What to do, what to do?

Winter weather and workers interfere with backyard activities...and what's a gardener to do?  The obvious answer is to attend to an indoor hobby.....and happily, quilting fits the bill.  I am working to improve my machine-quilting skills on my home sewing machine.  It's essential to warm up before working on my current quilt, so I layer a small 'quilt sandwich'--backing, batting, and marked top--and spend a few minutes following lines or adding fill--which is the term for quilting that fills (and flattens) empty space, giving the quilt added texture and visual interest.

 A quilting blog named SewCalGal is featuring a machine-quilting tutorial every month of 2012.  The January instructional video showed a leaf motif.  I changed the design a little and worked on a small scale, filling a curved space.

This fill design is called 'Dianeshiko,' for Diane Gaudynski-- one of the gifted individuals who has raised machine quilting to (literally) an art.

 After a week or so of warm-up exercises, one has a small sampler like this!  The inevitable imperfections are less noticeable in the overall view.  To enlarge, click Ctrl + (Control plus).


Diane Gaudynski tells us that our quilting gets better every day.  Hope so!