Shop Hop Eye Candy

Alright, so maybe not everyone would consider deer "shop hop eye candy", and I never expected to see deer at any of the quilt shops. BUT one of them had a pen-full of deer in their side yard, and you can see this one was quite friendly!

I couldn't decide whether to be irritated by the penned-up deer?? Why were they penned up? I'm hoping they don't serve as this family's yearly "deer meat" or something similar?? 

Though now that I think of it, it's not so dissimilar to what we do to cows & pigs now, is it? And don't get all freaky-deak on me~ I'm not some squirrelly vegetarian with no tolerance for pig and/or cow eating & being all judgmental ... I eat mean... just making an observation!

This same lovely shop (the one that went on and on and on and on) provided the most comfortable gliders on which we sat & had our lunch. And might I just add, we had the more glorious day for this weather-wise.

Now to some pictures of the loot! This first set of fabric is for making birthday place mats for the most part. I made them for my own gang at home & want to make some "generic" ones as well.

I was lacking browns in my stash:

(I think the one is actually black?)

Tea fabric!

 

Coffee fabric!

A homespun I plan to turn into napkins for us.

A couple fun novelties: 

And we went to a new shop that offers a very nice array of wool felt! It's difficult to find in stores around here, even with us being in Lancaster, PA, which seems to be the quilt store mecca of the USA!

(the small brown piece on top is actually 100% wool)

These are the four shop hop blocks I'll make "someday". 

A few nifty patterns:

 

Notions~ If you enlarge this one you can see the labels say, "Created by Denise". How cool is that??!?!

And another random-makes-me-laugh picture, because yes, this was found within the deer quilt shop. The Amish & Mennonite are well-know for their herbal remedies, but the presentation & location cracked me up.

That'll be enough quilt shop-hopping for a little while. I'm still not back in my sewing room since our home was flooded in September of this last year, and all of my fabric is still in boxes. I can dig through them if I REALLY want to sew, and I have on a few occasions. But really the process is so annoying & exhausting that by the time I've dug through everything trying to find anything, I have no patience or energy left to BEGIN a new sewing project. Instead I just keep stock-piling :) 

Happy Weekend everybody!

Snap Bag Success and an EPIC FAIL!

Our family gathered at our home this past weekend to celebrate three birthdays & Mother's Day. I'd actually already visited my Mom on Mother's Day & gave her some cloth napkins I'd sewn up, but since I was on a snap-bag-making roll, I whipped one of those up for her too :)

Butterflies for my SIL, and the blueish for my MIL

The Hair Dresser for my oldest daughter, and Daisies for Mom

Penn State for my younger daughter, and Musical Notes for me

This pattern by Stitchin' Sisters for these "Snap Happy I" bags is easy to follow, and they're great fun to make (ie: fairly immediate gratification.) As you can see, they're perfect for those novelty fat quarters that seem to breed sorta like the piles of dirty laundry in my house!

The secret to their snap closure is a metal tape measurer inserted into the casing! Below is a pic of someone demonstrating how to open it using the flaps.

These fit nicely in a purse, tote, diaper bag, whatever... I like to hide my "girl supplies" in mine, but I've heard gals use them for make-up, pens/paper, medication, money, etc.

So those were a success. Now my EPIC FAIL....

I started with my blue tote of scrap fabric (if you look closely you can see that Stan Stan the Hairy Man climbed into it)...

Found some darks, some lights & cut them into 1/2" strips, not really caring how long they were -- and really, truly DID consult the pattern shown, "Get Hooked 2" by Grizzly Gulch Gallery. Was attempting to make a small table runner as shown...

Sewed all the many strips together, opting to go light, dark, light, dark, and so on.

Rolled them into a nifty fabric ball & began crocheting.

And this is what I was left with by the time I'd run out of strips that had been that nifty fabric ball...

Does this resemble the shown runners, placemats, center pieces on the front of that there pattern.... ANYTHING?? How 'bout a banana boat or the bottom of a crocheted slipper?!?!?

*FAIL*

I obviously didn't understand WHEN exactly to put the extra stitches in, thereby making the "corners". I did do those extra stitches in what I thought were the right places, but well, you can see how that turned out.

I will have to consult with my Crochet Expert On Hand, a.k.a.: MOM!! 

