Author Archives: geek

Spruce Knob

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I’m taking a leisurely road trip through West Virginia. The main destination is Charleston as this trip will add the West Virginia State Capitol to my list of state capitols, as I am trying to see them all. Along the way though, I am just enjoying the drive and finding detours and stops to make along the way. The first detour in West Virginia was Spruce Knob, which is the peak of Spruce Mountain and the highest point in West Virginia. It is a lovely drive to get there, as long as you don’t mind curving mountain roads including the final part which is forestry road and not actually wide enough for two vehicles. At the top of the mountain, there is a short trail that you can take to give you several wonderful vantage points of the surrounding area. There is also an observation tower of which I don’t understand the point because it provides views of the surrounding trees and that is about it. However, the views from the trail are worth the detour from the road.

Green tree covered mountains and a blue sky

View from Spruce Knob

Green tree covered mountains and a blue sky

View from Spruce Knob

Green tree covered mountains and a blue sky

View from Spruce Knob

Independence Day Table Runners

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Once again, I made table runners for a holiday. The main reason I made them for the 4th of July is simply, as is often the case, I found wonderful fabric with which I wanted to do something.

The narrow table runner is like the Mardi Gras, St. Patrick’s Day, and Easter table runners I made and is for the buffet. I just used strips of various red, white, and blue fabrics. I used a straight stitch alternating with a star stitch that came preprogrammed on my sewing machine for the quilting. The stars did not exactly space correctly. I am going to buy a dual-feed foot for my machine that can do a wide stitch, as I think that may be (part of) the problem.

The larger, wider table runner is an original design and is for the dining room table. It is obviously inspired by the U.S.A. flag. The proportions are similar but not exactly the same as the flag, as I altered the proportions a bit to make it easier to use 2.5 inch strips. I used a straight stitch to quilt the stripe portion of the flag. I originally wanted to buy an embroidery quilting pattern that I could use for the star field, but I could not find one that was just plain stars, and I don’t know how to design an embroidery pattern, so I ultimately just free-motion quilted stars on the blue field. I kind of like the way it turned out, but I also kind of wish it were a little more uniform. I made a duplicate flag table runner that hasn’t been quilted yet, and I am going to wait to quilt it until I can decide how to make it a little bit more uniform. [I made a duplicate as well as some extra of the more narrow table runner because I have excess fabric. My plan is to eventually try to sell them once I figure out how to do that.]

USA flag table runner

USA flag table runner closeup

Independence Day table runner

Independence Day table runner

Independence Day table runner closeup

Jug Bay Wetlands Sanctuary

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I went on a tour of Jug Bay Wetlands Sanctuary today, which sits along the Patuxent River on the east side. I have lived in the DC area for over a decade, and I am still discovering neat places to visit of which I just was not even aware exist. There are lovely forest and wetlands trails to see. Besides educational outreach, they also do scientific research on the wildlife and even archeology. It is a rather busy park really. On our tour, we also were able to go on a pontoon boat ride along the Patuxent River. There were so many red-winged blackbirds and ospreys along with lots of other birds that were difficult to see.

Jug Bay (in the morning while it was raining)

Spatterdock

Spatterdock flower

Jug Bay

Red-winged blackbird among the wetlands plants including cat-tails, wild ride, and spatterdock

Jug Bay Wetlands Sanctuary trail

 

Calvert Cliffs State Park

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I visited Maryland’s Calvert Cliffs State Park today, which I have been wanting to do for a while. The park is known for its beach where you can fossil hunt for shell and shark teeth fossils among others. The hike to the beach is not quite two miles. What I didn’t realize until I got here, mainly because the state’s website gives only the barest of information and is very unhelpful, is how lovely the trails are. The trail that is the most direct path to the beach first passes through a lovely wooded area. It then goes alongside a wetland area, which currently is filled with blooming water lilies. The wetland area is gorgeous and worthy of a visit to the park all by itself.

The beach is small and not someplace I would go swimming, but it seems everyone goes to this particular beach to hunt for fossils, not to swim. I found the geology of the beach to be quite interesting. There were rocks and other objects along the beach of which I couldn’t understand the origin. I picked up a few shells and at least one fossil. However, I also picked up a couple of items that I still can’t determine what they are, even if they are natural or human-made objects. I took photos of the objects I collected. If anyone can help me understand what the objects are in the last photo (also featured in second to last photo), I would appreciate you leaving a comment.

Calvert Cliffs SP trail

Calvert Cliffs SP lily pond

Water lilies

Water lilies

Calvert Cliffs SP beach

Fossils, shells, and other objects from Calvert Cliffs SP

Objects of unknown origin from Calvert Cliffs SP

Mathemalchemy

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I finally got to National Academy of Sciences to see Mathemalchemy before it closes. The exhibit shows the beauty of the art in math, or perhaps of the math in art. I love examining the math in nature and the beauty of it. This art exhibits gave me some ideas for things that are already percolating in my head that I want to make. Possibly because I am really into sewing and quilting at the moment, the Cryptography Quilt was my favorite part. Its construction is impressive.

Mathemalchemy

Yarn and metal shapes

Nautilus

Landscape

Sea life

Seashore

Cryptography Quilt

Curio Shop

Pittsburgh Rivers Boat Trip

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I took the Rivers of Steel Uniquely Pittsburgh Sightseeing Tour today. I have to admit to being slightly disappointed that I could not see more of the leftovers from the steel industry on the boat ride, but it was a nice boat ride. It started near where the Monongahela River and the Allegheny River join to form the Ohio River. It went down the Ohio River just a little then it turned went up the Monongahela River for a bit before turning around and going up the Allegheny River for a little. It was a beautiful day, and it appears everyone who had a boat was on it, and everyone who didn’t was out on their bike or just walking.

