A Quick Spring Getaway

On a rare sunny weekend in an unusually cold March, my mom and I zipped over to Arkansas to visit P. Allen Smith’s Moss Hollow Farm. Dubbed “The Martha Stewart of the South” by the New York Times, Allen runs a home and garden lifestyle business which includes a PBS show, several books, and his beautiful farm west of Little Rock.   He was at home that day and led the tour himself.

My mother is crazy for daffodils, so we planned our trip during “Daffodil Days” when the pastures were awash in shades of yellow and gold. The flowers just went on and on! There were all sizes, shapes and hues of sunny blooms waving in the breeze all around the house. It was a most welcome sight for the winter-weary!

Although not much else was blooming, there was still plenty to see. The farmhouse, an environmentally-friendly wonder, was built less than a decade ago but made to look as if it has been there for years. An enormous post oak in the front driveway adds to the illusion of longevity.

The interior of the house was no less dazzling than the outdoor show. Allen likes the early American look and has managed to capture that aesthetic while also using modern touches and accents. The living room is akin to an art gallery.

I loved this modern version of a Windsor chair.

This arrangement of serving pieces on the wall is gorgeous!

Of course, I noticed this half square triangle quilt pattern.

A closer look shows that is not a quilt, but a rug!

My favorite room was the sleeping porch with three beds at one end..

and a gleaming copper tub at the other.

This is what you see from the porch.

And here is a view of the back of the house.

The gardens were pretty bare this early in the year, but we admired the espalier

And the variety of heritage livestock such as these Buff Orpingtons.

For lunch, we feasted on recipes from Allen’s cookbook. It was so delicious that we went straight from the table to the gift shop to purchase copies of our own. For the rest of the afternoon we were free to walk around the property and see the rose garden, the vegetable garden and the rest of the livestock.

Moss Hollow Farm is open for tours most weekends and is only 2-1/2 hours door to door from my home in Memphis. Mom and I both highly recommend a visit and are planning to return later in the year to see the gardens in full bloom.

Quiltcon!

My normally predictable life has been anything but lately. What will probably be the highlight of my year was my trip to Quiltcon, the first-ever convention of the Modern Quilt Guild.  After all those years at home with Gwen, I felt anxious signing up for this event and registering for workshops all three days. I even considered backing out at the last minute!  Thank goodness I didn’t because I haven’t had so much fun or seen so many fabulous quilts since the Gee’s Bend exhibition came to Memphis several years ago.

At first I was sure I would be the one old fogey in a sea of skinny hipsters with pink hair and copious body art/piercings. But this convention drew every kind of person you could imagine!  There was pink hair, gray hair, no hair, and even blue hair on the ladies in the Spoonflower booth.

All the modern quilting rock stars were in attendance, most of them teaching workshops and showing quilts or new lines of fabric.  I saw Lizzie House, Jay McCarroll, Denyse Schmidt, Weeks Ringel, Amy Butler, Thomas Knauer, Yoshiko Jenzenji, Angela Walters, Anna Maria Horner, Alicia Haight Carlton, Jacquie Gering, Mary Fons, Sherri Lynn Wood, Lotta Jansdotter, Malka Dubrawsky, Penny Layman, and Elizabeth Hartman to name a few.

And I saw quilts! Rows and rows of wonderful, colorful modern quilts! I had to go through the show at least once every day to take it all in. In the front of the exhibition was a display of antique quilts. Here are a few that look very much like the “modern” quilts we are making today.

This little quilt, Ode to Paul Klee by Serena Brooks of Los Angeles was my favorite in the mini quilt category.

And here are a sample of quilts that caught my eye. There are many more in my Quiltcon Flickr set.

Adrift byt Tina Michalik

Paper Shredder by Pamela Johnson

Lifesavers by Lee Heinrich. I love what she did with those stripes!

Bolt by Rebecca Roach

Whoa!  Hold the phone! OMG it’s NANCY!  You know, THE Nancy. As in “Sewing With…”.  She was not listed as an instructor or lecturer, so I guess she was just checking out the modern quilt movement. It was such a trip turn around and see her standing there! She is even prettier than she looks on TV.

OK now back to the quilts. Here is my favorite.

Pantone Circles by Elizabeth Brandt.

And another one by the same artist.

Mobile

My second favorite.

My Tribute to B.C. Binning by Diane Thompson

A few more

Cool blue Kona Modern by Terry Aske.

Up in the Air by Latifah Saafir

This quilt won best in show. What a creative way to update the traditional double wedding ring pattern!

Double Edged Love by Victoria Findlay Wolfe

Here is a detail of the winning quilt.

Even the ribbons were show-worthy!

