A Little More Progress......

A little progress for me, I have the back finished for my Christmas Strip Road, it looks more Christmasy in person.









(Sorry, I've tried and tried and I can't get rid of the gap, I guess Blogger is acting up.)















Quite a bit of progress for Tabitha. she has a couple of minor repairs to make, and then her final border, and she has her first quilt top. Not sure when she'll be back, but she is excited to see it finished so I think that she'll be trying to get back soon. She also wants to make bread, so that is on the agenda, too.

Quilting Lesson Number Two for Tabitha

Today I'm sure that I was the envy of many a "quilting lady". I got to give my granddaughter her second quilting lesson and spend the day with her. She came over early and since it had been between one year and two since her first lesson, we discovered that although we had figured that all her blocks were done, we were actually about 7 blocks short. To explain the gap I'll mention that she has had 2 or 3 jobs at a time since, or has been going to school and working a job in between. She most recently was juggling 3 jobs, working at two different Wendy's and a Cracker Barrel, and now is the "lazy" worker of only two, as she gave up one of the Wendy's jobs. This week, she is on vacation from her remaining two jobs, and is hoping by the end of the year to be down to only one job and back in college. She turned eighteen this
past June.
She started her labors by trimming her blocks and then cutting out the new blocks.










Then she assembly line sewed for an hour or two, and her grandpa came home from some errands and we decided that we needed a field trip. We went and had lunch out and visited with each other (in the South that means that we chatted), and then we went to BJ's and did a little shopping. I got two new towels, DGD got new red house slippers and DH got laundry detergent, lol.
When we returned home, it was back to the sewing machine, and then after awhile DH went to the chiropractor and we decided that after she had sewn the blocks into pairs and ironed the seams and had them ready for the next step that we would have an imprompto not very elegant tea party. Just as we sat down, guess who came in the door, so I got him a cup too.










Below, are five of the seven rows, I think she did a great job. Tomorrow, she will be back and hopefully we will get the top finished. I told her she had 3 choices for finishing, send it out to the LA'er, quilt it herself on my Juki, or tie it. She is leaning toward a poofy bat, and tying it.

By the way, the pattern is Yellow Brick Road.

Christmas Strip Road

I took part in a Cyberquilters 4-C-Bees special project week-end before last, and miracle of miracles, I have finished the top. It is supposed to look very different, but due to my fabric choices, it is what it is. It is from a pattern generously shared by Benita Skinner, called Strip Road. Mine is more like a Strip Unroad though. The only purchase that I made was for 2/3 yard of the red cranberry fabric, and I'm going to use some Christmas fat quarters that I got from Connecting Threads for the back, so it is almost all from my small stash. I have wanted a Christmas quilt, and I'm not hating it even if it was supposed to look different than it does. It will be another miracle if I get it finished for this Christmas, but miracles do happen.

Minutiae

My daughter and grand DIL stopped by yesterday morning and when they left I saw this pretty fellow in the grass. At first I thought that it must be very intent on something, but then I realized it was injured. A shame, but still big and beautiful.









The lighting is terrible, but I think that this is going to be a pretty little quilt when it's done. I have gotten a start on the sashing, and am anxious to see the flimsy. This is for a little girl, and then there will be one the same size for a little guy, and a larger one for me (or someone else, who knows). The colors are brighter and less antiquey looking than it looks here.

Nine Patches

DH has several skin cancers on his arms and so we have been going back and forth to the doctors, about 25 miles each way. In between the doctor and the holidays and just not doing much, I have started my One-A-Day nine patch quilt along with Crazy Mom Quilts. I am supposed to have 70 blocks done, and have 12 done so I am again holding up the end. They are 6 inch blocks, and to be sashed with white.

The other little quilt is leftover blocks from my Strip Twist from Bonnie Hunter. I decided to make a little quilt to put over the breaker box in my family room, but if the new baby coming in the family is a girl, I may finish it as a small baby quilt.

I heard from my niece this morning that she received the baby quilt and 2 little girl quilts that I sent and she seemed happy with them. They live in Iowa and had gotten about 7 inches of rain which caused her cellar to flood so had other things to deal with. The babies were in day care so the rest of the family could clean up without too much extra "help". She has 4 older children, the oldest two teenagers, and she said they were wondering if I sent some for them too. I felt kind of bad that I didn't, but it took me long enough to get these done. Maybe a little later.

All Five Little Girl Quilts Finished

These two quilts look a lot like each other, and a lot like the one that I finished a couple of weeks ago. It went to the little girl across the street, and I received a very nice thank you note from Katie and her mother. Katie is 5 and a half. I made them from Quiltmaker's Super Sized Nine Patch pattern and just super sized them a bit more to the size of about 4 feet by 5 feet. They are for 2 of my nieces children who are toddlers about 2 and 4 years old, and the Strippie quilt from Mary's pattern is for her third little girl who was born December 2008. She has older children also, but these are for her 3 little girls who are still home. The older ones are all in school, and not so apt to be needing a quilt for napping. These were mailed off to Iowa yesterday.






















