I see my typo of 6-8 didn’t confuse any of you. The magazine discussion has been an eye opener. I truly did think I was probably the only one who hated it. After such a vigorous discussion I thought I’d let American Patchwork and Quilting in on our thoughts. There was no way to contact them that I could see without setting up an account and password! If there’s anything that gets under my skin more than that (except maybe entitled parkers) I don’t know what it is. If anyone here can point me in the right direction to contact them, please do. Otherwise I will send a letter in the mail – which will probably end up in the trash. It was such a great magazine back in the day.
Rick and I took the dogs for a drive late this afternoon and I snapped a few pictures.
And then there’s always this – a hog confinement. If I stopped to think about this too much I wouldn’t be able to eat pork.
Reader photos
The tree service is coming tomorrow morning to get the tree off the fence. Then I’ll call the fence company to fix the fence. Sigh.
I think I can finish Dove In the Window tomorrow but some of the grassy spots by the barn already need mowing again. That 5” of rain really made everything grow – it’s green as far as the eye can see!
See the birdhouse hanging from the tree? See who waits on the ground below? That would be Greta.
When I did chores tonight Barney had killed a striped gopher! He was very proud.
So sad about the firefighters killed in Idaho.
How can June be over already?
Ha! I thought the “structure” between the wind generators in the first picture was a signpost with arrows pointing the way to assorted sites or towns! Had me fooled! We used to go for country drives, too. We would come to an intersection and one of us would choose which direction to go. It’s a good thing I usually packed a picnic, and enough towns had a convenience store/gas station with the necessary facilities!
I love the assortment of scrap quilts since right now I’m just sewing strippy blocks to sash and make into LWR quilts. I could use some new ideas. I have enough donated trimmings from quilt backs to make more blocks than you could shake a stick at. Sorry, Hazel, I didn’t mean to tease you.
We will have a humid and 90* 4th of July so it will be hot for the activities at the park. The trees in the neighborhood have grown so tall I won’t be able to see the fireworks, but the sound travels between the hills and afterwards the neighbors across the block set off their fireworks. When we had the two cats the poor things would head to the basement at the first sound of fireworks and not come upstairs until the next morning. Seems a waste of $$$ to me, but then I would rather have a successful trip to the thrift store!
Thanks everyone for sending in the pictures of quilts, pets, gardens, and corn. It is so fun to see what everyone has been up to on Mary’s blog about everything! Kris in WI
Mary is that a Ponderosa Pine growing alongside the road? We planted one in our backyard, big mistake, it was over 80 ft tall when we cut it down. They grow up to 18” a year.
You can still see the Joy of Painting with Bob Ross on PBS stations.
Meta – oh! That’s Bob Ross? I don’t know what kind of tree it is but it isn’t huge and oh so beautiful!!! Why did you cut yours down?
It was getting too tall & was a little too close to the house. When it was cut down we discovered it was totally hollow inside. Not good.
Mary, that tree looks like a cell tower. We have lots of those around here. There not as ugly, when they are designed to be something else. We have Buffalo, trees, at Frontier Park one looks like a rustic water tower, another one is a cowboy.
My horror story about unsubscribing. I dropped my secondary medical insurance last December. I’m still getting notifications of past due payments. I sent in my latest past due notice with attn: human on the front of the envelope. It says I owe for the “grace period “ they gave me. I’m on a different plan. I told them that and they gave me the “grace” anyway.
The magazine I enjoyed is Today’s Quilter. It’s expensive, so I generally only get one a year. It’s from the UK and covers lots of European and Australian quilts.
Jo – so how did you convince them you weren’t you going to pay for that grace period? AFLAC asked for report after report and now they’ve sent me the bill for next year.
Mornin’ Mary,
Your email is the first I look for each day. I love your pics of the Midwest. I grew up in Wisconsin and never doubted the color green, rain, corn or snow. Colorado is beautiful and we have the Rockies but if we didn’t water everything would turn to gold, brown, brush etc… When I first looked at the tree I thot it might be a cell phone tower!! I have seen them where they have branches?? that aren’t real but an attempt to hide the tower! I as well, loved the old APQ magazine and got it for 20+ yrs and then it changed. I dropped my subscription about 3 yrs. ago? I loved the older? quilts, reproduction fabrics that were used etc. Where do we buy reproduction fabrics now? Can someone help me with that? I bought so many, horded them and waited to make a special quilt. Hope all is well for you Mary. Thanks for all that you give to so many. Arlene
Arlene – Jo said the same thing about that tall tree! Turbines aren’t hidden in any way across Iowa – that I’m aware of. I actually think they’re quite beautiful when they turn so gracefully. I wanted to put one on my farm way back when but I didn’t have enough acres.
