(see below for the winners of the Temperature Giveaway)
February is my month to be Queen Bee, a phrase I picked up from hanging-out-across-the-ocean with Susan of Patchwork and Play (she lives in Melbourne). I’ve gone through about a million different permutations, but in the end, I’m playing it safe and asking my beemates to build me a series of little houses, like the ones I saw as a teenager in the Daly City area, near San Francisco.
We’d drive up the newly built 280 freeway, look out through gaps in the trees and see the houses like zippers in the landscape.
There are lots of houses also in Dolores Heights.
But the USA doesn’t have a lock on houses crammed together: the first photo with the red house was from one of the villages in Cinque Terre, and the one just above is Porto Venere, Italy.
Dubrovnik, Croatia.
We’ll see what my beemates come up with. I’ve mailed them all the pattern, and look forward to seeing their creations!
Thank you to all who entered the Giveaway for coldest and for hottest place you’ve ever been. I started out by reading all the coldest, then had to go and put on another sweater; so many referenced the brutal cold the Midwest is experiencing. Our hearts go out to you.
Although I was shivering by the time I finished Celia’s story of walking in the snow in ballet flats, the winner of the coldest packet is Susan Shaw, with her story of sledding with her brothers:
I used to live in Wisconsin, and one summer we moved to Texas. The A/C broke and my children and I sweltered in 100+ hea for week. We’d gone from wearing our winter coats to the 4th of July parade to two weeks later, melting in the home.
So many of you had great “hottest” stories, but I totally related to Beth, who had to endure no A/C with all her little children:
I hope you all stay warm…or cool, whatever the case may be! I’ll be in touch via email to notify the winners. Thank you all for entering!
I’ve jumped on that colorful bandwagon and am making a Temperature Quilt, or as my scientist husband likes to refer to it: a Heat Map. And, I’m hosting a
…so keep reading for how you can win. Teaser:
No, it’s not a Featherweight…
Giveaway now closed.
Now back to our regularly scheduled blog post.
Here are some examples of heat maps:
World Touristiness: in other words, where the most photographs are snapped.Gym locations in Washington DCGas Prices 2014Tornado Watches, 20 year average
And one we are most used to: temperature heat maps. By the way, between the polar vortex and Australia’s heat waves, the heat maps this year are really getting quite the range.
Over the space of a few days, I’d looked up the range of temperatures in my area, chosen my colors, and then set to choosing colors. I had bins of my favorite solid fabrics: Painter’s Palette by Paintbrush Studio and what I didn’t have, I found at the Pineapple Fabrics booth at the Road to California, which just happened to be open this week. (See below for more information and the giveaway).
This swatch line-up is mostly accurate, but I have made some changes, reflected in the chart, although I did swap out Beryl 095 for Agave 094.
I made myself a preliminary chart, but by looking at Weather Underground’s calendar for this month for my city, I could see I would need to add a couple more lows. The chart on the right is the final one, and I added a color for rain, since that’s a Big Deal around here. Here’s the website for my city; you can type in yours and get your own calendar.
I was following along with Michonne’s Instagram posts for her Temperature Quilt last year. Like me, she’s not a fan of the heat (she lives in a hot climate, too) and since I didn’t want a whole quilt of reds and oranges, I switched up my colors. I don’t think it matters what you do, just keep a chart and be consistent.
Because I recently had rotator cuff repair surgery (aha! you knew it had been quiet around here…well that’s why), I was back to drawing lines on cloth and cutting them apart with scissors. It’s my right arm that’s out of commission, so no rotary cutting for me for a while.
I put them all in little baggies, labeled with their place in the chart, the color number and name, and the temperature degrees spread. I went with a three-degree spread because I wanted a lot of variation and colors.
I only made a few of this color, because if it’s over 115 for too many days, I don’t know what I’ll do.
If the day is warmer than the day before, the middle arrow points upward.
If the day is cooler than the previous day, the middle arrow points down.
If it’s a tie, I’ll look at the day’s low temperature and let that be the deciding factor.
If everything is a tie, then it stays pointing up.
Rain triangles always go on the left side of the big triangle when it’s pointing up (even if it is flipped around).
I penciled in the date in the seam allowances.
It’s interesting sewing with the dominant hand mostly out of commission. I’ve gotten better at wrangling the iron left-handed. And I iron in steps, as shown above. Everything is s l o w e r.
I was excited to get this to use for tracing around for cutting, but whoops. This just won’t do.
