the holidays have begun

and i'm not getting the handmade items i wanted to make done... in fact, i don't think i have a single handmade gift for this year (at least one i've made), with the exception of a baby shower present for this coming weekend. had the year been an odd one for you? it definitely has for me....

i hope your thanksgiving holidays were enjoyable and you spent lots of time with family and friends. snappy and i had several friends in town and we visited with them all. we had a little turkey, a little pie, some henna mehendi, glow-in-the-dark putt putt golf, a stroll around bayou bend's gardens all lit up with lights and lots of catching up on our DVR'd shows.

also happening this weekend was this:

it's the fabric for the QOV challenge with HMQS. their show in the spring has several challenges available and of course i'm going for the QOV one. they sent these 8 fat quarters, bamboo/cotton blend batting and a special label to use. tia, of campfollowerbags, is my partner for the challenge and she is going to longarm quilt it after i piece it together. we're allowed to add 3 additional fabrics as long as i submit a sample of the fabrics and i can add more of any of the challege collection. the paisleys are pretty awesome.

i want to showcase the challenge fabrics - which is what you're supposed to do in a challenge, right? i'm thinking of using kona solids and keep debating on purchasing some more of one or two of the collection pieces. the block pattern i think is picked out now, but i'm still playing around with that. maybe i should get on EQ7 and have a go with it.

do you remember the pretty massachuetts star QOV put together with blocks made by the FB swap group? well... there were some issues with one of the red fabrics used in two blocks.

my regional coordinator for QOVF got with me early last week and informed me that i can't send it to the intended recipient. drats!! the quilt as a whole was very well done; the blocks were pieced well, the top was pieced well and the quilting was fabulous. the dye bleed on two big blocks was the problem. my regional coordinator felt my pain and sent me a navy-themed QOV she had sitting at her house that only needs binding as a replacement so the navy doesn't have to wait a lot longer. it's a lovely quilt as well and i'm thankful to have it so soon.

ok. i need to get back to my regular job, even though it's been super annoying lately. been butting heads with one of the other managers here and we sort-of cleared the air on that touchy subject about a half hour ago. argh.

my red-headed inspector clouseau

inspector clouseau, a photo by greeneyedsilversmith on Flickr.

i'm a few days late in posting... but this is my cutie on halloween. i wore a pink panther hoodie (which most parents at the door didn't see) and he went in search of candy. i adore his red mustache and it was the only thing we bought for the costume... everything else was in the house.

october is almost over

hey everyone! remember this quilt top? you don't? it was toooooo long ago? yeah, i know it was more than 2 years ago and it's been hanging in my studio closet ever since then... at first, it was so big and i didn't machine quilt at all, so i didn't feel like hand quilting it at the time. plus, i was working on QOVs and trying to do all these swap blocks and bee blocks that i just didn't have the time either. then, i changed the backing fabric from a pale yellow solid to a plain white muslin (nice and traditional). then it just sat.

until....

tia bought her longarm. you may remember that i've gotten a few of her campfollower bags over the last few years. i loooove them. i carry my very first bag around with me everywhere from the instant i opened the box. anyhoo... she was offering her services and i took her up on it. tia does such a lovely job quilting the bags and pouches, that i knew i wanted her to quilt my bed quilt. plus, it saved me from quilting it and sped up the process of getting it on my bed.

i finished up the binding two nights ago and took it out of the dryer last night:

i LOVE the quilt on my bed. so does the cat.

it was late when i got home from the library so i couldn't take it outside for good photos. there's a "warm" glow that alters the colors from my fluorescent lightbulbs (good for energy savings...bad for color photography...). but you can see bits and pieces of the vines and feathers that tia quilted into the coins themselves and the organic lines that i wanted to do if i quilted it.

so far, this is my only finish for the month. i've been busy - stitching hexagons together during lunch breaks and scout meetings, slowly piecing together the dr. seuss quilt for boo, piecing together string blocks for a bastrop wildfire victim quilt and just going crazy i guess. at least i have one thing done and off my ever-growing list of things to work on. and i got to snuggle under it last night while i slept.

