Progress on Short Story....

We are now getting Bountiful Baskets almost every week and have loads of fruit and veges to eat. I had a ton of broccoli and cauliflower and so I found a recipe online and made soup. Everyone liked it and we used up lots of veges!

I also had collected a bunch of bananas in the freezer for banana bread...so I made three loafs using my great grandma Myrt's recipe. It turned out really well too. I brought some in to work today and am bringing a loaf to June's for sewing day with her and BJ and Ros tomorrow. I am quite excited for that and so tonight I got a bunch of my strips cut for Bonnie Hunter's Pineapple Blossom and also spent a long time cutting and pinning for Short Story!

I hope to make lots of progress on this at June's and if time to work on some Pineapple Blossom blocks too! I also continued working on organizing my fabric....I am going through my drawers that are organized by color and if the chunk of fabric is big enough I am folding it and putting it on the shelf and if it isn't I cut it into strips. I really like being able to see my fabric and envision a day when I have two and a half inch strips (the size I seem to use the most of) sorted by color or somewhat sorted by color to make it easier to use! Sometimes I just like to sit here and see that I do actually have a little stash!

Sew-In at Becky's House

Here is my cute balloon from June. I brought it up to my quilting studio and it makes me smile everyday!

Last night we had a sew in at Becky's house. Becky and Nancy gave me a suprise present (or three). I am very excited for the sewline pencil as I have tried out Becky's and like it. I had a purple thang but I think the dog got it because it disappeared a month or so ago and I can't seem to find it anywhere (it may be in one of my machines come to think of it...but now I have another if I find it!) There were a half dozen of us and two little ones too. I didn't take too many pictures but these represent some of the fun!

This was Barb's quilt that she needs to applique (bless her heart). In the green shirt is Barb working on something else I think. You can see Kathy's (quilt guild president) PUP next to Barb but I didn't manage to get her in the picture. She is hand quilting that huge quilt with 3D stuff on it!

Below is Becky in the red and Suzy sewing. Suzy is visiting from New Mexico but used to be in our guild (before I moved here though) and the little ones were hers. She made a cool backpack kind of thing and taught Barb to make one too.

Below here is Nancy with one of her black and white blocks. She is making these for an exchange the guild is doing (I hope to get in on next time) and they all turned out really nice. She is the vice president of the guild and has lots of good ideas and energy too! (She was the fire behind the Chinese Auction I blogged about previously, I believe).

I worked on my Short Story Schnibble all night. I sewed almost all of the strips together and ironed them. I made one block just to make sure I had the right idea before I went nuts and sewed them up. I have a lot of trimming to do before they can go into blocks. I am using Fruitcake fabric which is fun.

Birthday, Quilt of Valor and Amy's BOM Blocks

Today I finally got a chance to cut some sashing and such for a Quilt of Valor made out of twelve of Amy's Passions BOM blocks...I didn't have tons of the sashing fabric sooo..

this is how it wound up. I did put the teeny tiny little blocks in the corners just to use them up.
I plan to get a backing made up and send it off to Alycia Quilts for her donation at Colo Spgs again...she will get someone to quilt it up and send it on :)

CJ held the quilt up for me. I will try to take another picture outside because I wasn't tickled with any of them that I took! I do like how all these various blocks went together though.

Last night I got the next three Amy's Passions cut...Kathy helped on some.

Yesterday was my birthday so here is my very own completed Rainbow Goose Chase block for the backyard. Kathy really enjoyed making it for me, it is two feet by two feet and I love it!
I also got a suprise delivery of a dozen roses in different colors. They smell as good as they look.

I went to lunch with June and her friend Mindy and in addition to lunch and the singing people at the restaurant (I had never experienced before) she gave me these goodies! Oh and a balloon I forgot to put in the picture.

