Friday, October 31, 2014

Happy Halloween!

I got the last two Civil War blocks done.... so I made 31 blocks this month!
Runaway Slave and Guardian Angel. I think I only need a handful more and I will have enough for a nice size quilt.


These are the pumpkins the kids carved on Wednesday. Aidan's is on the left and Emily's is on the right. Rapunzel is all dressed up in her costume at school today but Aidan is going as himself rather than his power ranger outfit. He said he'd get too hot in it at school.... and his teacher saw him in it last night at the safe halloween event at school. She even touched his muscles and said he must have really been working out after school to get them that big!




Wednesday, October 29, 2014

Wednesday catch up day......

After a quick run to Walmart for some things..... I went right to the sewing room and got caught up on the Civil War blocks. Five were made this morning so I am all caught up to today!!!!! Two more to go for the month of October.

Mrs. Massie's Party

Fight Like a Man


Pig point - yes I cut all those parts and sewed them together!

Second Term


History of Travel



I also laid out the Rainbow Sampler Quilt last night. I have 92 blocks made and really need some more brown, black and a few oranges.... so I'll work on the last 6 or so that are posted for Friday. I need 100 blocks total.... I love how this is coming together.



Time to grab a quick lunch and then it is off to pick up the kids from school. They have an early release today and we will head to the library this afternoon for pumpkin painting with some friends....and then we need to carve out our pumpkins later this afternoon!







Tuesday, October 28, 2014

Tiny Tuesday and Century Quilt is a completed top!

I was able to sew up two quick CW blocks this morning in between adding the final borders onto the Century Quilt. I still have 4 CW blocks to make to catch up for the month but those will get worked on tomorrow.

Hospital Arrangements and Selling the Horse were completed today. I pulled some blue from the leftover century quilt to use in one of the blocks!

The Century Quilt with the final blue borders on. Sorry about the bad picture - it is a full size quilt and the wind was not cooperating this morning. 90x92 I believe.


I'm off to a meeting at school for Em's speech. I have a call in to her eye doctor - she keeps saying her head hurts after school and this is the second time she headed to the clinic for it. Will bring her to get fitted for glasses after school. I really hope this helps with her head always hurting!
Off to school for my meeting to increase her speech from 2 to 4 days a week. Good thing dinner is in the crock pot - beef stew tonight.
Happy sewing!

Sunday, October 26, 2014

October wrap up of goals

Last month I had a lot of things on my list. Some got done and some will try again for November.

1.) Quilting on the maple leaf quilt is in progress. I got a bunch done...but ran into thread issues when I switched to the black for the FMQ of the black parts in the middle. Hopefully I can finish this off before the end of the month on Friday. I made a nice green binding to finish this one off and hope to hand quilt some maple leafs in the third border in various colors. I plan to use the maple leaves my Mom sent down for the kids as a template!

2.) Snails Trail quilt - no progress. Moved to November.

3.) RSC Challenge - I got my hexagons done in brown, a 16 patch in brown and black and 12 churn dash blocks in brown. I hope to make 12 black ones this week to add to the mix. I also made a bunch of RSC Sampler blocks with the challenge and wrote a couple of tutorials.

4.) Tiny Tuesday  - one a day. I was doing good of one a day until Thursday of last week. I have added a lot of blocks this month to the pile and hopefully will catch up again next week so I will have made 31 block in October. It looks like I have 54 blocks completed..... I was thinking there were a few more made .... have to go looking for them.
Buddy just had to be in the picture!



5.) Celtic Solstice - great progress here. I finished step 3 and 5 and put 24 of the blocks together. I have 25 blocks to go now that I have all the units made. I can't wait to see this one come together into a top next month.



6.) The Century Quilt..... is almost done. I have the final 4.5 inch dark blue border to put on the quilt. Hopefully that will get done sometime this week. Completed 10/28 into a top!

7.) Hugs and Kisses Quilt - is a top and I hope to get this rolled onto the boards and pinned for hand quilting later this afternoon.

8.) Two pillowcases were made as gifts for Em's little friends for their birthday parties this month. No pictures of these.

9.) Steam cleaning the carpets were slated for this coming week... but I'm not sure how that will work with a dog visiting. It might get done..... if not I'll plan to do it next week.... just not on my birthday on Tuesday the 4th!

