Well begun is half done

Three things to be happy about:
(1) holidays
(2) Burt's bees lotion
(3) Skinny Pop popcorn

I have a new favorite snack - Skinny Pop popcorn!

I've been hooked on it ever since someone gave me a bag of it on a bus trip, and I liked it.  So now I get it by the carton from Costco, sometimes I can catch it on sale.

100 calories and 9 carbs per bag - pure popped perfection!

Here's part of my progress on the granny square quilt so far.  I didn't even contemplate trying to "balance" the colors, nuh-uh!

Three rows put together with sashing, I think I'm going to like how this turns out!

Five blocks across and six down should make a nice sized throw, especially with the wide borders...

All the blocks are sewn, I just need to add sashing and hook em up!



That's it for now, just wanted to show my progress.  Is it Saturday already??  Enjoy it!

Sew forth and sew on til later...

Two quilts done

Three things to be happy about:
(1) ATM machines
(2) a new wallet
(3) that first cuppa of the day

I haven't had mine yet, that first cuppa, but I'll get it soon as I finish this post!

Such a relief to get the binding sewn down on the two quilts!

Sunbonnet Sue Sees Stars got a red binding, a bit deeper red than the border... love those "pokey-dots"!

I love stars and I think Jaelyn will love them too, especially with all the scrappiness going on!

She should have fun picking out all the colors, no two Sues were dressed alike.

The cornerstones are also scrappy...

I think the backing goes really well, it's a piece of "batik-y" fabric from my stash...


different colors in a swirly pattern...

A lot for a curious five year old to look at again...

and again...

and again!

"Jay-Jay" will like his quilt, I think...

Blue baby chickens, with glasses yet!

The birds are all blue, but no two are the same...


Some have glasses, front view, side view...

sitting, standing around, and sprawled!

Kudos to Rhonda at ravelly1-quiltzblog for freely sharing this pattern on her blog!

I was able to use up the last significant piece of that backing for this one.

You might remember I bought it on a bolt for $3 at Hancock's Fabrics, when they were closing their Takoma Park, Maryland store (read about it here).

Kinda glad to demote it down to strings and scraps!

Both just need labels and they're ready to go!


Ahh, the satisfaction of finishing these two quilts!

Can you see the quilting on them?  These were long-armed quilted by friend and guild member Bernerdette King.


Now to finish that other one... sew forth and sew on til later!

Keeping it simple-er!

Three things to be happy about:
(1) clocks that tick
(2) red staplers
(3) tv remotes

Still designing my bee's anniversary swap blocks - I wasn't keeping it simple enough!

After stitching around those letters in the 10th Street Cafe block I realized I didn't want to do that 3 more times!  Even after simplifying it and just putting a "10" on the tray, I knew I could do better.

So I found some clipart and decided how to combine it with the number 10...

Getting there...

I'm glad I took a photo of it first though... that "1" looks like the number seven!

Not bad, eh?  I like it!  Why didn't I arrive here sooner??

The ones I didn't stitch down yet will be replaced with this figure.  This is so super simple, and it's all one piece!



That's it for now, I have a dental appointment this morning, lucky me.  Enjoy your day, sew forth and sew on til later!

Three more done

Three things to be happy about:
(1) signs of spring
(2) the colors of spring
(3) springing forward!

Two sure signs of spring for me are the clock springing  forward and street cleaning starting up again!  Today they clean my side of the street and parking is restricted between 9:30 and 11:30 or you risk a ticket.  Can you believe this... last year they installed cameras on the sweeping trucks so they can take pictures of the scofflaws, upload it to the District's Public Works database and bingo - a ticket!!

I used this clipart I found someplace to create three more blocks for my bee's 10th anniversary swap...

I like the silhouette, it's clean and simple!  To keep  it simple I eliminated the cover, and traced the word "Cafe" onto the platter instead.


Here's a green one:

I hope someone likes green!

A red one...

and my favorite!

I had just enough left of this blue fabric for the words:

it looks black, but it's a lovely shade of blue.  Not even a crumb left of this one!

Temperature's rising, have a great day, do something creative, sew forth and sew on...

Monday morning blues

I'm blue because it's snowing.  Again.  They're calling for up to 6 inches before it stops, I think.  There's snow on my car, snow on the street, snow on the sidewalks... I know other places have it worse than here, but ... still...

So here we go -  Three things to be happy about:
(1) the first flowers of spring
(2) birds building a nest (but not under my awning, please!)
(3) new house plants

Sandra over at Sistah Stitchalot told me about this handy dandy applique sheet she uses.  Actually it's a  Betty Crocker 23 x 16" oven liner!

