Missing in Action

Yikes!  Have I really been gone this long from my last post?!?
Not much going on in the my lil' quilting world.  I did finish this UFO in June.  Should have ironed out the crease in the middle before taking a picture of it but I was too lazy.


Used almost all of the leftover scraps for the back of the quilt.   

In non-quilting life, I was able to watch these two guys several times before the season was over.  Daddy was the coach of the lil' guy's T-Ball team.  I haven't watched a game since my own kids were in T-Ball so it was very entertaining.  Lil' guy enjoyed it and will play next year again but told grammie that he is better in soccer.  How can you not love 5 year olds?!
 


Fun news on Father's Day.  Oldest son asked if we were near a computer and to go check my email....this is what came up!   We can hardly wait for January to come!  Newest one is due on Lil' guy's birthday.  We are excited to see how close their birth days will be!
 

The Honey and I sailed away on this huge thing for our Anniversary.  34 years.  Who can believe that????!   We can't be old enough to have been married that long!
 


Cruised the Inside Passage in Alaska.  Had a wonderful time.  Even had time to stop for a few minutes to shop in Quilt Alaska in Skagway.   Bought a Glacier quilt kit to remind us of the beautiful scenery we saw up there.
 


This is a month full of birthdays so not sure when I will be back.....have been making some burp cloths for the lil princess.  She is now 3 months old and of course still as cute as can be!  We are suppose to head to the cabin again next week so maybe I will take some quilty things with me to sew and hopefully be back soon to show you all!
Hope you are having a great summer too!  Summer always goes by too fast here in Wyoming!

Happy Memorial Day weekend!

Not sure where the time goes but I just haven't spent too much time at the sewing machine.

Actually we have been visiting this lil' 2 year old this month.  She lives out of state and I sure do miss her!  We had a great week visiting her and her parents!


I've also loved having our youngest son home from BYU for a few weeks this month.  He left yesterday for an internship in San Antonio.  Hopefully that beast behind him will get him there, back AND around for 10 weeks!  Joel hasn't bought a car for himself yet...wants to keep saving money so he is stuck with our "leftovers" for his trip.  I'm pretty proud of this kid...he was just accepted into the Master's program at school (yes....he is older than you think).

This lil' one still has my heart.  6 weeks old now and still has all her hair!  She looks so big and chunky here but is still just a lil' thing!
 

I did make this wall hanging this month.  I realized I didn't have any quilt for Flag Day or 4th of July so I looked through my patterns and found this one to make.  It is an Out On A Limb pattern called America Something to Crow About.  Love my rooster guy!
 

Our newest addition!

Lil' Kinsley was born Thursday, April 12.  Here she is 26 hours later.
I've never seen so much hair on a newborn!  Not sure the doctor had either....she started styling Kinsley's hair into a mohawk as Janessa was pushing.
7 pounds 11 oz.  20" long
Mom and baby are doing great.
Grammie is pretty happy too!
 

Kinsley's baby shower

Middle child is finally close to her delivery date!  9 months seem to drag along when you are grammie waiting to meet a new grandchild!  Little Kinsley is due April 9.  Last night we had a baby shower for Janessa.  Lots of friends came and Janessa was even surprised with a visit from her sister.  I told Janessa that I could keep a secret!   It was pretty funny how Janessa saw Jessica walking across the parking lot and didn't recognize her since she wasn't expecting her to be there.

I have been busy for the past month making decorations, etc for the shower.  I am not a party person so I stress and stress but in the end everything always works out fine.

I made banners to go on the tables.


Kinsley's baby quilt made with love.  I make a quilt for each new grandbaby.  

Thank you gifts for the shower attendees.  26 owls in all!  These were fun to make with a fat quarter.  I found the pattern here.  I'm proud to say I used fabrics from my stash!

My test owls.

Wasn't sure how many friends to expect so one of the girls reserved a room at the library.  Here is the food table.  

Lil' Kinsley received so many presents!

Janessa seeing the quilt for the first time.  I'm usually not very good at hiding my sewing projects but this time I don't think Janessa even knew the colors I was using.  Hope she likes it!  Every time I sat down to sew, I thought about how this lil' one that will soon be joining her mommy and daddy and our family.  I am so excited to meet her.


It has been a busy, stressful month and I am so glad it is over!

Quilt in a Day

Before Thanksgiving last year, I received an email from Linda at Quilt in a Day.  She asked if I would like to review a book from Eleanor Burns.  I knew that I wouldn't have alot of time with the holidays coming up but I told her that I would love to do so.

I was even able to pick which book I wanted to review.  I have already made or bought several of Eleanor's more recent patterns so I choose Egg Money Quilts.  Linda was kind enough to send me not only the book but a ruler from the book that I didn't already have.  I love this company!

