First finish of 2012

Woo Hoo, I was able to get some sewing done, finally! I have my projects organized by what needs to be done with them. I also printed out the list at the very bottom of my blog, and it sits on my sewing table. I look at it every time I get to go in my sewing room. I am making progress, which is GREAT!!!

Why blogger, WHY do you insist on rotating photos?!?!?!

Last summer a designer named Kim, @ Chatterbox Quilts, contacted me to test out her pattern she designed. I got it all done,and then it got buried.  Then I started sewing on the appliques, did the first flower with a blanket stitch, I HATED it. So it sat and got buried again, today....I pulled it off the pile, with a plan. I signed up for the FMQ Challenge and this month is a leave motif.......well this table runner has flowers, so it will be perfect. So I pulled out all the stitches in the blanket stitch, what a pain in the ass that was! Then away I went with the leaves for the challenge, it turned out pretty good I suppose for a FMQ beginner. But starting on something small like this is perfect, I didn't have to fight it in the machine. I plan on doing a lot of FMQ this year, so start with the little projects.

See, it isn't perfect and the stitches in the beginning were REALLY BIG and LONG, but hey I got better as I went along. Made the binding and sewn that on too. Now throw it in the washer and dryer and make it all crinkly! Well now I am headed over to Such a Sew and Sew to post a January Finish in her Finish Challenge.

I also have finished the lil string blocks for Orca Bay YIPPEE! Now only 7 more steps to go. Those string blocks hold everything up, because with all that scrappy mess all over the table, nothing else gets worked on. So I will not be doing the other strings for that mystery for a little while, so I can continue on the MANY other projects I have going on. I AM going to get at least half of my UFO's, WIP's, and PhD's done this year!

Super Sewing Sunday 08-07-11

 Well I got quite a bit done today, and even quit 4 hours earlier than normal. Was at a point of boredom, or not knowing what to do next that I wanted to do. So I know it is best to quit at that point before you lose the MOJO. First I spent a couple hours making a back for another secret project quilt I made last week. Here is a sneak peek..........................

 
Sorry that is all I can show you for now.

 Then I got these 100 HST's pressed open. Chainstitched together in rows of 5, and now there are enough to sew them onto 5 of the 29 blocks I have yet to finish so I can start piecing together RRCB. Remember I want the top done before my birthday is here, and I am running out of time. If I do this each day this week. Then next Sunday I can spend the whole day piecing it together, and just in time too! Keeping the fingers crossed. I want this one off my ironing board, and my tablessssss. Then it can sit in the pile to be quilted.

 I am thinking I might use this bunch of fabric to do my Garden Fence QAL. Will think a little more on that subject. PS See Jethro stretched out in the background.

 Here is a closer view, of him hanging over the little scrap basket he is sitting in, with his arm all stretched out, like usual.

Just as I was about to turn out the light, here comes Ely Mae to start cleaning Jethro.....silly cats.











Normally during the week, I sew Mon, Tues, & Wed evenings. But this past week, I only did some sewing on Monday. I worked on the Rockin Row Robin. Here are all my fabrics cut out, stacked assembly line style next to the machine.

 Here they are layed out on the floor.

and here from the other end. There is no background fabric on these, didn't think about that till after it was all done. Oh well that is ok. Still have 3 more rows to do. Using scraps, takes along time to cut out all the pieces you need for a row. I will work more on these 3 rows again during this week as well.










I also have 20 shirts to embroider this week. I keep putting it off, and I need to just do it and be done with it. So I can give my friend his work shirts back to him.

The Happy Quilting Stars QAL starts tomorrow. Are you going to QAL too????

Super sewing Sunday 07-25-11

The little Lion that could.......  There is this lady that comes into the Post Office (where I work) who just had her first child. She was soooo excited leading up to her due date. Not sure what happened, but she had to have an emergency C-section, 4 weeks early. The first 13 minutes of her sons life, he wasn't breathing. She is glad they never gave up on him. When they finally got him breathing, he was swollen ready bad, they said he had edema ( I think) and he was in a lot of pain because his skin could only stretch so far, and his body was still pushing. They didn't give him too many days to live. Then a week later, they said he more than likely has cerebral palsy, she was devastated. As the days ticked on, he kept defying the odds. Every time they said he wouldn't be able to do something, he would do it. They were both in Shands hospital in Gainesville Florida for about a month before she could finally bring him home. I finally got to meet the little guy this past week. He is doing great. He might grow up to have absolutely nothing wrong with him. When I asked her what she named him she said "Laith" it means little lion. He has been fighting for his life everyday so far, and he is a strong fighter. So I am making them a little lion baby quilt. I am not done with it yet, but here is what I have so far.

White minkee in the middle!! I have to add the borders yet, and piece the back with a special label. She is going to be super surprised. :D

I also quilted and bound my secret project I did last weekend, here is the sneak peak...

I also have my Kaleidoscope quilt almost all pieced together, I have 5 more seams left to do, but I have to press, and pin, pin, pin and pin some more before I can sew them. Soooo I will do them tomorrow. Glad to have that one off the design board.

Ely Mae, steals stuff out of my room all the time, today I caught her running around with a piece of lace, that had a ribbon in it, so..............

I tied it very loosely on her like a queen or something.


Good thing Jethro has a stub for a tail, otherwise I might have stitched it into my Kaleidoscope quilt.

See the fluff on the right, that is his stub, and he was trying to sit in the hole where I was sewing, I had to push him out.


Oh and CONNIE>>>>>>>>this one is for you. Connie made this flower for the flower quilt along, and I told her I had done the same one about 10 years ago, and she asked to see it, here it is.

Not so super, sewing Sunday 07-19-11

Hello everyone, what have you been up to?? Sewing anything fantastic at the moment, I would love to know about it.



Me well, I was working on my RRCB, trying to get to the assembly part and I sewed half of these pairs together and started working on the 22 blocks I forgot I didn't do, and somewhere in working on the others, I thought, well instead of burning out doing the same thing over and over I can sew the rest of those string pairs.......well. I was NOT suppose to do that!!! Crap, now I have to rip out 9 of them. I was on a roll for sure, because I was Rollin, Rollin, Rollin, Cotton, Bollin, Bollin, Bollin!!!!

I do have the first two blocks of my turquoise and white one started.......

Then I started and finished a secret project, here is my sneak peek of it. Isn't this cat cute!!! It is pinned and going into the machine next for quilting.

 Then last night I started the Rockin Row Robbin QAL. Here they are started in pink and red. They did theirs 4 blocks wide, I did mine 6 wide.














From the other end of the spectrum, kinda faded out the light colors on the end, guess the flash was too close.

Then here are they are finished and sewn together, longer than my table was! 95 different pink and red fabrics, all from the scrap bins too. I did find one repeat when I was sewing, oh well.

I am going to do row 2 today. Then see how tired I am, only got 3 hours sleep last night.

Do you like to Hexie?

So if you think I don't have enough to do already......wait maybe that should read I have waaaaaaaaaay to much to do already, about throwing in a Hex a long??? Interested??

Well all you gotta do is jump on over to HERE and see what it is all about!!! I think it will be a very slow moving project, so I might join on in for another project to take a while. I see quite a few finishes coming up in my neck of the woods soon.

Oh yea, and I have a secret project I will be doing on Sunday as well, so everything else is on the back burner till that project is done. Shouldn't take me too long, then onto that looooooooooong list of UFO's.

Now remember, up until October, I hadn't been in my sewing room for at least 5 years, so most of my UFO's are from before then, except Moon Glow, and the ones I am actively working on right now. So I am kinda playing clean up from a previous life I guess you could say. :D That is my story and I am sticking to it, really.