Finishing some UFO's!

Yeah baby! I finally got all the bindings on the quilts I got quilted at my retreat...5 more off the list! I need a retreat at least once a month I think.

The first one, "Cottontail" was started over 10 years ago with a friend! I know it's so dang complicated that it took me that long to do it. I finished the top at LAST year's retreat and just now quilted it. Is that pathetic or what? But it's done and off the list and ready to hang for Easter. Whew!

#2 "Tower of Spools"--was part of my Quilt 24 Challenge, my design. I was asked to do a lecture/trunk show on that Challenge at a quilt guild, so thought it would be a good idea that they were all done and quilted, considering the challenge was in 2007! LOL

#3- "Positively Pineapple"- done for a class sample a couple of years back. I wanted to do circles on it on Zoe, but never had the nerve to do it. I've messed up on a few quilts by practicing new things and didn't really want to mess up on this. But decided to go ahead and do it and it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be to do. The quilting doesn't show well in this picture.

#4- "Spinning Stars" TR-- I showed that to you in the last post--but 'Kathy' is the one who gets credit for quilting it. hahahaha

#5- "Daisy Fields"-- another one of the Quilt 24 Challenge quilts, my design. I used a reproduction prints and wanted to do mostly 'traditional' type quilts, but with a contemporary twist. So I made this asymetrical. I was going to put yellow buttons on the flowers but a friend told me not to because the leaves points turned out well--she said you use buttons to hide flaws! LOL I just thought it would look good to make a flower. I pre-baste my appliques like Ted does. I just don't do well with needleturn. Doing them her way insures perfect points (well most of the time for me).

So, would you put buttons on the center of the flowers or not?

Retreat Report

We had a great time at our retreat last weekend..geez, has it been a whole week ago already? Busy week, but wanted to report on our weekend. After a tense few days when our electric was out for 2 days RIGHT before our retreat had me a bit worried. But it came back on in time to carry on. We have 8 in our small group and we divide up in pairs to do retreats, block exchanges, etc. It was my turn with my friend and we decided to do a cupcake themed retreat. Here's what we placed at everyone's seats. We made cupcake pincushions for everyone. We used those silicone cupcake liners and stuffed a fabric square with batting and then hot glued it in the liner. We put colored pins in them to resemble sprinkles. Then we made kits for everyone to make a sewing machine mat. We got this darling cupcake fabric (Robert Kaufman) and then I embroidered their names on the pocket piece and Cheryl fused cupcakes (leftover from the fabric) on. We cut everything out for everyone and all they had to do that night was do some simple quilting and then bind it. We also made the hugest cupcake pincushion EVER and I forgot to take a picture of them! I'll do it later. Actually I did take a picture of one of our buddies and she was holding 2 of them in a very provocative manner and didn't think she'd want it made public! LOL You owe me Mishelle! We played Bingo, using words that pertained to our group, and played a word scramble and had quite some lively conversations--one was what constituted a compound word. We had little cups with colored M&M's--quilter's pills good for energy for just about everything...seam ripping...decision making, like what color to use....winding bobbins. And we all had mannequin heads and we were to post thoughts about our fellow quilters on them...all good of course!

Evil twin Kathy made an appearance and took over the machine quilting on a tablerunner. She did a very poor job--it was like she had never quilted before! She blames it on doing so much on Zoe that she's out of practice on a regular machine. I say phooey--and SHE is getting the credit for quilting that, not me! I was pretty mad at her for doing so bad and she got back at me and ate all my M&M's! This was one of the Quilt 24 Challenge quilts and will be great in a 'hang 'em high and keep 'em moving' exhibit only! LOL

Down to the end of the fabric

End of what fabric? Stash--ROFLOL!! Scraps--LOL! No--my Quilt 24 Challenge fabric! Here is what I have left. On my rounds of blogs I saw what Bonnie and Tonya did when they recently were together. I thought it would be perfect to use up the small scraps. And what fun! But, ooops! She used a 45 degree angle diamond and in my excitedness, didn't even THINK about that--I had a diamond shape template and went to town!
And look what I get.....a 6 pointed star, NOT an 8 pointed star. It turns out my template was a 60 degree diamond. Oh well--I do have a few thoughts on what to do....I'll be back!
And of course, I had to make a postcard with ALL the fabrics that I used. I decided I will do that with each big challenge...it's kind of a nice way to remember all the fabric I used. My cousin does beautiful journals with her projects and I really would like to do that too--but time gets away from me SO fast--this has to be the next best thing.
And talking about going around the blogs--you guys are ALL so inspiring! I apologize if I don't comment as much as I would like--I'd never get around to all of you if I did that. So please know that I am keeping up with you--and will try to leave a comment now and then. I'd rather visit more blogs than stop and chat with all of you, although I would love to! Also, thanks to those who do stop and 'chat' with me. If you leave a comment or question, I'll answer you, but there are still quite a few who do not allow replies and then I can't answer you.

