Here's the mug rug I finished

This has been a very busy week but not alot of sewing.

 We had a great baby shower on Sunday for my new grandbaby. Baby Carmen will definitely be styling when she gets here.  She has more clothes than either of her parents put together.   I just love baby clothes and she got some very pretty things.  She also got lots of practical stuff too like diapers, healthcare stuff, baby bath stuff, you name it, and she got it.  We came home Sunday night and had to find a place to put everything.  She has her own dresser and closet and they are still putting stuff away.  They are still organizing but they'll be ready by the time she gets here, I hope...

I gave my DIL the quilt I made and she really liked it.  Her Grandmother made me laugh and I just have to share this because this is how I used to feel too.  We went to dinner with her parents and grandmother on Saturday night before the shower on Sunday.  I had never met her grandmother before this.  We had a great dinner and a wonderful time visiting with each other and getting to know each other.  Sunday, I went to the baby shower and it was so comfortable to be around this family.  It was like getting together with regular family...Anyway, her Grandmother and I hit it off and we were kidding each other back and forth.  When Brittney pulled out the quilt, her Grandmother said it was beautiful and what a lovely gift. It would be a real heirloom someday.  This is all the things you want to hear, right??? Anyway, I told her I didn't make it to be an heirloom, I wanted her to really use it and love it.  She just looked at me when I said that.  I didn't know what that look meant until later.

She came to me at the end of the shower and said she wanted to tell me something and hoped it didn't offend me. She said when Brittney first told her I could knit, crochet, quilt and do all that fabric stuff...she was very intimidated by me.  But when she met me, all of the intimidation fell away and she found out I was just another person.  She said later that she wants to get back together when she comes back into town for the baby.  She was so sweet and we hit it off big time.  Isn't it nice to meet and become friends with new people?  I just thought she was wonderful and was amazed that she was so open with me.  It reminded me of when I first started quilting.  I was so intimidated by all the women I was around that could make so many beautiful things. I don't do my crafts to intimidate anyone, I do them because I have to.  It's my way of expressing my feelings.  I'm compelled to make these quilt or knitted objects or my tatting.  I love doing these things and they are what makes me be me...Anyway, I just wanted to share this with all my fellow quilters cuz I thought it was so sweet. 


I finished a rug mug to match the quilt...

Tonight, I have nothing to do so maybe I'll get some sewing time in...til next time, happy sewing.

Oh, my stars! My flag is finally finished!

Ok, I wanted to show you the stars and here they are before and after they were baked.... See how many I made.  I know this is alot more than you really wanted to know about, right, but I wanted to show you how many I made.  There are two sizes here.  Almost no difference in the size but if you look closely you can tell they are a different size.  I think I made about 125 stars.

After baking.   Here's what I have left.  I wanted you to notice the different colors of the stars.  Some of them look light brown, beige, dark brown and even bronze.  These were the stars on the bottom rack that were too close to the heating element.  I really like the colors but won't be using them on this project.

Not bad colors for mistakes, huh?

Out of all of these stars , I only uses a few. I tried to do 50 stars but I just couldn't get them on the blue space. I tried both sizes and finally just gave up. So, I used 13 of the stars and this is my finished flag.  I hope you like it.  This will stay like this until after the State Fair and then I will put it in a frame with some Pledge of Allegience fabric, but I'll show you that another time....This looks small but it is about 14" long and about 8" wide.

Here's my flag:

Getting ready for baby

You are probaby aware that we are expecting a new baby in the family.  Hopefully, she'll stay put until she's due the last part of April.  I have too many things to do before she gets here.  I have a quilt retreat to go to in mid April and I really want to go, so, she better be a good little girl and stay put!  Priorities, right?!

