A Birthday and more Tomatoes

We celebrated my Mom's 80th birthday today. Here she is sitting in her new birthday swing, a gift from her husband, Fred. He bought the swing, but made the frame for it himself. Now they can sit in the front yard, in the shade, and watch the neighborhood go by. :D


I'd bought her a bottle of lotion and some perfume, and also gave her a pillow made of this 18 inch kaleidoscope block:


It matches this king size quilt they got for Christmas last year. I put a border around the edges, (some of the same royal blue ferny fabric from the quilt border) then a zipper down the middle of the backing so it could be used for a storage pillow... now it's stuffed with winter knit caps, but in the winter, it could be stuffed with t-shirts or beach towels.

And here's the status of my tomatoes... one of the medium size Goliath tomatoes was red enough to pick, and 14 of the cherry tomatoes. There's one very green cherry tomato that fell off the vine when I tried to pick the red one next to it, I've put it in the same bowl to see if it ripens enough to eat. I'm going to choose the five reddest little ones for supper tonight. :-P

Jewel Box and Tomatoes

Well, I have been quilting, and here's the evidence, one ninth of my jewel box quilt. All the half square triangles are done, all the 4 patch squares are done, all that's left is to combine them together into blocks and put it together. This is my absolute favorite part of quilting, assembling the blocks, then sewing the blocks into a quilt top.


Here's a link to what the whole quilt top will look like, my original EQ design.

And of course, what would a June blog post be without a tomato update? Here's three of my Goliath tomatoes, not near getting red yet, just getting bigger and bigger:


All sizes still popping up and growing on my Cherry tomato bush. The number of growing tomatoes on the bush is holding at about 50, because I keep picking the orangish ones:


And last, the fruits of my labors, the ones that were ripe enough to pick. They're all sizes, and so sweet and juicy. If you break it down, I've picked about ten little cherry tomatoes ... and way back at the end of April, I paid around $30 for the dirt, pots, fertilizer, three plants, and tomato cages. I try not to think about the fact that those tomatoes have cost $3 each so far... :D

Tomatoes, yet Again

Believe it or not, yes I HAVE had a request for a tomato update... :D Here's the Goliath tomatoes, there's 5 big ones growing on this bush. You can see three in this picture (4 if you click on it and look carefully.) They don't appear to be anywhere near ripening yet, maybe they're going to be huge tomatoes:


And here's the cherry tomato bush. Last time I counted there were about 45 tomatoes on here. Easier to count than you'd expect, mostly they're growing in clusters of 5 or 6. I've picked 5 of these so far, and eaten three of them, yum. The only thing I don't like is they all have the thicker skin you find on most home grown tomatoes.


Can you spot the one orange one there? I hope I'm not inundated with tomatoes when these ripen, they all look about the same size to me... lol. Maybe I ought to search for one of those cherry tomato/pasta recipes, you think?

My third tomato plant, the Better Boy, only has two tomatoes on it, but then, it was a couple of weeks younger than the other two when I bought it, and in a smaller pot, too.

First Tomato

*Sings* I've got a tomato! I've got a tomato!

It's actually a little more orange than the picture shows, so I'm going to give it a day to ripen here inside on the counter. I just didn't want the birds to get the first peck at it. Here's the arial shot, next to a nickel for some idea of size:



And the view from the side: :D



And best news of all, I'll bet that tomorrow I'll have another one to pick, it's getting some color too. Think I ought to go get some lettuce now?

Bird Scare CD's

I'm getting so many tomatoes, I decided I'd better put my bird scare program into effect. ;)

From my internet research, there's several things that should work... flaps of fabric to blow in the breeze, glittery things like cd's, noisy things like piepans and windchimes, predator-looking things like fake owls or snakes. But the key, it seems, is to keep rotating the things, so the birds don't get complacent, like the birds you see that sit on the scarecrow's outstretched arms. So here's part one of my bird scare - a length of old peach polyester cloth and some old freebie cd's. Looks like a carnival, doesn't it?


