A Quilt for my Brother and his Wife

Since I posted quilts I have gifted to my sister, I decided I must post something about my brother so you don't think I'm playing favorites! Here is a reprint of a post I published on 9/3/2020. I made this quilt for my brother and for his lovely wife.  They were not expecting a quilt, and loved it. I'm not certain I would care to do this quilt again, but I did love the birds!  - Dreaming, 2/28/2026

My obsession was started by my BFF. She attended a workshop by Lynne Tyler, and raved about Lynne's "Liberated Birds".  I checked out Lynne's "Patchwork Menagerie" and I was hooked! I adored her simple bird design. I decided that I wanted to make a quilt with her birds.

This was just the beginning...

---of my flock!

I made a bird here... and there. I discovered that each bird had his/her own personality. They became good friends. They "talked" to me!

I positioned my birds on my flannel wall. I tried them this way... and that! I rearranged one side, and changed birds top and bottom. I swapped this guy for that guy. I worked at varying colors and patterns. I stared at my wall, and swapped one bird for another for days! I tried to balance so many variables: color, direction bird is facing, fabric patterns, size, leg color... it just about drove me crazy!

Then came the challenge of putting it all together. Measure twice, cut once... oops! Try again! It was tedious at best, and involved a lot of muttering to myself!

My quilt began with a "charm pack". A charm pack is an assortment of 42 fabrics from a designer's collection. I purchased the pack years ago, and when I saw the birds, decided it met my needs. However, needs were greater than I anticipated. First I had to order more white, Then I needed more dark blue prints. Then I needed more, more, more. As I neared the completion of my birdies I worked on a pieced backing for my quilt with the leftover fabrics. 

Finally the piecing was finished; top and bottom! Hooray - celebration #1!

Next, I very carefully loaded the backing (I needed to keep it straight) and the top on my long arm quilting machine. I quilted some of the birdie wings with swirls or feathers, or added details to their chests. The white fabric was quilted with a meandering leaf design. 

I pulled my quilt off of the long arm machine. Celebration #2: not only was it finished but the backing was perfectly square! Woohoo! The quilt was bound, and sent off to my brother and his wife. He previously shared pictures of their new "cabin" in Idaho. They had tiles with birds on their backsplash. I think this quilt belongs to them! But, to be honest... I am going to miss my little birdies!

Quilts for my Sis

I am the baby of the family. My brother and sister are only 18 months apart. I came along a little later. Judging from the looks on my siblings' faces, I'm not sure I was welcome!

In my previous post I mentioned that my sister suffered a brain injury and must live in an assisted living facility. We are about as far apart in the US as one can be, living in Florida and Seattle. I do get out to see her on occasion. My brother lives a bit closer to her, so he gets to visit a bit more often.

I have made her two quilts. The first was very early on in my quilting 'career' - being made in 2016. Someone hung the quilt up in her tiny apartment. 

For a while my sister lived near Santa Fe, NM. She loves the southwest, and when I saw the fabric, and when I happened upon the embroidery patterns, I was inspired to make this quilt. 

I used 'stack and whack' to create the colorful blocks. I didn't have enough fabric to do more than 4 pieces for each block, but it worked out. 

I used an appliqué machine embroidery pattern for four of the blocks. 

I fell in love with the mottled red fabric. It reminded me of some of the pottery I've seen on our travels. 

I designed some SW Indian-looking motifs and embroidered them using my domestic machine.

Even now I look at this and I'm in awe of what I managed to do.

In 2021 I completed this bright quilt and sent it to her. 

She keeps it on the back of her couch.

She has always loved bright colors!

The last time I visited she was wearing a jacket that my mother quilted. 

Just by chance, I was wearing one I had made....

the first quilted object that I ever made!

(It was made using a quilt-as-you-go technique on a deconstructed sweatshirt.)

A Wondrous Wake-up Call

I had a wonderful surprise this morning. I received a FaceTime call from my sister. She lives in Seattle, in an assisted living facility. Tragically, she experienced a brain injury and because of that she can not live independently. She has no short term memory. Seriously. When we do visit our conversations are riddled with requests to tell her things again.  But, her intellect is intact and she recalls most everything from 15 - 20 years ago, and back. She can even converse in German, or French and if you asked her, she could translate Sanskrit! 

The amazing thing about this morning's call is that she was able to make it. She used her iPad and somehow figured out how to connect with me on FaceTime. My brother and I chatted, and neither of knows how she managed. (It was 5:30 AM in Seattle, and no one was with her) When she used to have a phone she would always ask for my phone number. She purportedly wrote it down, but she could never remember where to find the phone number, or perhaps how to use the phone, to give me a call.

Her land line telephone had to be removed. She responded to sales requests without realizing what she was doing, or remembering. When she was given a cell phone, she wouldn't remember to charge it, or even where she put it down. With new technology it may be that she can have a phone again, but one that will only accept incoming calls from specified phone numbers. My bother is looking into it. 

It was a nice way to begin the day!

My sister and my brother

But, Do We Really Need It?

I find it amazing what one can order through Amazon. I guess folks living on the frontier back in the ages felt the same way about the Sears Roebuck Catalog. 

