Looking Back to Move Forward On this Slow Stitching Sunday

The last day of January, the last slow stitching Sunday for this month and some health news updates.

On Wednesday I finally got the results of my CTA scan I had done in November,  I found out I have 3 clogged abdominal arteries which may be the reason for some of or all of the pain I have been having since March 2020. I have to have a consultation with the Interventional Radiology group to discuss stents to open the arteries or other options. It’s been 9 months since all this abdominal pain started and I still don’t have any real answers, My son gets married in less than a month and I would like to be able to enjoy the day pain free and maybe even eat a piece of wedding cake, but somehow I don't think that is going to happen. 

On Friday the doctor did another Endoscopy mainly because the report from the other doctor was either missing parts or written badly and one of the biopsy results was missing.  So my doctor let me decide now or June when it would be a year since the last one,  I chose now I want answers.  The results so far all my internal organs look good and I don't have Barrett's Esophagus (which the other doctor diagnosed). I am so glad I stopped seeing that doctor.  I will have the results of the biopsies in a short time. Now I'm waiting on the Radiology office to call me to set up an appointment.  

There will be light at the end of all this, from Jan 7th to the 21st I had two full weeks of no pain, no nausea and an actual appetite, it was like being me once again but I didn't let myself over do anything because at the start of all this after the first time in the hospital I had 2 weeks of normal and then it all started over.  I will say over the last 9 months I had a few good days but 2 weeks is the longest, so yes light at the end of the tunnel and at least so far the pain isn't bad enough to send me to the hospital, or it is but I just learned to live with it.

Here is a photo of my new glasses I mentioned in my last post. They are light weight clear blue frames, I picked them up on Tuesday, I love how they fit I wanted clear frames but all the ones I like were sold out so I ordered a second pair with clear frames, I like having backup glasses on hand.  I Purchase them from Lenscrafters.

On the needlework side of things for Slow Stitching today I'm going to put in some hand quilting on the first quilt I ever hand pieced. I began in October 1990, over the years I put off completing it and just work on it every now and then but I decided 2021 is the year to finish it. 

Every other block alternates a heart in the center and a red square center.  The heart piece was actually from patch work yardage I bought for just those heart pieces.  According to my Quilt Journal entry October 1990: The cutting and measuring is time consuming as I am using a ruler to make cardboard templates and scissors to cut my pieces (still my preferred way to cut). I spent 5 days marking the pieces and adding seam allowance and cutting all this entirely by hand.

By Thanksgiving day 1990 I have 12 blocks pieced, then put the quilt aside to do some Christmas crafting, on January 5th I had pieced a total of 15 blocks, and on January 12th 1991 all 35 blocks have been hand pieced and on January 22nd 1991 the quilt top was completed.   

Twenty years have passed since I completed the top and according to my journal entry regarding the backing fabric: Bummer my backing is 5 inches too short and I purchase 1/2 yard more than required according to the pattern book.
However, this turned out to be a road trip to the quilt shop in Allentown NJ, my late friend Sandy and I headed to Allentown to the Quilt Barn at least once a month, so the disappointment didn't last.  I did buy the necessary fabric and basted the quilt which according to the journal was my least favorite part. 

I began the hand quilting on February 2, 1991 I put it in the small standing quilt frame I had purchased at the newly opened Leewards, after two hours 1 square was hand quilted, I had the flu and a raging fever at the time. But hey it's slow stitching.

According to my journal after 6 squares I decided to quilt without the frame and just worked with the quilt on my lap, living in New Jersey at the time in a pre-WWI building (very drafty) it was nice to have the quilt on my lap while I worked.  On March 31st I added a loose binding made from strips of muslin to the quilt because the batting fibers were getting in my eyes and mouth wreaking havoc with my allergies, I have since changed to 100% cotton or wool batting.  Funny this more than anything stands out probably because even today loose fibers irritate my eyes quite a bit.  

Another memorable entry in April of 1991 I attended my first Quilt Show and loved it there were two others in April we attended.  I also put the quilt aside to begin plans to move to Florida in June 1991. There would be no other entry until June 16, 1995, My mother passed in 1991 a few weeks after I arrived and my son and I returned to NJ in December 1991 to tie up her affairs in NJ, I had packed everything in storage in Florida.  We moved back to Florida permanently in May 1994 and on June 16th of 1995 I found a quilt shop in Dade City, the one quilt shop in Ocala at the time, the Quilting Bee,  I would see it everyday on the drive to the hospital when visiting my mother had since closed. 

