Wordless Wednesday

T is for Tessellation

Fourth UFO finish since November 1. Hurray!

The blocks for this one were made many moons ago at a workshop where we were to design our own tessellation, a single shape that interlocks to cover the field. After these blocks 'rested' for quite awhile, I sewed them together, more or less to keep them form getting lost. At a September bee retreat I finally found the right fabric and put the borders on.

Yesterday and today I did the machine quilting and binding. It has finished to 38.5" square. How's that for an ODD size? Oh, well, that's just the way I work. If it's not big enough to be a bed sized quilt, I just stop when it seems to be done. This could be a neonatal quilt for the Guild collection next March--or I could give it to my Secret Sister.

Advent 3 and we were at Bethlehem Lutheran this AM. We had a close encounter with John the Baptizer asking us why we owned TWO coats when there were cold people out on the street. Good question. If we have food, why are we not sharing it with the hungry? Hmm, another good question.

Darn! These questions make me think I need to change my life.

Maybe I'll stop going to church.

Sara

Gratitudes:

Good preaching

Warm coats!

Plenty of food!

Sermon delivered

I got through it. I didn't realize how worried about preaching in front of the Bishop and other priest from the diocese I was.

We have blizzard level winds and drifting snow, but we luckily drive west to church, not north or south, so the roads were open.

At the regular morning service, my only duty was to lead some music during communion with my guitar. That was no strain, and we also sang some familiar and wonderful Advent hymns, and one of our other lay preachers had a good homily about Mary accepting God's great INTERRUPTION of her life. For lunch we didn't go home, but went to Schuler Book for soup and salad.


Then back to the church for Matthew's ordination. The service was delayed in starting because of the driving conditions, but all went well, and we had a congregation of about 55 people, many of whom drove home and back again after the morning service.

No photos, since I forgot my camera!

And when I asked the Bishop afterwards if I needed any theological correction on my sermon, he said, "No, I agreed with everything you said."
Hoo-ee, what a relief! And my knees were exhausted when I got home.

Now maybe I'll have a little time for quilting in the spaces between Christmas prep.




Sara

Gratitudes:
Kathie and Jo got to the service
Not many vehicles on the road
Charlie heated up leftover soup for supper

More on Advent banner

Earlynne asked about how the banner in the previous post was made, with the idea of copying it for her church.

I took a class on making wreaths with "snippets" by Cindy Walters. Here is a shot of the bottom of the wreath where you can see the different fabrics which were backed with a fusible web and THEN cut into snippets and laid out as a wreath. When everything was positioned correctly, they were ironed down.

I added the candles with their little strip of highlight in the same way, with fusible web. Before adding the flames I finished the quilt--borders, minimal quilting and then binding and a rod pocket at the top and bottom in the back. (I put a straight curtain rod in the bottom to help keep it straight.)

The flames are not permanently attached because each week of Advent the number changes. I suppose I could have attached ONE, but I made them all the same.

I cut circles of a fashion fabric (which is translucent and has sparkles imbedded) for the light auras and with fusible web again attached the fabric outer flame shape, and the inner flame shape. These four completed circles are stored in a kitchen drawer until needed. Each week another one is simply PINNED in position. I always hope that the pin heads will be mistaken for another one of the sparkles.

This photo is to give a sense of the size, 48" tall and 54" wide. It's pretty big for the house banner, but I have a bare wall behind the counter stools where I hand fairly large quilts.

Here you can faintly see the banner on the back wall through my kitchen window from the outside.

So are there any more questions?





Winter storm here since 1 AM. Looks like all the schools are closed, and the COURTS. I don't remember that happening before.


My statue of a cherub reading a book is standing in front of that post. I guess his head is under that little peak.















These are regular height chairs on the deck.

Sara

Gratitudes:
Friday is one of my "stay home" days, so what if it has been snowing since 1 AM.?
SpoolSpinners' holiday party last night
Making progress on my sermon

Advent 3

Maybe you need to be assured that we are celebrating Advent?

Yes, we light the candles for dinner, three this week.

Yes, the Advent Wreath banner is hanging in the kitchen.