******Gratitudes***********
1. Sleeping on sheets that have been hanging on the clothesline
2. Safe journey for my hubby
3. Being excited for each day--so much fun stuff to do!

Serendipity

I've been working hard on my Quilt 24 Challenge, trying to get that done and out of the way. The trouble is I don't know where to stop sometimes! LOL The good news is that I have figured out what the rest of my projects will be, have them cut out and some are well on their way to being done. Where does the Serendipity come in? Well, I had quite a few strips left, ranging in size from 1" to 2" wide and most not longer than 8". I finally decided to cut them into 1 1/2" widths x 6 1/2" to get the most that I could. I figured I would 'frame' a block or something and had enough to do 9 blocks. Then I thought I would maybe do some redwork in blocks, good idea. I stayed up late one night surfing the internet for redwork patterns. I then thought since I'm doing that other hand embroidery, I didn't want to do any more handwork, so switched my thinking to machine embroidery--a whole other set of internet sites. I couldn't find quite what I was imagining, finally settling on maybe doing the days of the week and I'd figure something out for the other two blocks. I went to bed with that on my mind. Well, you know what sleep does for you! It goes into overdrive in thinking, processing and assimilating all the information it took in for the day! I woke up with a great idea! My mother had given me a set of tea towels my grandmother embroidered years ago. I didn't even get dressed, eat breakfast or anything before heading to the studio. I found the bag! And there were enough for 8 blocks and I quickly decided that embroidering a center block with "When this you see, Remember me" in it.AND they were 6 1/2" square! The only thing was that one block was a bit stained from what appears to be a little rust from the hoop and in the other, it must have been the last thing she was working on, because their were a few small flowers that were not done. I thought about finishing it, but then decided not to--remember her just as it is. I have everything laid out..and had enough fabric left to cut down to 1 1/4" and sewed them all together for a small border, in between two white borders. I have an idea for the last outside border, but will withhold judgement until I get to that point.

****** Gratitudes************

1. Days were everything seems to fall into place

2. The lush, green grass of spring

3. Waking up to the birds singing

working with Miss M

It was little Miss M's turn to spend with Nana--and she too, had to make her own little personalized pillow. She wasn't afraid at all of the sewing machine and wanted to do it by herself! Ahh, maybe a little later, :)
They sure liked putting the "fluffies" inside the pillow. She liked doing that so much she wanted to make one for little brother too...Little brother...sorry Liam--you didn't get to come help--soon...soon..And another quilt for my Quilt 24 Challenge...this time we were to do an applique--and if you remember, I was working on this during my trips and then one little Scotty dog got away in Bora Bora. If you look really close, you'll see an outline of a Scotty dog, headed the wrong way. This little quilt is dedicated to him--titled, "To the One Who Got Away"! It's all basted and ready to be quilted--and it's not even due until June 2!! I'm working on another twin size quilt for this challenge. I've got all the blocks pieced and am working on the MACHINE applique blocks now.

how time flies when you are having fun

Man, how does time get away so fast? In fact, my granddaughter was here last weekend with me and she was really sad at bedtime. She was crying and said that time always go too fast here! Catching up on things....playing and having fun with grandkids.....

This is Kai stuffing his pillow we made with his name on it. He spent a day and night with Nana, just us two....sewing, playing soccer, having a picnic at the park


working on my Quilt 24 Challenge Medallion....still painting....making baby quilts......and running my daughter to and from work for 2 weeks while hubby is out of town--it takes 2 hours out of my day--OUCH! But he's home now and I can have those hours back!
This is my Quilt 24 Challenge Medallion--as I had sketched out on paper. It sure looked better on paper! After playing with it, I changed the leaves on the vine to become flowers and added 2 more borders...I'm a little happier with it now. Since I'm using feedsack repros--I thought I would make more traditional style quilts, but with a little contemporary twist to them. In this case, I would make the medallion OFF-center. And fortunately I had cut too many squares for another quilt, so I added the extras as a border.

"Funky Monkey" quilt for my youngest grandson. He just loves monkeys and SOFT fleece blankets, so I put Minkee on the back of this. I gave it to him and we put it on the floor with the Minkee side up and he kept putting his forehead on it, sliding along and then rolling over...looked like a little kitty!

a sneak peek..

a sneak peek as to what I've been doing......

