It’s been a little crazy at my house and I haven’t found enough time to post. The kitchen is nearly finished – I took these photos late yesterday. 

You can’t see one of the lights in the ceiling. The far light is in the breakfast room, the next one is one of two round, florescent fixtures that are on either side of the SolaTube.

Luis spent most of the day installing the sink. It was surprisingly complicated because the new sink is deeper than the old sink and the drain pipe was sort of in the wrong place.

Orville got most of the cabinet pulls installed yesterday. Robert and Jose painted – touching up cabinets, painting the walls, etc. It took all day. The open space in the granite, above, is where the cooktop will go.

I chose 3×6 white subway tiles and an accent band of 1/2″ white squares for the backsplash. Luis and I spent some time making sure that the tile was going to fit the space (it will). I think this will be something we won’t tire of and that will go with the mosaic of blue and white dishes in the breakfast room.

I especially wanted to show you the granite. When I went to the granite yard, I was surprised that most of the granite had small, tight patterns – like little dots, or peppercorns scattered densely. I think that most people imagine that if they choose a slab with a bigger pattern, it will overpower a small kitchen. I don’t find that to be true.

Don’t you think that the big pattern in the stone opens up the space? Steve and I do – and I have to say that the guys on the crew appear to love it as well. Granite this white, with this big of a pattern, is not the norm. 

Steve and I left town this morning to go to Austin for a friend from college daughter’s wedding. We left Orville laying the kitchen floor, Robert was doing something (painting or flooring), and I think Luis was going to start tiling the backsplash. When we get home it won’t be all done, but we will be able to start putting things away in the kitchen. Hooray!

I thought you might be interested to see what a difference a SolaTube makes. Here is the (empty) kitchen, before:

I took the photo above, mid-afternoon. I took the next photo at the same time of day, after the SolaTube had been installed:

The light in the room is not electric. It is shining down the inside of the reflective tube that ends in the roof. I wrote about SolaTubes when we added them to our bathrooms. Amazing, isn't it! 

The contractor says that we actually get more light from this than we would from a skylight. I think it's the reflective lining of the tube that does it. 

How's that for an attention-getting blog post title? I wrote a guest post for the C&T Blog about The Best-Every Applique Sampler. There's a bit of behind-the-scenes info, there are some pretty pictures… and then at the bottom of the post, you are invited to write a comment. I'm going to be interested to see what you write :-)!

One commenter will be chosen on June 10 to win a copy of the book! Click here to read the post and to comment.

I hope you enjoy the post!

Well, I don't know about you but I have been BUSY! I thought today would be a good day to catch you up on the remodeling. This was Monday (Memorial Day) evening – Steve preparing dinner…

And this is the same space, Tuesday:

And from where Steve is, looking the other way:

The new cabinets are built and at Rick's warehouse being painted. He tells me that there are a huge number of them, more than you'd imagine in this small space. 

So where is Steve cooking now? He has set up shop in the garage:

Many of you know that I don't do the daily cooking. I make cakes, cookies, and candy and that is not a daily occurance. Steve is the one who feeds us and I am so very lucky that he does! He assures me that he has done enough camp cooking that this is not nearly as bad as it would be if I was the one trying to cook in the kitchen. 

The cats are the ones who are most unhappy right now. They are nervous. Emma is staying in our bedroom most of the time because it's back together. Dave (the black cat) is staying outside a lot. 

Today, Luis and Juan are working on the kitchen – mostly putting up some new sheetrock where the backsplash will be and moving outlets and wires. Juan is mudding the newly exposed ceiling areas. Luis is working on some plumbing. Rick thinks the cabinets will be set in on Monday or Tuesday – yay!

It's been a while since I gave you an ugly fabri update. My quilt top is done, but I can't show it until the book comes out which is many months off. I can, however, share some snippets. The next photo is a section of the quilt back. Christopher suggested that I use the leftover fabric on the back which was a great idea. I didn't piece it to look good – I wanted to highlight some of the most memorable fabrics.

That amazingly awful Santa is just stunning, don't you think? I actually grew fond of the monkeys that you see above and below… 

The 'Chuckie' dolls, however, still give me the creeps. I didn't fussy-cut anything so it was just luck that the doll, below, is looking out of her triangle.

 I didn't get much fabric with text so I ended up liking 'HOT'.

All in all I can tell you that I really did learn a lot from working with this fabric, very little of which I liked. I think it really is true that you should work outside of your box every now and then.

This is a corner of the C&T booth showing a big page from our coloring book.

Quilt Market is interesting. There is a lot to lust after. Lovely fabric, great notions, inspiring quilts – so much! But the thing is, most of it you will never have an opportunity to actually buy. That was true many years ago, and it's more true now.

Used to be, there were a few big fabric companies. Shops bought from most of them. An individual shop could never carry all the fabric available but I could usually come home and find most of what I had fallen in love with at market. 

Now there are so many new fabric companies (in addition to the bigger companies) that it's hard to keep them straight. They each have great fabric but I honestly don't know how most shop owners can buy from them all. Each company has its own set of forms and minimum orders and ship dates… I knew when I walked the aisles that it would be sheer luck for me to find specific fabrics in a shop.

I quit looking at the fabric in self defense. You might imagine that I can get any fabric I want. That is not the case. I buy the fabric that is in my stash. Every now and then I request and get fabric from a company but that is not the norm. I prefer to shop in person at quilt shops. I buy some fabric online but colors can look different on screen. 

I design quilts and try not to be influenced by others' designs so I didn't look at quilts much either. I looked more closely at architectural details (like that above) because I can find inspiration there.

Trust me, if you don't look at fabric or quilts, you can walk market pretty quickly. I came away with the impression that clear colors are more plentiful and that there are still more pieced quilts than appliqued ones. 

I did look for new notions that would excite appliquers. I found a lovely silk needle case and an unusual scissor fob, and new needle nannies (there's a chicken that makes me smile, and I'm not that fond of chickens). I ordered a new sticky thimble that really does protect your underneath finger! I'll send a newsletter when these things come in.

I also found an amazing new lamp, the Stella. I got to try one when I taught at Aunt Mary's and was immediately sold on it. The Stella has an LED light source and is cooler than my Ott light. The LEDs are supposed to last for years without dimming.

You can change the color of the light with a finger touch from a yellowish color, to very white, and then to a bluer white. You can also adjust the brightness of the light.

The lamp itself is sleek. The desk version comes in black or white. The floor lamp is only available in white. They are not inexpensive – $220 for the desk lamp and $389 for the floor lamp but when you think about the hours/years you spend with your lamp, that doesn't seem so bad. I will make a video when mine arrives so you can see for yourself. 

I didn't say before, but Linda was at market too and we had a really nice time together. We don't get to spend time together often enough and when we do, ideas fly. We both left market inspired and ready to start on new quilts!