New Curtains

I just finished up some new curtains for DD, at a whopping 8 years old I felt it was time to replace the faded Winnie the Pooh Bear ones back from her nursery days.  I took what my mother taught me years ago about using two layers of fabric to create a light blocking effect and made these using a beautiful hand made batik on one side and a coordinating solid purple on the reverse.  Now should I decide to make tie backs I will made them using the last little bit of batik fabric that I have.  That way the curtains can be turned so that the purple side shows with a bit of batik detail or the simple batik as shown here.

If all else fails, ignore it.

I haven't been at my sewing machine lately, hence the blog silence.  The last time I sat at my machine it was skipping stitches horribly and my both my scissors and my sips needed sharpened, so I set everything aside and figured I would take care of sending the scissors in while DH fixes the machine.

Well then yesterday I read an article about digging in and dealing with what we've been putting off.  So forgetting my sewing studio woes I cleaned it and started sewing the final folded border on the front of the Mandala quilt.  That's funny, the machine purred like a kitten.  With not a single skipped stitch.  Everything was perfect.  Hmm, I think to myself, okay perhaps DH fixed it and didn't tell me.

When he got home later in the day I asked him about it.  Nope he never got to it.  So neglect fixed my sewing machine.  Funny, I wonder if it was lonely or just wanted a little vacation???  

Chocolate Humor

DH:  (looking at one of my cookbooks)
Me:  Oh!  Whatcha wanta make?
DH:  (shows fudge recipe) But it takes 2 hours, I'll make it another time.
Me:  I can make some fudge frosting, it will be ready in less than five minutes.
DH:  What would I do with that?
Me:  Eat it with a spoon of course!
DH:  (rolls eyes heavenward and laughs) I should have known you were going to say that.
Minutes pass
Me:  So do you want me to go make that frosting?
DH:  Sure
Five minutes later DH is eating fudge frosting with a spoon.
Me:  See, five minutes and it's good isn't it?
DH:  Well it's not fudge, but it is good.
Me:  Not bad for five minutes.

Mandala Final Border, Naw....

Mandala Quilt Showing off Stripes

Mandala awaiting another border

Today I attached the large border of spirographs to the Mandala Quilt.  As some of you know I made my half square triangles at 2" sewn in, instead of 2.5" sewn in.  This has created a bit of a size issue.  The quilt as it is right now at 73" square really isn't big enough for two people to share.  I believe it will need another border.  I've been looking it over and I think this will mean another folded border and another set of diagonal stripes.  That's another 328 HST's!  Right.  I am so not loving that idea.  Any options that you see?  I have some fabrics that match rather well which I had been planning to use on the back that could technically go on the front.  I demo'ed them on the edge for DH.  He said one in particular but when I protested, saying I think the best answer is the HST's he said "yeah, I know."  Really?  LOL.  That means he's telling me what I want to hear even if that means I believe him and take the easy way out.  Men!

Christmas CQAL Mid-Morning Check In

Halloween is my daughter's favorite holiday.  For the life of me I don't understand it.  I was always a fan of Christmas myself, but she loves this time of year.  I imagine someday she will own one of those brightly decorated amazing houses filled with plenty of Halloween Fun.  So when Sue said, who wants to host and gave me the choice of October I knew I had to seize the opportunity.

How are your projects going today?  Did you remember to leave a comment on the Mr. Linky post so that you can win one of my pin cushions?

Well grab a snack, or whatever is left from being picked over from breakfast and I'll join you for a cup of bloody raspberry tea.   I'm just now getting up so I'd love to hear what you've done so far.

A Little of This and a Bit of That...

Interior Backpack Pencil pocket

Whatcha been up to lately?  This was our first week of school, and it was rough getting back into the daily grind.  As a surprise a friend bought my daughter a Disney Fairies backpack.  That made the lifetime warranty one I bought seem a little like chopped liver.  It lacked a secondary pocket so rather than telling DD she couldn't use it for school, I made her one.  The fabric matched perfectly and the piece I had was already cut at the correct width.  I was sewing on the fly and didn't have a zipper so instead it has a Velcro closure which the more I think about it the more I like it.  This is my start and finish for August's New FO project.

River Art Quilt

I've been quilting too.  I put the River Art Quilt on the frame and have started working on it.  As you can see I have made some progress on my tree trunks as well as some of the browned grass in the background.  At this point I'm just finishing this quilt to finish it, as I don't see many quilt guild meetings in my future.  Pay no attention to all those wild threads, I will tame them by the time this quilt is finished.

Lonestar Day August!

Happy Lonestar Quilting Day! 