Barge going down the Ohio River

Monongahela Incline

Looking down the Monongahela River

In the middle of three rivers

Duquesne Incline with a coal barge on the river and train going under the incline

On the Allegheny River

Looking up the Allegheny River

Carrie Blast Furnaces

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I’m in Pittsburgh for the long weekend. Today I took a tour with Rivers of Steel of the Carrie Blast Furnaces. The area is part of the former U.S. Steel Homestead Steel Works. Blast Furnaces #6 and #7 and the accompanying equipment is all that remains of the site. The site is really interesting, and the tour was lead by a former iron worker who used to work at a similar type of facility. It was rather amazing to hear such first hand knowledge. I admit I did not catch everything, but the tour was fascinating. It was also incredibly interesting and fun to photograph. I’ve tried to name things in the captions of the photos below, but I may have gotten some of it wrong. I should have taken notes while on the tour. If you are in Pittsburgh, I highly recommend the tour. It is a wonderful tour of some incredible history.

Generator building

Blast furnace in foreground and supply crane in background

Supply train area

Supply train area

Supply train area

Crane

Carrie Blast Furnaces

Close up of stoves

Skip Bridge

Blast furnace

Near stoves

Near stoves

Near stoves

Bottom of blast furnance

Iron notch

Molten iron car

Fabric Landscapes

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I have started to just experiment and play with fabric for the purposes of not creating something practical, like a table runner, but art. I have bought fabric, a lot fo fabric really, that I love because the fabric itself is beautiful, but I did not exactly buy it for the purpose of creating something specific. I bought a book “Intuitive Color & Design” by Jean Wells that among other topics discusses cutting fabric without measuring it and just creating.

I wanted to try that a bit with some of the beautiful fabrics I have bought. I started first with a bunch of green and blue batik fabrics. I cut and sewed them in unmeasured strips to sort of resemble a landscape or perhaps something else. I just sort of cut and sewed them in a manner I liked. I then glued the whole piece to a pre-stretched 10 inch by 10 inch canvas.

Blue and green free cut landscape

I rather liked the way it looked, so then I tried something a bit less abstract. I own several paintings by amazing artists whose paintings are quite literally three dimensional. I have both a pointillism and floralism painting by Sara O’Connor. I love her use of color and the way she literally gets the paint to stand up off the canvas. I also have a painting by Diego Lukezic, which he calls floral sculptural paintings. I think the term is appropriate as the paint stands off the canvas. I used their paintings, or at least the ones hanging on my walls, as inspiration for an experimentation with fabric. I cut and sewed a bit more of a simple landscape as before. Although I used a beautiful pattered batik fabric for the foreground that resembles greenery with leaves and flowers. I then cut, sewed, and sculpted fabric strips to somewhat resemble flowers. I hand stitched them to the landscape fabric, and I also sewed a glass bead for the center of each flower. I then glued it to a 10 inch by 10 inch pre-stretched canvas as before, but for this particular piece, and I glued a piece a batting between the fabric and the caves, and I thought that would help soften any issues with the fabric from the flowers sewed onto the landscape. I am rather happy with the way it came out. I want to play some more with this type of art, but it was enjoyable to create.

Blue and green landscape with roses

Up close view of roses on landscape

 

Easter Quilted Decorations

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Last year, I made an Easter wreath for my front door. This year I am sewing up a storm, especially table runners and other decorations. I found some wonderful Easter fabric that I just love (Hop to it from Dear Stella) and some coordinating floral fabrics. I made some Easter table runners plus a door hanging and some pillows with leftover fabric. For my buffet (and for table runners I made for others), I used my go-to pattern of just sewing strips together.

Easter table runners using a strip pattern

Easter table runners using a strip pattern (up close)

For my dining room table, I did something a little different. I sewed some strips together, with the prints 4 inches wide and the solids 2 inches wide. I made three different rectangles with them. I then cut them to look like eggs. I folded the first one in half to make it symmetrical then hand drew an egg half on the fabric then cut. The other two were cut using the first one as a pattern. I then sewed the eggs as appliqués on a solid background when quilting the piece.

Table runner made by sewing strips into a rectangle then cutting to resemble eggs

Table runner made by sewing strips into a rectangle then cutting to resemble eggs (up close)

Table runner made by sewing strips into a rectangle then cutting to resemble eggs (up close)

I used leftover fabric to make a hanging for my front door. I machine embroidered Happy Easter on one piece of fabric. I then used the leftovers from the eggs on the dining room table runner to cut small eggs that I then appliquéd on another piece of fabric. All the eggs are cut from the leftover corners of the rectangles I made that I then cut the big eggs out of for the table runner.

Door hanger with leftover Easter fabric

Then with the fabric I had left, I made some envelope style pillow covers. These fit the same plain pillows for which I made covers for St. Patrick’s Day.

Front of pillows made with leftover Easter fabric

Back of pillows made with leftover Easter fabric

 

Spring Table Runners

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I have really enjoyed making table runners for the holidays. I bought some floral and pastel fabrics initially for Easter, but then I found some Easter fabric that I loved even more. Thus I decided to make a spring table runner for use before it is appropriate to put out Easter decorations. I made two: one for the dining room table and one for the buffet. For the buffet I stuck with the pattern I have used before of just cutting strips and sewing them together. For the table, I made a basket weave type pattern. I wanted to have bigger pieces of some of the beautiful floral fabrics to use as field type fabric. I then cut strips to form a simple basket weave around the fields. Fairly easy, and now I can start to welcome spring.

Spring table runners in pastels

Closeup of table runner for buffet

Closeup of table runner for table with a basket weave pattern.

Closeup of table runner for table with a basket weave pattern.