The quilt shop in Dade City was nearly a two hour drive which was fine with me, the shop in Allentown NJ my friend and I used to go to was a long a drive too.  In the time I went back to NJ, I had made several 9 patch baby quilts and taught my son Nick how to hand piece starting with 6 inch squares.  In 1996 I attended my first quilt show in 5 years, in 1997 I began a Joann's Quilt block of the Month, and in August 1998 there are 2 quilt shops in the county, so no long drives to Dade City.  Over the years the quilt shops in Ocala have closed, with new ones opening and then closing as well.  There is one quilt shop on the other side of town which I attended several classes including hand embroidery class in 2015 that reignited my love of hand embroidery, sadly those classes ended when the instructor moved away. My first quilt journal has no entries after August 1998, when I moved back to NJ for 2 years I didn't record anything even though I made a few baby quilts and wall hangings, there are brief mentions of them in the journal. I began keeping a stitchery journal so I record my projects in one volume when the mood strikes me.  Mostly I keep a running list of embroidery floss colors for project patterns I have, and the start and finish dates of my hand embroidery projects.  So today I will enter my first entry into the quilt journal since 1998.

I am linking my post today to Kathy's Quilts for the Slow Sunday Stitching, the link is here take a look there are so many wonderful bloggers stitching up some lovely projects and maybe with a story to share as well. https://kathysquilts.blogspot.com/2021/01/slow-sunday-stitching_31.html

Before I go just a heads up to anyone interested The San Francisco School of Needlework and Design is having another Stitch at Home Challenge, 

Info can be found here https://sfneedleworkanddesign.org/rules-and-entry-form/

I signed up last night and ideas are swirling in my head, I also have the final touches on the February goddess for my Goddess a Month project and more embroidery has been done on the Brigid's Cross.

Happy Stitching Everyone and thank you for visiting my blog.

Slow Sunday Stitching and a Little Hoop-La!

Happy Sunday, this morning I woke to a loud rumble and louder clap of thunder or maybe it was the rolling thunder that woke me up, either way I greeted Sunday morning to the sound of rain pattering down and warmer weather.

It's been a week of sorting, purging and finding items in my stash of fabric bins.  Years ago I cut out the pieces for a scrappy log cabin quilt and hand stitched the first block.

I had forgotten all about this project and put it in my scraps bin only to find all the strips stacked and waiting to be stitched all these years later.  So I pulled them out of the bin to decide what to do with them.  I had cut all these pieces using scissors and templates for each strip, my preferred way of making a quilt.

I am a long time hand quilter and by the looks of the first block my stitching has the wonkiness I love in hand piecing.  I suppose after I pieced the block I wasn't thrilled with the overall appearance or I  may have not like the colors I don't recall off hand but somewhere in my quilting journal I would have noted the why I put it aside.  I like to think I just became too busy and forgot it.  I am looking at all those strips and trying to decide whether to finish what I started, remove the outer four strips and focus on the blues or cut up all those strips into 2 inch squares (or make them into 1 inch squares for my postage stamp quilt) and sew together one by one.   I'll give it some thought.  I will be posting today over at Kathy's Quilts for Slow Sunday Stitching https://kathysquilts.blogspot.ca/2018/01/slow-sunday-stitching-photo-challenge-1.html

Kathy has a project going on to show a photo of our  favorite hoop, I use all types of hoops and have several of the one's in Kathy's photos including the large floor stand hoop which I use when I'm hand quilting.   My all time favorite hand embroidery hoop is the old metal hoops, this one and several others including an oval one I purchased in 1973.

These are some of my wooden hoops in various sizes  and a purple plastic hoops which I don't care for.

These hoops I was introduced to when I took a hand embroidery class in 2015 they are used most of the time for machine embroidery or at least that is what I was told.  I have a love/hate relationship with these. These hoops do keep the fabric taut but those handles are a nuisance and catch the threads every now and then so I am constantly moving the rings around so I don't catch the threads.

This is a metal hoop a friend sent me last year which is painted and has the cork liner in tact.

I bought this heavy wooden hoop at a thrift store while on vacation last year for 50 cents, I haven't

used it yet but I'm sure it would be good for small hand quilting projects or a large embroidery project. Another favorite is the Q-Snap frame

I love the tautness of the fabric in this frame I usually work larger projects in these, I have them in several sizes if the fabric is thin I add strips of scraps to better hold the fabric in place, or as in the photo I fold over the extra fabric. 
Last but not least the piece currently in my hoop is the little sunshine piece I was working on last week, I plan to be stitching this today

December's New Moon Ort Report

Another New Moon is on the horizon so its time once again for a picture of my Orts for this months TUSAL Report. Not sure what a TUSAL is click the link and let Daffycat tell you all about it. http://itsdaffycat.blogspot.com/2015/01/the-totally-useless-stitch-long-2015.html

I have a nice little pile of Orts mostly from the Holly King and block three of the HocusPocusville Quilt.

