This and That . . .

The holiday season is off to a grand start as B-guy and I took a trip to Kansas to see my family for Thanksgiving.  The weather, food, company was perfect.  Half of my siblings and their families weren't there and we still had 38 people who were all family members.  It was so much FUN!!

The day after Thanksgiving was my brother's birthday and in his honor we ran approximately 4 miles.  Unfortunately he couldn't make the run.  Oh, well . . . next time.

This was taken after we finished our 4 miles.  It was really cold that morning and the Kansas wind just about blew us away, but we prevailed and celebrated with a big Italian lunch!!  Birthday Bro was able to make the lunch . . . hmm . . .

I'm meeting Donna for lunch today.  We're exchanging our Santa Sack gifts.  I still have one more to give, but I haven't finished it yet, so I'm sure we'll do lunch again next week.  Hee hee!!  I'm on vacation this week so hopefully I'll get my butt in gear and finish it.

The fabric rosettes look nice on this packaging.  I know, I need to work on my Christmas decorating skills.  Maybe next year . . .

 I've been working on reducing my scrap pile.  These are made just from the scraps that have not been cut up or put up and are rather small pieces. 

Even after making these blocks, I'm looking at the scrap basket and I swear it hasn't gone down at all!!  What's up with that??!!  Looks like I'll be making more blocks when I get back from lunch!!

And last, but not least, here is the latest book I read on the trip back from Kansas.

Lots of inspiration in these pages.  I'm not big on following other people's how-to instructions.  I'm more of a let me see the pretty pictures and then I'll let it brew in my head for awhile and then try to rework it into something more like me.  I do love me some inspiration, though.



Good Things Come in Small Packages!

My purchases from Creative Thursday arrived today.  Yay!  I say any day is a good day when fabric arrives in the mail.  This is Marisa's first fabric line and I am loving it.  Good quality fabric with adorable prints.  I'm looking forward to making something super cute out of these prints.

I also ordered some postcards.  I'm looking forward to sending some Creative Thursday love out into the universe!

 Marisa is the artist who created the Memory game I purchased earlier this year.  These little prints just make me happy.  I had to order the postcards as I'm getting ready to send the Memory Game off to a special little someone!  bye bye little guys!

I also received a few more items last Friday, but I can't show them until we have the big reveal from the Santa Sack Swap!!  Stay tuned . . . they're adorable!

And to continue the awesome week I'm having so far, tomorrow is lunch with Donna and I'm pretty sure that there'll be plenty of laughing involved!  I hope your week is also off to a GREAT start!

Enjoy!

The Idea Comes to Fruition

This idea has been brewing in my head for awhile now and today I found time to execute a rough draft.  I'm pleased with the results.

In an effort to try and use up a lot of my stash, I've been trying to come up with ideas that would use large chunks of fabric with not a lot of difficulty involved.  Just sew and go.  I have been making aprons recently and I thought "what about a quilted apron"?  So, today I sat down and tried it out.  I grabbed the first two pieces of fabric scraps that were already on the table and this is what I came up with.

This was already loaded on the longarm, so I resorted to the Bernina  . . .

and did some free motion quilting.

And this is how it turned out.  For a first try, I'm loving it.



Airing of the Quilts

I forgot to mention that last weekend Donna (from Donna's Lavender Nest), her husband, B-guy and I all took a trip to Smithville, TX to see the airing of the quilts.  We walked, we talked, we laughed, we ate.  It was a very FUN trip!  Thanks, Donna!!

This was small town USA and it was adorable!  It was amazing to see the real estate for sale on the main streets of downtown and how cheap they are in comparison to Houston's prices.  If there was a way to make a living there, I'd be tempted . . . We found out the only quilt store in town closed its doors seven years ago.  Hmm . . . I wonder if they're ready for another one . . .

Enjoy your weekend everyone!!

A Good Day!

Who knew waking up on Friday would be the beginning of a wonderful day?  Today was the quilt donation drop off at Texas Children's Hospital in Houston.  B-guy and I met up with my nephew, Dan, who works at TCH.  On our entry into the hospital we ran into my niece (Dan's wife - who also works at the hospital).  We took a quick tour as Dan was on a time crunch and then it was off to drop the quilts off at Volunteer Services.  After dropping off the quilts, we ran into one of my bootcamp buddies in the stairwell and had some more laughs at how "normal" we looked when we aren't all dolled up in our workout clothes with sweat dripping down our faces.

 13 quilts

 15 pillowcases

 Ready to deliver!

 Aren't these stuffed animals cute?  Yes, they were given to the hospital also.

And here we are delivering to Henry, the giraffe!!

I don't ever want to wish anyone a stay at the hospital, but if you need to be there, it is the most warm, loving and inviting place.  It's totally geared toward the children feeling at ease and as normal as possible.  I'm pretty sure my quilts have found a loving home! It was a very good day indeed!!



Yogi Master

So, I've been making quilts for a few years now and I've given most of them away.  Last week B-guy and I decided to finally try one out and we gave this one a spin. 

Turns out the quilt is really warm and nice and soft - perfect for cuddling on the couch.  So, I hope the other recipients of my quilts are as pleased with theirs as I am with mine.

It's almost time for the Thanksgiving holiday and my annual trek to Kansas to see the family.  Yay!  I decided I better get my butt in gear and finish the latest yoga bag for my SIL.  Cross your fingers that this one is (as Goldilocks would say) "just right"!!  And if it's not, well, you know, I'm not running out of fabric anytime soon and I'm getting pretty good at whipping these puppies out!!

