A Sewing Vacation

I have really enjoyed my vacation this past week.  We rented a cabin on Lake Barkley in KY.  One bedroom, a couple of pull-out couches... just perfect for the three of us.  It was a bit crowded when my daughter and grandsons came for a visit mid-week, but we're family and it's good to be close... once in a while...for a short time.

Although I've taken pictures with my camera, I forgot the cord to connect and download to the computer, so for now, these pictures are emailed and downloaded from my phone..a bit blurry, but good enough.

I set up my little 221 featherweight in the corner behind the kitchen table and had a blast sewing away on UFOs that I never could find time to complete at home.

    

The most important project of the week was to embroider a face on Bunny.  I had made this bunny as an Easter present for my oldest grandson from one of his receiving blankets when he was 2.  He was always carrying his blanket around and tripping over it.  So, rather than have him looking like a bruised up Linus, I decided a stuffed toy would be easier to carry.  Now that he is 5, he has been asking me to give Bunny a face.

 



He was thrilled to arrive at the cabin for a visit to find Bunny with a face laying on his sleeping bag.

I also made both boys a pair of Lightning McQueen pajama pants.  I have more fabric to make a matching top, but that will have to wait.  They have gone home and I have no T-shirts of theirs to use as a pattern.

First quilt done was Cracker Barrel... a UFO from 2007.  I had been working on these blocks as a leader/ender since January.  The rail fences were made and all the white triangles sewn on.  Several hours  of happily chain-piecing while also  watching the World Cup games and the blue triangles were sewn on too.  The blocks and rows were quickly assembled, borders on and call it done (except for the quilting!)

Next up was my Quiltmakers Block Party swap blocks from 2012. I had gone to Williamsburg, took Bonnies three classes and participated in the swap and haven't touched any of it since returning home.  

I had made and received 12 blocks, but some of them just didn't seem to fit the designated color-way and I just couldn't include those odd-balls in this quilt.  I  raided my stash and found the pink for sashing.

Next was to sew together another pink charm-square quilt.  These are my most popular item I have made and sold for the last 5 years...and I need a few for the upcoming shows in the fall.  I collect various pale pinks, cut 5inch charms, a white inner border and then find a final outer border.  It's an easy quilt to piece together in just a couple hours.

 

 

This next project is a BOM designed by Pat Sloan.  I made the first block back in January when the sew-along began... and then just never found time to make each additional monthly block.  I am really happy to be able to get caught up with these.  The first block is a 24in center and other blocks are 10in and will surround the center block.  I am all caught up  now and ready for the new block in July.

 

 

 

 

This next quilt I made from some blocks I had in my stash.  I had made these blocks several years ago, but not really liking them, I put them aside.  I decided now was the time to do something with them. I am sure I had more of this fabric to finish the quilt, but it has disappeared over time.  While I don't love this it is done, and maybe someone will have a little baby boy that can love it.

  

 



There are more pictures and projects to show... but I'll save that for another post.

 

 

Totals for June 2014

This birdhouse quilt for a customer was my custom quilt this month... made by the sister of the donkey quiltmaker.  This was a bit quicker finish than last month's donkeys...  I guess the more of these types of quilts I do the easier and quicker they finish.  There was some stitch-in-ditch (SID), outlining of shapes and then a small stipple meander for background fill-in.  

I have three more custom quilts to work on this summer... the third one being another donkey quilt!  The two sisters make the same pattern together (although one is a bit faster at completing than the other).  I won't be getting the second birdhouse quilt though... she decided to make one block at a time and quilted it on her DSM before assembling into a quilt.  Not to fear... they have other projects in the making for me to quilt for them!

My dancing 9patch for my great niece is now quilted and bound and ready for delivery.
I quilted and bound the pink squares babyquilt that I started to sew along with Peggy while she made her first quilt for her granddaughter.
I pulled out 6 red/blue placemats I made last fall and got the binding done on them.  
I also pulled out a quilt-as-you-go tablerunner kit that I purchased at an FCE craft camp and stitched and bound that.  I'd never done quilt as you go before.  It's a good option for those that don't have a longarm... but I prefer to quilt on my longarm :)

I am working on organizing a bunch of UFOs to take on vacation in hopes of completing at least a few of them.  I think I've found 10 so far! 

