No Snow? It's a Go Slow Sunday.....

Well, will it snow today or not?  I was up at 4:30 this morning, with my mind racing several different ways about quilts, cooking, kids, things I needed to do.  I got on the computer about 5:00 a.m. and decided to download a program I'd been reading about...QuiltAlbum.  It's an organizing program for quilt records.  I've been taking pictures of my quilts pretty faithfully since I got my digital camera in 2005.  My girlfriend Nancy and I even got out all the quilts in my collection last May and photographed them and recorded dimensions, why I made it, and the like.  But that information can just languish if you don't get it into some organized form.

I think this program will do the trick.  It's easy to use, easy to manipulate, and I'm getting the hang of it quickly.  Here's an example of what one of the printed pages looks like:

Coupled with the photo scanner my kids gave me for Christmas, I actually think I can get some of this information saved for posterity.  I can print out all the information and put it into a notebook.  The import function is a piece of cake, and it's a lot more intuitive than blogging, for example.

While I was scanning through my quilt pictures, I came across a few quilts and things I made over the years for my Mom.  Here's a picture of the wall-hanging I made for her many, MANY years ago (maybe 1969?)  It's the Irish Blessing embroidered for my very Irish mother, Hazel Skelly.  It took me months to finish this.  Mom kept it hanging, in a cheap wood frame, in her living room.  I brought it home with me after we cleaned out her apartment last year and hung it in our guest bedroom.





I also found this little gem at Mom's.
I bought this pattern at a Quilters Unlimited show at Northern Virginia Community College sometime in the early 1990s....It was foundation pieced; probably could be paper pieced so easily today. I think it came with all the fabric, since I know I didn't have anything resembling a "stash" then.  I knew NOTHING about binding, centering, 1/4-inch seams, blocking, or doing much pressing.  Some of the seams are coming apart, but I gave it to my Mom as a gift and she loved it.

I made Mom this Irish Chain wallhanging for St. Patrick's Day one year; she kept it hung above her bed.  I was improving a bit by now; I quilted it in the ditch on my machine, but it's pretty amateurish. The fabrics are blatantly Irish (four-leaved clovers and cheap cotton), but Mom thought it was great!

I was reminded as I was browsing through pictures to put into my Quilt Album that my mother never criticized anything I ever made for her (and she could and did criticize a lot of things)!  Anything I created for her was greeted with the enthusiasm a mother shows her 7-year-old when they give her a home-made Mother's Day card.  I'm so glad I got to please my Mom with my creations; she was proud of what I did and grateful to receive my gifts.

It's a go-slow Sunday browsing through pictures and memories.  Sometimes it's just nice to sit and reflect on what we have done, and stop the frantic pace of trying to control what comes next.  Have a great week.....will it snow?...I guess I'll just have to be patient and wait to find out.