I found the crocheting soothing & fun to do -- I was stitching away while watching a movie, so perhaps I wasn't paying attention, thought it was mindless stitching, and thus I've borne a banana boat...

Quilt Show Ramblings & Some Eye Candy

I'll admit to not being particularly inspired to write much of anything this last week. Lots of emotional stuff just clouding my thoughts. 

But in an effort to push past, I thought I'd share something that does make me feel inspired...

my trip the the AQS Lancaster Quilt Show!!

This venue was anticipating upward of 20,000 attendees representing 48 states & 4 countries! This amazes me, since we live right in the middle of Cow Town USA, BUT we are known for our quilts!

I don't me "we" as if I'm known for my quilts, because I most certainly am not -just meaning in the more collective Lancaster County, PA way ;-P

I like to look at the spectacular quilts, BUT, they do often give me a bit of the "will I ever grow up to quilt like that????" feeling. The talent can be a bit overwhelming. 

Of course I try to reassure myself that I COULD if I REALLY put my mind to it. I just choose not to. I'll concede that some of the quilts, those with the perfect, tiny stitches that just about cause your eyeballs to implode from strain, would more than likely truly push me over the edge into the oblivion of insanity. 

(Or wait, am I already there?)

I didn't take any classes while there. I'd been hoping for a longarm quilt class, but there wasn't anything offered for me. (Looking forward to Hershey's show in July for that!)

And really, if I'm going to be honest here, I go for the shopping. Period. It's something akin to the giddy pre-teen girl feelings over boys -- only it's not. It's middle-to-older-aged women getting giddy over fat quarters, notions, threads, and patterns out the wazoo!!!

So here's my loot:

Big cones of thread for the longarm machine!

 I'm loving this Australian woman's designs -she combines simple embroidery stitches with piecing/quilting. (The two on the left are Lynette Anderson Designs.)

These patterns below are for my mini 12"X12" standing quilt frame.

 My good friend, Suzanne, and I bought the red "Holster". It's touted as a rotary cutter holster, but we thought it looked a little small for our rotaries & decided they'd be perfect for holstering our cell phones to our jeans!!

Then there are some fabric markers, a scary looking scalpel I use for mega stitching errors, and some Handy Nets for my big cones of thread.

 I was beyond ecstatic when I saw AQS had added THIMBLES to their collectibles this year!!!!! Yes, I collect thimbles! 

And I always get a pin at the bigger shows that offer them. Not last year, though, because they were overrun by our masses & ran out.

 And the real Eye Candy is the fabric...

I guess you realize I didn't happen up this kitty at the quilt show. No, but my Furry Purry Stan Stan the Hairy Man was waiting for me when I got home.

Labor Day Shopping Spree

I'm so lucky to have two terrific friends whom love to shop & sew & eat & blab with me! They are both from the next town over, but I'm in Quilt-shop Heaven, Lancaster County, PA. They both headed out my way on Labor Day to do some bargain shopping. Fabric + shopping + good friends + FOOD + a gorgeous weather day = a terrific fun-filled friend day :-) 

The fabric I was most looking for was something having to do with Toy Story. I've been looking high & low for several months to no avail. I could've ordered it online, but truth be told, I'm a fabric fondler -- I like to feel & see it "up close & personal" before I decide if it can come home. I finally found it (rather some kindly quilter woman found it when she overheard us lamenting about not finding it.... we quilters are so nosey & eavesdrop all the time, don't we?? But usually, no one cares either! Cause we all know we're nosey!) at Zook's Dry Goods. We have tons of Amish and/or Mennonite shops out here, and this is one of them. If you ever go, there's a shop next door that sells pretzels & homemade lemonade --YUM. 

Anyway, back to the Toy Story fabric. I want to make a snuggle blanket for a little boy whom I've never met, but who's very special to my heart. He's gearing up for his first back surgery to correct scoliosis. His mom & I are friends online because they're from Australia. Her little boy has Marfan Syndrome. My little boy had Marfan Syndrome. She has two little girls, and I have two girls. My little boy had also had this spinal surgery..... 7 times. I know I've written about Montie before... but just in case you're reading for the first time, Montie passed away March 19, 2009 due to complications associated with Marfan Syndrome. He'd received numerous snuggle blankets during his 13 surgical stays & during other illness related stays. For some reason kids really respond to a cuddly blanket when they're hurting. At some age, they realize, too, that someone's heart & time went into making it -someone who didn't even know them! That's how much they're loved. I've made a handful of these kinds of blankets for donation to  Project Linus and Quilts for Kids . 

