Kindle Covers

One last thing, I made myself a Kindle cover and an iPad cover for my mother-in-law. I used a striped down version of Kim Walus' on Moda Bake Shop.  Didn't get a shot of Sherry's, but it was fun, too.

Twins!

My best and oldest friend, Laura, is having twin boys in a few months . . . lucky lady! She gave me what remained of her and her husband's baby blankets for their daughter a few years ago, and since I didn't have enough fabric left over to make two whole quilts, I did these window hangings for the boys' nursery. Merry Christmas!

New Modern Group Session

In February, JoyLyn Rigby and I are starting up our next 6-month session of the Modern Quilt Group. We've had a ton of fun in the last one, and I know I've learned a lot and met some really great quilters. If you're interested, check out our blog and join us! We meet one Saturday morning a month and this session you get 56 black-and-white bricks to do whatever you like with.

Fabric Chains

Don't freak out, I'm only doing this one other craft.  This one will also be demonstrated at the Modern Quilt Group on Saturday. It's fabric chains as a garland, or a wreath. I added some ribbon and trim, and if I was super at embroidery, I'd stitch what I'm grateful for on each one and do a Thanksgiving set as well.

One note about the pattern I used. It was very well written, and I noticed that  14 fat eighths + 2 yard of interfacing = 56 chains (I did 28).

Daisy Chain, Again

I gave away my Daisy Chain quilt a few years ago, and since I love anything Amy Butler, I did another one. This time I used a great aqua binding and thread for quilting in straight lines. In the process of making this quilt, I sewed strips together and they looked so fun, before I cut them into blocks I took a picture to remind myself to purposely make a quilt like this sometime.

Fabric Bowls

Linda Permann at Craftstylish has a great demo for fabric bowls. And since this month's Modern Quilt Group is about gifts using fabric, I tried it out. Look at me, all crafty and stuff! WARNING: these are addicting.

I used about 18, 3/4" fabric strips, and less than half of the $2.99 cording from Hobby Lobby. My bowl is about 4" tall. Pretty nifty gift for a budget.

Broadbent's Quilt Shop has teamed up with Builders Without Borders of Utah. Builders Without Borders of Utah takes quilting supplies, school bags and other items to Mexico each year around Thanksgiving. They teach the natives to sew and quilt for personal use so the locals can set up a cottage industry as a way to provide for their families. Their main goal is to help build homes & schools as well as home repairs.

 

What does that mean for you? They are looking for your quilting donations....

Fabric, yarn, thread, thumb tacks, needles (no batting please), any size fabric pieces, any type of fabric.

Bring your donation to Broadbent's Quilt Shop between Friday, November 4th & Friday November 11th. In thanks for your generosity take 15% off your fabric purchase at the time of donation. Donate as many times as you like. Discount off retail price and only good on day and time of donation.

doterra

The first and best thing we did for our family's health was to start using essential oils. My mother-in-law had given us some over the years, and we mostly used it to rub on Zoe's feet at night to help her RELAX!!! But then when Marshall couldn't breath at night and the mucus started taking over his lungs, my mother told me about doterra's Breathe blend. We put it right on his chest and back and within seconds his airway was opened. We diffuse it in his room on nights he's struggling and it's saved many trips to the ER.

Next I tried their Deep Blue blend, which also now comes in a lotion rub form, for my lower back, which has issues. I don't talk about them much because then they will be real. Anyway, I woke up one morning in Portland this summer with a very sore neck, far away from my beloved chiropractor, Mom rubbed some Deep Blue oil on my neck a few times during the day and my pains were gone. We also rub this on my dad's sore ol' knees at night and now he walks around asking where the rub has gotten to. My 73 year old, born in the '30's, old school I'm not trying anything new much less your weird oils, dad.

We were putting Mederma, a scar medication, on Rory's forehead scar from 8 stitches this summer, and he started getting these little, hard white bumps where the stitches had gone in and out. So I ditched that and started rubbing Frankinsense right on it and the bumps dried up and fell off, and his scar is going away!

