May 6 - Slow Stitching Sunday.....

I made my heart for the day! It is the orange one in the below photo.

I have a Heart a Day in the Month of May challenge going on - make one heart a day for the month and end up with 31 pretty hearts. Mine are hand appliquéd and will finish off at 6 inches with an alternate blocks of scrappy nine patches. It will become a baby quilt for a great niece due in July. I am also getting these extra white hearts when I cut the back out from the colored hearts and they are being put onto 5 inch charm squares for another project.

I only have a little running to do today - to Wildwood to get more girl scout things for our bridging ceremony. I'm picking up some new vests for some of the girls to take advantage of our 10% off  order.  I need to put a couple of coats of modge podge onto the girls flower pots for tomorrow - their mothers day gifts. Then it is nothing planned! Well, I do hope to add the last border to the graduation quilt, make the backing and get that one pinned for quilting. That will take up the kid free afternoon!

I should get a binding made and machine attached to the front of the churn dash so some hand stitching on the binding will be on tap for tonight.

I have a few more stitches to add to the brown Dresden to finish it off. Must prep that maroon one as I'll be ready for it tomorrow in car line!

There are a few more badges that need to get stitched onto Emily's brownie vest... best to get it done before she bridges to a junior vest! Must figure out what to do with her daisy and brownie vests.... might become pillows this summer?


Everyone slept in this morning...... Emily had a friend sleepover Friday night. Aidan had a friend Jakari over for a few hours Saturday afternoon. After they both left..... I skedaddled out the door to meet my friend Jill at Painting with a Twist. They had a free class put on by National Geographic to get the word out about an upcoming series on Picasso. We did self portraits in the cubist style. Not my particular style....but it was a fun 2 hours away from kids and some nice quality girl time I needed doing something fun! We are working on setting up a private class to thank a couple of our gs mom's for all they do for our troop.... as a thank you from the girls.

Linking up with Kathy and the other Slow Stitchers today.

If you are making hearts - lets show them off on this Slow Stitching Sunday.

RSC in Pink and A Heart a Day in the Month of May

I have a challenge going on to make a heart a day in the month of may.... we are 5 days in and have about 5 or 6 people joining in. We'd love to have more people join in..... it's not too late!
I am doing hand appliqué of my hearts... but you could choose any method you like!
I am planning to set mine with scrappy nine patches and it will probably become a 7x9 layout of 6 inch blocks that will be gifted to my future great niece due in July. I might even attempt to hand quilt it... so it might be brought to Vermont in June with me Mom. Don't be surprised if an OTT light is delivered to your door sometime this month for good lighting at camp =)

This is a shot from yesterday of my layout.

I added a pink heart today... just for the RSC Challenge.

I also got my churn dash straight line quilted last night as the house was overtaken by 3 kiddos! I seem to have made churn dashes one year with the RSC Challenge and half made it into this quilt top that has been waiting for years.... Yes, there is still a pile of them in the drawer waiting to be put together as well!  I'll make the blue binding and attach it today. This will be donated to a Charity for Hands2Help and shipped off later this week. It ended up at 50x60 I believe.

Emily had her friend Teagan from girl scouts over (one of my co-leaders daughter). The game of pictionary ended at 9:30 and then it was bedtime..... I still heard giggling a little before 11 before I told them it was time to sleep.  They were camping 'in'...... the 2 person tent is set up in the living room and they slept in that! I hear Peanut liked the tent... and was climbing it last night.....then joined them and proceeded to play with the zipper on the tent. Silly boy.


Today I hear we are making chocolate chip cookies this morning. Who knows what else they will come up with. I need to pop to the Skating rink across town to book a girl scout party for next month and then I have a painting with a twist event tonight with my friend Jill. It should be fun on this Cinco De Mayo.

Emily had her third riding lesson yesterday.. this was after her lesson with Belle. She had just given her an apple as a treat. I think her 30 minute lesson was more like 45 minutes on the horse yesterday.. then the brushing and putting on the saddle and taking it off after. We were there for nearly 2 hours! Did I mention the kid loves horses?

I'm linking up with the RSC Challenge today.

Here is the link up for those making hearts this month! Let's show them off ladies =)

May 4 - Another Day another Heart!

Thursday's are my day off from work. I got a nice walk in, folded a bunch of laundry and got some quality time in the sewing room!

I added the 2 borders I had onto the graduation quilt. I popped out last night and picked up the last border and some backing for this quilt.

