Stitching and Praying

Sundays are always a time for contemplation for me, as I am sure it is for many of you, too.  It is hard to ignore the insanity of our world right now, and this morning I found it very comforting to be able to pray my heart out until I felt His peace fill me up to the brim, and then spend the rest of the day with My Guy, peacefully stitching and watching the final round of the British Open.

And although he doesn't care at all for golf, my little furry sweetheart cannot resist a quilt, and it wasn't long before I saw this little face pop up .....  Whatcha doin' Mom?

Can I help?

I think you might have a problem .... right .... here .....

At this rate, you'll never get done Mom!!!  

C'mon!  Let me show you how it's done!

Yvonne at Quilting Jetgirl has challenged her readers to take a Mid-Year Review of their goals for 2016 and see how they are doing now that the year is half over.

I didn't have time to do a formal review, but I do know that my main goal for this year is to finish my Blue Collection quilt.  To that end, I have been diligently working the hand applique on this project at every opportunity since the first of the year.

I'm happy to say that the 3D braided tree is now completely appliqued down!  There are still a few small branches at the top that will need to be stitched down after the top row is attached, and of course, hundreds of leaves, but I am so pleased with my progress on this project!

I also have several quilts that are on my list for family members.  Our smallest granddaughter still does not have her baby quilt!  She's 1-1/2 now, so it's definitely time :*)  Other than choosing the pattern and purchasing the fabrics, this project is not yet started.  And I have a brother who hopefully will receive a quilt from me this year as well, but choosing the pattern is as far as I've gotten.  Another goal has been to complete each month's UFO on my Guild Challenge list - except for last month, I've been faithful to get those done - Yay!!!  I am determined to finish last month's Blooming Nine Patch before the year is out.

One special goal for this year is to make a special quilt for a special someone that I can't share for a while.....

As you can see from my design wall here, I've got a great start on it, and if all goes well, I should have it done by the end of this week.  I had a ball digging through my white, gray and black scraps to make this background.

I cut the pieces I could get from them, then of course I saved the little left-over crumbs for a later project.  By the end of the day, I had quite a nice little pile of adorable crumbs :*)

And yes, I had lots of help with this project too!

I'll show and tell on this project as soon as I possibly can, 

but I don't want this someone to see it before it is gifted!

I'm looking forward to a fairly quiet week, which is nice because the past month has been pretty hectic.  I have a sit-n-sew with friends tomorrow - one of my favorite highlights of every week!  I'm teaching a class one day and still have some prep work to do to get that ready.  The rest of the week I will be immersing myself in those things that make myself and my loved ones happy.  And I hope you will be doing the same!  What will you be doing this week that makes you or someone you love happy?

Isn't it wonderful to have a passion in life that allows us to put the chaos of our world on a back burner somewhere, while we enter our peaceful zone with needle and thread?  While the world is seemingly going to hell in a handbasket all around us (one of my grandmother's favorite expressions), I am thankful to be able to take up my needle and choose to create something beautiful and lasting and filled with LOVE to counterbalance the hate spilling out on our streets.  And while I stitch, I pray.  For our country, for all countries, for all people, for our world.  When fear for the future, for the world our children and grandchildren are inheriting tries to overtake my mind, I turn to Psalm 23 - The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.... and before long my broken heart finds rest in His peace.

Hugs & Blessings!

Teresa

=^..^=

Linking up with the following:
Slow Sunday Stitching
Design Wall Monday
Tuesday Linky Party
Oh Scrap!
Can I Get a Whoop Whoop?

A Few Fun Projects - and More on the Horizon

We took Sara and the grandpuppy Link home on Wednesday - what a nice visit it was!

One of our main goals was to get Sara reacquainted with her sewing machine, gifted to her by a sweet friend during her last visit.  She had decided to leave the machine at my house until she was at a place in her life where she could devote more time to sewing.  Although she is finishing up her senior year and plans to start college courses in a few months, she is excited about doing some small projects at home this summer, so we've sent the machine and some basic tools home with her.

As promised, while she was here we each made a cuter-than-cute Shark Pencil Case which I told you about in this earlier post.  This is a design by Patchwork Posse which can be found as a free download on Craftsy.  I got to play with a lot saved-up crumbs for this project....

Sara's case is done in her beloved vintage-inspired pastels....

..... while mine is done in a fun mix of grays - one even has quilting text!

This was a fun project, so much so that I was seriously entertaining thoughts of making one out of each color for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge next year - right up until time to add the zipper - UGH!!!  The designer says this can be a bit "fiddly" - riiiiiiight!  I even had to call in the Snoopervisor for help on this one!