I could go on and on about these oils and how they've changed our lives. Their immune system oil is so good for my kids who live in a petrie dish at school. I diffuse it while they're eating their afterschool snack and make them take a drop on their tongue each morning and I hope I'm not jinxing myself, but we haven't gotten sick once! I rub Serenity blend on our feet at night or on Paul's when he's stressed out from work and he melts and we sleep better.

There is so much more to these oils than I have gotten into: cooking, cleaning, etc, that my kinesiologist Stefanie is going to come over and give my family a mini-class about how we can use the oils in different ways and if you are interested in hearing more about them, or trying them yourself, please come! It will be the Tuesday night before Thanksgiving. Very informal, just educational. And life changing.

Chemical Free Home Please!

I posted earlier that my youngest has had a rough three years until his parents could clue into his allergies. We're still working everything out, and going to an allergist finally next week (yay!), but in the meantime, chemicals have been his worst nightmare. We haven't taken him to nursery at church and took him out of preschool until we can get his immune system built back up to where it can beat the chemicals in the everyday world. In the meantime, we're trying to make home a chemical free haven. No small feat for our small feet.

One thing I love about these chemical free products is how much better they work for our bodies. We are healing in so many new ways and my awareness of the harmful environment we build for ourselves is growing. Plus, so many of these products replace two or three other products, so less bottles in the cupboard.

The best thing we have done is replace body lotion with coconut oil. I know what you're thinking, Kristin's lost it. She's rubbing cooking oils on her kids. And myself too! I pushed away from trying this one the most, but so many people recommended it that I caved. And I'm so glad I did. This time of year, extra virgin organic coconut oil is in its solid state, a bit like Crisco, but it will melt the moment it touches your skin. It smells nice, you don't smell like coconut all day, and my skin is the softest it's ever been. My face doesn't tolerate it daily, so I use a different product for face only.

So here are some products that we have tried and loved since August. (Not all products we tried were loved, but these are the good ones.) If you have a chemical replacement need that I haven't listed, let me know and I'll tell you where we're at with that one. And I'm still new at this one, so if there's a product I listed that has something bad in it, let me know. I'm learning too!

For the body:

• Shampoo: Avalon Organics - I use their lemon and the kids love the peppermint
• Body soap: Dr. Bronner's - can't use in a pump, so I just use it in shower/bath and to remove my make up. We've tried Tea Tree and Lemon and I love the lemon. Extremely concentrated, one drop is enough for my face. It also comes in bars if your man is like mine and has to have a bar in the shower (no foofy gels for him!). We are also trying some goat's milk bars I found at Whole Foods.
• Shaving cream: pure aloe vera - Paul even uses it for his face and loves it and that man's got sensitive skin!
• Face cream: Answers From Nature Botanical Moisture Creme - say that three times fast! Very expensive, but very pure and I love it.
• Toothpaste: Spry w/o flouride - my teeth feel much cleaner longer, and some of the kids like a fruity flavor so we're doing Animal Parade's teeth gel.
• Make-up: I'm using Bare Escentuals right now and really loving it - even their powdered foundation, which if you know me, is really saying something.
• Lip Balm: Dr Bronners or doterra - once you get over sticker shock on this one ($3-4 each), you'll take better care of your lip balm and it will take better care of you!