After vacation I'll get back to working on my Celtic Solstice and I think I may use Talkin Turkey as a leader/ender for that one.  Hopefully I'll get at least one of them assembled into a flimsy before Bonnie's next mystery in November.

WORK COMPLETED IN June 2014
 ....03....customer tops quilted (YTD  30)
.....02.....customer quilts bound (YTD  8 )
.....00.....flimsy completed waiting for quilting (YTD )
......02.......quilted flimsy (YTD 4... OB, Owls, pink squares, dancing 9)
.....15.....hand-work hours (85TD )

Bonnie Projects in Progress

............... Celtic Solstice Step 1 blue triangles cut( 350 of 380 pairs)
............... Celtic Solstice Step 1 white and orange star points cut (380 of 380)
..............  Celtic Solstice Step 1 orange star point units sewed (50 of 140)
............... Celtic Solstice Step 1 white star point units sewed (100 of 240)

.....00.....cheddar bowties blocks hand-pieced (YTD  6  of  81in 2013)   ...  (81 of 162 in 2012)
.....00.....cheddar bowtie rows stitched (YTD  0 .... 9 of 18 in 2012)
.............. Talkin Turkey..... 2 blocks complete plus parts
.............. Midnight Flight....1 block complete plus parts
.............. Winston Ways... 2 blocks complete plus parts

UFOs – WIPs

2006 Barn Blocks
2009 1950s Santa

2009 Sunbonnet sue …prairie point borders

2010 Swartz Creek Quilt
2010 Vicksburg BOM 

2011 Cheddar Bowties 
2011 Happiness Key

2011 Novelty Quilt (pat sloan)

2011 Dear Jane/Hot Momma Rose

2012 Basic Class Wall Hanging…. Borders, quilting

2012 Winston Ways

2012 Turkey Tracks

2012 Midnight Flight 
2012 Pillow Cover …assembly

2012 Red/White D4P…assembly

2013 Daisy placemats/runner (sept)…. needs binding

2013 Florals & 9Patch (aug)

2013 Maddie Bea Sweet & Sassy (becky’s barn)

2013 Spring Wall Hanging (WSS project)

2013 Becky’s Barn Basket wall hanging… borders, quilting

2013 Celtic Solstice (nov)

2014 Cracker Barrel - Blue/White strip quilt (jan)… L/E for CS

Waiting to be Quilted

2006 Rosewood Cottage.. quilting by hand

2007Monkey Wrench BOM ...for sale

2014 Completed Projects

march..Orca Bay (started nov 2012)
June....Pink baby squares (started may 2014)
june....Dancing 9 (started march 2014)

june....blue floral placemats (started sept 2013)

2014 Totals - May

This month I made a new quilty friend... teaching her how to make a quilt for her granddaughter from baby clothing. 

 

I worked on a pink squares baby quilt along side her to give her confidence and reduce my stash a bit.

It took me quite a bit of time, but I finished my first custom quilt of the year... donkeys!  Lots of stitch-in-ditch and free motion background quilting.  3 more customs to go!

I made progress on my Dancing 9 and it is now a flimsy ready to load on the quilter. I hope my new great niece will love it!

I worked on Cracker Barrel as an L/E ... all of the white triangles are attached. Now I need to cut the blues to sew on the opposite sides.  I'm ready to get back to working on my Celtic Solstice again.

