Tokyo International Great Quilt Festival 2014 (Tokyo Dome show) part 1

Long awaited with much anticipation, the week-long show has begun.
For me, it was as much about friendship as it was about quilts.

"Queenie" and I had plotted and planned for weeks ahead to meet for the day, beginning with the opening ceremony. Because of her work behind the scenes and connections, she as able to supply me with free tickets so I could really enjoy the show more than once.

The opening was attended by the organizers, The ambassador and his wife from Finland, and even an Imperial Princess. In this picture after all the speeches were made they are cutting the ribbon in the opening ceremony. NHK was busy filming assorted aspects of the show and later my husband watched events on TV at home.

On opening day, there was a bit of time to view the show before the general public was let in.
Who needs a princess when you have a queen to shadow?  We set off to view the "traditional" Quilt Category.

One of my frustrations of the past 12 years is the practice of putting all information  ... title ... maker's name ... and other details in Japanese ONLY. This year was no improvement. Even the catalogs of the show are all in Japanese.

I am certain every one of these participants knows how to write her name in "Romaji" or Roman script. It is difficult enough to translate the quilt titles into English, but names are a challenge even for Japanese. (whenever you fill out a form of some kind, there is a space above the written name to note the pronunciation ... since many characters can be pronounced more than one way) Even so, s simple common name like Sato could also be written Satoh. Only the person possessing the name would know.
There were very few foreign quilts so where are the "International" aspects? Only in the public that attends?

This "Flower Garden I long for" was made by Michie Arai.

Here is a detail of the hand applique and embroidery.

Although machine quilting is beginning to make inroads to Japan, the traditional category was mostly hand pieced or applique and hand quilted.

It is hard to imagine the amount of time these quilts would take to complete.

This "Wreath and Small Birds" is the work of Sachiko Serizawa.

Each of these little birds was carefully appliqued in a different combination of fabrics.




Note the fine hand quilting.

"Blue Forest" by Sawada-san uses those same types of "Japanese Taupe" fabrics and is a masterpiece of detail in piecing and quilting.

This "Everybody Shining"

was made by a person whose name could be read either Shioya or Shiotani.

Even the Japanese viewers probably don't know her name by reading the kanji.

At any rate, it is a quilt with quite a lot of work involved.


Note the poor lighting caused shadows on many of the quilts. I guess I shouldn't complain because it has only been in the last few years that photographs have been allowed.

"Moment of Heightened Pleasure"

is a simple Amish style quilt that is anything but simple.


Created by Satomi Makino, it is closely quilted in trapunto.

Check out this detail!!!

Here is a detail of  a quilt called "Heart Compass"

By Masako Yoshihara.

Look how she fussy-cut the fabric on each of those rays!

And if you like sunburst or compass patterns, here is another detail of "The Sun of Tenochtitlan"

The center star has a huge Aztec figure and you can see smaller figures embroidered in the corners.

Note those tiny mola border blocks and fine quilting.

This is the creation of Miki Kanno.

"Cool Breeze of Highland" was another quilt with fine detail.



This one was made by Kazuko Ito.

Loosely translated title of " Harmony towards Reconstruction"


Well, even titles like names are sometimes difficult to figure out.

This quilt with many tiny pieces was made by Chieko Kudo.























By this time in the show, the thundering hoards had arrived and it became more and more difficult to take pictures without heads and elbows or whole bodies covering them.

For many years I had given up trying to see these shows with other members of my quilt group. It is hard to keep a group together under the crowded conditions and many people are interested in only parts of the exhibit or shopping in the stores. It has been a joy to go along with Queenie to more than one show. We move at about the same pace and both of us notice different things even in the same quilt. Often her observations give me cause to take a second look and find things that attract me in quilts I might have otherwise passed by. She is also a font of information so please pop over to her posts queeniepatch.blogspot.com . Also check out my friend,
Tania bytaniwa.blogspot.com, who met with us the following day. (Yes, two days so far and I have only covered the first hour spent there).

For now, this is probably enough to whet your whistle. Tomorrow after church, I will be doing nature study with the scouts. (my other life) My camera took quite a while to down-load so you can imagine there is a lot more to come.

How did I get here?

In the late 1980's I bought a blank notebook thinking I could use it as an album for quilt pictures and some details about the quilts in my life.

