Lazy Sunday

Pure peace ~ hanging out with a friend in the sewing room on a lazy Sunday afternoon.🐾

Life is Good!

Birthdays Past and Future, Those Little "Houses"

Bear with me; this is going to be a long post. That's what happens when I don't post for days weeks on end! I celebrated yet another birthday this past week. It was a perfectly wonderful day; Mr. Goodneedle took me out to breakfast and then on to an athletic shoe store that generates a 3-D model of your feet for superior fitting. I tried on three different pairs of walking shoes from there and settled on these new ones. They're probably the most comfortable shoes I have ever worn right out of the box!


We had dinner out for the next two nights, too; the celebration lasted for a full forty-eight hours. Our son and his family had a special birthday dinner in my honor on the second night, complete with a beautiful handmade birthday banner and a very special strawberry cupcake!

Yesterday we made a quick trip to the Capital City to celebrate Lucy Ann's upcoming birthday this week. She'll be nine years old. We brought a furry beanbag chair for her room, I believe it was a hit! Our daughter called to tell us that long after we had left and returned back home she was still in the chair!

We had a fun birthday lunch with her (and her family who were sitting on the other side of the table).

She was delighted with a piece of birthday cake that easily fed our entire table (with some to spare)!

So, those "Little Houses" that I teased earlier weren't actually houses under construction at all. But, rather, square-in-a-square blocks. I made fifty-four of these 2" block units. Why?

To border "Frank"! Isn't he handsome? He is a door banner measuring 17" X 44". "

Frank is a Country Threads pattern that can be ordered through the hyper link here until 10/31. 

I got carried away  consumed with details on this small quilt. The name tag was created from a downloaded name tag photo which I printed out onto Printed Treasures* and fused onto his jacket. The pieced border was my own idea too. I was auditioning solid color outer borders and couldn't quite come up with anything that got me excited until I decided to piece a border using colors from the shirt and jacket, I felt it pulled the whole thing together. Yes, I can turn even the simplest thing into a career move! All in all, it was so worth it; I absolutely love the final result! As you can tell, these are LOUD colors, perfect for Halloween and October decorating; almost time to bid September good-bye. And sew it goes. 

Life is Good!

* Printed Treasures are printable, paper-backed fabric sheets. This is the product that I use to make all of my quilt labels; I buy the sew-in sheets. I heat-set mine, face down, with the iron after printing and have never had trouble with them not being permanent after washing. They may fade a bit, over time, depending on how many times they're laundered with the quilt. 

Up next: the perfect, quiet, antitdote to all that garish color overload; a low volume remedy. 

Home Again, Home Again

I'm back! You may not have noticed the absence, I have been slow to post lately and got too busy to load any posts ahead of time before being in New England for the last week and a half. As you can see, I was lucky enough to visit Keepsake Quilting in Center Harbor, NH on Saturday last week, it was a rainy day and where better to spend time? And, yes, I found some goodies! 😁

Right around the corner of the porch on which I am standing is the site of the new Pineapple Fabrics store. It is featured as one of the top ten quilt shops in the current BH&G Quilt Sampler magazine; it does not disappoint, either! This space is filled with precuts; colorful displays, a wonderful room in which to relax (for quilter's spouses or those waiting on shoppers) equipped with a television, comfy chairs and complimentary beverages-- take a peek at the one minute video hyper-linked above-- you'll see!

A quick stop for Cider Bellies, donuts freshly made and hot out of the fryer, at a farm stand on the way to Keepsake made for a perfect day's outing! These may have been consumed in the car before even leaving the parking lot! Ah, fall in New England-- I wish you could have smelled this place, the donuts are positively irresistible!

Time spent in New England was precious family time. I carried a stack of quilt labels to document my Mother's quilts for her. Last time I visited we photographed and jotted pertinent data for each one.

This trip I sat and added the labels to the backs of each one. Don't ever neglect to document your quilts and include your quilt's name, your name, the year and where you were living when you made it; that's pretty much the bare minimum of what should goes on your label; naturally, if you can add more information it doesn't hurt (pattern name and/or source, quilter's name if different than piecer, etc.); you may think that you'll always remember and a label isn't necessary. Believe me, it really, truly is!!

My sister gave me this precious antique child's iron and ironing board during the visit. I still can't believe it; it reminds me so much of the ironing board that I had when I was three years old. I love it!

There's more to share and I know that I need to get back to the "little houses" teaser from the last post. I will, I promise. In the meantime: the pattern winner from that same post is Pat, she will be receiving a Lemoyne Trails pattern in the mail in the next few days; thanks to all of you for playing along! For the rest of the day I will be finishing laundry and settling back in. Dorothy knew best, even though it's wonderful to travel there really is no place like home! 