Arlene – forgot to say everywhere is green – we’ve had ample ample rain and I hope it saves the grass. Winter kill was bad – we had no snow!
Mary, I enjoyed seeing dusk reflecting on the farm after all the mowing. So beautiful, pastoral, and calming. Thank you for sharing.
Quilt magazines don’t really inspire me. As so many of you have mentioned, the color palettes aren’t my cup of tea. The more traditional designs and darker colors. Besides, Mary’s continual quilt show from readers and her own projects are constantly giving me ideas that appeal to me much more.
Case in point – the picture of four pillows, two with pinwheel designs is the perfect solution to the use of 5 pinwheel blocks I have. I like your idea much better than my attempt to make a quilt out of them with other scraps! Thank you for the inspiration! Mary H. and Mary E., pretty quilt ideas, too.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MARY on the 3rd of July! I’m glad you were born – a blessing to so many.
Jan
Jan – thank you! I think we inspire each other here on the blog
I am responding to the one before b/c that one had 85 responses–GREAT, but I have to get busy on binding our son’s birthday quilt.
Sunflower, your quilt is adorable.. I love the blocks:) And, the other quilts yesterday and today always make me look and look. I agree that some quilt magazines are just boring. I still get Fons and Porter and I usually find 2 or 3 I’d like to make. Of course, I will have to live to 250 yrs to make them all!! Note: be sure you are not signed up to automatically receive the magazine if you don’t want it anymore. You have to notify them; I hate that they started that. Ugh. I also still receive AQS magazine which I also still like.
Mary, it is so much fun to “ride” around your farm. I feel like I’m there:) We had soooooo much rain on
Saturday it was unreal. We got 4″ in about 2 hours and the wind was blowing the rain everywhere. It was good to be inside! We live on a hill so no flooding, but there was flooding all around.
I love that you tell people they are celebrating your birthday, good idea. Have a very happy one on Thursday. Columbus has a HUGE Red, White, and Boom celebration on the 3rd. It is awesome.
250 years…makes me chuckle. I’ll have to live that long AND quit buying fabric to make all the things I have planned for!
Loved today’s pictures and seeing how green everything is. Something I hate is when trying to unsubscribe to unwanted emails, they ask for your email address in order for you to unsubscribe!!! What?
I love QUILTFOLK publication. I have them all 34 of them so far. It’s a really great read about our quilting world. I have also purchased other items from their shop ( Swedish dish towels, metal bookends with quilt block on the ends) I like the cover pattern on the AP&Q magazine but not the fabric choices, it is way too busy, perhaps a little more planned out fabric choice would be what I like. I do love any star pattern quilt. I do appreciate all the quilters expression of their craft , it isn’t always for me.
My mouth is watering thinking about “sweet corn”. It will be out soon. I love seeing the corn fields grow and I pray for the farmers to have a good crop to harvest in the fall. Don’t follow a semi with corn too closely, Those kernels are like rocks!
I am home from retreat and expecting a quiet 4th. I am good for it. I have a new deck being built but doubt it’s ready to sit on by the 4th. It’s ok my sewing room is cool and the dehumidifier is running down there.
My husband used to love to drive in the country on back roads. Good memories.
Lovely pictures. Just like browsing in a magazine, but the chatter is better..
I used to like Mary Englebrite (?) magazine. She’d introduce so many amazing artists and their studios.
When I was a teen I liked to follow models and their careers. Now I am more interested in creative types like artists and quilters.
When I go to the local library they have a couple subscriptions to check out. I leaf through them while I am there. They are not worth checking out! Sad! Guess I am too old for that new fangled stuff. I have some panels with fabric to blend. Gudrun at GE designs along with someone (didn’t catch his name) are publishing a book and it’s coming out soon. The preview looks very intriguing!
As for rain, we have been getting rain almost every day to equal a total of over 4 inches in a week! Of course, now the farmer is really nervous because of the weeds that needed sprayed and couldn’t be! Ugh! But, hey weeds or crop….plus there was no hail! Farming is such a gamble! This is another occupation that is getting very stressful. The amount of money it takes to do this farming is crazy! Oh rant and rave! Some crazy farmers in the area are renting land for over $600! Just to have a place to haul their manure!