Queen Lone Star Top with DD

I am happy to say that my Lonestar Quilt Top is all together as one nice giant square.   It is a queen at this point though I do not have exact measurements yet, as I'm not quite certain how to square it in my tiny house...  I added the background pieces a week or so ago. 

In one amazingly peaceful morning with my sister I sat down with a some of Bonefish's Press Pot Coffee and came up with these rather extensive quilting plans.  With only a midarm I knew I needed a section by section plan.  I was also concerned that without a detailed images at the very least in my minds eye, I would inadvertently change quilting designs going instead for those that are more comfortable as I moved through the quilt, thereby loosing continuity. 

Quilting Notes for Lone Star

On the blog front things have been very quiet and I have missed stopping by and seeing how everyone is doing, but never fear we have just been enjoying the last strains of summer with DD which I will share with you later.  Have a nice evening. 

Summer Camp

Only three more background pieces to cut before I can sew.

In the meantime I thought I would show you my daughter's before and after camp pictures.  She couldn't wait for me to catch up so that I could have a cute smiling one.

Checking out Camp Cabin for the First Time

Home from camp

Foto Finish: Warm

DD Age 3 Warms my Heart

Today's subject for Foto Finish over at Cat Patches is warm.  I started in one folder of pictures and made my way through about 7 years of pictures.  Warm?  Should I have a picture of a sweaty person?  A Whole Family?  Would someone or a pet curled up with a quilt be "warm"?  That's when I found this one in a folder titled Family Pictures and I simply had to share.  It's date stamped August 2008, so DD would have been a solid 3 years old at the time this was taken.  Sheesh, can you imagine being cuter at three?

Person in a swim suit?  Check.
Warm?  Surely check.
Warms my heart?  Double Check.

The house even looks clean, where did that momma go and can she please come to my house and clean here too?

I find at six she's just as heart warming...

The Question of...

Who used Mommy's scissors and why?  

There is one really great thing about having given up machine embroidery and spray basting quilts on the floor (because they go on the mid arm frame now).  The reason is, my tools are never sticky.  Not my scissors, not my machine, not the floor, nor the cutting rulers...  Yet this afternoon when I snagged my thread scissors from their post at the quilting machine handles, I noticed they were covered in gunk.  Not toddler touches something gunk (don't have any of those, thank goodness) but sticky gunk.  Like someone was using them to cut something sticky gunk...  At least I have my DK5 so they are all clean now, but don't you worry I'll rat out who did it, and when I do...  They'll be using their own scissors from now on, and trust me everyone in this house owns at least one pair of scissors.

How many pairs of scissors do you own?  DD at age 6 has 2 pairs.  DH, oh boy, has at least four pairs that I can think of off the top of my head.  Me?  You want to know how many pairs I have...  Well let me think, four or maybe five pairs.  With three of those being really good ones, because you just can't have enough really good scissors...

Christmas Cakes & A Chihuly Kiss

We have a great many birthdays around my house this time of year.  I was the cake maker for two of them. Below my sister shows off with her butterfly cake that had whipped topping for frosting and Funfetti cake mix inside.

My next cake is a black forest cake for my husband.  It is my once a year cake.  Once a year I make it for him.  He never asks me to so it's a good thing I know how much he likes it.  Normally it has a lot more cherries on the top, I must have gone overboard on the lower layers.  Already DD is asking for one for her birthday, I think I can arrange that.

Christmas was good to us.  You can always tell how good Christmas is in a house with a little girl because it looks like the Pink Barbie Isle exploded all over your house.  Silly me, I forgot that I needed to clear out some toys in order to make room for new ones.  So guess what?  When DD's daddy asked her to pick up the living room she brought everything into the sewing room!  LOL.
I love a good surprise at Christmas time.  As a mom it's nice to know that people are thinking of you without having to say a word.  So perhaps the most surprising of all of my gifts was this one from my sister.  It is called a Chihuly Kiss, which my sister picked out for me when she visited our new Dale Chihuly Museum.  Isn't it lovely?  The shape, form, and movement are quite inspiring don't you think?  I haven't found a home for this yet but you can be sure it will be somewhere good.

Reversible Christmas Capelet

One of my daughter's Christmas presents is a beautiful white organza dress with purple embroidery.  I'm a wear whatever you want type of person.  Maybe that's bad, but if my daughter wants to wear her dresses to school, I say why not?  It's not as though she's bombarded to be a flower girl every other weekend.

Her new dress though is sleeveless, which is a bit of a "no no" for her school's dress code.  What to do, what to do?  Clearly I bought the dress, I knew it would be a problem, but I figured it was so pretty it didn't matter as I'd figure out something.  

