Wednesday, June 30, 2010

OK, this is as much as I could get cut out today..........time to get to what I was really supposed to be doing today........making kits for upcoming classes!!  I'm having fun with the winter/snowman theme I have to tell you!  I think I'm trying to get this laid out so I can carry it with me to Oregon to stitch on while I'm there.  They're having much cooler temps so stitching on wool will be a good thing. 

Oooh la-la............wool crazy block 2 for me.  After the class on Saturday I decided to piece together another block.  After all, I had crates of wool laying before me!!  I am going to do a winter themed piece this time, using my own snowman patterns.  So keep a watch ladies, this may be a future class!   This block is also a little smaller than the 24" x 24" block that some of you are working on or will be working on.  I'll post pictures as things progress.
Enjoy the "cooler" temperatures over the next couple of days.  For those of you that don't live here, we've been in the upper 90's to lower 100's for weeks.  Today we are in the mid-80's so that's a huge difference and welcome change.  I'm still looking forward to fall!!!!

Monday, June 28, 2010

Happy Birthday Irene aka Mom aka Grandma aka Great-Grandma!!  We hope you have a super special birthday!!  Love you bunches!!!!
What a super busy week I had last week.  So much going on I didn't have time to post and didn't take pictures all the time either.  But I did remember the camera towards the end of the week so there are bunches of pictures to share.  I think I taught classes almost every day last week finishing up the June schedule.  A little time off this coming week to prepare for new classes which start on July 3!! 
What better way to spend the day than having a parade at Mina's house.  Raleigh asked if she could play with my carolers on Thursday while she was at my house.  I really didn't want her to play with them because they're breakable and not really meant to be toys.  And the last time I let her play with a few of them, they all ended up with broken necks!!  But she was so pitiful looking when she asked me and so excited about them, I decided to give her another chance.  She lined them all up in my bedroom, getting them ready for a parade.  She told me her Uncle Eric was in a parade when he was a little boy and she wanted to be in a parade.  Long story short, we only ended up with one broken neck this time.  Guess that's progress!!
After the parade was over, Raleigh had all the kids line up to visit Santa.  I had the best time listening to her making each "child" give Santa their wish list.  She has a great imagination.
Sometimes unplanned days work best.  Evette and I both ended up with a Friday off.  Of course we had a zillion things we should have been doing, but we also both needed fabric for quilt backings and decided to take a drive to Miss Lou's Quilt Studio in Henderson, where she sells lots of backing fabrics.  The drive up was beautiful and we were in awe when we saw Ms. Lou's shop.  We were driving down the road with nothing real notable when all of a sudden on the horizon we saw this big red building with flags and STUFF!  We veered off the road knowing this had to be Ms. Lou's and sure enough it was.  Debbie was a wonderful hostess and showed us all around her shop and her lovely home.  I took lots of pictures but will share just a few here on the blog.  Thanks Debbie for a great morning and all your inspiration!
This is the front of Debbie's home.  The house is connected to her shop.....talk about never getting away from your job!!  She just walks through her kitchen door and she's at her shop. Really cool.
These cabinets are in Debbie's kitchen.  She has all open cabinets.  I loved being able to see everything.  Guess that means you would have to keep it neat!
This is a display case that's in her shop, just full of little sewing treasures.  It was so much fun to look at all she had in there.
Debbie had told us about a couple of places to stop on the way home.  The first was Sweet Peas in Youngsville.  What a fun place, plants and stuff outside and inside was full of dishes, decorative stuff, quilts, vintage and antique items.  A very cool place to shop. 
The second place we stopped was called Suzanne's.  There were several small buidlings on the property run by different people and then the largest building was Suzanne's.  Another super cool place.  The only problem was it was a 100 degrees outside and I was dying in the heat.  No air conditioning here so a great place to visit in cooler weather.