I referred to that as "my quilt diary". Not all the quilts I have been involved with have made it into that notebook. Some had the final stitches put in place only minutes before they were passed to the new owner and many had no  photographic record made ... but by in large, most items made it into the record book. I guess it is a good thing there is some record because most have no labels at all.

This poor notebook was not designed to have photos pasted in but it was well made and stitched and has held up remarkably well, considering.

Each time I traveled to the States, my kids requested me to bring my quilt diary so they could see what I was up to. Note the small blue strip.
That is the original back of the notebook. Yes, it was falling apart and consigned to a zipper pouch to save it from further damage.

Last week, I cut a new cardboard spine and using some old denim from recycled jeans, added a new back to hold the book together. A cloth ribbon keeps the denim from fraying. Hopefully, the notebook will hold up until the last dozen or so pages are filled.

It was a number of years ago, while I was attending a Scout Jamboree in Virginia that my son took the diary and scanned it and put it on a blog. We have a family blog to share photos and events and as far as I knew about blogs and blogging, this was a way my kids could keep up with my quilting.
Other than our family's, I had never seen any blogs (about quilting or anything). To improve the design, my son added a side bar with some other quilt blogs he had found.

One of those other blogs was "Taniwa", so before I even knew what a "follower" was, I was following Tanya's blog. I think it is quite accurate to say, Tanya was my blogging "sensei"... and she didn't even know it. She posted nearly every day and I not only learned about writing replies, but I checked out those who wrote comments I found interesting and made new friends through her blog. Over the years we have become virtual friends. There is a beautiful table runner on the table in front of me that was a gift made by Tanya. It keeps a smile on my face each day that it greets me.

I have been blessed to meet a few blogging friends and every one has been as wonderful in person as in the virtual world. Starting Thursday, Tokyo Dome will hold the annual week-long quilt show. It is always a super event but this year offers a bigger reward than looking at spectacular quilts. The opening ceremony will be a special treat with my blogging-buddy-turned real-life-friend, "Queenie" (also known in real life as Carin) ... And the next day, the two of us will be lurking at the entrance to meet Tanya and her friends. Would that make you excited? Well, it does me! Thank you, Jon! (I wonder if you knew where this all was leading).

This past Friday was also special in that I was invited to visit a group of women that also meet to quilt or stitch and share some fellowship right here in Tokyo. It was lots of fun and there were a few people I already knew. I plan to continue meeting with this group and am looking forward to making new friends.

I took along my homework for the Gala quilt and managed to put together all 11 blocks. I think marking and cutting them was the hardest part and that had been done for the most part on Wednesday afternoon.


We still have a rough up-hill challenge to finish but we are on the way.

I hope you all have a great week! I know I will!

Something to be happy about....

I am so happy to have this piece finished.

All that is needed now is to add a hanging sleeve and remove a ton of dog hair.

I think I need to look over my left-over stash of panels because the size plus the three inches of border is almost a perfect fit for my coffee table.



I used the same gray color for the lettering as for the binding. I think it shows up well enough.


This promises to be a busy week so I am glad that I won't have to worry about finding time for this project.

The "Gala" quilt group meets Wednesday so I suppose there will be homework pending.

The Tokyo Dome quilt show is nearing and I am especially excited at the promise of meeting up with blogging friends one of those days.

And quilting class sign-ups are on Thursday.
I plan to go with samples and answers to any questions.

The other thing that is making me smile is this picture my son posted on the family blog today.


All that is missing of my Oregon bunch are two sons-in-law.

Kimie and Julie Alice made the trip from Portland with a car full of kids to visit Ken and Zia and baby Ryden in Grants Pass.

I wish I could have been a mouse in the corner but this picture is the next best thing to being there.

I hope this week brings you all some smiles too.

After a busy week....

Friday night was my Pack meeting and our theme for the year is "Onward and upward".

Have you ever tried to build a tower using spaghetti and mini-marshmallows? Well, it is not as easy as you might think.

We had six teams seeing which could build the highest tower... three teams of Tiger cubs, one of Wolves and Bears, one of Webelos, and one of Dads. At one time or another, each team was ahead.

If you are tempted to try this, I would advise using the larger marshmallows. Three tiers and a spire were about all those little ones could support.

As I left the American Club at the end of the meeting, the Tokyo Tower seemed to be flaunting it's height.

Well, yeah ... but you are not built with marshmallows!


