My VERY SPECIAL BIRTHDAY PARTY

There is so much I have meant to be sharing YET I seem to have lost the flare or organization skills I used to have when it comes to posting to my blog! I honestly want to and NEED to get back on track...
But for now I'd like to share about the most fabulous day EVER that my children and hubby recently gave me! July 29th was my birthday and this year was one of those years some refer to as a milestone year or is that a milestone number ;-) lol  To help me try to let the number to sink in a little and help me celebrate in a BIG WAY my kids and hubby got together and threw me an amazing wonderful birthday party! Now seeing how the hubby and I live in VA,  one of my children lives in Cranford NJ and another lives in West Chester PA we all ended up on the road to MI the same day/evening lol good ole Ohio turnpike so we could all gather to celebrate with our friends and family in the area I raised my children; Clinton Township, MI. I knew they were giving me a party but that was it! I was not allowed any details so one might be able to imagine my fears since I do have a wild imagination and add to that my older son had been teasing me unmercifully about their plans to "finally get me"....lol. We all know paybacks can be hell...lol. Well the party was beyond my wildest dreams a WONDERFUL day...so many important friends of mine came and family to help me ring in the big birthday. ;-) It was AMAZING!
My daughter created the most exceptional book, such an amazing gift from my hubby and children...so many memories and she did not miss a thing, my life so far...She must have worked hours and hours on it. Such a treasured present.

Cover of my book

one the pages about my younger years

page about my daughter Keli

one of the pages about the children and I "our family"

Final dedication page

 In lieu of gifts the invitations asked guests to bring a yard of quilting fabric for me, the fabric was to be chosen because it reminded or made the guest think of me.

One friend chose a fabric w/birds and butterflies because of my love for them, she included a matching box for me to pack my fabric in to carry back to VA.

Possibly you noticed the pointillism painting fabric refers to my art background,the dark blue in the middle of photo has silver metallic dots that signified stars to represent the many students and people I have touched during my life ;-0 (teary eyes) and dark blue MICHIGAN skies

A beautiful basket full of batiks from my sister-in-law,sadly she missed party,was out of town

just look at my stash

All these beautiful browns from Heather's mom, I know exactly what I will make with these!

Tomorrow I will try to share more......until..... ;-)

silk dyeing-pole wrapping-shibori

I've been on a roll with my quilting but I've also been having loads of fun with my color-hue dyes and silk[dharmatrading.com]. I just added more dyed scarves to my inventory ;-) technique was pole wrapping - shibori style. So here are photo's of some of the process.

silk wrapped around pole using string

silk is dyed using color-hue dyes now drying

silk is removed from pipe and rinsed and hung to dry

completed silk scarves

Now back to my quilting... ;-) Enjoy.

Learning curve....

Since my last quilt has been delivered to the special person it was created for I am guessing it is now safe to show it off  ;-)
This quilt proved to be a good example of how much my quilting skills have grown since I first began quilting. ;-) My hubby's comment; "Wow I remember when you were scared to turn on your HQ16 and look at you now!" his comment gave us a chuckle, and lol lol he was oh so true about how scared I was when I first got my HQ16.
Another thing I noticed.... "my last 3 quilts have been created without patterns and designed semi as I moved along in my process.....lol lol  
proved to be quite enjoyable!!!
I saw a post this week the question {Why do you create your art?} and I realized I find it easiest to create my art when I am creating it with someone or something in mind. Guess that would fit in with my goal oriented personality? lol But basically I create my art because it feeds my soul. ;-) How about you, why do you create your art?
Well onward to my newest quilt........
Here's some photos of the process steps taken while I was creating my latest quilt.
This quilt came about because of a special person we know that has courageously had to take on some of life's tough stuff we sometimes get hit with.
I wanted to create a special quilt for her but it had to be completed quickly!
I luckily had on hand a 'layer cake' [40-10 inch pre-cut squares for those of you who do not know what a layer cake is] so decided to come up with a very simple design using 35 of the 10 inch squares and solid white fabric as spacing strips.
As I began sewing the design together I realized some of the sizes of white strips were becoming boring or stagnant looking so decided to become friends with my seam ripper and redo some of the white strips widths. ;-) Aren't digital camera's handy to help one see design flaws?

Deciding on square placement and original strips being sewn

Black and white photo to give me an idea of lights and dark placement

Completed quilt top- if you look closely you might see the white rows alternate thick and thin, hard to notice in the photo

Loaded on HQ16 ready to quilt, but now how to quilt to try to make the simple design stand out?

Became courageous in my free motion design, used hearts in the squares and zig zag lines elsewhere, row of hearts at top and bottom row of quilt.

Possibly you can see  the stitching in the solid soft backing

Completed quilt ready to mail off

Close up of quilting

Backing is nice and soft ;-)

I admit my husband's observation was very true!  I've come a long way in my quilting skills and have enjoyed every minute of my journey.  The plus on this quilt is that I have been told the recipient loves it and my youngest son gave his approval ;-) his quote sent via a text.... "it is so soft" ;-)

Enjoy.....more catch up posting to follow soon...