Today is a cold, dreary day. We have had snow flakes spitting off and on all day. It is the type of day where you really don’t go outside unless you are really and truly an outdoors person or if you need to run and errand – like go exercise (which I did). Now though it is time to just sit back and enjoy the inside and hope tomorrow will be warmer. I will tune in to the Olympics sometime today or this evening to see how it is going, I haven’t watched it today yet.
Yesterday we ran to Little Rock to meet up with daughter and her hubby to go to the Arts Center – the exhibit was nice but much smaller than I thought it would be and no gold and glitter among these Egyptian pieces. All pieces were more of the ceramic and bead jewelry type of items and a couple of mummies. Everything was great to look at although my husband and I both thought that the cards all of the information was written on could have been larger – is age creeping in here 
I hope not!
When we got done with the exhibit we left the kids (kids to me – not to them they are in their late mid-30’s) and headed over to Sam’s Wholesale and Barnes and Nobles for a quick look before we left for home – wouldn’t believe the weather – snow flying everywhere – and it had been in the 50’s the day before – it was melting as fast as it was hitting the ground so no worries about travel.
At Barnes and Noble I always look through the quilt magazines to see what is new. Now and then they will have an overseas magazine and I always look through them to see what is going on in the quilting world away from the states. I found a great one from New Zealand — and the best – it had a quilt border in it that I love and I think I will use that one for the Little Brown Bird quilt instead of the one that comes with it as it is one of the main parts of the quilt that I thought was just a bit too fussy for my taste. (saying that I should actually mention although I love the quilt I find a lot of it a bit too fussy for my taste and I intend to change it a lot – when I get done it most likely won’t even look that much the same as the original as I am planning on substituting some blocks for others that I have found and making some of my own design also). The magazine I found is simply “New Zealand Quilter”.
this issue has such a simple quilt on the front of it I was surprised - most magazines tend to put something a bit flashier on the cover. I'm glad I opened it up to look at it and found the border inside.
The is the border I liked. It is from an award winning quilt by Margaret Matthews (2007) called "Roses for Me" and in the magazine it was the final of a 10 part series. I'm so glad I happened to pick this issue up, it has the pattern pull out included.
So that is news on the quilting part of my day (yes I have been busy with my applique border and I have 1 1/2 borders left to do). Today was a baking day also.
Blueberry, Banana, Walnut Muffins
1 cup of quick oats
1/3 cup oil (I use canola)
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 small carton of vanilla yogurt (6 oz)
1/2 cup milk
1 mashed banana
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
2 tablespoons ground flax seed
1 cup blueberries
Mix all ingredients together except the blueberries. Stir them in after all is mixed. Bake for about 25 minutes at 350 degrees. Makes about 21 small muffins (this depends on the size of your containers).
some of the muffins - as you can see I use a variety of containers, the ones in the back are the aluminum foil toss away and the red ones are microwave/oven proof silicon rubbery things I found these awhile back and wanted to give them a try and they work great. You kind of just pop the muffins out. I had six more baking when I took this picture and they are in a muffin tin. I have very large blueberries frozen from my little brother's berry farm as you can see in the photo - a couple berries and you have enough in each muffin! I have only about a cup of frozen berries left from the crop in June.
my afternoon snack - my very nutritious blueberry muffin and a cappuccino - of course I went and spoiled the nutritious part by having some chocolate afterward can't be perfect LOL after all I was hungry I had gotten in an hour of exercise after lunch!
I am so glad to get done putting the main part of this quilt together! I literally feel like I am going in circles!! This part of the quilt measures 76 x 76 inches. Now to figure out a border (that will wait for tomorrow) right now I am leaning towards 3 thin strips of colorful fabric – red, yellow and orange and then a white border about 8 inches wide with some scattered circles on it. I’m thinking circles a little larger than the ones on this part that is done. That is just an idea right now, I’m going to think on it over night or maybe a day or two.
this part finished. Took up the whole design wall and overlapping somewhat.
This last week I have been working on my first Little Brown Bird block in between work at the sewing machine. I am really pleased how this block turned out. Right now I have it measured at 9 1/2 inches. In the book it says to trim to 8 1/2 inches. I decided to go with the more muted colors for the flowers (I also enlarged the flowers a little bit - they were so tiny) but I changed out the center green for a brighter green instead of the one I first chose. This is block #13 from the book. I am still not sure if I am going to make all of the blocks from the book. I really don't like all of them and I think I really like this more lacy look to this block than flowers and baskets or vases. I might look and see what I can find in this similar look. There are 3 more in the book something like this, but as you can see it is really a quilting design (a wreath) and there are plenty of those kind of patterns out there. The accent embroidery on this block I used 1 strand of embroidery thread in a free flowing pattern that I drew on with a light gray fine point chalk pencil.