 Salad plates make perfect circle templates for bag ends.

All right, here's hoping this one's a winner! 

More Scrappiness

Last week I found this website and I cannot believe all of the fabulous tutorials she has posted.  For some reason I was looking at my basket of scraps (which is totally out of control right now) and I remembered seeing fabric flowers somewhere so I went in search of a tutorial.  That's when I happened upon the Tip Junkie site.  So, I promptly sat down in front of the TV and made me a few.  I think my original idea was to make a wreath out of them, but we'll see where they end up.  Any ideas???

Last week I also finished quilting a scrap quilt.  Here are some pictures of it in progress.

And last, but certainly not least, Donna and I had our Christmas exchange lunch and here is what I gave her.  Unfortunately I haven't taken any pictures of her perfectly wrapped and adorable gifts yet.

Seeing Dots

This has been a busy week . . . I'm on vacation . . . Yay!  On Sunday I did my 3rd triathlon and I'm pleased to say that I finished 9 out of 18 in my age group.  If I was just one year older I would have taken the 3rd place medal . . . drat!!  Why couldn't I be OLDER??!!  What??  That's insanity!!  Next year, I'm looking to podium!!  Hee hee!!

On Monday I had high hopes of making it to bootcamp at 5:15 a.m., but that didn't happen.  Neither did the 6:30 p.m. Monday bootcamp.  But, I was out there bright and early Tuesday morning for an hour of brutality, er, I mean high intensity exercise.  I was back at it again this morning and I have one more session tomorrow morning.   My body is totally beat up, but I need it so I'm determined to get out there and do the best that I can.  I'm trying to talk myself into a little run when I get through with this post.  I'm thinking maybe I should write a really, really long post and then it'll be too late to run!! 

But, unfortunately I have nothing to say, so I'll just share a couple pictures of the projects I've been working on during my week long hiatus from work.

This week my niece turned 13.  Coincidentally, "Happy Birthday" is 13 letters long and I sent her 13 presents for her birthday.  I got to use some of my handmade tape to wrap the packages.

 D9P

Backside of the D9P

Okay, the color is totally wong in this picture; I'm not sure what happened with the camera (operator!!).  The fabrics are all shades of purple (mostly dots) and the circles were made with the longarm.  The fabric is light purple dots in that area.   This quilt is being added to my stash of giveaway quilts for the kids at the hospital.

This is the backside of the quilt.  It's a lavender color.   I really should go take some better pictures . . . but you know, there's that pressing running issue!! 



A New Mess

I had an idea . . . (they all seem like good ideas in my head . . . must be sleep deprivation) and I cut up some fat quarters and experimented making a drawstring bag.  I didn't like the execution so much so I decided I would cut the fat quarters into smaller sizes and make some blocks.  When I finally decided on the design I realized that I needed 2 more blocks to finish my quilt and of course after carefully measuring the existing blocks I set about cutting some more fabric.  Yep, you guessed it, I cut the wrong size.  Well, actually, I cut the correct size first and then went back and measured and decided that the strips were 1/4" too large so I trimmed them up.  Right after I sewed the first set, I knew they were wrong.  So, out came the seam ripper and a new design was born!!  Oh, the beauty of creating on the fly . . . gotta love it!!  It still needs work, but there's a new idea percolating around my brain right now so we'll see how that design turns out!!

The start of something new - looks nothing at all like the original design, but hopefully it'll be acceptable!!

The other day I was listening to a podcast with Marisa from Creative Thursday and I had to jump on over to her Etsy shop and look at her adorable paintings.   Do you remember the Memory game?

I loved playing this game, but we played with a deck of plain 'ole ordinary playing cards.  These are so much more fun, don't you think?

There are two each of these little prints all painted by Marisa.  They were just too darn cute.  I have plenty of grandnieces and nephews so even though I'd like to keep them all to myself, I'm sure they'll make their way to a new home soon. 

Marisa has her first line of fabric debuting this Fall.  Check it out here.

Busy, Busy

Where does the time go anyway?  It's already Saturday evening . . . hmm . . . maybe if I hadn't taken that nap!!

I read an article this week about the price of cotton going up in the coming year and the price of cotton fabric is also expected to increase.  So, my dilemma is to get on board and go stock up on my stash (which is already more than I will ever need) or pay a higher price in the coming years.  Ugh! 

So, I made a trip to JoAnn's today (not to stock up; just to look).  I think this is only the 2nd time in a year that I have gone to JoAnn's and I was totally surprised to find fabric selling for $9.99/yard.  At JoAnns!!!  Incredible . . . especially when I pulled a bolt out and the date on the selvedge was 2006!!!  Uh, no . . . fabric that old needs to be a whole lot less than $10/yard.  Am I wrong??!!

Anyway, what was my point??  Oh, yeah, I think that I'll probably pass on trying to stock up before the price increase and just be happy that I have plenty (probably too much)of cotton in my house.

Donna and I met for lunch this past week and did our Christmas present exchange.   My packages from her are all wrapped so pretty.  I feel I'm cheating her on my packaging skills.  It's the thought that counts, right??!!

 Presents from Donna . . . aren't they pretty?

This bag is getting heavy and I'm loving how it's filling up nicely!!

I cut up the rest of my fabric tape so now I am ready for some wrapping.  Unfortunately I don't have anything to wrap right now.  Hmm . . .



I have two quilt tops ready for the longarm and I'm in the process of making another quilt top.  I guess I'll go load up one of the quilts and get ready for some longarm action tomorrow.  I hope everyone is having a very creative and inspiring day!!