Crackpot Quilters’ Blog

Yesterday was an “Eat Chocolate!” day. WooHoo!

So here is a photo of the Eat Chocolate page from my fabric journal.

It’s not finished yet, but you can tell a couple of things. First and most obvious, all the chocolate is dark chocolate, the most powerful kind. If you could see the detail, you would notice that each chocolate is decorated with embroidery that shows what the filling is. I’m sure you recognize the brown with pink dots ribbon. It was purchased when we were trying to keep someone away from the balloon fabric. The fabric journal has been in a box for a while, so it was fun to get it out look it out. Some day I’ll finish it.

Now in the interest of full disclosure: While I was checking out, my driver was eating Hershey’s kisses. I had a peppermint. What was I thinking! So we stopped down the road at Culver’s for a dairy based lunch. The Turtle Sundae was good for the winter, but nothing beats a real Tommy Turtle. And when my book group went out to dinner last night, I had Tiramisu. Not all that much chocolate, but filled with other valuable goodness. 🙂

Wednesday was the Fiber Arts Guild’s potluck and ornament exchange. It was great fun, with good food, good company, lovely art, and plenty of laughs.

Everyone brought a dish to share.

We were all interested in Jonetta’s Rice Porridge. In Norway it is traditionally served on Christmas Eve (or is it the day before Christmas Eve?) with butter, cinnamon and sugar, and dried meat. It was delicious. There was a certain amount of debate about Aron’s decorated cookies. Were they for decoration or for eating?

OK, we ate them. Yummy!

After dinner, we had show and tell. I didn’t get a picture of the most exciting news of the evening. Jennifer had her work featured in 500 Handmade Dolls from Lark Books. See http://www.jennifergoulddesigns.com/ for more of her work and information about the book.

Lynn brought mittens.

In 2006 there was a NATO Summit in Riga, Latvia. All of the delegates were given a pair of mittens knit in a traditional Latvian pattern. 4500 pairs of mittens were knit, and all of them were unique. See http://www.rigasummit.lv/en/id/cats/nid/698/ Lynn adapted a Latvian pattern for double knitting.

Jonetta brought hardanger. This is a traditional Norwegian craft.

Aron brought some of her felted dolls. Here is the Grinch, in case anyone needs a mood adjustment. Aron learned to make these felted creatures at a Fiber Arts meeting just over a year ago, and now she is selling them at a local shop.

Alison brought three dolls

and a wall hanging showing the same figures.

Bonnie brought a bunch of adorable crocheted finger puppets (sorry, no photo) and a woven ribbon pillow.

Some talent in this group, isn’t there?

After show and tell we had the ornament exchange.

This is the ornament I brought. A plain brown wrapper:

The inner gift bag:

The beaded ornament:

Coming later–a photo of the ornament I received.

I have a piece of an antique quilt top that came from my maternal grandmother. It is about 30 inches square.

It is quite fragile, and in some places the fabric has completely deteriorated.

I don’t know the date of the textile or who made it. I really don’t have any memory of my grandmother sewing or quilting, and I don’t remember any quilts that she made. As a point of reference, my grandmother was born in 1871 or 1872, depending on the source of the info.

The question is what to do with it. One suggestion from a friend who collects vintage textiles was to soak it in Biz or Oxy Clean! I’m afraid to put it in water! The colors go surprisingly well with the decor of the back bedroom, so I thought about having it mounted and framed, using archival materials.

Any suggestions?

OK, so Marty at least has figured out that the photo that accompanied my earlier post and which was most definitely not the fabric for Andrea’s baby’s quilt, was in fact a picture of me modeling my latest 1920s fashion statement, which I wore at Prophetstown last week, to general acclaim. I think it is more modern, by 1920s standards, than the three dresses I am replacing because they are pretty well worn out. Note the slightly flapper-esque lines and the generally loose fit. Thanks to Marty’s expertise at pattern altering, it is appropriately loose fitting, rather than gargantuan, which it would have been without the alterations. I am now quite fired up as a 1920s seamstress, and I am eager to see if I can remember enough of Marty’s alteration techniques to try altering another pattern. But first I need to make an apron for this dress. I have a pattern that fits, and I have decided to go for an understated look – just blue gingham trimmed with blue rick-rack. I will be bringing fabric and pattern to the Cute Little House for Thanksgiving, along with my camera, so there may well be future posts of my progress.

Finally, after 7 years in the making, Judy’s quilt is totally and completely finished. It was begun in Feb., 2000, just after I retired. The initial fabric purchases were made in the company of my wonderful friend Lorene. The fabric shopping expedition was Lorene’s first outing after her second kidney transplant, and I have never seen anyone enjoy fabric shopping so much!

Here is a photo of the quilt back, showing the signature Crackpot decorative (and fabric-saving) strip down the middle. A little extra piecing sure beats purchasing several more yards of backing fabric and then using only a 9″ strip of it.

Because I always find it pretty scary to stuff a finally-completed quilt into the washing machine, it is a great relief to be able to hang the clean and still-intact quilt on the line, so this is part of the process that I feel compelled to document.

Finally, it is always important to photodocument the absolute last stitch. Here it is:

The quilt will be delivered to Judy and her new husband Peter in Budapest sometime in the next 6 months or so, when time and health permit. There is no way that I will mail it to them, both because I would never entrust it to the postal service and more importantly, because I can’t bear to miss seeing Judy’s face when she sees it for the first time. (She has no idea I have been making her a quilt.)