Catching up!

Hi.  I'm back.  Didn't mean to take an almost two month hiatus but, as they say, life got in the way.  BUT, I haven't been too idle so I've got a few things to show for myself.

First up is a quilt I made to donate to a Wounded Warriors charity event my son & DIL are hosting this weekend.  I chose to go modern and I made Elizabeth Hartman's Marmalade quilt ....

I went ultra-modern with the quilting....very graphic in the background...

 and wiggles in the diamonds.

I chose this backing that incorporated the teal and greens from the diamonds...

Elizabeth's pattern made this quilt really easy to put together and it looks great!  I know I'll be making at least a couple more - I want one of my own and so does my DIL!!  I hope it's a hit at the event and brings in lots of money for the charity!

Earlier this month, I celebrated Mother's Day by taking my mom and my aunt to the Quilter's Tea at the Cafe Gallery hosted by Old City Quilts.  We also invited my new sis-in-law Cathy and her mom.  This is the second time they've done the tea and my mom and I went last year.  We hope they continue as we'd like to make it a tradition!

(Me, Aunt Janice, my Mom, Cathy's Mom, Cathy)

The gifts were lovely...a lovely china tea cup and saucer filled with candies and cookies, mug rugs and a flowery FQ with a nice discount coupon for the quilt shop!

 Of course I had to drag my mom and aunt (both non-quilters) to the quilt shop after the tea so I could use that coupon that was burning a hole in my pocket.  It was hysterical to see my (as I said, non-quilter) aunt "help" some of the customers at the cutting table choose fabric.  But, that's her!  I think they both really enjoyed themselves.  And, I picked up some FQs...neutrals (to make this) and a red FQ to add to a version of this project that I decided I needed to make.  (There I go with my copycatting ways again!)

I'll be back with more soon!

Happy Easter! (A somewhat belated post)

Ok, I had really good intentions to post this on Easter Sunday...my house was clean, the table was set, the food was pretty much ready, the photos were taken and loaded and I was just starting on the text, then the family burst through the doors and all Easter broke loose - LOL!  Then, as is happening these days, work got in the way but I still wanted to show you Easter around my house....

The bunny came  and left this "adult" Easter basket for daughter Ariel....

Here are what I call my "Easter Quilts" - a Flower Basket and Log Cabin in 30's prints, but they look like Easter egg colors to me!  You can read more about these "quilts that almost weren't" here...

Also, please notice my new drapes!  Long time coming these were.  Buying drapes is such a huge purchase that I didn't want to make a mistake and I dithered for YEARS before settling on these beauitful gold ones...they were worth the wait!

Yes, now I need a new wing chair

I always hang these big eggs in the window...

I think I made 4 or 5 of these cute wallhangings .... I think 10 or more years ago ... everyone in the family has one.  The bow is stuffed, the three middle blocks are paper-pieced and the bottom is woven with ribbon. 

This was my first bunny quilt...again, made a really long time ago...

Very minimal quilting but the ears are "3-D" and they have googly eyes!

Here is my very favorite bunny quilt...a little newer and a lot more quilting...I actually really love the quilting I did in this one...

You can't see it very well, but I quilted carrots in the sashing around the bunnies and then small swirls inside each block (if you click to enlarge the photo, you can see the quilting better)...

We had a great meal and a wonderful day with family...

Dig in everyone!

Little Bits of Quilting

Sometimes doing just "little bits" of quilting is so satisfying.

Here are some little bits I've accomplished over the past few weeks...

More Granny Squares!  This time with a Going Coastal theme.  I love this line and I saw this on Jenny's Sew Fabulous Quilt Shop blog a few weeks ago and totally copied thought it was perfect for my Going Coastal scraps!  (of course, it required hunting around the internet for some pieces I didn't have - like the gray center starfish fabric - for this "scrapbuster" - LOL!)  This line is getting hard to find.

This was for the Philly Modern Quilt Guild Madrona Road challenge...we were able to choose a few fat 8ths of Madrona Road prints and were only allowed to add solids and more Madrona Road - no other prints.  And, you had to paper piece.  Amy's Creative Side's  Dancing Star Quilt Along quickly came to mind.  I used Kona White and Kona Medium Gray for my solids.  I'm doing 4 more blocks and calling this one a wallhanging!  These blocks were really fun to make...

And, here are my two March blocks for the Sunday Morning Quilts bee...one of our members chose Scrapper's Delight quilt for her blocks...a very colorful log-cabin-ish block....

and The Missing U was chosen by our other March gal...she's doing hers in a very elegant gray/black/brown/cream combo to go with her new furniture.  My assignment was for a gray block - luckily, I've been in gray mode lately in my fabric buying, so had some fun grays to include (including some of that new gray Going Coastal starfish!)...

I'm really loving this bee - we're working our way through the Sunday Morning Quilts book and it's been fun to "taste" a little of each quilt!