Sure enough something hit, ironically a neighbor's niece is getting married this spring.  My neighbor was having a go at making a capelet for one of the girls.  What a pretty little capelet it turned out to be too!  Nice fabric and a beautiful drape.  I didn't make the connection right away, but when I did I started looking for girls free capelet patterns.  My friend Vicki found this one.  Which I love, but it's a bit more of a coat than I was looking for so instead of swinging my circle at 18" instead I checked some of DD's dresses and decided to swing instead at 10".  I left off the collar and instead sewed and flipped like a pillow.  Then I top stitched and added a button.  

Perhaps I should say I added two buttons back to back so that it can be on the pink side or the white side.  The first time I did this (sewing through one button into another) I made it to tight and I could hear the chorus of "the button is to tight" so I cut them off and started again.  This time to ensure I had the space I actually buttoned the button and kept it that way while I sewed through the two buttons - one on each side.  That worked well and I will keep this method in mind for future projects.

This is a super easy project, I think it took between half an hour to an hour, and I had to iron some very wrinkled fabric.  I like the coat part of the pattern too so maybe I'll make a version that way some other time.

Crayon Quilt Piecing in Progress

I've been working on sewing the strips together for the Teacher's Crayon Quilt.  These are strips that the children selected as being their favorites when I went to the Great American Teach In the other day.

 So far I have the strips sewn and pressed.  All of the prairie points are made for the crayon tips and I've started working on the teacher's pencil.  So far I really like the pencil.  I went with a different pink than the one I'd planned as this one matched a bit better and I knew when I turned the tube I'd made the right choice.  Doesn't that pink scream eraser?

For the quilting I'm going to be quilting the students names onto their strips (hence all those bits of paper at the top of the flimsy).  Currently I'm planning to find the center and mark each strip with my Sewline Pencil and then write in the name with the pencil before quilting it. I am considering using gold glitter thread for quilting the students names.  I've never quilted with glitter thread before, but I think it would unite the crayon colors nicely so it's worth the try.

I don't think I will be working on this much more until after Thanksgiving.  DD was firm well over a month ago that we always host Thanksgiving so hence we will again this year.  What are your plans for Thanksgiving?  I think perhaps the best thing would be to simply sit at the sewing machine and give thanks for finding this passion of quilting in which to bury myself in.  ;-)

Christmas Quilt-Along November: Lunch Break

I haven't made it back to my quilting.  Walking into the living to load my Peppermint Burst Quilt on the frame for the sounds time took me instead to something that looked a lot like this so I just went back to the sewing room and made binding instead.  It's one less thing I'll need to make later.  What are you having for lunch?  I'm thinking a salad, which is surely the opposite of Christmas but something light and fresh sounds good after my donuts earlier.

Quilter's Fall Festival 2011

It is time for the Quilter's Fall Festival again.  Yippie!  It's always a joy participate.  Today I'm going to show you the first Wall Hanging I ever made.  I made it to give my husband for our 5 year wedding anniversary.  You're supposed to give wood for the five year mark so this was my take on that.  Now I know you only have a minute so I'll stop chatting right now and say come on back anytime you want to read about quilts, cats, or my six year old daughter as I'm prone to talk about all of those things.

Good thing for the two of us that love is still growing after all this time!

I won: The Devils Puzzle

How about that for a blog post title?  Sure enough it's true.  Just the other day going through my regular favorite blogs and I discovered that Caren over on As the Thread Breaks was having a book giveaway.  But not just any book.  This is a brand new novel from the "A Someday Quilts Mystery Series".  Now I don't know about you but I like a good mystery novel every once in a while and I can't seem to resist a book with quilts thrown in so this should make for a wonderful read.  If you'd like I'll even review it here on my blog when I'm done.

As for other matters, would you believe DD lost her first tooth?  Yes, it happened right here in my sewing room.  I convinced her to allow me to tie dental floss to it and after a few minutes of her gently tugging she gave it one great pull (I have no idea why) and the tooth flew across the room!  I heard it tink against something, but alas I've cleaned the room twice looking and DH even came through looking and we can't find it.  The tooth fairy acknowledged DD's picture saying "I lost my tooth" complete with a hand drawn little girl with a big gap in her smile, by writing that it was okay and leaving the token of $1 anyway.  I know $1 whole dollar.  I guess that's the going rate.  I recall getting pocket change from the tooth fairy but she much be getting rich on those teeth.

'Tis the Season for PUMPKINS!

