A Win, a Finish, a Start, and a Celebration!

Good afternoon,

It is warmer here today, but still not like normal. We have had such a pleasant July this year. Pretty unheard of to have almost a week in a row of below normal temps in the middle of July! As far as I am concerned it can stay like this. I can handle highs in the low 80's LOL After today (lower 90's) it is supposed to be cool again all next week. How great is that!

Look what I won at Pat's blog! Thanks Pat, I just love it. I plan to make the Georgia Hoe Down for our bed as soon as I get a few other projects cleared out. It will probably be a winter project. I can see some magnificent quilting opportunities in those open spaces. (grin)

I finished the crocheted pink baby afghan. It was fun to have a major change of pace. I may get some more yarn and start on another afghan. I have a place for the pink to go, but won't say anything till she is here. (grin) Won't hurt to have baby afghans on hand. Lots of babies being born this year in our family. I have 3 nephews and their wives who are expecting babies. Here is the pink all folded up on my cutting table. Here it is stretched out on the bed. I think it turned out pretty good. This is a simple pattern, but looks like it was much harder. The first picture is closer to the true color, yet I think it is a little brighter than even that one. I go in spurts. My poor sewing machine thinks that something has happened to me. I haven't even turned it on this week. For shame! I have been in a hand quilting mood. I told you I wouldn't be able to resist starting on one of those small quilts that I sandwiched earlier. I am still working on the Birds and Blooms applique, but this is what I have been working on for the past few nights. Laurie, here is Harbor Town. I have the center and one of the setting triangles quilted. I may put some more quilting in the center. So far I have quilted in the ditch around the stars and sailboats. Then quilted some waves in under the boats. I am just crosshatching the setting triangles. This one has been so much fun. (Wait a minute. I say that every time, don't I? LOL) Tomorrow is a day of play for us! It is our 32nd wedding anniversary. Where does the time go? Sure doesn't seem like it has been 32 years since we took our vows in the Methodist Church that Kevin grew up in. I was a lot skinnier then. LOL Not sure what we are doing, but Kevin said when he left for work today to not plan on getting much done tomorrow around here. We are heading to town. I must admit that I have not been to the city or Wal Mart for 4 weeks. Can you believe that? I have been getting groceries from a regular grocery store in a smaller town closer to us. By watching the sales, I have been able to get groceries pretty close to what it would cost me at Wal Mart. Not to dis WM, but I would lots rather help the little store keepers than them. I am still aggravated at them for their plans to take the fabric departments out. We still have one Wal Mart that has fabric, but they say that it will be gone when they remodel again. Our closest city has about 75,000 people, yet no quilt stores. We have Wal Mart, JoAnns and Hobby Lobby. I keep hoping someone will open up a quilt store. Surely there are more quilters than me in northwest Missouri. Must be, because I always have to wait in line at JoAnns and Wal Mart to have fabric cut. Now how did I manage to ramble off the topic of our anniversary to quilt stores. (eye roll) So, anyway, I think we will probably be eating out, going to Wal Mart (yep, need some things I can't get in smaller stores), Sams Club, Lowes, Porters and wherever else takes our fancy. It would not surprise me if my sweetie suggests taking me to JoAnns. I have been trying to avoid going there, because I just don't need anything right now. Need to use up what I have. But you know that I am weak! LOL If I ramble any more in this paragraph, you all are going to abandon me. LOL Everyone have a great day and wonderful weekend. Thanks for visiting.

A Finsh to Share!

Good afternoon,

We had such a nice weekend. I could not believe that we just started on the last half of July. We had record breaking lows about 4 nights in a row. Goodness, people were even wearing jackets. I didn't because I am just not going to drag those back out until I absolutely have to. LOL It was so pleasant all weekend that we basically stayed outside, just sitting on the patio enjoying the hummingbirds. We did get most of the mowing done. My garden is just not worth weeding. I don't know what happened, but everything looks stunted in growth and have very few leaves. The bush greenbeans are only about 8 inches high with few leaves and even fewer blooms. The sweetcorn is just pitiful! It is only about to my waist. Even the zucchini is only about 10 inches tall with a handful of zucchini on them. Just not worth wasting our time weeding them. Maybe next year. Even Kevin commented to me about how little everything is. He doesn't usually notice. LOL

I had a finish this weekend. I got the binding sewed down on the back of the Savannah Star and got it washed. It is now complete! That makes me feel good. Here it is.

