Well I am not back to it for long – but when I was preparing the quilt block yesterday going through things I remembered I had started a block for the Little Brown Bird quilt when we had traveled to Paducah back in April and never finished it. I have still not decided for sure if I am going to make this quilt but I only had the flowers and embroidery left to put on the block so I thought I would finish it before prepping another block red/green block.
Here is what I did today:
Little Brown Bird block #2 with the flowes and embroidery now added. (8 1/2 inch blocks)
And this is the first block for that quilt that I made last winter:
Little Brown Bird block #1
I hate leaving things unfinished so now that I am done with these two blocks for sure they can go back in their project box with the book until I decide what I am going to do about it. If I ever decide to make this quilt I will be changing it a lot because where I do like most of the quilt I do not like every single block and I think the border is too fussy.
The next block that I am preparing for the Red and Green Applique quilt is called Asymmetrical Rose block#8. An interesting block because is doesn’t look anything like a rose to me!
One of the main things I hate about spring is all the wild storms that come with it. Both Friday and Saturday brought horrible weather to Arkansas. On Friday night I do not know how many tornadoes touched down and did damage to life and property in an area some distance from us. The area was about 70 miles north of Little Rock. While I am glad it did not happen to our area it is never good for it to happen to someone else.
Flowers are blossoming all over the place – before the storms hit I cut some to bring in the house.
My peonies and roses are looking terrific
Since shortly after Easter we have seen this rabbit in our yard. Normally you can't tell one rabbit from another as they are all the same shade of brown normally but as you can see this one is tan. I'm beginning to wonder if it was an Easter rabbit that someone had bought for a child for a present and it got loose. No one in the neighborhood has come knocking at our door looking for a pet. It is cute and has made itself at home on our property.
One more block finished on "Insanity Revisited" This is block 8 from row 11. I also finished the applique on the block that I started for the Little Brown Bird quilt while I was in Paducah - now it just needs some flowers appliqued, embroidery to embellish and then I will take a photo of it.
Yesterday morning I made another of the pineapple blocks and now my cutting table and sewing room seem to be in general disarray! There is something about working with scraps that really makes a mess of things. This past week I got a little quilting done on the Christmas quilt but progress is moving very slowly on it. I have not touched the baby quilt in some days and my fingers are now healed up once again so I really must get back to it.
I have not had much energy for much of anything the last couple days with this awful cold that I went and got. Surely I will be feeling better later today – as it is I think I must get on the phone first thing in the morning and cancel my dental cleaning for the afternoon. I hate to cancel an appointment so late but rather do that then try not to cough and struggle for breath when someones fingers are in my mouth!!
I had wanted to open my windows today for fresh air but CJ (lives nearby) from “From My Studio – Created by CJ” has warned me she did and now has pollen all over her house so I will heed the warning and keep my windows closed – yuk pollen –when will it go away? I am getting caught up on laundry and feeling kind of crappy today. Mike got a cold half way through the week and I do believe he has given it to me as I feel really “off” and have since yesterday afternoon.
A few more photos from Paducah on Saturday in between rain storms. We spent the afternoon in the town so we wouldn’t be in the camper in case of tornadoes – luckily it was just rain and no branches down in the campground.
The skies near Paducah on Saturday. We had rain off and on but the really bad storms missed the area.
the big white temporary "tent" like building in the storm. It kind of blends right in with the sky. I heard that there are people interested in building two hotels on either end of the convention center so maybe in a couple years something will be here to replace this.
A historical museum in the historic area of the town, we spent time here passing off one storm in the dry inside. A very interesting array of items here.
the baby quilt in progress - I did not get as much done as I had planned to - it will get done though in the next couple weeks I hope. About 3/4's finished? The top 1/4 has to be quilted still besides the little bits on the side where the hoop is. My backing fabric wasn't quite wide enough and I didn't feel like sewing another strip onto one edge what I plan to do is I am quilting to about 2 inches of the long sides and then I will trim the edges, add the binding and then if any little bits need some quilting on the end of the lines I will add it then.
A new block for the Little Brown Bird quilt. Flowers will be scattered over this block like they were on the first block for this quilt that I had made some months back. I have some uneven places here and there - how did that happen? I didn't cut carefully enough I guess - no matter the flowers will conveniently take care of the bad spots. I need to do a bit of needle turn still on this one and will get back to it next week maybe - I want to get the baby quilt finished first.
I got one Dear Jane block finished also but forgot to take a photo so I will do that tomorrow.
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.