I corresponded with the company and apparently I need to iron the seam allowances toward the smaller triangles to make it work. I haven’t done that. Those of you who are long-time readers know I appreciate the sculpting that can happen with the direction the seam allowances are pressed. Because I want the larger triangle to pop, this won’t work, but I’m keeping this ruler around anyway. (I ended up using a smaller 4 -1/2″ ruler with a rough undersurface to help things from slipping around.) [And no, I’m not obsessing if the tip of a triangle is cut off a bit. There’ll be over 365 of those in this quilt, and since I’m working left-handed, it’s a miracle they are even sewn.]
And so here I am on this nearly last day of January. I planned this so I’d have pinks in the scorching temps and lots of blues in the moderate temps, but was surprised at the combination of oranges and greens in January’s temps.
It reminds me of the citrus bushes next to my driveway (kumquats) and if you ever drive by, you are welcome to pick some. It’s citrus-picking season around here (Valencia oranges come on later in the season). But no worries, I’ve lived before in Wisconsin in during one of the coldest-it’s-been-in-80-years winters, so I am familiar with how it feels be up North. Obviously their temperature maps this year will be blasting open the lower ranges of possibility:
(By the way, more than happy to see the National Weather Service and NOAA back up and running!)
Pineapple Fabrics is the place where I buy all my Painter’s Palette. (If you use that link, you’ll be taken right to the place to purchase the fabrics.) There are several of us who are total manaical fans of this fabric and after you try it, you’ll be converted. Linda has written about why you should try this fabric; I’m in love not only with the colorfastness, but the silky hand and fine weave.
I’d like you to be able to try some. Because I can’t get to the Post Office (not cleared for driving yet), and because my husband is the one doing all my errands, I’m going to limit this to U.S. readers only.
And you’ve got to get your quilts quilted, right?
When I did the top quilt, all in a rainbow, Magnifico was just new on the market. Some of those sections are Magnifico, some are So Fine, both threads by Superior Threads Company.
But when I quilted my two most recent quilts: Northern Lights Medallion and Annularity, it was Magnifico all the way for one reason: it makes your quilting look great. Superior Threads has graciously agreed to give away some thread, too.
If you want to win this bundle, leave me a comment about the hottest day you can remember and where it was.
If you want to win this bundle, leave me a comment about the coldest day you ever lived through and where it was.
Both bundles have one spool of Magnifico Thread, and two yards of Painter’s Palette Solids. Yep — you have to choose: either the Hottest or the Coldest. If you write for both (always interesting) I’ll use the first comment you left for your entry. If you are a follower, you get two double chances. I’ll close the giveaway February 1st.
The Gridsters are starting on their third year, and it’s been a delight to discover the variety of styles and choices each member puts forward for us to make for them. Carol was our Queen Bee for January, and she asked us for blocks designed by Kristina of Center Street Quilts.
I chose Geometric Christmas Tree and Mod Tree, and mailed them off a few days ago.
before
I still haven’t settled my sewing room yet after last fall’s room switchearound, but in the meantime, I’ve been trying to get everything off the floor and into some semblance of order.
My husband and I needed only two trips to IKEA to make this one work.
We purchased a new light from Lowe’s Hardware that goes under the bookshelves, and boy, does it blast the lumens into the room. I love it, and love that it is an LED which doesn’t give off much heat nor consume as much energy. And I can see everything in my tiny sewing universe when I turn it on.
The ironing board gets set up in front, so the iron is parked on the right. In the first bin on the top of the shelves, I put all those mini charm packs, and other random charm packs. I don’t buy many precuts, and so they all fit in there. The second shallower bin holds Featherweight Sewing Machine Stuff, as I purchased another Featherweight this fall when a neighbor cleaned out her mother’s storage unit and discovered that her mother had collected all these old sewing machines. I’d also gone to a garage sale, where they had a box of feet and attachments; they appear to belong to the Featherweight, but I’m still researching. One woman’s trash is another quilter’s treasure.
And I’m still trying to make the bins useful, so this will change as I work in here. Right now the upper left holds stuff for Bee Happy, a quilt that my friend Leisa and I chose to do as a long-term project. And as she says, “No deadlines. If it takes us two years, so what!”
Been working on this, both in cloth and in pattern.
I decided to try to upgrade my pattern-writing skills, unsatisfied with my Microsoft Word approach. I’d been using Affinity’s Photo and Designer software, which everyone knows is sort of a replacement for the Adobe Creative Suite. I didn’t want to join in the subscription plan that Adobe wanted me to, so found the Affinity (all 20% now for Christmas–so that makes it around $40 for the Photo and other software in their store–quite a difference from the Adobe prices!).