For cleaning:

• Getting germs outta here: GSE (Grapefruit Seed Extract) - this comes very concentrated, as most natural products do, so I diluted it 10 drops:32 oz spray bottle and I use it on knobs, light switches and high traffic counters to kill germs. We also put a few pure drops into Marshall's shampoo to help his dry scalp.
• Dishwasher soap: biokleen powder - no streaks or smudges and still gets the crud out every bit as well as the Electrosol did
• Laundry soap: Ecover - let me tell you, this has been the biggest change. Our clothes are now SO SOFT (we quit dryer sheets) and the first few loads there was so much lint it almost blocked my dryer tube. It cleans the clothes so much better than the others.
• Stain remover: Bac-Out - I bought the concentrated and diluted in a spray bottle, but you can also buy it already diluted in a spray bottle
• Neosporin replacement: Nutribiotic First Aid Skin & Wound Spray - we have been using this like crazy. It works on burns, it cleans cuts, it helps insect bites (converted my dad this way). It's the same company that produces GSE so it's great in so many ways.
• Windex: I'm using Paul Arnett's window cleaner right now, mail order only, but I tried Earth Friendly Products' version at my parents last week and loved it.
• Stainless cleaner: method Steel For Real - love that it's in a spray bottle, was using a powdered paste that took forever to clean with.
• Jetdry Dishwasher Rinse Aid: Earth Friendly Products WaveJet
• General counter cleaner (think 409): biokleen All Purpose Cleaner - this product is so great. Dilute it in a spray bottle for counters, or mop tile with it.
• Hardwood cleaner: Murphy Oil Soap - used it before, and it's still good to use now
• Dish Soap (Dawn): This was a hard one. They use Dawn to clean the oily birds when they're stuck, but we went with Seventh Generation's Dish Soap. I like it, and will try Earth Friendly Products' version next.
• Toilet bown cleaner: Seventh Generation - I like this line for any cleaning product, but Marshall has since tested slightly high on this line for some reason, so we'll try other things too.
• Hand sanitizer: EO lavendar hand sanitizer

Wow! Now that I sit down and list all of them, no wonder I'm so tired lately! It's been a lot of mental energy and trips to various health food stores, but I can tell you, it was worth it! This list is two months of work, so don't be overwhelmed. I did it all quickly to save a family member's health, but if you want to get into this, and out of chemicals, try replacing something you've used up with something new and chemical free until you've changed the air and feeling in your home. Then you'll know it was all worth it.

Thank you Pinterest!

Erica pinned this cute idea online, and I totally copied it today. I needed some time to quilt and didn't want to added guilt of turning on Shawn the Sheep to get it done. The kids LOVED it, and added three more parking garages and a helicopter pad. Plus, any toy lasts longer when the Disney Children's Station is blaring from Pandora in the background.

Local Quilt Retreat

My childhood friend, Pamela, is organizing a quilting retreat next month right here in Lehi, Utah. It will be two days of open quilting, with one class, a trunk show, and a bird's eye review of Quilt Market this fall. I will be spending most of the two days there, and would love my quilty friends to join us! The food will be fabulous, and it's always fun to see what others are doing. Check out her blog for all of the nitty gritty.

Salt Lake Temple

I'm holding my breath on this next project. Earlier this year I saw this darling bunny online, and wanted to try my own turn at it. But I didn't know what shape to use. I finally settled on the Salt Lake Temple, shmultzy, I know. That's why I'm holding my breath. Since it's going to be such a monster of a project (if you can say that about a temple), I thought I'd chronicle my progress along the way.

This week I found a sillouette I like, and had it enlarged to fit on my 44x60" slate background.

Next I used an exacto knife to cut it out.

Then I ironed Steam-a-Seam to the back of some Kona snow, and traced my temple onto it.

And finally, for this week I cut out the white, ironed it onto the slate, and did a blanket stitch on my machine all the way around it.

I drew the windows and doors onto the white from the template, as well. The idea is to use bright, modern fabrics in little pieces to make a mosaic all over the white background, so very little of it will be showing. I think I'll do all of the round windows the same flower, the doors the same brown, and so on, to make it calm and consistent.

Whenever that's done, and I'm in no hurry, I'll border it with words; either the eight Young Women's values, or a cool temple quote from one of the General Authorities. Wish me luck!

Frayed Raw Edge

I needed some quick quilts to donate to our elementary school's fundraiser, so I did a boy and a girl frayed edge quilt. Here are the results. Couldn't bring them to Broadbent's Modern Quilt Group, because I had to turn them in before our meeting.