I did some studio cleaning and organizing as well as household organizing with help from my grandson.  Now most of his toys have a place to be :)

Last but not least, I did work on my Spring Wall Hanging and have all the flowers stitched down.  Next.... the leaves! (I thought I had a picture but can't find it right now... will post one later)


WORK COMPLETED IN May 2014
 ....05....customer tops quilted (YTD  27)
.....01.....customer quilts bound (YTD  6)
.....00.....flimsy completed waiting for quilting (YTD )
......00.......quilted flimsy (YTD 2... OB, Owls)
.....10.....hand-work hours (70TD )

Bonnie Projects in Progress

....done..Orca Bay
............... Celtic Solstice Step 1 blue triangles cut( 350 of 380 pairs)
............... Celtic Solstice Step 1 white and orange star points cut (380 of 380)
..............  Celtic Solstice Step 1 orange star point units sewed (50 of 140)
............... Celtic Solstice Step 1 white star point units sewed (100 of 240)
..flimsy..... Dancing 9s  9patches made (YTD 64 of 64)

.....00.....cheddar bowties blocks hand-pieced (YTD  6  of  81in 2013)   ...  (81 of 162 in 2012)
.....00.....cheddar bowtie rows stitched (YTD  0 .... 9 of 18 in 2012)
.............. Talkin Turkey..... 2 blocks complete plus parts
.............. Midnight Flight....1 block complete plus parts
.............. Winston Ways... 2 blocks complete plus parts

UFOs – WIPs

2006 Barn Blocks
2009 1950s Santa

2009 Sunbonnet sue …prairie point borders

2010 Swartz Creek Quilt
2010 Vicksburg BOM 

2011 Cheddar Bowties 
2011 Happiness Key

2011 Novelty Quilt (pat sloan)

2011 Dear Jane/Hot Momma Rose

2012 Basic Class Wall Hanging…. Borders, quilting

2012 Winston Ways

2012 Turkey Tracks

2012 Midnight Flight 
2012 Pillow Cover …assembly

2012 Red/White D4P…assembly

2013 Daisy placemats/runner (sept)…. needs binding

2013 Red blue floral placemats (sept)…. Needs binding
2013 Florals & 9Patch (aug)

2013 Maddie Bea Sweet & Sassy (becky’s barn)

2013 Spring Wall Hanging (WSS project)

2013 Becky’s Barn Basket wall hanging… borders, quilting

2013 Celtic Solstice (nov)

2014 Cracker Barrel - Blue/White strip quilt (jan)… L/E for CS

Waiting to be Quilted

Rosewood Cottage (since 2006) quilting by hand

Monkey Wrench BOM (since 2007) for sale

Pink baby squares
Dancing 9

Donkeys Done!

This was made by a customer of mine.  Her mother had made several for other members of the family.  She came across the pattern recently and decided to make one for herself. She originally wanted it completely stitch-in-the ditch... since that is not my best or favorite I convinced her to let me free-motion the background and only SID the donkeys.  15 hours later I got it done!

Overwhelmed!

Over the last 10 days we have been picking and enjoying strawberries from the garden.

I have made 8 jars of preserves.

I have made 4 pies.

And we have eaten many fresh strawberries with cereal, ice cream, or just by themselves.

But last night, I was officially overwhelmed!

I wish they had a much longer shelf life!

Strawberry Pie

Strawberry Pie

9in Baked pie shell

5 C strawberries quarterd and hulled

¼ C cornstarch

2/3 C sugar

1/8 tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla extract

¼ tsp almond extract

1 tbs lemon juice

Place 2 c of strawberries in small saucepan.

Mash until strawberries are chunky.

Add: sugar, cornstarch, vanilla extract, almond extract, lemon juice and salt

Bring to a simmer over med heat stirring until sugar dissolves and glaze thickens

Cool

Add remaining 3C strawberries and mix until well coated.

Spoon into prepared pie crust.

Refrigerate 2 hours before cutting to allow filling to set.

Top with optional whipped cream

A Quilter is Born

My handyman always brings his wife along as a helper. Bob and Peggy are a great team. Peggy was very intrigued by my quilter and and I showed her some of the quilts I had made, including the Big Brother quilt I had made for my eldest grandson from his old receiving blankets.  

Now I really had her interest.  We talked about her granddaughter and she decided she wanted to make one for her.  She had her daughter-in-law send her a bunch of her granddaughter's outgrown clothes and a new quilter is born! 

We have spent many happy hours working together.
I helped her sort through everything and showed her how to debone. 
When she had everything deboned, I showed her how to fuse stabilizer on the back of the knits and we ran everything through my Studio Cutter to make 5" squares.  

