Blocks - Crazy, Sane and Mental

Well, the mental block is nothing new. If I want to focus on something, I have to write it down. Yesterday, I made up a list of things I wanted to get done and by golly, I did get most of them done. But sometimes I am unrealistic. In addition to cleaning 2 bathrooms, changing the catbox, cleaning the kitchen and mopping its floor, preparing and mailing my Etsy orders, doing 4 loads of laundry, doing a blog post (that I forgot to send until today), and writing long overdue letters (emails), I thought I could quilt the in-process baby quilt, cut out another one, and dye the last of the seaweed lace. Yeah, only if I went without sleep. So, Monday’s goals will probably spread out over the entire week. And maybe I should go with the flow instead of writing daily goals?

So I said a post or two back that I would share the work that the ladies in our recent Lace & Pearls Round Robin (for Crazy Quilting International) did on my blocks. Previously, I shared the work I did on their blocks, but this is the lusciousness that I got back.

Barbara W. always does amazing flowers!

This is Gayle’s lovely work. Wish I’d given her a bigger piece of lace - my bad.

Connie K did this gorgeous work.

Andrea did the lower right area and Connie finished up this block for her.

Liz R used the lace to make a peacock! Isn’t it amazing?

And this is the block that awaits my stitching.  

A few of my female relatives and I have started a Sunday Sewing Session. My cousins Carrie and Kim (who went to Arizona with us and are really my hubby`s nieces even though they are roughly my age), along with Carrie`s grown daughter Jenny (who has two kids that stay at home with their daddy) get together in my studio from 10am-ish to 2 or 3-ish on Sunday to sew.  Having a regular few hours to stitch has enabled me to get a lot done. I`ve been helping Carrie with our local quilt shop`s Block of the Month (BOM) blocks (which are red and black and white and I have no pictures of because I give them back to her).  And she has been helping me organize my stash of quilting fabric.

It`s not finished yet, but it is sure looking better. Thanks, Carrie! I love you!  :-)

Last year in January I started an online BOM and only got the very first one done. That’s because February’s block was awful - paper pieced center block with 8 sections, and I could not get it. I finally got smart and made the center plain. I figure the quilt police won`t show up and arrest me or anything, LOL.  That block is on the left, below.  The right block is the same line of fabric (Notting Hill by Joel Dewberry) plus some birdie fabric. That pattern is the one we have for March for our local BOM. I don’t like how those 2 strips came together to make that big oval in the lower left, but I am still undecided about fixing it.  What do you think?

So now I have 3 blocks done for this quilt, which will eventually be for me. But it is a long-term project to work on here and there.

Finally, I have another CQ block to finish by the end of June for a friend. I can`t really talk about it, but this is it`s start:

I am still in the idea-gathering stage. I`ve been researching and reading and pinning pictures on a private Pinterest board, collecting online pix, sketching ideas in a sketchbook, etc.  I have given myself another week (until the end of the month) for this phase before I gather all my possible supplies and begin piecing the block.  And then everything will probably change, or at least morph as I go along. It’s always a fluid process, isn’t it?  

Now can you see why I finally cut yesterday’s post short and published the first half this morning?  This second half was way long, and together - sheesh. I need to blog more often.  

By the way, I will have one more post either today or tomorrow. Subject: Lace Seaweed. It is all dyed up and just needs to be packaged and listed in my Etsy shop. That’s what I am doing this afternoon.  Oh, and for those of you who commented (or wrote to me) saying that 11 yards of seaweed lace isn`t very much, I neglected to mention that it is 13” wide. It really IS a lot. I’ve been dreaming seaweed. . .

Hugs,

Finishes, WIPs, and . . Hey! Where Did March Go??

I woke up this weekend (figuratively speaking) and realized that the number of my followers (over 350) on the old Google never seemed to be going up. Well, duh, Cathy. That`s because it is defunct. Now there is Google+, Bloglovin’, and other means. So I finally installed those options (I think) in my sidebar. Hopefully I haven`t lost too many followers along the way. No one likes the feeling that they are talking to themselves, right?

First, thank you to my dear cousin Annamaria Kover (Manya) in Romania (actually Szekely, the part-Hungarian region) for sending me a lovely pendant. She had a contest on Facebook, and we all got to comment on which one of four pendants that she showed was our favorite. My favorite was the daffodil pendant, and I was the lucky winner of it. I already had one of her beautiful rose pendants (I was her first customer when she began selling them). So, I snapped a picture of the two pendants together. I love wearing them!!