It turned out all crinkly and soft like I wanted after washing it. Here is a closeup of the center star area.

And of course a picture of the back. (grin)
I also finished the crocheting on the pink baby afghan last night while watching tv with Kevin. All I have left to do is weave in the loose ends and it is done! I'll try to share a picture of it with you all tomorrow.

(Big sigh here) I never did get Kevin's new shirts cut out. Friday I cleaned the table all off. I just couldn't resist that big clean space. I started sandwiching tops that need quilted. I got 3 tops all sandwiched and pin basted. I usually just use pins to baste on the baby size and smaller quilts. These were all about that size. I have Harbor Town, Noah's Ark, and leftover strips quilt all ready to start quilting on, but I do have a few projects to finish first. I wonder if I will stick with that. I wouldn't want to lay money on it. LOL Here they are just crying out to be worked on. I will get Kevin's shirts made, maybe this week.

I have also been working on the Birds and Blooms quilt. I am on the last applique section on the bottom. It is coming along, kind of slow, but steady. Well, this post is short, but hopefully sweet. LOL I have things I need to get done, so I will end here and try to come back tomorrow. It is looking very much like a storm coming in, so I'd better get off the computer. Everyone have a good day. Thank you for visiting and please come again.

Working on Applique

Good evening,

The humidity is much lower and it is only in the 80's. I hope it stays like this for the rest of the summer, but I'm sure that isn't happening. LOL I don't have alot to talk about, but figured I'd do a post anyway. I crocheted some this morning on the pink baby afghan while watching The Great Outdoors on DVD. We love John Candy movies. We have watched 2 of his movies this week. Also watched Uncle Buck. His movies have brought a lot of laughter to our family.

I have the first 2 parts appliqued on the Birds and Blooms. I think I like the starch and pressing under the seam allowance. Not so sure about the washable glue. I have learned to use very little drops of washable glue and only on the seam allowances. It gets hard and is frustrating to get the needle through. I also learned that the little holder for the tip of the mini-iron also gets really hot. The first day, I burned my right index finger on the rod of the mini-iron. Yesterday, I burned the left index finger on the little holder thingy. I unplugged the iron and grabbed the holder without thinking about it. I just planned to move it. Hmmm, now I am thinking maybe this mini-iron isn't such a good thing for me. Anyone else have trouble with burning themselves while using it? Maybe I am just more of a clutz that I thought. LOL Here are the first two parts all appliqued down. I am getting better, but some of the eggs still had little points. I am just going with the story that the bird laid odd shaped eggs. LOL

I have the next section prepped and ready. As you can see I am back to pins. Maybe I will use the glue some when I get more at ease with appliqueing. I think there will be lots more of this in my future, because I am having so much fun with the Birds and Blooms.

I will work on this pretty soon. I need to cut out some more shirts for Kevin. He loves the shirt I made him and asked for 2 more. Hmmm, not sure if that is a good thing or bad. LOL I am glad that he likes what I made him, but didn't really plan on making more. My head is always full of quilt designs, not clothing. LOL Oh well, it won't kill me. He does lots for me.

I don't think I have shared these little scrap quilts that I threw together for our kitties. I had a bin with some leftover blocks from when I got carried away with a quilt. LOL So I drug it out and just started putting things together. Even the strips and sashing were in the leftover bin, so everything was already pretty much cut. I am sure this was meant to be, because I had just enough scrappy 9-patches left for this. I still have some rail fence blocks left. I have already used some of these leftover blocks in a couple of other projects. Even after making this, I still have a few. I must have really gone hog wild when I was making them. LOL I realized that I have come a long way in cutting accurately. Those red strips were cut about 3 years ago. I was amazed at how uneven they were. Oh well, the cat won't care. LOL I want to use these to practice machine quilting, but just can't quite get with it. I guess I should just do it and get them ready so my kitties can have them.

