Challenge Change, More Wedding, and Birthday Fun

Most of my quilting has been put aside for the wedding quilt. I knew when I set the challenge that it would pretty difficult to actually get all of that done and started to think of it more as a priority list or working list...meaning those quilts that I want "in my face" so they get finished.

The wedding plans are ramping up, which is good because it is coming up fast. Sunday, August 15th....6 1/2 weeks away. We're making lists like crazy and figuring out what we want to make and what we can/need to buy. It's so much fun, but rather all consuming! It's probably just as well they picked the date they did as I think if we had a few more weeks, we'd just be this busy/crazy for a few more weeks.

Rebekah's wedding quilt is in the hoop and underway...though with all of the other wedding planning it's been hard for me to really sit and focus on it. I hope to change that very soon. The plan is to have it done in time for the wedding, and I don't have that much time!

My birthday was yesterday and it was a lovely day. A bit cooler than it's been and not so humid, so I felt better than I have in a while. It was a quiet day overall, which was so nice. We went out for dinner to this nice little Italian place. We've lived here for 24 1/2 years and it's been here the whole time. We thought it was this little hole in the wall diner....boy were we wrong! We had a gift certificate to go there (Rachel's boyfriend gave us a bunch of different ones for Christmas that he got for really cheap off restaurants.com, thinking if we even used a couple he got more than his money's worth) and we are so glad we tried it. I had lobster ravioli and it was truly one of the best tasting things I'd ever eaten.

I had some birthday money to spend so we went shopping after dinner. I had been using an old keyboard because my cordless died (we've not had good luck at all with cordless keyboards) and I really wanted to replace it.

Much better! I'm still getting used to the slightly curved design, but it's quiet and wonderful to type on so I'm sure it will be old hat soon.

I also got a new pair of shoes for the wedding. Silver will go with any dress I choose and these are nice enough for the wedding but not so fancy they can't be used for other things.
Another thing I'd planned on getting for the wedding, but wanted also for myself to use here at home, is a nice water/drink dispenser. We were at a party last summer that had a water dispenser with fruit and herbs floating in the ice water. It was delicious and I would love to do that here occasionally. It will also be great for when we have friends over, just us and one other family can be quite a crowd so this 4 gallon container will allow me to make as much lemonade or punch as I think I need! The kids all pitched in and got this for me.
And Ruthie. She's in discovery mode...finding what things she fits in, how things work and what she is and isn't capable of doing. She's getting to be quite the chatterbox, though some of it is still hard to understand.
All that learning makes a girl tired! Her feet are 6 inches off the floor, how one sleeps in that position I'll never know!

So off I go, with errands to run and quilting to do, the day will be a busy one.

Happy Quilting!

Sue

A Busy Summer

Quilting...and other busy-ness

I've been really enjoying quilting on the Celtic and Posies. Two blocks are quilted and the sashing surrounding them is done as well. Block 3 is in the hoop and ready to go, possibly a few stitches will be taken yet tonight. I could have more done except there is A LOT going on here these days. One of the biggest things is the ramping up of the wedding plans for our oldest daughter. They aren't officially engaged, yet, but that is really just a formality. They are figuring out exactly what they want and the engagement will likely bring with it an announcement of the date, most likely some time this fall.

It will be very much a homemade wedding. After seeing veils at the bridal store we visited, we decided we certainly could make one. We bought a piece of tulle and some beads and we picked a zig zag formation for the beads and she's been practicing getting them on without pulling too tightly.

I'm sure there will be much more to tell as the weeks go on.
In the midst of it all, my husband is job hunting. The company he works for now has been underbid and it's likely the current employees will lose their jobs. We need that income, and our insurance is there, so we're in a bit of a mad scramble to find a way to replace that job. We're sure all will work out for the best in the end, but in the meantime, it's quite nerve wracking!

Thankfully we have our own personal hair stylist! Ruthie wants her hair cut whenever the haircutting supplies are out. Since Rebekah does hair out of our house, poor Ruthie would be bald if we obliged. She did need a trim, though, so she got that last week.

Here she is, discovering the wonders of Easter chocolate. She's not much of a candy eater, usually we give her a small toy and some snack crackers or something in her Christmas stocking and Easter Basket. She does enjoy an occasional piece of "chokuck" so had a few among her Easter goodies this year.

