Sunday Stash #2

Last Sunday, I spent a very enjoyable afternoon with some of my guild peeps (or as friend Bobbi put it so well afterwards - My Tribe - I LOVE that!) at The Round Bobbin.

Well, you can't go to a sew day at the quilt shop and not imbibe in some stash enhancement...particularly when a) there's a President's Day Sale going on and b) you have a $50 Gift Certificate burning a hole in your pocket!  I made good use of both.

First up (clockwise from top) ... I couldn't resist this gray Collage Scratch in Charcoal, I got a couple of yards of that, and a yard each of this Paris News Linen and the little flowers from the Mama Said Sew line...

I found these on the sale rack (from left to right)...Some Comma News print, and Jacks from Dress Up Days (from Doohickey Designs) and Super Star Paisley (from Riley Blake) (those last two were all about fabric envy, Bobbi had gotten some cut and I couldn't resist!)

The shop had this new Flatter spray in the Yuzu scent at one of the ironing boards.  I have no idea what Yuzu is, but it smelled SO good I couldn't resist buying a bottle.

All of this and I only went $6 over my certificate!

This isn't stash, but I had to share....this was dessert tonight....

Stuffed Strawberries!  These were all gobbled up within minutes.  You can find this amazing - and easy - recipe here at Best Bites.

I'm linking up again to Sunday Stash hosted by Molli Sparkles.

Show & Tell Tuesdays - a Winter Wallhanging

This wall hanging was supposed to be finished a year ago.....

Last year I saw this winter wallhanging in this issue of The Quilt Life and thought it would be a perfect wall hanging for my daughter-in-law for her birthday.

I gathered the bits and pieces needed from around the internet (sparkly flannel, silvery threads, silver and iridescent large rick rack).  Some of those things were hard to find!  And, then everything sat...until early January 2014.  Since DIL's B-day is February 4th, I needed to get a move on - and so I did and finished by the big day.  All of the fabrics came from stash.

This quilt required a lot of fiddely work.  Most was fun.  Some was not.  Couching many lines of silvery thread was fun...for the first 5.  Then it was just boring.  Luckily, it came out nicely.

Cutting out the snowflakes from the sparkly felt...big huge pain in the butt....but they look nice!

Hand sewing sequins and beads - tons of fun.  I really enjoyed that part! Aren't these little silver snowflake sequins adorable??

More sequins and beads on the large rick rack...

And, I was so glad (NOT!) the weather cooperated so I could photograph the winter wallhanging on snow...

All the work was worth it because my daughter-in-law was thrilled with her gift.  I have enough of the bits and pieces to make another....and after the pain subsides I might just do that.  Next year.

I'm linking up again with Randi for Show & Tell Tuesdays.

Sunday Stash #1

While making my rounds this morning on the Internet, I saw my bloggy friend Charlotte, better known in blogland as Grammie Q posted a Sunday stash and since I just got some nice stash additions, I thought I'd join in.

On Thursday, while still working from home during the "Ice Days" last week, my friend Cathy texted me to see if I wanted to go to Sew Smart, a favorite LQS.  Even though I was working, I do get a lunch hour and I felt it was our civic duty to patronize a shop that did have power.  Besides, I had a coupon burning a hole in my purse!

I  saw a sample of Abbey Lane Quilts' Lucille Bag made up at the shop and it was just about the cutest bag I ever saw.  It looked easy enough for even a novice bag maker like me so I picked up these three pieces to make it...this floral called "Mocca" from Alexander Henry Fabrics for the outside of bag, the zig-zag stripe from Sweetwater's Mama Said Sew line (love that line!) for the inside, and the Garden Pindot in black/white from Michael Miller for the side ties and handles.  Can't wait to carry this around!

Since I had the coupon (spend $60 to get $10 off), I supplemented with this adorable stack of Riley Blake tone-on-tone Cotton Dots in Medium....

 I'm not sure if I want to use them all together or just add them to stash by color...

Then, I found this in the skinny bolt clearance bin for 50% off...I can never resist a good Basic Gray Grunge!!

