Howdy Ya'll!!!
It's sunny but a bit chilly with the wind outside here in little ole' Barryton, Michigan. The birds are just chripping themselves silly and hopping for everything they got.
First ~ I finally motivated myself to face the dreaded Treadmill this past week. I have been putting it off forever as I was waiting for my other half - Steve - to show me how to work the darn thing. Well.... Monday I finally grabbed the bull by the horns and took a few minutes of looking for the on button. After a few seconds of pondering it, I was able to figure it out and was on my way. I was determine that I was going to make myself dedicate 15 minutes to it at the #2 speed. Oh Vay!! Did I feel that. I came off the monster and had spagetti legs. But I did it.... and told myself that I would do it everyday since I have a choice of staying where I was at with my personal circle of hell or grab the bootstraps & get to it. So the circle is slooooowly being broken one stride at a time. Which isn't a bad thing seeing how I was able to quilt smoking cold turkey a year ago on April 5th. I was doing good 'til yesterday when I got so wrapped up in my quilting day and missed my time. So today to make up for it.... I did 30 minutes. That works out just a smidge over a mile and worth 112 calories burned. After that it was a small bowl of oatmeal, cinnamon and dried cranberries...with a touch of brown sugar. Oh and there was the one slice of whole wheat toast. Chicken breast for dinner tonight.
But anyways..... it quilting news this week....
I got spent a couple of days re-sorting and general straightening of my meager stash, but I was able to local some fabrics for some applique work that is planned for the outer boarder of my Q&N Challenge top. If you remember from my last post this was the one that was just driving me crazy. I stood up to it .... refused to let it beat me..... and got the top done!! At least up to the point that was needed for the contest. I know like it soooo much that I want it to fit my queen-size bed. But the hair pulling has come to an end! YEAH!!!!! Happy Dance Y'all! LOL.
I'm going to add a nice wide border of no less than 8" and add a nice time period-ish type applique of flowers vines & leaves. The challenge to break us out of our quilty ruts and was called "They Choose, You Make." This was a new way for me to take part 'cuz this challenge was we were paired up with a partner. We both had to agree with a pattern, then discuss what fabrics that the other partner had to use in the choosen pattern, and the size. Which is a big part to rather it would be just a top (twin-size or bigger) or if it was a small project -which had to be completily done & quilted. So I got paired up with Debbieann from Canada. We agreed on pattern & fabrics; those being the look of scrappy quilts, Civil War Era colors, and the pattern: Feedsack Common by Susan McDermott ( http://www.windhamfabrics.com/cgi-bin/fabricshop/projects.cgi?patternID=110 ) and we was off.
But..... we just ended up taking it just a bit farther..... this is where we decided to make it even more special to each other. We sent other a surprise Fat Quarter along with some other bits & pieces from our own tops to the other to use in the applique sections of our tops. We also figured out that we both are using the same applique pattern that we both loved on another quilt. It was tooooo funny.
But here it is... done per the rules at least. TADA!!!!!
My P.I.T.A quilt top.
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| Q&N Challenge Top |
Let's see what else this week. I might have mentioned last week that I'm taking part in a Mother's Day Swap on my OST yahoo group. Well I got the first mini quilt/wallhanging finished. I found this pattern on Fatcats.com I believe and embroidered it. It only took me a couple of evenings of TV Time to knock it out and I finished it up yesterday with the sashing, snadwiching & quilting. My choice was for an echo quilting pattern, by hand. I actually thought it came out better than I thought it would. It is mere finished 10" x 13" . And I'm on the last of my Blue Redwork telephones for the second mini nine-patch quilt. Pictures to come when I finish it this weekend.
I also got some other things done..... like 3 ~ 6.5" blocks for a quilt and a label for another. I can't show pictures of those yet as they are a suprise. So yeah I've been busy as usual. Someone asked me how I got so much done..... my answer.... I have no life....LOL.
Oh before I forget.... here is the picture that I promised last week. This shows the bag & mugrug that I won from the March 17th Blog Hop.