I worked on a fabric bag last night (the kind to hold diapers, it's not a diaper stacker, but I might make one of those too)  and a mug rug.  I didn't finish those yet and  I'll show those later.  Today, I pulled out the bassinet and cleaned it up.  I made a sheet for it and a pillowcase for the baby pillow.  Two things off the list!  I want to make more sheets for this and some sheets for the baby bed too.  I'm going to make some receiving blankets to match too.  You can't tell by the picture but the sheet and pillowcase are light purple.  Wow, that pillow looks big!  It's a baby pillow but you sure can't tell it from the picture.

My star buttons and Printed Treasures

Last night I baked my polymer clay buttons.  I borrowed a toaster oven from a friend of mine. She uses this only for her craft projects.  Anyway, I learned alot with this first attempt.  I had enough buttons to go on two trays which is what this oven came with.  I lined the trays with parchment paper and put the buttons into the oven.  I cooked them at 275 degrees just like the directions said.  The top tray came out perfect.  The bottom tray was a little different.  I like what happened but it was an accident and probably can't be repeated.  The bottom tray was closer to the heating element and some, not all, of the stars came out, shall we say, darker than the others.  They kind of look like they were bronzed.   I actually like them but only a few of these turned out this way.  If these were cookies, I would definitely just toss them in the trash. They looked  crispy, I guess that's the word I'm looking for.  Anyway, I have enough stars to put on my flag and now I'm not sure I want to do that.  They fit but I really don't like them.  I'll take some pics and show you this afternoon. 

I tried to print on the Printed Treasures paper fabric and it would not go through my printer. I tried several times and it just wouldn't work.  So, I was so disgusted  about the buttons and the paper, I just turned everything off and went to bed to sulk...


Today, I will go home and look at everything again.  Maybe it was just my attitude last night when I took the crispy ones out and looked at them.  I'll decide what to do and show you.

Shopping at Joann's

Last night, I was waiting on my son to get off from work and I had about an hour to kill so what better way to do it than go shopping?  I ended up at Joann Fabrics and bought a new ruler and a package of heat transfer paper, PrintedTreasures...Both of these were on sale, so I don't feel too guilty.  I  wanted some of the transfer paper so I could make my Civil War Block with Lincoln in the middle.  I have never used this stuff and I'm hoping it's easy to use.  I wanted the new ruler because one of my friends said she loves this 4" X 8" Omnigrid Ruler and uses it all the time.  I  usually go with what she says as we do alot of things the same way...So, I bought it and I'm going to see why she likes it so much....

I'm going to try out the transfer papers tonight after I go to Weight Watchers.  Any words of wisdom, suggestions or things I should watch out for on this stuff?  Til next time....Linda

Talking about buttons...

I don't know what it is lately but everywhere I look I see buttons.  Unfortunately, I could not find the ones I needed for my flag so....I made them myself.  I have cleaned up my flag by hiding all the threads and looked at different ways to do the stars and finally decided on buttons.  I have gone everywhere in town and on the internet and couldn't find the simple stars that I wanted.  Tuesday nights are usually tatting night and I did go to tatting but with the help of my friend, Marie, we made buttons from polymer clay.  These were fun to make too.  I might be hooked on something else!  We made over 120 buttons but they need to be baked.  I have them at home to bake them and I'm going to borrow an oven from another friend.  She uses this for nothing but polymer clay. As soon as I finish them, I'll show them to you.  They are nothing special but they are exactly the size and shape of the stars that I wanted so they are special to me.  I did not take pictures yet but I will to show you how many we made. 

This was my first time to do anything with polymer clay but it was fun.  I just might have to do some more of this stuff.  After I bake these, I'll decide if I want to make anything else.  It was easy and fun to do but I'm kind of nervous about the fumes.  I've looked at various sites on the internet and they say to not use any of the pans or kitchen utensils for anything else.  Wish me luck!

Button, button, whose got the button? Barb does, that's who.

Ok, I'm a little late in getting this posted.  So sorry, I've been distracted lately with the new baby to get ready for....