As for hog confinement pork, I cannot eat pork loin anymore! It smells! Pork chops and bacon are fine from the store. My favorite way to eat pork is to buy it from the local guy that raises it in fresh air! Yum!
Enough of my ranting and raving! I love living on my farm even tho all of the above stresses! Have a good one! Jay can’t spray weeds but he can mow the lawn and yard 😝
I love your table topper! So cool! That puppy is so stinking cute! Your yard looks very pretty! Guess what we came home to last night….momma coon and two young coons around the cat pan, which was empty! Grrrrrrrrrr!
Hi Mary, in regard to contacting the magazine company, I might suggest sending them a message via Facebook. A lot easier for you and tends to get a response. Have you checked out other options on the Libby app? You could sample through other magazines and maybe something new out there might be interesting. The farm and the pincushions are gorgeous!
I read quilt magazines via the Libby app. It’s not quite the same as holding the magazine in hand, but it does save money, although I guess it doesn’t help the publisher much. Over the years, I’ve subscribed to several different ones.
Seems like great minds think alike since we all agreed that this months AP&Q was a complete dud. This is the only subscription I held on to after i let all of my quilting magazine subscriptions lapse. Mary, your farm looks great! I know it’s lots of work but it must be so satisfying to sit on your porch & enjoy the surroundings. All of the rain has missed us & we are very hot & dry. Lots of rumbles of thunder & lightening but no rain. And yes, people have already started setting off fireworks nightly. Poor dogs.
APQ: I do like the quilt on the cover this time and think I’ll make it—it uses charm packs and I have a bunch. The rest of the magazine was meh. Just got my renewal notice and won’t be sending it in.
In defense of some poor parkers: my DH is 78 and a lousy parker. It’s not because he’s 78, either—he’s always been a lousy parker. He is directionally challenged and told me he struggled learning left and right when he was a kid—and he still struggles with it. I also think he has poor depth perception. I point out when he’s parked badly and he fixes it. He now drives an electric Mustang Mach-e. It has no instrument panel, it has a big touch screen that gives parking guidelines as well as back-up guidelines (he struggles with that too). Bad parking ticks me off, but I try to be tolerant. The ones that have no excuse are the sports car and giant truck bros that do it on purpose. I taught special ed for 35 years and saw neurodiversity up close and personal. Many people’s brains just have difficulty with spatial relations. (It still annoys me!)
This magazine is about the only one I subscribe to. I agree most patterns are not of any interest to me. The Hope Floats pattern did look fun with the old block set differently. I used to buy my magazines at JoAnn’s because I could look before I buy … can’t do that anymore. Mary, love your blog about nothing.
I just let my subscription to American Patchwork & Quilting expire. I used to look at the magazines as soon as they hit my mailbox. For over the last year I found myself setting them aside to look at later. Then when I did look I rarely found anything exciting or a lot of them are repeat designs. Nothing new.
I design a lot of my own quilts or use patterns I already have. I’ll use the magazine money for fabric or tools I need.
I loved your pictures from your drive. The green of the fields and the blue of the skies is just perfection!
I think you may have touched on what may be one of the problems with magazines. — there seems to be no way to contact them with comments or criticisms that could improve the content. I’m not sure companies even read mailed letters anymore but, it’s worth a try. I would hate to lose AP&Q magazine but, they may need to realize that, most of their readers are seasoned quilters and include some articles for us instead of all new, modern quilters.
Thanks for the driving tour. Everything looks so lush and green. Are you going to replant your pumpkins?
Connie – no, I’m not going to replant. This is two years in a row – I think it’s time to give up and just buy them in the fall.
Mary,
Reiffs north of Floyd always have such a fun selection and so many unique colors and sizes. And, not that expensive when you consider all the work you saved yourself.
Hanks mom – plus about $50 worth of seed!
I used to have several subscriptions but I let them all expire. Now I can read them and any one of a number of other magazines with Libby. Libby is an app that allows you to read digital copies of hundreds of magazines thru your local library. No cost, but even better, no stacks of magazines cluttering every room in the house. If you see something you like and want to make, just do a screen print of the pages..
I agree with you about American Patchwork and Quilting. Nothing this month! It started to go downhill after my friend, Jody Sanders, retired as the editor! Heidi Kaisand before her also did an excellent job! That’s the only quilting magazine I get any more but will let it expire the next time it comes due! Thanks, Mary, for your dedication to the blog. I enjoy reading every day but don’t respond much!
