Cutting out and getting ready to sew, sew,sew....

Well, I'm sorry to say, I have nothing to show you.  I have been very busy getting ready to sew but I have done very little sewing.  I did make one block for a raffle and I made  a walker bag to show my group what they looked like. I have done some repairs on clothes too but that's all the "sewing" I've done.  However, with that said, I have cut out like crazy.  I cut out scraps and exchanged them for a Wheel of Fortune quilt. I cut out and got 46 kits ready for my group to sew walker bags for our local nursing home.  Now, I am ready to sew this week and get some things finished. I have four quilts ready to have the binding sewn down. I have 2 quilts ready for their borders and I have three small quilts pinned and ready for machine quilting. So yes, I have been busy. 
  I have been busy with the new grandbaby too while doing all of this and I'm having fun with her. 

My oldest granddaughter graduated from Kindergarten on Friday and they were so cute.  Kids grow up so fast so you have to grab all the good times while you can.  Anyway, hopefully, I'll have alot to show the next week. Have fun, have a good week sewing and Go Mavs!!!!!

Weekend Sewing and Cupcakes for dessert and a quilt too!

Ok, I know on my last post I said I would sew and show you what I did. Well, that didn't happen but I guess you can tell that....Anyway, life is still not  back to normal or whatever normal is...but it's getting there. 

I haven't been sewing hardly at all. I just can't seem to get motivated right now.  I have been looking at all my projects and reading books and magazines but when I have the time, I don't have the want to.  When I don't have the time, I just keep thinking of all the things I want to be sewing on.  This holiday weekend is a long weekend for me so maybe I can get a few things done. 

I was able to sew a little on Saturday. I  got a little hand sewing done and some tatting too.  After that,  I got some stuff ready for a sew day on Sunday with my friends.

For the Sunday sewing, we made cupcake blocks and we will be swapping them later...it was so much fun to get together and sew with friends. Of course, we had to have food and cupcakes for dessert.  I had a good time being with my buddies and actually got some sewing done too... We all met over at Martha's and we spent the afternoon making our cupcake blocks, playing with her dogs and eating cupcakes.

We had real food too.

Yum, those cupcakes are good!

Dee's first cupcake block...

This is so much fun!

Another one finished!

Aren't these cute?  Judy gave us all ceramic cupcake boxes with a piece of chocolate inside!

Here we are with one of our cupcake blocks.  We had alot of fun working on these together.  It's so much fun to see how everyone's was so different.  The instructions were to have a pink background with a cupcake on the diagonal. We all drew up our own pattern and we'll exchange later next month.  Some will embellish and some won't. It's left up to the individual but they were all cute!  There are 4 other ladies in the swap that couldn't make it. We will have 12 blocks each and we can put it together any way we want. We will be getting together to swap and sew the quilt up next month.  More fun times with friends to come for the summer months. We planned 3 other swaps too so please stay tuned!  Til next time, happy sewing.

National Day of Prayer

Today is the National Day of Prayer.  Please remember to  pray for our servicemen and women, our country and leaders in our country too along with all your personal prayers.

I am thankful for so many things today. I have a new grandbaby that is healthy. A Mother-In-Law that came through major surgery and is doing well. She went home yesterday to her house and is doing great.  I have a wonderful family and three other beautiful grandchildren and I'm healthy too.  Life is good and I feel truly blessed.

Here's a picture of my newest grandbaby. This is Carmen and she was born on April 26th. She is a beautiful sweet baby.

The only thing I need is more sewing time!!!  I have not had any time the last couple of weeks to sew but I'll be playing catch up starting tonight!  I hope everyone has a wonderful week and weekend and I'll be updating soon.  Hugs,

Family Time

Hey guys, sorry for the delay in posting. I have been busy with family and still more coming...

I have not been sewing this past week as I've been at the hospital with my MIL. She had to have surgery for a mass.  I'm really happy to say that it was not cancer and we are so relieved.  She is recooperating at my house and I'm watching over her.  She is doing very well but is very weak.  She's in her 80's but you wouldn't know it.  She gets stronger every day.  We did not have the grandkids over for Easter because we needed some rest time.  They went over to the other grandparents house to look for Mr. Easter Bunny and I sure missed them. 
Tomorrow is the due date for my new grandbaby.  The proud parents go back to the doctor tomorrow to see just how far along the little mother is.  If there's no changes, the doctor is talking about inducing.  Anyway, I will have my hands full this week as my MIL and the new baby and parents will be staying with me too. So, as soon as I know about the baby, I'll post it.  You will either hear from me or I'll show new pictures.  Anyway, I must dash for now.  Have a great week and do some sewing for me.  Hugs, Linda

What a great weekend! Sunshine, family time, sewing and tatting too.

I got to sew, get out in the sun (too much- I have a terrible sun burn!), be with the grandkids, be with family and get some quilting done too! 

