In Honor of Dorothy

I've been thinking about tatting since I shared Debbie's stash yesterday which included a couple of sweet tatting projects.

There was a bit of it in Susan's stash...and I added this little daisy to a collage that I tucked into her joy journal.

Paul's grandmother Gunderson (Margie's mom) taught me how to tat. I never got as good as her...but I made a handful of lace over the years. This pink lace is something grandma Gunderson made.

I think I was the only relative to show any interest in learning....and I have such fond memories of that precious time with Dorothy. She was so patient with me as my fumbly fingers got the hang of this delicate work.

I pulled out my little red tatting shuttle today to see if my muscle memory would kick in. Although I still know how to do it....I could tell after just a few stitches that it will be too hard on my hands. More tatting is not in my future.

But I will keep my eyes and ears open for someone I might be able to pass this onto....in honor of Dorothy.

It was windy and a bit chilly today...and it would have been really easy to just stay tucked in at home. 

But Paul and I headed downton for the protest...and we are always glad we went. I am hoping next week's NO KINGS protest is bigger than ever! 

Hers and Mine

It's the first day of spring! I had the windows open for a while...not because it was all that warm out...but because I burned my homemade crackers. But the fresh cool air coming into the condo made my heart sing! And it's kind of ironic that Jay and Janice are coming for dinner and cards. Jay is the Assistant Fire Chief in Falmouth so he's familiar with house smoke!

My neighbor's crocus are popping though! Hallelujah! 

I have a good start on Debbie C's joy journal. She was one of the people who requested a blue and white journal....but she also sent me some of her own papers. They were sitting on the dining room table for more than a week as I pondered where her materials would take me. 

I'm off and running now.

On this first day of spring...I'm celebrating this very spring-like serendipitous hers and mine pairing.

This is HER little tatted card....and MY little leaf snippet I had sent to her in her Ounce of Joy packet. The leaves match perfectly....so they will hook up in the journal

I know Debbie from Hancock Church in Lexington. She's an artist herself...but more as a knitter and embroidery artist. She is requesting more of a finished book with places to tuck more precious things she finds rather than blank pages here and there. I can do that!

Debbie's things are mostly on the left. They're pretty things....delicate things...feminine things. And on the right are all the things I sent her in the Ounce of Joy give-away several years ago. As a knitter...she didn't quite know what to do with them....so they've found their way back to me. That made me chuckle and got me thinking....how many other people had no idea what to do with their Ounce of Joy? 

My first thought was to trade some of the bold snippets for softer...more delicate ones. I will certainly add a few soft things from my stash....but to honor the challenge I'm going to incorporate at least a little bit of ALL of these snippets. That will be my creative challenge this time...too pull together hers and mine.

A warm welcome to a couple of new blog readers via Cherie! Cherie wrote a lovely post about her joy journal on her own blog....and I was so touched. You can check it out here on her quilting blog....but then keep scrolling to see her beautiful quilts. 

https://seemorequilts.blogspot.com/2026/03/a-wonderful-gift.html

I just learned that Lily has been following Cherie's quilting blog for a little while. Lily was another joy journal recipient. Lily lives in Alaska...Cherie in Pennsylvania and I live in Maine. You just gotta' love all the creative connecting!!! Pure joy!

And Susan in Scotland just received her joy journal today! My heart is full...and I have an evening of friends in front of me! 

Look!

Look at what's popping up in my garden! 

And look what's starting to open!

  

And look who spent several hours playing with me today! Liam and I had a great time...and he cut up nearly every piece of cardboard in the condo with the Chomp Saw! It's just fun to cut stuff up!

A big shoutout to all of you grandparents who do this on a regular basis! We were busy!

Creatively Connecting

Cherie and I had a Zoom call this morning....and it was so nice to put a face to a name and to hear more of the back story of her choices for her joy journal and for me to share more about my process. Our mutual fondness for textiles was clear as well as the joy that we both find in making things for others. What a treat this was!

I think there are enough of you who have interest so I thought I would share some of the pages in her journal. The rest of you can get a head start on your day. 

Before I knew anything else I knew the first page was going to be Cherie's dad's doodle. I also knew I was going to cut out one side and fold it into a page. What I learned in today's Zoom is that he doodled all the time...even on napkins in restaurants then gave them to the wait staff. He's a legend for his doodles...and Cherie chose this one for the journal. 

I always pause for a moment when I cut into someone's art....but she said to go for it! 

This...by the way...was the only actual piece of regular paper Cherie provided. And at this point I still didn't know how I was going to hold everything together.....but lots of ideas were going through my head. This is where it started.

On the back was another doodle of a bear flying off with balloons with the caption 

Oh my I did not plan this! Look where the caption landed on the folded page! I didn't plan this either! The fold was completely determined by how wide the front flowers would be for the cover. Serendipity!

  

The second thing I knew I was going to do was cut her quilled tree card in half. That also was a little unnerving. 

But it was too wide as is....and then I could use it in two spots. I stitched it onto a piece of cardstock to create the fold and tucked it in as a page.

The other half has the fold on the right side and opens out....and it worked out well. 
The photo is a bit blurry because it's a screenshot from a video.

Using the color scheme from the cover I went to my scrapbook paper stash and pulled several pieces of medium weight paper in all kinds of patterns. Books need paper...and I needed something to stitch the clothing tags to.

I wanted the tags to stick out just a bit...and layer up and down the side of the journal on different pages.

It was like putting together a puzzle.

I do love mixing patterns....and I went a little crazy in Cherie's journal!

