RECENT SEWING

Here's a turtleneck I did for 'Lil Miss Rachel. Her Mommy brought the shirt back with the ones I did for Laura and Rachel with Christmas motifs before Christmas.
The frog has a tutu on. It's from "Playful Pals" one of the Crafter's Collection division by OESD. You can order it online. I bought mine at my Bernina Dealer and Quilt Shop---Nancy's Calico Patch. Where I went this morning to buy more Kona in black for my Blooming Buds quilt. While there I picked up a fat quarter of roses on a yellow background for the said quilt. I had bought fabric for the backing and outer boarder previously. Though I like the fabric a lot I was not overly happy with it for this particular quilt. Today I found just what I had in mind for it. I'll have to add a picture of the fabric I bought later. I've been cutting more squares, cutting them into triangles and sewing them to strips to make more blocks. I need to get cracking on it...Monday night we put the strips together and do the binding.

RULER GIVE AWAY

Please go by and visit Kimberly on her blog "Quilting with Kimberly". She's giving away a neat ruler---EZ Pineapple Log Cabin Ruler. Scroll down to see this ruler. Looks to me it's a must have for making a Pineapple Log Cabin Ruler. I read about it on "Quilt Hollow". Be sure to tell her you read about her give away on "AverettLadyNana" You leave a comment on her blog under her posting HELLOOOOO OUT THERE....to be considered in her drawing.

STASH SHOPPING--STASH BUSTING

DD came over with the three girls. I pulled out some of my stash. That which was the easiest to get my hands on. She went home with an armload of some nice fabric to add to her stash. She left with the instructions...save all of your scraps. Do NOT throw scraps away!!!

She's made a couple necklaces...sew a tube of fabric, Thread on a bead, then insert a marble or something similar that is round, thread on a bead, insert a marble, bead and so on. Sew up the open end. They are really cute. Reminds me of some I made a long while back.

Her shopping for her stash resulted in stashbusting for me....both a good thing!!!

I THINK SHE'S GOT THE BUG...

I think my DD has caught the bug. She got her first sewing machine for Christmas after indicating an interest in sewing. She has three darling little girls. The oldest will be three in February. She wants to sew for them...pillowcase dresses are one thing that peeked her interest. Napkins, pillows are some of the things she wants wants to try her hand at making.

Today she had her first Out of the Box Class to learn about this little beauty of a machine. She came home with five or six fat quarters. She said well they were so cheap and pretty, she figured she could do something with them. The start of her stash!!! I am so excited! I told her she could come shop from my stash.

GIVE AWAY

Go by and visit Roberta. She's giving away an awesome Bow-Tucks Handbag she made for a sample for a class. All you have to do to enter is leave a quilting tip on her blog comments. She's drawing on the 31st. Vera Bradley eat your heart out...

HOW ODD IS THIS??

My brother-in-law and his first wife were divorced and he remarried when my husband and I started dating and got married. He and his first wife had three children together. Over the years she and I would chat about the kids, family happenings, etc. our friendship grew and we refer to each other as my sister-in-law to other people.

What is so funny is we both worked at the same department store in our town back many years ago.

When she and her second husband lived in the same time they would be out eating and my husband and I would show up at the same place, or we'd be out eating and they would show up at the same place. We used to joke and say OK where are we going to eat next week.

We both notify each other when we know of someone who is in need of prayer and offer up prayers for those people.

We both love all aspects of sewing.

We both took Home Economics eighth grade through our senior year.

Our first sewing projects were done on borrowed treadle sewing machines.

We both got our first very own electric sewing machines for Christmas when we were in the eighth grade.

We both had asked for them but our parents felt it was just a whim and we had no idea we would get one. Neither of us those Christmas mornings saw the machine and the last thing after gifts had been opened they appeared. Rather like The Christmas Story and Ralphy finally gets his beloved BB Gun.

We both used those machines until we wore them out. We later got a much better machine that we both still love and use. She got a Janome and I got a Bernina. Then in 2000 we both got new Bernina's which were the top of the line at the time.

Now we are both dreaming about the 830 though we both don't want to put out that much money with the economy the way it is and feel we really don't use our machines to their full capability and wonder if we'd use that one to it's full capability. But we visit it at our dealer's quilt shop and dream of the day...

Scrap Therapy--Charming Buds Quilt

Last night I went down to my local quilt store, Nancy's Calico Patch for a Quilt Therapy Session/Class. We're working on the Scrap Therapy's Charming Buds quilt. A month or more ago I went for a cutting session where we cut our scraps into squares. Here are some of my squares.

Last night we cut these squares in half diagonally and got these:

Next we cut strips and got a stack of these:

We sewed the triangles and the strips getting a bunch of these:

Then with right sides together matching points of the triangles and sewed the unsewn (is that a word?) sides of the strips together and got these:

Next we are to square these units, trimming off the extra.

During the next two weeks we are to make more units, squaring the units. Cut our sashing, sew together the various rows.

In two weeks we meet again and will sew squares to sashing until we get our quilt top. And we are to cut and add the borders with mitering the corners.