To see the show and tell of our group, check out our group on flickr.

Fabric Sale

Once again, Muriel Cook is selling her fabric samples out of her garage. If you've never gone, it's a treat. Here's the details:

11086 N. 5650 W. Highland
Sat Oct 15 8am-1pm
Mon Oct 17 930am-12pm & 430-8pm
Tues Oct 18 1130am-1pm & 530-7pm

Jelly Roll 1600

Have you done a Jelly Roll 1600 yet? They are so fun. Once again, Peggy let me on to this fun quilting idea. You need a jelly roll (or 40, 2.5" strips). You sew all of the strips into one loooooong strip, like binding, and then you bring the two ends together and start sewing along the long way. There's even an edited video of a quilting group racing to see who could complete theirs first on Heirloom Creations' blog. It took me over an hour, and their winner was around 35 minutes - amazing!

We snapped the pics in the setting sun, so it's even more orangy than in person. The binding is incomplete, so that I can demo it in our Modern Quilt Group next month. I used oranges from my stash. Broadbents has kits for $29.95 of a really clever Halloween medly JoyLyn Rigby put together.

Pinkalicious

Talking about art in books creeping into our lives, I took a fun picture of Zoe the other day in pink-pink-pink and sent it to my mother, who watercolor paints. Here is what she was musing in the night. I love it and wanted to share.

The Art in Books

We have piles of books distributed around the house, lest you think quilts are the only thing we do excessively here. Childrens books are so much fun, I'm going to miss them during that high school phase, before we move on to grandkids. And some childrens books have really terrific color palettes. Saturday in our Modern Quilting group I brought two of my favorites, along with a stack of solids that matched the books, to show that you can get quiltspiration out of things in your daily life as well.

I'm a big believer in color. If there's a color you love to wear, there's a reason for it. If there is a home dec panel, or season of nature's colors, or picture book that you are drawn to, I think you should go with it. Colors do mean so much to our health, and it might be that your body is needing more green or orange in your life.

So the first book I am going to quilt like is Caps For Sale, by Esphyr Slobodkina. The story is really terrific (every parent of a three year old should read it often), and I have always loved the author's color choices. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with these, but I just love looking at these colors in a fabric pile.

The second book is appropriate for this time of year, The Ugly Pumpkin, by Dave Horowitz. I love the story in this book, too. And this is a harder book to talk about in fabric colors online because there is truly so many great colors in this book, used in such a modern way. This pumpkin is rejected at every turn because he's misshapen, until at the end he realizes, "OH MY GOSH I'M A SQUASH!" I love it.

And this last pile was just me getting carried away. I think we all should have third yards of lots of solids in our stash.

Why Marshall Hated Tuesdays

I am from Oregon. Having said that, I will also say that I do shave my pits, I don't own a tie dye t-shirt, and I don't ride a bike everywhere (but I wish I did). However, lately I have been getting back to my environmental roots, thanks to my three year old son, Marshall. Marshall has been sick for two-thirds of his little life. He gets RSV, then bronchitis, then pneumonia, then RSV again. And his skin, particularly on his legs and wrists is shredded. We've been told he has asthmatic lungs and eczema. We live in Utah. That was the answer. But it wasn't.

I have wrung my hands over this child's poor health. And the long nights of short breaths clogged with mucus. And then allergies popped into my head. We had him tested for our cat, and bingo. He was dramatically allergic to the member of our family who's been around longer than all of our children. So we loaded up the next week and drove the cat to live in Portland with my parents. Problem solved? Oh no.

The allergist was booked until November, so we consulted a naturopath my mother-in-law Sherry uses in Colorado while we wait for the full test panel to be done. She did testing on Marshall's hair and discovered he has a very high chemical sensitivity. So I sent little baggies with every chemical in our house to be tested against Marshall. Toothpaste, shampoo, hand soap, laundry soap, dish soap, flouride tablets, daily vitamins, mopping solution, even a feather from our chickens just in case. And guess what. He's allergic to all of it except the chickens and vitamins. Bah!!!!

