variety of stuff...

All through the fall, my cousin and I were making blocks. It was a free online pattern. I don’t remember the name or who sponsored it right now. We made two blocks. One for me, one for her. We picked a fall color scheme. We didn’t show each other our blocks until we got together to exchange. We were kinda nervous about them working together. 

We were pleased with the results. My blocks are in the 5 position on a dice. They are still a stack of blocks. Goal is to have it finished for the quilt show next August. 

Little turkeys made for Thanksgiving. 

Made this at a party type thing. You pick what glitter you want, paint on glue, sprinkle on the colors you want. Then pick the decal you want to use. Then leave it for a final coating to protect it. 

It’s expensive, but it does turn out pretty cool. 

I was seeing gnomes all over. Too cute not to try. No real pattern was used. Basic cone shaped hats, fake fur beards and wooden beads for the nose. The bigger one is a wine bottle topper and the smaller guys are the fur wrapped around a wine cork. 

There is a quilt ready for me to pick up. I’ll get that posted  when it’s finished. It’s for a wedding in February. 

fun things made over the weekend.....

Blocks for Lotto. These sewed up faster than I thought they would.

Words from one of the t-shirts that were too short and too wide to fit anywhere. I put them on a bath towel instead. I think Amanda will get a kick out of it.

I always have a bag of colored pencils on the bus so kids can draw. 

One little 5 year old boy drew this. I am not sure what it is. 

But he was intense as he worked and colored.

I asked him if I could make a pillow from it.

He wanted to know how I could make a pillow with the paper.

I told him I would use fabric. 

I had no plan at that point so the drawing hung on my fridge for a few weeks.

I had all this t-shirt fabric laying about. I was even wondering what to do with it. 

A sane person might just toss it.

Then it struck me where I could use it.......

I have seen these plush toys made from kid drawing and thought it was pretty cool.

That's what I did here. 

I feel his legs are too skinny, but I love his hair.

 I hope he likes it.

Happy 4th of July...

I sent my niece Madi an orphan doll. They got on a bus yesterday headed for NYC. they are sending pictures of the doll where ever they go. 

 Flag painting last month. We did this right before I left on the road trip.

A federal shield that will go on a quilt. I appliqued this to the top using freezer paper on top. 

You glue the edges down and then peel off the freezer paper. 

I loved everything about doing it this way. 

It was so slick and easy.

Here is a link to the super good tutorial on it......(click here for fantastic tutorial)

another doll and the dry weather......

My nephew said, you should make a Mrs. Red Dirt, with brown hair. I was thinking he wanted it for his Grandma. 

No.

He just thought I should make one.

So, I get to keep her. That is okay. I really love her. She has underwear.

Watching this youtube video gave me the idea to use a t-shirt and make a shirt and shorts. I didn't cut off the hem of the blue t-shirt, that became the hem of the shorts.

I didn't have any elastic, so I used ribbon for tightening the waist.

The shirt is pretty basic too. I kinda, sorta measured to make it the right size. It is rectangles sewn together. I rolled her sleeves for a more finished look. I could have used the hem of the blue t-shirt too, but I didn't think of that until the shorts.

Here is the link to the doll's body

I love her striped legs. 

It has been SO DRY here that our local creek has dried up. 

We took a walk down it with our friend the "junk king"

We ended up at a place full of old old cars.

We were looking for old signs that might have been tossed in here and any other treasure we might come across. Never did find any signs, but it was pretty cool looking around.

We went down to Farmer T's corn field that surround us. We are very lucky in our area. While most rain went around us or never hit the ground all summer, there was enough that the crops have not dried out. This corn smaller than normal. So there will be something to harvest around here.

One more picture. Because the rivers are getting so low, the fish are pooling in the deeper areas. This huge catfish was caught. He says he had three meals from it.

auction things...

There were 2 auctions in town this weekend. We went to both of them. At the Saturday one, we bought this wood wheel barrow...it was still in the box, it had never been opened.