I got the churn dash quilt pinned for quilting. Emily has a friend sleeping over tonight so I might or might not be able to do a little walking foot quilting on this tonight after horse riding lessons and picking up Teagan, then making pizza for dinner and no bake chocolate cookies (yup - today is cheat day on my Atkins diet!).

Here are the hearts - My yellow from practice and 4 so far this month. Some alternate blocks got sewn up yesterday too! Sorry about the blurry - I cleaned off the camera lens after I took this!

And the extra white hearts cut from the backing on 5 inch squares.

Here is the link to show off your beautiful hearts!

May 3 - a heart and a dresden....

Today was a purple heart! Peanut allowed me to show it off with him this morning.

Hand quilting on the brown Dresden has made progress as well. I got the petals quilted up and outlined on Sunday night and started the cross hatching in the car line on Tuesday and just have a wee little bit to go before I can start on the outer frame. Guess I need to prep the next one in maroon very soon!

Last night was busy so this post is a little late this morning. Emily had gymnastics and then my last girl scout leader meeting of the year was at 7PM.  I got all my year end financial and troop reports done on Sunday so I didn't have to stress at the last minute... like I normally do! Just 2 girl meetings left  and we are done until August... although we might meet once or twice over the summer for fun things like our roller skating and maybe some scrapbooking. Next Monday the girls will plan their bridging ceremony (we are breaking from the other troops at the church this year and doing our own thing) - they already decided on pizza and ice cream with some people bringing a few things to supplement it on their last meeting/bridging ceremony on the 14th. Then they can make a little tulle skirt for their bears from Build a Bear last month. They did great at the chain stitch in crochet this week. Most of the brownies got it with the hook and the daisy's were doing it as finger crochet. Some got frustrated but they all gave it a good effort for trying something new.  I had some great parents volunteering to help out..... makes my life so much easier!

In fact... I borrowed Emily's new crochet hook (the troop bought each of the girls an I hook which I got at Joann's for a little over $2 each!) and grabbed some pink yarn and made this dish cloth while she was at gymnastics yesterday using just the single crochet stitch.

Today Aidan has his 4th grade FSA testing (well today and tomorrow for 2 hours each and then 2 days next week for math). I have a day off - so need to finish gathering and taking out the trash for pick up, then get my walk and grab breakfast before I find the sewing machine. My plans are to finish the borders 1+2 on the graduation quilt, make a backing for the churn dash quilt and then pin and machine quilt it and add the binding. I do need to get that one done first to mail out to my selected charity for the Hands2Help Challenge I joined. It's deadline is the end of this month.  The graduation quilt will hopefully get quilted up this weekend.... I have NOTHING planned..... well, other than 2 hours at painting with a twist with a friend Saturday evening. Hey - it was a free event for the first 45 people that signed up and Jill let me know about it first thing in the morning and I got in! Woo Hoo! Should be a fun time.

Here is the link to share your hearts for day 3 of the challenge!

May 2 - A Heart a Day for the Month of May!

My second heart is blue! Here he is posing outside on some green grass as a 7 inch unfinished square. I'll trim him down to 6.5 inches soon.

As I was cutting away the backing of the green one from yesterday - I drew a smaller heart onto the white before I trimmed it out.

It turned into the middle one on a green square!

Those are being put onto a 5 inch colored square and will finish at 4.5 inches. I loved seeing other hearts popping up in blog land. Here is a link to show your progress for day 2!

May - first heart of the month!

Today is the first day of the Heart a Day in the Month of May Challenge. I made a nice pretty green one today.

My heart is cut out of a 5 inch charm square and placed on a 7 inch background. I just drew around the heart onto the fabric. I trimmed it around the drawn line and will use needle turn appliqué to finish it off. The blocks will be trimmed  down to 6.5 inches once they are all appliquéd down. I am planning to set mine with a scrappy nine patch block using 2.5 inch squares.

I will be making these as I sew other things this month. I have this nice little basket of parts next to my sewing machine so I can pull and work on these nine patches as a leader and ender. The hearts - those are my car line and evening hand work this month. A good mix of hand and machine for me.

I would love to see your hearts. Please use the link up so we can all enjoy your work.

OMG for April

Well, there are a few hours left to the last day of this month and I 'might' find some time to get back to the sewing room later and maybe add the borders to my graduation quilt. I have all the blocks made and sewn together so I am calling that a big win. It will be a top by Thursday when I have plans to pin it for quilting this coming weekend.

Linking up with all the others at Elm Street Quilts for the April finish linkup.