Ice carving for dummies

When I was in the hotel industry, I worked with a chef who was a master ice carver. His specialty was a huge, glorious swan, but he could render just about any figure in ice. Every week, he'd trot out a new example at our Sunday buffet in the Elizabethan Room, where it would be greeted with oohs and ahhs, then unceremoniously drip into an eventual puddle next to the roast beef carving station.

I thought about this chef on Saturday when I was at the used bookstore. I was looking for a royalty-free book of flower art that I can use as inspiration for appliques when I came across this title: "Practical Ice Carving."
In a world beset by poverty, war and famine, I can't think of anything LESS practical than ice carving.

I guess that's one thing I like about quilting: it combines beauty and practicality. Sure, a lot of what I sew is for show, but comfort and warmth are where quilts originated.

Here's the latest Freedom Place quilt, all done and waiting for me to get brave enough to ask for someone to quilt it.

Although I enjoyed trying this pattern, and I'm pleased with how this turned out, I plan to return to the other design for the remaining Freedom Place quilts.

When I look back on all the things I learned in high school ...

So you can tell by my rhapsodic waxing last week that I was a fan of my high school teacher, Mrs. Mills. But hers weren't the only great classes I took. I loved Spanish all three years with Mr. Meredith, who wrote in my yearbook that I was one of the only true scholars of high school age, proving that not only was he a great teacher but an excellent judge of intellect as well. Mr. Fanning's Constitutional History class was mesmerizing and exposed me for the first time to the actor Sam Waterston, who I still have a bit of a crush on. Then there was Chemistry with Mr. Parker. He had a glass eye and was nicknamed "Gumby" for reasons lost to Appleton West history.

Although I didn't take sewing in high school, my junior high home ec sewing classes remain some of the most valuable, long-lived lessons I learned.  Sewing has been a way for me to relax, to contribute, to express my creativity. I've had articles about my quilting published in national magazines (fingers crossed for a new piece I'm submitting tomorrow) and I've enjoyed writing this blog tremendously. I never imagined when I was making that first doll dress and then the little apron that all these years later I would still enjoy it so much. And even though the teacher's name is long forgotten, I do remember that her husband was training to be a surgeon and would cut out her patterns for practice. We were all quite envious of that.

Yesterday I was at JoAnn Fabric and the young woman who rang me up started telling me how her high school sewing class changed her life. I don't know whether she was a star student overall, but she said that excelling in sewing class and having the items she designed and made modeled in two fashion shows gave her confidence she'd never felt before. Her career path, she said, would include fashion and sewing -- two things she had never considered just a few years earlier. She just looked so darned happy as she spoke, I wanted to hug her.

I have completed another Freedom Place quilt top. The featured fabric is a slightly more subdued cat print that has a lot of grey in it, which could be a problem. I didn't want the quilt to look too moody or dull, but foraging in the stash provided a great solution: a black and white plaid and a quirky heart-and-asterisk print that "called to me" during a late-night online shopping spree.

I think that together they are very young and refreshing.  They provide a counterbalance to the cat print and the other complementary fabrics.

Here's a closer look at the cat print. Cute, right?

And here's the completed top. 

Frogging

The friend who gave me 300 pounds of fabric is the most exquisite knitter I know. And although she enjoyed fabric, her passion is really yarn and knitting: I was with her once when she purchased $400 of yarn from one booth at the International Quilt Festival. When she left Texas for North Carolina, her yarn collection took up several wardrobe size moving boxes. I can picture her in that artsy hippie town, just happily needling away.

Despite her experience and talent, she did occasionally make a mistake. Then, she would "frog." That's what she called undoing her stitches because, she said, she would rip-it, rip-it, rip-it.

Her expression came to mind while I worked briefly on the first of my Freedom Place quilts today. The design calls for alternating a feature fabric with a checkerboard pattern of complementary material.

First, I cut the butterfly fabric into squares and triangles.

 
Then I cut the other prints into strips and sewed them back into a set

that I cut apart and sewed back together.

