A bit of this and that

More glorious sunshine and happiness here. Woohoo.

I see you!

Eye Beady framed, which barely got done before we left Cairo. The framing helps - makes it look finished. You can read about how I made the beady here.

And in place on the wall. My tree looks dull. I'm almost hoping the movers smash this metal thing during the next move so I can get a black feather tree with no guilt. Although the tree isn't the problem, the ornaments are... I should work on that. Maybe tie brightly colored fabric strings on there.

I went to the Quai Branly Museum yesterday for free Sunday. What a disappointment. It has the absolute coolest stuff in the world in there (anthropological finds, carved wood, embroidered and woven textiles and even a Haitian Vodou Flag) and the worst way of displaying them. New museum, just opened last year and it's more like a ride at Disneyland: stumbling around in the dark with colored lights. The displays were so poorly lit you could barely see them. I'm sure some of that is for conservation purposes, but if you can't see it, what's even the point of showing them?

I'm sure other people may not have that reaction. I just need light. I'm one of those people who can't watch a tv or read the computer in a dark room. Makes my eyes hurt. Oh, and the other thing I hated about the museum? No cameras allowed. Not that any of the pictures would have turned out well in that dark space.

Anyway, had a wonderful walk home, going right through the chic part of town near the Champs d'Elysees. I felt out of place amongst all the beautiful people. The women, all skinny, were very much in uniform: blonde hair, high heels, designer jeans and sunglasses.

Check out this cool window display (for a children's clothing shop?), not to mention the classy interior with a chandelier.

I love the "mannequins" - a mouse with her pet cat here in front and a cat with her pet mouse further back.

The pet cat:

An expensive hotel with fabulous flower boxes:

Independence Day

A closer look at my wall display. I use what's available (the hanging rod plus a nail the flag beady is perched on) and then hang everything else up with 3M Command hooks. They work great and are temporary, so I don't have to worry about leaving holes in the wall.

Happy 4th of July. I made this quilt with scraps left over from yesterday's quilt Celebrate Liberty as well as the one orphan firework block. It's freehand fan quilted in white perle cotton size 8. This is one of my favorites. I was able to loosen up, play and not worry about the edges of the quilt being straight.

Liberty Blooms. I wrote about making it here.

Patriotic Crazy. I wrote about making it and showed details here.

In the upper left is my flag beady. It's completely covered in beads and buttons. I barely finished it up and got it framed before leaving Cairo last fall and this is the first year I've been able to display it. I think it really helps to have it framed--although the color was supposed to be bright red, not maroon--makes it look like a work of art and stand out against the wall.

Crusty is short for encrusted. That's just the term I use. I learned the techniques from Susan Shie's Lucky School of Quilting. I'm not sure if you can read this well. It says "big cup of liberty tea."

I've been doing some hand quilting and have made a lot of progress on the Blue With Stars. Hopefully I'll have something to show you soon.

I just rewatched Shaun of the Dead. That show is such a hoot. A British Romantic Comedy Zombie film - the perfect movie for me. My husband on the other hand won't even try it.

Flag Beady

Woohoo, not only did I finish all the quilting on Terms, but last night I finished the Flag Beady that I've been working on intermittently for the last two years. It measures 6.75" x 5.5"

I learned a lot while doing this and got better as I went along. Would do things differently if I were making it again, but that's life. The framers reopens from their summer holiday so I can take in a bunch of my pieces for framing on Monday.

Learned how to do this type of beadwork from an article Andi Stern did in the Spring 2004 issue of Quilting Arts magazine. I also like the book Beaded Embellishment by Clarke and Atkins.

Some fun bead embroidery blogs are: The Lone Beader and Liz at I Work to Support My Vacation Habits

My sweetie took the day off from work yesterday and we spent several hours organizing. We now have a place to stack items that are going in our airfreight shipment and the boxes for charity donation are out of control. Cats are having fun exploring the new playground.

We watched "The Big Night" - a great movie if you love food. Even if you don't. Highly recommended - has great acting by Stanley Tucci and a pre-Monk Tony Shalhoub.

Our stinking a/c went on the fritz yet again but has been cleaned up. Somehow I expect that we'll be seeing the janitor again for this chore in a week or two.

And last but not least, some X and O action. Check out:

• Clare's graphic letters
• Hanne has made some marvelous pink and yellowish green letters
• Desertsky Susan has a great American Hero quilt going in red, white and blue. I love how she's playing around to make the letters scrappier.

Red White and Blue this n that

What a space case I've been lately. This is really idiotic, but I just realized today, the 6th of July, that I could put up my 4th of July decorations. D'oh. I am a pinhead, truly. Admittedly my brain has been elsewhere lately.

So put the decorations up today. I posted pics of all this stuff last year, so I'm not going to do that again. This year the blue and white houses quilt has been superceded by my need for a design wall.

I have done zero sewing. Since a couple of ya'all mentioned liking the flag block in here, I put it back up. I love this border fabric, so it's providing me inspiration.

I decided to let myself do a bit of playing today as well. Instead of quilting Terms (going up the left side on the third row of fans - woohoo) I got out the beady I've been working on for two years now.

Unfortunately the sparklies don't show, but I'm happy with the size 5 red bugles I just added. I had to put a bead in where a blue sequin used to be - I had skimped and used a single thread of Silamide instead of doubling it as is recommended. Hopefully that'll be the only bead I lose. Since I want to get this one framed here in the land of inexpensive framing, I'd better work quick.

Finn, you asked if I'd beaded or french knotted Liberty Blooms. No, that is just the cool fabric I found. I had to carefully cut out the circle so that I would get the little dots going around like this.

Liberty Blooms is 22" x 26". I explained how I did the running stitch applique here.

This poor quilt definitely needs more quilting in it. Maybe someday when I have extra time (ba ha ha ha) I'll add some crosshatching.

I haven't mentioned it, but it's officially Tour de France time. Now, the cycling so far has been dull what with all the flat routes, but one of these days it's going to get intense in the mountains and I will be glued to the tv with no distractions other than my quilting. Yet another factor in my diminishing blog time allowance. This of course assumes that my tv channel will cooperate. I was home in time yesterday to watch but the channel was dead air for hours and hours and hours. It was working again this morning (exercise equipment infomercials dubbed into German - always good for a laugh) so fingers crossed I will not be desolate two days in a row.

Beady Eye

Whee, I finished my bead embroidery this morning. This is Eye Beady and measures a bit more than 4" x 3.5".

I started this way back in the fall when Finn and I were talking about eyes (hope yours are well now, Finn!) and of course it was Halloween time then. I stopped when I decided I wanted some orange sequins. Well, my search for them in Florida was a failure, but I did buy some other beads which worked fine. I used a mixture of sizes and finishes as well as some really cheap ones and some expensive ones (which isn't that big of a deal, since I've got loads left for more projects). Think I'm going to get it framed, but without glass, cuz that will just interfere to much with the sparkle.

It took loads of time, but I am happy with it (and happy to be done).

Not much else interesting going on. I refuse to use the sewing machine in the dark, so I won't be doing any piecing until the scaffolding moves. I don't want to turn this into a big whiny post, so I won't say anymore about that.

Hubby and I have started on the third season of "Alias" - hopefully all that nonsense about The Passenger and the Chosen will make more sense this time through.