Before I go there is a great giveaway on this blog. Her birthday is July 18th and she is adding to the giveaway daily. So why don't you visit her blog.

Ok, I want to get busy with something. Everyone have a good evening. Thanks for visiting.

A good crafy weekend!

Good morning everyone,

I ate wheat this weekend, so I am moving kind of slow today. My joints are screaming at me. I have all the necessary work done up, so decided to take a break and update my blog. I doubt that I will be very energetic today. I just have to learn to leave wheat products alone.

I hope you all had a good weekend. Mine was good, but not at all like we had planned. We had lots of outside work planned. We received almost 2 inches of rain early Friday morning. It was still too wet outside to work on Saturday morning and too hot and humid that afternoon. So we thought we could do our work on Sunday. Nope. We woke up to a downpour of another 1 1/2 inches. So it was an inside weekend for us.

We watched movies and just piddled. I, of course, have to have something in my hands to work on while watching tv. I finished the quilting on the Savannah Star. Even got the binding sewed on. Now I just need to handsew it on the back and wash it and it is done. I decided to quilt an 'X' in each square and rectangle. There are lots of squares and rectangles in this quilt, so it is densely quilted.

I made the binding up at the same time as I sandwiched the quilt. I was starting to sweat a little as I was sewing it on last night. Talk about cutting it close. Of course, I think I have used up the leftover green and blue in other projects, but I made it, barely! This is all the binding that was left.

I also did quite a bit of crocheting on the pink baby afghan. I have used a whole skein of yarn and about 1/2 of the second skein, so I am coming right along on it. As you can see, Callie had to inspect what I had laid out on the bed. It is after all her bed. LOL She just lets us use it. I decided to make a wall quilt for my sister-in-law. She has had a really rough year. This is a Thimbleberries pattern called Birds and Blooms. Can you tell that I love Thimbleberries patterns? Here is the middle of it. It will have a bird, flowers, and berries appliqued all the way around this border then a border of half square triangles. I am fairly new to hand applique, so I have been trying different methods to see which one works best for me. This time, I drew the the design on the dull side of freezer paper, cut it out, ironed it onto the wrong side of the fabric, then cut out the fabric being careful to leave a 1/4 inch seam allowance. Then I used a Q-tip to put some starch around the seam allowance. I used my little bitty Clover mini-iron to iron all the seam allowances in. A little warning here. The rod on the mini-iron also gets very hot. Do not stick your index finger on it to get more leverage. It hurts! I had read that you can use Elmers washable school glue to hold applique down till you can stitch it. Since it only cost $1, I got some to try. I am just as clutsy with pins as I am the iron. I always hurt myself, so I decided the glue was worth a try. Here is the first section all prepped. I am really hoping I can take the little points out of the eggs and berries as I hand applique around them. I hope I get better with circles. They are hard. Nothing like square eggs. LOL I will let you know how this method works. I see in my picture that the leaf just barely shows up, so I will have to choose darker greens in the rest of it. So far I have had fun with this project.

Well, I need to get off here. It is time to fix dh something to eat. I hope you all have a good day. Thank you for visiting. Please come again. I am sorry that I haven't responded to everyone's comments, but last week was a busy one for me. I will try to get caught up and do better. Can't promise, though.

A little sewing, a little crocheting...

Good evening everyone,

I am not sure what is happening to all of my time. I am an empty nest mama. I am supposed to have lots of extra time. LOL It doesn't seem like that is happening lately. Probably because it is nice enough to be outside now. We worked outside this morning. Kevin mowed and I did some raking of an area we want to work on this weekend. I also have been trying to get all my work done up during the morning. The heat and humidity is coming back. My ankles swell when it is hot and humid. In fact, they just kind of disappear, so I try to sit down and prop them up as much as possible during the afternoons. Usually helps. Here is what I have been doing this afternoon while sitting.

I haven't crocheted for quite a while, so I bought some soft pink yarn and started making a baby afghan. It is an easy pattern and I can crochet while watching tv without concentrating too terribly much. Won't say it is mindless work, because I had to take out about 1/2 a row when I found a booboo. LOL Do need to pay attention to what I am doing. I also want to do some more knitting. Carolyn and I took a couple of classes to learn to knit last fall. I have made a dish cloth, scarf and about half of another scarf and not touched the needles in months. I don't want to forget how to do it.