Not a bad haul!  You can check out the other Sunday Stash posts here.

Ice Day!

Today wasn't a snow day (that was Monday), but an Ice Day!

This thick coating of ice was on everything....

And the icicles on all of the power lines have been bringing them down all over...and creating spectacular light shows as transformers blew...

And the ice on the trees have been bringing them down all over the area too...

When you walk outside it's quiet except for the crackling sound of the ice and snow coming off the trees.  Very surreal.

My office has been without power all day as has hubby's.  Many friends are without also.  They're not sure when the power will be restored.

We have been very, very lucky here...so far.  We have power and since I really couldn't do any work from home today I used my "ice day" to...what else?  Sew!

I'll have my Ladies of Downton Abbey quilt top done before bed tonight!

Winter...you can stop now!!

Show & Tell Tuesday: Poppy

At a sewing days at my good friend Becky's house last fall, we were doing a little show & tell and again, I had a bit of Becky-quilt-envy.  She made the Poppy quilt from the Simply Fat Quarters book by the It's So Emma gals.  It's fabulous and I wanted one (go take a look - here - I'll wait).  Then I thought I can have one!  I have that book!  I think it was the next day I chose a stack of random FQs in salmons and greens I'd picked up somewhere last year and got started...

I love this color combo...

I didn't get a chance to quilt it yet because I had to move right on to deadline sewing after I got this out of my system, but it's coming up to the top of the stack soon!!

Again, I'm linking up to Randi's Show & Tell Tuesdays.

Downton Abbey Quilt Retreat - the Recap

It's hard to believe it's been a week since the Downton Abbey Quilt Retreat.  What a blast.  I'm going to recap here - it might be a long one.  I'm pretty long-winded with blog posts to begin with, but I want to relive all the fun here - so get a cup of coffee, or maybe wine - I'll wait.  Because there was drama.  Not quilt retreat drama, but hotel drama.

So, I left work last Thursday to stay overnight at my mom and step-dad's house.  They are only 15 minutes from the retreat hotel. I get to my mom's in time for us to go out to dinner and we had a nice visit.  Friday morning dawns and I decide I'll leave about 815am - plenty of time to make the 15 minute drive.  I look outside and my car appears to need scraping.  I talk to the hubby at home (in PA, I'm in NJ) who assures me the roads are just fine at home and he's sure my car doesn't need scraping.  So, I go outside.  The car is encased in ice.  Mmmm, think I need to scrape.  I get going and  get out to the main road (a major highway) and the traffic is going about 10MPH  Oh my.  As I'm going, (very slowly), I'm passing accident after accident.  The black ice was horrendous.  But, I'm about halfway there - no point turning around as that would be even more dangerous.  I was a nervous wreck, but everything was fine until I'm just about to make the left hand turn into the hotel.  My car loses traction and I'm all over the road.  Luckily (and God was with me), no other cars were behind, to the side or in front of my (and I'm going about 10MPH anyway), and I'm able to get to car to the left hand lane and make my turn into the hotel.  Where I park and immediately lose it and call hubby, who calms me down and feels terrible that he told me the roads where okay (they were...where he was in PA!!),  But, I'm there and safe, so I haul all my stuff inside and commence my Downton Abbey weekend.  Where I will not move my car until Sunday!  Drama, No. 1!

The hotel was lovely, my room was very nice and comfortable and our sewing space was spacious and comfortable.  The staff at the hotel couldn't be beat.

While going to my room, I noticed large industrial blowers in the hallway, the trim on the walls by the rug ripped off and rooms with open doors and furniture moved into the middle of the room.  Unfortunately, apparently, the night before a guest had gone into his room, run a bath and promptly feel asleep on the bed and managed to flood 4 rooms!  Yikes!  What a mess.  I felt really bad for the hotel and staff.  That was drama #2.  But, my room was fabulous.   Except I still feel like a dummy for not knowing how to work the Kuerig coffee maker and actually asking for a replacement, which I now realize was user error.  I'm sure they are stilling rolling their eyes at me, but were very kind about replacing the *broken* coffee maker.