This weekend was really busy but it was fun too.  I spent some of Saturday at the baseball field watching my grandson play baseball.  This is his first year to play regular ball. He played T-ball last year but I don't know if you should count that.  He mostly played with his friends and played on the ground.  This year, he's playing coach pitch baseball.  He's a little more focused this year and  these kids are so cute to watch. His team won on Saturday but that really doesn't matter.  What matters is that they are having so much fun and learning to play as a team.  The coaches are so good with these kids.  I had such a good time watching them and being with the family. It was noon time and I didn't pay attention to how burnt I was getting.  I had a hat on and I'm glad of that, otherwise my face would have gotten burnt too.  My arms are slightly pink but my neck and chest are so red, I look like a tomato.  I had a V neck T-shirt on and it looks like I still have it on.  It's time for the sun block!  I'll be more prepared next time!  Other than being burnt, I had a great time.

I left there and went over to my friends house for some quilting time. She called me early Saturday morning and said her machine was empty and asked if I wanted to come use it and visit with her.  She needed to sew but I could use her Gammill while she sewed. I said you betcha!  I went upstairs right then and started pulling out some small quilt tops and started putting the backing and battings  together.  I pulled out a community service top and one of my UFO's. I had hand quilted my UFO except for the border.  I decided I would take this over and see what Jackie and I could do with the border.  She didn't get alot of sewing time in but I got the little top quilted and we put my full quilt on the frame and I quilted the border on it.  I learned alot about her machine and she said she learned some things too.  It was so much fun to visit with her and get some quilting time in too. I finished both of those and they are ready for binding.  I'll show you those later when they are bound.  I didn't get to bind them yet, but I'll work on those this week.  I went home and went out to dinner with the family.

Sunday afternoon, I worked out in the garden and I planted two Knock Out Rose bushes that my MIL brought me.   She said one of them was Double Knock out roses...I'm not sure exactly what that means but they are pretty rose bushes. The Knock Out Rose bush is a new rose brought out by Texas A & M and is supposed to be very healthy and like the Texas soil.   We'll see how good it does at my house.  My roses are doing great this year and I have one bush that has bloomed out and another that is covered with buds and should be blooming any day now.  I'll show you pics as soon as it blooms.   After Mom left, I was able to go to my sewing room and do a little sewing. I pulled out some purple scraps and some blue scraps and made another purple quilt top and added to the Disappearing Nine Patch quilt top too.  Here's a pic of both.

Ok, this is now big enough for a baby quilt. I can add a border and it will be ready for quilting....

Yay!  It's purple month over at Angela's -So Scrappy Blog.  I have a little bit of purple and can make a few things. Here's the first one...

These scraps are from the purple baby quilt I made.  I'm making this one to give away as a community service quilt.  I just need to add a border and it will be ready for quilting.

And, last night, I got a little bit of tatting done too.  This will eventually look like a hexagon or maybe and octogon, I don't know which....I'm using up little bits of thread still left on my shuttles and am enjoying doing these little flowers.  It's called a Grandmother's Flower Garden and I saw this over at Martha's Ess's blog.  This just spoke to me when I saw it.  As a quilter and a tatter, I knew I wanted to make this.  My first thought was to swap little flowers with each other but you can't do that as you build this as you go and have to attach them.  You can swap thread and it takes just about 40inches so I might bring this up at my next tatting meeting.  Anyway, I'm enjoying this while I watch TV....

Three more blocks and my crowded design wall

Ok, here's the three little blocks I did this weekend.  They will be added to the 30's Sampler quilt I'm working on.  This one is a UFO I'm trying to finish and it is up on my design wall waiting to be put together.  I'm working on the little blocks that go around the big blocks to finish this up.  I'm afraid I'll be working on this for a few more weeks.  I still have about 18-20 more small blocks to finish.  I plan on taking this to retreat to work on. Maybe I can knock alot of this out before that and put it all together then.   I want to work on other stuff at retreat too so I'm going to try really hard to get more done.  I take way too much stuff to retreat but I would rather take too much than not enough...

anyway, here's my blocks and my design wall:

Wait until morning to see what you are tatting!

I've waited to show these because I didn't really want to show my goof ups but for all the new tatters out there, I think we should show them; so, here's one of my  mistakes.

I tatted Friday night after I got home from sewing. Afterall, it was International Tatting Day, right?! Anyway, it was late and I should have stopped but I wanted to finish this little motif and I ran out of thread. I searched and searched and thought I found it. I should have just stopped and waited until daylight but no....I actually was completely out of thread but used this thinking it was the same until I got it in the daylight. Boy, what a difference! But, it's done and I don't have anymore of the real thread anyway so it's staying just like it is. It was for fun anyway so it really doesn't matter. I made both motifs using two different methods. The one in bright colors was done with regular split rings and two shuttles. The one with the mistake on it was how the pattern actually said to do it. I made it with one shuttle and with the single shuttle split ring method. I learned this last year but didn't do anything with it and you know what they say...If you don't use it, you lose it.  Boy, I don't know who this quote was from but they are definitely right.  I had to go on Youtube and see if I could relearn the SSSR.  I found several versions out on Youtube and watched them until I could do it.  I remember now how to do it and I'm going to keep doing other little things with this technique so I don't forget it.  I'm also going to find some little motifs with other things I want to remember and practice those too like the self closing mock ring...

Here's the little motifs I did.  I've done these before several months ago and I just love this pattern. I pulled it out again in honor of the recent Mardi Gras holiday and tatting day...This pattern was done by Patty D from Intatters and is called Mardi Gras:  Click here for the pattern.