Monday, Monday......

The start of a new week! This one looks to be a little calmer - finally! After way too much takeout and fast food meals this past week (and darn that scale that I got on this morning!) it is time to prep and cook meals at home and incorporate more fruits and veggies into all our diets! Emily has requested Cowboy salad from the pioneer woman. Ok, not the healthiest but I think I will change out the dressing and make a broccoli/cauliflower salad as well. We have a few leftover chicken legs I roasted off last night to go with it. Must remember portion sizes!

I am starting off right so far - I got my walk in before work this morning and after dropping off the kids to school.  I work from home - 5 hours a day, 4 days a week as a computer programmer while the kids are in school. A nice egg scramble breakfast with scallion and red pepper and a little cheddar cheese in my ceramic microwave cooker this morning to start off the day. I seem to have used the last keurig coffee this morning.. I am debating making a little amount in the coffee maker... I think it needs to get done. Still recovering from lack of sleep on Saturday night!  Then I'll switch to some water flavored with a baby orange sliced into it. My goal is 20 ounces of water this morning, afternoon and we will see about evening! I also need to do a power zero to keep my salt up. I know, I'm strange and have low sodium levels and boy does that make your head spin when it gets too low!

Since this is a quilty blog..... I did get a little hand work in on Saturday while the kids were bowling. I had most of the star part prepped and just added the white surrounds to these. So glad I keep that baggie and sewing case in my purse, you never know when the opportunity to get a few stitches in will pop up! Time to make some more stars in the car line this afternoon. These are using Inklingo to print the sewing and cutting lines onto the back of the fabric. I love how quick it is to prep things.

So far - 3 posts in 3 days! I wonder what I will find to talk about tomorrow!

Weekend Roundup....

Another busy weekend.... of course! Would you expect anything else from me?

Saturday was an early morning start with Emily and 7 other girls from our girl scout troop heading to a Wizzadry event about an hour from us in the forest.  I had 3 girls in my car.... I will enjoy quiet today in my house! The girls got sorted into houses (GIRL - go getter, innovator, risk taker, leader). Then we headed to potions class. The girls got to make a scary bubbly creation that bubbled over the huge glass container. One of my daisy's added the final touch that started the bubbling. Then they made lip balm to take home. Next was herbology - where they put together some mandrakes to grow before learning about different herbs and scents.  Spells was next- the girls picked and decorated their wands and got their acceptance letter with a butterfly surprise inside. It was outside time at the quiddich pitch after that .... with a obstacle/solving race first then a quiddich game. We hit the honeydukes store last for some butter beer and lots of scary named candies that the girls got to eat. A fun time was had by all. My 3 had some playground time....and my daughter didn't like the twirly tire ride. We had a sick girl (mine of course) on the way home but she was better after.  Grandpa A was there when we got home after dropping girls off to parents. A nice visit with him and then.... the boys started putting down the floor in Aidan's room. We did have an issue..... a nice heavy box fell and landed on the boy's big toe. After about 20 minutes of screaming and crying - he has a very bruised big toe.  At least the carpet out of the room is really helping with his allergies.

Some pumpkins got carved and pumpkin seeds got toasted in the evening. Needless to say - I was in bed early after watching a Harry Potter movie.

Sunday - it is going to be an interesting week with Aidan and his toe - with putting on socks and shoes. He seems to be walking fine and can move it - just a good bruise. They are off to Grandma's house today. They are headed to the cooter festival in Inverness today to see the turtles race. That leaves me a couple of hours to clean up the house a bit before everyone returns. A quick lunch date with hubby at Chili's (with a margarita with my fajita so no driving  errands for me today!) I'm headed to the sewing room shortly - the sewing machine doesn't count as heavy machinery..... right?  (which now has all Aidan's things from his room in there - I just had it all cleared out! ). I hope to get the spring blooms quilt into a top stage by the end of the day. I went with white..... I cut out the blue and just didn't like it. I'm thinking a bright green binding from the leaves in the bloom blocks eventually.... or maybe the light blue. I guess I will see what works when I get to that stage. Sharing this one with the RSC Challenge. The free pattern can be found here. Thank goodness I still have 2 days to make some pink bow tie blocks!

