Sewing Inspiration and Symbolism

This week I finally made it to Open Sew at Intrepid Thread in Milpitas. Wow, Julie has outdone herself with the brick and mortar shop. Loved every single bolt in the place and all of those display quilts -let's just say my to do list just quadrupled.

I brought my paper piecing block for F+F2 Bee so that Anne could coach me through it.  Since I had packed fq's rather than my scrap buckets, it didn't really seem practical to make them. 60 different fabric bits - that just screams scrap stash.  I mostly took notes and pieced a few parts to get the idea then went home with my head wrapped around the concept. Several days later and a few lessons learned - here they are:

Pattern designed by Shape Moth

Rather than assigning us color combos we got to choose a month for inspiration.  I chose November and explained on my flickr picture it was to represent the reddish color of the buildings and the gorgeous blue sky at our SBAMQG 1st Annual Fall Retreat.

Although green would've been an obvious choice for the 3rd color to symbolize the redwood trees, I didn't want it to look christmassy so I opted to batik bomb the center with grey for the foggy skies of Capitola left behind that weekend.  We also joked that it could be the grey hairs that I got from learning EPP from a lefty at 2am.  We visiting possible venues for this year, yippy, here we go again!

Can you guess what the three colors in the other block are all about? On flickr Linda commented it might be grapes and bananas and got it half right, sort of.  Think of crushing grapes - like the episode of I Love Lucy.

I'd like to try one without the inside grey - what do you think?

On several occasions, I've used my birthday in November as an excuse to go visit my friend Ann and her family at their winery in El Dorado Hills, Wofford Acres Vineyards.

Not only is the wine award winning, but the view at sunset is spectacular.  I've taken hundreds of photos and played around in photoshop - here are a couple of favorites.

My crystal block is not the first time WAV has been a quilting inspiration. This one is titled "CRUSH" made using Cheryl Malkowski's pattern shown here. It originally transitioned in the center to green blocks but that didn't quite translate as I'd hoped so instead there are little sliver hints instead.  If it looks familiar, it's probably because the design for last years F+F quilt and block tutorial for Tassels was inspired by this quilt. 

my Crush Quilt

The yellow ring represents my birthstone Topaz - stealing the idea from Linda Beth's green block Peridot.  When I was browsing pictures of the winery I stumbled across this lovely shot of the tree I sit under to drink my morning coffee and realized it could have been the source of inspirations as well.

DON'T trim while the strip is folded down - OOPS

I'm including my lesson learned photo - to remind myself not to repeat the mistake.  Picking out 1.6 stitch size is challenging.

Our South Bay Area MQG is having a Negative Space secret swap due in August so I worked on that project at Intrepid Thread, completing the top. Here's a little peek:

Negative Space secret swap

Moby-style Wrap

The baby shower is a couple of weeks away and I finally finished up one of the gifts.  Hopefully I'm not spoiling the surprise by posting a sneak of the Moby-style Wrap. My SIL invited me over to use my niece's serger to finish off the knit.  I have only used one once at Sewing Summit and had forgotten how much fun they are.

Yesterday we had our 30th Anniversary. 

Signing off with these two pictures from when we said "I do" 

Linking up to Finish it Up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts and to Freshly Pieced WIP Wednesday 

Finished:

moby style wrap 

Progress:

2 bee blocks (paper pieced f+f2 July) parts made

SBAMQG Negative Space secret swap -top done

Sparkle Punch - layout sketched 

Fall Quilt Retreat  - visited venues, decisions made!

Still To Do:

Tire Rotation aka: Taffy in Ride (need back, etc..)

Ring Around the Briar Rosies (need to FMQ, etc..)

Two fabric basket covers (change of plans...)

baby shower bunting and runner (change of plans...)

21st Bday Quilts (x3!)
more curtain panels (yawn-should get on this)

Cradle Quilt (back and binding chosen)

Rip Curl Backing

sandwich, quilt and bind Fruit Salad
X-Plus quilt for the SBAMQG show
more Zakka 2.0 Patchwork Please SAL

Sewing Room ReDo -forever in this category