Now to come up with a pattern!

I also grabbed some Christmas fabrics and .....

Halloween fabrics (I've got two mini quilt
tops done for my mini frame Zlaty!)

Stan Stan the Hairy Man -- Stanley the cat likes to curl up in my sewing room now that the weather has been cooler at night. I put him up here on my table so Smokey the spastic black lab puppy wouldn't try to chew on him.

I have lots of things I'm either in the process of making or gearing up to make. I'm going to try taking some of my wares to a couple craft shows this November, get my website up & running (it's out there, just with no content!), and set up an etsy account.

Stay tuned to see what I've been sew busy doing!

Radiant Star Quilt is done!

Woohoo!! Finished the Radiant Star for my client, Randy Leonard, in time to begin focusing on the new school year. I tend to become ludicrously focused when I start quilting a new quilt. The process is such a lovely one for me... well, that is once I get past the nerve-wracking part of loading the sucker. There's always a chance something doesn't load straight or something isn't long enough, but I've been lucky thus far & haven't encountered much of either. I'm just the perpetual worry-wart & worry about these things even though they've never actually happened to me.

Anyway, I'm very pleased with the results & it seemed Randy was too. But being I'm a homeschool mama, I've been running ragged trying to catch up from my obsessiveness over the quilting. Once I start quilting, I just want to quilt & quilt & quilt. Sure my body protests, the feet hurt, my back hurts from hunching over, my hip hurt from hunching in an uneven way (I HATE being uneven as anybody who knows me will tell you!) I'm neurotic & a bit obsessive you might say ;-P

But I do think my obsessive quality does have it's payoff occasionally. For instance, I began this quilt with a whirling feathering going down the entire length on the largest border. I wasn't happy with my imperfect stitching so I literally spent a day picking out microscopic stitches done in invisible thread... um yeah, my eyes, neck, back AND head hurt after picking all those out!! Then I went back & restitched AND then took my fingernail over all the holes left by those rejected stitches!! But I was so glad I'd done it & was so much happier with the new & improved results.

The green border above is where I'd started the meandering feathering that was looking horrible, and thus replaced it with this meandering leaf. I'm not sure why the feathering in that particular border looked crappy & the feathered circles turned out awesomely?? My spellcheck didn't flag "awesomely"which is kinda cracking my up! Is that REALLY a REAL word??? 

Below is the backside of the borders......

Stayed tuned!! NEWSFLASH: I finally bought myself a belated birthday present.... a camera to replace the other one that got dropped on the hardwood floor on said birthday..... I'm trying not to harbor ill feelings about having to spend so much money to replace the camera which was being swung around & around by it's wrist strap, forming large O's near my DD's face. Imagine when -OOPS- the thing was flung to the ground & cracked?!?!? GRRRR... okay, gotta let it go... I'm a big girl now!

Anyway, the real point is that I hope to post more frequently the things I've been working on. Not only have I been quilting up a storm, but I've also been researching & testing out items to sell at local craft shows and/or etsy. I love to sew & create & quilt, and I'm at home (homeschooling), so I'd find it quite rewarding to manage to recoup some of the miniscule amounts of money I spend of fabric & such (no tittering!!)

Show & Tell

I finally snagged --oh, eh hem... BORROWED-- the daughter's camera whom dropped my camera & rendered it almost useless. Which reminds me, I did take my old camera to Best Buy & they cannot find any record anywhere that shows evidence that we ever bought my camera at any of their stores. Soooo I still have a fairly expensive digital camera that does take pictures but that I cannot see anywhere of what I'm taking pictures. It has no view-finder & the view screen is what cracked when said camera met the hardwood floor. But I digress...

First off, I finally bought some proper hardware with which to hang my thimbles. I don't recall what this piece was originally, but I picked two of them up thinking they'd make fabulous thimble displays. So after having them sit around for years, I finally got one up on the wall in my sewing room:

As you can see I have PLENTY of room for further collecting! Some of these are actually from my MIL.