Yes, the creche figures of Mary and Joseph and the donkey are making their way around the livingroom under the beneficial eye of the angel.

I'm not working on any quilting. I'm working on a sermon for Sunday afternoon when our congrgation will celebrate the ordination of a son of the parish on the feast day of St. Thomas, the Doubter. The combination of these is my topic. How to interweave them is my problem.

Sara

Gratitudes:

Breakfast with my Reunion group

Shopping for the church Christmas basket

Escapism reading

Arrival at Stable

In a crowded Bethlehem,
far from the airport,
Joseph has found a stable.
Looks like there is hay for a bed
and some friendly animals to warm the air.

Time to move in before Mary's time arrives.
Hope there is a midwife nearby;
he'll ask the innkeeper's wife.
Then he needs to go to the Tax Office to register.

And we think we've got a busy schedule!
I'm looking forward to a sermon about Joseph this morning, since we are in the lectionary year of Matthew. Matthew doesn't care about Mary. All those stories are in Luke. However, I still hope we will sing "The Angel Gabriel from heaven came".

EVENING:

I made the "THE" this afternoon. Decided it should be a little smaller, as a less significant word. Now they are both pinned up at the head of the bed. It would be nice to get "STAR" done before we leave for Costa Rica, but Christmas Eve may not be a good day for working on it. Then again, maybe it will be! With no one coming to visit, I can use my time however I want!
I am trying to imagine how to make the "A" for "STAR" look like a star. Since I am not certain, I don't feel like starting. Guess I'll go to work on the packing, which could make for more time tomorrow before the Christmas Eve service. Maybe I'll have a brainstorm by the morning.

Sara

Steps: 2831 (bad!)

Gratitudes:

Yes! We sang "The Angel Gabriel from heaven came".

FOUR candles lit on dining table.

Pasta with pesto for dinner.

Third Week of Advent

The Collect for the Third Sunday of Advent started "Rejoice. . .", hence the name "Gaudete" Sunday. Today our Collect has changed, but we still light the rose candle, not quite so penitent as purple.

Our book discussion group is reading Toward Holy Ground, Spiritual Directions for the Second Half of Life, by Margaret Guenther. Today's chapter is entitled, "A Good Death".
The end of the year, the length of these dark nights, and my increasing bodily aches -- all make this a appropriate topic. She says that preparation for death is a life-long project! Hmmm, I've put this off for a many years. Her recommendations include a daily examen of conscience, acknowlegement of our pain and loss, holding onto hope. Old words, but difficult to follow. I guess one really does need long practice so the process becomes "natural".

Yesterday I did all the Stitch-in-The-Ditch quilting on the Secret Sister quilt. Today I "screwed my courage to the sticking point" and started free motion quilting the red and white fabric. It has a very concealing pattern, which I really need. Now that I've finished that part with loops, I am looking at the outer, red fabric and trying to imagine that it too will hide the vagaries of my stitching, Probably NOT. However, I am using red thread at this point, so it will be a little hidden. Since I want this quilt to be useable for Valentine's season as well as Xmas, I am conjuring Hearts for this border. But now the corners that I liked are causing a planning problem----anything the right size for the border will be too small for the corner. Need to "put on my thinking cap". [Shades of Brownie Scout Troop #556 in 1950!]

Sara

Gratitudes:
No trouble driving to church (snow)
Choir practice for Christmas Eve sounded good
Lunch with Kathie

Hole in the Lake

Quiggle Lake has frozen in a strange shape this year. Usually our side of the lake is the last to freeze because the spring is near our shore and the lake is much deeper not too far off our dock. So far we have a skim of ice, who knows how thick, that goes wayout to the middle, and a round hole out there. The geese have been gathering in LARGE numbers, but seem to be gone this morning when I took this photo.

On the window ledge you can see Mary and Joseph under the care of the Angel marching on their way to Bethlehem. Only 9 days left in Advent and arrival at the creche stable.

We had a little supper party last night, which always throws me into a dither and almost complete exhaustion by the time the company arrives. Even when it is simply spaghetti and salad! I certainly am the complete Introvert, whose reaction to arriving at a party is to say, "How soon can we leave?" When the party is at your own house. . . . However, once I find the conversation interesting my mind gets into gear and I do enjoy the exchange of ideas.

