weird quilts, etc ...

I really should put some more photos of my quilts and crochet and other stuff up here some day ...
I keep saying that, but I never seem to get around to it
(actually I have a "round to it" somewhere ... it is a leather key tag with the word "tuit" embossed on it ... I have also seen a paper version with a circle with the word "tuit" in it, and a caption saying something about how this is to help with all those things you want to do and have not done yet, because you have not got around to it - now you can do them all because you have one ... lol ... trouble is ... i lost mine! ... it is somewhere around the house, last seen attached to a pile of spare/not currently in use keys ... I think I know what pile of mess it might be hiding at the bottom of ... one of the piles I was going to sort out "when I get around to it" LOL (catch 22 could be a good excuse to keep putting it off - "I will sort it out, when I get a round tuit ... but until I find my round tuit, I can't sort it out yet, so I may as well go and do some quilting/crocheting/whatever instead ... " ;-)

Anyway ... what I came in here to do was to copy and paste some more stuff that I have been saying on one of the yahoogroups I am on ...
In the Scquilters group, someone was talking about satin binding, they found out that you could buy it as strips of binding AFTER they bought some satin fabric, and were asking if they needed to stabilize it with anything before they cut it and sewed it on ... and this was my reply ...

er ... why not add the satin yardage to your stash ... maybe it could become a satin backing for a future quilt/etc? lol ... or a satin lining for a bag (a lot of quilters seem to end up making quilted/etc bags ) ... then you can buy the satin binding and use that....
but I know - probably because if it was me I would be thinking/doing the same (LOL) - you want to use what you have because you don't want to have togo and BUY something else ... and you want to get it done NOW and "surely itcan't really be that hard to make it work" ... if it were stubborn cheapskate me, I would probably use some second hand (i collect stuff like that from op shops etc ) satin fabric that I have on hand, and cut it with a rotary cutter, and my "short thumbs" - and make sure I have just the right look on my face and growl at it at the right moments and jolly well make the stuff do what it was told ... and when I sewed the stuff I would probably get a bit of "frogging" practice (rippit rippit) while I was at it... LOL
Andrea,
disorganised in Dunlop
... who really should go out and do some of that sewing I was going to spend the evening doing ... lol

then someone else was asking about freezer paper (some quilters use it for applique etc ) and someone else replied to tell them about using the wrappers from reams of photocopy/printer paper (the stuff that has a waxy coating on the inside does the same thing as freezer paper does) so I had to add my 2c worth ...

Hi All,
Just one thing to watch out for though - don't use the bit where the wrapper
was glued together because the glue is sticky and doesn't come off your
fabric ... one guess how I found out that little bit of handy information -
LOL

Also - not all photocopy paper wrappers have a "shiny side" - I have a
plentiful supply of photocopy paper wrappers at the school I work at
(schools do a LOT of photocopying!) ... but the brand they have been getting
lately just has plain paper wrapping - so it has no "shiny side" to stick to
the fabric! ... luckily I don't use it much and I still have a few sheets
of the stuff that does have a shiny side stashed away here at home in case I
do want to use some ;-)

I used photocopy paper wrappers for some angel swap blocks I made - but not
for appliqué - I used it for tracing a design on and sewing on the wrong
side of the block with fancy thread in the bobbin (so the bobbin thread
formed the decorative design on the right side of the block) it was handy
having something that would stick to the fabric and stay in place while I
sewed and it also helped stabilise it ... but, like when using any tear away
paper/etc foundation, it was a pain having to rip it all out from between
the stitching (next time I will probably just trace a design onto the fabric
and unless it another swap block I will add the batting and backing and draw
the design on the back ... or I will do what I have been doing with a
few things I have made recently and quilt from the back with fancy threads
in the bobbin (crochet cotton and stuff like that) and just make up the
"design" as I go ... lol) ... but I will eventually get around to having a
go at "freezer paper" appliqué ... one year? ... one millennium? ...
whatever ...