To encourage her, I pulled out some pink scraps from my stash and cut up a bunch of squares to start a new baby quilt to have on hand.

Wednesday we spent several hours together sewing the squares into rows.  

We'll be getting together again soon to assemble the rows and then go shopping for an inner border and final outer border.

Strawberry Time

Do you remember all those overgrown rows of strawberries that I posted a picture of last week.  Well, with the warm sunny weather this week they are pumping out berries like crazy :)

We have been enjoying strawberry shortcake or strawberries and ice cream or strawberry shakes!.... and I still had way more in the frig! LOL

Yesterday I decided to make some sugar free preserves.  I was surprised at how quick and easy it was to do.  Two cups of crushed berries and some pectin... cooked, jarred, processed and in about an hour I had 3 jars made.  I made a second batch last night.

And I still have more quarts of strawberries in the frig and still more to be picked!   I'm thinking that maybe I'll do up a couple of quart sized jars and when I want a strawberry pie all I have to do is make the crust, fill and bake!
YUM!

Garden update

After much digging and cutting out some HUGE tree roots the Easter azaleas are finally planted.

The garden is mostly weeded at this point.  Hubby will get the tiller going this weekend and we will be ready to plant the tomatoes, squash and beans in-between all the berries.   

The strawberry plants were in rows last year... you can hardly tell to look at them now.  We dug up some plants for my daughter to plant in her garden.
The raspberries (red and black) and the Blackberries are coming back strong too.

The snow peas I planted with the grandson are about a foot high now.  I'm not sure if they will produce anything to harvest now that the warmer weather is here.  I will have to try planting again in August or September and hope to get a crop in the cooler weather before the frost.

It's hard to believe we started with just 4 Black Eyed Susan plants 2 or 3 years ago.  Now we are over run with them!  They have taken over the backyard garden and have overfilled the front walk garden.  I have resorted to selling some on LSN this year to try and thin them out.

The iris are coming up strong and blooming nicely now too.

Birthday boy

Last week my grandson turned 5!  His aunt made him a  very special birthday cake.  Unfortunately, riding over in the hot car (she has no airconditioning) the frosting melted and shifted.

No matter!  

He loved it anyway!

2014 Totals - March and April

I began a Dancing 9's quilt in mid-march and am making some progress. I had cut strips from one sleeve of each shirt and have enough 9patches for 2.5 rows of blocks and the border strips.  I cut the rest of the sleeves and shirt fronts into strips and have more 9patches made and ready to assemble into blocks.  I'll have some free sewing time then end of May and hopefully will get this done.

I've loaded the first of 3 large custom quilts on my quilter to work on. The first is donkeys, then comes birdhouses and lastly is a starburst.  Custom work always takes me longer so this month I will not finish as many quilts as normal.

WORK COMPLETED IN Mar-April 2014
 ....06.....customer tops quilted (YTD  22)
.....03.....customer quilts bound (YTD  5)
.....00.....flimsy completed waiting for quilting (YTD )
......01.......quilted flimsy (YTD 2... OB, Owls)
.....10.....hand-work hours (60TD )

Bonnie Projects in Progress

....done..Orca Bay
............... Celtic Solstice Step 1 blue triangles cut( 350 of 380 pairs)
............... Celtic Solstice Step 1 white and orange star points cut (380 of 380)
..............  Celtic Solstice Step 1 orange star point units sewed (50 of 140)
............... Celtic Solstice Step 1 white star point units sewed (100 of 240)
......24..... Dancing 9s  9patches made (YTD 48 of 64)

.....00.....cheddar bowties blocks hand-pieced (YTD  6  of  81in 2013)   ...  (81 of 162 in 2012)
.....00.....cheddar bowtie rows stitched (YTD  0 .... 9 of 18 in 2012)
.............. Talkin Turkey..... 2 blocks complete plus parts
.............. Midnight Flight....1 block complete plus parts
.............. Winston Ways... 2 blocks complete plus parts

