In Love With My Foot

WALKING foot, that is.

The quilt is quilted......

the binding is on. Just have to hand-stitch it to the back. I made the binding from the vintage sheet I used for the back, and I'm loving it so much! I managed to get one side stitched on the back, then stood up, and realized somehow I pulled a muscle in my chest. Time for a break!

I love this machine. I love that I can do a needle-down with the push of a button, and it will stay until I push the button again. And when I stop with needle down, the presser foot automatically raises. Pivoting? No problem. I love the push button thread cutting. And I love the wavy stitch that I always seem to use on quilts - this one matches some wavy lines in the fabric, and I never noticed til I was done! And I really, really love that I don't need to oil it - I never could get the hang of that. With my old Singer, I always got the oil in the wrong spot.

What are your favorite feet and features on your machine?

Sooo Busy

I've been having a fun week. I've been working on a set of stitcheries I created that I want to share - got the first one finished, here's a sneak peek:



And I've decided to use a jelly roll for my Wonky Houses instead of the Snippets, mostly because I feel the Snippets deserve a bigger project and I'm marinating a few ideas.






But I can't do that today. Can't do my Shabby Roses either.



The sheet behind this block will be the sashing for the Shabby Roses quilt.

Nope, I have to do this.





This is for my friend Kathy No Blog. I adore the vintage sheet I found for the backing, it's like it was made to go with the fabrics in the quilt. I usually always use a vintage sheet for backing - about a dollar at the thrift store, and I don't have to piece them. I love pieced backs but I'm really too lazy. And I use thrifted flannel sheets for the batting. I love thin quilts, and flannel won't shift - you don't have to quilt it closely, but it looks great if you do. If I had unlimited funds, I would buy everything from the quilt shop, but I have to take it where I find it!

I always pin baste using a table. I have severe spinal arthritis and can't do it on the floor anymore. I was very glad to find this method. I center the quilt on the table, letting the overflow hang down. The weight of the layers holds everything in place. As I finish one section, I leave the pins open, and slide to the next section to pin. I don't close my pins until the last one is in. Closing the pins will cause things underneath to shift, and you end up with puckers.

I'll probably quilt it using straight lines. Hopefully I'll be putting the binding on tomorrow, and then I can play with my stitcheries some more!

The Birthday Boy

Well, I made the cake. And it turned out FINE, we're all still here, lol! I made it in a bundt pan and, while it wasn't all that pretty, it was fully cooked and came out of the pan with hardly any effort. I nuked the frosting and it went on very easy. No pictures - it wasn't worthy.

After dinner, we went outside and my boys played lawn darts - it was very sunny, and my mom's backyard has lots of trees, so that means lots of shadows and my camera gets confused. Or maybe the camera is fine and the operator is confused. Anyway, the pics I took of my boys turned out AWFUL. This pic is our family friend Pam on the left, my mom, and my brother standing.



My baby brother.



I was an only child for 11 years. Being an only child was VERY nice. I had everyone's undivided attention whenever I wanted it and at Christmas all the gifts were for me. Yes, I was spoiled rotten. And I loved it. Then my mom had my brother, and suddenly I was the built-in babysitter! But oh how I doted on him. Our dad died when he was 6 and I was 17 - some very rough times followed, but now we're close again and I love the man he's become. He reminds me a lot of our dad - he's a very gentle, caring and resourceful man.

And now for some other news. Kelly at Charming Chatter is having a quilt show, I told you...and there's an UPDATE! You can now enter two quilts! And boy check out the first place prize - any fat quarter bundle from the shop OR one of the jelly cakes she picked up from Spring Quilt Market! They're not available in stores yet, even! There are some truly gorgeous quilts entered, but not very many of them, so your odds are good to win! Here's the other quilt I'm going to enter....



Hurry, go enter! You have until May 31st!

I Entered, Have You?

I sent my entry photo off to Kelly at Charming Chatter, for the Charming Threads First Annual Spring Quilt Show. You can win some awfully nice prizes! I would love to see more people enter this, so take a pic of one of your quilts and send it off to Kelly! There's a link on my sidebar too. Here's the quilt I entered:







Can you tell I named my blog after this quilt? *G*



I can't believe it took me so long to create this post. I had installed IE 8 last night, and suddenly couldn't copy and paste into my blog. I upload pics to Flickr, then copy and paste the url into my post. But it wasn't working after the "upgrade". I had to uninstall it back to IE7 to get it to work! Crazy. SOMEDAY I'll have a Mac, lol.

Today I worked on prepping my fabric for my Shabby Roses blocks. Tomorrow is my brother's birthday, so I need something to take over there to keep my hands busy. It drives me NUTS to just sit. I have to bake a chocolate cake for him - usually hubby does that, but he's working, so I hope I don't kill us all. I am not a cook. I can open cans and thaw frozen stuff, but that's the extent of my interest in the craft. I do like to eat, though. Especially chocolate cake.

What's that old saying? I only have a kitchen because it came with the house. Well, that's me. I could get rid of the pots and pans and store fabric there instead!

Have a wonderful Memorial Day, everyone!

A Hug From Down Under

I woke up crying this morning. I needed a hug. God is good - He saw that I got one.



Shortly after I woke up, the mailman came. It was my package from Jenny at Elefantz - her Wonky House Give-Away! Jenny is just the sweetest, most caring person. Look at the beautiful ribbon on the package, and the card with a ROSE on it -



And inside? Oh my.



This absolutely gorgeous wall-hanging, stitched by Jenny's own sweet hands:



And this fabulous fabric with Australian wildflowers! Isn't this pretty! I'm going to turn this into something really special, and it will always remind me of Jenny.



And look at this. This took my breath away. A Shabby Rose block with MY NAME in it. How special is THAT????



Jenny, you sure know how to make someone feel better. Thank you dear one!

I felt so much better after that hug, I decided to finish the binding on my quilt for Italy. But first I took a couple of pictures:





It's now completely done and will hopefully be mailed this coming week. I have to tell you - I had just finished stitching the birds on, and hubby walked in and looked at them, and said "Nice baby seals". I could've kicked him. Do they really look like baby seals??? EEK!

MIA

I'm going to be missing in action for a few days. A very, very good friend, who I've known since 6th grade and called "Pa", died today. On his wife's birthday. These were like my adopted parents. I remember when my dad died, when I was 17 - and Bob hugged me and told me to call him Pa, and I did from that day forward. I am going to miss him so much.