And here's one of the new clusters on my Cherry tomato plant:


And (as if you haven't seen enough) ... ONE more:

Tomatoes part 4, eight days later

Here's the status of my cherry tomatoes - they just need to ripen, I think... :) There's another 8 or so little green-pea to marble size ones on this plant, it's making bunches of tomatoes. There's 5 here, all tight together in this little spot:


I have lots of blooms, two little tomatoes, and this ping pong ball sized tomato on the Goliath tomato plant:



Finally, the one tomato on the Better Boy plant (it was the smallest plant of the three I bought, in a little peat pot, not the ½ gallon container like the other two) but there's lots of blooms here too:

Quick Baby Quilt

Took a break from my jewel box quilt this week to make a baby quilt for one of my mom's friends. They provided most of the fabric, except for a couple of FQ's for the stars. I especially liked the pink with red strawberries I used for the nine patches. :)



Now I'm trying to decide if I want to quilt it with the walking foot in diagonal crosshatched lines down the nine patches or put on the quilting foot and make loops and hearts.

Tomatoes Part 3, Ten Days Later

Here's the progress on my three tomato plants. It's been ten days since I took a picture, and now they're all up over the first ring on the cages. :)



And here's the size of the babies from the Cherry tomato plant. You can't see the biggest one from this angle, but it's not too much bigger than the largest of these four. Blooms everywhere, on both other plants, and the Better Boy has one teeny tomato.

Back to the Jewel Box quilt

In spite of having tomatoes to get excited about, I haven't forgotten to quilt. But what I've been working on isn't really photogenic, nothing but two-patches. I"m making some of them from strips, and some as leader-enders, and it's taking forever! Here's 784 white-to-a-color segments:


And here's 520 blue-to-a color segments:


All these blocks, along with hundreds of half square triangles, are going in my king size jewel box quilt. I've divided my EQ drawing into 9 chunks, counted out what each chunk needs, and now I'm subdividing all these two-patch segments into baggies, putting an equal amount of each color into the 9 baggies. I'm just anal enough to want to make sure to spread out the reds and bright oranges and yellows, I didn't want a clump of any one color in my quilt. Is anyone else this nit-picky or is it just me? :D

Now comes the part I like best, sewing all these segments into blocks, and the blocks into rows. Should go faster!

PS. I have 6 little baby tomatoes on my cherry tomato plant now. :)

Tomatoes part 2

Ok, I know you're getting bored with tomato baby pix, but they're new to me... lol In five days, my two green-pea size tomatoes have become 5, ranging from a marble sized one to the new teeny ones. At this rate, I wonder how long it'll be before it grows cherry size and ripens? Anyone want to place bets on what day I sink my teeth into the first ripe cherry tomato?

Tomato Progress Part One

Here's my tomato plants, ten days later. From the left, Goliath, Cherry Red, and Boy. Sounds like Tarzan's family, doesn't it? :D


I just put the cages on them this morning, and told them they had a lot of growing to do to live up to the tall cages I'd bought.

And (drrrrum roll) here's a picture of the first two teeny tomatoes, about the size of an english pea. They're on my cherry tomato plant, the one in the middle. Blooms on all three plants, but this one will have the first fruit.

More Iris

Well, the yellow iris are still blooming, and now the purple ones are out too.


I have a lot of this variety, big purple petals with a zebra-looking vein pattern on the petals.


This year, the ruffled ones with purple edges are full of blooms too, they're my favorite. :)


And finally, my peony bush is just starting to bloom. For some reason this year, a lot of the buds stayed tiny and turned brown. I guess I need to make sure to divide them this fall, maybe that will help.

How Does my Garden Grow?

I may not be 'Mary, Mary, quite contrary' but it's been a good growing season this Spring, so I'll be 'Jane, Jane, can't complain'... lol

Feel free to click on any of these pictures to see a bigger, better one. :) Here's one of my yellow iris. They have seemed to be blooming out of control this year, and I don't think they bloomed much at all last Spring. Must be all the rain:


And lots of buds yet to bloom, too! Haven't seen much of the purple iris yet, the buds on them aren't even out of the stalk hardly, just little bumps where they will be. :)


I decided to try container gardening on my patio this summer, and went to Wal-mart and splurged on some containers, fertilizer, and potting soil. I did some research on the web (and everyone I talked to at work) on what kind of varieties to grow, and finally picked these three, all indeterminate plants, that will produce a good long time.