December Orts

I made good progress on Sunday slow stitching and hope to have this block completed shortly as long as my fingers hold up.

bubble and brew block 3

Well that's it for my December Tusal report, its been a wonderful year of stitching and taking part in the Totally Useless Stitch A Long motivates me to stitch more.

Here is a shot of my orts jar filled with most of my threads for the year, there is still room for more which I plan to add in the last weeks of this year. Its been a very good stitching year for me and for the up coming new year I will carry over my goal of last year to add more creative activity in my life.  

Taking part in the TUSAL and Slow Sunday Stitching over at Kathy's Quilts ( http://www.kathysquilts.blogspot.ca/ ) has really helped keep me motivated not only to stitch more but to venture into other areas I haven't tried before. 

Slowly Stitching a Log Cabin

A few months ago while reading a few of my favorite blogs I came across the Slow Stitching Sundays post and thought to myself this is a site I could add a post after all I do quite a bit of hand stitching and often times I'm slower than I'd like to admit, so why not. Last Sunday I posted my first Slow Stitching Sunday post linking up here on http://www.kathysquilts.blogspot.ca/

For this week I once again have my hand embroidery progress on the Holly King piece but first I want to tell you about my other project I have been stitching on since early morning. The first quilt I ever pieced started back in January 1991, this Log Cabin quilt garnered many memories while piecing it together, many bittersweet, I suppose it's the reason I have put off completing the quilt until now.  

just a glimpse of the twin size log cabin quilt hand pieced 

Originally it started on a cool crisp October morning in 1989 when my dear friend Sandy and I were shopping for fabrics for my quilt at our local So-Fro fabrics. We spent a few hours lugging bolts back and forth while I decided which colors, prints, etc I favored. After I had made my choice and was replacing bolts I didn't want, I turned around only to see most of my chosen fabrics were gone, my son being helpful soul he is had put back some of the bolts too. Yikes! It didn't take long to find my chosen fabrics again, then it was off to the cutting table.

last block I quilted the white thread is where I left off

Along with the fabrics I chose for the Log Cabin quilt I found a sweet panel to make a patchwork pillow with a strip of little patchwork hearts which I would later decide to use in the center of alternating log cabin blocks, I remembered reading traditional log cabin quilts used a red fabric in the center to represent the heart of the home so I decided to use those hearts as my block centers, but not for all the blocks. I was all set to trace templates, add seam stitching lines and grab my trusty scissors and begin cutting all my pieces for the quilt.

hand quilted block

I was midway through tracing the patterns onto the fabric when on December 29^th 1989 I slipped on a small patch of ice and fractured my left humerus in 3 places, needless to say with a plaster cast from shoulder to fingertips for several months it would be a very long time before I would continue on with the log cabin quilt. After the final cast was removed (there were many), a few set backs to the recovery it took me nearly a year to trace and cut all the pieces for the quilt, which is only twin size, In January of 1991 I sewed the first pieces to the first block together.  

back side of quilt 

If I didn't mention it before I am a self taught quilt maker, I love traditional quilt patterns and while planning the log cabin I had many other patterns I wanted to make and eventually I would. I have made most of my quilts by hand, and have always hand quilted my quilts or used the tied method. Last year I ventured into a basic quilt making class mainly because most new quilt publications have instructions for cutting methods I had no clue how to do, I needed to learn how to use all those rulers, grids and the Rotary cutter. I will admit while I loved learning to use the rulers and cutting strips etc. I didn't care for all the stress of piecing the quilt together by machine. There was no actual pleasure in it for me, aside from the fact it worked up quickly, to me I felt no joy, no calm that I feel when I hand piece.  

I do admire people who make machine pieced quilts, my late friend Sandy would put out 20 to 30 quilts while I completed one. I think for me hand sewing, hand embroidery, hand quilting brings me a state of peace and calm. Every thing in my life slows down when I have needle and thread in hand, and I can breathe. 

For some inexplainable reason I am determined to finish the quilt this year, I have learned much from making this quilt, I can spot just about every imperfection, crooked line, wobbly stitches etc. but I wouldn't change a thing about it.  I always said I'd know when it was time to close the chapter on this UFO and the time has come.

Here are a few fun facts about me and my quilts:

Almost every one of my quilts have green fabric in them somewhere.

When I am shopping for fabric I am always drawn to greens first.

Green has never been of a particular interest to me not even as a favorite color.

I have made 3 Irish Chain, 4 Nine Patch, 7 Four patch, 2 Double Wedding Rings, with green as the dominate color.

And now a look at the progress of the Holly King hand embroidery piece I will be working on this evening.

There are only a few more Holly Leaves to stitch, then on to the longer green leaves and the face. I am looking forward to completing the hand embroidery for this piece I am quite pleased with how it looks so far.