Then I added the top and side triangles, so the completed block will be on point. I like how the yellow cools off the color combination, which reads a little "hot." Plus, it reminds me of sunshine.

Then I decided I hadn't put the block together properly, so I removed the triangles and unpieced part of the block.

And then, after turning the strips around a couple of times,  I realized I had done it correctly. So I sewed it all back together.

This is what happens when your head's in a frog.

Iron rich

I've been attending Emerson UU Church for nearly 20 years, which is a pretty good track record for a Jew. Because I married a Congregationalist, when we had children we looked for a denomination and congregation where we could both feel comfortable. I've been a very active member -- taught Sunday School for nine years, served as chair of the Social Action Committee for three, chaired CROP Walk for six or seven years and counting (evidently I'm the Papa Doc of CROP Walk), and I'm currently on the Board of Trustees. My husband has been in the church maybe a dozen times. Apparently our comfort levels are as variable as a Sleep Number bed.

One of the reasons I love Emerson is that it's home to some of the finest women you could ever imagine. Having lost my mother at an early age, I've spent a lot of my life looking for a substitute mom, and at church I've found plenty.

Among them is a peach direct from Georgia. She's the only person I know whose drawl draws out my son's one-syllable name as if it had 12 instead.

This old gal, as she would refer to herself, was determined to get a tattoo when she turned 70. She wanted a gingko leaf, the symbol of memory. The funny thing is, the last time we talked about it, she couldn't remember what the leaf was called.

One time when we were discussing religion, she told me that her concept of G-d is as a large African-American woman who gives you a slap upside your head then draws you to her ample bosom and says, "You'll do better next time, baby." I kind of love that image.

She occasionally holds court at a Wednesday morning sewing group that meets at church, where she keeps us in stitches with her stories. One time, she declared that what bothered her most about today's young girls is that they don't iron. A multitude of sewing sins can be repaired by ironing, she said.

I like to iron. It's soothing to me, Zen-like. I remember having a little non-electic pink toy iron with a pigtail cord and pint-size ironing board that I would set up next to my mom's old, wooden ironing board, and we'd iron together while watching Concentration. I was in charge of the towels, and I'm sure I did a fine job.

Today, I've been ironing a lot, working on the bed sized Kona and batik quilt I've been commissioned to make. Each time I add a strip, I carefully press it. It's the way quilt-sewing should be done, but sometimes I'm in a hurry and don't iron until a block is completed. I can tell already that the precision will pay off. (Ironically, the future quilt owner actually likes a slightly wonky look, which is almost guaranteed to some extent in a handmade item, but my care will restrain that. She's paying for it, she gets my best work.) I took a few sneak peek pictures that I'll post later.

The support for the quilts for Freedom Place continues to overwhelm me. I believe I have seven sponsors, which should translate to more than seven quilts. I met my longarm quilter today as she was finishing up with her sewing group, and several members said they would help with the quilting. I think G-d -- whatever He or She looks like -- is smiling on this project.

Happy, Happy, Joy, Joy

Thanks to the generosity of five friends who are sponsoring Freedom Place quilts, I had the great pleasure of fabric shopping today, again with someone else's money. I shopped at JoAnn Fabric, where everything was on sale and I had a coupon. (I also shopped at Quiltworks, where everything was on sale and I had a coupon, for a quilt I'm doing on commission.) Because I'm an abject failure at running-totaling and the fact that I was drunk on fabric fumes (I've lost my tolerance), I overspent the cash I had in hand, but I'm still within my anticipated budget. I'm sure I'll get more than five quilts out of my purchases; my hope is to have a matching pillowcase for each girl, too.

Here's what I bought.

 It's not apparent from this photo, but the purple gingham complements the purple in the butterfly print quite well.

 I'll use this orange in more than one quilt.

I chose bright colors to cast out the darkness these girls and young women have experienced in their lives, butterflies and flowers to represent renewal, and cats because I like cats!

I'll be working on my commission quilts over the weekend.

Happy Passover, Happy Easter. See you on Monday.

