Marginalia: Getting it Together

My Marginalia (Quilty 365/6)  needed 12 more blocks for an 18 x 22 layout.  What to do? What to do?  I found a remnant in my stash that looked like it had handwriting on it to make my circles. Then I used an ABC stencil from my scrapbooking stash and a fabric pen to put each letter of MARGINALIA on a circle.  The HSTs were all fabric that looked like doodling on a chalkboard.  

I wish this was one of those "no assembly required" things but it's not. (I love piecing but hate the boring task of sewing together rows and columns).  I have four of the 21 rows assembled and from now on it will be my JOT (Just one Thing) to work on a little bit every day after work until I'm bored with it which will probably be after one row is sewn together or before. 

Oh, in case you were wondering about the two extra blocks I needed for my layout...(I said I needed TWELVE more blocks and MARGINALIA is only ten letters)...they will be at the end. 

At least I didn't have to worry over a layout...they are going together in date order

 Nov 4, 2015 - Nov 3, 2016. 

But I will have to worry about how to quilt it. 

Quilty 365

June Marginalia

I'm still working on my daily circles and am caught up through June 26.  I started these on Nov 4 last year so I have about 8 months of circles. That means I'm 2/3 of the way through the year!! Slowly but surely I'll end up with a big journal quilt. 

A lot of my circles this month are about fruits, flowers and veggies.  I love gardening about as much as I love quilting. 

And speaking of LOVE...we just celebrated our 39th wedding anniversary and the spark is still there. Celebrate, celebrate, dance to the music!! 

We still haven't had a honeymoon and we still do absolutely nothing special when our anniversary rolls around. We just got used to having no money when we were younger to spend on anything other than necessities and have just continued on living frugally. 

We lived in Naples, FL back then (39 years ago).  We had lived together for four years and had two kids together so we decided to tie the knot one day after work.  Our friend, Sandy, was a notary public. In Florida it was legal for her to marry us so she officiated. My soon-to-be-married brother and his fiancee were our witnesses. After a few verses were read that I had chosen from a  Kahlil Gibran book we were married. Sandy and her husband surprised us and made a cake and served some champagne.  It was just another day. Ahhhh, memories!!

(P.S.  I made most of our clothes back then.  See husband's shirt and my outfit - halter top and matching long loose pants in some slinky knit. These were NOT specially made wedding clothes but our everyday wear. ) 

The daily circle was Audrey's idea - Quilty 365. 

There's usually a monthly link of creative Quilty 365 ideas at her blog Quilty Folk. 

Marginalia: Quilty 365 Project

Another month of circles.

I've been making them since Nov. 4 and I am caught up through yesterday although when I put May's circles up for a pic it seems I've misplaced May 7 which, according to my notes, was "rain, rain, go away" and May 14 which was when we planted green beans. 

As you can tell I've been doing a lot of gardening in between the rains and the paying job. 

I took a "staycation" this week. I need it. 

I really need to start sewing these together.  I say that every month. 

Linking up with other Quilty 365ers at Quilty Folk. 

Marginalia: A Quilty 365 Project

I've been making daily circles (and HSTs) since November 4. 

This month I have fallen woefully behind although I do have circles prepped through today, April 30. 

We've planted lots of seeds inside under lights (tomatoes, peppers, brassicas, flowers) and they have been transplanted and are hardening off.  Lots of flowers (tulips, lilacs, bleeding heart, bluebells) are blooming.  Spinach, lettuce, sugarsnap peas, potatoes and radishes are planted outside and have sprouted. 

My daughter-in-law had hernia surgery so I've been helping her out. My husband has an infection in his mouth where a tooth was pulled a couple of months ago that will not heal because he had so much radiation in the past when he had cancer. He's miserable but doesn't want to go through daily hyperbaric treatments again like he did last year.  So I've been doing a lot of the chores (like make dinner and do laundry) that he usually does (he's retired, I'm not) because he doesn't feel well. 

 I finished reading "The Pecan Man"  (good book) by Cassie Dandridge.  

And we finally replaced our pop up camper with a new one complete with bathroom.  The grandkids have already slept out in it in our backyard and had fun. 

And I finished a couple of quilts. 

Luckily I keep track of daily events to portray in fabric on pieces of scrap paper.  Hopefully I will find time to play catch up in May. 

I need to start putting circles together soon because I want to keep them in order. I will lay them out 18 x 21.  But first I need to make some circles with letters. 

Every month it's fun to see everyone's circles. I love the variety. 

See for yourself....May Quilty 365

Marginalia: Quilty 365 Circles

My March circles for Marginalia which is a Quilty 365 project - an idea of Audrey's who blogs at Quilty Folk.  The idea went viral and there's all kinds of circles out there in blog land now. 

I started my circles on Nov 4, 2015 and have made one every day since.  I don't know how many that happens to be but I need to start sewing them together. But first I need to make up some circles with the letters in MARGINALIA and then I will sew them together in date order in rows 18 x 21. 

I keep a note some highlight of the day on each 4 inch block with either a micron pen or permanent fine tipped marker.  I finished up March 31 last night while waiting to hear on my brother's quadruple bypass surgery.  He had a heart attack two days in a row which was a surprise to all of our family since he didn't even know he had any heart problems - he doesn't smoke, is not overweight, and doesn't drink or take any drugs.  He does love bacon, though. So no more bacon for Steve! It's difficult to be so far away (he's in FL and I'm in IA) and feeling helpless. 

