Color Palette Challenge for March/Zentangle Challenge #64

Challenge # 64- Fortune Teller

I missed last week's challenge and if we were going by Laura Harm's time, I would have missed this week too!  But I have 10:40 PM here in Texas so hope I am under the wire!  Fun challenge...I always enjoy these!
AND......
I finally got my wall hanging pieced for the March Color Palette Challenge.  Here is a picture posted by Vicki Welsh for the challenge and the fabrics she chose for it.

And here are the fabrics I chose and the quilt I have pieced with the Disappearing 4-patch block.

My choice of fabrics from my stash.

March Color Palette Challenge 27" x 27"

So for the last day of the month I think I am caught up with the challenges I am doing....so time to start all over again!!!

studioQ meeting for March

     My favorite bunch of fiber artists...studioQ....met Monday at my house.  We have started a new challenge.  Because we are just smitten with the 12 X 12 gals, we decided to try a 12 x 12 challenge of our own.  Each month we will do a quote from something..a song..a poem..a book..whatever one of our member's decides on..as well as a technique and/or fabric choice.

    This month we were to do a quilt with the topic of "Counting Flowers on the Wall", including use of black and white polka dot fabric somewhere on the block and could use the technique of resist if desired.  I made a Smilebox  of our meeting with the challenges and some additional items.  It was so cool to see how everyone interpreted the challenge!

     If you have not tried Smilebox before...give it a try..it is fun to make up slide shows and photo albums!

A digital slideshow by Smilebox

Crystal Bridges

     This past weekend we had a wonderful trip to Bentonville, Arkansas to visit the Crystal Bridges Art Museum in the heart of the Ozark Mountains.  Alice Walton, who lives not too far from us here in Texas grew up there...daughter of Sam Walton of Walmart fame. She is a multi-billionaire who has a terrific interest in art...and even better, in sharing her interest with the public!  So the Museum which she was the force behind opened up last fall and immediately landed on our bucket list!  Bentonville is still the corporate offices of Walmart and it is the prettiest little town with some of the best restaurants I have ever dined in.

    The trip is about seven hours from here...we went with another couple who have an equal  interest in art and architecture as ours and none of us were a bit disappointed!! We traveled on Friday, went to the Crystal Bridges grounds by 9:30 on Saturday...the museum didn't open until 11:00 but the trails and grounds offered beautiful landscaping...natural and enhanced! So we took advantage of the time to roam around for a couple of hours.

A Stainless Steel tree..like one at the Modern in Fort Worth

Dogwoods in bloom on the trail

Redbud and dogwood in bloom

Crystal Bridges from an overlook on one of the trails.

Crystal Bridges from the front.

The Last Supper, created with 20,736 spool of thread, hung on chains...upside down.  To view the work of art right side up, there was a sphere to look through!!!!  Size: Huge!!!!

A closeup

     We were astounded by the art work that Alice has collected through the years...so many very famous artists and works...and the whole exhibit is open to the public for FREE!  The area got very crowded and congested before we left, but the whole experience was totally worth every second of it!  Only one damper took place Sunday morning about 30 minutes on the road...Two young does ran right out of the ditch and in front of us!  There was no way to avoid hitting at least one of them...it all happened so fast that we are not sure if we hit both of them or not...quite a bit of damage to the hood, grillwork, head lights and bumper. It will take quite a bit of work...and our friends have only had the SUV less than an year.

Working on Color Challenge

      These are like the fabric chosen by Vicki Welsh for the March color challenge.  I love the richness of these colors and I have been working on a pattern with these fabrics from my stash that I got from the internet called "Disappearing Block".  It is an easy block, but looks complicated....very fun to make!  There are several ways to put it together so in another post, I will show the one I chose to use.

My fabrics for the challenge

Working on the "Disappearing Block"

Step # 2 for Disappearing Block

Step #3 for Disappearing Block

     I wish I had noted who this block came from...I tried to go back and find the information but was not able to...so if anyone knows who should get the credit, please let me know....at least, know that it is not MY original design...I am just an admirer!!!

    Monday, my studioQ fiber arts group meets.  We have started a new challenge for the new year....started in February.  We are all big fans of the 12 x12 group and decided to do some of our own 12 x 12 challenges.  Our challenges will consist of a quote chosen by one of us (taking turns each month) with a twist and a technique.  The quote can be from anything...a song, poem, book, speech, etc. and the twist is also chosen by the same person....the technique will be drawn from a list which we developed last month.

For March, our challenge is "Counting Flowers on the Wall"...using black and white polka dot fabric with the technique of "Resist".  Should be fun...eager to see what everyone did!

Quilts Stolen

I just saw this item from Karen Combs on Facebook and wanted to share with the quilting committee and anyone else who might be in a position to help her.

Quilts Stolen....Please click on this link and read Karen's tragic story!!

Wearing of the Green

    And a Happy St. Patrick's Day to all!   They say that everyone is Irish on this day...Well, I can honestly say that I am!  At least half...my mom's mother (my grandmother) was as Irish as they come.  I never knew her...she died before I was born, but I remember Mom telling stories of her and her family of many sisters and brothers.  Family legend has it that my great grandparents met on the boat coming over from Ireland in the 1800's at the time of the potato famine and that the voyage was so traumatic for my  great grandmother that she lost all her hair. Another legend was that she was an Irish princess.  Now, I have read since that practically every village had a "king"....like the mayor...and that his daughters would be considered princesses.  But I prefer to dream that I am of Irish royalty!!  Just my vivid imagination at work!   

    I always loved these tales and would swell with great pride when we would sing out the Wearing of the Green in choir at school.  And "Danny Boy" always gives me goosebumps!  I love "Brigadoon" and  a touch of Bailey's in my coffee,   I do love the rich Irish literature...the lore of the fantasies of the Emerald Isle...so I will continue to don my green (sitting here now with my green t-shirt on even though I didn't leave the house or yard today) and share the following blessing with everyone.