60 years and counting

today, i am wishing my grandparents a very happy 60th wedding anniversary!!




isn't her dress amazing?! the train was so long, the photographer couldn't capture the entire thing. if it was fully shown, there would be about 2-3 more feet of train below what is in the photo. 47 1/2 years after their wedding, i cut into that glorious heavy silk satin (the real deal, no synthetics) and made my own wedding gown for my 1st wedding. i used HALF of the train and my dress included a little chapel length train itself. i also took some of the satin covered buttons and a few of the new-fangled plastic orange blossoms and used them on my jacket and train. we had to clear the living room furniture out and spread just the train diagonally across the living room just so i could pin and cut my dress pattern.


51 years later, some more remanents of the train, along with more buttons (this thing had something like 50 buttons) and made a very traditional christening gown for my son to wear, plus any future children in the family.

i embroidered an anchor cross on the front - symbolic for the church and because my now ex-husband was a mariner himself - and my son's initials inside the hem. there's a bonnet that matches, but my sister got me an heirloom hankie bonnet, which is what boo is wearing in the above photo. since then, both of my sister's children have worn the christening gown for their own baptisms and i have embroidered their initials inside the hem as well.

so, after 60 years of marriage, my grandparents are still holding hands and driving each other nuts. i had the joy of celebrating their 50th with them, my family and their closest friends. this year, there is no party as my grandfather is recovering from a broken back and surgery and my grandmother doesn't move around well either. but that doesn't mean that we're not celebrating with them... they've been flooded with anniversary cards - 30 -40 or so as of yesterday, my mother and i have arranged for their neighbor to deliver dinner from their favorite italian restaurant and flowers will be delivered and set up by the florist in their dining room. both of which are a surprise til this afternoon.

of course, my grandmother knows something is up... but can't get my mom or i to let out any hints.

i can only wish for another 56-ish years with my hubby. of course, a man who does this...

can stick around...

as heard around my house...

last night on the way home from the Lego store, i told my son that i had an appointment to see miss c for a long-awaited haircut. he was ok for a moment...but when i said that i might go short again, he told me that "it's against the house rules." i loved that. he kept trying to convince me that i was not allowed to cut my hair short, that snappy wouldn't like it, etc. for the record, snappy already said that he really likes this haircut and that i'd look great:


it's not so different from two years ago when i "had" to cut my hair off - just fancy styling and a prettier face... it was the first time either snappy or my son had ever seen me with hair quite that short, even though the top/front/bang area was quite a few inches longer than the first few times i'd hacked it off. but still, boo kept saying no and i finally had to call miss c so she could get a few words in. long-time friend and my stylist, she tried to tell boo that too bad, he didn't have a license, so he didn't get to decide either.

i'm still debating on whether to trim it back to my "normal" length with some funky style to let the crazy curls come out better, or to take a good 8-10 inches off. while the longer hair has been great for ponytails and pigtails and braids, that's all i want to do. my hair has it's own mind and right now, it's telling me it doesn't want to be long. if we keep it long, it needs a dramatic style change.

on to non-hairy things...

last week, i got to open this box:

tia, of tia curtis quilts and the infamous camp follower bags (of which my house owns a few), used her brand new-to-her longarm to quilt up my coin quilt. there are swirls, organic lines, leafy vines and feathers all over my bed quilt. i LOVE it. my MIL was visiting and had my studio occupied with her bags and stuff, so i didn't get to work on the binding until this weekend. the binding is a pale solid yellow and last night i started the handstitching part of it. one short side down... three more to go.

we adore the duvet cover my other in-laws bought us for a wedding present, but we both felt we needed something else. something that i made. especially since most of my quilts are given to other people. i know i'd like to snuggle under a handmade quilt each night! when we opened it up after taking it out of the box, the quilt instantly brightened up the room. the quilt is step one of redoing our bedroom, although we have a long way to go before we actually redo anything else in there. like bathtub replacement, kitchen revamp, new floors around house...

houston is finally seeing a break from the ridiculous heat. it was about 82 degrees for our high yesterday and it's in the low 60's in the morning. how glorious! now...if only we could have a usual october and get some stinkin' rain!! at least with the better temps, i can start doing painting and stripping of paint and all around the house. slowly...the shoulder is still aching from my dining room paint weekend 2 weeks ago.

and - a couple more weeks til the texas clay festival, then a couple more and international quilt fest!!

