Sunrise Quilt Studio

I've added a few more patterns for sale on my website. They are all landscape quilts using my glue basting/freezer paper template method. My 12 year old daughter designed a landscape pattern yesterday afternoon, picked out the fabrics, and constructed her quilt using the freezer paper and glue basting method. I hand appliqued the pieces for her as she doesn't know how to do that yet. The quilt is on the quilting machine along with several of my own small landscape quilts waiting to be quilted. I'm going to try to get her to quilt her landscape today. She's a bit nervous about quilting it although she's used my longarm since she was 7 years old! I think this being her first landscape quilt she is a bit intimidated. This is my daughter's quilts. Isn't it pretty! I also got her to draft another landscape pattern. I'll try to get that one constructed in a few days. She is really good at drawing - in my humble opinion - so I'm going to try to get her to d...

Today is rainy. We're getting the remanents from Hurricane Dolly up here in central Missouri. At least it isn't storming so I feel o.k about sewing and quilting. I'm currently working on binding Joe's quilts. I finished one completely, sewed the binding to the front of one and pieced the binding of a 3rd. Why do I do things half-way on 3 different projects instead of finishing one at a time? Because my sewing machine isn't in my studio and I have to keep running up and down stairs to complete anything from beginning to end :( I cut the binding downstairs, then run upstairs to piece it. Then it's downstairs to press it and glue baste it to the quilt. Then it's upstairs to stitch it to the quilt front. Then downstairs to turn it to the back of the quilt and glue baste it to the back. Then upstairs to sit on the couch to hand stitch the binding to the back. So, I'm trying to find a way to do as much work in the basement as I can at a time, then go upstairs ...

I'm working on redesigning my quilting studio. I need some more storage for fabric as well as customer quilts. I could also use a space to put my domestic sewing machine and a better pressing surface. I've been playing with graph paper and studying kitchen cabinetry that is available commercially. They make a kitchen cabinet that has a fold-up ironing board in it. I'm going to see if I can see one on display to determine if it will work for me. My plan is to use the wall where my "design board" is now to put a line of base cabinets. I'll use a section of it for my domestic machine so I have to find a sewing cabinet that will fit there. I don't like to face the wall when I'm sewing, but so far I haven't figured out any other location for the DSM. Good thing I'm still in the paper phase of this project. There still needs to be insulation installed as well as drywall. I hope to get started on that phase soon, though. I am soooooo tired of working ...

Here is the landscape quilt all quilted and ready for binding. I like it better without the Aspen tree and using the leaves instead. I think the eye flows over the entire quilt better this way. I used Signature 100% cotton threads in white, harvest, black, seascape, and greenhouse. And my machine is working like it should now :D Susan

I put the Snow Capped Mountains quilt on the machine this weekend. I decided against the Aspen trees and decided to go for Aspen leaves sprinkled in the upper left- and lower right-hand corners of the outer border. I studied pictures of Aspen leaves from photos and made patterns of 6 different leaves, then transferred them to fusible web and fused the web to 6 different yellow and orange fabrics. Once I started quilting on the top, my machine decided to act up. When I would stop quilting, pull up the bobbin thread and push the machine back to cut the thread, the needle would come down into the quilt while I was moving the machine-ack! I tore 2 holes in the top because of that. So I shut off the machine and decided to wait a day to tackle the problem. This afternoon, I started quilting again and still had the same problem - although I was watching for the needled to come down unwanted and was able to avoid tearing the quilt. By the way, I was able to repair the 2 tears. So I adjusted t...

It has been raining since midnight last night - off and on. As soon as one storm finishes, another one starts up. We've had thunder, lightening, wind and heavy rain. My plans to go grocery shopping have been put on hold until after all the storms. It's almost 4 pm and the clouds are starting to break up. One good thing about all the storms, it certainly has cooled things off. It had been in the middle 90's and today it's down in the upper 70's to low 80's. I even opened the windows and turned off the a/c! I spent the day cleaning house and working on a quilt binding in between the storms. I also completed a couple of melons for a double wedding ring quilt and hand stitched the binding on one of my small landscape quilts - see above. These quilts are some I finished binding last week. They are all small wall quilts from 8x10 and up to 11x14.