10.) Walking - Absolutely no walking other than all day at Disney on Friday with the kids! I will start this back up this week with the dog and continue doing this in the morning after I drop the kids to school. The foot is all healed and I think the two colds everyone has had this month are finally over. A couple of pictures from Friday - Emily, Grandma H and Aidan riding the raft back from Tom Sawyers Island. Emily with Tinkerbell. She really wanted Ariel but that fast pass was all booked so I got her in with Tinkerbell. I'll plan farther ahead next time and see if we can see Ariel for her. Aidan got the Tomorrow land track driving the cars for his fast pass and we also did Thunder Mountain - a roller coaster for Grandma!



11.) I made a snowflake from a free pattern from Joanne over at canuckquilter.com. She is having a snow along right now - I think the last week is tomorrow to get two free paper pieced snowflake patterns. I hope to make a couple more so I can have a little runner for the table in January. They would make a great little quilt for the wall as well.

12.) Half of the driveway has been power washed. It is amazing how much black gunk grows on the concrete down here! I also did the two walkway's to the doors of the house. I hope to get the rest of the driveway done in the afternoon/evenings while the kids ride their scooters this week after school.

Em had a hearing test this month and her hearing is just fine. That will let us concentrate on her apraxia of speech and a meeting this week at school will up her speech to 4 days a week. Aidan's allergies are under control now with his medicine. Now if they would stop getting colds every other week!
We have a busy week ahead - school of course this week. Boy scouts has a party tomorrow night which I need to bake some sugar cookies off for prizes. Pumpkins, ghosts and witches hat I think will be the shapes. Emily will have a trick or treat and then hit Aidan's boy scout party on Monday. I get to work that morning morning so they can deliver a spa so all baking must get done today. Thursday is their Trick or Treat at school in the evening and then they can wear their costumes to school on Friday. Somewhere in there I am sure we will have a funeral to head to in Melbourne this week as well although with everything going on I think Greg will just head over at this point.

My goals for November...... hopefully some will get completed by the end of the week in October but if not we'll shoot for the end of November!

1. Finish the Maple Leaf quit quilting and get the binding on.
2. Finish Celtic Solstice into a top... and maybe get it quilted before the next mystery starts on Black Friday?
3. Finish The Century Quilt into a top. DONE! 10/28.
4. Machine quilt the Snails Trail quilt.
5. Continue the RSC Challenge for the monthly color of November.
6. Tiny Tuesday blocks one a week from The Civil War Diary Book.
7. Begin hand quilting the Hugs and Kisses Quilt. This will be a long term Project!
8. Prep and appliqué the extra block from The Century Quilt to make a pillow
9. Get back to walking every weekday morning.
10. Steam clean the carpets.
11. Try and tackle the sewing room so there are not quite so many piles hanging around everywhere! I'd show a picture but...... it is pretty bad in there!

I'm linking up with Kathi over at KC Designs for her monthly task list party. Head on over and check out the progress that was made this month. It's not too late to make a quick post and link up for a goal to accomplish in November.
Now to go pull the sugar cookie dough out of the fridge and make some pumpkins, hats and ghosts. The recipe can be found on my recipe page - it makes great cut out cookies that are thick and moist and oh so yummy! I make a half batch and it makes plenty of cookies. I've already taste tested the raw batter =).

Slow Stitching Sunday......

I really hope to get an hour or so this afternoon so I can roll my Hugs and Kisses quilt onto the boards with a batting and backing. That would let me pin it so hand quilting can start on that this evening.

Right now the kids and I are on full house cleaning duty as Greg is on his way to pick up Buddy from Grandma's house. She is headed over towards Melbourne as she got a call this morning that her Aunt Ruth (more of a big sister/Mom) had a brain aneurysm late last night. Her kids pulled her off life support mid morning so hopefully she gets there before she passes. We'll have Buddy for a bit until she returns home. It is a good excuse to get the kids to clean up their rooms and the play room so the dog can go in and not have to worry about chewing their toys on the floor.

I'll also have a post later today for my October goals wrap up. Head on over to Kathy's Quilts and see what other hand work is being stitched today.
 Must make the kids a quick lunch and then they can vacuum and dust the front two rooms. Living room is all picked up and clean and I have been working through the kitchen and bathrooms. Their rooms are next up for a vacuum and then..... the play room. Notice I never mentioned my sewing room - that would need a week to clean up!... maybe I should add that to the November task list =).

Saturday, October 25, 2014

Last Saturday in brown and black...

I am very happy we still have a week of October since I still need to make my 12 black churn dash blocks! I did get the 12 brown ones sewn up on Wednesday.