Today was bright and sunny and when I stepped outside to sweep the street, I was surprised to find it warmer outside than it was in the house. With the new buildings going up, we get only about ten minutes of sunshine coming in the diningroom window each day and slightly under twenty minutes in the livingroom. The sun does hit the greenhouse on the roof so I decided to take down the decorative lights outside and put them away in the storage area.  Today, the door behaved a bit better and after five or six tries, went in place.

I actually had a good chunk of the day left to work on the gift runner.

I have finished a light gray binding. I had a choice between that and navy but I think the gray looks better with the rainbow border.

I decided to go with the Bible verse from Ecclesiastes, "To everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven."

I have begun to quilt in the text using light gray thread.

The coming week has lots of activities lining up, so I am glad this task is on the way.

Oh look, my holiday runner is still on the coffee table ... maybe it needs to be washed and put away too. At least it doesn't have to go into THAT cupboard! Whew!

storage challenges

When we were building this house, I think I drove the carpenters a bit nuts trying to make use of every tiny space. There is storage under the stairs, accessible to both sides and drawers in the stairs that are too low to put things under.

There is a porch on the third floor roof where clothes are hung to dry and that has been turned into a greenhouse... or maybe solarium sounds a bit more fancy.

That is where I sleep. It is very hot in the summer and cold in the winter but sunny and pleasant on a sunny winter day like today. I decided it would be a good time to put away the Christmas decorations while it is light and warm.

Well, see those doors? As wonderful as the storage space is, the two doors will try the patience of a saint ... and I am no saint! First, my futon has to be folded up and moved out of the way. Then the section on the left is removed by lifting it by the two handles and pulling the bottom toward the room and out of the groove at the top. That takes no time at all.

The things I store in this space are holiday items/decorations. Christmas, New Years, Girl's day, boy's day, Halloween, Thanksgiving,   etc. This is NOT an everyday closet. The reason is, getting those two doors back in the grooves and standing straight is the most frustrating, time consuming project one could imagine! The door to the right keeps rocking over to block fitting the left door in place. holding the door by those handles and trying to aim it into the groove at the top is hard enough but kicking the bottom into the lower groove without getting the top out of place takes a few hundred tries and more luck than I can muster. I also manage to leave several knuckles worth of skin on the door frame. I think if the back part of the upper groove came lower it would be easier to find a position and probably my very talented son-in-law could fix it for me. The thing is, taking it open to show him the problem means picking up my bedding so that there is a place to stand and then putting the whole thing back in place.

Well, the stuff got put back ... I thought ...   and I put my semi-single futon back. My sleeping bag enjoyed an airing in the brisk winter wind.

Now I have come back down as the sun is setting and the room is getting darker and colder, and what do I find???

Two wreaths forgotten on the front gate and garden door.

Well, Hina matsuri is about two months off. Maybe I should wait until then. I have had enough of the storage challenge for today!

The other day I finished the rainbow border on the gift I am making. 

Saturday I bought a roll of 40 weight thinsulate and pieced some yukata fabric for the backing. 

I had plenty of fabric I could have used but I thought a speaker coming all the way to Japan might like something that will remind her of her visit.

I am now quilting the last Kanji (spring) with gold thread. Every time I use this, I say it is the last because it is hard to quilt with even the best metallic thread. I am using Coats, which is better than some others I have tried, but it is not easy, especially if, like me, you like to use a rather long length of thread. I don't think I would choose this other than the panel is printed with gold outlines on the pictures. I will quilt the border in the ditch with white thread. I have a choice of navy or gray for the binding.

Next I need to put a bible verse. Last year's I put "To everything there is a season...." I really have to check with the committee. Trouble is, when Yahoo made the most recent non-asked-for changes, my contact list went bye-bye. Well, all the e-mail addresses are there but how many people use their names as e-mail addresses. It used to be, all I had to do was type in the name of the person and the address went to the out-box. 

Who was it that said, "some kind of help is the kind of help that helping's all about, and some kind of help is the kind of help we all can do without"? Thanks but no thanks, Mr. Yahoo!

And someone else said, "Never do today, what you can put off 'till tomorrow". Guess I'll quilt things now and worry about the rest tomorrow.

Onward, into the New Year

I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year,
"Give me a light, that I may tread safely into the unknown".

And he replied, "Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the hand of God. That shall be better than a light and safer than a known way".

For many years, I have kept a small notebook of quotes and this one seems to fit what the year ahead has to offer. There is more unknown to face than ever before in my life and it is stuff over which I have no control.

My focus word for the year is "acceptance".

