Do you know how to miter a corner?

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I've been piecing more than usual lately. First it was the baby quilts, then it was the Big Fish quilt for Elanor. I needed to get the back made for the fish and I pulled some fabric I've been saving to use for a kid's quilt – from the Castle Peeps Collection by Lizzie House for Andover.

I got the center of the top (below) together before I decided that it really did not go with the fish at all. I added the dark strips top and bottom and am calling this yet another kid quilt (and I have just the child in mind for it – a nephew that never got a baby quilt!).


Castle-Top_01

Those 8" wide border strips around the center had to be mitered to look good. Mitered corners are easy to do if you know how and I do know how. I want to share what I know with you. 

I've made a new Piecing Lessons page. There are only two lessons on it for now; more will come in time. I'm hoping that if you click here the How-To Miter A Corner PDF will open. If not you can get to it from the Piecing Lessons page.

NOTE: In case you don't know, you can save a PDF to your computer from your internet browser. In mine, I go to 'save as' and save it to my computer.

There's a link on the Piecing Lessons to a video that shows how I make triangle squares. To spare you from having to click to get to it, here it is. I hope you find both of these piecing techniques useful. 

 

  

ANOTHER NOTE: We did write a book, Piecing the Piece O' Cake Way, that you may or may not have seen. It's on it's way out of print but it is available as an eBook.Click here to read more. You might find a copy in print if you hunt around the web a bit.

 


Cats…

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Did you hear about the Walker Art Center's Internet Cat Video Festival (called Apocalypse Meow in this article)? Imagine a large outdoor screen with hundreds (maybe thousands) of people in the dark watching 65 minutes of cat videos. Not just any cat videos – the videos were selected from more than 10,000 entries.

The following video won the Viewer's Choice award. 

 

Apparently Henri is famous! I think I'm not doing justice to Dave and Emma. There is not one video of them online. Or even in my camera. I don't think I'm going to tell them that they are missing out on fame. 


AAQI (and Ami) are in Women’s Day!

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Watch the news stands for the October issue of Women's Day magazine. You'll find an article about the AAQI – and Ami – on page 14.

 

Don't forget that you can buy a quilt to help fund research to find a cure for Alzheimer's. AND, coming soon, is the Celebrity Quilt Auction. I'll have more on that as it gets closer to the auction.


Welcome back, Mr. Rogers…

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I seem to be finding videos this week. I heard about this one featuring Mr. Rogers on All Things Considered last week and finally hunted it down. You may have seen it – I had not. It literally brought a tear to my eye. More than one tear — and it put a big grin on my face.

(This is the best use of Auto-Tune ever.)

 

You might also love the Bob Ross ReMix (remember his happy trees?). What the hay, here it is. More grins.

 

You might also love the Julia Child Remix. Click the link, once there you'll find other videos from NPR. 

 


Use your muscles…

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(I apologize in advance to those of you who might not want to watch a heavily muscled man in admittedly small shorts. If this is you, just ignore this post. But if you're up for it, this is really sort of amazing.)

You may already have seen this, but I had not until just a few minutes ago. It's fun to watch, but then wait a bit when the video ends. It's not over. 

Here's a tip: when you see the record button, click it, then hit some keys on your keyboard.

Old Spice Muscle Music from Terry Crews on Vimeo.

 

 

For Addyson Grace…

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No, that's not a typo. Both babies have Grace as their middle name. And their first names are 3-syllable names that start with "A". I have to stop and think before I say (or type) either name – but I don't see them often. I'll bet the members of the family that see them all the time have the names down pat. 


ButterfliesForAddyson copy

Alea, Addyson's mom, didn't have any color or design preferences. This quilt is just about the fabric. The center is a background that I had in my stash that didn't have a home. It found a home! I added borders and scattered butterflies from Applique With Attitude over the surface of the quilt – stitching them with #12 perle cotton and a running stitch.


ButterfliesForAddyson-02 copy

Addyson's name isn't appliqued on the quilt top so I quilted it in with my signature. I had fund with the quilting – combining lines and flowers. I especially like the look of the two motifs meeting in the border. I hadn't done that before, but I will do it again.


ButterfliesForAddyson-05 copy

I intentionally did not put a lot of applique on this quilt and I kept the pattern on the busy side. I want Addyson, like her cousin Annabelle, to use her quilt and love it to pieces!