The planning for the suffragettes.....

This was the front of the cover for my old singer and you can see some of the print fabrics that I used along with lots of black fancies. Since I'm on the road a lot between the farm and mom's and the nursing home it's great having this project to tinker with in my brain... I love the planning and gathering for a new project...

Monday (1$ day) my very best friend and I are hitting the thrift stores... She ALWAYS drives and I always buy lunch.. We used to go every Monday but as we've aged and health and family issues have developed we only manage about once a month.. But we've done it so many years we shop "in sync"...even tho we split up while shopping we always manage to arrive at checkout at the same time.. We used to be able to hit about 6 stores but nowadays it is only 3 on a good day.. I'll be scouting out bargains for this new project.

I want to make cameos of some of the suffragettes similar to the cameo I put on the back of my singer cover... I used transparent water-slide decal paper to put an image on a blank plastic cabochon.. Even though the decal paper I had (left from a jewelry project) was for a laser printer, if I put on a couple coats of acrylic spray it works with my inkjet printer.

This has been an entire year of experimenting for me... I did Laurie's "out of your comfort zone" challenge, goldwork techniques on Leslie's block, a whole lot of stumpwork in a stumpwork RR and then the Art Nouveau and Art Deco in another RR plus the landscape block for the challenge...

Now I'm ready to plunge back into my comfort zone of lots and lots of lace and embellishing, embellishing, embellishing... It may be some while before I emerge again...if ever.... I should be finished, or about finished, with the challenge block and the "seams only" RR by the time I get the blocks made for the quilt... I plan on using some of Allie's piecing techniques.. Speaking of Allie she has a book coming out and I've already preordered it on Amazon... "Allie Aller's Crazy Quilting: Modern Piecing and Embellishment Techniques for Joyful Stitching" will be published by C & T Publishing in February 2011! I especially love the words "joyful stitching"

Morris the Mover

Morris spends a good part of his day wandering around the house collecting things he feels are misplaced and moving them to the living room.. He doesn't chew them or hurt them.... he simply piles them and looks for something else. By the end of the day there'll be a big pile that will include several shoes/slippers, a glove or two, toys, things he can snag from the laundry, always the dog bowls, etc. etc. It has to be the herding instinct.


Occasionally he decides to move the kitchen runner.. It is 8 ft long and as heavy as he is.. He tugs and pulls, huffs and puffs and grunts until he has it in the living room and then he collapses.. He not only has to pull it the length of the kitchen, he has to get it around a corner.. No small feat..


But the only problem is our Miss Molly is absolutely terrified of walking on linoleum and that rug is her lifeline to the front door. I know at that moment she's thinking "OMG! That little brat has done it again."

Hideko's Art Deco block finished

I just laid a black matte on it to set the block off. Everyone before me had layered seams, beads, hearts and lots of swirls..so I followed along... There were beads and glitz on every block, especially Leslie's so the large butterfly is embellished with crystals and silver beads although it doesn't show up that well in the photo.. Ritva had some unique fan lace which inspired my fan seam.

But the rose was directly from Hideko's prints she sent. I loved the little red patch and used the rose to bring the red into the block and the little heart "lanterns" brought it even further into the block.. I kept the other colors and all the swirly stitching subdued.

The stem of the rose curves into the butterflies and up around the large butterfly wings into the lanterns to form a frame around the center motif...

Then one last thing that tickled my fancy and proves that I really need to get a life... I was able to echo the pinstripes in the dark material with the chains on on the heart lanterns.. It's those kind of details that make my day..


Well I started out to make a CQ block for Hideko that was as simple and elegant as her lovely block......did I do it???

Finally......Courage in Corsets

A project that has long been on my list of things to do is a suffragette quilt but it never seemed to firm up in my mind... But recently I received this flyer announcing the opening of a 6-month exhibit at Spokane's museum celebrating the centennial of women's right to vote in Washington State..

What a stimulus it was... What I had always been leaning toward is a quilt showcasing various famous suffragettes whom I've studied and admired... But it was going to be a very big quilt and really just a lot of anonymous faces to most viewing the quilt unless I figured out ways to include their biographies... So instead of showcasing famous suffragettes I've now decided to make my quilt using a lot of anonymous faces celebrating the struggle, determination and celebration of the millions of women in this country and abroad...

I've collected dozens great photos over the years to choose from and am excited to get started...

Don't you just love this one?

And recently a lot of incredible photographs from this era were discovered in the Scotland Yard archives and released by BBC.

So while waiting on my mom at the nursing home I began making notes... My initial thoughts had been all black and black lace but I've abandoned that idea and will use materials similar to those I used on my singer cover (on the dark side and vintage prints) ...and lots of vintage lace. Maybe I could figure a way to use some famous suffragettes in very small cameo-like images...just a thought... I want to include various slogans but especially love "Courage in Corsets" which will be the name of the quilt... It's exciting to have this long nebulous idea finally taking shape..

Several years back just before I stopped doing dolls I became interested in doing suffragettes and did several ... The only one I kept and my favorite was one of Emmeline Pankhurst... I became totally obsessed with it and spent months working on it... I will take some pictures to post of it and the details.

Update on lace cottage block

I wanted a smaller "cottage" pocket on the other side of my UFO cottage tote... . I had started by sketching a cottage scene on a piece of fairly heavy white silk.

So the next thing I did was color it lightly with alcohol inks.... It was a big decision for the lace for the cottage walls and I went through my whole stash... The one perfect piece was really too small but it was a tiny remnant of very old lace which was gifted to me by Cathy Kizerian during my visit last winter... Because it was the perfect weight and texture AND a gift from a friend I was determined to make it work...

It took some creative piecing and may need a vine to cover a spot or two. The lace for the thatch (roof) was easier. This was all in July and the decisions I made doing everything and why are in this post if you are interested...http://olderrose.blogspot.com/2010_07_01_archive.html

Now that it's this far along I'm thinking the old lace may be a bit fragile for a tote so it's future is undecided...probably the center for a piece of CQ. This has been my tote along needlework because I can easily stop and start and since it is almost all french knots it's mindless... And mindless is what I'm needing... My mother's longtime boyfriend, housemate, caregiver, and designated driver had a stroke and went to a rehab center after he was out of the hospital last week.. She is 91 and he is 90... She needs a walker and really couldn't be alone so I was staying there.. Then she had an "episode" with her heart and had to go in for a pacemaker on Thursday...

We're trying to get them into an assisted living facility because living independently is not an option any more... She came home today so until she can be moved (she's first on the waiting list) I'll be filling the roll of caregiver etc.... During that time I expect to get a LOT of stitching done... and everything else goes on hold...