Fair Results

I am humbled.  I can't even begin to tell you how much.  Yesterday when I looked up the results for The Evergreen State Fair (Monroe, WA), I saw that I was a "Class Winner".  Being completely new to entering anything in a fair, I didn't know what that meant.  A friend explained to me that it meant I was a "Best In Class" winner!  Wow! Really??? Even in all my errors that I know to exist in my Jane?  After the major tuck in the back that I hand sewed down (and really, you can't even tell there is one at all now)?  The backing that is made of scraps and my "map" to the fabrics I wanted to use for the blocks?

Kevin came home from work in the late afternoon today and we decided to go ahead and go.  We went to the quilt/sewing barn first (after parking a million miles away and checking out the horses).  After initially not finding my Jane hanging, we started to walk back to the entrance again and look.

I found her.

Over the moon is the only thing I can say.  Three ribbons!!  Here is the explanation for the pink/white:


Jane and I.  She was three rows from the entrance, but facing the opposite way.


Here is a link to my finished Jane quilt album (there are also some process and block pictures as well).

And a few fair pics...

Unusual chicken:


You will probably need to click through, but what would you guess on this one? Chicken or rabbit?  These were interesting too!


Free rides


I wonder if they are buddies? The silver cow was sleeping, but I just can't see how that was even comfortable.


Before we went into the goat barn, Darrin told me goats eat anything.  'Tis true... even blue ribbons!


I want one! Spot would be great for the blackberry bushes next door :)


This photo makes me laugh:


That's my fair report.  Again, I am so happy that quilty friends urged me to go for it and enter when I got a wild hair and asked if I should.  It was beyond my expectations.  Maybe I will finish my Orca Bay for next year?

Old Post: Dec 28, 2012... a Finished Jane Top!

***Note, this is from my first blog which got overtaken by a spam virus, and I ended up shutting it down. While reading through Feedly (where I read my blogs), I discovered when clicking on my old blog (I never unsubscribed my old blog) I could pull up old posts.  I am thrilled because now I can place certain posts here and save them.  I will have this note on top of any post that is from my old blog****

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**update 8/2014: Here is a link to my finished Jane Quilt.  After encouragement from friends, I decided to go ahead and enter Jane into The Evergreen State Fair in Monroe (runs Aug 21-Sep 1).  Hopefully she at least wins a 6th place ribbon :)  I entered it as an intermediate, but I am nervous about that as this quilt includes 14yrs of skill building, meaning perfect points may not have always happened.  On top of that, this is the first time I have ever entered anything in for judging (aside from when I did 4H rabbits as a kid).  I have had quilts sent to the Houston show for special exhibit, but that wasn't judged... I think I just have something against being judged :)  When we go to the fair in a couple of weeks, I will post a fair picture of Jane.

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Today I finished up one triangle: The embroidery on the final corner: (I should really photoshop that piece of linty fabric off the block! of course I didn’t notice it until I uploaded pics). And I sewed the final border on for this: yah!! Right now it is getting ready to be pin basted. The backing, batting, and top are altogether, I just wanted to take a break for a few minutes. Pretty productive afternoon. Plus this morning I finished up my Easy Street clue 7, so I’m just waiting for Monday for the next one. I’m glad we won’t have to wait until next Friday for that. The quilt top measures about 82″ square. I am using Kona white and some scraps for the backing, along with a color swatch guide that I made about halfway through this project: I’m not sure how I will quilt this one yet. I plan to quilt in the sashings and then go back through the blocks with various designs. I thought about adding a white border and quilt a feather pattern through that, but this top is finished and this will most likely be the last update for a while (at least until the quilt is finished). ________________________________________________ ETA 12/30/12: later that night… the math seemed off, and I was right. I was off by 1000. Because that error was too big for me to just let go, I made a new block. Since I marked my block with a thin pigma pen, I couldn’t simply remove the embroidery and fix my error…. so, I tested removing pigma pen marking on another piece of fabric and was not successful. Tonight I finished applique and embroidery on my new corner and I am very pleased. I have some tails that I need to clip from the perle cotton (a variegated Valdani) since it is showing through, but at this point I am now ready to QUILT THIS BABY!

Starting the year off right, with a finish in 2013

After 14 years, my Jane Stickle quilt has come to a close.  She taught me quite a bit about sewing: hand applique, machine applique, paper piecing, you name it.  I think this quilt took me so long to do because I wasn't ready to attempt to master some of the techniques.  And let's face it, I still haven't mastered Y-seams especially.  This quilt is full of challenges.


While I have no plans for this quilt yet (too small for our bed, too large to hang on one of my walls), I am content with using it right now to sit under while watching tv or playing Candy Crush :)
A few pictures taken right after I finished:








Flowers in the basket:


And the back, I love seeing the backs with all the quilting:


If you'd like to see more pictures of various blocks and all of the triangles: Go to my flickr set here I wish I still had my other blog up so all the posts about my Jane quilt were together, hopefully someday soon I will be able to get those cleaned up and virus/spam free so I can post those. Though this quilt was a huge process for me, I am glad for the process. It stretched me and taught me. Towards the end with the quilting, I was really burnt out but I pushed through. With one day left in 2013, this project finally came to an end.

And to answer a question upfront, no, I will not make another EVEN THOUGH I have seen so many other Jane quilts in various fabrics that really sing to me. It's not happening. This chapter is closed.