pam's earthly quilt

before she moved away from us, my mother-in-law picked out a lovely selection of solids, earthy batiks and a neat stripe to tie them all together. she wanted a simple design of square blocks for her brand new guest room, which she hadn't seen at the time, but my father-in-law had put together while waiting for her to finish retiring.

i started work on the quilt during 4th of july weekend. things were slowed down a little with this trip instead...

my MIL has come to visit us for a week and i knew i needed to get it finished before she got here so she could take it home to north carolina with her. that goal was accomplished and this is how it looks!

and some detail of the all over stipple i did in the variagated brown/tan thread:

the thread was a complete nightmare though. 3 of the 4 spools were defective in some manner; thread breaking (not due to tight tension or wrong sized needle), thread peeling and not being able to quilt very long (say, an inch?) with spool 3. the first spool had a few issues, but i managed to do ok. the second spool was wonderful without issues. the third... i hate. i don't want to talk about the third spool. the fourth spool was better than the third, worse than the first, but managed to get more quilted on it. then the third spool had to come back out since there was so much breakage and waste, i needed the extra.

i haven't mentioned it to my MIL yet. she'll eventually see the mess on the back - it's not obvious until you get to one side of it and you see little clumps here and there. i think once she washes it when she gets home, it'll be better looking.

and i need to give a HUGE shout-out to my favorite redhead. today is boo's 9th birthday and i love him dearly. now...just how to figure out how to keep him from growing more...

can i take a nap now?

i had a very, very busy weekend and i'm glad it's over. although, i'd rather sleep tomorrow than go to work.


on friday, i was annoyed at all the junk in the garage and the fact i couldn't find my painting stuff. so, snappy and i started cleaning it out and getting rid of all the junk and putting the camping supplies in their huge storage tubs again. i cut my leg on the bucket of tile pieces that we unearthed - be careful around cut tile... it'll make a nasty jagged cut when you just barely bump it. somehow, most of my painting supplies went missing and i had to buy them all again, but we did find the dining room paint that i purchased a while ago, but couldn't do with my bad shoulder.


while snappy kept working on the garage, i ripped out the old caulking in boo's bathroom. my MIL is coming to visit this week and boo was with his dad - perfect timing. i also worked on stripping more of his bathroom door and trim that he started.

and then i got to some serious work on the wall. while the paint was drying, i worked on the bathroom and replaced some worn out items for him.

by the end of the weekend, this is what i got to see:











the fruits of my labor were worth it!!! of course, the garage isn't finished, but it's SOOOO much better than it was. we have clean carpets, the tile and worn out linoleum has been washed and we have more color in the house. i love it.

it's moving along and coming soon!

this winter, some of my contacts with the navy approached me about making a QOV to enter in a wounded warrior art exhibit that would be in a brand new DoD building in the washington, d.c. area. at the time, i was a few weeks out of my shoulder surgery and still completely immobilized... no sewing was happening for quite some time. they had a backup plan and that plan worked.

the opening ceremony has been delayed from mid-august, to october to early november. the first press release is here and it tells a little background of two artists and some of the program. i didn't know before, but the DoD only selected 12 pieces to be displayed within 2 floors of this new building. the quilt is mentioned (i'm not, but that's completely ok! these two are more important to the story and history).

so now my travel arrangements are being made and i should know something "soon" about that. i'm taking my mother with me to the opening ceremony - who better than the person who taught me to be kind, generous and artistic?

some help for the littlest wildfire victims!!

my sister fowarded me this info a little earlier this morning and i'm definitely going to help out. can you?

http://futurecraftcollective.com/2011/09/what-we-can-do/

the modern day quilters at valli and kim quilt shop are hosting a quilt drive with the hopes to have a handmade quilt for every child who has lost their home in the texas wildfires - especially those in the bastrop area, which is just down the road from them.

the fires have started popping back up in the greater houston area, where i live, as well. thankfully, they have not been to the level of destruction that bastrop is suffering and i continue to pray that we see a little spot of rain and that the winds stay calm enough that the firefighters can do their job as well as they possibly can.

so if you can help out, even just a little, please check out the most up to date information with modern day quilters. if you want to make some blocks and have me put them together, i am more than happy to do that too. just send me a message or leave a comment and i'll give you an address to send the blocks.

