Batik in Autumn Colours

This is Phyl's Batik Quilt and I used the panto Tickle to quilt it.  Green Lava thread and Dream Blend batting.

 Love the definition of the quilting in this shot!

 Don't know how much longer I will be able to use the ice as my back drop as it will be above zero all week so it is going to get wet out there as the snow melts.

Oh and guess what?  I won Jenny's Ruler and Pattern giveaway yesterday!!!!   :)

So I see an Urban Pods quilt in my future now.

Over the River and Through the Woods...

...to Tamarack Shack we go :)

This is Marlene's Over the River and Though the Woods quilt, a pattern from Crabapple Hill.

Marlene did a beautiful job embroidering this quilt top and I was very flattered she ask me to quilt it for her.  Marlene has sent a few quilt tops to Judi at Green Fairy so I was a bit nervous at first but once we started talking about how she wanted it quilted those nerves just disappeared.  

Marlene asked for stippling in the background and to leave the geese and star points unquilted. I just love how they pop off the quilt as I just did SID around them. I suggested cross hatching the center rectangle and then decided to also cross hatch the centers of the blocks.  Added some free hand quilting in the embroidered scene to highlight the landscape images.

The temperatures have finally warmed up here and the snow is starting to melt!  Let's hope spring has arrived early.

Just Takes Two -Part 5

I'm still keeping up with the Just Takes Two project and have just completed part 5.  The next set of instructions come out on Thursday and my goal is to be done each set of instructions before the next set come out.  This months as a bit trickier as the feather star block was template piecing not paper pieced. I have always wanted to make a feathers star and if it wasn't for that this block might have ended up in the garbage!  The instructions were good but the cutting instructions for one of the triangle pieces was too large and there were no trimming instructions. I had to wait until I was in the right frame of mind to figure it all out and once I was there it actually went together quite well once I figured out what to trim down.

Giveaway at Sew Kind of Wonderful!!

Jenny is giving away one of her Quick Curved Rulers and her Urban Pods pattern over at Sew Kind of Wonderful.  She will be making the draw on Monday so head on over there now and enter! :)

I don't usually do posts about giveaways but I truly believe this is one of those 'must have' quilting notions that every quilter should have as it takes the fear out of cutting and sewing curves. I just love mine!

Cutting into the Stash!

I have been busy quilting but unfortunately can't share any photos right now as the quilts are gifts and we don't want to ruin anyone surprise :)  But I can share what I have been getting ready for a retreat I am going to in May.  I have two quilts all cut out and ready to go so all I have to do is sit and sew!! I'm having fun with Jenny's ruler and finally cutting into my bright batik stash.

Last night we had more Northern Lights but with the full Moon they were very hard to see.  Tim took some shots of my Shack while I was working in there last night.  You can see how bright the moon was by the light on the snow on the roof. We had all the lights off in the house and the light in the shack is just from my machine.

Looking south.

Now if you have a bizarre sense of humor like I do then you might find this cartoon funny. It made me laugh especially after looking at this photo showing the constellation of Orion in the sky. Made me wonder if Tim purposely aligned the trees this way in the shot :)

Black and White

This is Lynn's Black and White quilt that is going to be a gift for her daughter.  I have quilted two of these quilts with straight lines and thought this time large swirls would be nice to try. The panto is called Fascination.

I love the backing fabric she chose for this quilt!

Bali Love Song Quilt

This is Lynn's Bali Love Song Quilt and the pattern can be found free at Hoffman Fabrics here.   She asked for it to be custom quilted and wanted my Teardrop quilting in the heart blocks.

This is a very pretty pattern and a great one for using your bali pops or jelly rolls.  

I had fun feathering in the setting triangles and outer border.

Back Online!

Well after 7 days of being offline I am happy to report I have my internet service back and the upgrade is definitely faster!!  I was finally able to watch a YouTube video without it stopping every few seconds to load, that was a joy! And just loading this first picture went much faster than usual so I can see a huge difference with the upgrade.

Now back to quilting!  This is Yvonne's quilt and she used the X-Block ruler to make this quilt at our last guild retreat.  The great thing about the X-Block ruler and patterns is that they show you how to use the pieces you cut off to make borders so no waste.

 I used the Feather Curls panto and pink Lava thread.

Now I can go catch up on all the blogs I like to read, I really missed not being able to check in with my online friends!

We are Experiencing Some Technical Difficulties...BLAH!

It has been 5 days since we have had internet service at home and so I have been pouting all week. I'm not sure who has been pouting more me or my teenage son!  On Sunday we were suppose to get an upgrade on our service and ended up with no internet at all!  It was a total failure so we are now in a waiting game with the company to get it fixed.  I am at my friend's house right now using her internet as we still do not have service!
So that being said I have had a lot of time to quilt....so here are a few pictures of what I have been working on since I have all this new found 'free-time'

I made three fleece throws to sell at our quilt show. Two are feathered and one has a music panto... just to be different.

The music panto is called Musica.

I also finished Am's quilt, this is one of her first quilts and was done beautifully.

The panto I used is called Floral Chain.

Hope to be back online soon.

Just Takes Two - Part 4

Here is my next set of Just Takes Two blocks. I have been really good at keeping up with the instructions so far.  The next set come out on Thursday.  So Lori is the kitchen reno keeping you from your blocks or have you found some time to work on them?  I'll do my best to motivate you so you don't get too far behind!  The paper pieced blocks would not take you long to do but you might not like the applique one ;)

Dreaming of Spring

This is Val's Tulip quilt and it has a wonderful spring feel.  I used a pink Lava thread and Belladonna for the panto as it has a tulip style flower.

 This next picture was taken today....I am definitely dreaming of spring!

Town Square

Here is Robin's Town Square quilt that she was working on at the last guild retreat.  I was over at her place a few weeks ago and she showed me all her quilts top that are ready to be quilted....all 17!!!  So she said I could pick which one I wanted to quilt for her next as she had her name on my February list.  Yet another example of how I have the 'bestest' clients in the world!  Yes I know 'bestest' is not a word but I'm using it anyway because they are better than best  ;P

  So I picked this one...I love brown and blue.

The blue outer border and the lighter print square have a print that reminds me of ripples from raindrops on water.  So I chose the "Curlz" panto as it has a swirly water feel.

I think picking out the fabric for your backings is just as important as the fabrics you chose for the tops. Here is a perfect example of a well chosen backing that just flows with the quilt top. When this quilt is on a bed and turned down when about to be used it will look so nice. I have made a few bad backing choices in the past that have really taken away from the quilt top so now I try my best to not buy the 'cheapest that will do' but the 'cheapest that looks the best.'  :)

 LOL... I just realized these are the colors of my website, no wonder I picked this quilt.  :)

Northern Lights at their BEST!

Last night we saw the best Northern Lights we have seen since moving up north 16 years ago. It was incredible to watch.  My son even said it was better than watching TV!  :)    So we got out the camera, tripod and ran down to the lake. My husband took these pictures with his camera as he knew how to keep the aperture open longer on his camera.  I just stood back and watched the night sky in awe.

These next 4 picture were all taken in a one minute time period so you get the idea of just how fast they were moving and changing. Note the red edge to some of the lights, I had never seen that before, they are usually just green.  These photos are looking west over our house, you can also see the constellation Cassiopeia in the top right corner.

This one was taken just to the right of our house.

These next two were taken looking straight up!  They pretty much ran right across the sky from east to west.

This one is was taken looking south toward the constellation Orion which we only see in winter.

And this last one towards the east which is a perfect shot of the constellation Leo.