture of religion and racism.  First, that's not true.  All we're trying to cancel is them forcing those beliefs on the rest of us.  And, second, we show up with votes and they show up with guns.  Who's really trying to cancel who here?  

I won't be forced into antiquated beliefs by anyone.  Likewise, I won't try to turn anyone into a fun-loving, happy, quilting, gardening homasekshul either.  Just let me be and don't try to force me to believe what you believe and I'll let you be whatever unhappy person you choose to be.  And, if you can't keep up with your part of the bargain, I'll turn up the Lady Gaga until I drown you out.  

We'll see just how far people are willing to go in the next couple of months.  

I hope it's not far.  

Lane