This past fall, they released the free beta version of their Affinity Publisher, which I couldn’t wait to try. They’ve had two upgrades since I started playing around with it, and each has improved the flow and workability of the app. I can’t wait for it to be released in its final version. I also tried to contribute to their Bug and Help forums, you know, to be a good brownie. It wasn’t hard to come up with things to say, because I was working on patterns, but really, at this point, it’s almost ready for launch.
I used screen shots from QuiltPro for the basis of my artwork, as they were perfectly sized, then modified them in Affinity Photo, then saved them as illustrations. I opened Affinity Publisher Beta, watched all the training videos (taking notes) and dived in. I finished up one pattern earlier this week, did the pattern for my turn next month as Queen Bee for the Gridsters, and am still working on Northern Lights Medallion (NLM). I’m sorry for the lateness in getting NLM out, but I’m learning as I go, and I wasn’t satisfied with how the templates laid out on the page (exported from QuiltPro) so it’s back to more learning, more Asking the Internet. I’ll get there–thanks for your patience.
The Los Angeles Central Library was set ablaze by an arsonist on April 29, 1986, an event captured in an excellent recent book by Susan Orleans. The photo above shows the library on fire, and below, a glimpse of the burnt stacks, showing charred remnants of books.
“Even after total resurrection in 1993, when those who stuck it out returned to dear old Central, it seemed like a terribly unreal nightmare. Just to ponder 200,000 books destroyed by the act of a madman is bad enough, but to have worked with and touched these objects created by deep thought and intellectual struggle makes the sadness all the more haunting.
“Irreplaceable numbers of hard copy periodicals, drawings from patents, historic maps, fine art prints, photography negatives and newspaper archives were turned into ash or mush by the water that inexorably seeped down the stacks and into the basement. The bottom floor of the venerable landmark became a waterlogged graveyard of collections.”
What does this have to do with us quilters today? Because recently someone set fire to our collective digital library, also known as Craftsy.
Unlike the LA Central, Craftsy (which as of today is changing its name to BluPrint) has no funding from any state or local governments. It is a business, and in that sphere, money — or keeping your business viable — reigns. So while it’s not surprising that they might make changes to keep it profitable (and no one begrudges them that), too many of us, when looking for our favorite patterns this week saw this:
A friendly, grandmotherly tone with the “Oh Dear!” but because of the lack of punctuation, the sympathic murmuring we all say (“Oh, dear!”) was turned into a dimishing description. They can get us back on track, they claim, as “things aren’t going as planned.” No kidding.
It’s my turn coming up on Gridster Bee and I was reviewing past bee blocks I’ve seen and made for others, trying to audition one for this month. Time after time, I clicked on the links I’d carefully imbedded in blog posts, only to see the Oh Dear! Craftsy notice.
I had earlier received the notice that I was one of the designers they decided to keep, but waited to see what would happen. My collection of nearly 15 patterns was reduced to this one pattern:
I had some revisions in process, so was able to upload them, but doubt I’ll be allowed to do more. But more importantly, some of my favorite pattern makers are gone:
This one was mine.
I would have liked some notice that they were going to ransack our digital library, burn the books and torch the shelves. I imagine some of you would have liked that, too. Couldn’t they have tagged our patterns, letting us know they were headed for the dustbin, and then a week later, we could have taken them off the site ourselves? Would it have been feasible for them to start charging us and letting us keep our “store”? I would have been fine with that, for of course we should pay our way.
And…why did this happen the week before Christmas? It felt like one of those “release-the-horrible-news-on-Friday-and-maybe-no-one-will-notice-by-Monday” sort of things.
For awhile I’ve had patterns up on PayHip, which also satsifies the VAT issue payment. To search PayHip, use Google. Type in “quilt patterns payhip” and you’ll see a large listing of creatives already on that site. Another way to the patterns is through direct links, such as the one to the right on my blog.
PayHip OPQuilt site
For now the takeaway is: download anything you like for, without warning, it may suddenly go up in smoke.
Postscript regarding Craftsy/BluPrint: I have created a folder on my own hard drive, and downloaded into one place all the patterns I’d purchased on Craftsy which I also uploaded to the Cloud (I use Dropbox). I’d suggest doing the same.
I chose Geometric Christmas Tree and Mod Tree, and mailed them off a few days ago.
OccasionalPiece--Quilt! 