Farmer's Wife has begun!

It has been a while since I sat in my sewing room and cranked out blocks. I worked on some Farmer's Wife blocks today. I had done one with Ellen a week or so ago. I think Ellen and I are going to have our work cut out for us, to keep up with Yvette!


The first block we did was an easy snowball.... Here is mine...















The second was not hard - although my mad photography skillz make it look WAY more wonky than it is in reality.
















But this third one.... Well, it totally dispelled the theory I had that perhaps Farmer's Wife was going to be a little easier than Sylvia's Bridal. Wrong!


At one point, I had a complete set of the paper pieces cut out and assembled, and another set with seam allowances that I was using to actually construct the block. In a weird way, it helped me keep track of all 4,592 pieces!

































Okay, it's technically Monday. I'm off to bed!

Road to California, 2011

RoadToCalifornia2011

Click linkie after properly attiring yourself, i.e., get out your bibs. These are the pictures I took, and I will add Karen's pictures later, if they are not duplicates of mine.

The gentleman you will see in two pics, sitting quilting, is John Flynn, who was this year's Featured Artist. I did not see anyone else that I recognized. Eleanor Burns and Bonnie Hunter were teaching and we were unable to do the fan girl thing..... I thought that Ricky Tims and Alex Anderson came to this show, but no such luck. Mr. Flynn was really involved with his hand quilting and I didn't bother him.

Oh, and one thing to pay attention to in particular.... The first couple of pictures (seven, I think), were of a quilt that had everyone's jaw on the floor. The quilter has been quilting for three years. She designed the quilt herself. She pieced the quilt, and QUILTED the quilt, on a 20 year old regular sewing machine. She has three preschoolers and she accomplished this beauty in six months.

There are some close ups of her incredible quilting in the slide show. Again, these are, I hope, the first seven pix that come up for you.

I don't think we've seen the last of this young lady! She is pictured in the sixth picture, in the center, in white outfit. She looks pretty normal, but I am in awe of her ability to make that quilt, in six months, and quilt/embellish it herself. Wow!

I came away from the show inspired to get back in my sewing room and get busy!!