Scouts and Popcorn!

would you like to support this adorable cub scout and his pack?

it's the time of year where scouts come out and sell delicious popcorn to raise funds for camping and other scout activities, pay for uniform supplies and awards and give them an awesome experience to remember and grow by. this is their one and only fundraiser for the scouting/school year and we try to make it count.

popcorn treats offered includes kettle corn, microwave bags, chocolatey delight, white chocolate pretzels AND one of the greatest things - the military donations. trail's end, operation popcorn and the BSA offer two levels of donations that send popcorn treats to our troops overseas. take a look at the pictures of popcorn in action!! orders of popcorn for yourself is shipped out in a few days directly to your house.

so if you would like to support scouting and possibly our military at the same time, visit the trail's end site and use scout ID 8480080. the deadline to order is october 1st.

many thanks from all of us!

happenings around my house

it's hot. it's stinkin' hot here in houston. and it's dry!!! although, as i type that, the sky is getting really dark and i'm crossing my fingers for desperately needed rain. we've had over 215 days with less than an inch of rain (if ANY rain). where i live, we got a soaking rain about 2 weeks ago and haven't seen any since...that rain was the best i'd seen since last year in about october. how sad is that?

the heat and a failing A/C unit have made us all sluggish. no one wants to do anything but blob. i want to sew, but just don't have the energy to sit under the lights or use an iron or have fabric draped over me while i bind things. at least our entire A/C system should be replaced this weekend or early next week...i'll find out more on that tonight.

snappy got a few of his stitches out last thursday.

we actually got to see his hand and wrist unwrapped from all the massive amounts of gauze and the surgical splint. poor thing with his bruises. he's a bad patient... would keep trying to do lots of things with both his hands instead of letting me do it. you should go with a man to the store to buy a new printer/scanner and try to carry the box. hah! ok, so my shoulder still doesn't quite allow me to pick up a lot yet, but he had all this stuff on his hand and stitches! we were both broken, but at least i didn't have thread holding me together.

it looks a lot better now. the incision is healed up so much more and he gets the remaining stitches out tomorrow morning. i know he's looking forward to that. then the mean PT lady can work her torture on him...

that same day, i also received my super lovely mini quilt from DQS11.

how gorgeous is this?!

i watched pattiann's photostream as she posted pictures of this one - from the drawing stage, to the little blocks pinned for placement to the final quilt. it's amazing. her binding is even pieced - that's not printed fabric. this was one of my absolute favorites in the bunch and i'm SO thrilled and surprised to have received it. she couldn't have made a more perfect mini quilt for me.

ok. it's a lot darker outside. the sky looks like dusk it's that dark. so, where's the rain!?! and if it's not raining here at my office, can it pretty please be raining at my house? that direction of course is where the weeeeee bit of light is showing, so i doubt there's rain there right now. the ground is so dry that if you look in a crack in your backyard, you can see down it a few feet. and if you step on one of those cracks, it breaks apart and falls down.

oh oh! there's a mist! it's a start and we'll take what we can get!

"roman rainbows" for dqs11

i'm participating in this round of doll quilt swap (dqs) over on flickr. you may have seen it around on other blogs... i haven't made a mini quilt in a while now and wanted to jump back in now that the shoulder has healed up enough and i'm taking a slight break/slow-down from all my QOV making. last night, i finished sewing on the label and boxed up this little beauty so it can arrive soon at it's new owner's house:

this one is called "roman rainbows" since it's the roman stripe block and done in a scrappy rainbow fashion. it's perfect for summer, even if houston isn't having any rain and the forecast for the week is all over 100 degrees. ugh. with the heat and humidity and no rain, i felt like keeping things simple.

my secret partner's mosaic and favorites showed that she likes triangles, bright and happy fabrics and often in the scrappy fashion. so do i! and i love the way the roman stripe block looks...gives the perfect opportunity to do a scrappy quilt without being overwhelming.

i had a hard time deciding on the quilting for the doll quilt. in a way, i wanted to do some tiny freemotion stitching, but i hesitated from working on that for some reason. i knew i didn't want to overdo the stitching, but i definitely wanted to do something other than stitch-in-the-ditch or just straight lines. so i opted to do some lovely little circles of various sizes in yellow handquilting. plus, the handquilting gave me something to do while sitting in the hospital waiting room, waiting on my hubby to come out of surgery last week.