So Sherry, who has chemical sensitivities herself, gave me her book, Why David Hated Tuesdays, by Amilya Antonetti. This mother had a son with a dramatic case of chemical and environmental allergies, and she gives steps to help you rid your home of damaging chemicals and toxins. Her son hated Tuesdays because that's the day she would clean her house and he would get sick. Same situation here, once I paid attention to the patterns.

I am learning so much. I take the book in small chunks, because I've been focusing on many trips to the health food store, and I'm trying not to turn into OCD Howie Mandell. We've got just about everything replaced now. Even organic pillows and towels. And still, Marshall has specific things that set him off that I haven't discovered yet. Molds was also very high, and I suspect our trampoline is adding to his woes, but seriously! A kid's got to be a kid!

Stay tuned in future posts where, if you're interested, I'll let you know about the products we're using now and how I like them. I think this is a huge blessing in disguise for our family, because we are all benefiting from getting rid of the anti freeze in our shampoo. And I did go into the health food store and have the gaul to ask the granolas about deoderant. There's an oxymoron here somewhere and I feel like it's me!

Peacock

Sometimes there's a terrific fabric that jumps out at me and I think, wow, I really love that, but I don't know how I'll ever use it. I used to be better at letting myself buy this kind of fabric. This quilt is Exhibit A. I've been really trying to use my stash, and I pulled this Alexander Henry piece out. This is what I ended up making. It was so much fun! (I say that a lot, sorry.) So I would encourage you to A: buy that random piece of fabric that screams to you, and B: have fun with solids.

Silas Marner, by George Eliot

I am an English major who graduated without reading a single George Eliot book. And I'm a woman, even worse. I should have studied her extensively, but since she got sorta lumped in with Jane Austen in my mind, I skipped her all together. But oh not for long. My book group put that to rest for me. I have just proudly finished Silas Marner (who I always thought was pronounced Mariner, what a dud!), and I have to say, for a well written book of 183 pages, she sure took her sweet time getting going.

This book was written in the 1860's, and her writing style took some getting used to, as I've given 19th century British lit a rest for over a decade. But eventually characters are developed, and eventually there is a plot. And I did like it. The ending was a bit expected, but maybe it was new and shocking for that time period. A lot has been written since then, and this may have been the reason. It will make for a good discussion, and I almost want to see Paul Giamatti play Silas in the movie.

Red Tumblers

Thanks to Peggy and McKell for this quiltspiration. They did scrappy tumblers quilts recently that I fell in love with (which always happens when I go into Peggy's Craft Room). My red bin keeps growing, but very few of the fabrics that ended up in there are usable in my more modern quilts of late. Or red at all, sadly. So here's my solution. So fun to do.

I'm a bit overzealous about this straight line quilting. I like how my quilts feel when finished and washed. They're softer and the batting can fluff up more, if that even makes sense.

Also, we had a lot of fun at the Broadbents Modern Quilt Group meeting Saturday. Check the blog to see what we did. Pictures of the many, terrific class members' versions of Stacked Coins are in the works.

P.S. Hooray for Downton Abbey's wins at the Emmys last night!!!

9/11 Anniversary Tribute

I finished my Random Reflections quilt, and it looked more like a big city skyline to me, maybe because of the fabrics I used. Plus, I added an extra row to make the quilt finish a rectangle. That was last week, as everyone was preparing for 9/11. And don't you know it, life slipped into my quilting again. I love it when that happens, because quilting seeps into my life only too often.