Unfortunately, he wasn't much help.  He's decided zippers are not his thing!

In fact, he was plumb tuckered out by the time we got that sucker in there
and declared an emergency nap break =^..^=

  

It was nerve-wracking to tell the truth, and I had to do quite a bit of hand-stitching to close in the ends properly.  But they are well worth the effort I have to say. These turned out so darn cute and Sara was delighted with her accomplishment.  She did all of the sewing on her shark herself except for the zipper.  I put that in for her - I didn't want the poor child traumatized at this early stage of her sewing career :*)

And here's mine before the button eyes were added ....

I even used "scraps" for the buttons - these are buttons I've saved from recycled men's shirts!

No quilting was done on the Blooming 9 Patch while Sara was here, so I didn't meet my Guild UFO Challenge for June.  We were just too busy, and I had a couple of non-quilty things going on that needed a lot of my time and energy.  But Rocky volunteered for some overtime hours in the Studio to stand guard over the quilt until I can get back to it ....

One reason I ran out of time is because we celebrated the 80th birthday of my dear friend, Joanne!

Yes, she's 80 and still fabulous!!!

And she runs rings around me!  This is the Joanne who often shares her long-arm machine with me.  She had two parties, one given by her daughter for all of her many friends at church, book club, women's groups, as well as a few of her quilting friends.  The second was a small surprise party at the home of one of our Mountain Quiltfest ladies, Susie.  I made the cake for this party and put a lot of love and time into planning and executing it, especially since it had been ages since I had decorated a cake and I wanted it to be perfect!

Joanne loves birds and birdhouses, especially cardinals, so naturally I had to put a couple of those in the birdhouses.  You can just barely see the white picket fence behind them if you look closely.  I let out a deep whoosh of relief once that was done ... I was definitely reminded of why I no longer decorate cakes LOL!!!

I did manage to finish my latest See-N-Go Project bag.  This is the back of the bag featuring a Kaffe Fassett Corsage print ....

And the front with a vinyl see-thru window - I just LOVE Kaffe's purple and pink dot fabric lining showing through - so bright and cheerful :*)

This is a pattern I designed for Jacquelynne Steves for her Summer 2014 Summer E-magazine.  Some of you told me the links I shared in my last post for this pattern no longer work, so she gave me new links for you to get this pattern from her......

Please sign up for my free newsletter and emagazine here http://jacquelynnesteves.com/my-emagazine/

and when you sign up you will get a welcome email with a link to the archives page with ALL of the previous issues. The bag project was in the Summer 2014 issue.

You also can read the online magazine issue without signing up for my newsletter herehttps://issuu.com/jacquelynnesteves/docs/the_art_of_home_summer2014

If you have further questions, please email me at comments@jacquelynnesteves.com

I highly recommend that you sign up for Jacquelynne's FREE e-magazine - it's always full of fun projects, inspirational ideas, and even a few delicious recipes!

A teensy bit of hand stitching has been worked in here and there when I can.  I always enjoy linking up with Kathy's Quilts for her Slow Sunday Stitching linky party - today she talks about multi-tasking and the value of slowing down.  It's a great post - be sure to go over and check it out!

My 3-D braided tree is almost completely stitched down in my Blue Collection center....

And I am finally getting back to playing a little with my Patchwork of the Crosses blocks.  This is the latest one in progress ....

Even with the best of intentions, I didn't find time to join in on these great QAL's, although I fully intend to make a start this coming week.....

   

I really, really want to do both of these.  I love starting something new and fresh, don't you?  I plan to keep both of these pretty simple so they don't end up on my UFO list for next year LOL!!!

Hugs & Blessings!

Teresa

=^..^=

Linking up with the following fun parties:
(links will show up when the party starts :*)
Slow Sunday Stitching
Tuesday Linky Party
Scraptastic Tuesday
Oh Scrap!
Can I Get a Whoop Whoop?
Let's Book It

So Many Projects!!!

I thought I'd share a few of the projects that are getting the lion's share of my attention lately.  I've got so many quilting irons in the fire right now!  But I think I really work best when I have a lot going on.  It keeps me energized and inspired to have lots of different projects to choose from on any given day.  There's always something in the works that trips my trigger and makes me want to play in the studio!!!

Blue Collection is one of my Dinosaur UFO's - it's been in process since 2008!!!  It's my focus project for this year, and I've been steadily plugging along on it.  I'm happy to say that I've finally added the 3D tree in the center!  This tree has been a stumbling block for me from the beginning.  I've been dreading it!  But it got to the point that I couldn't add other elements until the tree was stitched down, so I finally bit the bullet and went for it!

