ALL EYE ON GREEN BAY TONIGHT!!!

 THE 2025 NFL DRAFT begins at 7:00 PM CST at Lambeau Field.  Thousands and thousands of fans, players, coaches, and media have descended upon the iconic Packer's home stadium.

Every detail has been planned...even the main bridge in town is displaying a light show of team colors in order of their selection status.  Most importantly, the Brown County Tavern League of Wisconsin will collaborate with the City of Green Bay and other entities to provide a free shuttle program running between April 23-27. A total of 40 passenger shuttles will be operating. They'll be in the Lambeau area each evening to take fans back home safely. They'll also be stationed at over 200 participating Tavern League bars and restaurants.  I predict a wild night for many!

Here's a few photos in and around Lambeau Field to get you in the mood:  the HUGE main outdoor stage, the green room where players will wait to see which team drafts them, plus other homages to the Packers, even our rescue black lab Sooty who wasn't happy to be squeezed into a Packer shirt!!

ROSEVILLE, CA

The growth in the community we moved to is astonishing!! I'm guessing there are at least another 300 homes being built almost like an assembly line. I've been watching one that's the same model as ours, on a corner like ours and across from what will be the new club house just like ours. The foundation was poured Dec. 1, 2024 and on 4/19 a sold sign went up. It isn't even finished yet!!

Everywhere one looks there is construction, with newly poured concrete and already sold. Perhaps this is why:

https://www.newsbreak.com/share/3969154854788-roseville-ranked-best-california-city-to-move-to-by-consumer-affairs?_f=app_share&pd=01dcPZ1O&lang=en_US&send_time=1745249694&trans_data=%7B%22platform%22%3A0%2C%22cv%22%3A%2225.16.0.29%22%2C%22languages%22%3A%22en%22%7D&sep=ns_foryou_recall_exp_25q2-v2%2Cns_foryou_model_exp_25q1-v8%2Cns_local_strategy_25q1_exp-holdback%2Cns_foryou_blend_exp_25q1-v3&s=i16&fbclid=IwY2xjawJzVOtleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHrh9QdB0xL4lrSE9WYnELZJrS_26NjZLI_OCUvx9TeMqN25Iv_tcboQ7q-vi_aem_gyKvcXXZEpBZZ1XT5XOqpg

EASTER 2025

 Happy Easter to all......we celebrated early along with our grandson's 13th birthday.  Kiddos that age are more interested in monetary gifts rather than toys....this short video shows the gift I created for him.

Thank you for Robbi Porter Payne who showed this clever gift giving idea on her blogs years ago....I've been waiting for the right time to create one myself.  Here's how:

I opened the BOTTOM of a can of pineapple chunks with a can opener...removed the fruit, cleaned and dried it. (You must search for a can with a pop top lid and a rim bottom...not the curved ones that seemed to be on about 90% of the cans.) I taped 13 bills of various denominations together, rolled them up and placed in the can with a tag saying pull facing the unopened end.  I added some ribbons and a heavy rock to give it some weight and hot glued the bottom lid back in place.  What a fun way to give cash for the birthday boy with younger brother & Mom looking on. 

DRAT - I can never seem to get movies to load on this site anymore.....this is such a tease....so if we are friends on Facebook....go to my personal page, it's posted there only for Facebook friends.

 

SUNSET OVER HERITAGE PLACER VINEYARDS PONDS

 After nearly 6 weeks of constant work, the finishing touches are now added to my newest landscape art quilt.  This piece was inspired by a Bobbi Jayne DeLozier photo and used with permission.  

                   SUNSET OVER HERITAGE PLACER VINEYARDS PONDS

                                       28.5" x 19"

Appliquéd, thread painted, embroidered, and densely quilted.  Materials:  ice-dyed & batik cottons, Ultra-suede, oil pastels, Prisma color fabric pencils, invisible, cotton, and metallic thread. Faced edges & hanging sleeve.

Available for immediate purchase - DM for details.  Free shipping US destinations only.

IN MEMORY

 A friend's new playhouse for her grandkids brought back nostalgic memories, as the month of April tends to do for several reasons.