Andrea,
who was going to spend this evening working on my challenge quilt for the
Canberra Quilters exhibition ... but tea kind of took a while to cook and
eat, then the dog got a bath and then a walk (brrrr) ... and I got lost in
here for a bit longer than I intended (gee what's new? lol) and I seem to
have run out of "evening" ... sigh ... if I go out there now, I might get a
bit of something done before I either fall asleep or freeze ...

I think I did get a little bit of sewing done ... the next day!

anyway ...
among the replies was one saying that it is a bit difficult to trace on it ... so I just had to reply to that ...

I guess it could be - but I used a plain white photocopy paper wrapper,
without any printing on it, and traced it using my light box
(no - I didn't spend lots of money and buy a light box - I "made" one -
found an old wooden box, found a light globe with a fitting and cord and
laid it inside and put a sheet of perspex over the top ... works fine for me )

hmmm ... I think the only traditional thing about my quilting is that
quilting traditionally used to be about using up what you had on hand, or
could easily/cheaply find ... and most of my quilts are made using fabric I
have collected from op shops and garage sales or been given, or if I have
bought it new it has mostly been when it is on sale/at a cheap price ... and
I don't have a lot of the latest fancy gadgets like a walking foot etc, just
an ordinary sewing machine and the cutting mat, cutter and ruler I got as
birthday and Christmas presents from Mum one year, and another ruler that I
never realised how useful it would be until I won it in a raffle!
I have done a few "normal" quilts with traditional blocks/methods/etc but
most of my quilts/etc (especially the ones I have actually finished!) are
probably not at all traditional - they are too weird ... lol

Andrea,
disorganised in Dunlop

Yes - if anyone is still reading this (that is if anyone ever was reading any of this mess) ... you will notice that this all DOES relate to the title of this post ... because I told scquilters that I make weird quilts ... so of course somebody had to have their say and tell me that I shoud go and "google" (search for) something called "Gees Bend Quilts" and I "might find that mine are not so weird after all" ... so, like the good little girl I am (ha ha ha - not! ... is not hard to get me to go get lost with google!) I went and "googled" ... and sent this reply to scquilters ...

Ok ... of course I went straight to Google and did a search ... after a few "page not found" and other pages mentioning the quilts but not showing pictures ... I found a website with all sorts of info about the exhibition ( http://www.auburn.edu/academic/other/geesbend/home.html ) and there is a page with pictures of all the quilts in the exhibition ( http://www.auburn.edu/academic/other/geesbend/explore/catalog/slideshow/index.htm ) ... wow! - I am glad u told me to go look for these Lorraine!
... these are REAL quilts! ... these are what patchwork quilting is meant to be ... not that it isn't meant to be all the other things it is either ... but I like the idea of quilts made out of whatever one has handy, and without worrying if they follow the "rules" (some rules are meant to be bent ... if I vanish in the next few days, I have probably been taken away and locked up by the "quilt police" ).

warning: read (the rest of this post) at own risk
(I kind of ramble on a bit when I get going ... and this lot is sure to confuse you all because I think even I am confused - and I wrote it!)

I have just been getting lost in cyberspace for an hour or 2! ... I got a bit lost on that website, and then followed a link to http://www.alabamaarts.org/index.html ... interesting site for those after some arty inspiration ... then I decided that maybe I should post to my blog (because most of what I post to my blog is the same weird stuff I have just said in my latest post(s) to whatever yahoogroup I have just posted stuff to ... and I am just about to add this weird post to the pile of junk I have been posting to this list over the last day or 3 ... LOL) ... so I went to the blogger page ( www.blogger.com ) to log in, and did my usual thing - got side-tracked looking at the "blogs of note" they have listed there ... some of them are boring, but some are quite interesting ... anyway ... I am now up to the bit where I need to come back here and finish typing this post, and then copy most of it into my blog, then send this post, then finish writing my blog post and publish it ... talk about round and round in circles! LOL (hmmm - there could be a quilt idea in that? lol)