So, for the retreat itself...these were the projects - should you choose to make them....

The Ladies of Downton Abbey Quilt and the Manhattan Bag

I was making both... here's my set-up....

We watched Downton Abbey on the big TV starting from season one all weekend - that was so much fun!

On Saturday, we had scones and tea...

I have to share this funny story...on Friday, dinner was included, which was a lovely Italian buffet.  I went up to the bar to get a glass of wine to have with dinner, and the bartender asked if I had ID.  I laughed and said "ha ha ha, very funny" and he said, no really, do you have ID?  I said "really?", he said "do you want a drink?"   LOLOL!  I showed him my DL and still am not sure if he was serious or just being cute.  Not really drama, but funny anyway.

On Saturday night, though, drama #3 played out.  A wedding party was staying at the hotel.  Now, I'm used to this as the hotel where my guild usually holds retreats always has at least one wedding party during our weekends and I'm always on Bride Lookout.  So, of course, I was determined to see the Bride this weekend too!  Except, she wasn't coming out!!  We heard she was to leave at 4:15pm - at 4:45 she was no where to be found.  Even a call to her room elicted no reponse.  Yikes!  What was going on??  Was she getting cold feet?  Was she mad because it was pouring down rain outside?  Finally, at 5:15, a whole hour late, she emerged.  Lovely but nervous.  She did stop and let us looky-loos take photos.  I went up to her and told her how beautiful she looked and mentioned that at my wedding it poured all day and I've been married almost 30 years, so don't worry one bit about the rain.  She thanked me and went off in her limo.  I saw her and the (very handsome) groom the next morning at breakfast.  The wedding did take place - whew!

So, I went back to my sewing and while I got all of the blocks done for my quilt (but didn't get it put together), I did get my Downton Abbey bag done!!  

Here is it is in progress....

Here are all of us "bag ladies" modeling our DA Manhattan Bags....

Me, third from right.

While most of us were making the Ladies of Downton Abbey quilt....

Not mine, but mine will look just like this o:)

One lady was making the Victory Garden quilt in Downton Abbey fabrics (which is basically the British Flag)!  Genius!  Now, I have this pattern, generously given to me by a blogger-friend and I've been waiting for the perfect fabrics for it.  I haunted this poor woman all weekend taking photos of her blocks in progress...

The Retreat itself was fabulous.  I didn't know any of the Retreaters when I came, but left with lots of new friends!  Susan and her staff at the Village Quilter did a fabulous job and I can't wait to do it again!

Show & Tell Tuesday: Short Story - A Comfort Quilt

I wanted to share this quilt that I finished back in November.  Using the Short Story pattern from Carrie Nelson's Schnibbles Times 2 book, I made the middle of the quilt in the summer of 2012 and then put it aside to tend to more pressing quilt matters.  This was going to be a "just for me" quilt because I love how the pattern and the Sultry by Basic Grey fabrics went together.  It's so bright and girly and cheerful.

In November, I found out my daughter-in-law's step-grandmother (got that?) was battling breast cancer and going through some rough treatments.  I usually see Jacie once or twice a year at DILs' family's get-togethers .  We were even invited to Jacie's (beautiful!) home a couple of times.  I really enjoy her company when we do get together and for some reason or another, it had been about a year since I had seen her and had no idea what she'd been going through for most of 2013.

As soon as I heard the news, I knew I was going to finish this quilt for her.  She's vibrant and fun (my hubby calls her "Sparkles") and I decided she needed this quilt more than I did.  So, I pulled out the box and quickly finished the borders and infused it with loving and healing thoughts while I quilted it.

I pulled this cute and fun fabric from Bunny Hill's Windsor Lane collection from my stash that I'd been hoarding for the backing.

I gave it to my DIL to give to her step-mom to give to Jacie.  I got a lovely note from her telling me how much she appreciated the quilt and the thought and the cheer that it brought her.  I knew I'd made the right decision not to keep this one for myself.

I'm linking up to Randi's Show & Tell Tuesdays.