It’s going to take several posts to cover everything I saw and did at Quiltcon. Overall this event was well-planned, seamlessly organized, all-inclusive, and generally spectacular in every way. Kudos to the MQG board and volunteers for putting on a first-class show!

Playing Catch Up

Now that Valentine’s Day is approaching, maybe I should get around to posting pics of my booth at the 2012 holiday show.   The show ran from Nov 30 – Dec 24th in an empty store front in Midtown Memphis and participants took turns staffing it.  I had many more sales this year because I had a better variety of products and price points.   I also set up shop with other women makers at a Memphis Cash Mob event in the lobby of our local literacy agency.  It only lasted a few hours one rainy afternoon, but lots of people came and everyone did well.

Here is the whole setup.  It looks a little awkward and there is too much empty wall space, but I will remedy that next year.  We never know where our booths will be until the last minute so it is hard to plan ahead.  This year  I bought some fancy gridwall to better display the bibs.

I went ahead and made aprons even though everyone is making aprons.  I used large-scale prints with coordinating fabrics for backs so that they are reversible.  The best seller was the Buddha apron which is second from the back in the pic below.  I bought a lot more of that fabric for next year.

These birdseed ornaments sold as fast as I could make them!  I made the boxes out of recycled cereal boxes and nestled the ornaments in shredded tissue from last year’s gift boxes.

My sister made these adorable house ornaments.  There was only one left at the end of the show.

This was the big surprise of season.  I made about 30 decoupage ornaments using pages from fabric catalogs.  I was just sure that most of them  would be coming home with me after the show closed.  But I sold every single one of them and many of the people who purchased them bought two!  These take a long time to make and I even took the supplies on vacation with me.  Many were assembled while we anxiously watched last year’s presidential election returns in front of a fire in a cozy condo in North Carolina.

Other merchandise included hand knit caps, black and white fabric books for infants and recycled yarn.  I only sell one or two lots of yarn every year, but I will keep putting it out because people think that recycling yarn is cool and the pretty colors draw them into my booth.

Things went so well in 2012 that I’m looking to do more shows next season.  And I am starting on the stitching now to avoid the last-minute making frenzy that happens to procrastinators like me!

Glad To Be Back!

I took a long break.  Nobody told me that the second year of grief is often worse than the first.  It was.

But I finally feel like blogging again, my sister has been nagging me mercilessly and there have been some exciting new stitchy developments that have necessitated my return to this space.

You see, I have business cards with this address on them.   I ordered them from Moo.com and used Flickr photos of various projects from the past.  They turned out so well that I ordered some mini cards to use as price tags in a show I’m doing next month.

Yes, a show!  I did my first show last year and it was successful.  So I decided to do it again this year.  I’ll show you some of the merchandise in future posts.

AND because I am teaching!  A friend opened a small but fabulous fabric shop in May and invited me to work there occasionally and to teach anything I wanted.  (Check it out at Sew Memphis.com.)  So far I have taught purses and pillows for beginners, fabric jewelry for girls, tooth fairy pillows for kids, t-shirt upcycling, pajama pants and half of a two-part Christmas tree skirt class. In December I‘ll be teaching aprons, sock monkeys and drawstring gelt bags for Hanukkah.

Here I am in action.  Can you tell how much I love what I am doing?  (Please note that since this photo was taken I have lost 20 pounds!)

 

I have also made several custom pillows for clients of an interior designer friend of mine.  Here is the most recent.  The client wanted a pillow to match a quilt for a baby boy’s room.  She scanned and enlarged this horse from the quilt  The designer purchased the white and tan fabrics, gave me some direction and cut me loose.  Here is the result.  I fused and zigzagged the fabrics and embroidered the horse’s facial features and the birds’ legs.   I was worried about zigzagging around all of those curves, but setting my machine to the slowest speed setting made it manageable.

                                                          

And so, as sands through the hour glass, the stitching (and seam ripping) continues………

Get Lazy with Sarah

Hey, I just remembered that I have a blog!  That hasn’t been updated since February!   Not sure why- maybe I lost my stitching mojo. Chasing an adorable toddler all day leaves little energy for much else. And although it’s been 19 months, it’s still not easy living without Gwen.

But I did manage to squeeze in a few projects. First, a mini quilt for DQS 10.  Disappearing nine patch with batiks.

And my first Dresden Plate for the Lovely Linen Bee.  I was plenty nervous about attempting this block, but it turned out nicely!

This block for the Linen Bee was the most improvisational thing I have ever done.  At first it seemed I was just making a big ol’ mess.  But, again, the end product looked much better than expected.

Yesterday I made these bibs with my very best fabrics for a baby shower.  This was a really fun shower because there were many beautiful handmade gifts.

