I hope everyone had a really great Christmas/Chanukah/holiday season.  As well the happiest New Year since January 1, 2008. ;o) Before I began this blog, I checked with the folks at AnnTheGran to be sure you all want me to continue with my ramblings.  Since this is the first time for me in this year of 2009, I thought I’d just make it short and do a little review of what we’ve already talked about. 

In case some of you are new to LaRueSews, since my last post, I’ll give you a few details that my blog friends already know.  My name is LaRue Jones. (LaRue is spelled with a big “R”).  I was born in Idaho.  I have been watching and learning to quilt since I was a child.   I made three quilts before my first daughter was born.  Two of them were hand applique’, and the other was a “cheater” quilt top that I machine quilted.  I made several more quilts in the coming years (made with a little straight stitch Singer).  I made several other quilts in the next few years. One of them was a challenge to my mother-in-law and her sister to prove that you could indeed make a “handmade” quilt on the sewing machine.  It was, however, hand quilted.  I began quilting in earnest in the 1990's.  I have made many.  I made each of my daughter’s wedding quilts and one for each of my six grand children, as well as many more for various reasons, mostly just because I love to sew.

It hardly seems possible, but we began this little venture in July 2008.  Can that really be six months ago?  Since my last post, I haven’t done much piecing or quilting, but I have done a considerable amount of ME.  However, I am still a quilter, primarily.  I have big plans for a lot of quilt projects in the coming year.  Santa brought a new quilt kit that is still in the planning stages.  I need to do some other things before I begin that new one.  I may use it when I write about fusible applique’.  

This time, since I haven't finished any new projects, I'll show you three needlework projects  that hang in my house.  The first is a small counted cross stitched picture that I did years ago that has quilts in it.

For the most part, our house is finished on the inside, after spending the past two years, working on finishing the interior, including all the painting, my husband did all the inside  woodwork, and I made all the window coverings, as well as other decorating.  It is nice and comfy now, except that I still need shelves in most of the closets.

This small wall hanging was a thank you gift from a friend.  It was the inspiration for me to learn the technique of needle turn applique.  It is only 14 inches wide, so the piecing and applique are very small.  My husband made the hanger for it.

Now for a little review:  I began by telling you that quilting and ME are wonderful companions, making such beautiful and memorable works of art that we are often admired by those around us who are not quite as nimble-fingered as we stitchers.  (Hey, I just coined a new description of we who manage needles and threads).  We have discussed things to consider before starting to quilt, such as whether you really want to make the investment it takes to try the new venture.  As well as choosing quality tools.  The topic of fabric choices and selection came along with my warnings about being very careful when using rotary cutters.  They are SHARP!  They can cut PEOPLE as well as fabric.  Handle with care.

Color selection is one of the things that is so important in choosing fabrics.  Just as with ME, the choice of colors can make or break a project.  Color theory is a deep subject to many people.  I recommend checking out a few web sites that I have found and used that are really helpful if color is a Bug-a-Boo for any of you.  This first one is really neat.  It is a web designer’s site.  The name is VisaBone, by Bob Stein. When you go to this web site, you will see a rather unusual color wheel.  Play with it just a bit.  Use your mouse and click anywhere on the color wheel and it will show you the name of that color.  Don’t stop there, go to the bottom of the page and click on Home and see all the cool stuff on their site.  It will turn out to be a helpful tool for both quilting and embroidery.   https://www.visibone.com/colorlab/  

 
The next one is also for web design.  Click on this one and you will find a list of colors with their names.  It’s also handy.  It is w3schools.com, and this is the  URL. https://www.w3schools.com/HTML/html_colornames.asp

This one is a color names chart from Center Key Software, by Dem Pilafian.  It’s  just nice to have the names of colors handy.
https://www.centerkey.com/colors/

These web sites are just the result of my surfing, looking for the names of colors for lack of a good color comparison chart since my brand of ME thread uses only numbers, no names.  I hope they are useful to you too.

I think this will suffice for my return to ATG blogging.  I hope you missed me. ;o)  If you are new to LaRueSews, check out my previous posts on this blog at:

https://www.annthegran.com/blogs/larue-sews/default.aspx

Next time, I’ll talk about some other facets quilt making.  We still need to cover assembling the blocks, layering the quilt, and other topics and methods of quilting and piecing.  Sometime in the future, I'll talk about hand applique.  This is a wall hanging that has won a number of first place ribbons in quilt shows.  I used Ultra Suede to applique on background fabric.  All the applique was done in combination with the quilting.

Until next time,
Stitches to you,

LaRue