“Tatay, we love you and miss you so much.” …
I am spending the weekend with friends in Hayward, but before I go, I visited my dad at the cemetery. Today was the 8 anniversary of his death. I still miss him, especially when I’ve accomplished something… whether it be something I’ve made or having a photo appear in a book or a new recipe I cooked. I wish he was here to share these experience with and hope that he’s proud of me…
I think my 4 year old great niece added a DVD to my Netflix queue again… I’m getting “The Swan Princess and the Secret of the Castle”. …
I added some garden events into my calendar:
2011 Golden Gate Chapter Scion Exchange
Saturday, January 22, 2011, 12-3 PM
First Baptist Church; 4555 Hilltop Drive; El Sobrante, CA
www.crfg.org/chapters/golden_gate/scionex.htm
Sonoma County Orchid Society
“Waves of Orchids”, Spring Plant Show and Sale
Saturday-Sunday, February 5-6, 2011
Santa Rosa Veterans Building
www.sonomaorchids.com/springSale.html
The San Francisco Orchid Society
“Natural Wonders”, the 59th Annual Pacific Orchid Exposition
March 3-6, 2011
Fort Mason Center, San Francisco CA
www.orchidsanfrancisco.org/poe.html
San Francisco Flower & Garden Show
March 23-27, 2011
San Mateo Events Center
www.sfgardenshow.com
San Francisco Epiphyllum Society Show & Sale
May 28, 2011, 10am – 3pm
San Francisco County Fair Building
affiliates.cssainc.org/san-francisco-epiphyllum-society.html
San Francisco Cactus & Succulent Society Show & Sale
Saturday-Sunday, June 11-12, 2011, 9am – 5pm
San Francisco County Fair Building
affiliates.cssainc.org/cssa-affiliate-events.html
“I bought a mini sewing machine and told my Mom that it can run on batteries. She then tells me that I can now sew when I’m in the bathroom.” …
I’ve been interested in quilting for a long time now, but didn’t take any action towards actually making one while a few weeks ago. I’ve been watching YouTube videos about quilting—mostly from the Missouri Quilt Company, who features some excellent tutorials. These got me inspired and I started looking everywhere on the internet for more inspirations. I collected a few photos from quilts I likes and narrowed them down to three quilts I want to make:
“City Scapes” by Cherry House Quilts was my favorite… but I think I will not attempt this until maybe my second or third try.
“Tokyo Subway Map Quilt” by Elizabeth Hartman is another that I like, and she offers a step by step quilt-alone that you can follow. I think I’l also make this as my second or third quilt.
“Disappearing Nine Patch Quilt” was one that I thought would be a good one to start with. It’s pretty simple, but not just a simple grid. Missouri Quilt Company offers a tutorial on YouTube. There is also a tutorial on Allison Harris’ blog Cluck Cluck Sew. I found a photo of one made by Ann-Marie on Flickr, who uses a similar color palette that I want to use… but I wanted something a little different and thought that maybe I can separate the quarters apart and divide them with white borders, similar to this lap quilt by Lynds0517 on Flickr.
I started buying various fabrics, mostly quarters. Many greens, blues and purples. I also bought various quilting supplies like a rotary cutter, various sizes of rulers and luckily I still had a self healing cutting mat from my old work that I rediscovered.
I also bought quarters of reds, oranges, grays and yellow in preparation to make the Tokyo Subway Map Quilt. Luckily Hancock Fabrics had a 50% OFF sale for the New Year, so I snagged several quarter yards and saved a bundle!!! I think I went there a total of three times to look for different colors.
So a few days ago I started cutting the greens, blues, grays and purples for the Disappearing Nine Patch Quilt. I got a total of 24 colors—three 5″ x 5″ squares cut out for each. I didn’t know how much I needed so I drafted a sketch:
I calculated that I needed a total of 162 5″ x 5″ squares to make the 88″ x 90″ quilt that I want to make. I hope I did the calculations and sizes correctly.