Mission Organization/Irish Dance/Slumdog

Winter has kept us in it's grip. Our weekend was snowy & chilly. It was a good weekend to stay inside, & get organized. The first room you see, when you walk into our back door, is "Warren's workshop". He has promised me, that when we can fix up the garage, his workshop will be moved out there, & this room will become my wet studio. It has been crammed full of tools & building materials for our remodeling projects, & it was such a mess he couldn't really work in it.

His nice new tool chest sat right in the center of the room.
We finally got together, & rearranged, & organized. He got his drill press set up, & now only a few tools are still in boxes. We still have to get the tool bench organized, & I hope to do that this weekend.

On Sunday, we went to the "Irish Dance School's performance.

Good photos were hard to get, as there is no flash photography allowed,

but we had front row seats, so I got a few shots. That's Christi, (my pal Mindy's middle daughter) 2nd girl from the left in the picture below

This ghostly image was of Owen Barrington, Anchorage's own World Champion Irish Dancer. He was moving very fast.

I have no idea what this one was, but I thought it was cool.

We bid on several things at their Silent Auction. This is the only thing I won. It was one of Mindy's slumped glass bottles. She would've made me one free, but I wanted this. I thought the package made it even nicer.

Broc has been a slug, laying in the chair by the fire for the past 4 days. He loves it when we have the wood stove burning.

I worked Monday & today. Yesterday we went out to the movies & saw "Slumdog Millionaire". It was interesting, & disturbing, & sad, & a little happy. A strange mixture. With all of it's Oscars, & 4 1/2 stars in the rating, I'm a little perplexed. Give "Twilight", or "Harry Potter", any day!

Old Friends

I spent some time with my dear friend Kate today. She used to live about 45 minutes away from me, & she just moved into a house that is less than 2 miles from my house. I was so excited to have her near by. I like to tell people that it's all her fault that I am a quilter today. She is the one who got me started. She first piqued my interest, when we were working together in an Internal Medicine office. The same office where I first got to know my other dear friend, Mindy. They are both like sisters to me.

This was the birthday card I gave Kate today. Her birthday was a few days ago. I made 3 very similar cards.
We sat & worked on dresses. Kate had to finish one for her daughter Hannah, for a party tonight. I did some seam ripping on (Mindy's DD) Hope's Irish Dance dress that I hadn't touched since before Christmas.

Kate's cat really liked Hope's dress.

I also finished up on the earrings,

slider necklace/pin,

& pin,

which I mounted on to a card, & dropped it off at Mindy's, to be donated to an auction for the Irish Dance School, this coming Sunday.

Sunday Studio Time & ATCs

I got this lovely ATC in the mail this week from Mags. Thanks Mags, I love it! I helped inspire me to get moving!
I ended up getting called in to work yesterday, & worked the full shift, so I didn't get to play yesterday, but today

I spent some quality time in my studio. I finished up on 3 pins like the one above, made from things I painted, & layered & stitched. Below is a shot of some tissue paper that I inked & painted & glued on to card stock.

This is one of 3 ATC's that I made, using some Glad Wrap that I drizzled with inks & paints, & copper Angelina (the kind that can't be fused). I layered it inside the painted Glad Wrap, & ironed it between layers of parchment paper. It makes it look like glass, but feels soft & is easy to sew through.

I also made a pin & pair of earrings out of bits of leftovers.

Now I'm going to head for bed. I'm working the next 2 days. Wednesday my DH promised to take me to see "Twilight" one last time on the big screen, before it's not in theaters any more.

If you want to see more of the Teddy Bear Tea, I posted it last night .

Valentine & Teddy Bear Tea

I have been off line for a week. Tonight I just now got my DSL back up & running. I played in my studio for about 15 minutes today, when the phone rang & they were begging me to come in & work. I had to cancel may play day with my friend Kate, & rescheduled for next week, & went in to work a short shift. Just 6 hours. I'm on call tomorrow, but hopefully I can stay home & play.

I made my DH's Valentine as usual. This was the envelope. He says he's keeping it as well as the card.It's just a bit of black Misty Fuse, painted with copper paint on to the envelope. I used a copper gel pen to print his name, then outlined it with a black Sharpie. Easy.

The card, I started in my embellishment class. The white wings (actually have silver sparkles) are made from Embossing Powder. The lettering, & the heart are 2 different methods of Foiling.Of course there's a little free-motion quilting, & couched yarn, & the edges have more painted Misty Fuse, & LOVE printed with gel pen. It said "You make...my heart take wing!"
Thursday was our 6th annual Teddy Bear Tea at ALCQ. It was a great Tea. Over 200 bears & their friends showed up with little quilts to be donated to several area organizations. I will post a lot more pictures on the ALCQ blog tomorrow evening. This little Panda made me want to cry!
My DF Jackie was stylish as always. She sported this hat made by a Homer artist (she couldn't remember her name). I loved the big felted & bead embellished flower.

