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.

3 different things

I didn't do any block lotto blocks this month. 

They required the sewing of curved seams!

I am not a big fan of curved seams. 

Its not that I have never done curves and didn't want to try them.....

I have, really.

I dug this out for proof that I have sewn curves. I just wasn't up to the challenge this month.

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An acreage right outside of town is being torn down. The elevator bought it and they are putting grain storage and weigh stations out there. The house will be torn down. The auction was this past weekend. 

We went because we wanted this....

It was in the breezeway between the house and garage. Tractor joe's brothers made this cupboard way back in 1987 for the owner, Lois. They went out to the barn and grabbed the wood as they needed it. They were told to lay off the sanding by Lois, she wanted it nice and rustic.

We were able to buy it from the person who bought the breezeway and garage. She wouldn't need the wall it was attached to, so we got at it from the outside.

Tractor joe (and me a little bit) took the bottom half of the wall out. If we couldn't free it from the inside, we would take the wall with it. 

Just about free! 

Once we got it out on the driveway, we went back through the house. There was the man who bought all the kitchen cupboards, he was taking those out. Someone else bought all the plumbing and they were busy ripping out that stuff.

The house was about 90 years old. There was really cute wallpaper in the closet of a bedroom upstairs...

And some that was NOT so cute in the hallway....

We spent the afternoon cleaning the garage out. 

UCK.

We still aren't done cleaning and straightening up in there....but it all looks so much better with the new cupboard in place.

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I have a new project to work on...

Crispy's friend, Jacob was over. I am not sure how we got on the subject,

 but I was showing him Tonya's book WORD PLAY Quilts

"These are cool!"

Then I showed him this halloween quilt by Tonya...(click here to see it)

He fell in love with it. 

"I want one like this! Only I want more Zombies!"

I gave him some graph paper, and he got busy drawing and coloring.

Is that a hand coming out of the dirt? He is missing an arm.

How do you spell the sound a Zombie makes?

Karen and I will be headed for Des Moines next Saturday. The Quilt Show is only one week away!!

Not even that!

She doesn't know it yet, but we will be on the look out for Zombie ideas!

I finally remembered to grab the camera out of the car.....

The camera has been going to school with Crispy for a photography class. I finally grabbed it out of the car this morning to take a few pictures. I went outside with blocks and a quilt top. My first attempt with the blocks didn't go so well. Rather breezy.

This has got to be one of my all time FAVORITE blocks to make. It is a Bonnie K. Hunter quilt pattern. (click here) The link goes to the pattern. I sewed strips together on Monday. On Tuesday I put one block together, but it was wrong. Took it apart and redid it. On Wednesday, I had all afternoon to sew. I was surprised when my count was..... 12 blocks.

iheart flowers has a border on it. I loved the way it looked in the quilt store on the floor with this fabric surrounding it. But after I had it sewn on, I wasn't so sure. I thought about cutting it down and adding more black....then when it was laid out for the picture, I didn't think it was that bad. Black binding and it should be okay.

 There is even a farmer flower, since it going to a retired farmer and his wife.

There were freeze warnings last Wednesday night. It really feels like fall. The sunflowers are still working their magic. 

The barn swallows must have split. In August they start sitting and gathering on the electrical wires. They start with about a dozen....By early September there are about 4 dozen lined up...squawking and talkin' away at each other.....and then they are gone.

Well, good bye camera. Be good at school!

4 more.....

Sunday was a good time cutting paper and spreading mod podge all over it.

I have a very old college yearbook. These pictures screamed, "use me!"

It was some kind of tea for freshman. Some sisterhood thing.

Been sewing too, just don't have any pictures of that. My memories quilt (legos) continues to grow 

and the iheart flowers is just about ready to go to the quilters!

flowers from this summer.....

Sorting through photos and putting all my flowers together in one spot.

sweet postcards and not as sweet......

Gwen's daughter Lauren is going to college in Forest City. Only 20 or so miles from here. We had her out here for the weekend. She helped me paint some outside buildings!
Then we were in the kitchen making postcards for her Mom. I had to wait until they arrived in New Mexico to post them......

This one is Lauren's, her dorm building is named London Hall. I know this one made it.
Mine is a no show, so far.....I'll show it here anyway.

We painted the background on these. (used yellow, red and orange acrylics and a sponge) I had a book of Iowa artists, the girl is from a painting by John Kacere. We also used Walgreens ad. We didn't need to find letters....I have a pile of them cut and ready to go. All we had to do was brush on the mod podge & stick the letters down.

Monday morning I took an X-box magazine and started ripping out pages...

and then I started cutting out images, or leaving them whole if they were big enough for the backgrounds.

I ended up making 9 of them. They will be birthday cards for nephews and sons who have birthdays this fall.

Here is a close-up...Keep calm & kill zombies....

The font is the smallest font I have ever seen in a magazine, teeny tiny....obviously written for a much younger crowd.  It was good for stamping the words. These were fun to make, and the first one was mailed today! I hope it makes it.