This one's the little baby of my tomato plant family right now, but I heard good things about it, it will grow up to be a large bush, and the tomatoes will be nice size for slicing... a Better Boy:


This one is a Goliath Hybrid, supposed to make medium size, early-ish tomatoes:


And finally, a Husky Cherry Red, supposed to be a good variety of cherry tomatoes that will bloom and produce all summer:



Now I can hardly wait until I can pick my first ones! The cherry tomato plant already has blooms. :p

I took an interesting idea I found on the web, and put a raw egg, uncracked, in each pot just before I planted the tomato plants. It's supposed to provide calcium and prevent something called 'blossom end rot' early on, then when the egg breaks down, the yolk provides sulfur and other nutrients. Don't know if it'll work, but at the least, it'll be fertilizer. Anyone out there have any other good advice for a novice tomato grower?

Spinning Pinwheels

Anyone remember this one? I started it way back in November, doing the center tesselated pinwheels at a retreat. Then I added the outer row of pinwheels a few months later, and just a month ago, the border of squares left over when I tesselated the center pinwheels:



Now I'm trying to decide if I want the last border/binding to be purple/blue or blue/purple. The purple and blue fabric is the same pattern, just different colorway. I have enough to do either a binding or a border of each, but I can't do them the same color. Which would YOU do?

New Block of the Month and Jewel Box

Well, my taxes are done, and isn't THAT a relief. I always procrastinate, but always get it done in time or slightly early. It's never as bad as I think it's going to be, so maybe next year, I'll do it sooner. :)

I also got the block of the month page for my guild done, April 2008 , and here's mine, done in fabric:


Does anyone know the name of the block? It's similar to the depression block, but the center's made out of squares, and it's not 'hollow' like the depression block. I've just been calling it 'diamond in diamond' for the way it looks when there's several of the blocks set edge to edge, like I show in the layout on the webpage.

And in other news, I've still been working on my king size jewel box quilt - I chose the center layout from the three designs I was playing with on eq. I've finally finished the almost 400 half square triangles I needed, now I'm making hundreds of 4-patch blocks, some strips are a color sewn to white, and some are a color sewn to blue:


I've got more strip sets to sew, more to cut, there on the top, and baggies full of these two-patch combinations waiting to be sewn into 4 patches. Finally did the math on how many of what I'd need for this quilt:


I haven't even started counting the 4 patches yet, but I'm nowhere near the 360 white ones I need. :) Back to work!

Showagon

I work at a couple of different libraries as part of my job. Wednesday, we were happy to host a visit from Showagon, a group of players from Theatre Memphis. I'm always happy to see them coming, they always put on a top-quality program. This year, they did 4 fables from Aesop. I had slightly younger kids this time, and they adapted it to their level really well.

Here is the lion that got caught in the trap and freed by the little mouse:



This one is from the Boy Who Cried Wolf:



The ants that worked hard all summer and the grasshopper who only wanted to sing and play and dance:



They also do some literacy activities - here they were playing a game, matching the fable to the moral:



And just a very short video clip - I didn't want to make a long one because it takes up so much space on the camera card. The little kids really liked the scary lion that got saved by the little mouse - this is the lion roaring:

QuiltJane RulerPants

My guild decided last year to participate in the AQS Ultimate Guild Challenge. We voted on the theme - My Checkered Past, a self portrait. It had to have a checkerboard motif in it somewhere, and be within a certain size range, etc. For more details and rules, look on our website's challenge page.

Here's my entry - I made my self portrait out of quilting supplies and sewing notions. Her nose is supposed to be a thimble, a men's cotton shirt at the local Goodwill made great 3 inch rulerpants, and the scissors, iron, pressor feet, and cutter blades are made of silvery ironing board cover fabric. I took a hammer and nail to an old bobbin, tore it apart, and put the discs from that for her eyes. Click on the pic for more detail.