Oops sorry - I forgot to make sure there were not any smudge marks before I took the photo and I'm too lazy to take another one! This is the new microwave that we got the other day. Bigger than I had planned on getting - what can I say hubby was along and this is the size he thought we needed. It is nice that it has 10 levels of power -- so instead of heating leftovers and having over done veggies and just right pasta or whatever -- all heated evenly on medium! Now of course I have to keep looking at the instruction book to figure out what to heat what on. If even "talks" to you when done - the control reads "your meal is ready" or something like that.
We are having a good soaking rain today that started awhile ago and might go through to evening. Can’t say I’m happy about that, we just had 2 inches the other night and the ground is still wet from all we had last month and months before that! We will go out later and go shopping for the microwave. Thought we would go out to supper too and then get that done before or after.
My design wall is handy. I decided though to put the quilt on the lower half of the wall right now though so I can work from the top and not bend down — lazy is what I call it – but what the heck the purpose is to not have to work on the floor right. I am a little more than half way finished now. I have 15 of the 25 rows finished. When it is done it should cover the entire wall. I have found that the bigger and heavier it gets the more I need to stick a couple stick pins in it to keep it on the wall. I think I have 3 holding it on. I suppose it is actually just a little too big for it as the ends are sticking out a little. To bad I won’t be able to use it for the whole thing as it will end up being about 100 x 100 inches. It will be back to the floor for part of it and a final photo.
Getting there, more to do and I have little bits of thread all over the floor and myself. Isn't if funny when you go shopping or out to eat and hubby is plucking threads off your back that you didn't know where there I have several pretty Michael Miller fairy frost fabrics that I think I will use in strips for a border around the patches - skinny strips. I have 3 of them - a reddish type of color, orange and a yellow. Then maybe more scraps of some sort - thin strips maybe from the stash.
I also have worked on the Little Brown Bird block and got done with the reverse applique now it is supposed to have 4 flowers appliqued scattered over it with embroidery – little tendrils out from the flowers and a little black embroidery on the flowers for accent. These blocks will all be set on point.
sitting in it's storage box. I am auditioning these flowers right now - I'm not sure if I like the colors and might go brighter. The centers of the flowers could be embroidered also if desired in a green satin stitch. I'm not sure, I will look at it this evening when we get back home and decide. Keep in mind the centers look large because the seam allowance is there as they are not stitched in place.
It was nice to have so many people drop by this week and participate in my give away. So many have contacted me during the week with e mails and it is very interesting to hear about what everyone is working on and to find out where you are all from. The only problem with a give away though is that not everyone leaves an e mail address for contacting you back. When you leave a comment if you want an answer you need to have your settings right. So far I have not heard back from Rebbecca Potts Baker one of the winners from my give away. Rebbecca I have no way to get in touch with you as you didn’t leave a e mail address. Hopefully you will come back to check who the winners of the give away are and claim your prize. Contact me at k@pddoc.com If I don’t hear from Rebbecca in five days or so I will go through the random number selector and pick someone else.
I took a day off from working on my patches and circles yesterday and got back to it today. Making progress but anything to do with me and sewing machines moves slowly because I keep taking so many breaks here is what I have so far:
this is 25 blocks across right now and nine rows finished. I have another 3 rows in the process of as you can see. The total body of the quilt will be 25 rows by 25 and then some kind of border around that. I plan to get a little more work done on it this weekend and hopefully get the main part of this quilt done next week and then start on a border.
Here is the progress on the Little Brown Bird block that I started working on the other day. It will have some flower blossoms scattered on it over the wreath and a little embroidery. Right now the brown background shows through the light side a bit but I don't think this will be noticeable when I get the flowers on it too. Once it is quilted for sure I think it will be fine. This is a 9 1/2 inch block.
