Making Labels, Taking a Class

Yesterday I went to the Valley Oak Quilt Guild lecture, given by Sue Rasmussen. Good stuff. And wow, talk about parallel lives. It was almost scary. We both learned to sew on a Bernina bought at a county fair, both went to UCDavis as pre-vet students in the late 70's, switched majors, took up quilting, took a Ruth McDowell class at Asilomar that was life-changing, etc., etc. And we're both named Suzanne. Almost creepy - in a not-scary kind of way. :)

Anyway, Sue Rasmussen's work is AWESOME, and I was looking forward to today's landscape class with much anticipation. To pass the time last night, I made some more labels. This picture shows you the steps, from embroidery hoop to quilt. Notice that the lettering needs a lot of clean-up. But I still find it to be the best way to keep track of what quilt has been where...

This is a picture of Sue, holding her class sample. I made her show her face, none of this peering over the edge stuff. What I didn't tell her was that it was going to be posted. Hope you don't mind!!! You look great!

Most of the day was spent picking fabrics and cutting out pieces, but we made a lot of progress. I did not bring enough fabric, that's what happens when I leave it until the last minute. But, I knew I had plenty of stash at home. hmm. I thought I took a picture of my project, but apparently I didn't. I'm going to have to post it at another time. Instead, here are some of my classmates' projects.

work by Betsy Peterson and Patty Nunes

work by Ann Hinman

work by Dyanne Cox and Delores Murch

Finally, here's one more picture of Sue, teaching her favorite students. They were the ones whose machine worked, whose bobbin was in correctly and whose pins were not bent. (That would be an inside joke for those of you attending class. Let's just say that my pins were not up to snuff and are now in the trash bin. sigh. I had a new box of pins at home, too bad I didn't bring them with me...)

On the way home, I had to pull over and take a picture of this amazing collection of egrets. They were hanging out in a ponding basin. (For those of you who don't live in the valley, this collects rain water to replenish ground water as well as prevent flooding.) Anyway, there were three times the number birds when I pulled over, and I couldn't figure out why they decided to take flight. If you click on the photo to enlarge, you will see that 4 ducks have arrived...apparently they are pretty intimidating. Who would have guessed? quack quack.

And there you go, a quick overview of the past 24 hours. My weekend goal is to finish at least one quilt-for-hire and then move along to one of the baby quilts. So much to do, so little time...