I've seen vendors selling applique pressing sheets at quilt shows but for some reason I hardly ever see them anyplace else.   I don't know how much they cost, but this one was $9.99 from the kitchen area at Bed Bath & Beyond.

I know, I know, you can get them online but if you REALLY need one right away, a quick trip to your local Bed Bath & Beyond beats online shopping!

The Sue top has been kitted with the back, and I've put it to bed as it were til I can quilt it.

While I'm deciding what to work on next, I'm cutting fabrics for Bonnie Hunter's latest leader-ender challenge; the units are being cut at 3-1/2 x 6-1/2" with 2" squares for the HST at the corners.

I don't have any pre-cut 3-1/2" strips, so I've been digging through my scraps again, pulling out some of the larger pieces to cut down.

(have you noticed that every pile of scraps looks like you've seen it before??)

I even have this Alexander Henry print in two colorways:

It's a 2000 print called "elephants of rana" that was gifted to me, it'll play very nicely with the other scraps!

I'm pinning these into groups of 10 as Bonnie suggests... so far, so good, I've cut 60 already!

So that's it for today; I supposedly have a 9:30 appointment at the eye doctor which ain't gonna happen!  Have a great day, make a snowman or snow quilt, sew forth and sew on!

I'd rather be cruising!

Three things to be happy about:
(1) your favorite old quilt
(2) an ample supply
(3) Andy Griffith show reruns

The arctic blast they promised really came through Monday night, like the Orient express!  Water main break at Reagan airport, cracked rail on the Metro system, electrical failure in at least one school, and the list goes on!  Yesterday morning I had frost on my storm windows, first time that's happened as far as I can remember.  I noticed it was only on the wall where I have a space heater though... maybe that triggered it?

Anyway we reached a high of 12 degrees, supposedly the highest temperature in this area.

I'd rather be cruising!!!  The Caribbean would feel mighty fine right now.

I keep telling myself "November and December went by like a flash, surely to goodness January and February will do the same thing," especially since February is a short month!


Yesterday I laid out another "10" block for the anniversary swap ... this one isn't fused down because I need to look at it for a bit longer.

This is my take on a recently released movie which I haven't seen (and don't intend to).

I'm thinking of making the movie "screen" a little taller ... maybe the border could be a wee bit narrower?  No, maybe not...

The family could be moved down a little more if the screen is taller.

The words don't need to be any larger... this block needs something else but I don't know what!  Any suggestions???

That's it for now, gotta dig through some more fabric!  Stay warm, sew forth and sew on til later  :o)

Running around, another 10

Three things to be happy about:
(1) monkey bread
(2) King's Hawaiian bread
(3) Great Harvest Cinnamon Blast bread!!

I had two medical appointments yesterday morning, I was so relieved we didn't have chancy road conditions or weather!

By the time I swung by AC Moore to get a new non-holiday wreath for my front door (they're having a 30% sale but the savings weren't anything to write home about), popped into Giant supermarket for a few items, ran into Costco to make a return and into Target just for the heck of it  - most of the day was shot in the big toe.

I did manage to do another 10th anniversary block though!  One idea I had was for a church, and I thought of all the little pieces I'd need to fuse on for the window, the door, the steeple, yadda yadda yadda.  Then I thought "hey wait a minute, I can minimalize this and it'll work!"  More detail I didn't need to get bogged down into!

Now, I think anyone looking at this would HAVE to think "church," right?...

It's a 10!

It's fused but not sewn down yet, I'm saving all that til after my creative juices stop running for this project.  I'll probably do 3 different designs... we'll see!

That's all for now, have a great Tuesday, stay warm, stay home if you can, sew forth and sew on...

I knew I could do it...

Three things to be happy about:
(1) hanging new calendars
(2) refilling your mechanical pencil
(3) finding a workable solution


I'm really having an interesting time with the 10th anniversary blocks for my bee's block exchange!  I keep having ideas pop into my head, but I figure I better get what I've already prepped onto fabric so I don't get bogged down in the details.  April will be here before I know it!

I like this little hat lady, I think she's so chic!  I'm making her in different color ways so no two people will have exactly the same block in their collection.  I don't know about my fellow bee members, but I don't want a quilt that looks exactly like everybody else's.  I think that's what they call a "kit."  Just saying...

Somehow I only managed to get just this one done yesterday, other things got in the way of my quilting fun.  The pieces are fused down but not stitched, little bits of fusible around the edges worked just fine.  I don't like the way I placed the number but it'll have to stay put, that baby is FUSED!

I'd been having HUGE problems downloading my photos because the PC would only read the memory card sporadically, if at all.  I used the USB cable that came with the camera, but for some reason it gobbled up the camera's batteries - honestly, I put 2 fresh batteries in that camera and it drained them dry!

