Craziness

I've been crazy busy and slacking off all at the same time the last couple of weeks.

Ashley, Chris and I had a wonderful time w/our Royal Wedding watching breakfast. We all decided the chocolate croissants were fantastic, but messy.

I totally loved my pink feathery tiara. Ashley's was a Hello Kitty tiara, which was waaaayyy better than that awful hat HRH Beatrice wore. What was that about? Isn't Ashley all cute and perky for 4am? Poor Chris, I got him pre-coffee, and with the flash no less. He's such a good sport. I think it comes from having a ridiculous amount of sisters.

Chris provided much entertainment by filling in what we couldn't hear when the t.v. people were whispering to one another. Ashley is apparently a fount of Royal gossip too! The wedding was so different on so many levels than Diana and Charles. I loved the Diana-esk sideways glances William kept giving Kate. It was clear they love each other and understand each other.

Ashley and Chris brought their dog Lucie, who's a nervous-nelly, just like my Robbie. Robbie loved her! He followed her everywhere. Magic was a butt-head though. When she laid down on the dog bed in the corner, he went over to her and woofed at her to get out and she did. She refused to go back there again. Magic and I had a discussion about manners and how treat our guests. Well, I discussed, he just looked at me until I stopped talking, then bounced off to his next escapade. Not much phases the Magic dog.

Ashley got Lucie a lovely pink sparkly collar to wear for the wedding too, but she wasn't so fond of it.

The retreat was a blast. Pitti-Pat and I took our time getting to Janesville. I had left my purse at work, so we had to drive a half hour East before heading back West/North. And then the hubby took the van key with him for some bizarre reason (as I was driving the van to Janesville). I was running around yelling "has anyone seen my van key!?!" My cousin's husband laughed and said "you and Ashley are so much alike." When I called the hubby he said "just use your van key." I said all sweet and innocent like "You mean the van key that in my purse AT WORK?" He said, "Oh. Would you like me to turn around and come back?" Me, very sweetly "Yes, please."
So by the time we got on the road, we were already 2-3 hours late in leaving. On the way we stopped at a couple of quilt stores, had a lovely lunch, got lost in the farmland of Wisconsin because the GPS told us to go the wrong way....
My friend Bobbie asked me if I finished at least 50% of what I brought with. I wish!

I did get a fair amount done though. I worked on my 'More Serengeti' quilt. It's not a hard pattern, but it is time consuming. I'm a total type A about lining up my sashing across the blocks, so that adds to the time. The pattern is based on 'Gypsy Girl' from the book 'Fat Quarter Five' by Heather Mulder Peterson. I altered it to use 2.5" strips and assemble it differently than her pattern though. I have over 54 fabrics in this quilt now. When I started putting the fabrics together for it, I couldn't find decent animal prints anywhere. Now that I'm 75% done with it, they are everywhere! It figures, doesn't it?

The problem I'm having is knowing how many blocks I need to make it the size I want. It's set on the diagonal, and my blocks are a different size than the pattern, so I'm going to have to slap it on the design wall and see how big it is to decide how many more blocks to do. I have 38-ish done now, I think I'll need at least 48, but that diagonal throws me for a loop every time. I guess I can always resort to more borders if it's too small.

I also designed and made one bag. I'm beyond thrilled with it. It's a 'planets aligned' bag. It was meant to be. I had the all of the perfect coordinates for the Cath Kidston London fabric in my stash, which was a good thing because the laminate fabric is no where to be found. Not on the internet, not at any stores I called, emailed, visited, not any where! One store even contacted Moda for me, but they aren't making it anymore.
I have just enough of the laminate and London canvas to make 8 of these lovely bags:

I bought the little carriage charm from Cath Kidston when I ordered my umbrella. Isn't is sweet? I have it hanging from the key fob I put in the interior of the bag. I made the button from another London print I happened to have that's from Kokka.

 It's the perfect take along size. I've been taking it to work as my work bag. It makes me happy when I see it hanging in my cube. And look at my matching umbrella with it. It's just too much, isn't it? I freaking love it!

I lined one side with pockets, because you can never have too many pockets! I found that perfect lining fabric at Loose Threads in Milton, WI.

The weekend is a blur, so here's what else I remember after 3 consecutive nights of 4 hours or less of sleep.

Michele made this amazing quilt top:

I wish I had a picture of it w/the black setting squares. You can see it over on her blog. Along with photos of everyone else's projects that I failed to photograph.

PittiPat worked on things that I don't remember, then made a curtain by cutting down larger panels for her newly finished basement. You can see it in the bottom left corner of the first More Serengeti photo. Michele cracked us all up when she said  "You go Scarlett!" We picked out a gorgeous batik jelly roll and coordinates at Attic Quilts in Beloit to go on the couch in her new space.

DiscoJen made about a hundred outfits each for her 2 children in the first 3 hours, a couple of placemats, and then finished a purple and green pinwheel quilt whose blocks were put together about 8 years ago.

Pat Pot worked on a happy and oh so summery, orange and pink Bill and Weeks Ringle quilt.
 

Debbie started not one, but 2 You Go Girl Bags! Judy did two projects, but I seem to only remember the second one, a gorgeous blue and yellow monkey wrench quilt. Carol finished a very detailed, GORGEOUS quilt using the 3 Sister's Sanctuary  line (see Michele's blog for a photo) then she started a Christmas quilt. She was using a pattern from a country style book, but we all had suggestions, and ended up completely changing it. Patterns are really just suggestions anyway.

And last, but not least, let me introduce you to my new bag model, Kate! Yes, I'm calling her Kate after the new HRH, because I got her the weekend of the wedding, she's wearing white, and is ridiculously skinny!

I'm off to finish off the 6 London Calling bags that I'm in the process of creating.

Happy Quilting!

Vicki

It's all British all the time here lately.

It seems to be Anglophile mania here lately. I got my fabulous Cath Kidston products last week, and tomorrow, at a ridiculously early hour of the morning, is The Royal Wedding! Yes, I'm totally one of those dorks that's completely into it.

I'm of the age when we all remember getting up obscenely early to watch Diana and Charles get married. It seems fitting to watch her son do the same.

I don't really care what Kate and William do on a daily basis, and think the press should stay out of it and let them live their lives, but boy do I love a good wedding. And a Royal Wedding is a whole stratosphere above your average wedding in fabulousness.

Yes, there are terrible things going on all over the world, as there are every day of every year, but you have to let that go and enjoy some pomp and circumstance every now and then or you'd be totally depressed all the time.

Ashley, her hubby, and their dog are coming tonight to have a sleep over so we can get up at 4am to watch it together. My hubby said to not bother waking him up for it. I told him he's a big pooper.

Ashley has secured tiaras for us to wear with our jammies, which totally rocks. I have scones, devonshire cream, lemon curd, crumpets, chocolate croissants, Prosecco w/peaches and fresh strawberries and Harney & Sons Royal Wedding Tea, which will be served in my Liberty of London teapot and matching cups. We are doing this thing up right.

Then at 9am, I will be picking up PittiPat and we will be heading off for our annual Spring quilting retreat at Evergreen in Janesville! I can't wait. I have the projects all packed. Needless to say there are waaaayyyy too many of them. I have the makings for 10 bags and 3 quilts (one of which is the Strawberry Fields quilt) packed. We all tend to bring too many projects. Do you think we have delusions of grandeur? PittiPat asks that every retreat, but I like to think that we are just optimistic.

All of those bags are projects, except the wheely one, which contains my beloved Janome 6500.