The picture is what I have begun working on as a gift for the speaker at the Women's Conference at the end of January. I had one more panel , the same as I used last year. After reading the "Who am I?" sketch by Sharon Draper, our speaker, she mentions seeing rainbows where others see rain, and tells of her love of seasons. The panel contains the kanji for the seasons and I will add one more inch of color strips to the rainbow border.

Once that is done, I will quilt the kanji and ass a bible verse. At this point, I am thinking of the same verse I used last year ... To everything there is a season.....
I think the finished piece can be used as either a table runner or a wall hanging.
I really don't like the pressure of deadlines, but I think I can get this finished by the end of the month.

Last month, when I was feeling depressed at the lookout for the future, my quilting friend shared this piece with me that she had received from another friend....

"I have come to  accept the feeling of not knowing where I am going. And I have trained myself to love it. Because it is only when we are suspended in mid-air with no landing in sight, that we force our wings to unravel and alas begin our flight.
And as we fly, we still may not know where we are going to. But the miracle is in the unfolding of the wings. You may not know where you are going, but you know that so long as you spread your wings, the winds will carry you."           Joybell

I hope I will do better this year with acceptance than I did last year with encouragement.
My notebook will be a good reminder.
Warmest wishes for the New Year to all my blogging friends.

\\\\\\

Last finish of the year...

This was probably the oldest UFO ever to be dug out and finished. This doll quilt was begun well over twenty years ago while I still had children playing with these dolls. Over the years it had been set aside and almost forgotten until Leia began playing with the dolls each visit.

I was reminded of my own childhood, playing with my mother's doll, Lily, each and every visit to my grandmother's house. Lily had a lovely wooden cradle and her own bedding where she could wait comfortably between visits.

With a twin brother, and another brother four years younger, I spent my hours with my dolls. They were my playmates and best friends. I sewed clothing for them and took them everywhere. My sisters were so much younger and though they may have played with dolls, certainly never to the degree that I did. We had adventures!

When I was no longer playing with my Lily, my grandmother had a visit from someone looking for antiques to buy, and talked my grandmother into selling her Lily and the bed. My mother was very upset when she found out. She had three dolls (I was named for her doll, Carol, as my middle name but never allowed to even touch that doll). Somewhere, she found a reproduction doll similar to Lily.

I was recruited to make a dress for the new Lily.

Here she sits on the new quilt. I have removed the dress and petticoats now because I see they are badly in need of a wash.

After my mother died, my father brought the three dolls to a family reunion for us three girls to pick one. My sisters got first choice and the Lily stand-in was all that was left. I have never seen or held the other two and I don't know which sister has Carol. Of course my sisters don't know either because they were not as obsessed as I was with dolls. They only know they got a real antique and I got the stand-in.

The two dolls Leia plays with, I made many years ago when my own girls were small. The head is made of paper mache. Once, one of the children bit the nose off of the girl doll, and I had to re-build her face.

When the dolls were made, their bodies were sewed of deerskin. About seven or eight years ago, the leather began to fall apart so I bought some cotton to replace the leather.

The arms and legs are carved out of wood. That wood came from old wooden sliding doors from our house as they were being repaired. The size of the pieces limited the size of the doll's feet.

I note that the ceramic feet on Lily are also small in size so I rather guess someone not knowing their history might think they are vintage too.

When I was growing up, if you wanted something, you figured out how to make it. I began sewing clothing for my dolls at age four, as they came with only what they were wearing when purchased, and needed changes for other occasions. These dolls also have many changes.

Now Annabelle and Bert will finally have their own bed cover when Leia comes to play.

I noticed they were changed into night clothing and then back into different clothing while Leia was last here.

I'm sure Bert was glad to get out of his tuxedo into something more relaxing to face the new year.

As for the "quilt", I do not recall where the fabric came from. It is just a print that was quilted along the lines in the design. The batting was very primitive, bought before the days that quilting became popular in Japan.

As the new year nears, everyone is in preparation mode. Spring cleaning cannot wait until spring. One must go into the new year with great preparation. I saw my neighbor out scrubbing his window screens today. My windows could use a bit of attention too ... but maybe I had better begin on a quilted gift for the Women's Conference speaker ... just a month away ... and unlike the doll quilt, there is a deadline.

December book club block is finished.

Considering all the trouble I had drafting this feathered star for a twelve inch block, I am satisfied... and a little surprised at how nicely all those little pieces went together. Yes, fabric is forgiving.