UFOs – WIPs

2006 Barn Blocks
2009 1950s Santa

2009 Sunbonnet sue …prairie point borders

2010 Swartz Creek Quilt
2010 Vicksburg BOM 

2011 Cheddar Bowties 
2011 Happiness Key

2011 Novelty Quilt (pat sloan)

2011 Dear Jane/Hot Momma Rose

2012 Basic Class Wall Hanging…. Borders, quilting

2012 Winston Ways

2012 Turkey Tracks

2012 Midnight Flight 
2012 Pillow Cover …assembly

2012 Red/White D4P…assembly

2013 Daisy placemats/runner (sept)…. needs binding

2013 Red blue floral placemats (sept)…. Needs binding
2013 Florals & 9Patch (aug)

2013 Maddie Bea Sweet & Sassy (becky’s barn)

2013 Spring Wall Hanging (WSS project)

2013 Becky’s Barn Basket wall hanging… borders, quilting

2013 Celtic Solstice (nov)

2014 Cracker Barrel - Blue/White strip quilt (jan)… L/E for CS

Waiting to be Quilted

Rosewood Cottage (since 2006) quilting by hand

Monkey Wrench BOM (since 2007) for sale

2 blue placemats (R taylor)

Garden work

Last year we had several huge old trees removed from the side/front of the house so to prevent disaster from striking.  Unfortunately, our rhodedendrens were damaged in the process.

So, taking advantage of the comfortable weather (72deg and overcast)  I went out this morning and after a couple hours was able to remove the damaged plant, weeds and black paper burried under pebbles and mulch. The broken plant is going home with my daughter to be planted in her yard.  If it survives she may have a very pretty bush.  If not, there is no great loss. 

 The soil is a bit muddy and clumpy, so I'm going to give it a couple of days to dry out a bit before planting my new Easter present.

Goodwill Find

A recent trip to Goodwill netted me these two shelves... perfect for storing projects and fabric!

Those rails make loading the shelves a bit tricky, so hubby is cutting them off for me.  I'll need to sand a bit and to smooth out the rough spots; then I think I will line the shelves with contact paper for added protection... I don't want anything snagged.

Orca Bay

I've finally finished piecing and quilting my Orca Bay.  I literally took it off the quilter and folded it up and put it in the car to bring for show and tell time during the Dancing 9s class Bonnie was teaching in Oliver Springs.

 
Bonnie asked me about my color choices .... 



At the time this mystery began, both my girls were taking classes at TTU.  The school colors are purple and gold... so I changed the black and white of the orginal pattern to purple and gold.


It also happens that the local high school colors are red and blue (navy).  Navy was too dark but the lighter blues worked well.



Since I still had some of these fabrics remaining I decided to piece a backing with the leftovers rather than buying more fabric for a solid backing.  With an idea and some help from an online friend (Thanks Cindy!)  we determined I had just enough fabric....

 

I love the way it turned out.  And the red binding I think frames it nicely

Easter

After the Easter Egg hunt we took a walk around the neighborhood.  Of course no walk is complete without picking some beautiful flowers for Nana!

My youngest grandson beginning to eat real table food instead of jarred baby food.  He loves his mashed potatoes and we can sneak a mashed carrot or green been in there once in a while!

We gave Matthew his "uniform" for the Knights of Columbus.  We still have to get the tux to go with it.

Spring flowers are popping up everywhere!

I received these beautiful azaleas for the garden.

Totals 2014 - March

Ok, I am definitely late with this, but life has been busy and I have been mostly offline lately in order to keep up.  I'll catch up with several different posts on what's been happening, but for now I am just going to update my work progress

I completed the quilting on my Orca Bay just in time to take to Oliver Springs, TN to show at class with Bonnie early in March.  I now have the binding on and just need to add a label.  The class was Dancing 9s... the baby quilt she made for her two nephews.  Mine will be shades of pink/orange/lavender... what I call sunset colors... and will be given to my brand new grand-niece when complete.  As of today I have enough blocks  assembled for the first two rows and must cut up more strips to continue progress.