The tree is made from three tapered bias strips of brown fabrics that are braided together and then loosely arranged on the quilt center, with lots of little branches and leaves sprouting out from it.  (Rocky felt that this particular strip should be his - we had a little bit of a disagreement about it, but happily I finally won ☺)

I had to piece together the blocks in the center section of the quilt with their blue-and-white checkerboard sashing before I could begin to make the tree.

When I appliqued that bottom pot, I left a section open so that I could slip the tree limbs down inside ....

I'm doing hand-stitched applique on this quilt, and it's pretty difficult work handling this large center section to stitch down the tree and all those little remaining leaves, but there was just no way around it.  Of course, this little guy with his curious little nose in everything I'm doing doesn't help LOL!!!  This picture was taken just seconds before he snatched the whole piece off my lap and tried to run for it!

There are quite a few wonderful little details stitched into this quilt ....

And lots of stitching remaining to be done!  But I can't tell you how excited I am to have gotten this far on my Blue Collection project!  I will try my best to post about my progress more often :*)

I usually try to have at least one project all set up and ready to stitch at the machine, so that when I have a spare few minutes I can use it stitching.  This is a paper-pieced project in progress called Diamonds Are Forever from a class I took at guild several years ago.

Lots and lots of scrap strips are going into this fun quilt, and it is amazing how quickly these blocks add up!

Happily, I also have an almost finish to show you!!!  Notice Rocky photo-bombing in the top right?  Believe me, he's not going to miss a quilt-on-the-floor opportunity!!!

Calypso is a kit My Guy bought for me quite a few years ago at a local quilt shop that is no longer in business.  I made the quilt top and then put it on my flimsy shelf to be quilted - and it has remained there for way too long.  I decided to put it on my Guild UFO Challenge list, and it's number came up for this month.  My friend Joanne let me use her long-arm machine so I could git 'er done ...

This will be a feel-good finish for me - I love whittling down that flimsy shelf!

Tomorrow my plan is to quilt and bind my little 14" Fractured Seahorse.  The fabric on the bottom is my backing fabric, and I'm thinking to use a scrappy hot pink binding.  This one is going to go in my stand-up frame in the living room for the summer!

After all the sewing I've been doing on my Janome 6600P, it was finally time to send it off to the spa for a good cleaning and to check the timing, etc.  While it was gone, Rocky found a new favorite place to sit and watch me as I putter around the studio ....

He's such a fun little guy, and I love how he keeps us smiling and laughing!

I'll be linking up with lots of fun parties this week:

Slow Sunday Stitching

Design Wall Monday
Main Crush Monday 

Oh Scrap!

I May Have a Scrap Problem

Linky Tuesday Party
WIPs Be Gone 

Hugs & Blessings!

Teresa

=^..^=

Slow Sunday Stitching - Playoffs Style!

I'm so looking forward to watching the NFL Playoff games today!  I'm all set with my hand sewing project and joining my friends at Kathy's Quilts for some Slow Sunday Stitching ....

This is the top right section of the border for my Blue Collection quilt.  Both of these top sections are complete, and I am working on the first of two side border sections now.  The sides are long vines like this that will come out of vases in the bottom of the quilt.  (I'll show you what I mean in a later post!)

All of this quilt is hand appliqued, with the exception of these side border leaves and a few very intricate motifs in the vase blocks, which I've chosen to do as raw-edge fusible applique.  They have so many curves and valleys, it would take FOREVER to hand stitch all these leaves, and I decided I'd rather finish this quilt in my lifetime than worry about whether it is ALL hand stitched LOL!!!  I've indicated one of them by the arrow on the right.....

I'll finish them with a straight-stitch along the edges.  The flower buds indicated by the arrow on the left are little monsters to hand stitch all by themselves!  The fabric I chose for the medium blue in the center is too flimsy and it's almost impossible to make neat V's.  And the points on the stems are very narrow and steep, so it's hard to stuff the seam fabric underneath such a small space.  On some of the last pieces I prepped, I drew the points in a little bit wider V to make them slightly easier to stitch.

It's a great day to be inside stitching here in Nashville!  I'm under the weather a little, battling a sinus infection with the usual accompanying aches, sore throat and cough, so the order for the day is to take it easy.  We're having one of our coldest days so far - currently 32 degrees and woke to a light snow on the ground.  Here's the view from my front window ....   Brrrrrrrrr!

The only bright spot is my little Christmas cactus....

Love that beautiful fuchsia color!!!  I bought it a few weeks before Christmas this year because I loved all my friends cacti which were blooming.  For some reason, it finally decided to wait to bloom this week - I'll take all the bloom and color I can find at this time of year, right?

Hugs & Blessings!

Teresa

=^..^=