the backing fabric is actually one of my favorite parts of this doll quilt. i'm not a huge fan of pink (and often not of orange and pink together), but after i got my partner assignment i had some ideas in mind. i saw this fabric at a LQS (sadly going out of business when i was shopping the last time) and knew i needed to use it somehow for my partner. if i had chosen one of the other designs, it would have been on the quilt top instead of the backing, or maybe the binding. it reminded me of summer. not sure why, but it did.

the past week has been a little nutso in my house, but i had something to work on while taking care of my loved ones. you know - the soothing repetition of handstitching binding and quilting stitches. now i can get back to working on the next QOV and try to finish knitting a pretty baby blanket for a dear friend.

hot flash.... a book review...

i'm scouring amazon.com for their newest free kindle books when i come across #11 on the top 100 list... it's called hot flash and this is the review:

"After her husband decided to become a woman, sous-chef Jill found a lover who not only dumped her for a comely young college student but also kept Jill’s perfect, well-seasoned skillet, an important tool of her trade. Her father is in prison. Her mother’s behavior is more than slightly crazy. Jill’s son, Stephen, rarely speaks to her, and when he does, it’s usually in French. The only positive thing about Jill’s life is her faithful group of friends. They decide to help Jill find love—and in the process, a way to finance Stephen’s art school. With Jill, they put together a “Marriage Satisfaction Survey” and send it to couples featured in the newspapers on their 25th and 50th anniversaries, hoping to discover the secret of these long unions. Unfortunately, Jill discovers the one thing they have in common: the husband is never home. The road to true love has many twists and turns, and Jill stumbles across all of them in Carmichael’s delightful romantic comedy. --Shelley Mosley "

it had me at "her husband decided to become a woman" and just continued to make me smile on a day where i NEED something to smile at during work. it's been purchased (for free) and now i have to wait til tonight before i can download it to my kindle and check it out.

happy birthday to me...

birthday flowers, a photo by greeneyedsilversmith on Flickr.

and happy 50th to our president and happy 221st to the u.s. coast guard!!

dqs11 and other happenings

i'm still here folks!! really, i am! just busy around the house with all the summer activities, work at the office and work at home and everything in between...

but i am happy to announce that i was picked in the lottery for the 11th round of doll quilt swap over in flickr-land.

i've started my ideas and i think i'm going to stick with one of the three that i've posted already to the group. all three ideas would have a narrow border, which i've left white in the pictures for now.

idea #1:

i would make this one in a scrappy rainbow of fabrics or possibly a set color scheme (see fabrics below).

idea #2:

this on would be like it is in the picture. varigated colors in each of the roman stripe blocks, making a rainbow. i don't know what light color i would use for the other half of the block, but it may or may not be a solid. i just know it would be light for good contrast.

idea #3:

quarter square triangles!! i love these. and the colors would be similar to the ones in the drawing, just not so electric. the fabrics below are the ones i would use, with the dotted fabric as either the binding or the border.

i like this combo together. it's bright, yet soft and subtle at the same time. and the little oval dots are just really cool.

here's the mosaic i made for inspiration for my partner:

it's pretty eclectic. i should think that my partner realizes she/he could make just about anything and i'll love it.

along with planning dqs11 little quilts, i've been working steadily on the next QOV that i have the help of the FB "quilt block swap group." this is my second QOV put together with their 6th blocks and it's looking great so far. no pictures yet... sorry... but i should have some this weekend for you.

and on a completely non-quilting topic... i got a new car a week ago today. i LOOOOOVE her.

happy 4th of july weekend!

happy independence day!!! after the usual firing up of the grill, i'm going to settle in for some strawberry shortcake now that the biscuits are out of the oven. yum.

thought i'd be doing a lot of sewing and other household projects during the weekend. unfortunately, something thwarted those plans. this is what you get after 5 hours in the ER:

you know you want one too. it's really that awesome.

the little grows up too fast

i've barely seen my red-headed leprechaun this week... he spends the day at day care and the evenings at twilight camp. it's summer "day" camp for the cub scouts that starts in the late afternoon and goes until after sunset. his den leader's husband (leader of the boy scout troop) posted a bunch of pictures last night of the pack and especially of the last 3 days.

i can't post the photos here... he's disabled sharing... but of course, it is the kids, so i understand. but you can see boo trying to hit a rhino, perfecting his archery and even see the arrow in motion - look closely.

