FMQ inspiration & evolution

Love the patterning on this building spied in an architectural magazine:

rendering of expansion to Mariinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg proposed by Dominique Perrault

Inspired, I stitched these samples as a warm-up for fmq:

pattern evolution from straight lines to s-curves

I find curves much easier than straight lines. Is it that way for you too?

Monster mash

This hulk by the sewing machine is the hexagonal bed quilt. You're seeing the backing.

I wanted to experience how manageable - or not - this bigger-than-queen quilt would be on my Janome 6600. So far not very -  it's like wrestling with a beast!

Stitches waver along the ditch even with the walking foot. Maybe free-motion will be better (ha!). Maybe a new machine with another two inches would do the trick. What I know for sure: un-stitching is in my future.

Record time for re-entry

Last month I started a new project with the intention of putting it in the local guild's quilt show in March. It now needs only hand stitching on the back to be done. Done ahead of time and only two months from start to finish - a new record! Wow! All other projects take years!

entry for Voices in Cloth

A three-day retreat in Healdsburg earlier this month really helped. 

morning view at Healdsburg

I had it pieced and pin basted before I went. Just decided what to do and stitched. Keeping the quilting minimal helped too.

Now comes the tough part: what title to give it? Gotta decide by the January 27th deadline for the submittal entry.

Re-entry

Life has been hectic in the past two months. I've taken two great workshops: Potpourri II with Nancy Crow at the Crow Barn and The New Complex Cloth with Jane Dunnewold at Art Quilt Tahoe. Seen two great international juried fiber arts shows. Maybe I'll catch up and post about these. Maybe not.

For now I'm happily engaged in a new project. Started with the golden pieces from the workshop:

modules from Potpourri II

and made more with some in other colors.

more modules, more colors

Re-arranged the jumbled mess,

more cohesive but flat

auditioned more colors,

looking livelier

resulting in a small half-way decent composition.

a 36x36 composition

Added red, and made more to make it bigger,

a 42x53 composition

but not necessarily better. Why the heck is that?! Needs more work!

It's not too big yet big enough to become my entry for the EBHQ quilt guild show, Voices in Cloth, coming up in March.

Gotta be big enough to hang around all those big traditional quilts. 

Urban Tale: recovery of stolen vehicle

The van was stolen from in front of the house in the middle of the night in early August. We'd joked about it being the ideal vehicle for criminal activities: big black van with tinted windows and only a driver's seat. Lots of cargo room! As the weeks went by, chances of recovery got slimmer.

In late September my partner left to do a 500-mile pilgrimage walk from France to Santiago, Spain. He allowed two months, but finished in 4 weeks. You can read about it and see photos from his pilgrimage here.

Meanwhile mail arrived from California Highway Patrol. Turns out the van was "recovered" on 10/19 and towed to a storage yard. To get it out he had to pay the fees: $190 for towing and $75 a day for storage. It was day five. You do the math.

They also required a release from the California Highway Patrol which meant a notarized letter from him authorizing me to pick up the van because I was not the registered owner. By this time we found this out, it was bedtime in Spain. >Ding!< add $75.

The next morning I was off to the CHP office by 8am with the precious notarized letter >Ding!< add $100. I paid the fees (>Ding!< add another $70 for title search) before they walked me out to the van. I had the key, but didn't need it. The thieves broke the ignition - anyone could've started the van with a screwdriver. And they locked a Club onto the steering wheel!

not my Club!

The towing yard couldn't get the Club off. Turns out the van wouldn't start anyway. So AAA towed it home. At least I didn't pay extra for that.

The $600 van has racked up costs of $810 for this incident. It obviously needs new license plates, door locks and ignition; the Club removed; and whatever fix to start it again. Unless the same thieves come back and fix it, it'd be waiting for him.

How much more will it cost to get it running again? Do you hear bells ringing?

Esoterica:

• In California, if the vehicle is picked up by the third day of storage, then no storage fees are charged. In this case, they recovered the van on a Saturday and didn't write and mail the report until the CHP office opened on Monday. Three days were up at a blink of the eye!
• The storage yard will keep a vehicle worth less than $4000 for 30 days before selling it. If the sale price does not cover the fees then they will send collections after the owner for the difference.
• The owner can offer the pink slip to the storage yard before the 30 days are up, but again, if the sale price does not cover the fees, then they will send collections after the owner for the difference.
• Avoid having your vehicle towed in a city like San Francisco. The storage yard advised me they charge for storage by the hour!
• A friend had a vehicle parked on a Berkeley street while she was out of the country. Her neighbor reported the vehicle because it hadn't moved for more than 72 hours. She had to jump through similar hoops to get her vehicle out of storage. The 72-hour rule is California law. 

The lessons learned:

• Don't leave the country if you are the sole registered owner of a stolen vehicle. Unresolved business comes back with a bite! 
• Get insurance coverage for theft and vandalism even if the vehicle is not worth much. It doesn't cost much and may help cover all the fees that rack up. 

cargo trash

Three on display

Three quilts in two exhibitions.

Golden Sol

Golden Sol will be at PIQF, October 17-20, 2013, as part of the New Quilts of Northern California exhibit presented by the Northern California Quilt Council. My third consecutive year of participation.

Orange Rhyme

Spin in Brown

And on the opposite coast, Orange Rhyme and Spin in Brown have longer engagements at the Schweinfurth Art Center: Quilts = Art = Quilts runs from October 27, 2013 until January 5, 2014.

Good things comes in threes.