I found an interesting site on the Internet that describes a few odd items that were listed in the catalog, many from the turn of the century...the last one!

Here are some examples from the site:

Leghorn chickens for $ .12, in 1947

A newfangled auto-mobile for $395 in 1909

A cure for consumption in 1898

As a kid I used to love going through Sears, Roebuck catalogs, especially the Christmas toy edition! And, in the early 70's I remember ordering clothing, and going into the order pickup desk at the store to get my order when it arrived. It was magical! 

Some time in the late '80's the Mister wanted a modem and Telenet. This would allow him to see a print version of the Sears catalog on our Commodore 64, among other things! (This was before Al Gore claimed he invented the Internet! LOL) Imagine that magic! (And, if Sears had continued to embrace access through technology, just think where they might be today!)

So, now we have Amazon....and all of the other tempting sites out there that sell and deliver, just about everything.

 

Some time last week the Mister ordered a drag harrow from Amazon. It had free, two-day delivery with Prime. 

• He got a message that the package had been delivered to a processing center in a nearby town and would be delivered the next day. 

• Then he got a message that the delivery would be delayed

• After that he received a message that they didn't have the package.

So, do we really need it?

He called Amazon and described the situation. They reissued the order.

Surprise! The package from the processing center arrived. The packaging had been cobbled together and taped, and taped and taped.

So, do we really need two?

The next day, we arrived home, and there was a heavy package at our gate. This shipment was appropriately packaged: 

Oops...it's another drag harrow. The result of the 2nd order that apparently wasn't canceled by the processing center once they figured out how to fulfill  the first order! 

The Mister called Amazon, and after going through lots of AI robots was able to talk to a real, live person from the other side of the world. The problem? Amazon wants him to take it to a UPS store to be returned. He explained that the package requires at least two men (better, a fork lift) to pick up.  (He may have pulled the 'age' card to explain why he was unable to take it to the UPS store) The gal finally understood the situation and explained that a truck would pick it up within an hour.

That didn't happen.

The Mister called Amazon, again. This time after all of the AI voices he was connected to someone in the US - amazing! He read through the case, and explained that a truck would be by to pick up the package.

That hasn't happened, yet!

I Have No Right

.... to complain!

I don't have snow on the ground.

I have only seen 3 flakes of snow this year.

It was in the 80's and sunny on Saturday. 

The sun is out, again.

But we are expecting another winter dip in temperatures. 

I brought in some new plants I had purchased, but not planted. Later today I'll cover some plants, hoping they are going to spring back from our 2 weeks of evenings below freezing. Our stag horn ferns are terribly sad. They are large and have been around for a while. but now they are mostly brown. Maybe they will come back once we have more typical Florida weather. 

But I really can't complain.

I could be living in the northeast where the winter storm, Hernando,

is dumping loads of snow and bringing strong winds. 

I have no right to complain!

Oh, Wow!

 In September I bought the quilt pattern for "Tulip Farm", and then bought the kit that used many pieces of  Moda's "Desert Oasis" fabric collection. I had seen the fabric at a local shop and was enchanted by it. I began the job of cutting out template pieces, and then some of the fabric pieces. All of this was put aside for some reason...Christmas? A new garage building? Travel? I'm not sure. Maybe even due to intimidation. I have never completed such a complex foundation paper piecing project before. 

I pulled it out yesterday and became very excited to proceed. I reviewed a few how-to videos and began, in earnest. 

The pattern, by Judy Niemeyer, and produced by QuiltWorx comes with a comprehensive booklet of instructions that are presented step-by-step. Judy has fine tuned the process by carefully numbering each step, and suggesting that sewists label everything, put pieces in labeled baggies. I pulled out my rotary cutter and the 'add-a-quarter-ruler and went to town.

I put together the pieces that will be the center of the quilt. I have to admit, that when I placed the eight pieces together on my cutting board I was "gob smacked!" Wow....just wow! I can't wait to move on to the next steps!

Malfunction Junction

I like to listen to the news on TV in the morning and in the evening. I'm usually doing something else, but this is an ingrained habit acquired over decades of life. I enjoy the Today Show in the morning, at least for the first hour. I also enjoy the local news. So, I listen to a Tampa station,  that's as local as we can get! Tampa is 80 +/- miles away. I guess one should call in local-ish!

This morning, as often happens, a cute young gal was describing traffic situations, pointing out delays and areas to avoid. 

She cautioned drivers to avoid "malfunction junction". I almost choked on my coffee! What a fabulous name for 'those' types of highways. In our RV travels back and forth across the country, we have seen more than our share! 

For haha's I typed "malfunction junction" into Google search and was surprised at the results. Mr. A-I-nstein reported that "malfunction junction is a common nickname for severely congested, poorly designed, or accident-prone highway interchanges in the United States. The most infamous, current example is the I-4 and I-275 interchange in Tampa, Florida. Wow! My "local area" is famous for something!!!

Here's a Google map image of malfunction junction

So, lesson for you...when you come to visit me, avoid this intersection! Message me and I will suggest alternate routes of travel!