On Thursday I also started working on the July recipe card.  I've been planning it in my head for awhile and finally decided I just had to get it started to see if it would work out.  Well, in the middle of stamping, I realized I was missing some critical stamps for the card.  I looked all over my workroom three times over and couldn't find those stamps.  Finally, I have a revelation.  I emailed my friend Debbie in Oregon and asked if she had them.  I had an inkling of a thought that I had loaned them to her but couldn't rememeber for sure.  She called me later in the day to say she had them and would mail them back right away.  Whew, thank goodness for that.  I was dreading the thought of re-doing the card if I couldn't find those stamps.  As you can see, I have quite a mess on the table.  Creative chaos!!!!
On Saturday we had the girls for awhile.  I was again working on the recipe card when Reagan decided she wanted to create something also.  She ended up making two beautiful birthday cards for her Poppy.  She worked so hard adding scraps of fabric, stenciling letters and pictures, adding fabric and evey some coins to the card.  They turned out great!!
Well, it's finally time to start WOOL CRAZY!!!  Here's the empty room, all set up for the first six ladies.  Each one has her own space to work in.  and I have bins of wool all lined up, just waiting for some fun plundering to begin.
I tried to take a picture of each person as they were working on their layouts.  It will be fun to look back to see how they started.  Pam is doing a fall piece.
Debby is planning her colors to be a summer farm scene.  She had lots of great ideas for what she was going to applique on her block.
I think Linda was going for a springy/summery block also. 
Oops, we can't see Barbara's block for all the beautiful wools she contemplating.  Her colors worked really well together.
Laura is doing a fall block also.  I think she was the most stressed over this project.  She has a very analytical mind and mismatched pieces just weren't computing for her.  But in the end she had a great block for her foundation.  I think she'll get more excited as time goes on.
And here's Ms. Debbie Lou's block.  Being the quilt teacher that she is, she came to class with her block all drawn out and planned.  I would never even have thought of doing such a thing.  She wanted to have a quilt block in the center to represent her love of quilting and work around that.  It turned out great.  Love the colors.

And since Ms. Debbie had her block planned, she got done a little ahead of everyone else and had time to relax and read the Wool Crazy book.   Good for her!!

Well, that's about it for that busy week.  I'm glad it's behind me and everything got done and accomplished that needed to.  I did get a little stitching done in between.  I'm still trying to finish up the wool girl blocks.  I have three left to be stitched and really will work hard to get them completed.  Lisa is busy kitting up the September BECKY block and will let you all know when that is ready. 

Happy summer stitching days.  Notice I only mentioned our oppressive heat once.  That was really good for me since it has been so miserably hot.  So everyone enjoy the upcoming cooler days they're promising for this week and try and stitch something every day!!



Saturday, June 26, 2010

Happy birthday to my sweet, wonderful husband!!!

Thursday, June 24, 2010

From this to........
this!!  Finished my red, white and blue quilt top this morning.  Just put the borders on.  I'm so happy it's done.  Well, almost.  Still need to get it quilted but at least I'm closer to final completion!!  Thanks for your help Jennifer!!!!
I am still amazed at how you can take pieces of fabric, whack them up, sew them together and come up with beautiful quilts.  Just think of how many thousands of quilts have been made over the years.  And how there are probably no two alike, just like there are no two of us alike!  I hope you all have the chance to make just one quilt top, to play with the fabrics, plan your colors.......it truly is a fun journey!
This quilt is my model for an upcoming class called the Disappearing Nine-Patch.  My friend Debbie taught me how to put these blocks together last summer and I have made several pieces since then.  It's fun, easy, quick, just my kind of project! 

Sunday, June 20, 2010

What a way to spend a Saturday.....teaching classes and celebrating a good friend's birthday. A few ladies got together to make tomato pincushions and a sweet needle keep designed by my famous friend Debbie Busby. We worked hard all morning, stitching and chatting.

And it looks like Rudolph even made an appearance!!  I told you to be careful how you posed Linda!!  You're so adorable..............
Finally, stacks of tomatoes began appearing on the table.......
Linda brought this scrumptuous strawberry cake to celebrate Laura's birthday......it was so delicious.....we'll have to get the recipe to share with everyone.  We had a yummy lunch of quiche and broccoli slaw, lit candles on the cake, sang, all out of tune of course, and celebrated Laura's adding another year to her life.
Laura was having fun opening gifts....oh what could it be?  Fabric, that's always a good thing.
Oh my goodness, I am in heaven....a sunflower candle.  In case you haven't guessed by now, Laura loves sunflowers!! 
Love the fresh flowers, especially the sunflowers.  Just for the birthday girl.
I found this giant handcrafted wooden sunflower at Cameron Days in May.  It's been hiding around my house just waiting for Laura's birthday to get here.  I thought maybe, since she's getting older, she could use it as a walking cane.  Just kidding Laura!

Whether it's your birthday or not, I wish you all happy days...................

Monday, June 14, 2010

We finished our quilt class on Sunday afternoon and I finished stitching down the binding last night.  Whoo-hoo, it's done.  I just love the fabrics and the layout of the quilt.  I'm calling it my "Happy Christmas" quilt.

Now, onto WOOL CRAZY!!  Can you believe that less than a month ago I started with this and now.............
I have this!!!!  I think I am DONE!!!  I just need to add a backing and it's officially complete.  I have to tell you I have really enjoyed this wool journey.  Can't wait for the classes to start so you all can begin your journeys................

Isn't this little birdie sweet! 
Happy stitching days girls.
HAPPY 4TH BIRTHDAY SWEET LITTLE RALEIGH!!  We love you bunches!!