Monday, July 1, 2013

Quilters" Book club update

For once, I was able to finish reading our monthly selection during the month. Of course, since I owned the book and had read it once before, that was easy to do. Now I am waiting for the next book to arrive by post so I thought it time to come up with a block.

The Lover's Knot, by Clare O'Donohue was our book for June. With a block name for the title, I went searching for something to represent the book and came up with many blocks and block variations by that name. Most of them were in just two colors and I have only a small amount of my "feature fabric", a dark paisley print. I want to include a bit in each block and I also want to add a bit of color since what I can pull from that fabric is rather dark red, green, blue. brown and black.

I found this version of lover's knot in The Quilter's Album of Blocks & Borders, by Jinny Beyer. and liked the fact it used more than two fabrics.

Interestingly, her illustration also included paisley print. The pattern was for a 9 inch block but it was not too hard to take a 12 x 12 piece of paper, divide it into thirds and, using a compass, come up with a template.

I can't say I am fond of piecing curved seams. but they didn't come out too badly. Those points were a challenge to iron though and I might not want to quilt through them.

I was going to use the floral tan I had used in the tulip block. Then I picked out a yellowish tan for the center. so went with a yellowish paisley print instead.
As I was putting the blocks together, though, my husband, who never pays any attention to what I am working on unless it is in his way, commented that the red-on-red fabric looked better.

I went with the red but thought the floral tan might have been better. To the right is what I first chose.
In some ways I kind of like that better, but I do like the touch of warmth the red adds and I am not going to un-sew and re-sew those curved pieces!

Next on the agenda is adding Kanji to the owl quilt.
Here is the Kanji selected for Ryden.

The upper ideograph is "trustworthiness" or dependability or reliability.

It is the first character used for male members of the Genji clan.

the second character "den" was taken from an uncle who was a famous movie actor, so it carries on the re-cycling tradition in our family.
The character means "passing on" as in communicate or even passing on a legacy.

On the left are the characters as they might be written in daily life. The middle writing is in "Samurai style" and the third on the right is more "Kabuki style". For applique, the third might be a bit easier to do but with a family history of the samurai, I will go with the center plan.

And in my little garden, with the orange and yellow lilies finished, the pink are having their time poking on front of the new maple and gardenias.

Every time I looked at my cell phone for the past two weeks, it reported the weather to be "showers"  ... the picture of a cloud with water drops spattering on the screen
and a wiper swishing across. Well, Mr.Google makes an interesting application but the only rain is just hanging in the air and would more appropriately be termed "humidity".

I also notice with the arrival of July, my blog list is still up and running ... or am I speaking too soon?
Time will tell on many things. Mr. Google, you are entertaining, if nothing more. (and I prefer that to screwing up my computer life).

10 comments:

  1. I love the block you chose to represent The Lover's Knot - with curved seams no less! And I think I agree with your husband. I really like the red center. I love the explanation of the Kanji selected for Ryden.

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  2. The wonderful thing with curved seams is that when you have completed your block you feel you have conquered something difficult. Your difficult block is so soft and charming and I like the red centre.
    Isn't it nice when one's husband takes an interest in one's needlework or quilting?
    You have another difficulty ahead of you - appliquéing Ryden in 'samurai script'! Not a challenge I'd like.
    For daily living I prefer the daily script style; so much easier to find in a dictionary or to copy. With other styles I often make a misinterpretation of the strokes or the stroke order.
    The hydrangeas in front of our house are beginning to wilt. I guess they would rather have rain than humidity. Lucky you to have such stunning lilies.

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  3. ooh! like that block.. not sure I would want to make it though xx the red makes it warm and picks up the other colours wonderfully x
    good luck with the applique x

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  4. Wow, that block is so pretty, I love the red and blue paisly print, it makes it pop.

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  5. I recently added your blog to my sidebar after Taniwa mentioned the work you were doing with the tsunami communities.
    Anyway, I think the blogger thing that was going to stop is something that sends updates of your chosen blogs to your email. I haven't used it, so am not quite sure how that worked. But like you I have a list of blogs in the sidebar. Those aren't changing. So, I think we are safe - for now! LOL
    Sandy in the UK

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  6. I love some of the new paisley prints, fun to work into primitive quilts.
    We have rain and humidity, too much of it.

    Debbie

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  7. Lovely lovely block. I have another friend who is doing a similar block - love the variety one gets when different people interpret a theme.

    It looks like a good applique session is ahead - enjoy. And I like the red center best too.

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  8. What a lovely block. I was so interested to read that you can "choose" the characters for a name, so the same name could have different meanings when written in kanji characters, is that right? I've been listening to "The Reason I Jump" by Naoki Higashida on the radio this week and was interested to learn that in Japanese characters the word autism is made up of self-shut-illness which makes sense. Love language :-)

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  9. Love that block! Dashboard reader stayed, while Google Reader (had to click the button on your page to use that format) went away! I always used the dashboard reader, so, I'm happy.

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  10. I really like the way the center kanji is written. I practice writing kanji with a Picma Micron pen and have a really fun time playing with the different sizes of line width. The tiny widths make "scratchy" looking kanji and the thicker ones look more like they are painted with a bamboo brush. Fun times! :)

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