NYE Mystery 2011 is a Flimsy

Kathy came over today and we working on the NYE Mystery for 2011. I got my top together and am undecided on what to do with the borders for now. Glad to have it done, this is the first year that the flimsy wasn't together the same day as the mystery and I felt bummed about that!

Kathy has all the units you see here done and now just needs to assemble the blocks. I love her colors though she is worried it is too much white.

It has been a month of joining all kinds of stuff in blogland and so I decided to jump in on Angela over at http://superscrappy.blogspot.com/2011/12/rainbow-scrap-challenge-2012_22.html for her Rainbow Scrap Challenge. Luckily her rules are flexible and I don't have to use scraps unless I want to! The color for January is red so I thought I would jump in and pick a block to make in every color of the rainbow as we go. It is always nice to find myself with a "bonus" quilt top at the end of the year! I looked through my Quiltmaker magazines at all of the Bonnie Hunter blocks for one that was good for only two colors (neutrals and the color of thhe month...) and I came up with the same one Amy did! http://skattebo-skattebo.blogspot.com/2012/01/rainbow-scrap-challenge-january-red.html if you want to see her blocks. I have copied Amy successfully before and she doesn't mind so I am doing it again! Here is my first block in red. I didn't follow the directions right the first time (what, me?) and had to redo half the blocks so that I was sewing on the half line instead of cutting on it so that it all fit together (now I have four extra small flying geese to stick in the what do I do with this unit box) and this block is called "Jack in the Box" and I love how it looks!I also put together a few more bow ties and then constructed another block.

DJ and I also got this spray basted and pinned so I can get to quilting it (this is the UFO Challenge for January)!And (s0rry for the blur) this is also spray basted and pinned. This is on the UFO list, so it will be that much closer to done when its number comes up!
I also sewed a few more light blocks on Orca Bay and trimmed them up. It was a nice day and I am happy with getting in lots of sewing time this weekend!

A Christmas Finish...Can I Get a Whoot Whoot?

DJ and I worked on quilting this little guy quilt...hoping once it is washed and the sticky spray stuff comes out it lays a little better but it is for a little one and won't be in pristine condition for long anyway. DJ is just learning how to do all this, lol. I did some more sewing on Orca Bay clue 3 (and did the math to do a half size quilt too...figure that will motivate me to try to catch up half of each clue and as it comes together I may add to it as time allows, but at least that way I don't feel like I am running in place and burning no calories!) This is as far as the next 72 hst's got. So now I have 95--sort of!
And I finally got Hannah's Christmas Tree Skirt binding on! I started it earlier today (I worked at 6 30 AM and was home by 130..wrapped Christmas gifts, put my bad knee on ice and attached the binding til it was time to go back to work.) and finished it up after I was done working for the day--after icing the leg again. Lasted about two hours before I had to put my leg up and ice again. Knee is improving faster than I would ever believe, but too slow for this impatient person anyway!

Back to the skirt, the pattern is on Moda Bake Shop "Fruitcake Under the Tree" and I love how it came out. I hope my daughter does too. She requested a tree skirt last year and umm here it is now!
I hope she didn't buy one in the mean time! I backed it with some muslin I got for free from my knitting teacher's fabric giveaway! I figured no point in putting 15 dollars worth of fabric no one will see on the back. My matching skirt is still a flimsy and I am not taking bets it will be done before next Christmas. Too many irons in the fire (or needles in the machine) to get to stuff for me! I really am pleased as punch with this one! Especially since I quilted it myself and it isn't bad :)

In other news I enjoyed participating in SewCalGal's quilt show...I managed to get the most votes overall (by my count) but somehow I didn't win--I am guessing some of my votes were thrown out or something (some were anon since facebookers came over and commented and many of them don't do blogs, etc. but I can tell you they were voting because they were commenting on my facebook!) but I did win a random prize which I will share when I get it. Mom always told me life isn't fair and so again mom is right, lol. SMILE, the winners' quilts were amazing so I resisted the urge to ask how the counting was done and moved on, but I had to say something! Oh well, I am a work in progress.