I decided to make the Twin Towers in one row, as a tribute to the tenth anniversary of that day. I was here in Utah at work, Paul was at BYU, and two of the executives I worked for were in New York City running. Their cell coverage was intermittant and we were all so worried. But my biggest memory of that week came on Friday when we had a national day of mourning and President Bush had a religious service from the National Cathedral. (A far cry from this Sunday's "let's not invite any clergy so no one is offended" garbage.) At work we all went to the conference area to watch it on a small tv. When the congregation stood and started singing The Battle Hymn of the Republic, everyone in our office stood of their own accord and started singing in beautiful voices. I was so moved by the people I worked with. I wish our country could regain that faith and collective belief again today, without another explosion to force it on us.

Brush Strokes

I've seen these graduating color value quilts online a ton and I've wanted to try my hand at them. I knew what Paul would say. "I couldn't do that with a gun to my head." And he's right. I barely did it. It was more difficult than I thought, but a great stash buster. I did 8.5" strips. It might just drive me a little crazy, because the more I look at it in different rooms, and in this picture for example, I would like to switch a few around. But that's not life and so I will just enjoy what I did and move on.

The Ruff Ruffman Party

I'm of the mind that children should be allowed to do crazy things with their parents while they're young, in the hopes for mellow teenagers not addicted to Wii. Wish me luck. With that goal in mind, we really enjoy birthday parties at our house. This year my daughter got to have her first one and since she wanted Rapunzel, Paul and I spent over an hour weaving a 12 foot yellow yarn braid. At one point it was so frustrating he tried flipping them across each other like the little girls in the movie. Note: did not work at home. We hung the braid from our treehouse and the darling guests got to take turns telling Rapunzel to let her hair down, and then we attached candy to be hauled up. Good time was had by all.

Fast forward two years to my son's birthday last weekend. He's a smart kid. He figured out if you invite the entire neighborhood, girls and boys, you get more gifts. I figured it was ok because in a few years we'll be at the two-friends-at-Boondocks stage and then teenage years, and I can't think about it or else I won't get to sleep tonight.

He has a really terrific, and did I say LARGE, group of kids his age here. And having them over is fun and exciting and in this case, explosive. PBS' Fetch! With Ruff Ruffman is his favorite show, and he wanted a Ruff science birthday. So we spent an hour and a half trying to get Ruff to realize his lifelong dream of flying without an airplane. We fizzled liquids in cups with baking soda, alka seltzer, and coke and mentos. Then we tried launching Ruff into the air taped to peanuts. (I chose peanuts because the Jays love them and I don't have to clean them up.) Great ideas from Ruff's website at PBSkids.org. Finally, we all decorated our own rockets with really cool duck tape and launched them over the tree tops with a borrowed pvc and bike pump launcher from the Scout trailer. I think the kids just barely outscreamed Paul each time one was launched.

I have to say, it was tons of fun. Everyone brought the nicest gifts and we're so grateful to live in this place where everyone is welcome and everyone likes to have fun. And fortunately, I'm good for another two years.

BBC and me!

I've gone over to the dark side, and by dark side I mean that island we fought to be independent from. That's right, I'm a BBC junkie. In my defense I think that doesn't mean what it used to. Don't get me wrong, there are still plenty of US shows I do like (Blue Bloods and CSI top the list). However, I am finding myself getting sucked into more and more BBC programming. It probably began with Planet Earth, which led to History of Art and that one about England by century (which wasn't as boring as it sounds). But then the tv shows (don't worry, I'm not calling it a "telly" yet) pulled me in. Here is a list of the best BBC shows I would highly recommend, in no order whatsoever. After all, I am an American. Netflix even has some of them on instant play.

1. Lark Rise to Candleford
2. Foyle's War
3. Downton Abbey
4. Monarch of the Glen
5. Inspector Lewis
6. Sherlock
7. The Last Enemy

Love, Stargirl

I wish I had been brave enough to rename myself in high school. I don't know what it would have been, but I admire Stargirl for doing it.