I am getting pretty curious as to what color November will be.... and December? In the past December has been a 'free' month but maybe there will be a posted color this year? I guess I'll have to wait and find out....

I purchased a bunch of Kona black last weekend and think I might make some hexagons to have in the busy bag so I can start the pathway's of the hexagon flowers I have been making all year. I've been playing Candy Crush or Cookie Jam in the car line this week... Must replenish the busy bag with hand work! My inspiration is from a book called America's Glorious Quilts. A friend from bowling last year brought her book in for me to look at and there are tons of great quilts in this book. The pictures are all from a 1971 exhibition of quilts from The Whitney Museum of American Art. Over 300 pages of beautiful quilts and a nice write up on the different types of quilts. I got mine through Amazon back in May for $11. It was well worth the cost as I find myself looking through the book a few times a month at night.


There is a picture of a flower garden quilt with black surrounding the flowers. I like the look and can't wait to see how my flowers look with black surrounding them.
Mine will be brighter with my fabrics but it should look pretty neat when it is done.... I hope.

I scheduled this post so hopefully I am at work today and I survived Disney - Magic Kingdom on Friday with Grandma H and the kids. They had a day off from school and it is finally cool enough for me to be outside down here during the day!

Head on over to SoScrappy and see what other dark colors have been coming out to play.

Wednesday, October 22, 2014

Wednesday....sewing with the windows open!

Well, I had to shut them a little bit ago as it was getting too hot but the fresh air and birds talking were a fun way to sew this morning!
I got it to this point with all the rows sewn, the trapezoid sections and the corner triangles sewn on this morning.

Then I started adding the borders. Did I mention I really hate sewing long seams?  There is one more border to go with the dark blue but this is where The Century Quilt is right now. I hope to cut and sew the final borders on after picking up the kids from school. This was 78.5x75.5 before adding the 2 inch yellow borders which actually matched what the pattern said! It will be a full size quilt when it is done.



I also did a quick CW block today - Writing from the Cars.




Tuesday, October 21, 2014

Tiny Tuesday.......

I got a quick block made today called Drawing for Our Clothes.



I spent the rest of the morning trying to get three Century Quilt blocks a little bigger to their 12.5 inch  sizes. The seam ripper got a LOT of use this morning. Two of three blocks are now the correct size. The last one is showing on the bottom part of the picture and with all those tiny parts.... I'm going to fudge it maybe with a little white frame. Then I got to cut some huge squares so I could make some hourglass blocks for the setting blocks. Progress is being made but..... it sure is slow when you need to redo blocks you made 14 years ago!


Step 5 of Celtic Solstice was completed during all this sewing today as leader and enders. Just need to snip the tails and then I can start putting block B together!

Monday, October 20, 2014

Monday Civil War catch up.....

I had to make three CW blocks this morning to catch up from the weekend. No sewing this weekend other than a few stitches on some Celtic Solstice blocks on Sunday. I have half of step 5 done - 50 units! I did get Greg to show me the hose connect on the power washer and I got a great start on our long driveway. Lots of black mold and gunk is off and it looks so clean this morning! I'll do some more this afternoon while the kids are out riding their scooters.

The Civil War blocks today are getting interesting as I am running low on some fabrics. I am just pulling like fabrics from my stash to coordinate at this point.
Another Death went together pretty easily. It is not exactly like the book....but close enough.

A Little Broth.... I had it laid out correctly with the 60 degree triangles... and somehow the two lights did not end up together.....it seems I put the side rows on wrong. I did not notice it until after I trimmed it. Oops.... I made my own version for this one too!


Infernally Ungrateful went together as it should have.... so I was 1 for 3 today.

I am planning to do lunch with Emily since I completely forgot about it on Friday! Do I go power wash the driveway or sew some more.... ?

Saturday, October 18, 2014

Saturday.....


Lots of RSC Samper blocks got made this week. Here are the six blocks in the darks.  I had to modify the cat a bit as I cut it out wrong - so mine is a little chunky on the bottom just like my Sophie!

I also got to sew a few hexagons together this week. Next week is the churn dashes....
I found Kona solids at Joann's fabrics.... I think some birthday $ will be spent on a bunch of black or pepper  next month to start surrounding these hexagons. I just printed out some coupons... so maybe I'll just pick them up tomorrow after work =) They are 'standard' colors so if I don't get enough for all of them.... it should be the same color later..... I hope!