when he comes home around 9:30pm, he is excited and wiped out all at the same time. i have to shove the stinky boy in the shower before bed and can't wait til morning to hear a little of what he did during the day. i swear he's grown during the week already. he looks taller and older...and zombie like in the mornings from too little sleep...

i had a helper again

his little eyes would shift from looking at me to looking at snappy...

and then i got the "what did i do?" look...

i guess grandma d's quilt has the seal of approval. shortly after i got him off the quilt and i started pinning again, he came back. stood on it for a while and despite me telling him to go to his bed, he laid down on top of the blocks again. i went so far as to lift his feet to rearrange the blocks under them.

and then the cat came and sat down next to him. at least i can pick her up and move her.

fresh sewing day - lotsa donation quilts!

over at lily's quilts blog, she hosts a "fresh sewing day" on the first of each month to show what has been worked on during the previous month or is on your cutting table for upcoming projects.

i seem to have been working on lots of things for other people this past month. there is only one quilt top in this pile that will belong to me...eventually...when it's finished! so without further adieu... here are the pictures:

the very last picture has already been cut into and assembly started... so much for clearing off my space with finishes...

first the navy...and now the army...

no, it's not my hubby's move from one branch to the other (although...it DID happen for a super short time period).

this QOV is getting a new home.

on tuesday morning, i logged into my computer at work and found an email that made me smile the entire day. thinking of it is still making me smile! this QOV is now the permament property of the dept. of defense and will be hanging in the DoD's newest building in the washington, d.c. area, set to be completed in august.

a couple weeks after my shoulder surgery, i received a call from the good folks with the navy who i send my QOVs to. they wanted to see if i could make up another wallhanging quilt like i did for their office to submit to a new dept. of defense building that is going to house a permanent installation of wounded warrior artwork. of course...my arm was still in a sling full-time and there was no way i'd make something before the end of march for it.

they had an option #2 in case i didn't have time. submit one of the QOVs already in their possession if they were unable to present the QOV to its owner. the petty officer who it was designated for was "lost" and they couldn't find him. not even with the dept. of defense looking. fast forward another month and a half. i got a call saying they couldn't find him still, so they were going to submit the QOV for the installation.

you can see my favorite USN fabric mixed in with anchors, stars and bright colors

then tuesday morning, i had an email waiting for me from my contact at the navy with a scanned letter from the army saying they chose my QOV to hang permanently in this new building!!!! woohoo!!!! the building opens in august and there's supposed to be a small ceremony mid-august that i should be attending.

while i'm sad knowing the petty officer is suffering from his injuries and PTSD so severely that he went AWOL, i'm glad to know that an actual QOV is hanging in the wounded warrior installation instead of a quilt that is like a QOV. the sailor's name and all is on the label on the back. it is and always will be his quilt.

steadily working still (a little late in posting)

on friday, i got home a little early from work... hooray for 4pm release!! which meant that i instantly got to work on fabric that was waiting in my studio.

hubby caught me ironing the quilt top...

i worked steadily for an hour or two to finish up the borders on my row robin quilt. i've been excited over this one for a while. ever since i saw this row quilt and this little one, i knew i would make a red cross quilt for myself. when HMQG announced that we were going to do a row robin swap, this was my opportunity!

i'm calling my red cross quilt "corner cross." can you see why?

since there were so many right angles and linear elements to the quilt, i used a swirly red print for the main border to give it a little "oomph." you can't see the swirls unless you're close to it, but that's ok. i've had the fabric stashed away for over a year waiting to make the red cross quilt. and the aqua sashing is a beautiful color and sheen.

during dinner, there was a knock on the door. it was the UPS man bringing me my little gem of a mother's day present!!

my very own 1948 singer featherweight 221-1. yippee skippy!! she is the little sister to iron maiden and still needs a name. any suggestions?

i was a busy woman this weekend

i've been sewing again all of last week and it's been good. i started cooking more of my regular type meals and laundry and ironing - even more gardening! the shoulder is still stiff and sore and doesn't quite move all the way yet, but it's so much better the last few weeks than it had been for the last 4 months. i took advantage of the mobility...

