Sunday, March 31, 2013

Weekend Wrap Up

There's not much to wrap up this weekend.  I haven't been feeling the best.  I started out with an ear infection at the beginning of last week and the antibiotic is about to kill me. I'm trying to decide if I've been on it long enough to call it quits.  Plus I'm having some other health related issues ... I have a gastric band and I'm having problems with it.  It's not looking good and I've got some big decisions to make.  So that has been weighing on my mind too.

I did finish the binding on the baby quilt I needed to get done and will try to pick up a card and get it in the mail this week.


Here's Nala modeling it for me ... shhhhh .... don't tell!  I'll run it through the dryer and no one will be the wiser.  Unless of course the recipients happen to read my blog!


This is the first quilt I've ever labeled.  I need to start getting in the habit of it but I find I don't usually think about it until I'm hand stitching the binding.  


I did manage to drag myself up to my sewing room this afternoon to put the binding on several quilts:


That should keep me busy for awhile.  There are 7 wall hangings and one lap quilt in that pile.  I'm working on the lap quilt now.  Hopefully I can get out of this antibiotic induced funk by next weekend so I can do some sewing.




Friday, March 29, 2013

Feline Friday

Meet Keira ....



Miss Keira has lots of rules about being petted and loved.  I mean most kitties have rules, but I think "Butter" has an entire handbook! It's hard to resist that face!!

Happy Feline Friday, Y'all!!


Sunday, March 24, 2013

My Birthday Gifts

While I was off at retreat, my Hubby went and did a little shopping for me for my birthday in the form of vintage sewing machines!  He picked up two little beauties for me and is currently working on restoring them both!

First off he got this one:
 This is a Good House Keeper machine.  The body is in pretty good shape, but the case has seen better days.  I'm going to re-cover the case with new fabric using decoupage.  The wiring was scary according to my Hubby, so it's currently being replaced.  I don't think this one will get repainted.  I kind of like the copper and ivory colors. 

The second is this one:

The cabinet is in decent shape.  It has a few water marks on the top.  The machine .... well it's not the prettiest machine I've ever seen.  It's kind of  battleship gray rough finish.  It would look industrial if it weren't in a wood cabinet like it is.  
I think this one will get painted.  The cabinet is stamped 1952.  The machine is a Free Westinghouse.  I'm not sure what color it wants to be yet. 

I'm super excited my husband wants to tinker with these old machines!  Now I just need a bigger sewing room to store them all!!

Saturday, March 23, 2013

Jackson's Mill Quilt Retreat

It never seems like we get to stay at Jackson's Mill long enough. I kind of wish it were a week long event rather than just a long weekend.  I'm already counting the days until next year!

Me and my friends Debbie and Susan went up on Thursday.  We managed to make a two hour trip in to an almost 6 hour trip!  We had a wonderful time!  We stopped at a couple different quilt shops, had a great lunch, and stopped at an outlet shop.  We got checked into our hotel room and then had a bite to eat.  Then it was back to the room to get rested up for the next day's festivities!!

Friday we had a nice leisurely breakfast and then went to check in at the retreat itself.  We met up with our friends Teresa and Kristen and then got everyone settled in to their classrooms.  I failed to take any pictures all weekend.  I'm really bad about that!  I need to do better.  My Friday class was an Iron Pad Caddy taught by Brenda Casto.  I made it on my Featherweight.  It didn't turn out half bad, but I have to say my Featherweight struggled with the walking foot and all the fabric layers.  I may not have had something adjusted quite right.  I need to play with it some more.  Here's my finished product:

It's going to be perfect for my little antique iron to carry back and forth to classes.  Brenda had drawn all of the sewing lines with arrows to follow on freezer paper to iron on our fabric.  This made it possible to finish this in just a few hours -- aside from hand stitching the binding to the back. 

Friday evening after dinner we started on our main class for the weekend.  Mine was Lucky Stars again taught by Brenda Casto.  I went totally scrappy with it using the Old Glory Gatherings line by Primitive Gatherings.  I was a little nervous that I wasn't going to like it when I first started putting it together, but I think it turned out fantastic!!
Brenda handed out some finishing directions that were slightly different from the pattern.  She had added a narrow inner border and then an outer piano key border.  I'm still debating on whether or not I want to add that.  I'm not sure I have enough reds and blues to do it which means I'd need to buy more fabric.  Fat quarters would be too much and it's hard to find some place that sells fat eighths.  I just don't know what I want to do with it.  

Saturday afternoon we took a little break and made a Snappy Bag.  Brenda had everything pre-cut and ready to go.  All we had to do was sew!  I thought they turned out super cute:
These are the little bags that have the tape measure pieces in them to make them "snap".  It was easy to make.  I may make a couple more to carry my sewing supplies in to classes. 

I'm anxious to register for next year!!  Come on June!!







Friday, March 22, 2013

Feline Friday

I haven't posted in awhile.  I think I'll jump back in with Feline Friday!  Since getting back from the Jackson's Mill Quilt Retreat, I've been doing a lot of this:


Khaleesi doesn't seem to mind!

Happy Feline Friday, Y'all!

Sunday, March 3, 2013

Weekend Wrap Up

I didn't get much sewing done this weekend.  It seems like it just flew by!  

Friday:

I got my centers done for my Lucky Stars quilt.  If you recall I had mentioned that I couldn't stand using a plain square in the middle and had decided to string piece them.  It got worse from there .... then I couldn't decide on one style ... so now I have 3!

Lucky Stars Centers
Then I did this week's Modern Half Square Triangle Quilt-a-Long block:

Block 25 -- I think

Saturday:

We attended the funeral of our good friend's family member.  It was very sad and I just wasn't in the mood to sew when we got home.  Very sad.

Sunday:

Today I finished up the next two blocks for the Civil War BOW.  I'm all caught up with that now until Primitive Gatherings ships the next 4 weeks worth.

Block 7 -- Strength in Union
Block 8 -- Fox and Geese
The rest of the day was spent on errands, cleaning and laundry ... YUCK!!  This evening though I started gathering all of my things for Quilt-cation .... my name for Retreat at Jackson's Mill!  I cleaned my Husqvarna machine and changed the needle while my Hubby did some maintenance on my baby, Plum Crazy:


She's all ready to go for this weekend now!  And I can't wait!! Quilt-cation here I come!!