Seasons quilt…. Not in nature but in life and friendship

I ask quilters to name their quilts, mainly as a title to my blog and told this quilter to get creative and I think the name suits the quilt.  Most quilters simply give me the name of the pattern or technique, which is fine too.

This quilt got to me during load shedding and there it was on my dining room table staring at me with my hands being tied without electricity.  Once that was over, it was time to prepare hubby’s lunch, put the parrot to bed for her afternoon nap and then the kids had load shedding in their area and came over.

This poor quilt had to wait for another day which did not go much better than the first, but I got it loaded and whenever I could, quilted a couple of straight lines I love the texture these wider lines gave the quilt.

I do not have any quilts coming in this week, as far as I know, and occasionally that is good too.  It gives me time to focus on other areas in the house that needs my attention.

Disappearing 9-patch

Another rather busy week behind us, starting with our youngest grandchild turning 3 but holding her birthday party for 3 days.  If this is established as a family tradition, I can have my birthday next year for the whole of June and July.  Sadly, I do not have a mother who would organise and pay for the venue and treats and I do not think my family and friends would appreciate bringing me gifts for two months.

On Wednesday we had a day loaded with appointments and just when I got home, thinking I could start working, it would be interrupted by load shedding.  These are killing me and if only our municipality/government would stick to the routine, it be one thing but to shut all electrical appliances off, just to see that there is no load shedding, is frustrating.  Can the peace be trusted or will someone after a while realise their mistake and switch it off then?

I had yet another disappearing 9-patch to quilt and I think this must have been the third one this year.  The quilter wanted edge-to-edge quilting and I dug up an older motif I frequently did on my own quilts, just on a much smaller scale as back then I quilted on my domestic machine.

Table runner

Next on my frame was a rather long table runner.  Different fabrics were used and then the quilter used embroidery floss to make large-scale patterns with thread on some of the material.  I am sure this technique has a name I sadly cannot remember now.

Not to kill the hand stitches with quilting I only stitched in the ditch of some of the fabric touching each other.

Disappearing 9-patch

This lovely batik in Autumn colours kept me busy for the first part of the week and what a week it was.

One of the first friends I made when we moved to Bloemfontein in 1987 went to visit her kids in Mauritius, contracted gastro, and thought it was over when she, one morning, couldn’t move properly and had double vision.  She is now still in ICU over there diagnosed with Guillain Barré syndrome.  The doctors took her cellular phone away, her husband could only get a flight for tomorrow and it is absolutely frustrating to sit on this side having no means of finding out how she’s doing.

I find quilting distracts me from constantly worrying and wondering about her.  Quilting this beauty did just that.

Shwe-shwe circles and squares

 Word underlined the word Shwe-shwe as incorrectly spelt but this is the name of 100% South African cotton and I am in love with the vibrant colours.  I got this one earlier in the week but with it being the school holidays the little ones spent quite some time with us.

On Tuesday my daughter took me to the local art festival where we shopped way too much but also got some divine traditional South African food.

Thursday, I went with the two moms, all the grandkids, and a friend to Jumpers Lane where the little ones could spend the day on the trampolines and in the water.

Got another quilt this week but the backing was too small and now I am waiting for a new backing from the quilter.  I however got to finish this quilt

Checkerboard quilt

Having deliberately decided not to quilt on Monday and Tuesday last week, I got up to date with cleaning and even cooked suppers ahead.  The only quilt expected arrived after hours on Wednesday thus I had the whole day all to myself with no urgent matters to attend to, I decided to make the most of this day off, prepared myself a plate of Jalapeno poppers, poured some wine and read a rather disturbing book suggested by my daughter.

Got the quilt but being hubby and my time didn’t load or started it.  Thursday DIL taught her last class at school for the term and invited me to celebrate it with her with cocktails and yes, more Jalapeno poppers.

Friday evening SIL phoned to say he had a lambs’ rib and wants to come over if I can prepare something to go with it, which I obviously did.  How can one refuse rib?

I decided to add a hint of blue to the guest bathroom, no painting but just in the décor with towels, bath fizzers, gel, lotions and whatnot but I simply could find a blue plate that suited my needs.  All I could find were plates with definite patterns on them and I get bored with them.  I wanted something abstract.  My dearest daughter said, if I give her a glass plate, she will decorate it for me.  The plate I gave looked like this.

Once done, just what I imagined.

We had the grandkids over the whole weekend, not all of them together but in sessions but somewhere in between I got the edge-to-edge quilting done on this quilt.