Back To Some Quilting

Oh so miserable outside today.

Ky and I tried to do some yard work, but within an hour we were both feeling sick and decided not a good day for outside, but its an excellent day to sew.

Early this morning before Ky arrived I worked on my Buggy Barn challenge quilt

All the blocks are assembled all 20 little blocks are assembled, now its time to put it all together

The top row is assembled, I have all the blocks on the design wall in the order they will be sewn together.

Yikes Kylee came along and moved them all to one side so she could work on her quilt,  She did promise me that they are still in order, just stacked. Oh I hope so. It takes me forever to put the blocks in the order I want them.

Kylee managed to make all of her blocks today and started sewing them together.

She is getting to be such a big girl.  We have so much fun together, I always love it when she gets to spend time with me.

Bag and Blooms

Yesterday was the girls monthly sew day. As usual we had a very good time.  No pics though.  Sorry.  I should have brought the camera but didnt.  I worked on Buggy Barn challenge quilt.  Realized it was the wrong project to bring.  You really have to pay attention to what you are doing or you can really mess up.  Well with the talking and laughing I wasnt very productive, but I did enjoy myself tremendously.

This morning I made a bag for my friend Nettie.  She is giving this as a present to friend/coworker who is going in for hip surgery soon.

Its not quite finished.  I made yo yo's for it but they are not sewn on yet. She didnt know if she wanted yo  yo or wood buttons. I prefer the yo yo's - they do need a cute little button in the center, but that is up to her to finish one way or the other.

As usual if Im not sewing Im in the yard.  The good news!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Fish pond mound is all cleared of weeds and today Kylee and I put down 4 loads of mulch on the mound and another load in another bed along the house.

Here is the mound before the mulch but after weeding.  Oh so pretty blooms!  Its really prettier now that some of the mulch is down.  Hoping tomorrow will be the final day of mulching (for this area anyway)

Of course this is not the mound this is the pond, but wanted to show you the lilies

In addition the Bee Balm is really blooming more and more each day

I promise one of these days I will have so much more quilting to show you.  

Like I said I have never understood why women had told me in the past they didnt do as much quilting in the summer because of  gardening. I NOW TOTALLY GET IT !

Quilting With Clouds

Baby quilt for Teri.

I have been thinking about this quilt for 2 days. How to quilt it - its for a little boy so no frills and flowers but it is a baby so wanted to do something cute.  I was even thinking of how to do snails and puppy dog tails, but decided no, the tails would look like snakes.  Then I thought ok how about stars and the moon. No didn't like that either, done it before and it was cute, but wanted something different.  Then I'm thinking boy, boy, boy what to do for boy.

As soon as I loaded it on the machine it hit me.  Clouds!!! - This is such a sweet quilt and for a baby what better than clouds.

How about that 2 in one morning.  

Now its time to clean up. Meeting BFF at Loose Threads, she is buying fabric for a bag.

Many Trips Around The World

After a buys day of running here and there and everywhere, I finally managed to get in some quilting time.

Finished this morning.

Remember the blocks for Many Trips Around The World? 

Liz finished the top and I finished the quilting:

Liz requested a simple meandering.  I really wish I could have done some really special quilting on this.

She didn't forget the top border, really!  Her daughter suggested it being long enough (89x99) to not put on the extra border. Liz is giving this to her daughter so she finished it to her specifications. I don't think her daughter realized you can always do a pillow tuck.  

Before going to my sewing room, I had a visitor (outside)

I think its eating apples

Can you see it just behind the tree

Off it goes into the woods

This was taken from inside through a window which gave it a funny color. Sent Belle out and silly dog didn't even see it, but the deer saw her.

CT Sunday Sew In June 2012

Yes another month has gone by and today is our monthly Sunday Sew In on CT (www.connectedthreadz.com).

For my projects today I am quilting customer quilts.

First one of the day

Teri made this  Fast No Match Stars quilt.  I gave her the pattern, which I received the pattern from my CT group.  The pattern is free on CT documents.  Using scraps she made this beautiful quilt.  The border is a piano border, but Teri sewed each piece individually rather than sewn in strips and cut. She put a lot of time and thought into this border and a big applause for her work!!!!

Feathers and swirls in each block. Feather borders and loops in sashing.  Love love love this one.  I am becoming so much more comfortable doing free hand feathers I came up with this cute quilting design in each block.  Each one is similar but yet different.  That's the fun of free hand, its never exactly the same.

Now that this large quilt is finished I will be loading and doing a baby quilt for Teri.

All Better

Many years ago I used to make porcelain dolls. (might have mentioned this before)

One of my favorites needed repair.  Her eyes actually came lose from her head and had to be glued back into place.

Its been a while since making this doll and I wasnt quite sure how much trouble it would be to repair.

After taking off all of her clothes (thinking I had to remove the head from the body) I realized I just needed to remove her hair and hair cap and her head was open in the back.  Does this sound gross. I hope not, remember its just a doll.

I do have to laugh, because looking at her this way it is somewhat creepy.

I used to really enjoy, and probably still would, making these dolls. The best part was painting the faces.

Much more involved than it looks.  Each eyebrow was painted on a single stroke at a time and looks like tiny hairs, just like real eyebrows.  The same for the lashes, each lash is a single lash and has to be spaced beside the next. Not too close and not too far apart.  It would take hours and hours just to paint a section of her pretty face.

It was always a real sense of accomplishment and pride when I finished one of the dolls.  Not everyone can appreciate the beauty in these dolls.  There are a few that do.

Its like making quilts.  The time and creativity that goes into making one can only be appreciated by another quilter.

I did get her fixed and put back together.

June Blooms

I hope you aren't getting bored to death with my flowers, but I have to show you more.  Each day something new blooms.

Some have been blooming for a while, and some just the past few days.  Love taking pictures of flowers.

I want to capture as many of them as I can and hopefully I will remember where they were next year so I can look forward to seeing them again and maybe even more.  Now that I have cleared some space for them to grow.

Way hot out there today, so not sure how much outside work I will be doing.

I did some sewing this morning and I'm thinking maybe I should do some more and tomorrow play outside.