Head on over to SoScrappy and see what other dark colors are being worked with this week.
I created two of the tutorials this week for the RSC Sampler. Clay's Choice is here and Sarah's Choice is here.

Today I am off to work and tomorrow everyone is healthy so we will head to the Pumpkin Pickin Patch. The kids can't wait. They had so much fun last year and can't wait to drag bring Daddy through the corn maze! He has never been with us. Here are some pictures from last year... I can't believe how much the kids have changed. Aidan had his baby top teeth still! 
Climbing on the hay bales fall 2013.

Wagon ride through the patch fall 2013.

Pulling sister in the wagon fall 2013.

Friday, October 17, 2014

Friday sewing....

Absolutely no time sewing yesterday.... but the house is slightly cleaner than it was!
I made up for it today and did a bunch of sewing this morning. I made two Civil War blocks to make up for yesterday and today. I also got my four RSC blocks done.
Suspension of Furloughs and Americus Soldiers Relief Society on the bottom.


I also finished up the block A of Celtic Solstice. 24 of these are done so it is time for step 5 so I can make the alternate block. Two need some repair as the oranges are not turned correctly. Oops.


Wednesday, October 15, 2014

Half Way through October....

Since I did not make a Civil War block yesterday I made two today! I am half way through my goal of making one block from this book a day and have 15 blocks completed this month! The pile is growing fast and it is time to figure out how many I need to make a nice little quilt.

Prisoner of War

Incompetent Officers

Busy day today - Emily had a hearing evaluation and as I thought she can hear just fine (especially when you are talking in another room about something you don't want her to hear!). That rules out the last thing so we can just concentrate on working with her daily on her speech for her apraxia. Now I am just waiting for a meeting to be scheduled so we can bump her speech from 2 to 4 days a week at school.
Aidan had an open house for his music class this morning and 25 minutes later was his lunch.... so I stayed and joined him for lunch today. Em had her open house for music a couple of weeks ago and I'll go in and have lunch with her on Friday. Must keep it even you know! I've got 20 minutes until I have to go pick them up.... I think I'll go and put the last few blocks of the Celtic Solstice Mystery together so I can start step 5 soon.


Tuesday, October 14, 2014

RSC Sampler - Sarah's Choice

Time for a RSC Sampler block in the black color way! I selected the block called Sarah's Choice from Jennifer Chiaverini's Sylvia's Bridal Sampler from Elm Creek Quilts. I just love the Elm Creek Series - it is a great series of books revolving around quilting if you are looking for something good to read.

I've modified the cutting instructions to use the Easy Angle Ruler and the Flying Geese ruler. This allowed me to pull from my 2 inch strips for all my parts. I used three fabrics - a grey, a black and a black print. The black print is my 'background' fabric. 

Background : A 2 inch strip at least 21 inches long.
Cut 4 - 2 inch squares. Cut 4 of the big geese part.

Light : 2 inch strip at least 12 inches long.
Dark: 2 inch strip at least 12 inches long.

Place the light and dark right sides together so you create the correct 'wings' with the flying geese ruler. You will need one of each color for each of the 'wings'. Continue and cut 4 more half square triangles. (Essentially cut 8 hst's and four split out to wings and four turn into half square triangles.)

Piece the four flying geese units.  Piece the four half square triangles into a pinwheel unit.

Lay out the block and sew together as you would a nine patch.


Your finished block should measure 6.5 inches and finish at 6 inches in the quilt.


RSC Sampler - Clay's Choice

I am helping Angela out at SoScrappy and posting two RSC Sampler blocks this week. First up is Clay's Choice in shades of browns.

You will need two shades of a color and a background fabric. I am using the Easy Angle ruler to create 2 inch unfinished squares.
Background fabric :
 4 rectangles 2 inches by 3.5 inches
 A strip of 2 inch fabric to make 4 hst triangles. At least 6 inches

Medium Brown fabric:
 A strip of 2 inch fabric to make 4 hst triangles. At least 6 inches

Dark Brown fabric:
A strip of 2 inch fabric at least 12 inches long to pair with the light and background fabrics.



Sew your triangles together to make your half square triangles and press to the darker fabric.

Arrange your parts to look like this picture. Sew the two half square triangles together. Press to the medium/dark pair.

 Sew this unit to the background rectangle. Press to the rectangle.


Sew the top units together and the bottom two together.


Sew the top and bottom unit together to make your block. It should measure 6.5 inches and finish at 6 inches in the final quilt.