Last night I also got the next Schnibble cut and will bring it to Becky's sew in tonight to work on it. I really had a great birthday...from the omlet and coffee Randy made me to get my toes done with my Deaf friend Misty...a suprise second lunch (I didn't eat lunch again) with her and two other Deaf friends and a second suprise singing group at Applebees (I wound up interpreting it for my Deaf friends...beyond embarrassed twice in one day!) but all in all it was a really nice day with my loved ones calling me, texting me, facebooking me, etc. I really felt special. Thanks all! Well I better get ready for the sew in at Becky's. I am bringing my camera and hope to get some fun pictures!

Puddle Jumping Mystery Clue Three Done and Another Win!

Clue three of the Puddle Jumping Mystery took me some time last night and a good bit of today to complete! I kept wandering off and doing other things and I watched way too much Wife Swap and Shark Week stuff while working on it, time well spent!

All marked and sewn and then cut.

It is sideways, but you can see the stack I have that needs trimming!

I used my little mat and a 3.5 inch ruler to easily trim and turn, trim and turn, repeat again and again until my index finger hurts from accidently pressing into the little hole on this ruler over and over!

And all of my half square triangles are trimmed...see that pile of trimmings? I did have to unsew and resew about a dozen of them because they were just a titch too small. I need to learn to sew on or in the line, not on the other side apparently!
I also had to show you this green and red fabric...it is so far my favorite in this civil war quilt. I just can't stop looking at the cute fabric...not sure what it is that makes me smile so but it does!

Then we get to my win! Melinda from melinful.blogspot.com sent me this adorable basket for her post 999! I love it! Many years ago I learned how to weave baskets and have made quite a few (before I was into quilting really) and still have a few. So I do know the work that goes into these beauties. Dawn at basketsbydawn.com made it and it is called a Cabinboy. I have already filled it up with stuff and then changed my mind and filled it up with different stuff. And now I am thinking I should put a portable project and supplies in it and put it in my living room instead of leaving it up here. Decisons, decisions! Thanks Melinda!

I think I am the world's luckiest blogger this week....two wins and I think I have another one coming still :)

A Win, Some Bindings and Scratch :)

Thanks to Messy Karen at messykaren.blogspot.com I won her wavy wiper scrappy bundle! They are so very cool and in lots of cool colors. I almost can't bear to wet one down and try it out, but I will. Thank you Karen--it is indeed a great day!

I had a thought that my towel rack (which has been unused for the past two years on the back of the bathroom toilet room door we never close) could be a great quilt rack. I hung it on the outside of the ac room door which is visible from my quilting studio and I hung a few Schnibbles on it!

Another blogger had a great idea to get her Schnibbles book spiral bound. She said it cost around 6 dollars at Staples. So today I brought my two FAVORITE quilt books in to Staples...their machine jammed so we had to come back to pick them up about forty minutes later--cost FREE! I am doubly thrilled with my spiral binding. :) Both these books are autographed by their authors too (that is partly why they are my favorite!).

Today is my sister Tina and my partner Kathy's birthdays! Kathy and I went out to lunch, stopped and had ice cream and then went to see a movie. We had planned to see "The Kids are Alright" but Kathy looked up the wrong theater (this has happened before, lol) and so we decided to see "Inception" which was really good and made us think a bit. When I got home I cut and put on the borders for Scratch (from Schnibbles Times Tow book above). I discovered I am a tad short on the red fabric for the last border (on the top) so I will order a titch more to finish it and some backing too, but I am happy with how it turned out and have no idea who will wind up with it yet!

Scratch is Coming Along

Scratch is coming along! I made the last four patch row and then trimmed away and sewed all these rows together....and realized I have one more row of the bars to make...have some left from before but will need to keep on sewing to complete the row and sew it on, then on to red borders. Am really enjoying the process on this one...taking my time, ironing well and trimming. It is looking big already and it isn't done. These Rural Jardin fabrics are really romantic looking too!

Leslie Helps with Bargello Seasons!

Leslie sent me all these great workups for my Bargello quilts..isn't she amazing? I think I am going to go with the last one...I was hoping to have sashing between them to that each quilt was taking up a quarter of the quilt...but now that I can see it more visually it looks like this might work just as well. Still have some Math to do to get it just so, but I am a bit closer thanks to Leslie's help!