anyway ... what I really should be putting on my blog is some more pictures of my quilts - so that anyone who wants to can look at them and decide for themselves how weird they really are ... but in the meantime, there are some photos of some of my quilts (and other stuff) in my yahoo photos at http://au.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/aykayem/my_photos ... that URL gets longer every time I go there! ( that is the one that comes up in the top of the browser once the page loads ... but I actually got there by typing http://photos.yahoo.com/aykayem into the browswer ... yahoo works in strange ways ... ) unfortunatley I have been slack and lazy lately and there are no recent photos in there ... but there is a whole album called "quilts" that has a lot of stuff in it, and there are other albums with photos of mystery quilts being made, and crochet stuff, and a couple of scquilters gatherings, and one called "other peoples quilts" that has a quilt mum made in it, and a quilt (made by Evelyn) with blocks from a scquilters swap ... (hmm - I probably should just put photos of all my quilts and stuff in yahoophotos and then mention that on my blog ... but if I talk about any of my quilts etc in my blog I will probably still stick a photo in there too) and, for those mad enough to look at all my photo albums - no - my "family" does not consist of a bunch of stick insects! ... that just happens to be the only photo I got around to putting in that album - I didn't know what other album to put them in - that one seemed the most logical because they do live in the house with us ...

hmmm ... I don't know if my quilts are weird or not, but I am sure you are now all totally convinced that I am definitely weird!

oh ... yeah - if you want to check out what actually ends up on the blog today ... and/or look at what other strange stuff is on there ... and/or look at the few quilt/etc pictures that are on there ... my blog is at www.aykayem.blogspot.com (well, the one I am posting to is ... there are links on there to 2 more, also on blogspot but even weirder than the main one ... and I have one or 2 others but I have not actually posted anything much on them - I just created blogs on a couple of other free blog places to test out how well they worked/etc ... but the blogspot one usually works fine so I have kept using that one ... )

Andrea,
disorganised in Dunlop
... getting lost in here and talking about quilts instead of actually being out in my sewing room and making them ... which I should be doing ... after I have gone and got milk/etc from the shop, cooked tea, hung out the last load of washing I did, etc ... sigh ...

he he he ... I just sent that message ... and had a good laugh at the spell checker ... wants to call my blog a "bog" and blogspot "bloodspot" (but it does find most of my zillions of typos ;-)
And now, like I just said in that post ... I have other things to do ...
but first ... I have to reply to another scquilters message and say "Goodonya" to the person who decided that her daggy old "sampler quilt" that has been lying unfinished in the cupboard can be put to good use and is making it into 2 quilts for her 2 dogs ...

... I said this there, too ... was going to say it here, then decided it went there, then decided that it probably goes in both places ... and ... why type it twice when I can copy it? lol ...

We have a dog and 2 cats ... and I have made them each a quilt ... the cats each have a small one (about 18" square) that I had fun making out of leftover bits from a mystery quilt I made (the one that I then added to so it became my 2m square monster ... lol) not that they sleep on their own quilts - they seem to think that whatever half made/new/clean quilt/fabric/etc I have out on my sewing desk is far better ... so is the basket of clean washing, or any article of clothing that DH or I leave lying on the bed ... The dog has a quilt I made out of old cotton shirts and some bits of an old sheet ... I held it up for "show and tell" somewhere and got told it was too good for the dog ... LOL (gee - it was only some old shirts, even had a stain on one bit ... threw it together in a day and made it for the dog ... so it is HIS quilt ... and he sometimes uses it ... lol ... it lives inside, gets put on the lounge when he wants to lie on there beside us and is wet or dirty or has a "pigs ear" he is chewing ... spoilt brat ... lol)

and now ... I really do need to go buy some milk and come back and cook some tea (we need the milk for the pancakes DD wants and probably for what I might end up cooking for DS and I ... and for a hot chocky later this evening, and breaky in the morning ... the milk always seems to run out in this house - someone must be drinking the stuff or something ... lol)