Hope your Holiday items are getting sewn and you are ticking things off your list!

The Quilt that Started it all...

Stamped Cross Stitched quilt I made while pregnant with Mac (who is now 19).

Bonnie Hunter at Quiltville challenged us to link up with our first quilt so.. this isn't the first quilt, it is actually quilt number seven which is really the quilt that started it all! I had sewn a few Christmas tree skirts and three quilts before this (scanned pictures from journal) but then didn't sew anything quilty from 1990 or so until 2003 when I got an itch to make this quilt which I had seen in a magazine. I so enjoyed the process that I have constantly been quilting since. I started out with one quilt at a time and now there are always a half a dozen or so in various stages and I am constantly looking for the next fix--ah I mean quilt! This quilt (modeled here with Randy's daughter Rachel) was for Randy's first granddaughter.

Saturday Sewing :)

I finished piecing my Christmas tree skirt...you can see Hannah's too. I ordered some stripy fabric from this collection to do the binding with so hoping to get at least hers bound next weekend.
I worked this morning (after a late night out with DJ, first at Pink Spot and then at Charlies' Bar) and then had no energy to do anything. Eventually I went in and did some sewing. I added a border to this little quilt.

Then I cut it with that wicked Lil' Twister ruler and put it up on my wall. I have one more to add a border to and do. One of these is for a quilt swap I signed up for (what was I thinking!) it really stresses me out because I worry I am not sending the same quality work as I am getting. But time to bite the bullet and just do it! I thought this little quilt would be nice and I most likely will tie it because I don't want to ruin it with my quilting! I may do the other one is either green, brown or the light aqua fabric since I have chunks of each of those. The best one will be heading off (or the one that is done by mail date!).

I quilted another tablerunner for DJ's family. Of course the dogs took turns posing on it. This is Bug.

And this is Zoe.

I finally machine bound Christopher's Quilt of Valor. Not bad from that galloping horse I hope you are on!
Once again this was from Amy's Passions BOM last year. I added a Navy block to it since Christopher is in the Navy and I am really proud to give this one to him and his fiance this Christmas!

I did do some cutting and sewing of Orca Bay units, but didn't get any more assembled. Feels like a tiny drop in a big bucket, but I wanted to get some of that Christmas stuff going. I am SO looking forward to next week...I will be off work for four whole days! I plan to really be getting some stuff done, but of course Bonnie will give us a new clue on Friday so I will be lucky to be caught up on that. I still love it though!

Staycation in Prescott

Sorry ahead of time..I can't get the info to line up with the pictures which drives me nuts, but just giving up on it tonight!

DJ and I needed a weekend getaway that didn't break the budget so we planned going camping. Then last week we were talking about how cold it will be camping this late in the year and about all the stuff we needed to get to sewing for Christmas...my parents had previously mentioned that we could stay at their mostly empty house in Prescott any weekend we wanted, so the next thing you know we were camping and sewing indoors!

We accomplished far more sewing that I would have thought possible and I watched several movies and listened to two audiobooks! But before I get to all of that...check out my huge stack of Secret Santa Swap 2 gifts from Shannon! Two more gifts arrived and it was all I could do not to peak in there!

Have I mentioned I am not good at waiting? And I finally took a picture of my civil war swap strips from the last quiltvilleswap. Some of these fabrics are just GORGEOUS! I can hardly wait to do something with them.




I love the variety I have now.

So back to our sort of Staycation! I started out Friday with DJ cutting and me whipping up several doll baby buntings for Christmas gifts. I decided to break into the Mark Lipinski fabric I had to have a few years ago which has just been hanging out getting no love.

So here is the view I was looking at while sewing. The sun sets over that mountain and it takes your breath away. It is my favorite moment of the day!

We made the binding and got these two Christmas table runners bound.

