Borders and Promises

I am caught up with Borders and Promises. I really am loving working on this BOM. It is too warm to sit with a quilt in my lap quilting, so I have been doing embroidery when I have time to do some handwork. This has been a very busy spring. Not so much right now, though. We need rain bad. So, since it is so dry, don't need to mow and no gardening. Not even the weeds are growing. Of course the chicks, ducks, and rabbits keep me busy, but that is just a couple of times a day.

Anyway, back to Borders and Promises....I have already shared blocks one and two with you. Here is block three...

Block four....

I just finished block five yesterday. I have had the embroidery done for a while, but needed to sew the sashing on it.  Here it is.....

I think these are going to make a very pretty small quilt.

I also did some sewing yesterday. My poor sewing machine thought I had abandoned it. LOL I was supposed to be repairing a rip in Kevin's shirt, thanks to Sassy, but never did get around to that. I made Kevin a bag to carry his headphones in. Then I decided I needed a case for my Sony MP3 player that actually fit. I made a case for my first player. Then when I bought this one, it was too long to fit into the case. I gave the old player and case to Kevin. I finally got around to making a new case for mine. I just used a few scraps. Here is the front of it.....

I left an opening in the bottom left corner for the headphones to plug into the player. Here is the back of it, hooked onto the arm strap....

Here it is opened up. It fits perfectly and works great when I go on a walk.

I love it when I can create something that we need that would cost at least $20 to buy.  Kevin loved his bag for his headphones so much that he asked me to make him another bag to keep all his recharging cords in. Let's see he has a laptop, Sony MP3 player, Zune, Kindle, Pad, and Palm. So yes, he has a lot of cords to try to keep track of. LOL He is the King of electronic gadgets. LOL
I hope you all have a good day. It is nice here today, only in the 70's. Supposed to be a good chance of rain tonight and tomorrow. I am praying we get it. Thanks for visiting. Please come again.

Big Stitch Quilting

Can you believe I am doing three posts in one day? LOL I have not shared any sort of crafting in such a long time that I was afraid you would think this is no longer a quilting etc. blog. LOL  I am working on some BOM blocks, just about caught up with my May blocks, but today I thought I would share a new to me way of quilting. It is called Big Stitch Quilting. I am quilting Birdie Stitches this way.  I am using a Fons and Porter Utility quilting needle that I got at Joanns. It says #5 Embroidery on the package. I am using Perle cotton #8 ecru color. I just cut off a large length and go to town. I still make the knot and bury it inside the batting just like normal hand quilting.

I bought this PVC hoop thinking I would like the square hoop better. I haven't used it much, but so far I have not been too impressed. I think I will go back to my round wooden hoop. I am glad I used a coupon to buy this hoop at Joanns. (grin) At least I didn't waste too much money. Who knows, I might like it on another project. (grin)
Here is a closeup of one of the blocks and sashing.

So far, I am really enjoying this way of quilting. It is quicker and no worries about getting tiny stitches. LOL Of course I still love quilting the regular way, but this is a nice change of pace.

I was so excited to win this Aurifil Sashiko Thread Collection a while back. Sorry I don't remember for sure where I won it.  I know it had something to do with Pat Sloan and Quilting Bloggers.

Aren't these some fabulous colors of thread?

Well, I think I am done posting for today. LOL Just thought I would share my experience with Big Stitch Quilting. Thanks for visiting. Please come again. Have a wonderful evening.

The ducks and chicks are 2 weeks old.

The baby chicks and ducklings are just over 2 weeks old. Goodness they have grown fast. I had to make a special trip to town this morning to get a bigger waterer for the ducks. LOL A gallon waterer just wasn't doing it. They can go through a gallon of water in less than 2 hours. So in order to prevent a day of walking back and forth between the house and the brooder, I bought a bigger waterer. I took a bunch of pictures this morning. The chicks are at that awkward stage where their feathers are just coming in.

The chicks have feathered out more, but the ducks have grown lots more. Of course, the amount they eat probably accounts for that. LOL

Well, I think that is enough pictures for now. At this rate the ducks will be ready to move into the big chicken house before long. Can you believe how much they have grown in just two weeks? Thanks for visiting. Please come again.

Izabella Turned Four!

Our sweet little Izzie turned 4 last Saturday. We had a family party in KC on Sunday. What a fun day that was. I took lots of pictures, but will just share a few with you. Here is Izzie and her big brother, Noah. They are so close.

Here are Izzie and Maddy waiting for the candle to be lit. Hmm, we never could keep it lit for more than a few seconds. It was windy. We sang happy birthday anyway. (grin)

I love this cute pink hat on Ava.

Ashton taking a second from playing to pose for his grandma.

Noah.

Maddy.

That is Izzie above. Not sure why Blogger won't put the label above the picture. Oh well. This is all 5 of them waiting for that first piece of cake. Look at where all those eyes are focused.

It was a wonderful day. I treasure every day that I get to spend with all 5 of the grandkids since it usually only happens a couple of times a year. I hope you enjoyed seeing our grandbabies. Yeah! I am a bragging grandma. LOL

Meet Our Rabbits!