Tractor joe has been buying old metal coolers. He thinks they are better than the plastic ones.

But to get the cooler on Saturday, they bundled it with an old high chair.

It is just like the one my Mom used, when my sisters and I were little babies, a long time ago.

We really didn't want it but we took it home.

Then we started calling it the Hope Chair.

As in....we hope to have grandchildren some day.

Maybe our children need a visual hint.

Something to remind them that it is their duty to have children.

Tractor joe stuck the latest doll, Mrs. Red Dirt in the chair. Will this get their attention?

She is out in the garage, maybe I could set her in the kitchen. 

They might be less likely to walk on by and not notice her.

I can even put a few cheerios on the tray and pretend.

On Sunday, at the other auction we bought this wagon/trailer.

Tractor joe was excited by the wagon/trailer. I was excited by the wood.

He saw fire wood.

What! Surely there are things to be made with all this wood!

And so, it became my job to start sorting it.

I worked on it for awhile last night until it got dark.

Went out this morning and took a so-far picture. 

There are two things I want to do today. Clean out the rest of the wood,

and finish sewing cushion covers for the patio chairs.

Better go get busy.

teeth and new doll adventures...

This isn't finished, BUT, there are teeth in the dinosaur now. That went better than I thought it would. He looks like a cartoon, but so does everything else.

Remember Mrs. Browndirt?

She went on an adventure (gone camping and geocaching)

She is on a new adventure!

Check it out (going to the mountain lodge)

She is so lucky, going all over!

Mrs. Browndirt goes camping and geocaching.....

When I mentioned that I was going camping, a comment came in from Brown Dirt Cottage....

she said she could start a fire with one match and no paper.

I thought,

It sure would be nice to have her along to start the campfires.

Then I thought some more....

She could go with!

I could make a Mrs. Browndirt, she could do everything we did.

Mrs. Browndirt arrived safe and sound at the campground with us. She sat nice and still on the trip over. She didn't even get into the graham crackers and leave crumbs all over.

Mrs. Browndirt wasn't able to start the fire like she said, 

BUT 

I got all kinds of encouragement while I started the fire. I used paper. Mrs. Browndirt said that was okay, I still only used one match like she does. 

Always the prankster, she played with the flashlight. When it got dark, she stuck it under her chin and tried to scare us. 

Time to go geocaching!! It was me, my sister Jane, and Mrs. Browndirt.

First up was a cache inside a library.....

We needed to search the card catalog for John Sculley. This was the wrong drawer. It was the next drawer we tried. We found what we needed and went searching for the book.

Mrs. Browndirt helps sign the logbook...

There were kids playing video games at the library. 

A bunch of them kept staring at us.

Watching us.

What the heck?

Was it because we actually used the old card catalog to find a book? 

I can't imagine what else would cause anyone to take a second look at us. I thought the three of us blended right in at the library. Good geocacher use stealth. Doesn't do anything to call attention to themselves. I think we were okay.

The next cache was in a small wooded area, in the middle of no where. There was no clear path to it. We had to fight our way through the trees to find it. It is called bushwhacking. The next problem was getting the lock open. It took a couple attempts before we got it right.

I opened the door...

and looked inside.

I screamed my fool head off and slammed the door!

Jane's eyes bugged out, "whaat?"

Then I started laughing and couldn't stop.

Jane wanted to know if there was a mirror in there?

NO! Go look!

Jane refused to look, 

and Mrs Browndirt just sat there with that amused look of hers, wondering what all the fuss was about.

I finally calmed down enough to re-open the door. Jane came over slowly to see what made me scream so much.

It was just a fake chicken with real feathers and beady little eyes watching for anyone who might open the door. The cache was in the drawer. We did a few more caches that were pretty tame, then headed back to the campground.

After a few hours of geocaching, Mrs. Browndirt needed to lay back and relax. 

We had lots of fun while camping. Our only complaint was how HOT and miserable we were every afternoon. 

The body for Mrs. Browndirt came from (HERE)