Friday, December 14, 2007

Home Dec, With Quilts!

I did a LOT of laundry today, and did some basic decorating. We “did” our tree last night. I thought I had taken a picture, but not so much. I also went to "knit night" at Bloomin Yarns, but wound up tagging new yarn instead, since I was the only person who showed up. It was fun!!

Oh, and the Hubster wants everyone to know that he is NOT a Scrooge. He was just cranky on Sunday when I was doing the outside lights. He was quite helpful with trimming the tree last night, and is ready to go for the holiday. Ho Ho Ho!

So aside from the magic of dirty-to-clean that is laundry, I also got three quilts hung up around the house … well, mostly around our entryway.

First, I wanted to get my Christmas Charm quilt up on the wall. This is one of my very favorite quilts, although I’m going to need to do the Penguin Charm quilt, also by Mount Redoubt Designs, that Beth and my other M&M peeps got for me at Asilomar last year. Soon. Really.


The door handle you can see is for the stairs to the basement.

I’m using the “No-See-Ums” hangers plugged -- and sold -- on the Ami Sims website. I’ve been thrilled with every thingamajig I’ve ever purchased from Ami’s website and this is no exception. These suckers are a little pricey, but I’m still a fan. Oh, and if you need a chuckle, Ami’s monthly newsletter is always pretty good. Click on the snowflake on her home page, here.

You can see the brackets on either side of the top of the Christmas Charm quilt. I was very much OK with that, since for the majority of the year, I have another slightly wider quilt that will fill that space. Plus, the gold brackets against the off-white wall are a lot less obvious in person.

Oh, and this was the first one I put up and it’s more than a little crooked. I need to get a few more Command Adhesive strips and I’ll fix it. Meanwhile, safety pins are my friend!

Next, we have another one of my favorite wall hangings, my Snowflakes quilt!

It's on the landing going upstairs. I'm basically standing a half-step to the left of where you'd be when you first walked into our front door. The quilt is a little small in the pic to give you perspective.

I didn’t think to take a closeup shot of this quilt, but each snowflake is machine appliquéd with gold metallic thread, and it looks pretty damn cool. This is also a spot where I can change out less seasonally-oriented quilts. Or, thanks to the Command strips, I can just take down the brackets entirely.

Finally, the “showcase” spot in our entryway goes to a quilt that I didn’t make, but it’s one that means a lot to me.


This is “Celestial Gekkos,” a bargello quilt made by a good friend and fantabulous quilting teacher, Mary Ellen Sakai. Several years ago, she decided to sell a few of her quilts. This one spoke to me and her price was quite reasonable, so I jumped on the opportunity.

When we were in California, this quilt had a place of honor in our guest room, and I could see it every time I went downstairs. Now, I’ll see it every time I go into the entryway of my house!

We're meeting with our interior designer on Saturday to get a piece to fill the space under that quilt. I'm hoping to get a bench for one wall in the entry and a table of some sort for the other wall.

All of the colors are a little "off" in these photos. They were taking during daylight, but it was seriously rainy in the 'Burgh today. I needed the lights on all day!

I'm volunteering at the hospital with my mom tomorrow morning and then I'll start chipping away at my loooong list of things to do. I need more hours in the day!

3 comments:

Sarah said...

Great quilts! That last one is spectacular -- I can see why you snatched it up!

Anonymous said...

I love bargello quilts. I haven't made one...yet. I have a watercolor quilt that needs finished. SIGH...so much to do, so little time!

Jen said...

What lovely quilts! Now, let's see that tree! ;)