Some more Inklingo shapes will get printed. I had NO luck last Sunday. Lots of paper jams until I figured it out on Tuesday. Note to self - leave a 1/4 inch of just freezer paper on the top and right side of the paper going into the printer so it pulls through ok. After I did that - no printing issues! I need to prep a bunch for my trip next week so I have some hand work for the plane ride and evenings in the hotel.

I also hope to slow down a bit and finish the last row of the purple setting triangles on the trip quilt.  I do like how this one turned out. It will have to wait a bit for it's hand quilting.

Linking up with Slow Sunday Stitching.

Slow Sunday....

Not! I get to do the drive to Grandma's today with the kiddos. I also pulled a turkey out of the freezer yesterday... and will finish the defrosting with the cold water bath later this morning before popping him in the oven to roast this afternoon. Lots of turkey meals this week -and the rest in the freezer for easy meals while I am gone in a few weeks.

I think it will be time to play with the printer and Inklingo again today. I finished up the last of the lemoyne stars I had prepped ages ago. Time to prep a few more... these finish at 4.5 inches and are from the free diamond set from Inklingo.

and while there I will print out some of my new hexagon shapes in a white dot print to finish the edges of the spring hexagon flower quilt.

If I have time, I might even try and make my vines for the border of the midget appliqué quilt. I am trying to think of a good take with me project (or three!) for my business trip to Vermont in a couple of weeks. Lots of plane time and evenings in the hotel room to hand stitch.

What will you be hand stitching today? Linking up with the slow stitchers over at Kathy's Quilts.

Long weekend.....

I was to be at the girl scout Camp Wildwood all weekend.... but opted to just spend a nice long day there in the heat and humidity for a sisters retreat. Lot of great ideas, networking and resources for leading my troop of girls (daisy, brownie and then it will be some juniors next year!).  I do have to say, it was sad and surprising to see all the tree damage to the trails from hurricane Irma, but thankfully no damage to the buildings.

We did have a power outage due to a branch falling on the power lines and knocking out a transformer. SECO was great and had power restored in a couple of hours so the fans could be working again (and toilets could flush!). Did I mention it was hot and humid.... in October. Mother nature forgot the humidity should be gone by now.... We had a few people with the beginning of heat stroke but thankfully I was not one of them.
 I have to make a quick trip back today to pick up a few things at the store since their internet didn't come back up for a credit card payment.

That led me to come home and have the surprise of Greg and the kids removed the carpet from Aidan's room yesterday... and they went into the pool as well! Aidan said he slept great and was able to breath this morning in his room. No mold on the back of the carpet (my worry) but I guess  we need to order the new flooring now! He has terrible allergies to dust and mold... so carpet is a no no for him.

I looked into the disaster of a garage this morning - where my office and sewing area is.... and everything gets thrown in there (yes, the pulled up carpet is in there now too) . I think today will be a clean/organize day in there.... it needs an intervention, big time. I think that is why I have not been going in there to sew - too messy even for me!

After all that... I will finally relax with some slow stitching. I have 'fixed' the last row of hexie flowers on my springtime little quilt top.... and with another in process needing a black surround, I splurged and purchased the 1 inch Inklingo hexagon pattern. This will allow me to print off hexagons with sewing lines on the back of fabric to make quick work of prepping to finish this quilt. It comes with half and 1/3 shapes as well to get that square edge. If I can find more of the white dot fabric I hope to print off a few today. I started with the free diamonds from the inklingo site and made a bunch of lemoyne stars and I must say - this is a wonderful tool to quickly get you stitching.

If I can't find more of that white dot fabric in my cleaning... I will be adding purple quarter triangles to make a square edge on the trip around the world quilt. It decided it was done and I listened! I have started adding them and have 4 in... with lots to go.

Linking up with the other slow stitchers and Oh scrap.

Tiny Tuesday......

I know, I'm a day early but I may go back to posting the lemoyne stars on Tuesdays... since they are tiny - finishing at 4.5 inches.