Well, I've got the second dress done in the series of embroidery that I'm doing. I only work on it during a few TV shows that I watch--American Idol and House. I like CSI, Without A Trace too, but forget to watch them.














For the next Quilt 24 Challenge, we have to do a Medallion Quilt. I have come up with a dozen designs and could never decide what I wanted to do. I finally decided to do an hand applique center...so here it is, all basted and ready to applique. I hope to get it done tonight during my quilt group.







This is one of the borders for my medallion quilt above...it only used 1 1/2" squares from each of my FQ's! At this rate, I'm going to get 20 quilts out of all those FQ's. This is quilt #2.










This was a storage room, that was full from floor to ceiling of stuff! To name a few things: 5 sets of metal bed frames??? A twin headboard/footboard set of my husbands, a picket fence, a box of books, 7 Cabbage Patch dolls, a kitchen play center and boxes of dishes, play food,etc., a miniature kitchen cupboard that my Dad made for ME when I was a little girl, boxes of games, clothes, a laundry hamper from my girls younger years and many more odd and end things. I should have taken a picture. It was a mess, and filthy! The walls were dirty and dusty. I turned it into my Quilting Supplies closet
and will store all my batting, quilts to be quilted, threads, and stencils/templates for my HQ16.


I just love the colors! Lime green and aqua...it looks so fresh and clean. And hopefully ALL my supplies can be easily found now and I can see what I have. I do know that I will not need to buy batting for a LONG, LONG time! :) I found all sorts of batting for all types of needs. You don't even see all the batting--that big bin below the W&N batting roll, is full of packaged batting and I need one more bin like it to hold the rest!

Back to normal?

So, am I Back to normal? Well, I'm home now and busy as ever, so yes, I guess I'm back to normal for me! I sure am paying the price for being gone so long! And I didn't get my taxes done before I left :( So...I'm stuck at the computer. But I had to take a break to finish my Quilt 24 Challenge's first quilt. It was due by April 1. We had a meeting that day, so we REALLY had to have it done! Okay, not really--we are really challenging ourselves, so if we don't get things done, it's our own loss. But it's nice to have deadlines. So, while adjusting to being back in my own time zone, I sewed in the wee hours of the mornings to finish about 4 hours before our meeting!

This is my first quilt--(which was to be a twin quilt, according to our challenge rules) and you'll recognize it as Judy L's "Gratitude" pattern! I figured I might as well kill 2 birds with one stone, although I didn't follow her one hour a day. It was more like ...sew like a banshee during a retreat on the blocks and sew like mad during the middle of the night! But hey, it worked and it's done. I can't tell if my eyes are blurry (it's 1 AM here), or it was a blurry picture..the blocks look a bit blurry to me. At our meeting, it was really great to see everyone's quilts--they were all so different but beautiful! I think we all are enjoying the challenge it gives us to be very creative with our fabric. I can't wait until next month.

Our next quilt is to be a medallion quilt and I designed my own, so am now working about 1/2 hour a day on those. I'd MUCH rather work on those than my books/taxes so I have to limit myself until I get them done.

Thank you all so much for bearing with me while I posted mostly non-quilt related posts about my trips. Not only am I sharing my adventures with you, I'm really recording them for me. I hope that if they bored you, you went on. I do enjoy looking at other's pictures of where they live, they visit, their kids along with the quilts.

By the way, did you see the new "The Quilt Show" with Ricky Tims and Alex Anderson? Ricky said that quilters do have other lives! :) How many of you signed up for the series? I read somewhere (I forget now where) that they pay for cable and weren't going to pay for more shows. Well, my feeling is that all the good quilt shows are gone (from my area at least) and for the price of less than 2 yards of fabric, I can watch quilt shows for year, at my convenience. And they are close to an hour long! There are a few ads, but very short ones...not annoying long ones that last longer than the show segments! So....what are your thoughts? If you are against it, why? If you did subscribe, did you like the first shows? Just curious....

*******************

Gratitudes:

1. Taxes--hate to do them, but love the freedoms we have because of them

2. Fun challenges to keep us inspired

3. Pansies

Quilt 24 Challenge

I am starting a new challenge for a new year! Like we don't have enough to do already, right? :) Remember my posts from April/May of last year where I had a challenge with a friend using 24 FQ's? I'm doing it again and opening the challenge up to anyone who would like to join in. I am not posting the official rules until Jan. 21 (you can come to the meeting, y'all are invited!--or check out the website the evening of the 21st). Details will be on my website under Quilt 24 Challenge.