When I went to take pictures of my circles I also noticed I forgot to make circles for two days (so maybe I fibbed a little when I just said I "have made one every day since"). Either I forgot or they got lost but anyway...I had some black fabric with eyes on it...those denote that either the block for that day fell into some black hole (or I was feeling like I was in a black hole). 

Other than that I celebrated a birthday, St. Patrick's Day (I'm of Irish ancestry on dad's side), first day of Spring, PI day and Easter.   I had crocus and species tulips in bloom. My granddaughter received a blue ribbon for her violin solo. I decided I will retire March 30, 2017. I finished the book "The Kitchen House" by Kathleen Grissom ( a good book, btw).  I finished a Jack's Chain quilt and I ended my sewing machine tension problems (on Janome DC2010) and my tension headaches and bought a new  Brother SB3129. 

There's quite a variety of circles (and other shapes). Just look and see at the Quilty 365 linkup. 

Marginalia: A Quilty 365 Project

February Circles

Since Nov 4, 2015 I have been making a circle a day. That's 118 circles if I counted right.  I choose fabric that kind of highlights something from the day, match muslin with fabric for a HST background then buttonhole stitch by hand around each circle. 

In February I:

•  finished four quilts that were UFOS - Which Way to the Chocolate (hand quilted), Fireworks on the Rails, Wonky Logs and Pentland Crackers 
• read two books - What She Left Behind by Ellen Marie Wiseman and The Life We Bury by Allen Eskens
• celebrated three birthdays - son -in-law, dau.-in-law and grandson
• experienced unusually high winds and unusually high temps
• celebrated Ground Hog Day, Mardi Gras, Valentine's Day and National Drink a Glass of Wine Day
• had a sick computer, a sick sewing machine and a sick body
• enjoyed flock of cardinals for several days and almost ran over 5 deer in the road out front on my way to work at 4:30 a.m
• gas was down to $1.42 per gallon (I've been keeping track monthly for posterity)
• gave myself some advice to "stay calm and eat bacon".

Quilty 365 was Audrey's brainstorm

On March 1 she will have a Quilty 365 linkup where you can enjoy quite a variety of interpretations of the year long journey. 

Some Stuff for Slow Stitching on Sunday or Monday or Tuesday or Wednesday...

Today I finished up the final five of forty-nine Dresdens and need to applique them to the gray background.  I made these all year as a Rainbow Scrap Challenge project. I will have one big quilt if I ever get it finished. The background squares are 13 inches.  The Dresden spokes are 4.5 inches. 

I'm also behind on getting my circles appliqued to their backgrounds. I have Dec 7 (Kayla's Birthday) through Dec 25 made and ready to have the buttonhole stitching around them completed. I have the fabrics pulled for yesterday and today but no circles made yet.  I may take these to work and work on them during my lunch break. 

And I still have 11 more blocks to quilt on my Vintage Spin.  I just accidentally sliced into the callous on my underneath finger so we shall see if I can still quilt without pain. 

I will be virtually quilting along with other Slow Sunday Stitchers this evening at Kathy's Quilts. 

The Circle Game

And the seasons they go round and round 

And the painted ponies go up and down 

We're captive on the carousel of time 

We can't return we can only look 

Behind from where we came 

And go round and round and round 

In the circle game  - Joni Mitchell

Audrey of the blog Quilty Folk had a brilliant idea to applique a circle a day for a year that  she called Quilty 365.      I decided to play along starting on Nov 4. I had been thinking of making some type of journal quilt so decided to choose my fabrics based on some highlight of the day. I also add a little handwriting describing the highlight.  Reminds me of the old Joni Mitchell song Circle Game so I'm calling my quilt Circle Game.

I'm showing my circles Nov 4 - Nov 29.   I have fabrics chosen for Nov 30 and today but don't have those circles cut yet. (It's been a long couple of days at work).

And, in case you are curious about some of those highlights -
In health news I found out lumps in my breast were cysts, my granddaughter needs to carry epi-pen since she had a severe allergic reaction to fresh pineapple and my health insurance premium will go up 127 % next year...Affordable Health Care, my ass.In other news,  I experienced an awesome sunrise, saw Venus every morning on my way to work and we had a record 9.9 inches of snow.  I finished a book, celebrated 29 years on the job, thought I heard a mouse under my bed, bought a new laptop with Windows 10 to replace my antique Windows XP.  Gas was 1.99 a gallon, we ate the last of our fresh tomatoes and I started a Peacock quilt.  Can't wait to see what December brings...one day at a time. 

Join in if you haven't already.  There are so many awesome interpretations of Quilty 365 out there. Don't believe me? Then you need to check out the Quilty 365 linky party.  I'm hopefully going to visit all the links this weekend.

Quilty 365: Marginalia

Marginalia

Nov 4 - 8

I was thinking of ideas for a quilt journal project for next year and I was trying to decide on an applique project for next year and then up pops Audrey of Quilty Folk with Quilty 365.   

I'll call my project Marginalia. I'll be writing in the margins about daily life and the circle fabrics will depict something to go with the marginalia.  I've been blanket stitching with two strands of embroidery floss and writing in the margins with a pigma pen and ultra fine sharpie. 

I started right in because if I didn't I never would.