I’m not sure what we are doing this weekend. Sounds like we might have more rain tomorrow – I hope it waits until evening and the day will be pleasant. I need to start looking for a new microwave oven. Ours technically is not really all that old but it has not been working well recently and last night burned a hole through the bag of popcorn on the same setting it is always set at!! That shouldn’t have happened. Also some other things have not been cooking at the normal amount of time and I have been having to constantly adjust the time. I looked briefly at some a month or so ago but held off. I think this weekend we will find a new one. I don’t need anything fancy – we only use the microwave for reheating leftovers and making popcorn, defrosting frozen items and things like that. This is only the second microwave we have had! The first one lasted forever it seems, much longer than this second one did.
What with having the design wall in the living room and the sewing machine down the hall in the sewing room I have gotten a process down for working yesterday and today. I find that my little sand paper board that I use for my Dear Jane pieces works well for this too.
I bring my 12 inch square in the living room and put 9 blocks on it to sew together to make a 9 1/2 block. This helps me keep them in order.
after I sew the blocks together I immediately take it over to the cutting table where I cut and press. Here is the block pressed. Then I remove the pressing mat and my cutting mat is underneath.
square it up with my 9 1/2 inch ruler. Immediately take it back to the design wall and press it in place and start over again.
this is what I have gotten done with so far yesterday and today.
close up of the blocks - this will indeed be a colorful scrappy quilt.
Now we all know that I’m not happy unless I am working on several things at once. I have to have some hand work handy and I am taking a couple days (weeks?) off of my second Dear Jane “Insanity Revisited” and I was itching to get started on the applique quilts I intend on starting this year. So last night I bit the bullet and got a Little Brown Bird block prepped and got started while I was watching TV and finished with the patches for the evening – I don’t like to use the sewing machine while the TV is on – I can’t concentrate that way.
here is the first Little Brown Bird block that I am working on. This first part is reverse applique. Maybe you can see the design traced on? It is in light gray chalk. Scattered over the wreath will be three or four flowers. I'm not sure what colors I will have them, they all have some embroider on them I believe. I got started on this one last night.
It has been very nice outside since Sunday or maybe it was a couple days before that even? We took a walk on Sunday and the turtles were out it — was so nice. Today was even nicer! 68 degrees of course we are supposed to maybe have storms tonight and tomorrow in the 50’s – oh well, nice while it lasted.
Turtles on the log
I'm not sure what these berries are that were growing on the side of the trails, but they are pretty. These two outside photos were taken at the nature trail near by.
Comments are now closed on this blog post, winners will be announced shortly. (edited 1/22/ 11:59)
I started blogging in April of 2007 – almost 3 years ago – wow how time flies. At first I really didn’t know what to write and didn’t write very frequently. I finally decided to just write as I talk as though I was actually chatting with you. I am not very good about formal sentence structure and I know it! I just don’t care anymore – I assume if that is what a person wants to read they will go elsewhere About a year and a half ago I really got into it and started blogging on a very regular basis. To celebrate this 500th anniversary I am having a give away – winner will be announce in one week on Friday the 22nd of January.
There will be two winners. The rules are simple. Leave a comment and tell me where you are from and you get one chance. Blog about it and make sure you tell me and you will have two chances.
prize #1 included 20 light aqua hoffman batik 6" squares, 20 dark aqua hoffman batik 6" squares, a McKenna Ryan pattern and the other things in the photo.
prize #2 is another stack of both colors of batiks, another McKenna Ryan pattern and an assortment of other items in the photo.
The two aqua fabrics are the ones that I used in my Dutch Treat quilt which originally was going to be much larger than it ended up being. I had cut a lot of 6″ squares in preparation for the quilt so had a lot left over. The 3 bears pattern featured in the second grouping of prizes is the one that I used for the wall hanging in the motorhome. It is like new as you trace the pattern on to fusible web so the pattern is not disturbed in anyway. I had cleaned my sewing room back in the late fall and filled a basket with items that I do not used – possibly used slightly but not so you would notice. Some things were given to me that I never used as was not something I needed or use. I still have a basket – no longer overflowing but still full so plenty for future give away’s.
And the weather today with this warm up that we are having and enjoying!
slightly out of focus as I had to stand over to the side so my shadow wouldn't be on it. The little boy has no jacket this time and no little snowman in the corner Someone asked the last time I posted a photo of the thermometer what kind is it. It is from the Weather Channel and is digital.
I have been busy today organizing fabric – yes once again. I have decided that I will go ahead and start soon on the Little Brown Bird quilt after all. I have been undecided about it. I do not know if I will make the whole thing, but I am going to give it a start and decide as I go. I will be using a lot of almost solids – batiks and moda marbles. I want to make sure there is no bleeding so I have been washing fabric and pressing all day! And still more to go through in my wire baskets on the shelves. I will use a little of the other fabrics (prints) here and there but most of them I will wash as needed.
