Tag: Penny Rogers Camm

Turkey Tracks: Penny Rogers Camm’s First Quilt

Turkey Tracks:  October 21, 2016

Penny Rogers Camm’s First Quilt

Penny Rogers Camm and I graduated from Bellevue High School in Bellevue, Nebraska, in 1963.  We knew each other then, but were not close friends.

Bellevue sits outside Omaha, Nebraska, and is the home of Offutt Air Force Base.

We are Air Force Brats.

Penny lives in Burlington, Vermont, in the summer, and we reconnected almost four years ago now as Penny comes to Mid-Coast Maine to sail on the windjammer Stephen Taber in September.  She called me, and we wound up spending several days together and going to the Maine Organic Farmers and Growers Association (MOFGA) Common Ground Fair.

Last summer she asked me to come to Vermont for the annual quilt show.  She had gone the year before and was intrigued with quilting.

I went, and Penny decide she wanted to learn to quilt.  We started this quilt in September when she came to sail–and now to quilt.

Here is her FIRST QUILT TOP–which is for a family child of about three.  The block is from Bonnie Hunter:  “Carolina Chain,” which is in her new book, ADDICTED TO SCRAPS.

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Cute border fabric.

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Here we are layering the top with the batting and backing.  That’s my Amy Friend quilt on the longarm, “Tell Me A Story,” which is ready to quilt now.

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Penny is going to hand-quilt with various colors of size 8 pearl cotton.

AND Penny decided last summer to go on the Coastal Quilters (Maine) October retreat to the Franciscan Guest House in Kennebunk, Maine, where she started her SECOND QUILT.

Folks, she fell in love with Amy Friends “Tell Me A Story” quilt which is FOUNDATION PIECED.

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Love her background fabric with these blocks, though it gave both of us fits for a time until we worked out the orientations.

It will be 7 blocks by 8 blocks, so she went home yesterday with a good start and other blocks cut.  This quilt is going in Penny’s den.

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Penny is coming back in early December to learn to do the binding on the first quilt and, maybe, to layer and start quilting the second one.

AND, she has visions of other quilts dancing in her head already.

Here she is at our retreat:

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More on the retreat in another post.

Turkey Tracks: September 2016 Update

Turkey Tracks:  October 1, 2016

September 2016 Update

What a glorious summer I have had!

And the fun continues as my life continues to be rich with experiences.

The sailing trip on the J&E Riggin was terrific, as I posted earlier.

Quilter Timna Tarr comes next weekend for a Coastal Quilters trunk show and workshop on making “improvisational” quilts.  She has a terrific gallery on her web site.  Take a look?

On October 17th, some Coastal Quilters of Camden, Maine, will make another retreat at the Franciscan Guest House in Kennebunkport, Maine.  Attending will be my Bellevue High School, Bellevue, Nebraska, classmate, Penny Rogers Camm, who is making her VERY FIRST QUILT.  Messages have been flying between us about layouts and how to sew blocks together and so forth.  Her quilt is so, so pretty.  We will pick out borders, etc., when she comes week after next.

I picked what will probably be this season’s LAST flower bouquet the other day.

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Next year I want MORE cosmos and zinnas in my garden.  And I need to go out and cut the gorgeous hydrangeas to bring in side the house for winter decorations.

Friend Megan Bruns is in Texas with her family this week.  She took all the rosettes from her Millifiori quilt (see former blog posts for details), and her mother helped her decide how to put them together.  This picture is the last I received.  Megan used all Anna Maria Horner fabrics in this quilt.  Of course there will be borders and so forth yet to do.

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Horch roofers have been here for the past two days.  The new roof is so pretty.  Pictures of it later as the yard and house is full of men, flying roof pieces, and equipment.  I would take my life in my hands to go out there.  Besides, it is cloudy and overcast, so I’ll get pictures later.  I am loving the soft color of the roof though.

We still have had no appreciable rain.  I continue to worry about my well running dry.  I have stopped watering deeply outside.  The growing season is running down anyway.  I do not think we will get much fall color this year as drought-struck trees are just dropping brown leaves to, hopefully, save themselves.

 

Turkey Tracks: My Post Sailing Surprise

Turkey Tracks:  September 27, 2016

My Post Sailing Surprise

I’m pretty sure I’ve written about how challenging my garden has been this–now past–summer.

(Fall really has come to Maine.)

We had cool temps at night until August, when I was finally able to get some zucchini and cucumbers to germinate.  And then there is the ongoing drought, which is very severe.  I have a well, so I have been worrying about it going dry, as many in the region have.  I do not think we will have much leaf color this year either as the leaves are just turning brown and dropping off the trees.

I left for my “Slow Sewing at Sea” sail on the J&E Riggin with some small cukes forming on vines that were now running everywhere and zucchini plants blooming.  (The Sun Gold cherry tomatoes and chard I planted from bought plants are doing great–and maybe that will be the trick next year.)

So, on Sunday, after Bellevue High School classmate (1963) Penny Rogers Camm left to drive home (Burlington, Vermont)–taking with her the cut blocks FOR HER FIRST QUILT, I mowed.  Imagine my surprise when I suddenly saw this zucchini nestled in the cold frame among the zucchini leaves and stalks:

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Good Lord!!  How did that happen???  It’s HUGE.

I cut it up today and put the pieces in the dehydrator–along with the Sun Golds cut into half, which I let ripen inside for two days.

That’s the last garden tomato of this season in the blue bowl.

And the light yellow squash is a spaghetti squash, a squash I love.

Now, when I use the dried zuke this winter, I’ll remember my reaction when I first saw it.  And I will laugh.