How are you all?

Some quilters say sewing a circle is hard, but it is easy when fabric for background comes on the top of the circle (and if you do not mind to do a little hand-stitches). I do not have the patience to sew many circles by applique, but sewing a circle into the fabric (well, big circles).



I took some pictures of my process of my drunkard's path quilt because I wanted to show how easy it is. There is no pattern for it nor marking on fabric. It does not have to be accurate, which is enjoyable for many quilters.

First, pick up fabrics for background (BG) square and a quarter of a circle (QC). My background is 6.5 inches (6 inches finished) square. QC needs to be slightly smaller than BG. My QC is pieced from scraps. I usually do not take a measurement. Just eyeball it. When I find it's too large, I just trim it. It's from scraps anyway.



Layer them the wrong side of BG and the right side of the QC together. The two square's corners need to be met.



Pin the two at the top an…

I think I like to sew varieties of scraps together. I somehow feel like I have to use them up. Also, I like to see diversities (individuality) when I forcus on a micro world. I like simple design when I focus on a macro world (collectiveness). So, I like both busy and simple designs. A micro world is within a macro world, maybe that is why I feel like a scrappy area needs to be confined by a single color.



I also love circles. I tried the simple circle design on the placemats (below). I enjoyed the colors and designs but sewing it was not as easy as I expected. I think the circles were too small to sew comfortably. It would have been much easier when they are larger. Since I did not use the method of applique, the background fabric needed to stretch to be turned in on the circle, and it did not stretch well - I could make bunch of slits on the eges of the cut-off circles, but I did not.





I still wanted to sew curves and wanted to make circles. It is easier to piece a quarter of circle …

I recently found two babies were born in my friends.

When I hear a baby birth, my ears pop up and feeling of "I have to make a baby quilt!" comes to my mind like a tsunami. I want babies to be happy, wish them to have a good childhood that leads to good adulthood. Happy adults will make a good society.

One is Winnie the Pooh.




Back.
I did not want to waste the tiny scraps after cutting FQs into the big pieces for the front, so, used them all for the back...



The other one is an animal panel. I bought 3 panels at a quilt show a couple of years ago for future baby quilts.



The panel had 6 kinds of animals. The quilt has a repetition because the blocks are more than 6. Quilting is a heart pattern.









Making a baby quilt is a happy thing. As well as thinking of a baby's happy life in the future makes me feel happy, working with nursery and novelty fabric is fun.

The first assignment from the art class was a drawing for a coloring book.

In the class, we, students, discussed the collective theme of the coloring book, and we decided it to be "Mythology and Humanity - Then and Now." It needed to be broad so that it can give us a wide range of interpretations. Along the theme, each of us created three thumbnails with own concepts about the theme. They were then developed and elaborated into a drawing on a letter-sized paper.




(I used to draw a comic when was a teen. It was nice to feel that time again.)

To me, mythology directly links to Greek/Roman gods and goddesses, especially goddesses of harvest and fertility, which are very basic things for survival. Probably it's because of my paper for "Art and ancient mythology" class I took in 2015 was about Inanna (Ishtar) who is the goddess of love, fertility, and war (later). It's very interesting to see the evolution of her characteristics along the society's change. I …

We had Winter Field Day last weekend. This is an amateur radio event that occurs twice a year, summer and winter, in the whole United States. Ham operators compete for numbers of connection made between ham operators during Saturday 2pm to Sunday 2pm. It is a 24 hours operation, and some operators really operate the radio without a sleep. According to my husband, it is a practice for an emergency situation so the event occurs in winter and summer when the weather is extreme. I get an impression that is a social event for most ham operators though.























Due to winter is hard to have an outside event, Roanoke Amateur Radio Club had not had Field Day in winter. Summer is much enjoyable, so they do it in summer every year. This year's Winter Field Day started with my husband who wanted to bring young generation in the amateur radio world. It was initially hosted by the Virginia Western Community College Amateur Radio Club, and the event took place at the Community College. The event was s…