While the big cat's away...

While Big Cat Daddy is gone, I have been VERY busy with my WIPS and some new things. I am hoping for a totally Handmade Christmas this year! The pumpkin pillow above is finally finished!

I am thinking I should have photographed more detail of the pillow above, I love to mess with "unconventional" ways. Like Vintage and new fabrics randomly quilted together, and then randomly embellished with my creations ( crocheted motifs) or Vintage buttons, or fun trims and embroidery. Keep checking back as I plan to update the blog all week with the fun I have been having! Oh 41 is going to be great!

What's going on here-

Fell asleep with her goodie bag from her friend's pinata!

Jessica's visit last weekend was GRAND!!! We miss her!

Jurnee's quilt beginning...lots of work to go, those triangles are not east...but it will be cute when it's done in a few years!

Quilt time!

Finally finished piecing the top of the string scrap quilt. I am happy how it turned out. I will be using it for soccer games, camping, that kind of thing. It was so easy, almost more difficult to find the scraps:)

Remember this...finally stitched the binding!

Stitched the binding yesterday, put it on Sophia's bed while she was busy. When she noticed some time later, she walked in her room, and said, "Mom, I LOVE my new Quilt thank you!" Just priceless, she is so fun, and now she has a cute quilt, Jurnee will be next!

Quilt finally basted!

You may remember Sophia's quilt, from March.hmm...hmmm Anyway, the goal was to have the top pieced in the month of March. Which included the 24 embroideries, mostly from Wee Wonderfuls. Well, I did that, but I could not get the border right for anything, so I put it away for awhile, and Sunday I was able to get the binding on, baste it, and now I am actually tying it. I planned to send it out for quilting, but I think there is enough "busy"and I did not want to take away from the embroideries. And this is only a large twin size. So anyway, I will let you all know when I am done!

I love fall, and so do my girls, if you look closely, you can actually see Sophia's pigtails! First time on Sunday, and this is a milestone I am telling you! Her passport is almost two years old, and I dug it out the other day, and she still looks EXACTLY the same! she was very proud of those pigtails too!

Crazy Holiday Weekend!!

Jurnee & cousin Tanner

Sophia on Daddy's lap

The parade & fireworks were just so much fun! The girls LOVED the fireworks. We went to a small (dare I say hick) town nearby and saw one of the best displays of fireworks we had seen in years!

Just could not resist this photo on the blog. I let the girls choose their own fabric for pillowcases, and Sophia is just so small I put her in her case! See, I have actually been sewing!
Small table covering I made for my kitchen, with some of my charm pack fabrics. Also, I did some minor machine quilting on here and I think it photographed well, considering my photo issues. Love the new camera btw.

Quilt in progress...

So, this is the beginning of the quilt I hope to finish for Sophia. I have embroidered the stitchettes from Wee Wonderfuls. I am having issues with the corner fabrics though. I really need to find something with pink, as that was the initial plan, and I am going back to it. Large patterns do not work with the embroideries, and some small prints are just not right, you know how it is?

Anyway, just wanted to show the progress, still do not have a camera...pretty sad when I have to use my 5-year old's camera. But with our busy schedules these past weeks and the snow...arghhhh, it is hard to get out with two little children.

Back to normal

Back to normal it is. I think last week was pretty much one of the most stressful weeks I have had in awhile. One saving grace is that in the midst of it, to blow off steam, I rearranged the living room, and now I am enjoying it.
In my last post I told of my grandpa's passing, this photo was taken by him in September of 1981. It is the view he had from his cabin in the woods to the water. While pouring over photos, this one touched me the most and I thought I could share it since my camera issue hasn't been solved.

I wanted to get out to at least look at cameras, but you know with the 8 or 10 inches of white stuff falling like heavy rain today, I decided to stay in and work on my first large quilt project. It is going well, I am alternating cutting, and embroidering now, as I have 25 squares to embroider. I have four done so far, and I do think these will go pretty fast. I have used some of Hillary Lang's designs so far, but I think I will be designing my own, as I have a few ideas.
Stay tuned for that if I ever get a camera...arghhh. Maybe tomorrow. If I can drive down the road. Seriously, the snow is piled so high it is just ridiculous. Fun for my girls, but ridiculous none-the-less.

Thank you for the nice comments about my grandpa's passing. It is comforting to know that people actually do read my blog once in awhile, and they do care.

I really need a new camera!

