Last Minute Gifts

Are you looking for some great ideas for creative Christmas gifts?  Check out Pink Chalk Studio to see some fabulous tutorials.  She has a handmade with Love contest going on.  There are plenty of great gifts that you could finish before Christmas.  Check it out and let me know what you think.

I finished attaching the binding for the tree skirt and sorting the pile scraps.  I made some ribbon bookmarks too.  I hope to post the tutorial later this week.  It wasn't a very productive day.

Happy Stitching!

Skirt is Quilted

I accomplished one thing so far this week- I finished quilting a tree skirt.  I have felt like I could take a nap at any given moment this week...wait I did take one last night.  I did a little line dancing in the squares, and some very bad ribbon candy in the tree trunks.  I keep practicing at this design, but I can't see much improvement.  This was made by my niece, and I knew she would just be happy to have it quilted.

Design Wall Monday

I am happy with my progress this week.  I am still working on quilting this tree skirt, but I did get my star quilt pieced.  I found the perfect fabric in my stash for the inner border.  I had a fat quarter which left me with just 2"x22" of scrap.  

I went ahead and pieced the backing while I was motivated.  I had some odd ball shaped pieces and it was time for me to get them used up.  The trouble is now I like the back as much as the front!  Is it wrong when the back of the quilt has more pieces than the front?  Perhaps I should just make this a lap quilt.  Just something to ponder.  I hope to get this quilted over Christmas vacation so I can hang it after the first of the year.                                                 My design wall is still full of the flannel scraps from 2 weeks ago.  Hopefully I can make some progress on that this week as well.   Thanks for visiting.  Check back with Judy and see what others are working on this week.

Betty the Grate

One of Betty's favorite moments was meeting Bonnie Hunter in Shipse.  She loved Bonnie and all her patterns.  Bonnie's blocks in the Quiltmaker magazines kept her busy making potholders for years - but she was very selective on who she made them for.  I am sure Carolyn will have a list of who has been naughty and who has been nice.  I must have made it to the nice list somewhere along the way because I received some potholders from her.

I was always nervous when Betty would receive a gift from me.  It was the inspection process that worried me.

Betty was often caught in the act of sorting other peoples scraps.  If she liked one of your pieces of fabric, she would hint very strongly to throw the scraps her way.  Or she would often ask, "do you have any more of that one."

We loved her for her honesty and her great one line interjections that made us all smile during meetings.  She will be greatly missed.

Another Topper

This pinning at night thing seems to be working for me.  I was able to get this top all put together without the borders in just a week.  This included re-work from poor workmanship.

I have pulled another project to work on.  I am saving the border work for a different time.  I will have a weekend of borders.  Is this called batch processing?


In order to please my daughter - who exclaimed I had nothing to hang on the wall for Christmas, I pulled some more leftover charms.  I think these pieces will never end!


I saw this pattern on a blog, so I

followed the link to Moda.  I won't have it ready for Christmas, but always get in the mood to sew for the holidays too close to Christmas.  Perhaps it will be finished for next year.  This pattern would make a great tree skirt also.  The patterns calls for this ruler, but if you have been practicing the take away method, you already know how to do this.  If you are still struggling with the, you may want to get the ruler to help you.

Remembering Betty

Remembering all the fun and laughter Betty brought to the ISE quilt group.  If you wanted an honest opinion, Betty was sure to tell you what she thought.  Nothing brought a smile to her face more than going through a bucket of scraps or digging in the boat at Shipshe.

Betty left us today after her battle with cancer.

Picture Fix...I hope

Well, I found this great blog to help me with my out of space dilemma (I hope).  It took some time to find this site.  I was happy to hear that I was not alone in my "out of space" problem.  She has some great tutorials on blogging.  She referred me to this free photo editing website along with a great tutorial.

Hopefully this will help me have better pictures on my blog and also more memory.

This is the quilt I am focusing on this week.  If you've been with me for lots of years, you will recognize it.

Since my photo uploaded fabulously, I would have to say the tutorials were amazing.  By resizing and cropping my pictures before I upload them, they upload speedy quick too.

Thanks for stopping by.  I am back to seam ripping, pressing, and pinning.  I have learned so much since I started this quilt.

Inspired!!

Bringing out these old projects and working on them is very inspiring to me, yet I still can't focus on doing one project at a time.  I am excited to be getting to know these UFOs once again.  This is where my wheels started turning, and my excitement started building.  Wouldn't it be fun to have sort of a fashion show/parade of all my projects that I have hidden away in containers?

I thought this could have a multi-effect.

1. I could count all my unfinished projects so I knew exactly what I had
2. I would get reacquainted with what I needed to do to finish them
3. I could decide if I wanted to finish them or donate them - perhaps there is some stuff in my studio that I don't want to finish
4. I could prioritize and set some goals on what I want to finish in 2013 - which will once again be focused on finishing 
5. I could put binding fabric with each of my projects so I don't use it for something else

Binding was one thing that really hindered me this year.  When I put most of my projects away, I did not put the binding fabric with it.  Don't make this mistake!  Once fabric sells out, you are generally out of luck, or you will waste loads of time looking for the perfect binding to match.  Is there anyone else that would like to join the UFO parade?

I do realize - this is going to cause a huge mess in my currently clean studio.  And readers- don't judge me when I get over 50 (and I don't mean years old).

This Weeks projects

I can't exactly call it the design wall, because I didn't work on my project that I had on the design wall.  I did do a fair amount of sewing this weekend, but I don't have much I can share.

My niece finished piecing her tress skirt.  I am so happy that she is showing a crafty interest.  I hope my own children will someday.  This is her second quilty project.  I hope to get it quilted for her this week so it can go under her tree.








I completed Betty's quilt last week.  Shari was kind enough to join the blocks, and Lorraine did the embroidery in the center.  I added the borders and did simple quilting.  Char did the super quick binding job.  Thanks for all your efforts!  And Eleanor, I even put a label on it.

My sideline project this week is to continue to put an old quilt together.  I guess I can't post a photo of it.  Can anyone help me with how to get more storage without a monthly fee?  I thought I could do it with Google Docs, but I must be doing something wrong.