wordless wednesday ~ august 7, 2013

 

 

 

 

TAST ~ palestrina stitch

morning gifts from the garden.
:-)


this week (26) the stitch on PinTangle was the palestrina stitch.
this is a new one for me once again and i really needed to study quite a few versions of instruction as well as videos to understand how to do this stitch.
once i did understand it though, i found it to be a really great stitch to work. it became wonderfully rythmic as i settled into it and now i'm looking for more places to put it~! first i worked these samples using a variety of threads. i randomly tried a few different things and then made a decision about which stocking to apply it to.


the wonderful daughter's stocking received a bit more work in this lacey area that i started  a few weeks back . . . the newly added palestrina stitch is along the top  of the lace and i love the way it created a small braided type of edge. feel free to click on any of these images to see a larger version and if you would like to see a 'before' shot of this area go here. it's been fun to see the actual 'evolution' of this particular area. i think that there will be more stitches placed here before the TAST challenge is finished . . .

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i did miss a day of the 15 minute challenge . but for the remaining six, i managed to meet with success. i worked on a few appliqued basket handles, more experimental stitching on some atc's, and the TAST/christmas stocking project.

my time and energy for stitching does seem much more limited during the summer but with this challenge on my daily list of to-do's i am still able to make steady, yet slow, progress.

if you think adding a 15 minute sewing session to each day's priorities is something you would benefit from head over to Kate's at Life in Pieces and join in.

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i thought i would show you a few shots from my garden. it's what has been keeping me only minimally involved in blogland and my stitching.

one of the columbine plants in some soft morning light

this is russian sage which is a new plant to my garden. i like it for it's wispy leafyness and purple blossoms which remind me a lot of lavendar. it smells wonderful when touched or wind blown and is supposed to be very winter hardy. i'm anxious to see how it does. i've planted several plants in various places and if all goes well i'll be adding lots more.

i've been unable to find a lavendar plant that makes it through our high altitude winter so until i do this plant will be my stand in. it's very fragrant (both plant and blossoms) and looks similar. it may be that this russian sage will be a better choice for the extreme winters as well as the other harsher elements here (lots of wind, very short growing season, cool nights and hot daytime temps).

we seem to have a lot of butterflys this year. the small blue ones like the one above flutter up out of the lawn as it's being walked upon. they are so pretty and so fragile looking.

this one had a bit of tatter on one of it's wings . . . i suppose that it's a short life that butterflys live but they seem to know how to make the most of it, don't they~!?

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recent gifts include:

• a couple of days rest from the garden work
• working on the dog's fetching skills in the evenings
• a small fabric shopping trip (+ lunch~!) out of town with a friend
• picking vine ripened tomatos

the weather today is a bit grey but so far we've only gotten rain . . . the weatherman says it could turn to snow but the temps are currently in the mid 40's so i've got my fingers crossed that it won't. the leaves are beginning to bud out and the trees are wearing that misty light green veil that they get before their buds all go completely into leaf . . . very pretty and very promising~!

this first one is one of the ornamental fruit trees that we have in the yard. there will not only be leaves soon but also blossoms (if the frost doesn't get them).

last summer i planted false spirea in one of the gardens. i like it's feathery leaves and it's supposed to be a fast growing shrubby/ground cover. so the second shot is the leaves just beginning to form for it's new year. it's always good when a plant makes it through it's first winter here and i have hopes that it's going to be happy and healthy. i really like the way the new leaves have a rosey red blush to them. the plant that i planted last year had only green leaves so this was a surprise. possibly the color will only be a spring thing . . . ?

the columbine has been growing leaves for a few weeks now and i'm also pleased at their robust sturdiness. i love the way that the leaves look like a blossoming rose at first.

i have quite a lot of artemesia in various places throughout the yard and it does very well here. this year it began to show some growth way back in late february/early march which is VERY early here. i'll be making this a staple. i like it's sagey green color and it's feathery soft growth. it makes for a lovely small shrub-like plant along walkways and around the pond and i have a feeling i'm going to come up with a lot of other places to plant it as well.

so all of these spring leaves have gotten me in the mood to applique some vines and leaves of my own. and if there's a vine with leaves . . . there has to be berries, right?!?
i always keep my leftover vines and leaves from past projects. i tuck them away in a box and draw out of it before i cut more for new projects if i can. i have used this design element in so many quilts that i have  quite a few little bits and pieces to choose from.
i happen to really like the look of a pieced quilt with some appliqued accents or features; sometimes within the border, sometimes an oddball applique strip or block tossed in among the pieced ones, sometimes a surprise bird or blossom randomly placed onto an otherwise pieced top, etc.
i think the possibilities are probably endless.
one day recently i felt the urge to applique but didn't really have a project in mind so i went through the box and chose a length of prepared vine and started sewing it down to a 5 inch wide piece of muslin cut from selvedge to selvedge (approximately 40 inches long). what you see here is a portion of that strip which i have now completely filled with applique. it was so satisfying i think i'll start another.  (-:
i have no idea what exactly i'll do with them but i do know that they will find a "home" within something eventually, after all, is there any quilt that can't somehow benefit from a bit of "greenery" within it~!?!
feel free to share your ideas on how you have added applique to piecework projects.