In non-sewing news, we had a clematis explosion,

then a lily explosion.  We are still waiting for the tomato and green bean explosions.

And after 10 years, I got a new car!  This comely machine is a 2011 Subaru Outback and I am in love with it.

The purchase of this vehicle was most exciting, yet somewhat bittersweet.  As part of the deal, I traded in the handicap van I had used to ferry Gwen around town for so many years.  I couldn’t help but feel that I was losing another little piece of the remnants of her life. Yeah, the van is just a “thing”. And  I will never lose my love for my daughter or the wonderful memories of our time with her.  But still….

Second Annual Birthday Retreat

My birthday rolled around (again!) on the first weekend in February and, like last year, I celebrated by myself at St. Columba Episcopal Retreat and Conference Center. I had already planned to attend a half-day silent retreat on Friday morning, so I reserved a hermitage and stayed all weekend.

St. Columba has become an important part of my life over the years. When Gwen was with us, the monthly half-day retreats and the annual weekend retreat were the only forms of respite available to me. Now that she is gone, the solitude and silence I crave can always be found sitting by the fire in the lodge or rambling around the 40 acres with no distractions.

The two hermitages are small one-person cottages with a bathroom, kitchenette and a bedroom/living area with a fireplace. Last year, I took my vintage quilt along, but this year I had the memory quilt made for me by friends from church. It looked great in its rustic surroundings.

The weather was cold and I was tired, so I spent lots of time under this quilt basking in the warmth of a fire and re-reading the messages written by people who loved Gwen. In between many long naps, I spent the weekend traipsing through the woods looking for color in an otherwise bleak winter landscape. Surprisingly, there was plenty to be found, most of it supplied by fungi.

Such as oranges and reds…

Reds and greens. I love that random mahonia growing in the middle of nowhere.

More fungi in green and blue-green

a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/45804256@N08/5441698307/” title=”color in winter – green by Get Stitchy With Sarah, on Flickr”>

This wrinkly raisin-colored mass that looks like fruit leather

And a fungal trifecta with orange, blue-green and raisin all on one stick!

I was hoping for snow that weekend but only spotted a few stray flakes. A few days later, however, Memphis had 3+ inches on the ground! The retreat center undoubtedly looked like a white wonderland and I’m sorry to have missed it.

Although these birthday weekends are relaxing and renewing, I may have to skip next year. I will be having a big birthday (the kind where your age ends with “0″) and am not happy about it. So it will probably be better to throw a big party with friends and family than to brood alone about my geriatric status.

So y’all help me here. Should I have a Barbie, Dora or Disney Princess theme?

Cranking Out Hats

I finished three more hats for a fundraiser sponsored by my knitting group. Here they are photographed against our latest snowfall which is coming down hard and accumulating fast.

A button tab hat in Cascade 220. Pattern is here.

A man’s cap loosely based on this pattern with different decreases at the top. It needs to be an inch longer to cover ears properly. The yarn is mystery yarn I got in a swap.

And finally this fun earflap “Califairisle” cap with pompons and zig zags.

Hat production is booming because I can knit at work while the baby is napping. The sewing machine, however, is slowly petrifying and will probably need to be jump-started when I try to use it again. If this snow keeps up, that could be tomorrow!

Stumbling Into 2011

January is almost over and I haven’t said a thing since December. Let me tell you why.

I had barely recovered from the holidays when a job fell in my lap! A friend of a friend needed a nanny for her 9 month old son and I started two weeks ago. So I take care of the easiest baby ever for 25 – 35 hours a week and we’re having a great time. I do the feeding, bathing, dressing and changing like I did for Gwen all those years, but I DON’T do doctors, sleep deprivation or first-time parent anxiety.

This is a perfect first step back into the job market because it’s fun and not stressful at all. Being on a schedule has been a big adjustment however. It’s been complicated by two snow days and a horrible stomach virus which had me up all Wednesday night and involved some serious heaving that left me a full 6 pounds lighter. I cannot recommend this weight loss plan, but I’m on the mend and have worked my way up to eating a baked potato for dinner. Woo hoo!

My sewing machine probably has spider webs on it, but the knitting needles are clicking along steadily. I made another Travelling Fern lace scarf, this time in maroon, for the Opera Memphis auction. As I have mentioned before, the opera company’s performances at Gwen’s school always inspired her to sing along and helped her acquire quite a reputation as a vocalist. For this I will be forever grateful.

And a few hats to raise funds for a friend of mine undergoing fertility treatments.

The bunny hat pattern is from the book Itty Bitty Hats, a treasure trove of adorable designs for babies and toddlers. Pink yarn is Berrocco Pure Merino DK bought for a song on Elann.com.