I considered doing some applique in the corners, but I think I like it as is.

If you read "The Christmas Quilt" by Jennifer Chiaverini, you will understand the significance of the eight-pointed star with red tips, and the feather star block. It is a fairly easy read, since I have managed to finish it within the month. My copy was sent me by my elder son and also includes "The New Year's Quilt" which I have almost finished. I am enjoying the Quilter's Book Club reads and some day may even have a reading quilt to snuggle in.

Yesterday was "mochi pounding" with the Scouts. Every year the Japanese Scouts invite our group to their Taito group 4 event.

Rice is steamed and then pounded in these "usu", mortars made from tree trunks. The sticky paste then goes into delicious soup or is eaten with an assortment of garnishes such as seaweed or bean paste.
The American scouts take Christmas cookies to share and we enjoy the cultural exchange, We even get some mochi to take home and we enjoyed some with our breakfast soup.

 There is a bit of seasonal entertainment on the temple stairs.

There was singing (I led one song ... repeat-after-me ... with lots of motions), and some presentations and speeches.

Many members of my Cub Pack travel over the holidays so we bring in other packs from the Tokyo Zone to share the festivities.

I don't remember how long ago we began this activity, but probably from the beginning of the current emperor's reign, 25 years ago, as this event is held on the emperor's birthday which is a national holiday.

The first three scouters in this picture and the lady just left of me have been my friends for all those years. The young man with arms folded is my Committee Chairman and assistant Cubmaster and the reason I still survive as a leader at all.


One benefit of the long ride there and back was time to finish the next bit of Gala quilt homework.

Too bad I only had eight blocks to complete. Other members of the group also took blocks to work on and this is all I could gather up. They look a bit washed out on the sunny floor of my greenhouse bedroom.

The turkey has flown in the door. Several church services await my singing, and tomorrow promises to be a busy day with family and friends'

Here's wishing a Blessed Christmas to my blogging friends.

Where did the week go?

I had promised my little assistant that this weekend, we would make Christmas cookies.

She arrived Friday evening and, after dinner, we mixed up the cookie dough to chill overnight and she dressed the dolls in their nightwear so they could get a good sleep and be ready to enjoy the Saturday activity.

Since my kitchen is really too tight a fit for more than one person at a time, after breakfast we cleared the dining room table to make enough room for our cookie factory.

I dug out the box of cookie cutters and Leia looked them over, deciding which ones would be good for the season.

We made "painted cookies". I mixed an egg yolk with food coloring, red, yellow, blue, and since I was all out of green, mixed blue and yellow on the forth cup.

Each color got one paintbrush and the colors were painted on the cookies once I had them cut and on the cookie sheet.

In addition to the painting, there were all kinds of sprinkles to add.

HOWEVER, these were not sprinkled but carefully placed on each cookie.

It is expected that a child can work on a project for about as many minutes as they are years old, but this is the kid who started taking the ornaments off the tree so she could keep doing the trimming.

We made a double recipe so there were cookies for Leia to take home and some for me to take to the Scout activity tomorrow... and a few to keep and eat here.

We actually spent hours decorating cookies and even the very last cookie was given attention down to the last detail.

Yes, I had to paint a few too. After all, I needed some to take tomorrow, and Norie shared some of the rolling and cutting and decorating, or we would have taken all night.

While I was cleaning up, Leia went off to the corner rice shop to take some cookies to that special neighbor.

The cookies were carefully packed for travel, after sampling a few. Leia has friends in her neighborhood to share with too.

Yes, I think there will be enough to share.  See how many she made? Yes, every expertly made cookie in that box!

I'll bet it won't take a fraction of the time it took to make them, for a bunch of Scouts to finish these off!











Today was not all that much quieter. Church choir, caroling in front of the church, and the walk to the bus stop.

This is how the street in front of our church looks during the daytime without the lighting.



The church is just the other side of Louis Vuitton.

And this is who was walking past, enjoying the singing.


Well, I doubt they came for the singing....
Perhaps it was a dog party of some kind because as I was about to put me camera away, along came another group.

 There were a few little dogs but most were huskies. I don't think a dog with so much fur needed all that fancy clothing.

Now that the activities are over until tomorrow, I had time to work on my book club block.

While reading Jennifer Chiaverini's "The Christmas Quilt" I decided to make an eight pointed star.

