Too Tired to Come Up With a Title Tonight!

I have finally gotten around to posting the round robin top that I worked on for the last meeting of Fiber Art Friends. The background was made by Carmen. I was the third person to work on it. This picture really doesn't show it very well. I have been wanting to try some of the techniques I've seen in my machine embroidery books. I made cords using the zigzag stitch on my machine and going over a piece of yarn with different color threads. It was fun to do and really easy. You can barely see them in this picture. They are at the top, sewed down in a grid pattern to go along with the grid Carmen had made.
I've got to come up with an idea for the next top. We meet on Fiday and I've been busy with work over the holiday weekend so haven't had a chance to work on it. Working at a grocery store in a tourist area over a holiday weekend is not fun!! I ended up being scheduled to work Thursday-Monday so I don't have much time to do anything with the family. I do have Tuesday off but the kids will be in school. Guess I can catch up on housework and work on my quilts.
I hope everyone else is having a wonderful weekend!

Calendar Contest Quilt

Since my quilt was not one of the 13 picked for the Quilting Arts Calendar, I can now show you pictures of it. These next two show some of the details of the flowers and leaves.

It was a little disappointing not to be one of the 13 chosen for the calendar but I'm still thrilled to have just made it to the final judging. One of my goals that I set at the beginning of the year was to make a quilt to enter into the contest. Which I did accomplish. Making it to the finals was an added bonus. By entering, I made myself stretch and try some new techniques and I had fun.

It is still raining up here in NH. It is getting to me now. Having rain and gray skies for so long just makes me want to stay in bed or just stay in my pj's all day not doing much of anything. Not very inspiring for working on my quilts but I do make myself do something each day no matter how small. This weather also makes it hard to get up and get to work. I keep telling myself at least our well is full and the next time we get a good day, I can do some dyeing without worring about how much water I'm using.

New Quilt Top Started

I've been working on the blocks for this quilt for over a month. Finally finished putting them together last night. I still need to put the stems on the leaves.
One idea I have is to put thin "slices" of gold fabric in the red. In the second picture, I laid on some gold strips from my scrap bag just to see how it would look. I'm not sure which way I like it better.
If I do decide to put yellow stips on the quilt, I think they would be narrower and shorter than the pieces here. I wonder if the yellow strips would take focus off the leaves or would they help keep moving the eye around the quilt.

I was so sure at first and now I don't know. I keep second guessing myself. Of course, I didn't finish the top until after the meeting of Fiber Art Friends yesterday so I couldn't ask them for feedback.

It was a good meeting yesterday. We exchanged our round robin pieces again. It is so much fun to see what everyone adds each time and to see how each piece has evolved. It's getting a little harder to add something now that we are getting near the end. We will exchange them one more time before we get out original ones back. I will try to post pictures in the next couple of days of the one I just worked on.

Round Robin, In-Laws and Flooding

This is the next top I worked on in the round robin that Fiber Art Friends are doing . Lynn E. made this cat one. Marilyn added the 3-D eyelids complete with eyelashes. When I got it, I was going to have the cat thinking about a mouse or fish. My daughter suggested a bird and I thought that was a good idea since I could add feathers floating around. The bird turned out a little more folk art in style than I wanted but I ran out of time and had to exchange it for the next top. I missed the last meeting so didn't get to see all the tops when they were exchanged. Can't wait to see them at the meeting this Friday. I have to get moving on the next top. Haven't had much time to do anything.

Last week, my sister-in-law, Wenda, was out for a couple of days from NY. She was vending in a quilt show in southern NH and came up here for 2 days before she had to do a class at a shop in Nashua, NH. We went to Keepsake Quilting. I still don't like the new shop as much as I did the old one. Not sure why. I think one of the reasons is that I don't find the staff very friendly.
My Mother and father-in-law came out from Ohio for my husbands graduation from grad school on Saturday. He now has a masters in elementary education. I thought he would never finish!! I hope he can find a teaching job!
They are supossed to leave tomorrow and go down to Glouster, MA to see their grandson, Matt (Wenda's son). I don't know if they will make it with all the flooding that is happening along the Mass, NH and Maine coasts. It is flooding around us in the center of NH. At least we won't have to worry about our well right now!!