The little quilt below is for my granddaughter, Breanna, who will be 4 this summer. It isn't very big, but neither is she, so hopefully she will be able to use it for the next year or two. We will hopefully see at least some of her family this weekend and give it to her then.














Julie was sweet enough to send me some of her hens and chicks and another succulent a while back, and I have actually been able to keep them alive, although something seems to want to eat them up. A couple of days ago I looked on the porch and there was an odd little yellow thing peeping up. A few hours later I looked again and it was about 4 times the size. The next morning it had turned into this mushroom looking growth so I took some pictures. It is on the back porch and we do have mushrooms grow in our yard at times, but they never have looked like this, so I assume that this is the "flower" of one of these plants. I'm still amazed at the speed of growth. It's kind of like an exotic umbrella.
I hope that you are all having a nicer day than us weather wise. We are having rain all day, which we need, but I'd rather have an hour or two and then it's over.

Homely Quilts, But Been Busy

First of all, I went to my LQS and they were having some of their fabrics on sale for $5.00 a yard, so I treated myself to a few miscellaneous yards. I don't have any plans for the fabrics except for the one on the right which I got for the bindings on my children's quilts.

Speaking of my childrens quilts, I have all the preperations done, and hope to actually baste and quilt them soon. I used the Super Sized Nine Patch from Quiltmaker and just made them a bit bigger (kids are from 2 to 6). As my title suggests, they are homely, but colorful and hopefully that age group won't be too fussy.

Here's my other homely quilt. I decided to participate in the Quiltville Super Bowl Twist, and then decided to make it bigger and make it for my Grandson, the only one out of fourteen who has actually requested a quilt. I had bought some fabrics to make him a lap sized quilt a couple or three years ago and so used that fabric for the borders. It was never my taste, but was the colors he had requested at the time. Back then, he was living by himself, and now he is living with a girlfriend, so this will hopefully turn out well enough that he'll like it. It is huge, about 92 x 105, so I'm waiting to try quilting it after I finish the baby quilts, and hopefully by then I'll have my courage up.

This last picture is the beginning of my little wallhangings for the Pay it Forward. If I don't get anyone else, I may make pillowcases for hospitals instead. I'm not going to let it stress me, if I don't I don't, at least I tried.

DH and I drove about 90 miles to see the Sandhill Cranes en masse, and found out that there had been about 7000 and they were down to about 200. Sadly, we didn't see a single one, although one time we did hear them. We enjoyed the ride together though, and while we were out we had lunch at Cracker Barrel. Sometimes I get a craving for a "good" hamburger, and now I know where to find one. Cracker Barrel makes a very good burger.

I hope everyone is safe. Like everyone else, I worry about the fires in Australia, and am saddened by the tragedy of it.

Kolbie's Quilt and DD Fabric

Kolbie's quilt top is finished, and now I need to get it basted and quilted. First step will be to watch the video on basting with the boards again, and then when I get that done, I have 6 tops to baste including this one and the one that I made for my 3 year old granddaughter. After that, I will need to watch the DVD that I bought on machine quilting and see if I can do better than last time on my FMQ'ing.

Isn't Kolbie a cutie. My favorites are the one where she looks like she's about to cry, and the one after it where she is asleep on her mama's hands.

My daughter called this morning, she Tabitha and Micah were out doing errands and wanted to know if DH and I would like to meet them for lunch. We did, I had a very good salad with grilled chicken, cranberries, pecans and feta cheese, and we enjoyed the outing and the company. When we got home I was a little disappointed not to see my package for the DD fabrics for Bonnie Hunter's latest mystery, and then when I opened the screen door the package tumbled out. DH and I liked them all, his favorite is the dark blue in the top corner, and I think that they, along with some scraps that I will probably add in, will look nice together. I hope so anyway. I'm not a patient mystery doer, so even though I haven't started yet, I have looked at all the clues, and I must say, I think it is a pretty one. I wasn't so sure about my Orange Crush, and now I love it, so I think this one will be a favorite right away.

I have a full sized laptop computer, but I have been very tempted to get one of the little 9.8 inch, 2 pound Acer's. It seems like it would be nice to have to carry around the house and to take anywhere that I might go. I was wondering if anyone has one and if they like it. It's hard being a gadget person, and being enticed by technology. The one I am interested in is here.

