Quilts and Books

Four years and four days ago, I published a blog post about all of my UFOs (UnFinished Objects) and my tendency to flit from project to project. I'm always attracted to the shiny new project. Or someone decides to have a baby and they need a quilt (and by the way, I learned of a new baby on the way just this past Friday). Or I sign up for a guild or QBFF challenge. I'm full of excuses. Meanwhile, the UFOs are still patiently waiting for me. Today I'm looking back on some of those UFO posts from 2009 and 2010 because I've decided to enter a UFO challenge at my local quilt shop . The rules are simple: during the next six months finish one project per month. Bring the completed quilt to the shop and get entered to win a $25 gift card. If you finish all six projects you get entered to win a $50 gift card. Hey, that's a nice incentive! Anyhow, it's rather gratifying to realize that a few of those quilts from that first post in 2009 are actually finished. In t...

Until today I'd never tried a macaron . It's not as if these French pastries are readily found in local bakeries here in flyover country. But what do you know? There they were in my local Whole Foods when I was shopping this afternoon and I figured that even if it turned out to be a poor imitation of the real thing, I should at least try one. Because after spending the last 2 days reading Laura Florand's latest, The Chocolate Kiss , I had macarons  and chocolat chaud  (hot chocolate) on the brain. The verdict? Pretty good! I got a passion fruit and chocolate-flavored macaron . The best part was the chocolate center. I think it was a little overly sweet for my taste, but I loved the textures and the chocolate combined with the tart fruit flavor. A-hem. This is supposed to be a book review. Back in August, Florand's The Chocolate Thief was one of my Phaves . I said then how much I enjoyed the way Florand made Paris come alive and how engrossing I found that story. T...

This month's theme is something short. Thanks to all of the $.99 ebook bargains to be found, I have quite a few shorts waiting for me on my Kindle. Then the other day I read Mean Fat Old Bat's review of Table for One  by Ros Clarke and SNAP! I have that book. So I came home from work, got on the treadmill and half an hour later I'd finished the book and my workout. Nice, huh? And so was the book. Nice. It was a sweet little read that made my half hour on the treadmill fly by and well worth my $.99. Table for One  is the story of Claudia, a food critic, who winds up unexpectedly dining alone on Valentine's Day at Ward's, a trendy restaurant named for it's chef. Claudia had planned to eat there with her boyfriend, but he breaks up with her just before their date that evening. Claudia goes to Ward's anyway and Ward finds himself curious when, on Valentine's Day of all days, an order comes back to the kitchen for a meal for someone dining alone. Ward cha...

This is a picture of a spread from the Spring 2012 issue of Quilt Sampler . I saw this quilt and instantly fell in love. The pattern was designed by Kathy Thomas and Jo Thomas of Suppose Quilt Boutique of Preston, Idaho. While the shop offers a kit, I decided to use that over-abundant stash of mine and make my own version. About the same time I was deciding to make it, I learned that my niece and her husband were expecting their first child. Baby gift! So below is my version of the quilt. You can see some variation in color based on what I own in my stash. (I need to collect some brighter yellows!) There are some great memories for me in the fabrics in my version. I used a couple of fabrics that are at least 20 years old. There are remnants from other quilts that I remember quite well. A few of those purples were in this pinwheel quilt I made last winter. And here is a close-up of my quilting. I did these half-moon shapes up and down the pencils to simulate the roundness of...

5. Angel's End by Cindy Holby . This is the first book in a new historical western series about a small Colorado mining town. A drifter by the name of Cade Gentry stumbles into town during a blizzard. He'd been wounded during a gunfight and is wearing the coat that belonged to a preacher who was on his way to Angel's End to serve in their church. The people who rescue him assume he is that preacher and to protect himself from those who might be looking for him, he doesn't correct their assumption. He is nursed back to health by a widow, Leah, with a young son. As Leah and Cade get to know one another, they fall in love. But Cade is afraid his past will catch up with him, putting Leah, her son, and the people of Angel's Fall in harm's way. He doesn't feel worthy to be with her. Cade has to come clean with the truth and Leah has to be willing to risk loving again. This was a sweet romance that I found quite enjoyable. 4. An Infamous Marriage by Susanna Fra...

I've never read Sandra Hill before. Judging by her website she's a popular and prolific author of paranormals, Viking heroes, and humorous contemporaries. I've certainly seen her books in the book stores, but I rarely see them mentioned in my favorite corners of Romancelandia. I think the only reason I downloaded this to my Kindle was that it was free. All I can say is that I don't think Sandra Hill is for me. I quit about 20% of the way into it and downloaded Mackenzie Family Christmas to read instead. Quite the nice palate cleanser that was, too. Sadly, this is not a review of MFC. A Dixie Christmas is actually two novellas. One is called Blue Christmas which was originally published in 1998. During the short time I was reading it I could tell it was written before cell phones were ubiquitous, so it was jarring to see that Hill had gone in there and in a line where the date is mentioned inserted "2011." I almost lost it there, but I kept going. Fo...

Last month I wrote about a class I took with Phillipa Naylor on precision piecing. I finished that little wall hanging and used it to practice my free motion machine quilting. Here's the finished quilt, which is 22" x 22": Here are a couple of close-ups of the quilting. There's so much of it--this sucker is stiff as a board, lol!  I got my Christmas present a bit early--a new camera! So I had to play with the close-up feature. Nice, huh?  And I decided I needed a festive holiday purse! I used some poinsettia fabrics here: