Weekly Themed Quilt Contest

Hello Everyone!  I'm entering the Weekly Themed Quilt Contest at Quilting Gallery this week.  The theme is Wearables.  I'm entering my quilted jacket seen here.  You can vote (one vote per ip address) by clicking on the purple button at the very bottom, left of my blog that says 'Weekly Themed Quilt Contest' on it.  I made this jacket several years ago.  I made two at the same time.  I gave the second jacket to a dear quilting friend of mine, Ann, who has given me lots of fabric, books and patterns over the years.  I quilted the jacket on my Janome that my dear hubby bought me.  I used one of the fun stitches, a leaf on a vine stitch.  This is one of the few things that I have machine stitched.  It took me two weeks to make the two jackets.  Quick for me!  I added the cuffs to the sleeves since I am tall, and so is Ann.  I don't know how to construct clothing, so, this was a big learning curve for me.  I love to pull this jacket out in the winter when everything is dreary and gray.  It really brightens things up.  Please take the time to vote for me (or whomever's  entry you like best).  PS:  I had a really  hard time uploading the picture to Quilting Gallery.  I sure hope it worked and they got the correct photo.  We'll see on Friday morning, won't we.

Trip to Texas (Part 1)

Blue Bonnets in Texas

 Spring break in Texas!  Yipee!!  My home state.  I am usually too early to see any Blue Bonnets over Spring Break, but, since we traveled through central Texas and the Hill country, we got to see some.  These were at Inks Lake near Burnet, TX.  My brother has a house on the lake.  I miss living at the lake.  We lived at the lake when I was in Junior High School.  I loved it.  We had screened in porch on the water.  I loved to sit there and read on rainy days.  It was so peaceful.

Ducks at Inks Lake, Texas

 I took this picture from my brother's dock early on Sunday morning before anyone else got up.  We've camped at Inks Lake State Park since college days.  There is a big group of my brother's friends that still go camping there every summer.  My boys went each summer until we moved to Illinois.  It's just too far to get them there now.  They sure do miss it.  This was the boys first time at Inks lake in many years.  We got to go out in the boat on Saturday afternoon.  It was a beautiful day.  Sunny and warm.  I even borrowed shorts from my sister-in-law, since it was so warm. 

Spider in web on boat dock

I DON'T like Spiders!  Now, since I've said that, there was a beautiful spider web with 2 spiders on it on my brother's deck steps.  I used the flash on my camera to get the web in the picture.  The spiders never moved the whole time I was on the deck (THANK GOODNESS). 

I have lots from our trip to Texas.  I'll probably blog about it for days.  I brought home some goodies from the trip. 

PS:  I mitered the borders on the 'Fat Cats in the City' quilt for Betty the morning we left on the trip.  Betty has seen the quilt top and loves it.  Now to finish the quilt on the quilt rack so that I can get it quilted.

This weeks sewing accomplishments (sew far)

Fat Cats in the City

Pineapple Blocks the Easy Way

     I've been busy sewing this week.  I'm making the quilt 'Fat Cats in the City' from Fons & Porter's Love of Quilting.  It was a bonus quilt in the May/June 2010 edition.  I am making this quilt for a friend of mine in Tulsa.  I learned how to embroidery so that I could add the cats faces.  They are so cute.  I wish the picture showed more detail.  I'll show more pictures when I finish the quilt.  I still have to miter the borders and figure out how I'm going to quilt it.  I'm thinking a combination of hand and machine quilting.  I can only 'stitch in the ditch' on the machine.  My free motion quilting is pretty bad, even after a few classes.  Oh well, you can't do everything.

     The Pineapple blocks were taught by Marilyn at quilt guild on Monday.  I couldn't post before now since my dear hubby had my camera in New York City this week.  Marilyn learned this method over the phone from a friend in Canada.  It is so simple.  Check out my tutorial.  I made the two floral blocks for the tutorial, and the red and yellow block at guild.  It really was fun and easy.  No paper piecing!  This would be a fun block for a block exchange.

      I've also been working on the string spiderweb quilt blocks.  Pictures and links are in an earlier March post.  I'm almost done with piecing the 80 blocks.  I'm hoping to finish piecing them in the next few days.  I'm hoping to get the quilt top finished at the next Quilts of Valor sew-in. 

Pineapple Block the Easy Way (Tutorial)

Dear Blogland.  I received an e-mail this morning that this block is copyrighted.  I honestly didn't know.  A friend showed me how to make this block.  She had a friend tell her how to make the block over the telephone.  None of us knew that there was a printed, copyrighted pattern for this block.  In my defense, I did Google search for this block before I sat down and created my tutorial.  Nothing came up.  This is wonderful block.  The correct name for this pattern is

Sew Simple Pineapple by Karin Hellaby and can be found on the Quilter's Haven web site.  I am sorry for any infringement on someone else's pattern.  I try hard to give credit when I can.  I am a firm believer in someone's copyrights.  I believe in paying for what someone else has created.  They did all the hard work, they deserve something for their efforts.  Again, I am so sorry about this.  It was an honest mistake.  Please check out the Quilter's Haven web site for this pattern and even more patterns.

 If you are in the USA, you can order these patterns at Landauer Corporation.   If you look on the Quilter's Haven website, under distributors, you can find places to purchase Karin's publications.  There is even a distributor in the Middle East.  These links DO work.  I've just ordered Karin's Sew Simple Pineapple block, and I also ordered Karin's Fast Flying Geese Quilts book from the Landauer Corporation web site.  

Enjoy Karin's quilting methods.  I surely plan to enjoy them.   

 Cheryl

finished block

Spool Pin Doily's

Spool Pin Doily's

Spool Pin Doily on my 1896 Singer 15 treadle

 Look what I got  in the mail yesterday!  Aren't they cute!  Thanks Linda!  The spool pin doily's will decorate my vintage sewing machines.  I've already put one on the 1896 Singer 15 series treadle that I use.  It is the treadle that I will be making the Disappearing 4 Patch TOBE's on.  A TOBE is a Treadle On Block Exchange.  The blocks must be made on a people powered machine, either treadle or hand crank.  I signed up for two sets.  We have to use muslin and civil war reproduction fabrics.  Mine are all cut out.  Now to find the time to sew them. 

The Wild Game dinner at church went well.  We had dishes with pheasant, venison, duck, turkey, and lots of other meats.  My favorite was the gumbo with shrimp, chicken and venison sausage.  YUM!  I brought some of the leftovers of that home. 

I did get some crafting done this weekend.  I embroidered 2 cat blocks for the 'Fat Cat in the City' quilt I'm making for Betty. 

fabrics for the Disappearing 4 Patch TOBE

Thursdays Thrift Store Fabric Finds!

 Look at the quilt I found while thrift store hopping yesterday.  Isn't he cute!  I don't know who made him, but '2006' is written in ink on one of the back corners.  I'll admit, I'm really bad about labeling my quilts, too.  The cute little hand quilted find was only $2.99!  I just couldn't resist. 

 I found these fat quarter sets at another thrift store.  There are two fat quarters in each set.  You can't tell it in the picture, but, the top fat quarter is a brighter green, and the bottom fat quarter is a slightly different shade of the same print.  These were only $0.50 for two fat quarters.  I went wild and bought 20 sets.  I'm glad that I'm signed up for a Santa block exchange with my quilt guild.  I signed up for two sets of blocks.  These will come in handy.  I may give some of these away.  Anyone want a giveaway!?!

 More Christmas fabric!  These sets had three fabrics per set.  More fabric for the Christmas quilt.  Each set was only $0.75.  I purchased 10 sets of these. 

Most of the fabric was seasonal, floral or panels for aprons or vests, etc, which we can't use for Quilts of Valor http://lolqov.blogspot.com/.  We'll have to see what Rita and the girls will use this for.  Maybe I'll add it to my 'strings'. 

Today will be a busy day.  I'm cooking 5 lasagna's and 5 stroganoff's for the church's Wild Game dinner on Saturday.  I'm making them with venison.  Yum!  I don't know that I'll get much sewing done today.  Oh well.  PS:  I added the 'Can I get a Whoop Whoop! button (and several other's, too).  Check out the links.

Another busy week

80 templates, ready to sew

 This has been another busy week, longer than a week, actually.  Sunday night, I had 22 people over for a church meeting and dinner.  Chicken spaghetti.  I had to clean house.  Yuk!  I hate cleaning house.  Wednesday was my turn to make the church supper for 28 people.  Taco soup.  Saturday night, we hosted an engagement party for 20-25 people.  Lots of finger foods.  Did I mention that I hate cleaning house!?!  I even moved the hand quilt frame (with quilt attached, of course) into another room so we'd have an open space this time.  I don't have a 'sewing area' so, I usually have stuff spread all over the dining room.  That means I have to pack all of it up and move it to the basement.  This usually means that I lose things in the process.  Hopefully I won't this time.  I've got too many projects I'm working on with a due date.

80 templates, in the process of being sewn

partially finished block

leaf squares from Marilyn

 Tuesday was Quilts of Valor sew-in day.  I managed to get 160 paper templates cut between cooking last week.  I also cut the 'kite' shaped fabric centers and glued them to the templates.  When I got to the sew-in yesterday, all I had to do was start sewing strips to the templates.  I started on the first set of 80 templates.  This is a pattern from Bonnie Hunter's blog.  The pattern is String Spiderweb!!  I am using the basic blocks, but, instead of putting the blocks together like she does, I'm going to use sashing between the blocks so that the 'star' shows up, not the spiderweb.  You can get an idea of what I'm going for if you look at the third picture.  I fussy cut each 'kite' center since the material is striped.  Most of my blocks are more finished (don't think that is correct English, but...) than the ones in the picture.  The sew-in's are fun.  We sew (and eat) and iron (and eat) and chat (and eat) and sew some more (did I mention eating?).  Everyone brings food to share.  We decided to make soups this week.  There were 4 soups.  Have you ever had 'Pizza' soup?  It was good!  There were desserts and snacks, too.  Yummy!  Next month we are going for salads and stuff to go with that. 

Marilyn gave me three leaf blocks she had left over from a quilt and pillows.  Her friends made the blocks for her as a goodbye gift when she moved.  I'm going to make binder covers with the blocks.  I've printed off the manuals for my treadle sewing machines (and other old sewing machines) and I've put all of the info into binders.  The binders aren't pretty, but, they are very functional.  Now they will be pretty, too!  Thanks Marilyn!  Aren't friends sweet!

lovely roses

The roses are just a bonus!  I bought them for myself.  I thought they would look nice in my kitchen at the engagement party.  The edges are crinkly.  I thought they were unusual and pretty.  I love roses!  My mother is from Tyler, Texas, and it is the Rose capitol.  They still have the Rose Parade and festival every year.  I haven't been since I was a child, but, I have great memories of it.  One of these days I'll go back.