A Finish and Other Whatnots

Hi everyone!!  I hope that you all had a great weekend!  And that you're staying warm!  We've been colder than anything around here lately.  I'm hoping that the groundhog is right this year and Spring comes early.  In my book, it can't come early enough.  I'm sick of all this cold!!

I finally tamed the beast in the form of the mitered borders on the Cotton Club and it's finished.  After months of putting the thing together and then another month (or two... or three) of stressing over the darned mitered border, I finally took myself by the arm, forced myself into the sewing chair and decided it was time to get it off the quilting WIP list once and for all.  So thanks to those wonderful videos on YouTube, here it is:

Ahem...Bailey, do you think that you could move?

Hello?  Bailey?  Do you hear me?  Hmmm, not listening, are you???  Darned dog!!  No surprise there - just like my kids when they were little (well, they're still that way - who am I kidding?).  Oh well, the lighting isn't good for a photo op anyway.  So a couple hours later the lighting got better and I convinced Bailey to go outside (I told him that there was a kitty cat in his yard), and here is my finish:

The Cotton Club

(mitered borders and all)

I don't know what my big fear was with mitering those borders - it turned out to be so easy (although you'll notice the fabric tails at the corners that I can't bring myself to cut off until the quilt has its final pressing just in case).  I'm so happy that it's finally done!!

In stitching news, Ann Smith is coming along although not as quickly as I had hoped.  A few nights where stitching time was a big fat zero.  But this is where I was last time I posted:

And this is where I was a couple days ago - Dear Son came home for a visit along with four friends from college this weekend and they camped out in our basement.  Can you say Dorm party?  Lots of cooking and washing (DS couldn't let an opportunity pass by without having mom do his wash) and laughing because of all the funny college stories they told and yes, there were a couple that I had to plug my ears - kind of - LOL):

The over one lettering and the sky just below that were the real time killers.  That took so long!!  But I'm loving her with her bright colors.  Although by my next post I may be hating her.  After this section, I have a whole section of over one.  If you hear some screaming and a car furiously gunning its engine and the squealing of tires (that is if our roads aren't all iced over as they have been here for a while, otherwise you can envision me furiously doing donuts in the street), you can rest assured that it will be me trying to run it over!!

After finishing up the Cotton Club I decided to start on one of the quilting projects I picked for this year.  Well, I lied.  I actually started two projects.  I started on Sylvia's Bridal quilt and got the first four blocks done.   Dear Jane will wait a little bit as I think that I'm learning a lot with these blocks that will serve me well when it comes time for Jane.  These are persnickety blocks - a little more detailed than the Farmer's Wife blocks.  Or maybe not - I think that with these blocks I'm given less fabric to work with than with previous Block of the Month programs, so I have to really take my time in cutting out the pieces.  The blocks will be a finished size of 6 inches.

Sylvia's Bridal Quilt BOM

I decided that since these blocks were rather time consuming I would also work on another quilt.  One that doesn't require a lot of brain power and can go together easily.  This was a kit from a local quilt store that I picked up during the summer and because of the fabrics - Blackbird Designs Antique Fair, I just had to have it.  I only have three blocks together at this point:

Easy peasy blocks that I can practically do blindfolded....well, maybe not.

So there you have it.  A little bit about what I've been up to since my last post.

And I have an apology too.  One of my plans (not a resolution, but a plan) was to post more and also comment more in 2013.  I have seriously lagged in the commenting department and I'm sorry for that.  It seems that I've needed a slight break from commenting because of things that have been going on around here  - nothing bad at all, just the kind of thing where you need to put attention to other things for a while.  Seems that once I got through my craft room, I proceeded to go through the house with reckless abandon cleaning out things.  I don't know about other people, but I get a huge sense of "Ahhhh" when I get things cleaned out.  I'm happy, the Salvation Army is happy, but it hasn't left me with much time to comment - and when I've had time, I put it into sewing as a reward for cleaning things out.  We're also gearing up to do some inside home improvements which means I'm driving around in my car looking for paint colors, bathroom vanities, etc.  BTW, did I mention that I hate looking for paint colors!!

So, I'm sorry and hopefully I'll be back to commenting more soon.  I think that my husband is getting a little worried that I'm going to empty out the entire house and buy all new things!  Well, it's been a thought!  Not really - maybe some new stash - but definitely not a whole house of goods.

Have a wonderful week and thank you so much for your comments!!  They truly mean a lot to me!!