I have agreed to help encourage a friend by starting and working on a new quilt together.   Make It Your Way    I'm not sure if this link will work, but you can copy/paste to see the pattern and directions.  

http://www.mccallsquilting.com/MakeItYourWay

I am trying to stick with clearing things out and using my stash, so I chose 8 goodwill shirts in green and blue.  I did supplement with 4 yards of cream fabric with either blue or green tiny dots on it.  This will make a nice low volume quilt. 

WORK COMPLETED IN January-February 2014
 ....07.....customer tops quilted (YTD  15)
.....01.....customer quilts bound (YTD  4)
.....00.....flimsy completed waiting for quilting (YTD )
......01.......quilted flimsy (YTD 1 )
.....10.....hand-work hours (50TD )

Bonnie Projects in Progress

....done..Orca Bay
............... Celtic Solstice Step 1 blue triangles cut( 350 of 380 pairs)
............... Celtic Solstice Step 1 white and orange star points cut (380 of 380)
..............  Celtic Solstice Step 1 orange star point units sewed (50 of 140)
............... Celtic Solstice Step 1 white star point units sewed (100 of 240)
......24..... Dancing 9s  9patch blocks made (YTD 24)

.....00.....cheddar bowties blocks hand-pieced (YTD  6  of  81in 2013)   ...  (81 of 162 in 2012)
.....00.....cheddar bowtie rows stitched (YTD  0 .... 9 of 18 in 2012)
.............. Talkin Turkey..... 2 blocks complete plus parts
.............. Midnight Flight....1 block complete plus parts
.............. Winston Ways... 2 blocks complete plus parts

UFOs – WIPs

2006 Barn Blocks
2009 1950s Santa

2009 Sunbonnet sue …prairie point borders

2010 Swartz Creek Quilt
2010 Vicksburg BOM 

2011 Cheddar Bowties 
2011 Happiness Key

2011 Novelty Quilt (pat sloan)

2011 Dear Jane/Hot Momma Rose

2012 Basic Class Wall Hanging…. Borders, quilting

2012 Winston Ways

2012 Turkey Tracks

2012 Midnight Flight 
2012 Pillow Cover …assembly

2012 Red/White D4P…assembly

2013 Daisy placemats/runner (sept)…. needs binding

2013 Red blue floral placemats (sept)…. Needs binding
2013 Florals & 9Patch (aug)

2013 Maddie Bea Sweet & Sassy (becky’s barn)

2013 Spring Wall Hanging (WSS project)

2013 Becky’s Barn Basket wall hanging… borders, quilting

2013 Celtic Solstice (nov)

2014 Cracker Barrel - Blue/White strip quilt (jan)… L/E for CS

Waiting to be Quilted

Rosewood Cottage (since 2006) quilting by hand

Monkey Wrench BOM (since 2007) for sale

2 blue placemats (R taylor)

Serenity Prayer...

God, Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
The stash to make a quilt to help me cope,
A quilt to give to comfort those I love in times of hurt, fear and uncertainty.
And the courage to keep on sewing when life itself seems held together by a single thread of hope.
Bonnie K. Hunter, 2014

After hearing about the tragic mudslide in Alaska and the loss of friends Bonnie modified the prayer to her own skillset.  It is one that we can all use when we hear of events, illness and tragedy that are beyond our control. We always want to do something to help.  

Prayer will always help.

Dancing 9s

Yesterday my friend BettySue and I drove over to Oliver Springs, TN to meet with the Ritzy Thimble Quilt Guild and take a class with Bonnie Hunter.

Bonnie's classes are always so much fun and so informative.  She begins by helping everyone find their quarter inch mark.  We test sew some strips and then we are off!

I was so busy having fun and sewing I forgot to take pictures! 

But first, the inspiration for my color choices for this quilt is my brand new great-niece Brooke Lynn.... just 17 days old in this picture.  This will be a gift for her once complete.

 

I was able to snag some pictures from Bonnie's post that she took in class.

These are the border blocks we cut from the strips we sewed.  I cut one border block from each strip set followed by a bunch of 2in strip sets to form the 9-patches.

Here I am at the end of the day with my first completed block.

When I got home I pulled out the remaining pieces I had stitched up in class and put together a total of 3 blocks, a good start on this quilt.