a place to hang quilts outside.....

The wire/cable stuff is hung between two nails.

Maybe next year this building will get painted, for now it will be a weathered wood background.

This should work out really well!

Christmas Eve was warmish and snowless. 

It's like we went on vacation to a warmer place but never left the house.

I was able to take a bunch of pictures of the latest quilts.

iheart flowers.... 

The hearts were won from block lotto in February. 

The flowers were one of the summer blocks. 

When I combined them I thought of my father-in-law, he has so many flowers in the summer. So this went to tractor joe's mom and dad.

Aubri received a baby quilt. Her mom was very excited. I had done one for Aubri's brother a couple years ago. She was hoping Aubri would get a name quilt too.

A breeze came along. The backing is a hot pink sheet, just right for a girl.

As long as I was out there hanging quilts, I went and grabbed this off my bed. Finally, a fairly decent picture of the geocaching quilt!

This isn't a very good picture, but take note of the packages behind the cat. 

They are nicely wrapped gifts for my children.

I am patting myself on the back here, 

because last year....

I didn't put much effort into wrapping. 

My poor children got grocery sacks that I just stapled shut. Each one got a different store bag. Looks like one of them needed two bags, so they got matching bomgaars bags.

Hope everyone had a Merry Christmas!

made by others....

My sister made me a postcard for Christmas. I loved the way she cut the pictures to make the letters in the words claws. After she finished it she thought...wait, we think of cats as having claws, not dogs, oh well.

It is just way to cute.

This quilt was made by a mom who has a visually impaired son. She collected fabrics that all felt different. He may not see all the colors, but he will feel all the variety.

Lots of different textures.....

...including some white fur fabric. 

She said there were pieces of white fur flying around for days after she cut and sewed it in. I think she also said this was the first and last time she will use fur in a quilt.

Famous last words.

One of my goals today......rig up some wire outside, hang quilts and take pictures of my quilted presents. 

They need to be wrapped for Christmas Eve gift opening.

Now is not the time to dilly-dally. I am off to find the hammer and a couple nails.

& clothes pins...

where did I put the clothes pins?

it is about time....

Seems like forever since I was last posting.
My sister asked me to make a "blue baby quilt" for a friend of hers. She didn't care what I did, she trusted me to come up with something.
Using this technique... (8 at a time)....I made blue HST's for all the points.
I wanted to make some bears paw blocks for the quilt. Doing them this way REALLY made it all quite painless.

The 9 patches are randomly sewn 1 1/2 inch squares. As I sew other things, they get put through the machine.  I emptied the drawer they were stored in. But there is still a box on the desk full of squares. Eventually there will be more 9 patches that finish at 3 inches, in theory anyway.
The HST's finish at 1 1/2 inches. I think the starting squares were cut at 4 3/4 inches.

Crispy brought home his art project from school today. I was so excited to see it! I was squealing in delight! 

OMG, I LOVE it. I needed to find the camera right away and take a picture. 

Then I had to ask....who is it?

He says, "if you were a fan of Weezer, you would know who this is."

It is Rivers Cuomo. oh, of course. 

It is already hanging up in his room.

a quilt top...

These blocks are from Block Lotto when I won back in May. 

(block lotto was very good to me this year)

I painted Crispy's room a deep blue this past summer...so I used orange and blue to finish off the blocks.

It should look good in there!

and it snowed....the sticking kind...everything is white now.

fabric postcards are off.....

What makes me happy here is....I finally figured out how to zig-zag around the edges and make it look nice! The secret is... letting the needle go off the edge!!

I am so pleased, I may make more.

Eventually.

I am keeping the top left one, his stitching was really bad. 

I actually had 8, but one was already sealed in an envelope when I remembered to take a picture. Then I was off to the post office. These went "as is" & so far all my postcards have made it safely to their destinations, so hopefully, these will also.

It cost an extra 20 cents for hand stamping them AND she used real stamps this time, not that print out thing! An angel stamp along with a George Washington.