Before Christmas came, I was able to make a couple of the blocks.  Eleanor's books come with A LOT of information on how to make her quilts.  

What is also wonderful is that if you still don't understand the instructions from the book, you can find each block from each book online in Eleanor's Media Theater!  Talk about awesome!!!

Time to sew!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Hope you have a lovely day with those you love!

Addiction!

I've been busy!

I LOVE FABRIC!  Oh yes!  I thoroughly enjoy visiting fabric stores and petting all the fabric but....because of that love, my fabric stash at home was getting a little bit (okay...alot) out of hand.  When I saw fabric in a store that caught my eye, I usually would buy a bit to take home for those "future projects".

My cupboards were getting a bit reckless!  I usually stacked like fabrics together or fabrics from the same line all together and tied them up with a cloth ribbon.  It worked fine until I would pull something out to use and then somehow it never got put back nicely in the same spot.  This is how messy it was becoming when I finally decided to do something about it.

I now can't remember where I first saw this idea of how to wrap your fabric.  But you can google "comic board fabric wrap", then click on "images" to see other pics of the same idea.  It's very easy and a very efficient way of storing your fabric.  I can now see ALL the fabric I have instead of pretending to know what is in that cupboard!

I bought my comic book backing boards off of http://www.amazon.com.  The size I bought were 7 1/2" x 10 1/2".  I ran out of boards and had to order some more and found that size was harder to come by the second time around.  I ended up not buying the same brand but it really did not make a difference.  To wrap the fabric, I just folded it in half length-wise and then placed the board on one end of the fabric and wrapped it up.  To secure the fabric, I used old straight pins.  

Here is a picture right after I finished wrapping most of the fabric.  I still could not bring myself to switch from fabric lines to just colors.  I left it like this for a few days and just looked at how pretty it was.

Finally I gave myself permission to sort the fabric into colorways.  Doesn't it look better?  I do miss not knowing exactly which fabric went together with a certain designer.  But I know that this way of sorting will make pulling fabric to use in my future quilts so much easier!  Isn't it beautiful?!  It makes me want to sew!

Almost forgot to show!

Here is Janessa's take on our "watermelon" blocks.  She made her blocks into a Ladybug quilt!  I think it turned out darling and can hardly wait to see it quilted.

Almost done!

Now to decide if I keep going around with a black border or just stop and wait for binding.  

To make the quilt, I modified a Circle of Nine setting with my BOM blocks.  I will put the 3 extra blocks on the back of the quilt.

Way back when...a whole year ago...when I first heard the LQS ladies calling this a watermelon quilt (because of the red and green colorway) at our January meeting, I knew I had to incorporate some of the design I saw from a quilt in Fons and Porter's Love of Quilting magazine.   The issue is May/June 2010 and the inspiration quilt in found on page 18 of that issue.  It's called Watermelon and Shoofly by Tammy Johnson.  I quickly made several watermelon blocks from the inspiration quilt and they have been waiting patiently to somehow make their way into my own quilt.  A few months ago, I watched a demonstration on how to make a Circle of Nine quilt.  I knew that my watermelon blocks would work perfectly with some modification on my part.  I added the ants and crows onto the corner blocks just because.

My Watermelon Quilt

This is what is on my design wall today.  Trying to figure out how to put my BOM all together.  The blocks are the 2011's BOM from our LQS.  Will talk about it all later once I get it sewn together.  I'm pulling from everywhere to make this into a quilt.  Hope it comes together like I envision!

One Down and One To Go!

Finished one BOM from our LQS a few days ago.  Now trying to get my mind and body in gear to finish the 2nd one (different from this one).  This one is called "It's a Wonderful Life" designed by our local quilt designer Geralyn Powers.  She is so creative!  It was always fun to attend the Saturday Sampler each month during the year to see what the next block would look like.  I think I only missed one Saturday out of the year so this quilt only cost me $12 to make, excluding sashing and border fabric.  You pay for the first block in January and then your next block is free if you bring it back the next month finished.  If you miss a meeting, you also have to pay for the next block.  Not too bad!

Let it Snow!

Winter has still not come to Wyoming.  We are hoping for some good storms in the next few days.  I'm afraid no snow now means we will have our Winter in Spring and then our Summer will be cold....once again.  Having no snow does not mean we don't have the cold temperatures though!  High today in the 20's with nights below zero.  Wind is already blowing hard so the temp won't even feel in the 20's today.

Here's a lil' quilt I made a couple of months ago but haven't shown.  I let it sit in the closet for a year before finishing it.  It's a cute little tabletopper but a new quilter showed her over zealous handiwork and went to town on it.  I guess since I hadn't already put the buttons on for the eyes, she figured she would help me finish the snowmen.  LOL!  I think of them as wearing goggles now, waiting for the next big storm!  :)