Manya has some great new egg-shaped pendants and as well as her gorgeous scissors keeps, compacts and eyeglass cases. Very drool-worthy eye candy!  You can visit her on her Facebook Page HERE.

Remember the pink dress I showed you in the last post that I finished for my DGD London? It was a ready-made dress, about 4 years old, that was given to me by a friend. The front embellishments were dirty and damaged beyond repair, so I took them off and made a new ribbon rose. I also added lace and ribbon and it came out very nicely. In fact, I did a double-take when the new Carter’s (children’s-wear store) ad booklet came in the mail.  Look at the cover and the inside picture.

It makes me feel good that these are so similar, even down to the tulle overlay.  So, London`s Easter dress is very in-style, and best of all (for me), it was free and a great way to rescue and recycle an old dress.  :-)

This is going to be a long post with a lot of pictures, by the way, LOL.

I finished the baby quilt for my grandson Bear.  My BSR foot for my Bernina 550QE sewing machine came in, so I could finish the stippling.  It is bright and the print is of pirate bears, so it will do. It`s not something that I would make for myself, LOL!

These 2 photos (above and below) were taken on the kitchen floor, under the skylight. 

This is the LAST of the grandkid quilts with Minkee on the back. Hallelujah!!

Below is the next quilt. The top is done and it is pin-basted to the batting and flannel back. I will quilt it later this week. It’s just a baby quilt that will be a gift for one of my daughter`s friends who is having a girl in May. Riley (the friend) will be welcoming Marlee.  Riley has always been special to us.

Well, I am going to close this post. I should`ve just published it yesterday. I have so much to talk about.  So, as soon as this is published, I`m starting on a new post!  :-)

Hugs,

Back in the Saddle (Yet Again)

It has been a loooooong, eventful Holiday season, and I think I am finally recovered. Just so much to do.  I have learned that being the owner/moderator of Crazy Quilting International, a Yahoo group - very active - with over 800 members in almost 3 dozen countries -  takes time. That rather surprised me (duh!), but I had been a moderator (not the owner/“Momma”) of the group for years.  Sure, if I set myself out special tasks, they are going to take time, but I didn’t anticipate all the emails (which I love, BTW)  and other mini-crises that happen and need attending to. I have four other great moderators - Berta Partridge, Sharon Boggon, Gerry Hookstra and Wilma Van Wagensveld.  But sometimes the buck stops with me. And then we had our 2014 Retreat Registrations, which filled up in 2 days (I was handling those deposits).  I will post more info about that here later because we are also going to have a Visitors Day where others can come for a single day.  In a nutshell: Kansas City, September 2014.  I will also be sharing some other CQI stuff here as well as on the CQI Blog.

Anyway, I have been blogging and writing to all of you ‘in my head’ for weeks, with full intentions of keeping my blog going and up to date. Eventually, that is.  :-)  I think I am ready to finally show some of the pictures of my son’s wedding last June, plus pictures of our cruise to the Bahamas and my visit with my dear friends Carol and Woody K in Florida.  But that will be in a post or two.


First, I want to show you a quilt finish (a sane quilt, not a crazy quilt) that I did in December.  I had pieced this easy strippy mile-a-minute quilt top last year after Christmas and then put it away. The fabric is Kate Spain’s Joy for Moda, with a few other strips added in here and there.

I had the backing fabric (red Minkee), batting and binding,  so all I had to do after Thanksgiving was whip it out, baste it together and quilt it.  The quilting process was a freemotion nightmare with my old Husqvarna machine (about 15 years old). It has  been an OK machine most of the time for basic sewing and CQ piecing, but has always had tension issues.

Let me tell you, I was soooooo ready to pick up my new Bernina out of Layaway in December.  This was the last quilt  I was ever going to quilt on a less than stellar machine!!  And since it was going to be just for me to cuddle up in during the winter, I played around and experimented with the quilting on this quilt.

So, I am going to show a close-up of some of my crappy quilting. I tried to mimic the cording in the Christmas lights prints that meanders and circles, etc.  And then I thought “what the heck” and practiced anything I felt like.

So the quilting varies here and there to include stippling, pebbling, waves and a holly leaf.  See?  Even in sane quilting I am good at breaking the ROOLS.    :-)

remember, this is just PRACTICE!!

 But that’s OK. I love it, and so does Alfie!

