Green for St. Patty's Day

 

 

Here I made a quickie art quilt to hang in my entry.  Trying to make one for each month so I feel a little festive.  However, I don't do much for holidays...like I didn't want to have a four leaf clover or a leprechaun.  So my spin is to have a bright green quilt.

 

 

I was actually trying out a weaving technique to teach.  So this was my test project and 4 quilt store want me to teach it.  Kinda funny.  It was just a test and I just thought it was fun, not teaching material.  Well that makes me want to go make a few more for class samples.  That is the easy part, the hard part is choosing which store is a  right fit for me.  Reno stores are funny about you being exclusive to their shop ONLY.  No sure that I want to be exclusive to one place.

 

I really love the side view, how a little sun hits it and you can see the 3-D felted flowers.

 

Well anyways, I hope you have a Happy St. Patty's Day.  Hubby and I are working on some organizational tables for my sewing room.  I'll share those pictures soon.

 

Judy



I just love Shop Hopping!

We started the day of shop hopping this week-end with hot air balloons!  I'm not kidding, as we were traveling towards Reno there were hot air balloons in the air, even the forest fires didn't keep them down.  Yes the sky was a little hazy, but here is the first view (below).

As we got closer to the field where they were taking off this butterfly caught my attention!  See how big it is next to the Remax balloon?

 

We were off to see at least 4 shops on Saturday and the first stop was Quilting Tahoe.  It was a cute little shop.

As you see Mary left with a big smile. 

 I think all of us left with one of those little green checked bags.

Next stop was Stateline, NV...Fabric Unlimited.  Ok this shop could be bad for me!  They had dyes, paint sticks, fashion fabrics and tons of purse patterns.  Now you see why this could be bad for me, or my pocketbook.

Now from there I forgot about my camera...I think it had to do with the Sangria's for lunch!

But we ventured to Gardnerville, NV to the Quilt House,  Minden, NV to Fabric Chicks

and then back to our stomping grounds of Sparks, NV.

Our last stop was Twisted Scissors, in Sparks, NV.  They will soon have a website as soon as I finish it.

This is a cute little store but packed with some awesome fabrics...here take a peek...

So at the end of the day I came home with all these goodies.

So I can say another fantastic day of shopping and now I have to get my shoulder better so I can get back to sewing!

Please share some of your favorite places to shop.

Happy shopping!

Judy

I'm not a quilter...

I will admit that I'm not a quilter and thought this was the cutest bag when I got the pattern...then I read the instructions.  It required some quilting.  Oh my gosh!  I have not quilted in years and my extent of quilting was making the tops.  Funny thing is I have lots of tops that never got quilted, another story.  Well as many of you know that I have a new sewing machine and I didn't even know how to turn the free motion quilting on until today in my sewing class.  It might have been helpful the night before when I was making this bag.

So here is your hint, don't look too closely at my stitches.  I think my next sewing class will be a free motion quilting class and I'll try this bag again. 

But at the end of the day I was proud of my little bag and I still think it is a cute bag.  And love the colors - AQUA.  Oh and it has awesome comfy shoulder straps that don't cut into your shoulders - a bonus!  I carry way too much in my handbags.

Which is my questions of today...what do you have in your purse?

wallet, camera (you never know when you'll need it), pens, cheater glasses for the aging eyes, Micheal's coupons, car keys, lip gloss, cel phone, snack...these are my normal stuff and sometimes more if I know I going to do something fun.

Judy

I love purses!

Good Morning!  I posted this picture on Facebook yesterday and everyone just loved this little jewel that I made.  Yes I made this purse under 4 hours.  I was so excited on how it turned out.  and I really like that it is a structured purse too.

This purse was so much to make and pretty quick to put together. I found this pattern in a local quilt store in Reno, NV, but found the website and designer Ellen Medlock online. You have to go look at some of the goodies on her website and blog.

Yes many of you know that I love my purses. 

Generally I purchase Micheal Kors, Coach, Juicy Couture, Dooney & Bourke purses but lately I have been wanting vintage style purses.  So I got this GRAND idea that I was going to teach myself to make purses.  Well I have to say my hubby is on board with this.  He thinks I will spend less on purses if I make them myself.  Wow!  He hasn't looked at the price of fabric lately. 

So here is my goal...

I want to learn as many ways to make purses and get as much experience as I can and maybe you will see a Etsy store in the near future!  The ones that I want to create are the ones that have lace, embellishments, many textures such as the purses in this book.

I'm so excited to get this book.

But then I found this book too...

Doesn't that green one look just yummy?

 

Well I wanted to verbalize my goal of making purses and what a better place to post it where I have to see it in print.

 

Hugs to you,

Judy



Fabric Scrap baskets

Well last night I was having fun making little fabric scrap baskets for me and my friend Carrie.  I thought this is a great little basket that you could carry supplies in to a crop and while you are there you can throw those little scraps of paper in your personal basket.  I got the idea from what alot of sewing people would know as a thread catcher.  You can google "thread catcher" they are super cute and they hang off the side of the table while you are sewing to catch thread and fabric scraps.  Most of the thread cacthers I saw online had a pin cushion attached to it.  I didn't think the pin cushion would be helpful for a scrapper or a card maker so I just stuck to making the basket part.  Anyways, I can think of lots of uses for these little baskets...like lining my desk filled with crafty goodiness!  And it would clean up my desktop too!

Now to find the right colors for my office - red & aqua with a retro feel.  Well that would be another sewing night, maybe this week-end.

Have a wonderful day! - Judy

Sew Happy

Ok...I'm sew happy or sew crazy!  Today I have a theme for my post.  I got my new sewing machine, Viking Topaz 20.  So I am sew happy to have a nice machine and can't wait to venture off to some fun projects, BUT I am sew crazy because I may have got a machine that is well over my sewing abilities.  Hubby thought it would be better to have one that would grow with me and that I would be happy with for several years, rather than buying a new machine every fer years for bigger & better. So here she is....

This is what she looks like when she is ready for embroidery, which I learn in 3 lessons.  But I did try her out on making pin cushions this week-end, I made 3 but this is the one that I finished embellishing.

Another fun project that I did this week-end is make ribbon pins with vintage earrings as the centers.  These are great projects you can do while watching TV.

So overall I feel like I had a productive week-end.  Now back to the grind and produce some cards for my new design teams.

See you tomorrow!

Judy

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CTMH stamp set used on card is C1442 Tailor Made - Love this set!!