Lucas was practicing roller blading with a helmet and pads, so Ruthie had to have some, too. She wore these for quite a while and grinned the whole time.

The quilting updates will be slow in coming these days, all the projects are big and have a lot of handwork, though I will have a wedding quilt in the works before too long.

Hopefully we don't get too much terribly hot weather or it will be hard to keep a big quilt in the quilting process!

Keep cool and Happy Quilting!

Sue

Long Update

It's been a while! I'm still not used to being able to post more quickly and tend to put it off longer than I should. I'm hoping to change that with more frequent updates so they aren't as crazy long as this one is!

Rebekah came to me a couple of weeks before Mother's Day and asked what I wanted...though before I could answer said they had an idea. The "they" was she and her boyfriend and their plan was to replace my favorite tree, which was dying, with a new one. We planted this tree when it was barely more than a stick. It started out green in the spring, then was covered with beautiful white flowers (though they stunk!) and then the leaves turned purple for the remainder of the summer, new growth coming out green and then also turning purple.

It got a fungus several years ago and we didn't realize what it was until it was too late. My husband wanted to milk it along for a while, since the fungus wouldn't spread to other trees and the tree was still looking passable, but I thought he might go for this new plan. He did, and the next day the cutting began.

Here the main lower branches had already been cut off. Brian (Rebekah's boyfriend) enlisted the help of a couple of our boys to help him take down the tree.

Here more of the branches are down, they are nearing the end of what can be done with it still standing.

Lucas was thrilled to be included and spent his time taking any branches he could carry to the garden, where they stayed until Jonathan was able to move them to the woodpile up by the back of our house.

Brian and Rebekah got a dog last summer. She occasionally comes for a visit when they are here so they can stay longer. She loved the activity that day, watching all of the neighbor dogs and giving kisses to the kids when they would get close enough.

The trunk was cut into usable sized pieces and branches all hauled to the garden. Lucas continued to pick up smaller pieces so the mower wouldn't run them over.

He came back a couple of days later to work on getting the stump out and took me to pick out my new tree. They had picked out a few different ones, the final choice was mine. It's a flowering cherry and should have beautiful white flowers in the spring. I can hardly wait. It seems to have "taken" well and there is some new growth at the top. It's supposed to be a fast growing tree so hopefully it won't look so little and lost among the rest of the trees and shrubs!

Mother's Day was great. It doubled as Rachel's birthday dinner day. We made dinner together and afterward went to do her birthday shopping. She wanted me to be able to shop, too, so got everyone together to chip in instead of picking out gifts. Ruthie and Rebekah came along, too, and we had a wonderful time, ending our shopping trip with ice cream at Oberweis.

During the course of those few busy weeks, I finished up the border of the celtic and posies. This past Monday I got the muslin needed for backing and started basting that evening.

Here it is in the hoop. This one will take me a while, but that's ok, I'm really enjoying quilting on it, even the difficult middle section where there is so much quilt to move around.

Here it is during the basting process. Every so often I go on a baking binge. I love to keep baked goods around, which is no easy feat with my hungry group. Sometimes rather than baking every couple of days I bake several different things in a day.

This time is was a Swedish Flop. The cake is a rather stiff, yeast cake. The lemon filling is the same as that in lemon pie. The white layer is a cream filling. So good!

Even better are the Kringles. There is a bakery in Racine, Wisconsin that makes these and I found a recipe online. I was amazed at how close this recipe comes to the original and it has quickly become a family favorite.

They are oval shaped, the recipe makes two and I halved them to fit them on the platter. The filling is butter, brown sugar, and walnuts. I've also tried apple, peach, and chocolate chip and nut, but this one is far and away the favorite. The pastry is soft and light and the powdered sugar icing just finishes it off beautifully.

Ruthie continues to do wonderfully. She loves the camera and we've decided that she needs to have her own for her birthday (which isn't until November.) There are a couple of disposables floating around here and she seems to lose some of her shyness when she has one in her hand. This may be just the thing to bring her out of her shell some when other people are around.

In the meantime, she'll enjoy getting her picture taken. She can be in the worst of moods, but mention taking her picture and she's all smiles. Here she is sitting on the back of the little couch in my sewing area.

This one was taken with my phone camera, so the quality isn't really good. She asked to ride the horse at Meijer, which was a first and was thrilled to have her picture taken on it. They have it rigged so no money has to be put into it, but she didn't like when it moved so we won't be pushing that button again for a while.