Tucked behind that second page were the first two trees.

They were like a little hidden surprise!

Cherie included a tiny gift bag that I cut up and made into a little pocket....

it was the perfect size for one of my little share your joy tags.

I used every single clothing tag....and every bit of ephemera Cherie sent. 

And I'm so tickled where this caption landed...with no planning on my part. This page got a tag too.

There are several more pages....but you get the idea. But my favorite moment may be on the back cover where I used this monogram of Knowledge, Wisdom and Truth that came from the inside edge a men's shirt. Such a beautiful hidden detail.

Using scraps from a previous project...I worked it into a little fussed quilt block for the back cover. I really wanted to stitch it...but I didn't think about it before I fused it. If I stitched it after it would have messed up the free motion on the back. But I think it's the perfect finish for this charming and personal joy journal.

I learned today that Cherie actually collects men's shirts and I was able to see her impressive stash in her cupboard this morning on our call. This quilt is made entirely of men's shirts! Isn't it gorgeous!

If you're still reading...thank you for walking through this journal with me...it was a joy to create. And I thoroughly enjoyed creativing connecting with its new owner! Pure joy! 

Free Motion Cover

It was one of those March days when the sun shines hot and wind blows cold: when it is summer in the light, and winter in the shade. Charles Dickens

It certainly was! 

I've been working on a personal project for a few days that I'm not quite ready to share....and the timing is just right to start sharing Cherie's journal because he just got it in the mail today. I'm going to start by celebrating the cover.

In October of 2024 I took a Fabulous Free Motion quilting class with Izzy Moore. I loved it!  One of my favorite lessons was practicing my free motion stitching around the designs on upholstery fabric. 

I did several projects that I was quite proud of including this card...and several of these 4 square pieces that I hope to turn into coasters. I wrote about these stitch doodles here in this post.

I recently found this larger piece I also did as practice....and thought it would make a lovely journal cover. It was just the right size. So that's exactly what I did for Cherie.

Cherie's materials had a bit of a vintage vibe....so gelli prints and handmade papers weren't going to work. But this would....and it became the jumping off point I needed for assembling her joy journal.

Because there was a raw edge around the fabric piece...I had to fuse fabric to the back then wrap it around to the front this time. I prefer to do it the other way around.....but this worked out well enough. In hindsight...I could have done a tradition quilt binding...but didn't think of it at the time.

A slide off and on belly band closure was the way to go....and I did like mixing in a stripe. There are quite a few mixed patterns inside.

This fabric cover...was the perfect pairing with all her vintage vibe clothing tags that you can see peeking out. I'll save the inside for tomorrow. I was pretty tickled with this free motion cover...and I loved using something from my stash.

I dropped off my bag of Maine needs good this morning!

That always feels good! Thanks again for the donations!

Out of the Box

Do you remember the collage I made for my son Nate out of Paul's discarded CD inserts? I've been using more out of the box inserts recently in some of the joy journals.

As Dotty makes her way through her blue and white journal (she's almost 1/2 way) she has come across some text pages that I assumed were lyrics from an album insert. 

I put this Dancing title in her book...and positioned it just right. It has pocket on the other side and there is at least one other smaller page from the blue paper too.

When she was writing to me about it...I wanted to figure out where it came from. 

This page was in Linda's journal....and there might be a some of this in the other blue and white journals. Several of the sheets were blue and white.

Paul told me the papers were also from his CD packaging purge. He kept the CD's....he just got rid of all the cases and inserts. These are from a Phil Spector -Mono (1958-1969) 4 CD set.  Paul knew I would love the boxes...AND the fabulous inserts with the song lyrics. He was right.

I've been using the boxes....but hadn't tapped into the papers until recently. I'm actually using the boxes at my puzzle table right at this moment. I just emptied the boxtop today. 

The song lyric pages are amazing. There are on quality paper in several earthy colors...and the title graphics and images are so playful.

These are just a few samples...I have quite a pile!

I'm going to smile every time I use these out of the box papers...and think of Dotty who got me wondering about them.

They would fold up into fabulous zines for collage journal.

Every Scrap

I was awestruck by last evening's sky! 

I won't share every page in Diane's journal....but I will share a few more before I move on. 

Cherie should get hers Monday or Tuesday. 

I mentioned before that Diane included a two page printout of a meditation. 

I used the second printed page for a gelli print that became a pocketed page in the journal. The first page had this graphic design at the top with the title...and I made it the center page of a little booklet with several lined pages.

I tucked the booklet into an "io-WAYS" pocket. (LOVED featuring that phrase) I used Diane's card stock for the cover and more of her magazine scraps to make a logo for the booklet that mimicked the title graphic. 

I'll have to say...it made me smile to connect these two images using just magazine scraps.

On the opposite page was a clever printout with fun rhyming phrases like see you later crocodile....and bye by butterfly.  I included it as is with an accordion fold so it could be pulled out and viewed as a whole.

Diane included a rainbow swirl that was featured a few months ago in our Graceland College alumni magazine. I cut the same image out....it's in one of my own piles of papers somewhere and when I find it I'll smile and remember sweet Rosey.

I used one swatch of it framing Rosey's....Diane's granddaughter.

I used the other swatch over one last magazine image.

I loved this bold magazine image with the amazing sky and the farm silo. To give it some heft...I fused it onto some heavier weight paper which means NO WRINKLES! Paper fuses well! I knocked down the gloss paper with medium and overlayed the swirl. It looks much prettier in person.

Thank you for following along with some of the details of making Diane's joy journal. There was joy...in every scrap.