I also loved Debbie's jacket. She said it came from Coldwater Creek! Go figure!

Family, Friends & Fun

I got this nice picture of my DS Brandon with wife Laura & daughter Carys yesterday. They will be here in July! I can't wait!
This was my ABC's of Embellishment class yesterday. We had a lot of fun, first paint, then embossing, foiling, & fusing, & heat effects. The gal in the center is Kate, she had taken class #2 last time around, & liked it so much she signed up for all 4 this time, including repeating class #2.

I wish I could go play in my studio right now, but I am on call tonight, & hate to get interrupted in the middle, so for now, I guess I'll fix my hair (so I don't scare my patients when I get called in), & read for a while. It's snowing & blowing here today, but the days are getting steadily longer. We're still waiting for Mount Redoubt to blow it's top. It's been threatening for quite a while.

I got good news today that one of my dearest old friends, Kate has moved in near by. She is the person who got me started quilting. I hope I'll see her once in a while now!

Hope you all have a happy Valentine's Day!

Thread play & Vicki's Flower Garden

My oldest sister Vicki "isn't a quilter", so she says. This Grandmother's Flower Garden was her first attempt at making a quilt top. She showed it to me in September when I was in Michigan. She made it about 12 years ago, & said she didn't think she would ever finish it, so I brought it home with me. I quilted it on Lily.
It's meant for a table topper, not a bed quilt. I used a very thin poly batt. The pieces had a few puckers, & it didn't lay perfectly flat, so it needed just a little loft to help hide it's minor flaws.
I quilted around the flowers, & spirals in the centers. Now I'm going to send it to my other sister Em, & she is going to do the binding. Good luck Em!

I taught a Threadplay class yesterday. My students were enthusiastic, & helped breathe a little ambition back into me. I've been such a slug lately! It was fun teaching people who appreciated the things I was teaching them. They kept saying, "This is so much FUN!" That made it fun for me too. One of my students was the wife of sombody who works on Kwajelaein where my son Brandon is.

Today I spent some time in the studio getting ready for my next class, "ABC's of Embellishment", on Tuesday. I painted a bunch of stuff.

A couple of skeleton leaves,

some Mulberry bark,

some pieces of the Misty Fuse that Sue B sent me, (thanks again Sue!)

used Dryer sheets, & scraps of Lutradur, & batting.

I also did some Thread-play. This flower was my demo from class yesterday. That's a mirror in the center.

I decided to make another to wear with a sweater that Warren gave me for Christmas. I put a glass blob in the center of this one.

Then I decided to make a different sort of flower. I think I'll call them Peggy flowers, because my late sister-in-law Peggy loved spider mums, & that was what I was thinking about when I made it. I used a clear glass blob for the center of this one,

then I added it to the top of "Modern Romance". Did I mention that I'd named the crazy quilt?

While I was in the Threadplay mode, I decided to also make a bit of custom lace for a seam on "Modern Romance", here it is before I washed the stabilizer away.

After I dried it, it fit perfectly on the seam that I made it for.

It felt so good to have a little creative time.

Granny Fran asked about the earth quake we had recently. Yes I felt it good! It started, then got louder, & bigger, I started timing it after about 15 or 20 seconds, & it lasted another whole minute. It was quite a ride! I was setting on the couch at the time. I never heard where the epicenter was, or how big it was, but it was a fun one!

Murder Mystery & Turtle Cat

Nothing quilty to report today. We have gone back into the deep freeze, with a temp of -18 F this morning. We got a pretty good snowfall on Friday, ice is decorating the eves, from the heater wire that we placed on the roof.
The ravens were having a party at Costco when we went there. I love watching their antics, & hearing their chortle.

Saturday evening we went to a 1950's themed Murder Mystery Party for my friend Mindy's 50th birthday (which is this Thursday). Hope demonstrated the hula-hoop.

Lindsey dressed in a Lucy costume. Mindy was 'miss Bobby Sox", Christie & Hope, & is that the Fons?

Our orthopedic surgeon played the part of Ivan, the Russian astrophysicist. He was soo funny.

We had a great time. I turned out to be the murderer! Nobody was more surprised than I was!

Sunday Mindy & John, & Hope came over to watch the Super Bowl, & brought party left-overs. It's always fun getting together with them.

Broccoli was playing like a turtle with the packaging that came with my camera.

Later he was exhausted after all that play. I hear that a cat who will sleep on his back is a well adjusted animal who feels safe.