Yes, we have no bananas

My paternal grandparents came to this country from a town called Kishinev in what is now Moldavia in 1906. Grandpa's father, stepmother and brother had settled earlier in Appleton, Wisconsin -- I have no idea what inspired them to land there, the home of Joe McCarthy, Edna Ferber and Harry Houdini, whose best trick was probably escaping it -- and opened a fruit store. When Grandpa came to Appleton, he was so impressed by his brother Joe's success that he, too, opened a fruit store, just down the block. Uncle Joe couldn't complain because he didn't want to be accused of sour grapes.

As my dad, his brother and his sisters grew up, they were expected to spend some time in the family business, waiting on customers, stocking the bins, and so on. My Aunt Helen also helped make window signs, including one that she carefully printed out that read, "Banananas."

She laughed when she told me that story. "I got going, and I couldn't stop," she later explained.

The song, Yes, We Have No Bananas, always comes to mind when I think of that family tale. As I was searching my stash for fabric that would appeal to the teenage residents of Freedom Place, I realized that Yes, I Have Nothing Appropriate. I have lots of juvenile prints, and you've seen my stripes and plaids and solids and batiks, but I don't have anything with a teenage flair. As luck would have it, a church friend asked if she could help contribute to the production of my Freedom Place quilts by helping to pay for fabric. Then another friend suggested I offer sponsorships -- you pay for the materials and I'll make the quilt. While that doesn't exactly whittle down my fabric stacks any faster, it does enable you to participate in this lovely venture. Together, we can make sure every girl and young woman at Freedom Place has a new quilt.

Because they are small quilts -- lap size, approximately 40 x40 -- the materials aren't terribly expensive. To keep the price low, I'll shop at JoAnn Fabric, which often has sales (and I have a coupon.) I'm thinking $30 should easily cover one quilt.

If you'd like to sponsor a quilt, you can email me at barbara.adams9@gmail.com, or use that address to make a personal paypal deposit (no fees). Thanks to my friends for coming up with this great idea.

Here's what I've been working on today. I've had a lot of success making quilts from this basic pattern. I've made two quilts like it in fall colors that are appliqued with autumn leaves, two quilts in frosty winter colors that evoke the solitude of a snowy morning and are appliqued with trees and birds, and one in jewel-tones without applique that I have hanging in my hallway. This one is my interpretation of the moon setting and day dawning over a garden of cherry blossoms. It will be appliqued with pagodas, to make the idea more apparent.

Thank you for asking

At church the other day, a woman approached me and asked if I would consider making quilts for a shelter she supports. Actually, she is the chair of what is called the Emerson (our church) Abolitionists, and they are fighting modern-day slavery as it occurs in the form of human trafficking. The shelter, called Freedom Place, helps those who have been victims of sex trafficking.

As I understand it, Houston has more human trafficking than any other major US city. Perhaps it's our proximity to Mexico and Latin America, but regardless of the reason, it's a shame and a crime, and it has to be stopped.

The shelter, she said, is looking for lap quilts for females. Great, I thought. I make a lot of quilts for kids -- I actually turned in four Project Linus quilts at Quiltworks last week where, you'll be proud to hear, I didn't buy anything but thread (although I got a vicarious kick out of the purchases made by my friend and, of course, since I'm sewing a quilt from her fabric I get to enjoy every inch of it) -- so it will be fun to make something for women instead.

I'm still trying to get my head around what I learned next. This shelter is for girls who have been sex slaves. They range in age from 10 to 17.

As young as 10 years old. Can you imagine? It's difficult to even think about without feeling more than a little sick. When my own daughter was that age she was so innocent, collecting Beanie Babies and reading American Girl books. At 17, she was a happy, normal teenager with so much to look forward to ... not a horrific past to try to deal with.

Two other women at church have already made two quilts each, so I have some catching up to do.

It's the only way I have to give these poor girls a hug.

If you'd like to learn more, here's a link: http://www.freedomplaceus.org/site/freedom/home.html