The End of September

Okay, I know that this sounds lame - but what the heck happened to September???  Seems to me that I just made a blog post and was just getting the kids back up to school.  Now I'm seeing Halloween (and in some cases, Christmas decorations - what's up with that?) in the stores, and October starts tomorrow!!  I thought that with school starting and everyone back to their respective jobs and school, my life would be free - free to quilt and stitch with reckless abandon.  Guess it didn't happen that way.  I had such good intentions on posting on a more regular basis.  Didn't happen.  But maybe things will get better, right?

There has been very little stitching going on - at least that I can show.  My progress on Charlotte Clayton (excuse the folds - too lazy to press) has been really lackluster:

Not a heck of a lot for the month of September or since my last blog post.  Mr. (or Mrs) Kitty Cat is in and so is Mr (Mrs). Rooster/Peacock - I'm not sure what that's suppose to be.  I would have been much further along, but I met with an unfortunate incident of "I can't count" (happens more than I care to admit) and I had to frog out an entire nights worth of stitching:

He's missing his whiskers, but the thread just came for those, so I will have to add them in.

I've also been stitching a little bit here and there on the Susan Singleton SAL which I can't show pictures until December, but we've had a new addition to the SAL list - Evelyne from Eef's Needle.  I think that we're now up to 8 participants.  Welcome Evelyne!!! The rest of the participants are listed in my previous blog post and if you'd like to jump on the SAL bandwagon - don't hesitate - the more the merrier!  Here's Susan just to refresh your memory - an ambitious project to say the least - but we're breaking it down over a two year span - plenty of time to finish the sampler (so I say with hesitant confidence):

So what has been happening besides my mediocre stitching?  Well, DD had a little mishap in walking one day.  Actually, not her fault - Mr. Bailey decided to bury a bone under his blanket, DD walked across the blanket, turned her ankle - and ended up fracturing her foot (see Bailey looking a little sheepish?).  So she's sporting this most attractive form of footwear and using crutches.

Not good as it will affect her dancing for another month or two.  But for all bad things, a good thing happens and yesterday was her birthday - her 15th Birthday - when did she get this old?

And her friend Max came over the house bearing a stuffed ladybug and a cup of her favorite Starbucks - Pumpkin Spice Latte - ymmm:

Aren't they cute?

See the HC on the lid of the cup?  That was his way of asking her to the Homecoming Dance.  So sweet!  He is a real sweetheart, although my heart goes into spasms thinking that she's old enough for a a boy to like her - I mean really like her!!!  He's even offered to come over and help decorate her boot as she'll still be wearing it when Homecoming happens.  Like I said - he's sweet!

I have managed to get a little bit of quilting done!  I'm still lovin' on some baskets and I managed to get 7 of them made in the past few weeks.  Working on this QAL with Siobhan has been so much fun.  She keeps me excited about working on these babies!  She's beating the pants off me though - I think 55 to my 30, but I'll catch up.  And some progress is good progress, right (excuse those threads you see - LOL)?

But there are more baskets waiting in the wings - about 60 templates pressed on fabric:

And more fabric waiting for some template love:

Did I mention that I love these little baskets?

And finally late last week I had room to breathe and I had missed sewing so much, so I took the bull by the horns determined to get the Cotton Club quilt knocked off the list of things to do.  I managed to get five blocks finished:

Which now only leaves two more blocks - Woo Hoo!!

So there's my month of September for you.  Not a lot accomplished, but October is looking really, really good!!

One last thing that has taken up some of my time this month was continuing to track my genealogy.  The large document that I found was a wealth of information and a lot of the month of September was spent building my family tree.  And a lot of Google Translator as a good portion of the front end of the document has events and information all in French.  Time consuming and I'm still working on the translating.  I finally managed to get the tree finished up at least as far as the document goes.  Mundia, which is the site I'm using to build the tree - tends to give you a lot of hints towards other things - you can see the little leaves at the top corners of each person.  So now it's a matter of checking out all the hints and start digging.  Because my family was so involved in things that happened in Detroit during the 1700's I've found that there are a lot of books that record a lot of their lives and so I need to start trying to track those down.

One funny story that I did find in the document (and there are a lot of stories pulled from newspapers and documents from the day) was that one of the houses of a relative started on fire and the woman in the house ran out in hysterics and on the way out the front door grabbed a gun that was sitting on a table.  Well, she ran out of the house screaming and waving the gun around, got so hysterical that when she got outside and her neighbor came to see what all the uproar was about,  my relation pulled the trigger and shot the neighbor dead!  Not good!!  I've managed to track my family down 28 generations.  I'm the 28th.  Now I'm in the process of tracking up from the first person that appeared and see how much further I can go back.  It's a lot of work, but so exciting!!