Happy New Year

This morning I have been busy and a little productive. Long story, but due to a bit of drama between x-wives etc., I decided that I wanted to make DD's fiance's DD a quilt. I had some prequilted fabric, so I did a little machine embroidery with her name, and used some assorted leftover binding, and now it is out of the washer and dryer and ready to be delivered. Not fancy, but she is in kidergarten and probably not too hard to please.
I also took a few pictures of my more organized stash (and I use the term loosely as it isn't a very impressive one) The top is my batiks and some smaller mostly half yard pieces. The middle is assorted colored and neutral larger pieces, and the bottom is children and baby fabrics.

Below is my backing stash, I bought several oxford cloth sheets and some flannel sheets from Land's End and am going to see how they work out for backings. I had one done with a sheet at the LA'er with her permission, and it turned out nicely, I'm hoping that I can do it, too.

The still a bit messy picture below is actually the shelf above my backings, and it is my scraps. I always thought that I had mostly pinks, but it seems that I have more blues and purples than pinks. I never would have known if I hadn't tried to make some order from the chaos.

This is just the side view looking in from the closet door. I still have a lot of organizing to do, and that will be done as I put away Christmas decorations. I think that I also need to get rid of some things, but that won't be easy. I can't stand the mess though.

This is a not very good picture of the fabrics that I have ordered from Thousands of Bolts. They are for Bonnie Hunter's mystery, and I'm anxious for them to get here. The email says January 6th, and I'm sure I'll survive.

I am supposed to do the Shakespeare in the Park with an internet friend, and these are the fabrics that I purchased for it about 4 or 5 years ago. They are still intact except for one piece of fabric that I robbed and replaced with another similar one. I just need to take Nike's advice and 'just do it', as for some reason it scares me. She has already started hers and has a couple of snail's trail blocks. done.

Sorry to have gone on and on, if anyone is still with me, I can imagine that your eyes have glazed over.

I wish all a Happy New Year.

Carolina Straightaway and State Flower Quilt

I have been sewing and machine embroidering like a madlady the last few days, but don't have a lot to show for it. Here is the first half (without the border of course) of my Carolina Straightaway. I think that when it is finished I will like it a lot. I have also been working to catch up on my state flower quilt, and midstream I decided to also make one for my daughter as she seemed to like it. I have caught up the blocks, except today this week's came out and I need to do two of the Colorado blocks. Then, I will need to add the borders to 10 blocks, and I will be caught up until next week's block. Yeah! Meanwhile, I also need to finish the second half of my Carolina Straightaway top and then it's on to the 4 star blocks for the borders and it'll be smooth sailing. Next picture, hopefully will be my next 4 states with borders. Then it'll be 8 blocks done and 48 more to go. Good thing only one comes out a week.

Carolina Straightaway

Six down and 19 to go and then on to the next step. I haven't gotten into the nose to the grindstone mood yet, but I figure if I can do a few blocks a day I'll be chipping away at it. Now to work on my state flower quilt before I get too far behind on it. A procrastinator's work is never done. I like that!
By the way, the sashing will be red, not white. These are just me using my new design wall. I still can't take a straight picture.

Carolina Straightaway

I've agonized and been back and forth between doing the Carolina Crossroads as written, and doing my version of Carolina Straightaway, and now I'm declaring myself as having made a firm decision to do my version. I love the pictures of everyone's CC's, but I don't think that I want that large of a quilt, and so I'm going to do my version. Mine will have sashing and will have the other CC block with the star, in each corner, with 3 - 3 inch borders, one each in red, white, and blue, to join together with the star blocks. I have 1 block completed, and am set up and ready to go, but still procrastinating on the computer, lol. I feel like doing the 4 star blocks will make me feel like I did everything in the pattern, but just in a smaller amount. If it doesn't look girlie, I may give it to one of my brothers for Christmas, or maybe even my DH, or if I love it I may get greedy. The top picture is the fabric that I had bought a while back for my Carolina Straightaway, and now I can't remember which is which, but it is for the borders and sashing. Maybe the backing too, as there is quite a bit of the fabric with the little blue stars. I'll need to figure it all out again, as I lost my little cheat sheet when I moved my sewing area from the family room back to the bedroom. Now I still need to decide if it is going to be a Carolina Straightaway, or a Florida Straightaway. I could be going off to Lake Buena Vista this afternoon with DH and 12 year old dear grandson, but at least I have my plan now

Turning Twelve Finished

Well....., I'm not proud, but it is finished, and I've read that finished is better than perfect, so it's lots better, lol. It is a pretty poor picture, but DH is napping so I just used my bed like usual, at least I changed the quilt from my pink rail fence to my pink Sumo Sudoku. It is ready for my dentist appointment tomorrow, and I just hope that they don't look too closely, the galloping horse scenerio would be best.