Bye-bye guys!

my favorite holiday....

Some of the preschoolers made turkeys for Thanksgiving. They were pretty happy with them. I loved how they turned out, they make me smile.
Tractor joe is in Wisconsin. It is deer hunting season. I have no plans to go anywhere. Staying home! I do need to go find my roaster oven and stick a turkey in it.....
Happy Thanksgiving!
If you aren't in the states here....Happy Thursday, it is almost Friday!

more distraction.....

I made 32 flying geese to use in the zombie border. 

Jacob was over this afternoon. He wants the geese to go in a circle around the quilt. So there will be 7 on the top and bottom and 9 on each side. Then each side will get filled in with one of the orange fabrics.

I also worked on something else today......

When my mom was here she said, "I like your fabric postcards the best."

hmmmmm....I wasn't planning on making any out of fabric.

But there I was at the kitchen table this morning.

I had the background sewn up with some check fabric inserted in there. 

Then I spent time tracing and cutting and pressing the heat-n-bond to fabric. Things went rather  quickly.

This is what they look like. The snowman came from a book of patterns called

Holiday Whimsies by Trena Hegdahl

They are all quilted, button eyes sewn on and the words "warm wishes" is stamped on the side.

Won't be long and they will be postcards!

block lotto and postcards......

This month for block lotto we are making scrappy trip around the world blocks. (November guidelines)
All the blocks must have black or very dark fabric going up the center diagonal.

OOPS....didn't quite get the dark in the center.



Try again......





the next one will work out right....

OOPS again....not even close.


I am in the middle of making my own scrappy trip around the world quilt.
So I was sort of happy, two more blocks for my pile.

But I really wanted some for the block lotto.

I figured out where I was going wrong and managed to make 6 blocks.

My sister, Jane, and my Mom were down for the weekend. Jane had ALL KINDS of artsy fartsy stuff she wanted to work on. All we managed to finish were two postcards....

I laughed when I saw this. Who will get it???? She didn't say.....She just continued to glue things down,
and giggle.
When she was leaving, I told her "wait, I need a picture of your card."
She pointed to the fridge. She had stuck it there.
The card was for me.

Yesterday, I had laid down on the couch and was having a hard time getting up off the couch when she arrived here. I was suffering from can't-get-off-the-couch-itis.
Haha.

My little niece, Madison or MJW, started a blog. She is 7, I think.  One day she showed how to draw a simple coffee cup. This is my "wishing you luck" card for her. Her drawing inspired me!

the quilt show here in town.....

The gym was full of quilts last Saturday. Big, small, old and new. 

When I went to collect my quilts back, I quick took some pictures.

I am not sure who owns this one.

It reminds me of my grandma. It is tied the way hers were. I never liked the bumpiness of them when I was going to bed at her house. I didn't like the embroidered pillow cases either. That bumpiness on the edge would bug me.... 

but it sure is pretty!

This one is really old. It belongs to a friend of mine. She says her great grandma made it.

There were four ladies sitting and waiting for the quilts to come down, so they could take theirs home.

I walked around grabbing pictures of different quilts laying in the bleachers.

I know this one is Karen's. It is the only one I got a picture of. She had more there, I could kick myself. I didn't get a picture of my favorite one. Dang.

This one and the next one are mine. It was made for tractor joe to hang out in his men's crisis center. (the fixed up hog house or shed)

I have never shown this one finished on the blog. It sat with no binding for a LONG time.

I know Doris made this one.....

and this one. She makes all bed size quilts.

She doesn't "mess with that little sh*t"....(wall hangings)

This still isn't a nice picture of my geocaching quilt. I miss my clothes line.

At least you can see my colorful striped binding.

one quick thing.....

These are travel tissue covers....keeps the kleenex safe and clean in your bag or purse.

I made four of them yesterday. 

They are the cutest little things....and so dang simple to make!

I first saw them here at vesuviusmama's blog and really like them.

Erin found them HERE and made up a bunch.