This same week I also attended Quilt Odyssey in Hershey, PA. I spent two afternoons attending a luncheon & two lectures, which I thoroughly enjoyed. I heard Pepper Cory, Morna McEver Golletz, and Valerie Schlake speak, and each lady was chock-full of great information & so willing to share!

I went back to the show a third day to view the quilt show & visit the vendors with two very good friends. This was the first year I've gone on a Sunday, and I'll admit to enjoying the thinned-out crowd. You know how there are those certain stands that are near-to-impossible to get into without a little elbow-bashing & lots of patience? And while on the whole we quilters are on a giddy high to be at the quilt show, talking to one another like we're life-long friends, and giving friendly advice on those color combos you're picking out, SOME of us can become another type of animal when we see THE PERFECT bolt of fabric to finish that project at home, drooling with anticipation to just get our hands on it whenever this slow train of people would just MOVE already!!!!

Anyway, I've recently gotten into "stitchery". I'm not sure how many of you are familiar with this term, but it seems very befitting to the craft as well. The outlining method used to stitch these patterns are very simplistic embroidery stitches. Occasionally, there are other more traditional embroidery stitches used, but for the most part, it's outlining. I love how these stitchings are being coupled with and/or bordered out with fabric. It combines my love for hand-stitching with piecing & quilting... HELLO?!??! What could be better???? (well maybe if you throw some chocolate into the mix)

I guess I never explained that these pics are of the stuff I picked up at Oddysey.....

So the pattern on the left looks like it could be quite nifty if I ever actually make it....

And the pattern on this right is another stitchery pattern along with how to put it into a tote bag. I'd love to make this for guild meetings!

I was looking specifically for yardage of Toy Story fabric, but came up empty-handed at the show. Out of fabric-envy, I HAD to pick out some small yardage pieces to wet my appetite.






The following two panels may turn into bags?? The one on the left reminds me of seed packets, so I suppose I could put them on grocery sacks or aprons? And the panel on the right has my mom written all over it, tho I'm still not sure what I'll do with it.

And last but not least, here is where I feel I splurged just a bit. I bought patterns for three 12" X 12" quilts to be hung on a small free-standing frame, and I bought the kit of fabric SEPARATELY for two of them. It about killed me to buy the kits separately, I'll admit. I'm usually way too cheap to do such things, and I'm usually very capable at finding fabric in my stash to complete small projects like these, HOWEVER, I want to work on it NOW. Know what I mean? I want to be able to start these when the urge hits & not go searching for fabric. Pure laziness is what it boils down to! And I'm okay with that.

My BFF & I went exploring for a new fabric shop I'd heard about, and we weren't disappointed! WOW... have you ever headed out thinking, "We'll just see what this is all about", and then upon entering realize your wallet is in serious trouble?? haha... that was us today at Weaver's Dry Goods in Lititz, PA. There were thousands of bolts in the main store, and then about once a month they open their "warehouse" which actually appears to be an unused barn (it's Amish country, don't ya know?) & contains more fabric at discounted prices.

The first two pics show some fabric I picked up to see how they'd go with my embroidered angel.... I forgot to actually bring along the angel to match. I'm going to have to stare at them a bit -not sure if I love either one with it yet. Or maybe like my BFF suggested, I could put a plain border or incorporate some plain navy... still thinking. Any votes? Or you think I should cank them both??

These are just some fabrics that I liked for their color combos & have no plans for them -just something to add to my stash.... speaking of which, I should take a pic of my fabric closet someday. It's always fun to see how others store their stuff, eh?

I think if you click on this one, you can get a closer view of the women & their quotes. Again, I don't have a plan for this..... just liked it.

This last set of fabrics I picked up thinking I could use them to make a bag for when I go to Quilt Guild. I like having small-ish tote bags for different activities so that I can keep the stuff in the bag without having to pack it all up to go, unpack it all when I get home, pack it up, unpack it and on and on... tho I haven't actually found a smallish tote bag pattern I like yet.

I'm still having trouble posting pics where I want them.... for instance, even though my last paragraph goes with the pic down below, my text keeps advancing the picture.... huff!! Sorry! One of these days I'll figure it out.....

Hope you're all having a fabulous Memorial Day weekend. My BFF is coming back tomorrow with another friend & we're going to learn how to put zippers into a purse! Bought some pre-quilted fabric to try this & perhaps I'll finish it & can post pics tomorrow?!?