during the week, i had been making up red, white and blue string blocks for the next QOV for the navy. i had meant to use more of my favorite USN fabric in it, but realized on the last block that it was my first block with the fabric. oops. but it's all good, right? somewhere around mother's day or the day after, i knew what i wanted my twist to be with this string quilt: x's and o's!

so on saturday, one of the fabulous ladies from the guild came over to the house and we sewed while our little boys played for 7 hours. there was a lot of lego, then lego computer games, then xbox and wii and more lego. other than the sounds of sewing machines humming and the piano tuner tuning... it was very much little boy territory. i finished putting sashing and borders to the xo QOV.

after that, we headed out to jo-ann's. i was going to help {j} with picking out colors and prints for coordinating fabric, but it seemed i picked up some extra fabric myself so i could make this:

i mean - how could you pass up these adorable flowered kitties? especially when you know it's going to a little girl at the children's hospital?

{j} taught me the fastest and greatest pillowcase method. it is seriously simple. and it finished out every seam as a french seam and there were no raw edges anywhere. the pillowcase took about 10 minutes to make. it's that easy!

snappy was also sewing along with us ladies. i'm so glad he sat down at his machine and not begrudgingly. we laughed the entire time and he made some great progress on one of his own quilt tops. the rows he pieced together about 6 months or more ago is now assembled and is waiting for a border. the ladies sort of talked him out of one fabric for another for the border and we all like it better... and we bought him giant cranes for his backing instead of the one that is now going to be his border. confused yet? :)

snappy also made me my last bee pieceful block for the month of january. he was late...but he was excused since he was taking care of me and boo during my shoulder surgery and recovery. later that evening, i was poking around the web at some of my favorite quilting related websites. i hadn't visited quilts for kids in a while and they've got an urgent need for teen appropriate quilts. i looked over at my stack of blocks. and i knew without a second thought.

my quilt needed to go to a teen stuck in the hospital for chemo and cancer treatment. some teen girl should love to look at the kaleidascope of butterflies and bugs and flowers while sitting in a dreary situation, right? so i put it together sunday morning while taking care of my own stomach-upset little one and quilted it up that afternoon.

butterfly kaleidascope

and then i set myself back to work on yet another quilt top.... seems i'm on a mission to clear up some space taken up with blocks and projects and row robins. even if they're completed tops, but hanging in the closet as UFOs.... they're in a better state that way. next up: the hmqg row robin. look for a picture in another day or two.

i need a laugh

and maybe a new doormat. so i'm thinking of something whimsical, as i've done before...just gnomes or dragonflies before. nothing quite as bold as this, but i feel the time has come to laugh instead of stress like i have been lately.

aaahhh.... humor. laughter is the best medicine, right? sometimes the little things really shouldn't get in the way. or people. or petty jr. high gossip-y clique issues. or this competitive & controlling crap that seems to be going around so much. so i'm going to let it go, find the free spirit within me that seems to have lost her way a little and dance like no one is watching.

oh wait...i do that already during the work day when i'm at the copy machine.

1st QOV finish of the year

i finshed binding the HMQG wonky star QOV this evening just before the sun started to set. since i had a major setback with shoulder surgery, some of the ladies from HMQG helped me out by making a variety of wonky stars in red, white and blues. i passed along quite a few fabrics from my stash at our january meeting and they used some of their own along with them.

i love the unique quality of each star. no two are alike. and the longarm quilter did such an amazing job - she even did a different star on the borders.

with the finishing of this QOV, i have 3 left for my current request. before my original contact with the navy retired in february, she mentioned they were already working on the next list. they all know i'm healing, so hopefully they can scale down the quantity so i can continue to rest my shoulder as i need to. this QOV is the first one for 2011 and i'm already making great progress on the next one - a red, white and blue slightly-scrappy string quilt that will have some sort of twist to it. no idea what that twist will be just yet, but i'll get it in the next day or so.

quilters have a tendency to be generous and loving spirits. i have the fortune to know some very kind spirits in the quilting world - from real life and long-time friends to ones i've only "met" online. i knew i could count on a few of the quilters in the HMQG to come through for me when i virtually begged for help while i would be unable to sew a single stitch. these women did and i'm grateful to them. i had hoped for more members to contribute so i could have a guild-wide project... but maybe another time?

i don't know about you...

but i started another QOV last night.