The Red and Green Traditional Applique quilt I will be starting first. I have the background fabric for both quilts on bolts on the shelf. The Red and Green quilt will be mainly moda marbles and batiks also with prints thrown in here and there. I have been collecting batiks and marbles for sometime now in preparation. I mainly get fat quarters and I have plenty of them. I might be organized enough tomorrow for a photo. My fabric needs organizing and I have a feeling it will take several days of working on it to get it all under control (and I have a very small stash compared to some of you I know).
Continue reading about Blog Post #500!!! I am having a Give Away
It is so sunny out one would think it was much warmer outside than it is. 23 degrees today with a wind chill of who knows what, tonight will be cold as well, Monday we should be back to normal! Possibly down to 10 or lower – like about 6! for tonight and the next 2 nights. Much colder than normal for here. I think the newsman said it was about 15 years ago that we had temperatures this cold. The state of Florida is having some record low temperatures also and I have a feeling we will all be paying more for our oranges and orange juice for awhile – strawberry crops will be hit also. What happened to global warming?
The pile of 4 patches keeps growing – I have 250 squares now pressed and squared up to the required 3 1/2 inches. The circles as well are coming along, I have 160 of them done.
my box of 250 4 patches - getting there and if I stuck with it for long I would be done!
For my "Insanity Revisited" quilt, this is block 12 from Row 9. This one was another one that was a little hard to deal with the tiny pieces, it is not perfect - but it is done and won't be re-done!
I have bread raising to bake later. If it turns out I will post the recipe – I added some things so who knows
My sweater is in the final stages!! I might have a photo of it tomorrow. I am working on the neck – I didn’t like how the neck line turned out so I am crocheting a “turtleneck” of sorts on to it! You know me, I always seem to have to change or add something to just about any pattern I have – even my beginning to learn how to knit sweater. I was already done basically when I decided I didn’t like the neckline. I would have had to knit a turtle neck to add to the sweater and thought really it would look good crocheted so I’m doing that instead. I’ll let you all know if it turns out! I do not think I will ever be a knitter — but I like the feel of the yarn going though my fingers and find the knitting (or crochet) soothing somehow.
I have the background fabric ordered for the Red and Green Applique quilt that I showed you all a photo of awhile ago so I will be starting that one soon. The Little Brown Bird on the other hand I think will be taking a back burner on the project list for awhile. It is such a fancy quilt that I haven’t quite made up my mind completely to tackle it. It is so pretty – but yet so fancy that it is not quite “me” if you know what I mean. I need to think some more on it.
I do want to finish all of my four patches and circles before I start the red/green quilt — and I have to wash all the red’s and greens first that I plan to use and I think I will use the Retayne solution for color set also — I want to make sure I have no bleeding.
When I ordered the background fabric for the red/green quilt I also ordered the background fabric for the Star Crazy pieced quilt that I am going to make. That one is a BOM so it won’t be taking away all my time from other quilts so I should be able to keep up with it and will start the first month blocks as soon as I get the fabric in.
For now the Dear Jane quilt “Insanity” will reside on my bed. Melanie is going to hang it on a wall after I give it to her so I need to put a hanging sleeve on the back of the quilt still. I am going to make the sleeve in such a way that a bracket can go in the middle to give the weight of the quilt support as it is heavy. For now though the quilt is on my bed and it will remain there for about a year for me to enjoy. I put the Twisted Star quilt that I had on the bed so the back of the quilt which is a purple moda marble is on top, the Insanity is on top of that making the underneath quilt look more like a bed skirt. At night I will simply fold the quilt and lay it over the tall stool I have in the bedroom in the corner of the room so it is out of the way and then when I make the bed in the morning it will go back over it. I still need to design a label for the back of the quilt. I haven’t uploaded the program I use on my new computer but I decided to get a newer version of Print Master Gold anyhow so I will do that soon. I have Print Master 12 and I think it is up to version 17 or 19 now and have newer ideas for it with internet access. I’m sure plenty of new clip art also which I use a lot on my labels.