She can still be found sleeping sometime in the afternoon or early evening a few days a week. She loves that little spongebob, I used a bit of my Mother's Day money to buy it, she entertained herself for quite a while with it in the store while Rachel tried on clothing, so I didn't have the heart to leave it there. Notice her painted toes, too. Rachel and I both bought new sandals on Mother's day, so we painted our toes that evening. Ruthie was not to be left out. She comments on her pretty toes daily.

So there it is, the very long update. I'm spending a lot of time sewing and quilting these days, but all of the projects are big so there really isn't that much to report. The warmer weather is slowly making it's way here and I've enjoyed the extended cooler spring weather that we've had.

All in all, it's been a good spring. I hope the same for all of you!

Happy Quilting!

Sue

Over the Tops - Another Finish

I've been quilting like crazy lately and enjoying every minute. I really didn't think this quilt would go so quickly, but am glad to be able to cross another project off of my challenge list. This quilt is 85 x 85, even our 16 year old with his long wingspan couldn't hold it out all of the way. Here is a close up picture of the center motif. Each of the plain triangles has half of this motif in red and all of the quilting is in red except for the crosshatching, which is ecru.

Here is a picture of the back of the quilt. It sometimes a toss up which I like better, the front or the back!

With the Oriental Railroads quilt done, I don't have any of my challenge projects ready for the hoop. I found an old project to pull out and put in the hoop until I can finish the posies and celtic, which will be my next project to be quilted. It will take a long time to quilt as each posy block has 3/4 inch crosshatching in it in addition to outlining all the applique pieces.

I have 6 more posy sets and 30 more leaves to sew onto the border vine, then the same braid as in the sashing (in the picture below) will be appliqued all around the outside of the posy and vine border. Still quite a bit of applique to go, but the celtic bias tape is made and a few of the pieces are sewn on as I took it to a friend's house one day to sew on. I'm hoping to be quilting on it in 2 to 3 weeks, but have no idea if that's realistic or not.

Ruthie has gone from hating her bath to not minding it much, even sometimes enjoying it. She gets her hair washed at the sink a lot of the time, which used to be accompanied by "top it!" (stop it) but is now at least tolerated most of the time. This time she wanted her head wrapped in a towel like the big girls do it.

We are enjoying our foray into the 21st century, the new cellphones are working great, as is the new wireless broadband connection. It's all in the timing, I guess, we now have better services for less money...a win win!

The last couple of days have been warm, reminding me what I don't like about summer. It's going to cool off again for the next few, which I'll enjoy.

I used to get less quilting done in the summer, but that hasn't been the case the last few years and for that I'm glad. I feel the need to finish up as many old projects as possible so I'm not left with a pile of UFOs when my eyes and hands are too old to finish them!

The next few days should bring a lot of sewing time and I hope to get a lot done on the celtic and posies, with a bit of hand quilting when I need a break. Happy Spring to you and yours!

Happy Quilting!

Sue

Welcome Changes...and Quilting Update

It's been an interesting couple of weeks around here. In an attempt to cut some expenses, or at least get more for the money we're spending, we're making some changes to our wireless services and launching ourselves into the 21st century...well at least taking some baby steps in.

The biggest changes for me are a cellphone plan that allows me to actually talk on it, LOL, (I had one that I only used when absolutely needed) and a wireless internet connection rather than the archaic dialup. Don't get me wrong, I was content with the dialup service, but being able to shift expenses to include wireless internet is wonderful.


With the change to wireless, my computer desk became movable. I was limited to where I could put it when it needed to be near a phone line, but now that it doesn't, I did some furniture moving as well. The computer desk used to be where the bookshelf is and vice versa. I also swapped the tables, putting my sewing table in our dining room and bringing the dining room table into my sewing room. This opened up quite a bit of floor space and, so far, seems like a really good change. I took the leaves out of the table to fit it nicely in my sewing room and can put them in when needed, for now, I'm adjusting to less table space and hoping this makes it easier to keep it cleared off.


I took a short break from my challenge to make this baby quilt, which Bren's mom bought from me and gave to a neighbor. These are so fun much to make, I've done a few of them now in various sizes. Tone on tone fabrics with quilting motifs done in colored thread, they are easy to get to the quilting stage and quilt up quite quickly in spite of the amount of hand quilting on them.