i have the binding to finish on the wonky star collaboration, along with it's label and presentation case. but i was compelled to start the next one immediately. usually i have one going as i finish up the previous. with the shoulder still healing, i've slowed down on progress and WIP so i can heal... it'll be a string quilt with a twist. not completely sure what that twist will be since there are a few ideas going around in my head.

there are 3 left on my current request after the wonky stars QOV. yes, i want to finish up this request, although i think my reasons were more of the events that this week started with instead of the open request.

bravo zulu.

dysfunctional easter picture

dysfunctional easter picture, a photo by greeneyedsilversmith on Flickr.

so.... how come the dog is the only one looking the right way in this picture? oh well! happy easter season everyone!

i had some "good" news today and it's eased my mind 1000% from how it's been the last week or so. it'll still be a process for the next 2 years since we basically reset the clock, but it's so much better than it could have been.

busy busy busy

since i started sewing again once the shoulder loosen up enough, i've been spending a lot of time with my thread, needles and fabric. not nearly as much time as i had prior to the surgery, but i'm back!! i finished binding little {k}'s baby quilt this week. it's all washed and ready to be shipped!

i also completed my "project park" charm pack challenge piece two nights ago and it's washed up as well. it's a perfect size for my large table - just in the center with plenty of space at the ends so people's plates are not touching, but close to it.

our challenge was to take one charm pack, plus 1/2 yard of any fabric and create something. we were allowed extra fabric for backing and binding, but my 1/2 yard also included the binding. i only used extra for the backing, which is a solid light blue from my stash.

i straight-line quilted it with matching blue thread on back and two colors on the front. i stitched in the ditch in an apple green thread and then did a diagonal stitching in eggplant purple that followed the star points. i've only used my walking foot on 2 projects and i'm not sure i really like it. there was great tension doing the green stitching and then the tension was "off" on the eggplant stitching that i couldn't seem to change. but i like it. i'll probably iron it so it holds shape a little better - this was just out of the dryer.

in just a little bit, i'm driving the QOV top and backing that the ladies of HMQG helped me with to the longarmmer. she's practically a neighbor and i don't need to mail this one off.

tomorrow is our next HQMG meeting as well. we're all presenting our challenge pieces at this meeting, so you've got a sneak peek here! i think i'll take my medallion from gwen's workshop with me for show and tell. over the week, more parts have been made, but not too much sewing to the medallion. the decision to work in rounds or in chunks has to be made still...i'm leaning towards chunks, but we'll see. i'm having fun with it!

but of course...one of these days, i've got to finish up some drawings and devote some time to graphite and paper instead of fabric and thread. i do miss my illustrations.

have a great weekend!! i'm going to try as well!

a gwen marston weekend

happy sunday evening!! i had a wonderful weekend... did all of you? i was cleared on wednesday by my doctor to stop wearing the sling - 3 months to the day! i also got confirmation that i was indeed taking a road trip to the north side of dallas to enjoy a workshop with gwen marston that i had signed up for in early-mid march.

i got to meet tia in person after 2 years of emailing and ordering her wonderful campfollower bags and flickr stuff. she was the one who told me about the workshop and asked if i was going. thank you so much for letting me know!!!

my sewing space is on the left and that's tia on the right as we were setting up for the morning. my table partner and tia both have featherweights. so did a couple other ladies there. i think iron maiden needs a little brother or sister that is a wee bit more portable since my shoulder is still healing...and they pack so small and pretty.

we then moved on to show and tell. not only gwen's amazing quilts, but some made by other attendees. they were all inspiring and so very different using gwen's "parts department" and collaborative quilting ideas.

we had a few demos as people requested help or ideas. the one above is using the "strata" or fabric you made yourself. you can cut it a variety of ways, such as at a 45 deg angle and then cut strips for borders or fillers. or you can then cut that 45 deg cut into blocks and voila! instant string blocks without the paper piecing. i haven't cut into my strata yet, but i definitely will. it was one of the few things i had finished before the workshop.

linda, gwen, tia and myself

at the end of the day, we just had to get a picture together. the laughter rarely stopped...the sewing and ideas overflowing....and a great group of women all together in one room. it was well worth the 5 1/2 hour drive on a bad shoulder - that was also the first drive in 3 months that wasn't 5 miles from home!! i cannot wait to get back to working on my parts quilt.