In the midst of pain came On The Scene

Bonnie Hunter named this quilt pattern On Ringo Lake with her inspiration coming from pics of a small boat literally on Ringo Lake in Minnesota.

I changed the colors.
Increased the size.
Made the blocks incorrectly.
Skipped the pieced sashing and cut the wrong width of plain sashing.
Added a border that nearly drove me mad.
You see a theme of *ugh* going on here? LOL
I admit I was lost. Physically and most of all emotionally.

Center of the unfinished top

In the zillion tiny pieces of the red, blue, gray and black confetti border I saw the light.
I was crying. Too much chaos in my life.
My vision was blurry. I could only see the pops of the bright colors. No pattern was visible.
I was seeing the emergency lights the night I found my mother dead in her home.

Confetti border has about 2500 pieces

An ambulance came even though my husband told them nothing could be done.
911 sent firemen as well.
The street was a sea of flashing lights. Confusing chaos.

Not my pic. See the red, blue, gray and black?

Sounds receded. I was numb, yet felt so much.
Firemen who all stopped and shook my hand or touched my shoulder offering sympathy.
Ambulance EMT's leaned in to offer a comforting word.
Police officers who spoke to me gently and stayed until the funeral home arrived hours later.
So many kind people were there for me. All strangers.

I survived.
My husband kept encouraging me to move forward with this quilt. He told me how much he loved it. I couldn't see past my melancholy to love it.
Until I started the borders in late July.

OKC Police Honor Guard 2015

Amidst my tears, I saw that night again and knew the name of this quilt.
On The Scene.
My husband is a 31 year veteran police officer. He still works the street.
The vivid colors are his.
The vivid color pops are his normal.
His comfort.
It means the cavalry is there to back him up.
He is not alone.
God and St. Michael are always with him. However, having your fellow officers on a scene too is comforting.

St. Michael is the patron saint of law enforcement

Now I know why I chose these colors.
Why it is so eye poppingly bright.
God knew my husband wanted this quilt before it was ever created.
My 'mistakes' were His wonderful directions.
His creation from my lowly hands.

The backing has a Thin Blue Line

I present to you On The Scene.
Design by Bonnie Hunter, On Ringo Lake, 2017 Mystery quilt
Pieced (and altered endlessly) by me.
Quilted by Bush Family Affair quilt shop, Chickasha, OK

On the Scene, final stitch 12-27-2018

I sat alone late at night hand stitching the label. I finally felt some peace. My piecing mistakes were loved and wanted. My struggle had become a thing of beauty for my loved one.

Thank you Bonnie for designing this quilt. You are helping heal my family <3

On our bed finally

I finally was able to get a pic in the late afternoon sun. I was happy to have any sunshine at all! 

A close up in the sun. Quilting is a loose stipple to keep it soft.

And to really scramble your eyes ... a close up of the vivid design.

I am so happy this quilt is complete. Amen.

On Ringo Lake progress

On Ringo Lake designed by Bonnie Hunter is almost finished. Almost!

Ponies keeping watch

As usual I wanted it to be bigger even though it didn't have a recipient yet. I made extra units to make extra blocks.

I pondered the layout. I pondered borders. I pondered finished size.

I pondered my endless mistakes. I did great until the calendar changed years then it was one mishap after another. I laugh about it now. At the time I usually sighed and shrugged. I am imperfect so my creations will be as well.

And .... I didn't like the look of my 'blocks'. I laid them out in several different ways trying to find a pleasing configuration. It all hurt my eyes.

Not Bonnie's pattern. My color choices!
I love the reds and blues with the grays and blacks. It was all SO LOUD though.
Bonnie's colors were soothing and went with nothing in my house.

Maybe no sashing?

I finally exhausted myself and decided since nothing seemed more pleasing to simply do Bonnie's layout and move on to sashing.
Then I sewed every block with the corners flipped wrong. Ugh! I sighed and decided God obviously had a plan because I knew I didn't.

This is the block. It's not correct - it's completed though!

I was too tired from the flu and a sinus infection from heck to make the pieced sashing. I decided to go with plain sashing. Which I then cut to the wrong width. Another sigh. More acceptance of my shortcomings.

Finished center lacking borders

The center of the top is done, stitched, pressed. It just needs the borders added.

Tiny squares everywhere

Oh the borders .... I got the crazy idea to do a confetti border. I didn't think how many tiny pieces that would be. Turns out just the confetti is pushing 2600 pieces.

Just keep stitching ... 

I stitched and stitched all those tiny squares.
I wore vibrant thread crumbs everywhere.
And I found my way past my melancholy and antipathy to love this quilt.
I'll share that story soon.

On Ringo Lake - I started!

Hello! I'm finally hard at work on 2017's Mystery Quilt "On Ringo Lake" designed by Bonnie Hunter over at Quiltville. If you want to stitch along it is free for now and lots of fun. We link up on Mondays to share our progress. Go visit HERE to see the fun!

My sweet pile of unpressed 9 patches

Bonnie has already released Part 3, however I am just finishing up Part 1. Same reasons as always - I had other stitching items to finish first. This year I had a few formals that needed repair and altering. The last was delivered a few days ago and now I can stitch what I want! Yeah! Party for me!

Bright blue. Vivid red. Black. Silver to gray neutrals.

I went out on my own for colors this year. Bonnie's are lovely but I want something for my room. So blue is happening here as well as vivid red, black and silver to gray neutrals. Pretty simple. Then the really tragic aspect is that this quilt will finish smaller than I need for my king size bed so I will have to add borders, or make more rows and columns to get the size I seek. I'm not sure why I can't simply follow a pattern without going rogue. My bad :)

Part 1 was stitching 9 patches. Thankfully I got them stitched and half are pressed. I plan on starting part 2 tomorrow. Unless life happens. We are eagerly waiting on grandbaby #3 to arrive. He should be here before Christmas. It will be a fabulous delay to welcome a new sweet soul into the family. 

Pressed 9 patches

I noticed something today as I pressed 9 patches. Look at the stack. It's fairly neat. 

9 patches

See how uniform the 9 patch units appear. Bonnie helped me learn this. I was simply pressing and stacking them. They are already properly sized. As I work on Bonnie's mystery quilts she instructs us on cutting, stitching and pressing. I spent the fall working on a partial quilt top from years ago. It is full of tucks and bobbles. I'm going to finish it rather than discard the lovely fabrics. It will be a testament to how far I have come in my quilting education. Especially now that I can see I have improved and will hopefully continue to get even better. 

Thank you Bonnie!! You have taught me so much. I can now cut, stitch and press with amazing (to me) results. I can take scraps of fabric and create a useful item that is also beautiful. I appreciate your devotion to teaching us all aspects of quilting!