After the computer issues of last week... I had to get my inklingo back so I could print some more. Got that done and then printed off lots of squares and triangles this morning. I also remembered to write the size and what it was on the freezer paper and put it on top of the printer with a sticky noting the page number I used for each. That really does help the next time you go to print things out!

Here is a shot of the completed and in process stars with their little baggie of prepped pieces. I just need to cut out the rest of the diamonds sometime before Friday's car trip. So nice to have things all prepped and ready for when you have a few minutes to stitch.

While I was out on the inklingo site... I took a look at the hexagons. I think the 1 inch pattern is close enough to my existing hexagons I was making a few years ago the old fashioned way (template made and traced and  cut out by hand). I got sick of marking them... and my template plastic got cut so I seem to have stopped. I need to add my black surround and start stitching them together and I think inklingo is going to be the answer to the solution of getting that project moving again next year. If you have never been over there - click on the link above and check it out. I will warn you, it becomes addicting when the prep work becomes really easy with your standard printer, washed fabric, an iron and some freezer paper. Yes, it is that easy! Hopefully these 160 flowers will someday turn into a quilt. I have fond memories of making these with the RSC Challenge a few years ago - once color a month and boy did they add up quickly.

It is election day here in the USA. I encourage you to go out and vote and have your voice heard. I voted this morning right after dropping the kids off to school. 

A rainy Wednesday....

It is a very cloudy day today and the kids have an early release today at noon. That means a long pick up line today.... especially if it is raining. Guess I better cut out some of the prepped star pieces so I have something to work on today. I got this little one done yesterday in the car line.... so 45 minutes to hand piece this little bugger. This is 5 inches and will finish off at 4.5 inches.

My stars so far.


 I have a feeling I will be making one each day for the rest of the week with the rainy weather that is forecast for my area. The tropical depression is arriving sometime tomorrow. I am inland enough that we'll just get rain and the nice sandy soil absorbs it pretty quickly. The kids and I will be walking around the yard and picking up and putting things away this afternoon... just in case it gets windy.
I'm so happy I finally decided to try printing on fabric with Inklingo. It sure does make hand piecing so much easier and the prep work that I hated is pretty much eliminated. Love it.

Inklingo... lemoyne stars.....

I took some time on Sunday... while the kids were at Grandmas... and got the printing figured out for the Inklingo parts and pieces. Inklingo is a way to print the cutting and sewing lines directly onto the back of fabric. Perfect for me.... so I just have to prep fabric with freezer paper ironed onto the top.. load into the printer and print. Then just cut with scissors or a rotary cutter on the solid line. ** Remember to take the freezer paper off before cutting ... and iron it onto the next one. I have reused mine 4 times so far. I got the 'free' diamond, square and triangle set years ago. Why did I wait so long to try and print out? Yup, kicking myself for waiting so long. Linda has tons of sets available on her website and the photo gallery of quilts is awe inspiring.

I decided since I have a finish... I'd finally take the plunge this year and made one lemoyne star by hand a day while waiting in the car line. Well, might not be one per day... they do take a while to hand piece but I'll sure make a lot while waiting this year! Ok, school started last week so I am a wee bit behind, but I'm sure there will be some rain days when I need to be in line for pickup forever.... =) These little guys will finish at 4.5 inches... and I should have 180 of them (or a whole lot if not the full 180!) by the end of the school year. I'm thinking maybe alternate them with a plain block should make it a nice size.... but plenty of time to worry about that much later.....

I had this hope chest line of fat quarters from Connecting Threads that got washed last week in preparation for printing on the fabric. It is nice pastels in a 30's type style of green, lilac, and blue. I'm sure at some point I will be adding fabrics from the stash but will start with these.

This is a look at the back of the fabrics with the ink on them... for those who were wondering. I used 11 to print on the darker and 2 to print on the white.

And.. my first completed block.

Back of block  - not pressed

front of block - not pressed.

So exciting. I have enough prepped for the rest of the week. I think Sunday's will become my prep day for these... nice and relaxing and done in just a little bit of time. This is the fist block I started with but it should become finished block number 2 today in the car line.

A needle, thread, scissors and a running stitch is all you need. It all fits into a handy ziplock sandwich bag that tucks right into my purse. Perfect take with me project this year.