Calmed down afterwards by working on Bonnie's latest clue for the Mystery quilt Carolina Crossroads, getting most of my strips of three patches sewn together while listening to jazz on the radio.

Since my kitchen counter is all cleaned off for the event lastnight, I will find it easy to get the Secret Sister quilt top layered and pinned with batting and backing for the real quilting work. Also will give me time to imagine the quilting design(s).

Sara

Gratitudes:

SHORT haircut for Costa Rica, clean house, quiet day

Cute nine-patches

I did indeed finish the 100 little nine-patches for the Carolina Crossroads Mystery quilt. Here's a basket full of them with a sample display of four.

I decided the light yellow that was my second fabric for the "accent" position was too light to read as a medium. This position is supposed to be closer to the dark plaids. Luckily I looked through my Yellow Bin and found a brownish-yellow there that will do a better job. But perhaps these two fabrics will not be enough for the whole mystery! I will have to wait and see, and meanwhile hold back from rushing wildly to the fabric store, my natural inclination. I am going to keep the nine-patches that were already put together with the light yellow. But I replaced all the three-piece-strips with that yellow that had NOT been turned into nine-patches yet. So now there are three yellows in use, but only two that will continue.

These patches are smaller than I usually use, and the blocks are rather cute! I had nearly decided to get rid of my little bin of 1.5' squares and strips, but Bonnie may have converted me. Nevertheless, this is no way to use up very much Stash. I think we have enough blocks so far to make a top of 30" x 60". The final top is going to be 80" x 80", so we have a way to go.

The next Clue will come on Thursday, perhaps. Therefore I will have to work on something else during my quilting time.

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Today an offshoot group was formed from Stashbusters by women who need to have a REWARD in order to exercise. The founder proclaimed that she was going to only quilt AFTER exercising each day, and lots of us think this may work for us. After all, this makes more sense than rewarding oneself with food! Hence a new group.

I have joined and gave myself the following challenge, which I am calliing "Healthy Habits":

1) EXERCISE weekly six days: Strength and Stretch class with Charlie twice, Swimmercise at the community pool twice, and walk at least 20 minutes a day twice.

2) EAT healthy always, and plan my morning and afternoon snacks (so I don't indulge in "easy" pickings).

Then I went out to take my first walk in a long time--45 minutes was my plan, or at least two times around the meadow. Forget it! I went once around the meadow and was winded. Total time = 10 minutes. Guess I need to lower my expectations to 20 minutes, which may be divided into two separate walks. Better to be realistic about my expectations.

Tonight I took out the first shepherd figure for our creche.

Sara

Gratitudes:

Singing Advent hymn "At Jordan's bank the Baptist's cry"

Tuna pesto salad

Discovered three 'lost' evergreen trees in the snow

Advent decorations

We are not having Christmas at our house for the first time in, oh, 38 years. We will rush out of here on Christmas morning heading for St. Louis and a trip with our grandson to Costa Rica for eight days. But we are having Advent, right through Christmas Eve church. So we are having our usual "celebration" for the first 24 days of December.

***We have the Advent wreath on the dining table and we eat dinner solely by the light of the candles lit each week. Dinner is pretty dark right now with only one candle.

***The quilt of an Advent wreath is hanging on the wall behind the kitchen eating bar. The flame and glow of each candle there is pinned onto the background as the weeks progress. I can also see this from outside the house as I drive in the driveway.

***The creche figures are coming out of the box one at a time. So far Mary and Joseph have each had a conversation with the Angel about an unexpected event. They have acquired a donkey, and all four of them are slowly making their way from Nazareth (table by the wing chair) all the way south (along the picture window ledge) to the stable in Bethlehem (table by the loveseat on the other side of the living room). In the days to come various animals will appear in the stable, and the flock of sheep and shepherds will increase on the commode. No children remain at home, yet this activity keeps us asking after dinner is cleaned up, "Did you get a figure out for tonight, or is it my night?"

Sara

Gratitudes:

Iris' birthday lunch

enjoyed cutting fabric

going to a play tonight