Kevin asked me to make him a sleeveless shirt to wear when he is working around here. So I did that the first part of the week. All I have left to do is sew the buttons on. I had better get that done since it is almost the weekend. This is a terrible picture, but it is the only one I got of it.

Nothing quilty to show tonight. I know that is hard to believe, but I just haven't been in the mood for quilting this week. I have worked on the Savannah Star some during tv time. I am on the second border, just 2 more and it is done. Yahoo! I need to get some projects done. They are piling up beside my rocker and my lovely kitties keep knocking things down in the floor.

I have had good news. Isaiah was called back to work this past Monday and Jon will start back this coming Monday. Thank you Lord. They have been laid off for a long time. It is such a relief to know that both our boys are back to work. Jonny called and talked to me for a long time yesterday, then again today, so I know he is relieved, happy, and excited to be going back to work. (Well as excited as Jon ever gets anyway. He is a pretty laid back kind of guy!)

Ok, since I don't have much to share with you tonight, I will share a few pictures I took of the grandbabies at Ashton's party a couple of weeks ago. Here is Ashton waving his pirate flag. You can see how hot it was. All of the kids were beet red.

Ava Beth with the wind blowing her curls across her face. We tried to put her hair up, but she wanted it down. Looks hot to me.
Here is Noah looking up at my camera all wide-eyed. Isabella is growing so much. Look how long her hair is getting. She won't get far from her mama.

Well, that is about all I know for tonight. Tomorrow is grocery day and it is supposed to be hot and humid. I will probably spend the afternoon hugging the ac. LOL Everyone have a good night. Thank you for visiting and please come again.

Happy Birthday Ashton!

Good evening everyone,

I have been missing in action for over a week now, but I have a good excuse. This week is Kevin's vacation and we have been very busy. He has about worked me to death! LOL Maybe I will lose some weight and be in better shape when he goes back to work next week. (grin) I'll tell more about what we have been doing this week in another post later.

This post is dedicated to our handsome first grandson, Ashton. He turned 6 years old today! Goodness, where does the time go? I can remember being so nervous, while waiting for him to be born. He was our first grandchild, after all. We drove to Lawrence this past Saturday for his birthday. It is over a two hour drive, one way for us, but so worth it to see our darlings. I finished his dragon quilt Friday night. I will share a cute story about this little wall quilt. It measures about 24 inches square. Cathryn told me this morning that Ashton insists upon sleeping with it every night. He just cannot understand about hanging it on the wall. He told her that it is his quilt that grandma made for him and he wants to sleep with it. LOL How cute is that? I am hoping he will let her hang it on the wall before winter. LOL I can't help but wonder what he thinks when he looks at how little it is and thinks it was made to cover him. (grin) I will have to share a picture of him with it, later. I didn't get one, and Cath is supposed to send me one. Cath, where is my picture? (grin) Here it is right after I finished it. I couldn't help it, I had to do some hand quilting in it.

I don't have any pictures of Ashton on digital till he was 2. Here he is with his mama on his 2nd birthday.

Ashton's 3rd birthday party. Our boy loves to play in water and mud. Here he is playing with Uncle Jon.This was in Memphis when I helped them move. That was a very long year for me. Thankfully they have moved back up here, much closer. He is feeding Beauty, my pygmy goat. The kids had a ball doing this. Playing in a pan of water again. Here he is at his birthday party last Saturday. You can see how hot it was by how red all their faces were. LOL So there you have Ashton from 2 through 6 years old with his birthday quilt thrown in for good measure. LOL He is growing up to be quite a little gentleman. He was going to his first Royal's baseball game today and was quite excited. I hope you had a wonderful birthday my little guy. Grandpa and I both love you very much.

Well, that is it for me tonight. I may not be back till next week. So happy 4th of July for all of my American friends! Everyone have a great weekend. Stay safe and enjoy your families. Thank you for visiting.