Life is Good! 

Finishing

It's been a summer of finishing up. This photo is of our Pastor at the end of August; she has been serving our congregation as an Interim Pastor and has finished her time with us. A few of us knew that she would need a proper send-off and of course that always requires a quilt to commemorate the occasion! Quiltkeemosabe just so happened to have this Lemoyne Trails top already finished and asked if I could quilt it and get it ready in time; not to worry!

I believe that she loved it! It was a joy to work on, too. I have this pattern and never had sewn it up but am inspired to make one of my own now. Actually, I have TWO of these patterns, if anyone reading would like to have the pattern and uses Deb Tucker's Studio 180 tools (this one requires the Rapid Fire Lemoyne and Square Squared tools) let me know in a comment and I will randomly select a winner next week and send it off to you.

Another project finished up: at church we have been collecting back to school supplies to stuff backpacks for disaster response. The supplies had been stashed until they could all be stretched out on long tables (our Women's Group meets at our LQS) and the backpacks could be filled assembly-line style.

Twenty six filled backpacks were prepared and sent to a local warehouse where they're undoubtedly headed now to Hurricane Dorian destroyed areas in need of immediate assistance. 

On the home front-- another scrappy tumbler quilt is completed. I finally realized, a few weeks ago, where that "missing" tumbler quilt had disappeared to; it was donated and I had completely forgotten about doing that. This is the third one that I have made and, after just receiving a gift of filled charm bins from Quiltkeemosabe who has been cleaning out, it seems that it certainly won't be my last one. 

Hexie Garden is completely done, too. It's been a fruitful season for finishes-- finishing strong and finishing well; hopefully the harvest from this season continues. I'm inspired and not slowing down yet; neither are the UFOs that I continue to discover!  

Life is Good!

Coming up next: where are these cute little houses going to end up?
Stay tuned...

Which Came First?

Which came first-- the dog or the quilt? Well, definitely, the dog came first; last month he celebrated his fifteenth birthday, but, he assuredly inspired this quilt pattern, don't you think? There's been a LOT going on in the sewing space these days, so much so, in fact, that I am woefully behind in posting to this blog. Hannes hangs out with me here in the studio and yesterday, when I looked up, this is what was looking back at me. So sweet! 😍


Speaking of Hannes and quilts-- do you remember when Lynnleigh insisted that Hannes have his own birthday quilt? She put some orphan String-X blocks together and we had a Hannes-sized nap quilt that same day. 

Since then it has been quilted, bound and enjoyed fully!

In honor of National Wildlife Day yesterday, we've been up close and personal with nature around here this summer. Our THIRD bluebird family fledged last week, five more babies(!) and twin fawns have been seen in the woods behind our home all summer as they've grown.

This smallish deer was spotted out the kitchen window while doing dishes the other day (sibling is on the very far left, almost out of frame); we were privileged to witness the baby bluebirds launching out into the world late one afternoon.

This wall quilt was worth the wait; begun in 1999 and hung last week in our bedroom. I just love waking up to this one each morning. 

 I had been working on this "Split Square" small quilt to use as a table topper, gathering the "charms" from my own scraps. (Pattern from Sew Charming by Mary Etherington and Connie Tesene). I pieced the blocks leader-ender style while working on other things. When it was time to set it together it DID NOT work! The edges didn't line up, but I struggled to make things fit. I "webbed" it using chain piecing but when I finally began sewing the rows together horizontally it was horrendous AWFUL. All the steam in the world could not convince these blocks to lay flat; there were puckers and pleats everywhere. I balled it up and threw it in the trash. I was defeated. But then, it began calling to me from the depths of my trashcan. "I wonder", I thought, "did I miss a step?" I went back to the book and realized that I had, indeed, missed a step-- a BIG ONE; the trim down! 🙄

I dug it out. I took it apart. I trimmed down the blocks (see above). I reassembled. Voila! Success. 

There is a lesson to be learned here-- don't give up, always do your best and read ALL the directions!

Let me conclude today on a sweet note. I have lots more to post, stay tuned; but in the meantime let me recommend this recipe that I got from our daughter-in-law for Peanut Butter Chocolate Cake that's mixed and cooked in the crock pot. It is easy to assemble and absolutely delicious. We topped ours with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Which came first here? The ice cream-- Mr. Goodneedle is an ice-cream making machine; he lives to try new flavors and crank out more batches, but in this instance, it matters not which came first; combined in the same bowl at the same time is perfection!

Enjoy~

Life is Good!