I'm getting anxious to get back to the posies and celtic quilt. I haven't done anything on it in quite a while, and the plan is for it to be the next one in the hoop. I'm appliquing on the border, have the posy sets chosen and ready to applique along with more bias made and ready to sew on.

The Oriental Roads quilt is moving along well. I'm on the outer row of blocks and hope to be quilting on the borders by Easter weekend. I don't know how realistic that is with all else that is going on here this week, but that is the plan.

Ruthie loves to have her picture taken and this one was taken just after her bath. Her hair is still wet and she's all snuggly and quite mellow.

I have mixed feelings about the warm weather coming, I do love when the windows can be opened, we can take walks, and sit outside. I'm not a warm weather person, though. The hand quilting may have to take a back seat on the warmest days, but I have plenty of hand piecing waiting to keep me busy! I'm already starting my list for next year, which will start off with whatever doesn't get done this year (I really think I've bitten off more than I can chew this time.)

Nothing will get finished if I don't get to it, so it's time to go!

Happy quilting!

Sue

Olympic Quilting Wrapup

I never know what to expect when I plan these heavy quilting times. All kinds of things can come up to thwart them, and that first week of the Olympics I ended up having a bunch of things to do that I didn't expect. In spite of that, I was able to get quite a bit of quilting done. Thankfully the second week was not as busy and that was a good way to end, had the busy week been second, I would have definitely felt that my Olympic quilting experience was tainted some.

I finished the shade on Thursday of the second week, which means I spent most of the Olympic days working on it. I'm really pleased with how it came out and, though I had hoped to finish it during the Olympics, I wasn't sure if it was really possible. Here is a closeup view.

Here is a view from a little further back. The next step is to turn it into a Roman Shade, something I'm still trying to figure out. I found what looks to be some good directions online and hope to get it strung and hung before too long. It will replace the blue checked curtains you can sit a bit of in this picture. I'm hoping that I can figure this out without too much trouble as I have one to make for our bedroom, too!

When I was nearing the end of the shade, I took some time out to baste the baby quilt that I made on my sewing night and I also basted the Oriental Roads. I started quilting on the baby quilt on Thursday and finished the quilting on Sunday. I don't think I've ever quilted a baby quilt that quickly. I put binding on both the shade and baby quilt a couple of days later.

I was still watching Olympic coverage when the quilting was finished on the baby quilt so I picked up the Oriental Roads and started quilting on that one. Here it is in the hoop, with a view of part of one of the Jacob's Ladder blocks.
Here is the center block. The middle and squaring up triangles have this feather motif, in red, with off white crosshatching. The rest of the quilting is in red.

This one will take at least a few weeks to quilt, and I will probably take days off to work on the Posies and Celtic so it is ready for the hoop when the Oriental Roads is finished.

Looking over my challenge list, I realized everything left (except for the sewing together of blocks) is hand work....hand piecing, hand applique and hand quilting. Though I prefer handwork, I actually do enjoy machine piecing when I'm in the mood for it and am thinking ahead for when my challenge year is over. I printed paper for the next strip quilt. I did one where the whole block was strips, one where half the block was strips and the other half background (the shade) so this one will have strips on both sides of the center line with a background triangle at each corner. The pages are printed and I played with the lines, now all 256 have to be marked like this one.

I'll be working on this project when I have a hankering for machine piecing, and on my late night sewing nights, which lend themselves better to machine work than handwork most of the time.

And finally, Ruthie. Here she is, bed head and all. It was around Christmas time and our oldest had just come back from the youth Christmas party (he is a leader) where they all brought white elephant gifts. He received a Barney video, which he gave to Ruthie when he got home. She had just woke up from a short nap and was THRILLED to get this video. She has since "bought" a couple more of them in the Awana store (where they trade earned shares for various trinkets.)

Hopefully this is a big quilting day for me. I have nowhere to go, a few daily household chores to do, but mostly a day that is wide open. I'll quilt on the Oriental Roads and if I need a break will work on drawing more lines on the strip quilt and/or cutting some more strips for scraps. With the successful mastering of the curved piecing foot, some Drunkard's Path pieces will also be cut from scrap and a new "when I feel like sewing" box will be started.

But nothing will happen if I don't scoot!

Happy Quilting!

Sue