Winter in July with broken dishes swap blocks

We've had such a heat wave, followed by some gorgeous weather, and then thunderstorms.  And July is all but over - how can that be??

Through it all I've had winter on my mind - finally finishing up this project.

The broken dishes border is pieced from Fun with Barb swap blocks (2016 I think?).  Thanks ladies for all the red and white!

The appliqué blocks are from Jan Patek's The Winter Quilt pattern.  It is a very loosy goosy pattern, really a series of sketches, from the late 90's.  For months this was my portable appliqué project.  I adore this primitive style, but decided to call good enough, good enough, after six blocks. I still wanted a large quilt, so I went a little nutso with the borders.

A pleasure to use my Grandma's 830 Record to sew the string borders while my main machine was in the shop getting maintenance.

A scrappy primitive puzzle...

I marked it with my current absolute favorite for overall quilting, a large baptist fan stencil also from Fun with Barb.  It took 1 hour to mark the whole quilt.  I use washable Crayola markers.  Mmmmmm... could have done a better job pressing the top!  I pin basted it to death so I think we are OK.

In other news we had our house painted blue and we are in love with the color, Ben Moore Newburyport:

And I'm emergency painting the kitchen cabinets (again) -

I had painted the dark brown 1982 specials last summer when we first moved in.  I used Ben Moore Stonington Gray, but it looks strangely icy against the Dove White walls, and has bugged me all this time.  David has single handedly painted all the brown trim in the kitchen white... and he's encouraging us to just go ahead and repaint the cabinets a richer color - and with Tommy home to help as well, the time is NOW -

Narrowed it down to these three....

Are we having fun yet?  ;)

Winter Quilt applique

A little bit of applique happening here and there.  I'm working on the Winter Quilt - another Jan Patek pattern (although I would really say it is only very loosely a pattern - more a series of sketches, and one is missing, etc. etc.) from 1998.  I'm changing it here and there to make it more personal to our family.

I adore this folk arty style.  This is Kaela's block - with all the pink - and Shadow and Yumi (long gone) which she - we - adopted as kittens - that was so long ago.



 I made the alternate blocks before anything else, and now I don't like them - too strong.  Shouldn't they be "softer"?



My applique skills aren't advanced, but I sure love the process.



December rolls along... I hope you are all having a good month - we are almost giddy anticipating all our young adult kids being here for Christmas!

x
Cynthia

Little house in the (not so big) woods

The past month has been a total blur.... moving into our new house (built in 1982 making it the newest house I've ever lived in),  just over the border in New Hampshire.   It's about 40 minutes from where we lived before, not bad.

Seventeen years in Massachusetts, and now New Hampshire for the next (simpler?) chapter of our lives!

Here's David in his happy place with plans for restoring the beauty of the little brook that runs through the property:

Nestled in the woods, but still light and bright - just a dreamy setting -

I did immediately want to lighten up the kitchen.  The walls were red when we moved in and we immediately had them painted white.  And then I set out to "emergency paint" the cabinets.

However... in the end.... I just know I picked the wrong color!  I was going for a subtle gray, but this is icy cold and just wrong.  I know I need to change it again but I can't face it!  I may not bother, but.... I don't know.

On the positive side, I'm experimenting with some open cabinets and so far, I LOVE it.  Everything within reach and I do love my Japanese dishes.

Window trim will be professionally painted in another couple months...

Finally I turned my attention to the sewing room:

Turning THIS:

Into THIS (the walls are white - don't know what happened in this photo):

It was an exercise in priorities.  I really wanted to have that brown wicker chair in the room - it's been with us since 1990 and I still love it -

Another priority - guest bed space.  I taped off the space for a future daybed/trundle, and for now, air mattress.  The cutting table is two Ikea rolling carts - and can be rolled away to make way for a trundle or air mattress.  

And.... then finally got to sewing!  I will write more about this next time.  It feels so good to be back in the swing of quilting.   Hoping now to get back into the swing of blogging as well. 

Hope those of you who are in "back to school" mode are loving it, one way or another!  

xo

Cynthia