The week after Easter, I went to a swap meet/flea market that was only a few miles away. I had never attended one of these before. It was fun, but there was so much to see... all kinds of animals for sale or trade. I saw chickens, guineas, ducks, geese, turkeys, quail,  pigs, goats, sheep, puppies, rabbits, and even some calves. The rabbits are what I was looking for. I met this nice couple from our area and bought some rabbits from them. I bought 2 does and a buck. They are so tame and pretty/handsome. I brought them home. Then told Kevin we needed a hutch. LOL Yes, he knew I was planning to find some rabbits, but as usual we weren't prepared. So, we got to work and built a hutch.

We didn't want to spend a lot of money on this, so most of it is from scrap and recycled lumber. (The front leg on the right, isn't leaning like that. It is the angle of the camera.)  We still need to get the roof on, but need to buy some plywood first. It will have a pitched roof when we get done. We laid a couple of pieces of tin on top and held it down with 4 concrete blocks. Kevin said that would be enough to hold the tin on. He was wrong. LOL We live on a hill and get lots of wind. About a week after we got this built, we  had a day with furious winds. I was sitting in the house and heard tin rattling. I thought, 'Oh no, the hutch!' I looked and sure enough it had blown off. It took 3 tries, but with the help of the Lord, I finally got the tin back on and the blocks weighting it down. Then I drug 4 more blocks out and put them on it. Then for good measure, I stacked 2 tires in the middle of it. It has not blown off since. I am a good finagler!

So here is our Buck, Sam. He is such a love bug. Isn't his color gorgeous? These are basically just mutt rabbits, but I don't care. He has just a bit of Lop in him. That is why his ears flop around some times. LOL

Here is Sara. She is the eater of the bunch. Wow can this girl put it away!

Now this girl was supposed to be called Abbie. Hmmmm, she has such attitude that her name became Sassy. She tried to escape by going right over Kevin's shoulder when we first put her in the hutch.  She has pulled on her feeder and dumped the pellets. She just has attitude, but she is the friendliest one. I love her.  By the way, their feeders are now fixed where they can no longer dump them. We took care of that yesterday. (grin) Here is Sassy, our attitude girl.

We built the does cages in one unit  (a wire separates them), then screwed it on to the base. The base legs are treated 4X4s set into the ground. The buck cage is separate, but also screwed onto the base. At the moment, I have cardboard stapled over both ends and the back. Before winter, that will be replaced with plywood. I might also remove it once the summer temps begin to sore. They will need every bit of breeze they can get. 
Here is another picture of Sam before I stapled the cardboard on it.

I hope you liked seeing our rabbits. I visit them quite often throughout the day. They are so soft. When we bought them, we were told the does are sisters and 4 months old. The buck is about 5 months old. 

Thanks for visiting. Please come again.

Baby Chicks and Duckings

Good morning all,

Today is Kevin's birthday, so I have some plans in the works. I plan to pick our cherries and make him a pie. Since I do not like cherries, I won't be tempted to eat any. (grin) Can't eat the crust.  Being gluten intolerant is a pain, worse even than diabetes, but it is what it is. Ok, enough of the whining.

 Kevin is on vacation this week, and we have been so busy. We worked Monday getting the brooder area divided and ready for the ducklings and chicks. They were supposed to come in the mail today, but 7 a.m. yesterday the post office called to tell me my chicks had arrived. Yikes. I didn't have the heat lamps on or their feed and water out. I had to scramble to get all this done before I went to pick them up. I am so glad that I made the trip to Orschelns on Monday to get the feed and heat lamp bulbs for them. Something told me they may be early. (grin)  Oh my goodness, they are so cute. Here are the baby chicks. They are just running all over their brooder area. LOL

Aren't they cute? I have 5 Buff Orpington pullets, 5 BO cockerels, and 6 Barred Rock pullets. The hatchery sent me an extra BR. I love this hatchery. We have always had wonderful luck with their poultry. Their customer service is so good. This is Cackle Hatchery  in Lebanon, MO. I just can't say enough about this family owned business of 75 years. If you need some baby poultry, they are a great place to buy them from.

The hatchery recommended that I spread their food on a paper towel for the first day. They now have a nice chick feeder.

Here are the ducklings. I know they are messy, but they are just so much fun to watch. What characters these already are. LOL They found their food immediately. Much quicker than the chicks, and they eat like little pigs. I have 5 Pekins, 5 Khaki Campbell, and 6 Rouens. They sent an extra Rouen. So I have 16 chicks and 16 ducklings.

They dart over to their food, then run to the water. I stood for a long time just watching them. I was kind of concerned because it got down into the lower 40 last night, but those 250 watt heat lamps did their job. They were all running everywhere waiting for the food this morning. LOL

I'll try to get some better pictures now that they have settled down.  My brooder house is 8X8. I used a large cardboard box opened up to divide the ducklings from the chicks. The ducks eat different feed from the chicks and are so much messier. They need to be separated. Unless we get a duck house built this summer, they will share the hen house this winter, but adults do ok sharing.

I hope you enjoy seeing my new babies. Paula, I know you will be squealing. LOL I wish I could get good pictures like you do, but photography isn't my thing. LOL We also have rabbits now. I will do another post on them, so Blogger doesn't get upset with me for too many pictures. LOL Also want to do a post on my first 'big stitch quilting' project.

Everyone have a great day. Thanks for visiting.