I finished Love, Stargirl, by Jerry Spinelli yesterday. I have to say, I liked it better than the first one. It read like a really fun movie. Her family has moved to Pennsylvania and a new life ensues. Spinelli developed new characters deeper than the first book, and they were more interesting to me. Stargirl had grown a bit from her experience in Arizona at public school. And there was more about her parents, but just enough to make me want to read a book from their point of view. Maybe Raising Stargirl, or Stargirl's Net. 

Coming from someone who is not generally observant, I love how observant Stargirl is of her surroundings. How brave she is in helping others and showing compassion. Just last night my neighbor's, a young single mother, father fell from her roof (he's ok now) and the paramedics and fire came. All of us stood in front of the house wondering what was going on in the backyard, hoping it wasn't her young son who had been hurt, and daring each other to invade her privacy and go check it out. I took a deep breath, thought of Stargirl, and marched into the backyard. My neighbor was glad I was there, she needed someone to hold her up. And now we're closer. Thanks, Stargirl.

Random Reflections in Progress

Hello friends! A quick update on our Modern Quilt Group at Broadbents. Our first meeting was last Saturday and it's not too late to join us. We had a great time and some new members even brought what they're doing to show us! I loved it. I think this will be a great group. If you'd like to see more about what we did, check out our blog and this earlier post I did.

One quilt I'm working on for this class is from Moda Bake Shop's Random Reflections quilt. I'm loving their blog because great quilters online are being enlisted to make wonderful tutorials for quilts of their own creation. There are several I love, this is just the start. This is a line of Japanese fabric called Coccinelle that I bought in Sisters, Oregon a few years back. It will have two more rows before I'm finished. At first it looked almost Reproduction Civil War-ish to me, but I've added some solids and pretended it's modern. I'm really liking the way it's turning out. It reminds me of a city skyscraper scene.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

Tracey put me on to this amazing book and I'm so glad I read it. (Note: I do not enjoy every book I read, nor do I finish all of them. I used to force myself to, but not anymore. So I don't mention the ones I didn't care for, lest you think I'm not picky and will read anything and love everything.)

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, by Rebecca Skloot, is the true story of the black woman in the 50's who unknowingly "gave" some of her cancerous cervical cells to science, which became the famous HeLa cells, and changed the face of medicine. Her cells have been used in the polio vaccine, shot into space, blown up in nuclear bombs, led to IVF, and many, many other breakthroughs. But for many years, her family had no idea what was being done. And the world didn't know the story of HeLa, and Henrietta Lacks' life. Skloot has taken a decade to research and interview anyone and everyone involved, and has written a touching story of great importance. Her story covers four areas: what we know of Henrietta's life and death (a beautiful story in and of itself), her cells' contribution to science, her family's struggle with finding out decades later, and the author's own journey to gather all of this information. I think this is a very important book for anyone to read, especially women.

In the first half, when the author tells us about Henrietta's life of love and service, and her awful spiral into death by cancer in the early 50's, I found myself very attached and emotional. Cancer is a terrible thing. And since our own lives have been impacted by IVF lately, I am so grateful for the work done by science and these cells to help us all.

Song of the Sparrow

Ever since Anne of Green Gables, I have loved The Lady of Shalott. I guess there was some drama Anne-style in me as well, because that scene was memorable for me. I remember when I was in England on a college trip and I saw John William Waterhouse's version in the Tate Gallery, I was captivated. So when I found out a young adult fiction writer had written a novel about the lady of Shalott before her famous boat ride, I jumped on it. Song of the Sparrow, by Lisa Ann Sandell, is a beautiful book written in prose. My eyes flew over her thoughtful lines and I really enjoyed reading this treasure. It's a book about struggle and family and friendship and new love. The kind of new love that was always there in front of you. This is one of my new favorite young adult fiction works and Sandell deserves all accolades coming her way.