Then, as I was reading "An Elm Creek Quilts Companion", which was sent to me by StarwoodQuilter
our book club organizer, I found a picture of the feathered star featured in the story, and decided to make that one for my book club block.

Looking through my patterns, I found no instructions for a 12 inch feathered star. I decided I would draft my own pattern... but that is not as easy as I thought it would be... and what a lot of tiny pieces! I drew it out on a 12 inch square of paper. Then I traced the segments on to yellow plastic to make templates. Because the pattern was hand drawn, none of the segments in the drawing were the same size. Well, I figured fabric is forgiving and I would pick the most even segment and use that for a template. Well, so far, so good.

Now I need to draft the center which will be the paisley fabric. I have been thinking about this and finally I think I have a plan that will work. If I make a circle, four inches in diameter and divide it into eight sections, then cut straight from one section to the next one, it should make an octagon that will fit those points.  I am lousy at math but if it works, my block for December might actually be finished before the month is out.

I may add some applique in the corners, but then again, maybe I should stop while I am ahead.

Sunday activities and a new book block

Our church has two services every Sunday and an afternoon "Praise" service once a month. Made up of people from different countries and different Christian traditions, other than the English language (spoken in a variety of accents), it is the center of a hodge-podge of activity.

Yesterday, our choir was scheduled to sing at the first service ... which meant catching the train to town as close to seven as possible.

Of course, after singing, I wanted to attend the second service because the children were putting on a Christmas program in place of the children's message.... and what a fine job they did too, including a drama and singing.

Then, after the second service, there was caroling on the front steps of the church. Well, I had to stay for that, of course.

Then, at four, there was a "Family Concert" put on by the embassy choir. My Cub Scouts were coming so I needed to stay for that and certainly not enough time to go home and come back.

Luckily, I had cut pieces for my next book block. They were packed in a zip-lock baggie and I could spend time doing a bit of sewing. THEN, after the pieces were almost all together, I found that the total look was just too pink looking. The more I looked, the more I thought I needed a touch of green ... so I spent some time un-sewing and finished up the wait by reading my next book club book.

By the time the concert was over, I headed home alone. Donations from the concert were to go to the church's homeless mission, which Paul is in charge of, so he had things to take care of before returning. It was dark by then and the trees along the avenue were lit for shoppers to enjoy.

This would be a wonderful place for taking pictures, BUT
there are guards everywhere keeping people from stopping in the middle of the crosswalk to take pictures.

Over the street, there are several overhead walk-overs. but standing at the bottom on both sides of the street, are guards keeping people from going up on that bridge. (A perfect place to enjoy the scene and take pictures).

I can understand that it might be dangerous to have too many people on the bridge at any given time, but certainly the guards could control numbers to only ten at a time or whatever they consider safe. I can't see much point in just sanding in front of a roped off stairs doing nothing but guarding the sign that says no passing.

It probably hinders the shopping as well because there are very few level crossings.

A family friend took this picture of me with the walk-over behind.


For a number of years, the lights were not put up. The story I heard was that there was concern for the Zelkova trees.

Of course, the lighting brings many, many people into the area and the stores were not happy to have no lights.

About two or three years ago, the lighting was resumed.

It was rather late for dinner by the time I got home and I had to wait for Paul, so I went up to my light green scrap bin to pull out fabrics that might work with my book block.

The book club book for November was "Aunt Jane of Kentucky" by Eliza Calvert Hall.

I had begun reading the book on line but was having a lot of trouble trying to read on a computer screen.

Luckily, my son sent me a paper copy and I was able to start over and enjoy the book.

The last story in the book is called "Gardens of Memory" and probably my favorite of all because I grew up in a garden. My dad was a metallurgical engineer but he had a life-long passion for roses, which he photographed and hybridized as well.

Each chapter/story in the book includes mention of Aunt Jane's garden. Also mentioned is a "garden house". There is not a description of that garden house, but we had a screened-in porch-type garden house where I grew up. As a kid, sometimes we slept out in that "house" with critters all around, as we were on the very edge of a wooded park, the Euclid Creek Reservation.

This block I found in "5,500 Quilt Block Designs" by Maggie Malone, a gift from my #2 daughter.
Called "Garden Gazebo", it seemed fitting and I could use more than two or three fabrics... my criteria, since I want to include the paisley fabric. The rejected pieces are off to the side and I included fabric from the tree quilt made very long ago. (my memories as well as Aunt Jane's)

When I looked for my pattern to cut new triangles, this is what I found...