And, in the interests of Equal Opportunity, here is a cute picture of Darla, taken a couple weeks ago:

So, I finally got my long-anticipated Bernina 550QE (Quilters Edition) out of layaway!!  I paid for most of it with proceeds from my Etsy shop, which I am proud of.  Financially speaking, going on the cruise and vacation was a higher priority than the machine sincethe layaway was 12 months interest-free.  Here is my new baby, which I have named Bernadette:

I have been taking the 4-week Owners Course and have completed 3 out of 4 weeks. Next week we will focus on quilting, and I'll learn how to use the walking foot and the Stitch Regulator (makes all stitches equal length when you are quilting!  YAY!).  The last week was a review of a lot of the heirloom stitching techniques that I used to do quite a bit of (pintucks and rolled hems being my favorites). I even bought a special gathering (ruffling) foot for it, so I am looking forward to sewing some cute clothes for DGD London this year!

My next goal is to save for a nice sewing table/cabinet with storage and lots of space for quilting and cutting out garments.

Well, my tummy is grumbling for dinner. Oh, and I am still on Weight Watchers and doing well.  Down 19 pounds so far, and going strong.

I will be back later in the week to begin catching up with CQ to show, wedding and cruise pix (I just want to see them again for the warm weather scenes!!), and a whole list of things. If I can find that list under this pile of paperwork for taxes. . .

Hugs,

Stitchy Quilty Goodness

The pressure is off; everything is done.  All the gifts that I set out to make this year are done.  They are not all photographed to blog about yet, and they certainly aren’t wrapped. But I am done with the five Christmas quilts, five purses, and four zip pouches.   Whew!

Here is the final Christmas gift quilt. This is for Lauren, aged 8. She wanted red and yellow.  The pattern is, again, the disappearing 9-patch, this time set 4x5.  It was totally randomly pieced, which I should have paid more attention to because there is a greater concentration of reds in the top middle area. Oh well.

Yes, the back is Minkee.  Red Minkee.  I quilted it with gridded lines, nothing fancy.

I finished this about a week ago and took a few days off from quilting.  This week, I began cutting out the next quilt, which will be for my daughter Megan. The fabric is mostly from Indie by Pat Bravo (I love, love, love that line!)  I’ll be making it in Jeni Baker’s Side Braid Pattern, the mini braid version.

But my sewing machine has not been idle!  When I was at Sewing Summit (a sewing conference) here in Salt Lake in October, I took a class on these sweet snap purses. The gray one with orange flowers is the one I did in class. The other four I made this week for a couple friends, my daughter and my daughter-in-law-to-be for Christmas.

My daughter will have her choice of this one or the gray one. I will get the other. But this is my fave!

One friend is very musical, so this was the perfect lining fabric!

The interior lining.

So, now I can start the fun, no pressure sewing. Pillowcases.  They will be stocking stuffers here and there if and when I get them done.  Or maybe I will use the pillowcases as wrapping for the quilts and purses (and kill two birds with one stone!  I hate wrapping presents!)

My Kahlua this year turned out awesome and all my kids (they’re all adults) have gotten theirs already. And we took some to Bruce’s office party, too. There is some left for a neighbor and one little bit left for me.  Luckily, I have all the ingredients to make another batch before New Year’s, LOL.

Last year, I shared a lot of vintage Christmas images.  I have hundreds, if not thousands. Would you like more?  Also, for those who are newer to my blog, you might want to check out the Father Christmas Fashion Show from last year, here.

Hugs,

Another Little Quilt

In between stitching for my round robins and the CQ Journal Project, I am trying to complete a half dozen quilts before Christmas. Sounds impressive, eh?  It isn’t really - these are small, very easy quilts.  The idea was to get me back into quilting with easy patterns for the grandkids’ quilts.

Bruce helping Hunter with Pumpkin

Hunter checks out our pumpkin patch

Cars and trucks Christmas quilt for Hunter

Detail view

Minky backing showing quilting

Below, I just love our orange front door, especially at this time of year when it makes a great backdrop for an autumn wreath!

I’ve started winterizing the yard, so most of the flowering annuals are gone and things are looking a bit bare.  The weather is still clear, gorgeous and warm during the days, but evenings are nippy.

The Japanese maple is also showing off for autumn.

The entryway looks so bare without all my flower-filled Mexican Talavera pots.  Well, I had to keep one there for another couple weeks . . .

Next time I am out in the garden, I will tackle this front flower bed.  I want to enjoy that delphinium as long as I can and pretend it’s still summer!

There are a lot of autumn themed laces in my Etsy shop.  Below I have just a sampling.  There are Christmas appliques and laces, too (we crafters like to get an early start).  Enjoy the fall colors, LOL!!

Hugs,