The Greater Journey, by David McCullough

In this latest book by David McCullough, you can see how he must have been drawn to this topic by some of the research for his other books. This one reviews famous Americans who lived, studied, and passed through Paris during the 19th century. A well written book about one of my favorite cities, I learned so much about the history of a beautiful and complex city. I learned interesting stories about fellow countrymen I had only heard of vaguely, and some I had not heard about at all, pity me. Where was my education? Sometimes I wonder if I slept through all of the important parts. In true McCullough style, the book is very readable, knowledgeable, and even inspiring. I highly recommend it. Chalk full of American heroes that we could use today!

Lego meets Quilting

I'm not sure who put this pic on the web, but I'd love to credit the mom behind the brilliance!

Jeans Quilts

My mother's bucket list included one jeans quilt for each of her children. There are four of us. After we got done doing all four last week during a visit to Portland, I told her I'm glad she didn't have five children. She had saved 3-4 totes full of jeans from the 60's through the 90's. I have to say the older ones were cooler. Gap jeans from my era . . . super boring. Not even creative stitching colors. We ended up tying all of them, both because I wanted my children to have the experience of crawling under the quilt and helping, and because I was worried about how my long arm would take the thickness.

Three of the four designs were completely my mother, I just did what she wanted. It was fun to quilt with her, I don't think I've ever done that. She was a very good seamstress in her earlier days, my sisters even claim to have had to wear homemade undies.

Stargirl, by Jerry Spinelli

I've recently reread Stargirl, by Jerry Spinelli. What a treat. This YA novel is about a high school in Arizona that is too much the same, everywhere. Enter Stargirl, the homeschool girl who has just come up for air. She plays the ukelele, she shows up at strangers' funerals, she hauls a tablecloth and fresh flowers to decorate her desk in each class. She's different. And sweet. And innocent. The story is told from a young boy's perspective, which I loved, who has a crush on Stargirl. What's a high school to do with someone who doesn't fit in?

It takes me back to my own high school days. I grew up in Portland, the land where people who don't fit in move to. There was a group for everyone, and even the loners felt like a group. I look back on the experience and cringe. I've learned so much since then. I hope they all have, too.

My favorite part in Stargirl is when she takes Leo, the narrator, to her home. In her room she has a small wagon on a shelf with ten rocks in and around it. She explains that when she feels sad, she takes a rock out. When she's happy, she puts one in. At that point, it was an eight-rock life. I love this idea. It reminds me of the Caribbean worry dolls. You put your worries on a little piece of paper in this little pouch that also contained little voodoo looking dolls, and they would worry for you, so you didn't have to.

Zipper

I thought I was doing so well at clearing out older fabrics in my stash, until I was showing this latest one to Paul and the Great Diplomat casually asked me how many more "older" sets of fabric did I still have to do. We got counting, I got embarrassed, and I don't know that I'm going to be buying any new kits anytime soon. . . I keep all fabric in one cupboard in our office, so I know it can't be THAT bad, because there's still room in there. However, that may be a little like saying you have money left to spend because there's still checks in your check book, I don't know.

This is Zipper, by Weeks Ringle & Bill Kerr in their Modern Quilt Workshop book. It's on the cover, and I fell in love with it. Four years ago we went to Sisters, Oregon, on the way to see my parents, during the city's quilt show. (See Paul pushing the stroller behind the other tourists.) It was so much fun, and the local quilt shop, Stitching Post, had done up these kits for the Zipper quilt. Naturally I have one more set of fabric from that trip, maybe I'll get to that this year finally, too. 

Every building was dripping with quilts. It was sensory overload for sure. And so hot! I know I had some pictures with my sister-in-law and my niece, but I can't find them of course. My mother and Maren drove to meet us and that was nice, too.

Katie Jump Rope

Finally I've gotten to this pile of fat quarters. And I'm so glad I did! What wonderful fabric. This is Katie Jump Rope, by Denyse Schmidt, using American Jane's Popsickle Posies pattern. I had enough fabric to do double the amount of flowers, and then I left her borders off. I bound it in solid black.

I have some good size rectangles left of each fabric from the line, and I will be giving it away during a Broadbent's Modern Quilt Guild meeting.