This past weekend, my husband and daughters and I took a quick trip to our former home town to see our son and other extended family. I took 4 quilts to Joe that I had completed and brought home another 6 to quilt and bind. Joe has a Trip Around the World quilt entered in the Ozark Empire Fair this week that I quilted for him. I don't remember the quilt, but he said that I didn't quilt it as a show quilt, but he still wanted to enter it. I hope he earns a ribbon for it anyway. If I had known he wanted to enter it, I would have quilted it as such. Anyway, we had a nice visit and now I have to get back into the swing of things. I spent most of today catching up on laundry and did a few other chores around the house. Tomorrow I need to go grocery shopping and do more house cleaning. My aunt sent me a quilt top to quilt this weekend also. So I have quilting to keep me busy. My landscape quilt is still hanging on the wall waiting for quilting and embellishment. I still can't dec...

Here is a photo of the Droplet dolls I have made for the African Widows and Orphans Project. This project is based out of Spokane, WA, and the dolls will go to the children in an orphanage in Ethiopia. There are 65 dolls in this photo, but I've completed 8 more since the photo was taken, so we have 73 to send :D The pattern for the dolls was designed by my friend Tracy Arnold-Chapman. She is a talented artist who has designed many "Softies". Check out her blog at http://www.cremebrulefox.blogspot.com/ In addition to the Droplet dolls, Tracy and her friends at her church are making 200 larger dolls for the children in the same orphanage. On the quilting side of life, I'm working on binding Joe's 12 quilts. I finished one yesterday and have another one started today. My goal is to finish binding at least one per day until they are all done. Susan

I've spent the past 2 days working on the landscape quilt challenge. Once I chose the fabrics for the quilt, the assembly went together very smoothly. Glue basting the seams helps tremendously in holding the pieces together so I can hand applique them without using pins. Those pins always catch the thread and tangle it up making me want to give up on hand applique. I spent several hours yesterday doing thread-play on the top, adding small Aspen and pine trees to the hill on the right with variegated thread. I also added the dimension to the mountains with a silver rayon thread. I started out using colored pencil for the mountains, but didn't like the affect. So I used the pencil to mark the areas I wanted to fill in with thread. It worked great! Today I've spent time adding an inner border of black solid fabric and an outer border of a green batik. Then I drafted an Aspen tree on tracing paper and transferred that pattern to light weight fusible web. I chose a white-on-whit...

I have one last quilt of Joe's to quilt. It's ready to be pinned on to the machine and quilted. I'll get to it tomorrow if my day goes as planned. Then I have to bind all 12 quilts! That will take some time. My deadline is before September 1st so I should be able to make that. Then it's on to my landscape quilt challenge. I have until September 1st to complete that, too. I have the pattern drawn on the freezer paper and have started selecting the fabrics. This challenge is through Valerie Hearder's yahoo groups e-list. My biggest challenge will be to embellish the quilt. In between quilting projects, I'm working on some dolls to send to an orphanage in Ethiopia. My friend Tracy has designed 2 sizes of dolls and I'm helping her make them. Her "Cuddle Dolls" are adorable and I'll start working on them in the next week or 2. She's sending me the parts :) The other is a smaller size called "Droplets". I've made 24 of the so far an...

We're waiting for the sun to go down so we can start our fireworks. Paul BBQ'd pork steaks and we bought potato salad, baked beans, macaroni salad and a green salad to go with the steaks - YUM! I spent the day painting my kitchen. Here is the before picture. The walls are a chocolate milk color. With the brown cabinets and hardwood floor, the kitchen was pretty depressing even though it gets a ton of natural light. Here is the after picture. I used Pale Marigold paint by Color Place. It's a nice cheery yellow, but not so bright that it screams at you - like my master bathroom did. That room is a nice pale green now. I decided to paint today because it was relatively cool out - especially for July. It only got up to 75 degrees! We're usually dealing with high 80's and 90's in July. So I opened all the windows and doors and got busy painting. Tomorrow it's back to quilting :) Susan