Of course in and around it all I made more cheddar bow ties!

I sewed a bunch of squares together (two tops) and need to get some borders on them before I take that lil twister ruler to them!

Here is the first of the baby doll buntings.

This is Saturday's breakfast (more like lunch time by the time DJ got up and made it, but I had been sewing for hours by then!)

Of course Bug came along and had a blast.

Five of the six baby doll buntings I made. Four of them are for Randy's granddaughters for Christmas.

This quick and easy quilt is for DJ's nephew for Christmas. Really like how it turned out and since it is strips it went together so quickly!

Blurry for some reason, but this is Hannah's tree skirt. I quilted it and trimmed it.

It just needs me to cut the center out and get the binding made and attached. I also made myself one but forgot to bring the setting triangle red fabric for all of it, so it is mostly pieced together.

Here is the second one that I will use the Lil Twister on.

So today I decide to have my own little parade of stuff! DJ was still sleeping and I artfully arranged everything on the pool table (that doesn't fit at Mom and Dad's new house).

There are two of these Peter Cottontail tops. One is quilted and bound, the other one awaits.

See here it is.

DJ did do a teeny bit of sewing today. She is still trying to master curves while quilting..she isn't particularly liking it!

Finally a Day of Sewing at Ros' Place!

After work this morning DJ and I toodled on north to Ros' place and sewed away for a few hours before heading to my folks' place for dinner. Ros let me borrow her Pfaff (and I mean she let me take it home with me, Lord bless her!) so I can actually sew again. My machine hasn't even been looked at at the shop...so I am not too happy about that but now that I have a machine to use for a bit I can breathe anyway! So I took a few pictures (but after Alyssa left so I didn't get any of her doing her needlework) so here is BJ. She did a good deed today and sewed up a bedcovering for a friend in need. It turned out really nicely and I didn't snap a picture! You cna see a bit of it near her machine though. Ros was working on a binding here.

DJ was working on cutting and laying out the Crown quilt...it is one heck of an undertaking and my sister is going to be overjoyed to get it.

Ros did some show and tell. I LOVE this quilt, the pattern and the colors so Ros shared her pattern. I hope to find time to make it one of these days. I forget the name of it but something about 5 yards of fabric..

This is Olivia piggy. It was really cute too!

Ah here is a not all sewn, but at least set up block for the Crown quilt. It took all four of us, in the end, to figure out how all this went. I have a pattern but am adding the Crown stuff to it so it is hard to match the colors and make any kind of sense of it. The gal online who made one of these...her picture came in handy (and I am ever more inspired that she managed to put a big one of these together without a picture!). Anyway this picture is to help us get the layout right from here on out!

What did I work on you may be asking yourself...well I finally got around to sewing my brother's surgical cap in PACKER fabric (GO PACK GO!) and DJ modeled it for me. It wasn't as hard as I expected it to be so I may have to make a few more!

For a good bit of the time I was at Ros' I worked on Hannah's Christmas tree skirt from Moda Bake Shop. It is called "Fruitcake Under the Tree" and since I have some issue with following directions I mixed up the colors more than the pattern called for (was supposed to be hourclass type blocks with a light and a dark) This way look scrappier and I like it, but I like their version too. This is as far as it had come together when I had to leave Ros' place. We headed up to New River and had dinner with my mom and (step) dad. He cooked steak on the grill and we watched a movie, gabbed and I knitted. It was really nice! Then we came home and...

happily sewed the rest of this skirt together! I hope Hannah likes it...now to get it quilted, smile.

Tomorrow Christine (co-worker and friend) is coming over again and we are working on CEU's for our national certification. I have a few more to get and will be done with them for this cycle tomorrow! It is a Math workshop because Christine and I are thinking about putting together and presenting a Math sign workshop in our area. It is desperately needed...Math isn't my strong suit, but signing is so we are doing our research and getting ready. Sometimes I think my plate is overheaping not just onto the table, but onto the floor. SMILE!