I had the hardest time trying to get it to be 36 x 45 finished, and still get the checkerboard 9-patch border to work out light corners to dark corners even/odd all the way around the quilt. I also wanted the top/bottom and side borders to be the same size. If it hadn't been for EQ, I'd have given up!

We had about sixteen quilters in the guild enter the contest, and my entry was one of the eight picked to go on to the show in Nashville. :) Here's one where you can see the entire quilt, next to a couple of the other entries:



I'm not much of a quilter, so that part was the worst for me. I had to force myself to start it, to put the needle to my fabric sandwich, so afraid of ruining it. If I'd been able to send it out, I'd have asked for a nice tiny stipple on the white instead of the big loopy lines I put there.

When it comes back, I'd like to clutter it up a little by sewing on some little orphan blocks over her head (like she is thinking of quilts) and using the quilt as a showcase for some of the pins and buttons I've collected.

Now that this challenge is done, it's back to the jewel box quilt. I've been swimming in hundreds of 3½ half square triangles for it. I've almost got my 200+ bright-to-white ones done, but only 150 or so of the bright-to-blue ones. :)

St. Patrick's Day!

Happy wearing of the green, everyone!





More funny pictures from lolcats

I keep trying to get one picture at least to the voting pages of icanhascheezburger but no success so far. Maybe I need to take more photos? Maybe they have to have a minimum number of votes before they'll even look at them?

Snow in Memphis!

We almost NEVER get snow here, but here's proof that we've got some! 4 to 6 inches predicted between now and midnight. :)


My daffodils had thought it was Spring already.



It's not sticking to the roads yet, but as the temperatures fall tonight, it probably will, to some extent.

My lolcat

I recently dug this picture of Toby out and captioned it, submitted it to LOLCATS. Anyone else seen this site?




more funny pictures of captioned cats

Caps and Block Progress

Hi Everybody! Sorry it's been so long since my last post, but in addition to a booger of a cold, I've been busy! But first, a picture of something my Mom's doing... remember the incubator blankets the quilt guild is making? Mom's a knitter, and she's knitting away every night, making teeny caps for the babies that will receive our blankets. The orange and yellow tennis ball that's tucked in the pink cap is on there for some idea of size, aren't they little? Mom is making two sizes, small and extra small. This is only the first installment, she's still making more. :)



My quilt guild is doing a half square triangle swap for March - where people bring as many hsts as they want to make, swap even, and go home with as many as they came with, but in more variety. Here's our current block of the month page, if you want to see how we're doing it. I don't know if any of the blocks I swap for will end up in the jewel box quilt, or in an incubator blanket, or in a future block of the month project. A 3 inch finished size hst is useful in a lot of things!

Every night when I get home from work, I've been making the pieces that will go into my jewel box king size quilt. Since I haven't decided yet which of those three designs I'll be doing (either #2 or #3 though) there's not an exact count for most of the bits, but the color-to-blue half square triangles are at about 90 right now, and the color-to-white hsts about the same.


I wish I could be the kind of scrappy sewer that doesn't obsess about placement of fabric, but I'm not... lol First I'll divide my fabric squares and hsts up into fourths, by color, to spread them out in the 4 different quadrants of the quilt, then make sure that none of the blocks match each other, THEN make sure that none of the fabrics in the blocks are in adjacent blocks. Do any of you go to these extremes or am I the only one? But I have made a few sample blocks:



This quilt is really helping me clean out my scraps - anything I can get a two inch strip out of gets used in the 4 patch blocks... and I'm sorting thru my 4 inch squares I bought on eBay for a lot of the half square triangles. Black, browns, creams, and beiges are about the only colors I'm not using. And since this one is for MY bed, I'm making a special point to try to use fabrics from previous quilts, like a memory quilt. See the navy 2 inch square with what looks like pick-up sticks in the block above? Those are knitting needles, and I used a FQ of that fabric in the fan blades and depression blocks of the quilt Mom got for Christmas. :)