Well, a big dog with separation anxiety must have been unhappy being left home alone from early morning to late evening.

This was the only pattern piece left!

Well, I probably won't make this block again anyway.

Decorating the table for a late dinner was this Christmas Cactus.

The pale pinkish white flowers have a thin red line in the center.

This is an interesting pot of flowers because this flower is on the green segments.

The thinner reddish sections are from a different plant and you can see a small red bud at the tip of one segment on the left.

When sections get broken off, I often stick them into the dirt in the same pot. When someone else breaks them, and I find them on the floor, I sometimes stick them in the wrong pot. I guess that is what happened here. Well, we will get an early Christmas in pink and a later one in red ... all in one pot!

Going to the "Gala"

Our group is far behind the curve in making the auction quilt for the Gala.

After a meeting last week, we decided to re-visit the Japanese fans.

The theme of the gala is the "Great Gatsby" We considered a Mondrian type pattern but that would have taken a lot more meetings to put together.

Next year is "the year of the horse" and the school team is "Mustangs" but a large black horse across the quilt would have also taken more time than we have left to work with. Our 2005 quilt was the fan design. A lot of the work can be taken home and worked on by the team members.

Last week, we met again with a bit larger group and pulled out Japanese prints and coordinated solids. These are the six that I took home to assemble. We will add the corners when we have the blue background purchased and marked.

Do you see the fish print? That came to me from one of our quilters who has left up, returning to the states. (Cynthia, we all thought longingly of you as we marked that section. You will always be a part of our worker-bees)

After many gusty days, things calmed down and I took this old quilt to the park for a photo. Maybe the sun is too bright because the green fabrics look rather grey. This quilt, "Sunny Glade" was made back in 1990, and one of my earlier quilts. I had no idea what I was doing  I had seen a tree hanging in a local store and liked the scrappy trees. I made a quick sketch (as I often do of ideas I like) and drafted the pattern in seven inch blocks.

I had been thinking of grading the background from the yellow to gradually darker greens but when it came time to put the blocks together, they came to a bigger challenge than I was ready for and I ended up adding sashing. In the end, the quilt turned out to be 6'3 x 8'3 and was too large to be used on my daughter's futon.

There are some blue fabrics that came from one of my cub scouts whose mother was a member of the International Quilters of Tokyo, a group I ended up joining (now down to only a few aging members).

This color shot is a bit closer but still not quite as green.

I didn't want to make a seasonal quilt but if you look closely, you may find a few trees in Christmas fabric.

My granddaughter, Leia, came over the weekend and helped me decorate our little tree.

After putting on one little box of pieces, she began to take them off so she could do it again. Can you guess how much she was looking forward to this activity?

She was very happy when I came up with two more boxes of ornaments.

My table has lost some of it's space but we are now feeling very festive.


Next week, my little assistant will come back to help me make and decorate cookies.

Note Leia dressed the boy doll in a tuxedo for the photo. Those dolls get lots of loving and clothes changing each time she comes, and even get to sleep in a real bed.

I hope you are all having fun making holiday preparations too.

Another book club block

Our Quilter's Book Club book for October was "State Fair", by Earlene Fowler. I finished to book some time ago but only had time to think about the block to represent this book in odd moments between other activities.

I am hoping eventually to assemble all these twelve-inch blocks into a quilt. I have so far been able to include at least one piece of paisley in each block. That fabric is mostly a rather dark red, and while I like it, I would like to have the end quilt a wee bit more colorful.

Looking through several books of block patterns, I find many of them are limited to just two or three colors. The block named "State Fair" had few colors and I ended up with a block named "Mystery Block". However, when I put that block together, I was not very happy with the rather bland result. I decided to substitute the center four inch piece with a four inch version of the "State Fair" block. It was rather fussy to draft in four inches and I am not a big fan of un-sewing, but I do like the end results.

The colors don't show so well in the four-patch but I am more satisfied than I was with the tan paisley center square.

November is over but I have not yet finished the book. I have been struggling to read the stories on my computer but .... Yesterday morning, things began to look up considerably. My birthday gift from my son, Ken, arrived in the mail .... and included was the paper copy of "Aunt Jane of Kentucky", November's read. I have started back at the beginning and this time am enjoying that book. I have yet to think of a block but that will come in time.

The December read? Yes, that was in the box as well. In fact, I'm all set for the winter, thanks to my son who knows how I love to read.