Through the Eyes of a Quilter

Maybe because "Spring" is here (and I say that in quotes because we're supposed to get a snowstorm tomorrow!), but I'd been looking at this tea towel all weekend and enjoying its colors and thinking this color scheme would make a great quilt!  Only a quilter, right?!

Then I noticed how this birthday card from my hubby had a lot of the same colors...very pretty!

I've thinking what a great quilt this color scheme will make...but it looked quite familiar, then it hit me!
It DOES make a great quilt and I've been making it....

I was using the Sunkissed by Moda line to make this Birdie Stitches Embroidery quilt!  If you just add a little blue in there - it all matches the tea towel!  This has been in my UFO pile for two years...I think now is a good time to do some more work on it!

Show & Tell Tuesday...What I Did on My Vacation

I certainly didn't get nearly as much sewing done on our long weekend at the beach, but I did get started on the Cross Terrain quilt I'm making as a wedding gift...

My daughter is working part-time in my office building in the cafeteria as a cashier while she's in school and her supervisor is a wonderful gal named Heather.  Heather is very good to Ariel (hey, she gave her a job!) and she's getting married in May.  Of course, I have to make her a quilt as a gift from Ariel and me.  So, I tasked Ariel with ferreting out favorite colors, modern or traditional, etc. so we could give her something she'd really love.  We found out Heather's wedding colors are teal and purple and I immediately thought of the stash of  Kate Spain's Terrain I have on my shelf.

I Googled Terrain Quilts and came across the great Cross Terrain designed by Lee from the Freshly Pieced blog on the Moda Bakeshop (by coincidence, I came across this post on Lee's blog about this quilt just the other day, so I want to give both her and the Bakeshop a shout out here!).  I loved the quilt, but using all the Terrain fabrics will introduce some other colors that I'm not sure Heather would like (like orange - I happen to L.O.V.E. the orange).  So, I decided to gather other purples/teals and use those to make the quilt - thereby saving my treasured Terrain for a quilt for myself (did I just say that?????) .

There are a lot of Kaffe Fassets in here and the fabrics are a glorious riot of purples & teals and I'm sure the Bride will love it!  I already do.

Lilly certainly had fun on her weekend at the beach too...here she is relaxing on the couch with Dad...

I'm linking this up with Randi from the I Have to Say blog and Fresh Squeezed Fabrics for  Show and Tell Tuesday.   You can check out the linkys on her blog to see what others have been doing!

Bloglovin...claiming my blog

Follow my blog with Bloglovin

Apparently Google Reader is closing down this summer.  I am not happy.  I don't like change.  o:)  I used to read my blogs with Bloglines.  I was not happy when that closed down either.  But, I got used to Google Reader.  I'm sure I'll get used to something else -- grudgingly.

So, I am "claiming my blog" on Bloglovin.  I'm not sure why I'm doing this, but it seems to the "the thing to do" and I don't want to miss any bandwagons or anything.

o:)

Birthday Weekend at the Beach!

I'm back after that very unintentional blogging break!  It's been a crazy, busy time at work, plus I've been asked to take a "new" job at work, while still doing my "old" job until some of it can be transitioned, and taking classes for the "new" job has had me quite frazzled for the past couple of weeks.  Sewing has been sparse, but I have gotten some things done!

We're at the beach for my birthday weekend and I'm taking a few extra days off to enjoy it, so we're here through Tuesday.  Yay!  I have my sewing machine and a whole quilt cut out and ready to sew.  Son Bill, DIL Raqhel and grandson Rick and friend have joined us from Friday until today (we're certainly missing daughter Ariel who had to stay home for school/work) and we celebrated my birthday last night (it's not until Monday, but in our family we like to drag birthdays out as long as we can!).

Last night, we had my birthday meal of Spaghetti & Meatballs (my favorite!) and the kids surprised me with a really yummy chocolate birthday cake!  And, I love the "31" on the cake - Raqhel and I always say "50 is the new 30"...

Along with a beautiful bouquet of tulips, and lots of good smelling products from Bath & Body Works...

 I got this gorgeous Cookie bouquet...

These personalized cookies are made by a woman who works out of her home near us in Chalfont, PA.  Her name is Kim and her business is called Park Avenue Pastries. Raqhel said her entire downstairs is set up as a professional kitchen/workspace.  She ships all over too.  I had never heard of her before, but Raqhel has used her before - besides being so cute, she said the cookies (butter) are delicious!  I can't bring myself to open them yet, so I'll had to wait to taste them!  Each cookie is individually wrapped inside, too, to keep them fresh.

Raqhel asked for a "quilting theme" the cookie above has a cute border on it.  Then, the "flowers" have "stitching" around the outsides with "buttons" in the middle...

How cute is that!  Thanks, guys!

They have to leave today, and we will miss them, but I'm looking forward to getting a few good days of hardcore sewing in!!

More soon, I've lots of stuff to blog about to catch up! o:)