  

Challenge #62-Paradox and Spiral

Challenge # 62-Paradox and Spirals

This was a fun challenge! I find the Paradox a little daunting...so I am not sure I am totally satisfied with my results on it...but I love doing spirals!  So here is my tile!

I have a new toy....my scanner is SOOOO slow, I decided to replace it.  But because the printer still works well, I didn't want to just junk the whole thing so I purchased a hand held scanner.  And I really like it!  It copies to an micro SD card and can be attached to my computer with a USB cord to download.  I copied this latest zentangle tile on it and I think it made a really clear picture.

In reading the reviews of the one I chose, one can take it anywhere and scan things...one example given was recipes in magazines in the doctor's office...or doing research in the library....I think it will be very handy!

Lots o' Birthdays!!

This year is the 100th birthday celebration for so many well-known things....The Girl Scouts were signed into being by Juliette Low one hundred years ago today.  The Oreo cookie is 100 years old this year...and the Titanic sunk 100 years ago next month.  I am sure there are more but these are what I have heard about in the last three days!

Girl Scouting has many fond memories for me...I was Girl Scout in the 1950's...my mom was one of my leaders.  Both my daughters were Girl Scouts in the 1970's and I was a leader...and my granddaughter was a Girl Scout in the 2000's!  That is three generations in our family.

My oldest daughter

Both of my daughters and me

When I was a kid, I went to Girl Scout camp one year...we had cabins, but no plumbing...latrines and cold showers...log cabins with no heat or air conditioning...  I was probably about 11-12 at the time.  There were four of us from my home town there together..good buddies!  Even though we were really "roughin' it", I remember we had a blast!!!  I was very nearsighted as a child...I remember looking out the cabin window very early one morning...really needing to use the latrine..I couldn't find my glasses and I could swear there was a bear right across the way, between me and the latrine!  So I got everyone in my cabin up to go with me...come to find out the "bear" was a very large pile of rocks and moss covered brush!  Boy, did I have trouble living that one down!!

As my girls grew, I was active as a leader with their troops...I was still not the real rugged type, but I was ok with taking the kids on trips with other moms.  This one time we had to take a nature training class before we could take the girls on an over night!  A good friend of mine and I were really beginning to wonder about the wisdom of our plan when the leader of the class...a real outdoorsy kind of gal...told us about the way to tell the difference between poisonous and non-poisonous snakes..by the shape of their eyes!!  Like we were going to get close enough to be able to tell what their eyes looked like!

Juliette Gordon Low

Juliette Low's birthplace in Savannah, Ga.

Several years ago my youngest daughter and I went to a quilting seminar with Jinny Beyer at Hilton Head, near Savannah.  While there, we took a tour around Savannah and saw the Low birthplace....bringing back many "scouting" memories for both of us.

And the last generation of Girl Scouts...at least to date...was my granddaughter at an awards  ceremony.

So...Happy Birthday to you, Girl Scouts of America!!  Oh....and also to Oreo cookies!!!

March is National Quilting Month

While reading some emails, I discovered that this National Quilting Month....and there is a website that has a pattern to honor National Quilting Day which is March 17...St. Pat will love that!!  The  site also has several patterns for the past four or five years that can be downloaded for free.  These patterns are sponsored by the National Quilting Association which has a pretty extensive website with all kinds of info.

We have company coming for the weekend so I have been a baking fool...cookies, brownies, coffee cake etc.  All things that can be frozen for later eating if not cleaned up by our guests!

And rain and cold weather are expected...no complaints...after our terrible drought of last summer we will never turn down rain!!  But looks like a lot of sitting around visiting rather than getting out!  Again, no complaints...we have a lot of visiting to do!!!

"Love Your Blog" Day

According to Lynn Krawczyk on her Facebook posting this morning, this is Love Your Blog Day...so I think I really should post something!  This week has been an interesting week Nature wise..

Monday when we were taking our daily walk, we saw literally hundreds of geese flying North!!!  As we are walking down our country road, we could hear "honking" and looking up, there was a huge flock heading North.  Then as they went out of sight, there were at least eight more flocks.

I didn't take this picture...thank you, visualphotos.com...but this is what they looked like. Most of them were much higher than this but one flock was almost this low!!  We could see their individual coloring and details.!

Right where we live, we often see the geese, loosing their "V" formation; then float around in circles, reform into a "V" and off again.  We think there must be air currents that they are taking a rest from beating their wings, as they will just glide around for a bit before taking off.  Weather often changes near us...storms break up; rains other areas are getting miss us entirely, etc.  Makes it interesting watching the changes.

Texas Bluebonnets from last year.

And today while walking, we saw that the fields across from us are FULL of bluebonnet leaves...hopefully that means we will have a flourishing crop to enjoy in a few more weeks!

Redbud trees South of our house 

And the redbud trees are starting to bloom...with such a mild winter, everything is blooming somewhat early!  Hope we don't have a surprise cold snap to nip all their little buds!

So Happy "Love Your Blog Day", fellow bloggers!  I love reading all of your entries!!

BOM-# six

BOM-# six, a photo by arts1plus on Flickr.

This is the sixth in the series of BOMs I am doing.  I think I am going to either make placemats or a table cloth out of the blocks when all are done.  My Fiesta Ware dishes are multicolored like this fabric and I can use some new mats!

We are having some marvelous early spring weather.  It is about time to get that hummingbird feeder going.  We have seen a couple of bluebirds checking out the house we have for them, but so far, I think the sparrows are keeping them away!  Even though bluebirds look fierce in some photographs, I think they are pretty passive until they get established somewhere and have a family to protect!  Then they get tough!!!