Tommy has a new girlfriend so he made a valentine pillow for her from the pink postage patchwork. It's filled with catnip to convey his amorous intentions (although he doesn't really know what that means).

 

The MASSIVE cleanup has morphed into an archeological dig. I found bear remnants in a bag from over 20 years ago. I have run across this bag of bear parts on many occasions but finally decided that it would be better to have a bear than bear parts. He's fully jointed and stands about 6 inches. There were many things I had forgotten about making jointed bears, so it was not an easy surgery. And he looks a bit scared because this was his first time outside. But I think he will be ready for full release sometime in the spring.

Meanwhile, Tommy called me to attend quite a few staff award banquets yesterday. But with neither food nor awards, I'm going to continue to call them staff meetings.

  

Piedmont Virginia Community College Art department is releasing this year's t-shirt. A cicada wreath--so festive for the holiday season! Now that it's getting colder, it's hard to remember the cicada invasion and I kind of miss them. I would gladly trade 10 stink bugs for a cicada.

 

And never out of season...here's the presentation case for the Placid Curves QOV. I found this specialty stripe hand-dyed by Vicki W. hiding in my stash.

Okay, count me back into the fractured quilt challenge that Vicki W. is sponsoring. It pushed me into finishing two quilt tops, so let's see if it can help me complete the quilt. So I investigated the stash and found this cat fabric. And heaven help me, because I have no idea why I have enough of this fabric for a backing.

Yesterday's comment suggested a quilt...so here it is...as requested. Well, in process. I pinned the blocks to the design wall without much consideration...just happy to have finished the 16 blocks. And okay, I may have had a quilt in mind before yesterday's post, but that doesn't make as good of a story. Green and yellow are not my go to colors, but I'm quite happy with this little blast of sunshine.

Tommy decided that he should be today's object of design...a modern cat.

Here's a full view of the quilt top I constructed out of the remnants of a failed project. I like that I would never have planned this design and that it came from strangely asymmetric blocks.

Here are the individual blocks. And no, I have no earthly clue what the original pattern was. I just remember laying them out, realizing the quilt wasn't working and packing it up because I still liked the fabric.

I'm back! Except I didn't go anywhere. I've just been plugging away on the Placid Curves quilt top from Amy Ellis' Modern Neutrals book. Having lived through the 80s, I have had enough neutrals to last a lifetime. (Except oddly enough my cat is buff and white.) So instead I thought I'd go with a Quilt of Valor (QOV) interpretation which I think worked out well with the stars and stripes banner effect.

I thought I would show the work in progress. The pattern is Placid Curves from Amy Ellis's book Modern Neutrals. The pattern's fake curves reminded me of old-time blue and white quilts and that made me think of a Quilt of Valor decked out with stars and stripes. This section is only 3X3 blocks, and the curves will become more obvious as it gets bigger.

When I made the first fractured quilt as part of Vicki W.'s quilt-a-long, I may have cut too many blocks. I thought I would make the Red Centre quilt with the remaining pieces but liked this layout better. Plus, when I was putting it together, my brain cells took a nice long nap.

Completed fractured quilt top.

The scrappy trips around the world has now taken the place of honor on the floor. This is the upper left hand corner. The upper right hand corner is mostly pink. The lower half of the quilt devolves to browns and oranges. An unplanned four seasons quilt, I guess. (The fractured quilt is sewn together waiting for a border, and the wedges from yesterday are lined up by the sewing machine.)

Playing with the leftover fractured pieces.

Here are my fractured blocks laid out on the floor. You know your cat is old when you lay out your blocks in the evening and there is only one out of place in the morning.

I finished all the blocks for the scrappy trips around the world and now have to figure out how I will lay them out. Well, first, I really do need to fix the overhead lights. I didn't realize how poorly the square on the bottom left fit in until I saw the photo.

Here's my progress on the fractured quilt-a-long with Vicki W. This pattern demands strong contrast, so I started a "I'll show them, let's try multi-color low contrast." Well, let's not go there... So here is my second attempt. Oh, and when Vicki said her version was king size, I was scared into using a smaller grid, so my block size is 9.5 inches.

This quilt was constructed from the remnants of a failed quilt project. I thought I could get a better photo of it in the morning, but I was wrong. Here in Portland, I mean, Virginia, it rains a lot so my photography options were limited.

cicada t-shirt

Cicada wreath t-shirt reprinted. Screen print, three colors.

Cicada screen print fail

Cicada wreath screen print on a t-shirt. What a mess! Can you find the three problems? Okay, the registration problem for the red ink layer is obvious around the eyes. But taking so long trying to get things aligned, clogged parts of the screen so details on the wings didn't come through. And of course it all started out with the black marks coming through at the edge of the screen. To be revisited...

Zebra screenprint

Zebras. Screenprint on t-shirt. Two colors.