Saturday I went to Wheaton Plaza for something and I found the perfection solution at Radio Shack - a USB digital card reader!  I just insert my memory card into the little gadget and it works like a charm.

Gee it feels great to solve a problem!

More later, sew forth and sew on til then...

Finishing up, messing up

Three things to be happy about:
(1) a brand-new year
(2) cozy firesides
(3) surveying the horizon

If you survey the horizon here, there's snow a-coming!  As I type this the weather wizards are calling for a monster winter storm with wind and below freezing temperatures.  At least 2 inches in this area, enough to shovel.

I did finish putting on the two inner borders of "the quilt" and it looks really nice!

I slept under it last night just because I could.

I did a pretty good job of aligning the red cross pieces; my next and final step will be to add one more outer border, probably in red.

The red inner border is 2 inches, maybe I'll make the final outer border 3" just to set it off a bit.  After that, it's off to the quilter (eventually)!

I mentioned before that my bee is doing a 10th anniversary block swap... I managed to mess up two blocks today, including this (potentially) nice looking lady in the red hat!

You're probably wondering "What's wrong with it..."

Well, nothing actually!  Except I don't have an applique pressing sheet and I got the bright idea to put the pieces on a piece of deli paper to fuse them together, then I was going to move it to my background and stitch it down ... piece of cake, right?

Well, what do they say about the best-laid plans???

The fusible stuck FAST to the deli paper and I couldn't pull it off - what a mess!  Back to the drawing board for this one... although I probably COULD just dot some glue to the back in strategic places and stitch it down... hmm....

Then there's this one - I just plain ole don't like it!  The pattern in the fabric is too too large for the size of the piece.

I may need to go with either a solid fabric or something with a very small pattern, which I probably don't have because I've always bought large flamboyant patterns. Don't ask me why, that's when I was a young and foolish quilter fabric buyer!

For the design I have in mind a piece of African fabric would be great, but hardly any of that comes in a small pattern - everything is either large or larger!

The swap isn't supposed to be a secret one, so I think it should be okay to share my progress with you.  The blocks will be swapped at the April meeting, so we'll have time to finish the quilts for the center's community day in June.

That's it for now, I hope you didn't get snowed in too badly in your part of the world.  Stay safe and warm, sew forth and sew on til later...

It's beginning to look a lot like...

a Christmas quilt!

Three things to be happy about:
(1) a repaid loan
(2) reloading your stapler
(3) a celebration with friends

Thanks everyone for your comments on my last post, I liked the idea of embroidered reins.  Debbra, I wish you could have embroidered them for me... when I tried my fingers were all thumbs so I took the "well phooey on it" way out and slung up some thick reins to hold those deer in check!  Doesn't look too bad though :o)

I've been busy making other Christmas blocks with no rhyme or reason except just because I like em!  Here are a churn dash and a goose -

the goose is right cute but I should have used a different background on the churn dash!  The jury is still out whether or not I'll use it in the final quilt.  I got both patterns from EQ.

I really like this one; it hasn't been stitched down yet but I still wanted to share it up close:

I based this manger scene block on a picture I found online about 2-3 years ago, I think it was a Christmas card. I might embellish it with a couple animals or a stable or a low wall in the background; we'll see.  Or maybe a bright star??

Will this block make my quilt look big???  ;o)

This block measures a whopping 12-1/2 x 26!  The size sort of got away from me, I started with the pot and it was sorta big.

I found the clipart online and adapted it to an applique block - clever, eh?  Actually it was fun making this block, despite the fact that my foot pedal seems to be going bad.  Sometimes I would have it pressed all the way to the floor and the machine would barely move - then all of a sudden it would take off like a race horse!  My baby, my Singer Touch n Sew, is only 41 years old, sheesh!  But I digress - I got the alphabets from Pat Sloan's web site, here (bottom, left).  I could have linked directly to the alphabet page, but I wanted to give you a chance to see all she offers on her great site!

So here are all the blocks that I've done so far...

The little "joy deer" didn't come out so bad!  I was deliberating over using it as a silhouette and if so what color.  I called Felicia, the Slow Quilter to ask her opinion about green and she said "sure, it'll look great!"  I said "okay, but if it comes out looking funny I'll tell everybody you told me to do it!"  Well, as you can see she was right, it looks great!  I just couldn't get the word lined up though, it wanted to twist for some reason.  Oh well.

Coming up soon I see trees, a house or two, more churn dashes, at least one more deer, Sue decorating a tree, more flying geese... all kinds of great stuff!  Stay tuned and see em all  :o)

Today we get to celebrate Pat's birthday a few days early, we're taking her to lunch at the Maryland Live! buffet; it's an international buffet with Italian, American, Asian and seafood, you gotta love it!  Have a great Veteran's Day everyone - sew forth and sew on!