Our next book, Applique With Attitude, should be available in mid-May. There are some very cute quilts in this book if I do say so myself. Soon I am teaching one of the blocks from the Chirps! pattern shown on the cover of the book. Linda made Chirps! so I've been working on my own version of the quilt to travel with. I thought I'd share the process I went through as I was deciding how to set the blocks together.

I made these four blocks:

That red background is by Liesl Gibson from the City Weekend collection from Moda. It's a very nice choice for this block. Linda used the same fabric in 3 different colors for her mini-quilts.

Normally I would have chosen the sashing and border fabrics before I started the applique but this time I just couldn't get that done before I had to start the sewing. I knew I'd be able to find something, the question was what.

I really liked black and white prints with these blocks so I sashed them in b/w. Idon't know why, but this big dot really called to me for the borders.

It's way over top, more so in person. So I wondered about using a colorful print…

Interesting, but not wonderful. I had the big dot in red…

…but it was the wrong red. The little print on the right was sort of good…

…but I realized when I saw more of it that it was too busy. So I went back to black and white.

I liked this, but decided to try other prints before finalizing my choices.

What these photos illustrate very well is that there is never one 'right' way to make a quilt. Many of the fabrics I tried could have worked well and there are so many more that I didn't even consider. But what's true for you is true for me – I had to decide which of my choices I liked the best. I couldn't help it – I still liked the big black dot. This is where the quilt ended up:

I think it needs a dark binding – either black or red, probably a print, not a solid. I hope I can get it quilted before I leave for California.

Ami Sims says to try Songify for a little fun. It's an iPhone App where you speak a few phrases into your phone and it creates a techno-digitized song to fit your words. Sounds like you are singing. Kind of. Ami used it in the video below… 

The latest news from AAQI is that the 10,000th donated quilt has been or is about to be donated. You can see what's up on the AAQI facebook page. I'm so happy that quilters are making a difference in hunting for a cure for Alzheimer's.

This is what hope looks like: little periwinkles planted where they will get the full force of the Texas summer sun…

I planted 3 flats of periwinkles at my house and 2 more at Mom's. They are everywhere!

I had great luck with periwinkles last year. They fill out and flower all summer long and really can take the heat.

Mom and I went flower and shrub shopping Friday morning. After cleaning house, I spent the rest of Friday and a good part of Saturday getting everything in the ground. I have to say that I am glad to have it done! 

This is a Knock-Out Rose, above. We planted 2 of them at Mom's last fall and they are already flowering. This rose bush should grow to be about 3'-4' in both directions.

You can't really see it but I planted a lilac bush just beyond those pink salvias. It should be around 4' tall if it survives. I have not had much luck with lilacs but the man at Twin Oaks said that he had had luck with this variety. To me that lilac is the essence of hopefulness.

And here are the kids, in the pool for the first time this summer (taken last week). 

The other excitement this weekend is that I lost Mom. She didn't know she was lost – she just forgot that we had a lunch date. I've done a similar sort of thing but what she didn't know was that 3 of her good friends from OKC were coming to lunch to surprise her. The big surprise was that I couldn't find her. Luckily they were running late.

I had about 90 minutes of mounting panic. I got helpers to drive around looking for her (after I had already driven to the likely spots). I called the hospitals, the library, Target, th police… I really thought that she might have been abducted.

Lorna suggested calling the bank to see if her card had been used. I did and then three things happened almost at the same time: I finally got the bank to tell me when she had last used her debit card (20 minutes before), Mom drove into the garage, and a nice policeman showed up at Mom's front door. Mom was surprised to hear that she had been missing (and she was thrilled to see the policeman).

We did go to lunch with her friends and she had an excellent visit. I had a glass of wine with lunch and felt much better. 

What did we learn from this experience? Mom says she won't forget her cell phone any more. I will wait longer to panic. And we are both hopeful that that this doesn't happen again. 

My kids and grandkids loved the stacking cups toy by Fisher Price. Surely you've seen them – they were a simple shape and came in a stack of rainbow colors. The cups coule be stacked little to big or nested big to little? They had a pattern on the bottom that could be stamped into Play-Do. Well, those cups are gone and I have to say that the new cups are pretty wonderful.

I ran across the new Fisher Price stacking cups and had to buy one for a baby. (Remember Theo, the beautiful baby? He got a set.) I also bought myself a set because I just love these things!

They are pretty! The cups are numbered which is educational and graphically nice. You can make balls which are fun to roll. Just ask Jack who has already given my set a test run. The little yellow ball makes noise when it moves. 

The cups can be stacked and the little ball sits nicely on top.

The balls can be nested which makes this an easy toy to store – you end up with the one biggest ball and everything else inside. I have my ball out in the studio ready for those times when I just want to stack some cups or see the pretty colors :-).

We decided to have the tile on the waterfall wall next to the pool replaced. I've shown it before, it used to look like this:

The little glass tiles were lovely for a while but over the past year they have been falling off and the concrete has oozed calcium through the seams in several places. It was looking sad. This is much better: 

Mom and I were sitting out by the pool before dinner on Sunday and we spotted this cardinal high in the tree across the alley. Isn't he a stunning color against the blue sky?

And there was a monarch butterfly flitting around the lavendar against the far fence. It must not be early for butterflies because there it was – but it seems early. The bumble bees and wasps are out and about here too. 

It never got cold enough for the asparagus ferns to freeze on our front porch. I have to say that they have never looked better! They are the only plant I've found so far that can make it through the heat of the summer on the front porch. This year I'm going to try a pot or two of periwinkles – I think they might make it.

The irises are about gone, the wild roses are coming on. The pansies and kale will get pulled up soon in favor of hotter weather flowers. The trees are greening up in a serious way!

I'm enjoying the way it all looks but it's also feels wrong. I'm not mentally ready for summer to be upon us.

Spring has sprung just about everywhere. In between everything else this weekend we did a little yard work. We put cardboard and mulch in mom's flower beds and I did some weeding in my front yard. There are a few houses, including our nextdoor neighbor, who got behind in their mowing. 

Oh my. Some of the dandilions were 18" and taller and were starting to go to seed. Luckily they got mowed Saturday afternoon but I keep finding dandilions growing amoung my other plants. They hide.

I had more than one variety of dandilion – some thorny, some not. They drive me crazy because if I let them go they'll choke out the plants that I would prefer to grow. So I made several of this sort of pile:

I also have some even sneakier weeds. I'm not sure what this is, although I suspect it's some sort of sweet pea. It seems to take over overnight. It's stems are delicate which makes it hard to pull. Can you see it peeking up through my lavendar?

I planted a viburnum a couple years ago and it's finally flowering…

I'll show you some more tomorrow. If you are like me you need to get back to work!