So that was my month of September.  Thank you for the comments you left on my last blog post, and I've tried to do a good job of keeping up with everyone (for once) and have really enjoyed seeing what everyone is working on!  I really missed that during the summer!   Take care and stitch a lot!!

Fifty Shades of Red

Hi everyone!! Sorry for the long absence in blogging.  I have missed keeping up on what everyone has been doing.   I have to admit that I have been lurking around the blog world here and there, but have been really bad about leaving comments.  I actually thought of just leaving Smiley faces when I did manage to find some blog time so that you would know I was there, but I thought that was a little bit lame.  I guess that my lack of posting (and commenting) kind of turned into an unplanned sabbatical from blogging.  It's been a rather hectic summer and I'm just coming up for air.  But I have managed to get a few things done!!

Now, lest you think that this will be a post about a new trilogy of erotic books like Fifty Shades of Grey, put your minds at rest.  Although I wouldn't mind writing something like that!!  I could make lots of money, have liposuction (okay maybe not - the whole idea of that scares me), bury myself in tons of new stash from all the royalties from the books, and snap my fingers and say, "Here Boy", when I dropped my quilting/stitching needle or needed a little liquid refreshing, all while I'm sitting in my lounge chair looking out over the Mediterranean/Caribbean, etc.  Lovely thought, right?  Such a dream!  But no, this is a PG rated blog. But lately I've been obsessed with the color red.  Lots of shades of red - fabric that is!  I dream about them, obsess about them and this is what I'm doing with some of those fifty shades of red:

Okay, I know - this is only 15 shades of red, but I'm working on the other 35 and then some.   276 more (actually 273 more - 3 were off having coffee or something and did not make it into the photo shoot) to be exact, but I try not to think about the number that I still have to do.  And I'm working on this with Siobhan from across the pond.  Actually, I jumped on her bandwagon and when she mentioned this quilt and that she was working on it, Trick or Treat, from the Blackbird Designs book, When The Cold Wind Blows, I just knew that I had to do it.  Crazy, yes, I know, 291 basket blocks, another 48 border blocks.  Truly insane, but they are so much fun, and it's fun having a partner in crime to work on them with!!

I had tons of reds in my stash and never knew what to do with them.  But now I know.  These babies are like eating candy - addicting.  And this is my first foray into hand applique (well, okay I'm lying - I tried it a long time ago and absolutely hated it).  But times have changed - I had so wanted to make the Phebe quilt,  really didn't trust my applique skills, but knew if I wanted that quilt I had better learn how to do it.  This is a great portable project and I drag them everywhere when I have to sit waiting for the kids!  Everything is in this box and I just pick it up and go!!  So much fun!!

I also managed to machine sew one lone block on my Cotton Club quilt - poor thing.  I still have about nine to do and then I can start putting the quilt together.  It's the one on the right.  There hasn't been much time to sit behind the sewing machine this summer.  :o(

Now, in case you think that I had given up stitching during my unplanned sabbatical from blogging, that would not be the case.  I've still managed to put needle to linen and actually have a finish:

Ann Hall

The Scarlett Letter

It was good to finish up this old WIP!!  But the whole time I was working on the bird under Adam, I kept thinking that the bird was so large that he could probably swallow Adam up in two bites - ymmm:

And once dear Ann was finished, I decided to start a new one - Elizabeth Clayton:

Elizabeth  Clayton

35 ct. Meadowrue

NPI Silks

I love working on her.  I don't know if it's the silks or what, but she's a joy to stitch.  It's always a toss up what I work on at night - Elizabeth or quilt baskets. 

Like I mentioned, it's been just one of those summers where I haven't had a lot of time to myself, but I did manage to take a small break when my sister came to town.  Even though she had lived in Michigan for 20+ years before she moved to California, she had never been to Mackinaw Island, so I surprised her and arranged a couple day getaway:

 You get to the island via ferry:

You grab a bike - the only mode of transportation besides walking or horse drawn carriages:

(DD makes bike riding look good!) and you ride around:

The Grand Hotel:

On the grounds of the Grand Hotel:

Arch Rock:

On the main street:

And a trip wouldn't be complete without some fudge which the island is known for:

There were more pictures taken with a phone, but they didn't translate well when I tried to post them here.  So there is my summer!!  Not a lot accomplished as far as stitching and quilting, but I spent a lot of time with my kids and that's always a good thing.

I'm anxious to catch up with everyone!!  I've missed your posts!!  I hope that everyone has had a great summer (can you believe it's almost the end of August?) and I'm going to catch up with everyone.  I can't wait to see what I've missed!!