Checking in...

Another week with little sewing but I did get some work done on my Chelsea bag. Almost completed... but I sewed the straps wrong so had to take it out and was 'done for the day' after that. Will try to get back to it tomorrow morning and hopefully finish it.
We went for a drive this afternoon to check out trees... my MIL gave us money towards an Aidan tree when he was born... something to plant and then take his picture in front of every year on his birthday. We didn't see anything we liked... but have seen a few online so will order it and plant it next spring... which we will probably just get 2 trees since we will need it by then. I can't remember the kind of tree DH wants for Aidan.. but it will flower in the spring, have fruits (not edible but could be made into jams) in summer and changes colors in the fall. For the second one, I like the idea of a Hazelnut tree for the front flower bed we will hopefully be expanding on next year. We'll also get some blueberry bushes, yummy!
After we hit the garden center... we went to ToysRUs and got a new bouncy/rocker for Aidan that is good up to 40 pounds. His current one is almost too small for him... a whopping 19 pounds and 14 ounces at his 6 month appointment yesterday! Then DH was hungry so we chanced having a late lunch (2:30ish) in a restaurant and Aidan was such a good boy! We had a nice relaxing meal. Gotta love that.
Tomorrow I am going to a tea for a Longerberger Breast Cancer party with an old friend. I have been going to this for the last 4 or 5 years and it should be a fun time. This year it is a tea being held in someone's perennial garden which should be an interesting change of pace. I have never been to a 'tea' before so this is something new for me.
Hopefully I will be able to post a finished picture of my Chelsea bag tomorrow....
until then, happy quilting everyone.
Deb

Monday...

Well, it was a completely unproductive week. I did manage to go blueberry picking with Aidan on Tuesday and got a few of them frozen for tasty treats this winter. With the rainy week we had, I am sad to say I got no sewing done. I was a little under the weather this weekend.... just lazy I think and got a bout of heartburn that just keeps coming back. Then a splitting headache yesterday afternoon for a good 6 hours... not fun with a babbling baby.
I did order the 2 civil war diary books and got them from Amazon 2 days later! Gotta love that service. I don't think I will be starting that project this year but look forward to doing that sometime in the future.
I also signed up for a mystery quilt using batiks... something I have never worked with. I stopped in at my LQS on Friday and got the info and materials list. The ladies there were great helping me with ideas for the fabric choices and were having a great time talking to Aidan while Mommy browsed. I'll have to pop back into the store sometime and buy the fabrics I need but I have a good month before the class starts. I selected greens and blues for the colorway...and this might become a gift for someone who loves those colors. We'll see how it turns out first.
I need to go grab fabric from my stash to do the quilt that Beth at bzyqltr is doing on her blog. I am thinking I might do a scrappy version.. but have not decided yet. We'll see what I pick out for fabrics.
Hope everyone has a great week.

Chaos quilt completed!.. almost.

I did get a bunch of sewing time in this weekend (thanks hubby!) and was able to pin, FMQ and get the binding sewn onto the quilt. I just need to finish hand sewing the last side down to the quilt. I think Aidan already likes this one with the bright colors... he was staring at it yesterday as soon as I brought it downstairs... and was looking at it all night! I guess he likes the kitty faces in bright colors on the black background for the backing. Here is a picture of the front... sorry it is not flat but it is a big quilt! 70x70.

Now I know that is too big to quilt on my machine... way too bulky in the middle. I just used a black cotton thread for the quilting on top and bobbin. I am getting better at this but still not 'perfect'. Good thing I still have a good 6-8 tops that need to get quilted. I hope to get through them by the end of the year... since I will be losing my quilting room early next year... or rather relocating it somewhere else in the house.


The goals this week are to make a Chelsea bag and get DH's quilt pinned. I also want to go blueberry picking and possibly raspberry picking this week and get those frozen and possibly make some jam.... it looks like a rainy week so we'll see if that gets done or not. Oh, and will try to get back to my 'normal' gym schedule too, since I only made it there twice last week.
Ok, time for Aidan's breakfast. Hope you all have a great week.

Deb

Heathers star block .... completed!

Well, I have been very tired the last week or two so have not gotten too much done. Finally got in gear and got lots of things done today... including Heathers block. A bunch of us are each doing a block in red, white and blue and sending it off to Moneik who will assemble and quilt it. Now I just need to get to the post office and mail it off.

A second quilt completed!

Here is a picture of the quilt that I FMQ'd on Sunday and finished the binding on Tuesday night. It also has been 'christened' by Aidan... before the binding was finished. DH had him on the couch between us and he rolled over to his belly and spit up on it. I didn't have enough of the blue fabric for the binding since this was a true scrap quilt from stash, so I used the leftover green, pink and blue for a colorful binding.
It has been a busy week and I can't believe it is Friday already. This weekend I hope to finish another quilt (guess I need to throw the black kitty fabric into the wash since that is the backing for the 'chaos' quilt ) and would love to get DH's quilt pinned so I can start hand quilting that next week. I still have no clue as to what pattern I should quilt.... Any ideas?

A fully completed quilt!!!

I got lots of sewing time in this weekend (around 10 hours!) and finally got to play with the free motion quilting. Aidan's puppy quilt is quilted, bound and in use on the floor already... and has been cristened with baby spitup. I also pinned and quilted another baby quilt yesterday and got that quilted. I just need to finish the binding and put that on. Now that I have overcome my fears of FMQ, I have a feeling I will be finishing lots of those quilt tops I have sitting in my closet this year! Here is a picture of Aidan's puppy quilt with a closeup of the quilting in the second photo.


I hope to get the binding onto the second quilt today... but have a list of chores to do today with a few errands to run so may not get to that until tonight.
Have a great day everyone.

Update...

Aidan was a good boy at the gym and only got fussy about the time I went in to get him! We'll try it again this afternoon. Going to lunch with a friend today and then will hit a store or two while we are out before heading to the gym this afternoon. They close the play area for kids between 2-3, so I'll plan to get there for 3.... which will get me home about 5ish since the gym is 30 minutes from home. Stir fry for dinner tonight so that should be pretty quick to do and the wok should not heat up the kitchen too much. I did get about 20 minutes of sewing in yesterday and started FMQ on Aidan's puppy quilt.....the front looks ok but the back.... well, I guess I need more practice. I debated pulling it out, but since I am using warm and natural batting and figure this will get spit up on a lot I think I'll leave it and just consider it a 'practice' quilt. Hopefully the end stitches will look better than the beginning! Ok, need to get dressed and get the watering done before it gets too hot. Have a great day everyone.