Barb, over at Bejeweled quilts has some of the sweetest birdie buttons to give away.  Ten lucky people will be the winners of these but you have to hurry as today is the last day to enter.  Click here and it will take you to her blog to enter.  But please, go over to the website that gave these to her and visit them too.  This is to help empower other women, so, please take a moment and check them out.

Purple baby quilt for Carmen

Here's Carmen's quilt, quilted and bound and with a label too!  It took me longer to quilt it than I had planned...I had to fight with my machine.  I finally took it off the frame and quilted it with my Pfaff at the kitchen table.  I just can't seem to get the hang of the Brother machine.  I'm going to sit down with it and have a nice long chat with it.  I piddled around with it for about 3 hours and quilted a little bit that I had to take out... Now, I can make a diaper storage and I'm even going to make a mug rug for her. I'm not going to call it a mug rug though...I'm going to call it a bottle rug!  I had two flowers left over from the border and these will be just the thing to hold her bottles or for her Mama's tea cup or whatever!  Anyway, I'll be working on those this week.  The shower is this next Sunday so I'll be ready.  I love not having to rush.  I want to make some receiving blankets with a little bit of crochet around them before she makes her appearance. I want to make some sheets for her crib and the bumper pad too. I have another month before she's supposed to be here so I'm sure I'll get it done.  For now, here's her quilt:

National Quilting Day

Hey everybody, Happy National Quilting Day!

Fab Shop Hop website has a free quilt pattern to celebrate the event.  Here's a link to the pattern.
I'm sure there are alot more freebies out there to celebrate, I just don't have the time to look right now. I gotta get out from in front of this computer and go get in front of my sewing machine and finish that baby quilt.  Have a fun day and go sew!

Friday night sewing with Heidi and Bobby

This week has been busy with my quilt meetings. I had two different meetings this week so I did not get to sew those nights.  I haven't done any sewing this week except for last night.  I went up to the church and sewed with some of my friends and worked on the purple baby quilt.  I decided to do the border a little differently than the picture of the pink quilt.  I'm not doing the leaves all going in one direction.  I'm doing them going up both sides and out both sides at the top and bottom with 3 flowers at the top and bottom....Since I didn't have a pattern and had to figure out sizes of leaves and filler, this is how I decided was the best way to do it.  (I had help from my Friday night friends and help from Freda over at http://imperamagna.blogspot.com/. Freda gave me some help with the size of the leaves.  I played around with several different size leaves  and finally decided which size to use and it was the size Freda had originally given me....I'll be finishing this up today and I plan to start quilting on it today  too...Here's a picture of what it looks like right now and I'll take a picture and show you what it looks like later today.

One thing I did get accomplished this week was to finish tatting my flag.  I have not hidden all the threads on it and I haven't blocked it but here it is all tatted up.

I'll hide the threads that need to be hidden, block it and decide how to put stars on it and the next time you see it, it will look a lot different.  I'm still trying to decide if I should use button stars or what.  I want to play around with some polymer clay and see what comes of that.  I haven't been able to find star buttons the size or color that I want. The pattern just says to tat rings and use those but I didn't like those, so now I'm trying to decide what to do about this.  I worked on this off and on since last July. It's just ring and chains but each row took about 13 hours to do. 

Weekend sewing and the Dallas Quilt Show

I didn't do alot of sewing this weekend as I had other quilty things to do. I did work on my border for the purple baby quilt.  I had made the flower blocks last week  except for the white on the edges.  I had run out of white fabric and had to get some more before I could continue.  I put the white on white on the flowers and they now look like flowers.  I made some leaf blocks too  but I'm not going to use them...I made them 3 1/4" squares with 1 1/2" squares on the corners and these are way too big for my taste. So, I'm going to try 2 1/2" squares tonight and see if I like them better.  I don't want my leaves to over-power my flowers....Now, I have a few leaves to put into some other project and believe me, they won't go to waste. 