Marlene – you are a seasoned quilter and I really miss hearing from you – you should comment more often. I agree the past editors you mentioned did an excellent job. I used to love this magazine – I believe I still have the whole first year or so and they were great. Thanks for your kind words – I love hearing from my friends.
APQ is the only magazine that I buy or read. This last issue was not my cup of tea. Too many pages based on how to’s or things to buy or ads. They are targeting the younger new quilters audience, while us older and more experienced quilters just deal with it. I liked when they had more variety with several different projects that would appeal to a wide range of quilters. I don’t make many bed size quilts anymore. I make a lot of donation quilts, miniatures, small quilts and few comfort or baby quilts.
I’ve thought this for awhile, but continue to subscribe. Maybe I should cancel, but doubt it would make a difference. A letter would be a great idea if we all sent one.
Not been sewing for a couple weeks. Popped a muscle in my left shoulder. So much pain, but drs dont give pain meds anymore unless you’re dieing! Oh well at least I can watch the Cubs while I’m down.
Seems like you’ve gotten most of the rain lately. My tomatoes need rain. Thinking about installing a rain barrel.
Take it easy Mary.
Diana – maybe a letter campaign would be an eye opener for them. I don’t need a tool of any kind but I would like to see some interesting designs and layouts. If anybody could find an email address we could bombard them.
It is so sad about the firefighters in Idaho. I don’t understand why anyone would want to hurt the people who only do good. So sad. Carole Carter, a blogger at From My Carolina Home, took quilts to a fire station in the NC mountains after the hurricane devastated so much of the mountains. The firefighters loved the quilts. She heard recently that they not only use them on their beds, they use them watching TV, wrapping up in them, etc. I decided that I’m going to donate my quilts to my local firehouses. Of course my production rate per year is pretty low, but I’ll do what I can. 😂
Frances – the gift of a quilt is never a bad idea – for anyone.
I quit taking any magazines. It seems like I don’t like anything in them anymore. It’s very sad because that used to be such a fun and relaxing thing to do….thumbing through a new magazine looking for inspiration. Maybe that’s why I’ve been in a slump lately.
I have a cat that waits under the bird houses too. She also sits under a peony or hosta close to the birdfeeders. Betcha can’t guess what she’s waiting for:)
It sounds like Barney is going to make a competition between Barney and Hazel.
Dee – I never thought about that!! They’re both fierce hunters.
I quit subscribing to quilt magazines years ago, too many advertisements, not enough pretty quilts.
To solve the e-mail issue to get into a web-site like Am. Quilts…..I give an old e-mail address. Then the e-mail goes to “e-mail heaven”! 🤪
I have a special g-mail account that I use for that sort of nonsense (having to set up an account to use a website). Every now and then I open the email inbox, press select all and throw all the emails away. Works a treat.
I also buy almost no quilt magazines anymore: the content is just too thin. I really miss Quilt Sampler: that was my favourite magazine, I loved seeing the different shops and reading about the owners’ passion for quilting. It is the only one I have kept back copies of. I am letting my APQ subscription lapse once it has ended, a magazine with only an interesting page or two is not good enough.
What I do enjoy reading is Quiltfolk: no patterns, no ads and interesting interviews with real quilters. I only buy issues about states that I have visited (have to limit the purchasing somehow!) so that I have some experience/knowledge of the places described.
Fiona – I recently subscribed to Quiltfolk and even bought several back issues and I love to go through them. Do you have the Washington issue? My friend Scott Hansen is featured – I still have the picture of him and his kids at Disneyland when they were little. I wish he didn’t live so far away!
Mary – very clever!
Your pictures were beautiful. Bernard love to go for drives. I really miss doing that. The tree looks like one that Bob Ross would paint. I just started a new subscription for American Patchwork and Quilting. I’m glad it was a special price. I thought the same exact thing as you did after I looked through the magazine. I thought maybe I would like some of the patterns if I changed the colors. I miss the darker country colors. Maybe the next issue will be more to my liking. It’s raining here again. We have really had a lot of rain. Thr crops are loving it. Have a good day tomorrow.
Diane – that tree is a great subject for an artist – I don’t think I know Bob Ross but I’ll look him up.
Bob Ross was a talented painter who had a show on PBS that taught people how to paint. He was so soft spoken and such a great artist. He made painting look so easy which, I know it isn’t to someone like me. So much fun to watch him paint.