Dear Jane "Insanity" on my bed
My younger daughter-Jessica will be receiving the second Dear Jane “Insanity Revisited” sometime after that one is finished. I need to sew row 8 on to the blocks and then I will post a new photo of that quilt. While the grandchildren were here examining the quilts which they love to do asking what will be next I showed Ciera the “Little Brown Bird” quilt and told her that I was thinking of making that one – her words “that one will be mine”. (I told her maybe she would get it when she was 21 – she is 7 now – that should give me plenty of time to make it and enjoy it if I decide to do so). Utah spent one evening working on a design for a quilt that he wants me to make – he said it would be the quilt to use while watching tv in their basement family room which is a little chilly in the winter. Designed by Utah and made by Grandma – he specifically said that it had to have scraps of fabric in it from a quilt that I made him last year He had the big pad of drawing paper out, a square quilting ruler and colored pencils – he did a really good job but was only about a 1/4 of the way done with it when they left for home. He took the drawing home with him and said he will finish it and send it to me – I don’t know if he will keep his interest but if he sends it back I will see what I can do with it.
It rained off and on all day today, a nice soaking in kind of rain in my area – other areas had downpours. I’m glad we had the better kind. Also and this is so unusual for August our high temperature happened about an hour ago – 70 degrees!! 
normally at this time of evening it is still in the mid 80’s as it was it was 66 for most of the day. That is so nice — but crazy this is August after all.
Between last night and today I got 4 more “Insanity” blocks quilted and I am partly 
done working on a “Insanity Revisited” block but it isn’t finished so I didn’t take a photo of that one. This one on the left are blocks 4 and 5 and the ones on the right are 6 and 7. Half way done with this row! it is moving right along now that I am back to work on it.
I have been really looking over the patterns and the book for the Little Brown Bird as I mentioned the other day and though I like it I wonder if it isn’t too much? If you know 
what I mean – it is so full of designs. I am wondering what it would be like if instead of the blocks that have 4 designs in them if I enlarge the pattern to have just 1 design in each of those areas and just pick and choose which ones I use? It is so fancy the way it is!! I would like the challenge though. I know I saw some place someone had made this quilt but changed the design up a little in that she had left some of the blocks out also – does anyone know a link to it? I can’t find it. I was sure I had bookmarked it. I will keep looking but if anyone has seen this quilt designed just a little differently let me know. I would like to see several versions if I can before I get started on it (not sure when that will be). I’m pretty sure the picture I saw was on someone’s blog.
I had been pretty much at work all day finishing up the painting in the quilting/computer room. Finally at about 6 this evening (Mike is working late so I didn’t cook) I started to move things back into the room and try to organize! There are 
still a bit of things on the kitchen table waiting for me to go through. I did get “Insanity” back on the quilting frame – just finished doing that a little while ago.
Here is what it is looking like right now. This is the side that has my cutting table and the sew ezi table for my machine. I put my seven boxes of scrap fabric up high and the wire containers of fat quarters or less are now on the single shelf up high. I use to have bolts and folded fabric up there but when I would get things down they tended to fall. I think the wire containers will go up and down easier. As you can 
see the room isn’t changed that much other than the fact that the paint is fresh and my ceiling isn’t sagging!
This is the side for the quilting frame. I have made use of the under quilt area for book shelf and a basket of batting. Also my small hoops are under there also. My 
sewing machine travel case on wheels is under it also. Small room! I have to make use of every inch. The shelf above the quilting frame is holding the bolts of fabric and folded pieces. The bottom shelf has the bolt of fabric and colors that I got when we were in Pennsylvania for the “Little Brown Bird” yes I still intend to make it – when – I’m not sure, but I am collecting up the fabric needed to make it. The shelves still have room for me to put more things on them. I have photos in frames that I need to decide where to put and which ones, I had too many and some of them will go in the photo albums.
And here is Dear Jane “Insanity” back on the quilting frame. I have not worked on it for 11 days and really need to get 
back to work! I was moving along really well there for awhile and need to do a little before we leave for our three week trip to Colorado.
I am sometimes amazed at how poorly things are made now. I got this iron about 2 years ago – maybe? it might be more like one year. I was folding up the cord preparing to put it back on the shelf and the plug in fell off! Mike says he can fix it so it is set aside for him to do so.
I am going to try to keep the room organized and even though I still have some things to put away and the two drawers to clean out I think I will actually have more room than I had!
I’m glad everyone has enjoyed looking at the links to the free patterns that I posted for the last two days. I can’t take the credit for finding them. The list volunteer from the “quiltersbee” yahoo mailing group finds things all the time. I have been on this yahoo group for about 8 years or more! It is an on-line quilting group and Diana finds information constantly that she lets everyone know about.