I tatted on my flag last night too.  I finished the last row of white and now I'm on the last rows of red.  Only two rows of this red and I'll be completedly finished.  I have been trying to decide how I'm going to do the stars and I've about decided on buttons.  This will be mine and I was thinking I would do them in thread but the more I've thought  about it the more I'm leaning toward the buttons.  I've looked online and at various shops for star buttons and haven't found anything I'm interested in, so I guess I'll make them. Some of the girls at tatting do polymer clay and suggested this to me sometime back...so, I'm thinking that's what I'll be doing.  I've never done this but there's always a first!  I'll be showing you my flag soon, I promise.

The reason I didn't do alot of sewing this weekend was the Dallas Quilt Show.  I went Saturday with two of my friends and we oogled and oggled at all the beautiful quilts.  In my opinion, this was the best show I've been to in many years.  The quilts were all great and it wasn't the same thing, over and over....Everyone is getting so good!!!  There was lots of eye candy to look at and I had a hard time deciding on which one I liked best.  I had several favorites.   Yes, I have pictures and I'll upload those later tonight when I get home.  So for now, this post has no pics but come back later and you'll see lots!  Have a great day and go get some sewing time in!

Knitting night

This week has been crazy.  I've had something to do each night and haven't sewed all week.  Tonight was knitting and it was a fun night.  One of my friends brought this cute little bag and showed it tonight.  No, I didn't make this but I just have to share it with you....so cute.  I want to make it and if I can get the pattern from my friend, I will make it.

Sewing on Sunday

This afternoon, I got to sew a little bit more.  I finished up three more turtles for community service....As it turns out, these are bigger than I first thought. I was just guestimating the size when I told you last. I measured these this afternoon and they are 28" long and 20" wide.

I put together last week's Civil War Block

and I put three more blocks together for one of my UFO's...

This is my purple quilt with some of the almost flower blocks around it.  I say almost because I ran out of white fabric and will have to buy some before I can finish these blocks.  I'll also be putting the leaves around it too.... this is on my design wall right now waiting for the white fabric to put the finishing touches onto the flower blocks.   

Another little quilt on the design wall is my Disappearing 9 patch.  I put this one together Friday night. I've decided it needs another row before a border so I have to make 4 more blocks.  I'll be doing those this week and finish this one up too.

  Anyway, that's all for now, more to come later.  Have a great week and happy sewing! 

Sewing for the week, Friday night sewing and Saturday sewing

This week has just flown by.  I have been so busy and haven't had the time to post a thing.  I have sewn a little bit this week. I haven't finished anything this week except for a few blocks. Block by block, piece by piece, a little at a time, creates a finished project, or at least that's what I tell myself...So, I don't feel too badly when I don't finish something.

 Last night I went to sit and sew with some friends at the church.  I decided I would cut things out before I went and I got nearly everything sewn together that I took.  I felt so good and was so glad I got so much done.  I sewed my D9P together and decided to make a few more blocks to make it bigger.  I sewed three other blocks together for one of my UFO's, I think it's UFO 2 on my list and I sewed all the flower blocks for my border on the purple baby quilt.  Now, I need to make the leaves and vines sections and I'll be able to put the border together.  Sorry, I didn't take any pictures of these but I will and I'll post them later...

  Today, I went and sewed with my sewing guild friends.  We were sewing on our community projects for the year.  I made a turtle. Yes, you heard me right.  A turtle.  It is so cute...I have three more to sew together. My group is one of many of the ASG (American Sewing Guild) and the community service project nationwide is to make turtle pillows for Paul Newman's Hole in the Wall Camp.  We got together today and worked on those...Here's a picture of my cute turtle all done and ready for stuffing. We don't have to stuff these ourselves, we make them and send them to our headquarters.  They are gathering them up and a sewing guild in California will stuff these and sew them shut and deliver them to the camp.  These are alot of fun to make...I have two more to sew up.



I haven't measured these but I'm guessing these are about twenty inches long by about fourteen inches wide.  They are pretty big and will take quite a bit of stuffing.  I hope the kids like them...