I think they will make the perfect little gift 

and I will be sure to keep at least one for myself!!!

the baby, the zombie, and I'm not sure......

It is hard sharing the camera with Crispy, he always has it with him for school. It is never available when I want it...but it is finally back in my hands, for now!

All the northwind blocks are sewn together and the name is started. The letters are from a piece of tie-dyed looking fabric. I love the way they look. I may use it for borders too.

Center is complete....the second round will be this check fabric cut just so.

And then the final border will be some shade of orange. Exactly what orange hasn't been determined yet.... It is time to go shopping for it.

I am not sure about these. I made them up thinking they would work for a baby quilt. I need more made.

Right now it is sorta boring to me. Colors....it needs more colors.

One more thing, my baby turns 18 tomorrow. Sigh. 

I am really not that old. I had him when I was about 10.

feels like forever.....

I have been SLOWLY getting filler put together. Seems like it is taking forever.

I had 2 days worth of jury duty last week, that  slowed me down. We voted NOT guilty in an assault case....very interesting to be on a jury. It was my third time over the years. 

There will be a quilt show during out town's Fall Festival on Nov. 5th. I was asked to put some quilts in it, along with a bunch of other local quilters. So.... I have been putting binding on quilts, the geocaching one and the Live Laugh Love Learn quilt. Just the motivation I needed to finish them.

We can make up to 9 blocks for blocklotto I managed to get 3 electric fan blocks sewn.

When I went out to Crispy's car to get the camera, I snapped a Fall photo. The wind was from the NW (cold) and the clouds were dark blue.

We had very light flurries one morning, other wise no snow yet. It has really been very nice for the last few weeks. Warm days, cold nights and not much rain.

I must sew big.......

I am tired of trying to squish it all in.

 I have made a decision. 

My words just come out bigger than what I picture in my mind. SO...I will stop fighting this and work with it. Instead of wall hanging size, this will be lap or nap size when it is done. 

so who died? the zombie will be thinking about.....

Poor old Barry M. Deep

The wording for the gravestone came from some Halloween scrapbook stickers. 

I am off to start adding filler to this, soon I will have a center. Then I will think about the border.

When ever I think filler, Michael Jackson's song THRILLER starts playing in my mind. 

one stage done.....

so far, so good

they aren't sewn together yet, just laid out rather quickly for a picture

I plan on putting the baby's first and middle name along the top and the last name along the bottom.

And some more border around everything.

Now, it is back to Zombie sewing.

zombie started....

He is started. I got this far last night and stopped.

I still need words and a pieced pumpkin for the bottom right corner.

Some of the big chunks of purple can be chopped off to make room for words.

I need Jacob to do some more thinking.

My ideas so far.....

1. mom always said there'd be days like this

2. that'll leave a mark

3. sounds...not sure on spelling yet. Ida had aaaauuurrrgggghhh.

baby quilt and the quilt show....

I bought a scrap bag of cherrywood fabrics last year at the quilt show. It was time to cut it up and start a baby quilt. The block is called Northwind and these finish at 6 inches. I want 36 blocks. 

Not quite half way there yet. I am supplementing it with other fabrics to make it go further, the orange, light  blue and pink. 

Nothing was reaching out and grabbing us at the quilt show. It seemed like there were less vendors.

Both Karen and I found some fabric though.

Skeletons, tractors and animals for me.

Karen was in a beer and music mood.

We were also looking at fabric with circles....for zombie eyeballs. I debated about all these circles and decided I didn't need them. But Karen liked them enough to get them.

  Outside, down these steps is a geocache. This is the third year that I have ventured down there to look for the cache. I could never find it.

that changed this year....

Me with two of my favorite finds this year, the book and cache.

Actually it was Karen who found it!!! If I had known she would be such a good geocacher, I would have dragged her out there 2 years ago! (maybe I have, I don't remember for sure)
She didn't do any happy dances,
 but there was excitement in her voice when she announced that she had it found it.
It was a good day in Des Moines at the quilt show.