As I mentioned we went to decorate pumpkins.  I was surprised how many mothers are very bossy when it comes to their children's artwork.  I tried to take my cues from them as what not to do and instead just tried to help DD make her pumpkin how she saw fit.  Many of the girls made girlie pumpkins which I found surprising, even DD with her love of Halloween.  No matter this is our pumpkin this year.  Isn't she a delightful Jill-O-Lantern?

Foto Finish: Feet

I nearly forgot about Cat Patches Foto Finish, yesterday's theme was feet.  So after going back to my old pictures, I found this one that I'm certain I've never shared. These were my daughter's shoes before before the days that she could walk.  My momma always told me that if children can't walk there is no sense trying to keep shoes on their feet so don't even bother buying them.  She always felt it was better to invest in quality baby socks that stayed on instead of being worried over loosing shoes and I saw the logic in that. So I didn't buy any of these shoes. Instead they came to me as hand me downs from friends and family.  As you can see most of them have never been worn and many still had stickers on them.  When DD outgrew the possibility of wearing them I happily donated them all to Hospice and sent them all paired together off for frugal Grandma's to pick through and gush over.

What is the Difference?

Now I was going to start this post saying I didn't have a very productive day, but the more I thought about what I had to tell you I'm certain it was a productive day.  So you decide, but keep in mind your only option is to agree with me.  First there was 10 days worth of laundry...

I helped DD with her homework.  She has spelling words each week this year, just like clockwork.  She is still on the learning side of the reading hill so when the spelling list comes home I know she doesn't know any of the words, and that causes me a bit of turmoil.  After all, I have one week to not only teach her how to read the word, but how to spell it as well.  I know she'll hate me if I make her write the entire list of ten - five times each and everyday, and there is a part of me that feels without proper reinforcement that wouldn't stick anyway.  So I've been trying to dream up new and different options to present the words in a fun way.  This is what I came up with last week that DD liked so much we did it again this week. I tell DD the word and she finds the letters for the word and puts them together.  This week I also added writing the word down on a piece of paper after it was spelled out, as I thought that would reinforce the connection between the capitalized Scrabble letters and the lower case letters she needs to use on the spelling test.

Tiny looks very disinterested, but she was really just waiting for the right moment to spell her own word. She singled out the letters TELC, which shockingly  seems to stand for language fluency matters in multiple countries.  I have only read two of The Cat Who mysteries so I'm not going to bother thinking she's smart; I already knew that.

After homework I was completely tuckered out, and settled in on the couch to start a new book.  I was to tired to read and ended up sleeping while DD curled up in my lap to watch "Powerpuff Girls" episodes that I record for her every night (they don't come on here until 10:30 pm!).

When I woke up and felt in much nicer spirits so I finished folding the last load of laundry, and started to pin Tropical Waves on the quilt frame.  I had actually started this project two other times. The first time I discovered that the uptake leader is bigger for a reason and mine was in the wrong spot.  So I had to switch all those around.  Then when I pinned it the second time I only thought I started pinning at center, but had really started at the 3/4 mark so I had to unpin everything.  Needless to say after that I walked away and let it sit for a couple of days.  Yesterday the pinning went much more smoothly with the only hiccup being some hamburger helper noodles stuck to the bottom of my pot and trust me no one cared.

So you see how can you call that an unproductive day?  Yet that was how I felt; perhaps it was due to the nap, or the matronly laundry that I somehow forgot I did.  I think we judge ourselves to harshly sometimes.  I didn't get that quilt quilted, I didn't do this or that thing that I needed to do.  But the question becomes what did you do instead?  A nap?  Cooked dinner?  Study?  More to the point, remember that all those things matter too.  Regardless of how you intended to run your day, enjoy this one no matter what it throws at you.

It's Saturday and I remembered to check over at Cat Patches for Foto Finish.  This weeks theme is Look Up.  I think perhaps the best part of this weekend venture is going back through the thumbnails of my old pictures and seeing what there is to see.  This is DD I would guess for her 4th Christmas so she would have been about 3 1/2.  I found it in the 2008-2009 folder so that works out about right.  I think there is something beautiful about the way a child looks at a Christmas Tree, don't you agree?  Though I'd like to state for the record I have no memory of my living room being arranged like that, so I can only figure that must have been the year we moved the furniture all around for maximum capacity for Thanksgiving.  Wont ever do that again to much work instead just grab a seat and sit where ever you can!

Do you see Sunny above DD?  How about out that window?  Do you see my neighbor's green grass?  That's life here in Florida.  Now I bet right now you're all missing snow but just wait until it gets here and the roads are covered in that filthy slush and everything is covered in grime...  Then you'll be back to enjoy my green grass.