I Finished My Fourth Quilt

A year ago, I would have said that I could never make a quilt, not in a million years. I can't believe that I have finished my fourth quilt. Turns out you CAN teach an old dog new tricks! I'm learning so much with each quilt and my skills are improving dramatically. I'm getting a lot faster and so much more confident. 

I'm really happy with how this quilt turned out. It's the first symmetric quilt I've made and the first where I've sewn adjacent stripes fabrics together (tricky!). The binding remains the most difficult part for me, but I'm improving. 

Speaking of the binding, I'm not thrilled with the white. I would have loved to have bound it with the yellow or with another fabric from the quilt, but there wasn't nearly enough of any fabric to do that. Quilting exclusively with donated fabrics really limits things. On the other hand, it's a fun challenge to see if I can make something pretty using the small bits of pieces of fabrics that people give us. 

Invasive Ductal Carcinoma

Life in the deRosier household was good in early 2024. If you look through the scrapbook album, you see Trevor's admission to his top choice for college, a fun celebration for my 52nd birthday, our trip to Texas Hill Country, Brayden's adoption, the Highest Honors ceremony... and then a blank space, followed by all of Trevor's end-of-senior-year festivities and graduation. 

The blank space represents my cancer diagnosis. 

I thought for a long time about how I would include that in the album. I wanted a stark, black page that would represent how the diagnosis was abrupt and unexpected, out of place in our otherwise happy lives. This is what I came up with:

Invasive Ductal Carcinoma (affiliate link)

It's not quite as stark as I'd originally planned. I used the title of Invasive Ductal Carcinoma instead of just CANCER. There's a lot of journaling. The pop of pink is for hope. 

It's been two years and four months since my breast cancer surgery. I finished radiation just over two years ago. I graduated from in-person physical therapy 16 months ago. I have eight more years of endocrine therapy ahead and the lymphedema is still here; I'm not happy about either of those, but it is what it is. Overall, I'm doing well and at this point there is no evidence of disease (NED). I hope it stays that way and that I never have to make another layout like this one. 

Ohio State Quarter Coloring Page (Redo)

Yesterday, I shared an improved version of my Missouri state quarter coloring page. When I colored the original, I didn't have the correct ink colors to do what I wanted. I updated it now that I have new supplies. I'm much happier with attempt #2. 

Today, I'm sharing my improved version of the Ohio state quarter coloring page. In this case, I can't blame the materials - I simply made poor color choices the first time I colored it. I don't know what I was thinking. I used the same colored pencils for the redo and I like it so much better. 

I'm not going to be redoing any more of these coloring pages, now that the two that bugged me the most are better. On to different crafts!

Missouri State Quarter Coloring Page (A Redo)

It's been about 18 months since I finished coloring pages all 50 state quarters using different art materials. And for that whole time, I've been unhappy with the inks I used for the Missouri quarter. At the time, I didn't have better color choices, so I went with the ones I had, knowing they weren't what I wanted. I have some new ink colors now, so I gave them a test run by redoing Missouri's quarter. As before, I started with a base of ink, then added Prismacolor colored pencils on top. 

In addition to using different inks, I changed the colors for the text and the border. I added some golden browns to the river since "The Big Muddy" is actually a yellowish-brown as it flows by Gateway Arch. It's not perfect, but I'm much happier with this version. 

There's one more state quarter coloring page that has been bugging me. I'll share the redo tomorrow. 

DIY Photo Scavenger Hunt - 75 Ideas

I love photo scavenger hunts. It's such a fun way to look at a place differently. I always end up with unique photos I never would have thought to take. You can do photo scavenger hunts while camping, at Disneyland, for Halloween, during Christmas, or even just around the house. 

I want to do a photo scavenger hunt on an upcoming trip, so I started by making myself a template, designed like a BINGO card. I put FREE CHOICE in the center; the remaining squares are blank. For now. 

Next, I brainstormed a list of 75 attributes that work well for a photo scavenger hunt. Each can be taken at face value, but for some words there is room for interpretation. For example, #62 Wave could refer to something wave-shaped, an actual ocean wave, a flag moving in the wind, a person waving, or even something like amber waves of grain. 

Finally, I used random.org to generate a numbers between 1 and 75. 

Since #31 is Soft, I added it to the first square of my card. I repeated the process for the remaining 23 squares until my card was all filled in. If a duplicate came up, I generated a new random number. 

I love that the prompts are truly random. If I had chosen the items to go in each square, I would have balanced the colors, shapes, patterns, etc. Instead, it's all over the place, which adds to the fun. I'm looking forward to using my new photo scavenger hunt card!