i mentioned in a recent post that i was playing around with using paper, fabric and stitch. i'm still playing but this is what i have so far. the hexagon pieces are a variety of papers that i had on hand. i've added a piece of an old embroidery linen to one corner and a fabric fussy cut butterfly as well as some random embroidery stitches. i've used a thin scrap of muslin batting for the base. i think i may be cutting a postcard and some atc's from it and then finishing them up according to what each small piece "tells me" it needs . . . still experimenting and having a great time with this and as you can see my "green garden fever" has infected this piece as well.
i hope to show more as i get further along.

today's gifts included:

• the soft light of a foggy morning
• the shimmery veil of green leafy buds that trees wear in the early spring
• bearing witness to my daughter's blossoming into womanhood.

Bugs and an Adventure Story from Honduras

the garden is currently plentiful of more than just flowers, fruits and vegetables. when i was out with my camera it seemed like there were beautiful bugs everywhere that i looked~!~ this butterfly was about the size of my thumbnail and the inside of the wings were an electric blue similar to the brightest blue areas on the outside of it's wings. the wind was blowing pretty hard but it was very patient with me and i did manage to get a couple of decent shots although none with the wings opened up. i'm not sure what kind of a butterfly it is. i do know that i used to see many more of them a few years ago than i see now.

not only are the (yukon gold) potatoes in abundance but so are the garden worms~!~ which is supposed to be a very good sign of soil health. are you able to find the worms sticking out from the dirt in this shot?

this mantid was basking in the last of the evening sunshine. i'm pretty sure it was a female judging by her super extended abdomen . . . and i think she's giving the camera the stink eye~!~

this little grasshopper thought it was all about camouflage and so didn't hop away when i was taking it's photograph.
i loved looking at all of the amazing details in this shot (both of the grasshopper and the tree bark it was sitting on)~!~

there are quite a few of these spiders in our garden. i know them to be an orb spider and generally beneficial. i managed to get a photo of both her (i think this one is female) topside (above) and her underside (below). she was accidentally disturbed when weeds were pulled from beneath one of the pine trees and so she is perched here on a tiny pine bough. she was roughly an inch and a half long (including leg span). usually they like to sit smack in the middle of their web and almost always have a zig zag bit of creativity woven into it. i will try to get some shots of one of the better looking webs before the summer is completely over.

apparently the bugs are plentiful in Honduras too, as last evening brought a call from my daughter with tales of a very large (5 to 6 inch) tarantula that came visiting one evening right before bedtime. the one thing that this courageous girl of mine seems to be truly afraid of is spiders. i don't have to tell you that in a tropical environment they thrive (meaning they grow quite large) in many variations and this has been a difficult thing for her to deal with. for the most part she manages to keep herself calm and does her best to ignore them, but apparently this particular specimen was just "too much" and she was forced to run for help. she describes a lot of arm waving and heart palpitations at this part in her story. the family that she is staying with was quick to jump into action with "dad" bearing a broomstick and "mom" at the ready to squash it. in the end, the reportedly large mess of the squashed spider (and all of it's remaining parts) was swept up and deposited outdoors. so other than a restless night of sleep and her host family's gentle teasing, all was once again well. poor kid.

this morning i took a walk and just happened to notice a butterfly on the side of the road. it looked like it dropped straight out of the sky mid flight and died. it was in such great shape (other than being dead, i mean) that i carried it home for a photo shoot. i think i've made it look convincingly alive in this shot . . .

these butterflies seem to be migrating through the area and sadly all of them just don't make it to wherever it is they are going. i have no idea just what kind it is and would love it if someone could identify it for me.

today's late lunch consisted of a plate of homemade oven roasted sweet pototoe fries. they turned out perfectly and i thought that they looked so nice that i had to take a shot of them.

i failed to post my scrap management photo yesterday. i am still making decent progress through the basket of scraps; it's even starting to look a little bit less full than it did and those of you who scrap quilt know how long it can take to make even that much happen. the scraps must breed like bunnies once the lid is placed back on because they can be very difficult to see any end to.

i have a total of 50 tulips made and i'm still not tired of them~!~also there is a growing pile of coin quilt strips . . . and a small mountain of three and a half inch squares for the nine patches that i'm making.