Okay ..... Well I have rambled on again for the week. So I guess I should go work on the telephone block, from there I have 15 Scrappy Calico & White Blocks to make for a swap, finish quilting my Feb. mini quilt, get started on tracing my applique pieces for the PITA top. Then there is the..... and the............ well you get what I mean. It just never ends...LOL.
So Toodles for now,
Tricia
Well today is a fresh new start and there is nothing more I like is slowly waking up to a nice spring thunderstorm. My Mother always said I had a thing for thunderstorms... she thought is because I'm a Sag/Scorpio cusp baby with fire and water as my elements and that was the way Mother Nature tend to blend together. She also thought my personality also has some of the same traits. I don't know if that is at all true, but I do Love me a good storm..... but anyways I'm babbling on.
Yesterday I was working on my Q&N "They Choose & You Make" Challenge. And I felt like all I managed to do is waste a whole day, get stressed out & frustrated to the point the top went flying across the room. This is a really pretty pattern that I'm working and definitily a Challenge since I've never made "Snowballs" or "Flying Geese" blocks before. The pattern is a freebie (got to love freebies!) from Windham Fabrics. I'm doing mine in scrappy Civil War-ish Fabrics. I don't have a big stash so this will put a serious dent in it so I guess I can consider it to be stashbusting too. But I have had some help from a couple of fellow quilting ladies to help me fill in the void towards completing the top. Thank You Ladies.... you know who you are. Hugs!!!
http://www.windhamfabrics.com/cgi-bin/fabricshop/projects.cgi?patternID=110
This is the center of my quilt at the stage where I was still happy with it.
Today I refuse to let my Challenge defeat me!! I will stand up it and lay all out on the ground. Now I remember why I started the mini quilts. LOL They are sooooooo less stressing and much easier to manage. I will let you know if I won or not. LOL.....only the Shadow knows!!
Oh I have eye candy! These are the little nine-patches and 2 of the telephone Blue Redwork blocks I've been working on for my Mother's Day Swap. This is my current handwork project when I'm not at the puter or sewing machine. I kind of like this and may have to do another.
Then after that is my HT Forum Lottery block that went out yesterday. The first picture is the square of fabric that each of got. We have to make a 12" block using the fabric in some way. I just happened to be thumbing thru my "Civil War Diary" book when the mail came..... and presto!!! The China Doll block seemed to be a prefect fit for the fabric. Sooooo traced to fuseable and then tryed needleturn applique on the dress. Actually came out better than I had expected. And I might have enough of the fabric left to make another one for myself. I also had my first exiperence with silk thread on the dress. The jury is still out on that one.
I also got my 6 sets of piano keys done (for the 2nd time) and those are in the mail pile too. These are for go with a set of pinwheel blocks that is for a Friends Grandbaby quilt.
Let's else.... oh we had a visitor stop by on our little deck the other day, me & my boy just happen to be out watching the river when "he" stopped by.
Ohhhhhh remember the March 17th Blog Hop? I was able to have the luck of the Irish on the hop. I got about half of them done. Well I won 3 times!!!! Drat!! I had a picture to show ya but camera to puter isn't playing nice. Okay so I guess I'll just tell ya. From Trisha of http://www.allthingscrafty.com/ I won her "Kiss Me, I'm Irish" mugrug. Then from JMF of http://jmf-betterthanideserve.blogspot.com/2012/03/quilters-blog-hop.html I won one of her mineral bags for favorite comment left. And finally From http://www.doublenickelquilts.blogspot.com/2012/03/ribbonry-is-done-and-blog-hop-party.html I won a copy of Candace's Ribbon pattern. Thanks everyone for allowing me to do my 1st Blog Hop and inspiring me to start my own blog!!
So I've been a bit busy lately. I even put the sewing machine away while my 9 year old son Curtis was here a week for Spring Break. Hummmmm, maybe that is why my challenge top is getting the best of me. Who Knows how that goes? Oh yeah ~ the other thing going on was I got my Feb. Mini Quilt top done and as soon as I finish the above projects, I'm going to hand quilt it. It is a never ending cycle. LOL!
Toodles,
Tricia