Life will be different now that I’m working, but naturally, my creative dance card is full. I am doing DSQ10, the Lovely Linen Bee, and will be entering the Modern Quilt Guild’s Project Modern Challenge #2. I’m putting two knitted scarves for holiday gifts on the list and today I promised an earflap hat to a 1-year-old girl.

I had better log off and get busy!

Handmade for the Holidays

Wow what a crazy holiday season! I had it totally under control until a few last-minute projects popped up. But the celebrating was done by noon today and I immediately settled in for a long (5-hour) winter’s nap.

No more keeping the handmade gifts under wraps! First, some ornaments for a swap with my knittaz in the Memphis Knit Mafia. They did not have to be knitted, so I made mine from glass balls and pages from a fabric catalog.

This was not a fast project, so I cut and pasted in the evenings while watching White Christmas three nights in a row. As a result I have been continually humming the tune from “Sisters” and thinking about technicolor blue dresses and fluffy feather fans. The Hancock’s of Paducah catalog didn’t stand a chance as I cut up the Kaffe Fassett pages for the color and photos of a blue fabric collection for one monochromatic ornament. When the glass balls were all covered, I strung them up from the bathroom shower curtain and applied three coats of mod podge to make them shine.

There was minimal knitting since I have been so busy finishing the Crosstown Quilt and running all over Hawaii. But I managed to crank out a soft Saroyan scarf/shawl for my cousin. It was completed on Tuesday, blocked on Wednesday and given on Friday night. The yarn is Berocco Palace. The first pic is the best representation of the true color.

About a week ago, I was searching for some stitch markers and found some yarn I had bought to make my sister a hat. Not just any hat, but a replica of the Ralph Lauren hat worn by the US athletes in the 2010 Winter Games. Last winter, these hats retailed for about $70, sold out before the Olympics started and then sold for up to $500 each on ebay for months afterwards. In March, I found a pattern for it on Ravelry, promised one to my sister, bought the yarn and promptly forgot about it. So I cast on in a hurry and did the stranded color work for the first time. It was not a fast knit, but I love the finished product. This hat is pretty big. If I made it again I would leave out some of the rows of white below and above the moose/reindeer.

Even with all of this going on, I accepted two opportunities to make a little money. After all, the credit card bill with the Hawaii trip on it was coming! I picked up a quilt from a friend on Wednesday, bound it for her on Thursday and returned it Friday. Fortunately, my sister was in town and helped me get it done. I love binding quilts, so getting paid to do it is especially fun.

We also hosted a canine visitor for a week while her people were at Disney World. Annabelle is a good girl and a pleasure to have around. Her presence forces me to take those walks I should be taking anyway. While she was here, she snagged a half-eaten turkey sandwich off a counter while I was answering the door. Made me think I was crazy because I couldn’t find the sandwich and didn’t remember finishing it! The game was up when Larry spotted some telltale pickles on the floor.

We made a date to meet my friend Nancy and her wild-man dog Jethro at Memphis’s new dog park. This was my first visit to the park and now I know that it is THE place to go for free entertainment. That’s Annabelle on the left and Jethro mugging for the camera.

There are still two small gifts to finish and give. After that I’ll be working on two commissions (pillows and a shoulder bag), participating in a linen quilt block swap, and signing up for the next Doll Quilt Swap.

What will YOU be making in the new year?

We went to Hawaii!

After our daughter Gwen passed away last year, Larry’s family got together and gave us a vacation. One of his cousins had a timeshare she did not want to use due to the impending birth of her first grandchild, and the others chipped in for airfare. We decided to visit Hawaii (the Big Island) and scheduled our trip for right after Thanksgiving.

Neither of us had been there before and we tried our best to take in as much as possible. We saw lots of black lava beaches.

And spotted this sea turtle in a tide pool. He was snacking on algae.

We took an historical sunset dinner cruise and saw a whale! It was about a week early for whale season but we got lucky. The native Hawaiian historian on board was not only very well versed on his state’s past, but he played a mean blues harmonica.

We saw these windmills on the northern peninsula. Don’t they look pretty against the ocean? Hawaii is humid as well as windy, so don’t spend much time on your hair if you go there.

The natives were very friendly, although these guys were a little stiff.

The most amazing thing we saw was Volcano National Park. There was no red hot flowing lava to be seen the day we were there, so we spent some time walking around on old lava flows.

I could not get used to seeing holiday decorations going up when the weather was tropical and balmy. And it was totally surreal to watch these adorable ballerinas dancing scenes from the Nutcracker outside in December!

There is so much more to show and tell! We’ll cover it all in later posts. For now I will leave you with this beautiful sunset we snapped on our last night on the island.