This quilt block is a sample (to see if I might be able to make a large quilt) for Sophia. I used some scraps I had on hand, so these aren't the actual fabrics, but I do plan on pink and red as the main colors. The other set of blocks will have embroidery incorporated with them. Hopefull I can finish that later today.

Anyway, I do need a new camera, but I seem to be getting organized, so rather than get behind, I am going to post what I've been doing. The photo above is some embroidered (again the photo...argh...) towels for my kitchen, again, I used some SUBLIME STITCHING patterns. Love them. And boy would I love to attend one of Jenny Hart's classes/workshops. Someday maybe.

Weekend is over...already

Well, my weekend would not seem to have gone so quickly if I hadn't slept most of it. I went to bed early the last two nights, slept in both Saturday and Sunday and slept most of Sunday too. I sure hope I am not coming down with something!
One thing I know I am coming down with though is some new quilt ambition! I just found some fabrics to make a sample for a quilt I might like to make for Sophia's new bed. You know a "big girl bed." Hard to believe that she is to that point already! Now, if she could try to talk, we would be in business. Seems like she just stopped trying a few weeks ago. I will check in with the finished sample and hopefully another creation tomorrow.

Quilting & "Cheese"

This is a baby quilt top I just finished. Some of you may notice some of the squares are from the 5x5 square swap I was part of last year, finally using them...lol. Anyway, I hope to be a part of another swap like that sometime. Read about it here.














I then went into my embroidery pattern stash, and I think this one was from my grandma. So I had a great time doing this. I like doing the stamped embroidery once in awhile! Also, I apologize for the photo quality. I am still using Jurnee's camera.

While I was photographing the quilt top, Sophia was saying, no YELLING Cheese, so I had to take a photo of her too, boy that hair is sure slow going! But still cute nonetheless.

Weekend Retreat

So, Where was I this past weekend? I went on a scrap booking retreat. Mainly I went not only to get away for a weekend, but to see if I am still as passionate as I once was about scrap booking. I did answer my question, but I went away with so much more. Our speaker was Tricia Morris the owner of CLUB SCRAP.
This company is amazing, but Tricia herself was an incredible teacher/speaker. WE learned some fast layouts, (which is the premise of club scrap,) but we also learned book binding and I very much enjoyed this workshop! In fact I plan to do more soon.

This pillow above I finished last night with the help of my mom's button stash and it turned out pretty good, but my photos are not the greatest, as usual. I am trying to finish what I have started. So you will see more in the very near future! I have been adding to my Etsy shop.
I could not resist this photo op. This is my little Sophia, with two of her babies, and her cousin Jake's graduation photo placed precisely in that position by her on her lap. I must have giggled for 1/2 hour about this one.

Latest Happenings

Lousy photos, but this is one of my latest projects. Winter, Spring, Summer, Fall. I appliqued the circles into what I feel is a change of seasons that we experience here in Wisconsin. I really need to figure out how to make better photos with the digital camera, or I may as well forget it! Sheesh...
I also picked up my poppy pattern for my applique class, and I can hardly wait to get started on it. I will show my progress as I work on it.

I just called my sister in Minneapolis and she is not affected by the bridge collapse other than inconvenience, though she said at approximately 6:05 Tuesday night she was on that very bridge, man, close call. I bet traffic sill be a disaster there for awhile. We will see in early September when we go there for the fair. Did you know the Minnesota State Fair is incredible?...I like to hang out in the arts & crafts building, lol.




Janell was here this weekend and took some fabulous photos of the girls for me. She is so stinkin' talented. She works with all sorts of vintage cameras for herself and has a darkroom where she develops the photos herself, but using my camera seemed to work out fine. (Maybe she could tell me what I am doing wrong.)

Enough for tonight...

Feeling a little fallish

We are so incredibly busy around here, with I don't know what, I guess it is just the home with two small children.
So, this potholder is something I came up with awhile back, and while cleaning & reorganizing my craft room, I found this unfinished little number, and decided to finish it, I am pleased with it, and plan to make more for my Etsy shop.
Speaking of the Etsy shop, I created the shop last year in September I think, and had lots to sell, before I got it all in the shop, I sold it. So I will be more prepared this time around, and I have a few other things coming along. I will report when new items are listed, probably in a couple of weeks.

Update on Rusty's dad, he is getting by, still in the hospital, so far the surgeries he had last week have been successful, he gets rods in his back on Friday.