My brother loved spending hours and hours at Bookworm Gardens with his granddaughter. This charming botanic garden located in Sheboygan, WI was inspired by children's literature. One will find alcoves in carved out trees, benches near ponds, an old school bus, miniature light house and wonky play houses stocked with books, making them perfect places to sit and read together.

They loved this special place so much that my brother built this playhouse for his granddaughter. Talk about adorable! Tragically, he passed away in April 2012. In lieu of flowers, the family requested memorial donations go to Bookworm Garden.
This is the quilt I made as a donation.

"Pick A Book" - 42" x 31"  © 2012

 

BONDING WITH MY MACHINE

 I almost never use my machine's programed stitches, preferring to avoid what I often think of as 'canned' designs.  However, this agonizingly slow to finish project is quite stiff and nearly impossible to hand stitch.  That led me to acquaint myself with stitches I've totally ignored since I purchased my Janome probably 5 years ago.

UTILIZING ALL MY KNOWLEGE

 This project keeps challenging me.  I've never been a free motion stitcher.  I'm aware how much practice it takes to excel!  I've preferred handwork for most of my career.....so the need to learn FM quilting wasn't necessary.   As a judge at some of the biggest (and smallest) show in the country I've seen excellent quilting skills, leaving me a bit pea green.  I've also seen less successful examples....many times failure was due to poor thread tension.

But today I simply had to tackle free motion thread painting.....it was the only reasonable solution to create a line of small trees along a horizon.  Naturally, I did not jump into stitching directly on the quilt top without practicing on a similar sandwich of fabric...so it went better than I expected.  

There is so much stitching now on the piece, my guess is I've tied a zillion knots.  Yes, I continue to be a fussy stitcher, preferring to pull threads to the back and tie off rather than use the tie off function of my machine.  Those little nubs of thread bother me.  Onward, I WILL finish this piece soon!

DIGGING DEEP

Reinventing the wheel seems to be the theme for this art quilt.  The intention was to incorporate fabric to depict dark grey clouds interspersed in the sky.  Nothing worked!!

Since there was dense stitching already in that area, thread stitching seemed to be a better choice.  Darn, I lacked the suitable weight of thread.  Ah ha....harkening back to a technique I use to blend two contrasting colors. I threaded the machine's needle with two threads - black and grey Aurfil 50 weight and away I went.

It was still necessary to stitch very densely however the addition merged much better than narrow fabric strips.  Don't forget to utilize unconventional approaches when necessary (meaning when you don't want to leave home to shop or wait for an Amazon delivery!!)

 

REQUIRING CREATIVE OVERDRIVE

 Work continues on my depiction of a sunset photo, where orange is the main color.  It's NOT a color I use much or own, therefore it's been a struggle obtaining the appropriate tones.  Yes I could purchase some but what fun is that?  I simply do not buy fabric anymore since I have so darn much already....foolishly stubborn about that!

So, I printed my own with the aid of my large gelli plate.  First I tried over-dyeing a sample of a mottled hand-dyed of mine.  Glad I only did a small test piece and silly me, I didn't take a photo when it was rejected, sorry.

Next came a reddish tone on tone batik.

Below you'll see the gelli plate readied with orange & a tad of brown acrylic paint.

And finally the finished printed fabric.  This will be used as surface water that is being reflected by the sunset.

The project so far is trying to get the best of me, but I keep fighting back, hoping in the end the piece will be an art quilt worthy of its photo inspiration.

A CHALLENGING PROJECT IN THE WORKS

 I gasped after seeing a sunset photo posted on our community Facebook page by Bobbi Jayne DeLozier. So much so that I asked her for permission to recreate it in fabric. Oh boy it's been a challenge...in part because I don't have the exact right shades of the colors needed.

Here's my start and I hate to admit how long this has taken me......notice the 1st photo....the last two strips do not have the same color range. With ingenuity/trial and error.....it now matches.

Problem #2 is being tackled now with the use of my gel plate....fingers crossed. Stay tuned...