A couple more NI blocks done....

This block wasn't too hard, thank goodness because the next photo shows my personal block from "you know where".

 

 

I don't know why this block was so hard, but I've probably worked on it for over 6 hours yesterday and today. As best as I can tell, 3 of the pieces from the NI EQ6 paper piecing pattern were flipped. Why...I don't know and for some reason I just could not work this one out easily! Finally last night after messing around with it for hours, I walked away and watched a movie. The Shopaholic movie as a matter of fact...very cute and enjoyable...when that was over I looked at the block again and FINALLY I could see what needed to be ripped off and sewn on to the other side. It will look better when I have all of the paper off and the little tiny threads cleaned up, I hope! I'm not doing it over that's for sure...lol So I think I made 5 blocks this weekend and I'm still handpiecing another one. Woohoo I'm making progress.

I got a wonderful surprise in today's mail all the way from Germany! It's from my Pincushion Swap partner...Bea from Capricorn Quilts

 

Would you look at the wonderful goodies that Bea sent!!! The cutest little suitcase pincushion with a quilty luggage tag & travel stickers on it, a small sweet little pincushion, a quilters pin, beautiful embroidery floss and a stitch project and a pretty fatquarter! Thank you Bea, I love everything!

Well I'm going to try to get another NI block done this afternoon and finish prepping the le moyne star which is coming along okay I guess. Maybe I'll be able to show a picture of it tomorrow.

I love weekends!

This weekend started off with my brother, his wife and their granddaughters coming for dinner and a swim. Here are the little girls floating in the pool (don't worry there is an adult under the air mattress). I'm not around little children very much right now as I don't have any grand kids...thank you Lord...and I forgot how much energy they have...lol...I was tired when they left, but it was fun!

On Saturday Jay took his Mom to a wedding in Kansas so I scheduled an all day sew day with Kathy and Susan. Kara and her friend Jacob came later in the day. Jacob worked on his sketchpad although Kara had him sewing just a little bit last night. I forgot to take pictures of everyone, but it was a fun day! Here are my Nearly Insane blocks that I completed yesterday.

And here's a start of the block I feared!

 

I'm not going to use this little le moyne in the block, but it is my first attempt of 3 to get it right. This one is OK, but I paper pieced it and it's a little thick. I finally gave in and started hand piecing the stars which I should have just done in the first place, but no I had to waste about 3 hours messing around with it! :o/

I may get to work on some more NI blocks today. Oh and the heat finally broke a tiny bit because we had a cold front last night. Instead of getting up to 104 like yesterday it's only supposed to be in the 90's....lol We did get rain though which is much appreciated!

Audition time!

Okay now what does everyone think? I think I might like it....adds interest....perfect color of white/off white & red....a little insane and different from others I've seen.

 

Wonderful giveaway!

Would you look at pattern that Helen from Hugs N Kisses has just finished?!

 

So go on over to her blog and leave a comment because she's going to give away one set of patterns and if she gets enough comments she'll give two away! Since I'm almost finished with one stitchery project and red and white are my favorites, maybe I'll win!

Still mulling over sashing options, but I'll definitely cut some fabric today to audition and I'll be sure to show everyone. Thank you for your opinions!

Opinions needed please

Okay here is my Nearly Insane up on the design wall, minus a few of the half blocks.

 

And here is a picture of the sashing and cornerstone fabric that I'm thinking of using.

 

I would need to order the red & white/cream sashing from BunnyHill. If you click above it will take you to a better picture of the fabric. I already have the cornerstone fabric and I love it, but I just need some reassurance I guess.
I also finished my 8th Truly Scrumptious block and prepped the 9th one to start stitching on tonight.

 

Oh my gosh...I just heard that Michael Jackson died today...wow, he's just a little bit older than me...weird. I'm not going to get into his personal life, but I know that I really, really enjoyed dancing the night away to his songs in the early 80's...fun times!
Please if you have time give me opinions on my choices, I'd really appreciate it!

Red & White quilt....done!

At least the top is pieced....I still have to get the back ready and then I think this quilt will be the next to go to the longarm quilter. Pay no attention to the gravel pile, that's my husbands and the neighbor cats really like it as well.

 

No work was done on the NI blocks yesterday, but I did finish stitching on a Scrumptious fairy last night. I'll post a picture when I get the border added this afternoon. One more and I can make a quilt out of these little cuties.

I just realized that Christmas is 6 months from today.....AHHHHHH where does the time go?!?!? Seems like we just got done with the holidays around here. I'm looking forward to my sister and her husband coming for a visit in July. Pam and I are going to sew. She hasn't every really learned to make quilts before and I'm going to teach her. I am so excited for her to be here and Larry too of course! :o)

Well tonight is Dear Jane night so I'd better dust off that pile and figure out what I'll be working on. I don't think I've looked at Janiebright since last month, but once a month is better than nothing!
Later,

34 down and how many more to go????

Here are the 2 newest Nearly Insane blocks. The first one went pretty fast and the second one....well it took a bit more time.

 

 

I think there's nearly 100 pieces in that 6" block! I'm not sure why my blocks always photograph all wonky. They really are very square most of the time.
I'll try to post pictures of my Red and White quilt top tomorrow, but right now I'm going to watch the Dangerous Catch show with my husband.

Yummy fabric...

 

More red & whites for the Nearly Insane

 

And some fabrics just because I like them :o)

 

Now if I could only get my sewing mojo back. I intended to sew like the wind yesterday, instead I sat and watched hours of The Deadliest Catch with my husband. It's very addicting, really it is! I did do some handwork while sitting. I guess I didn't feel very well, but I think I'm on the mend today.
The visit with Emily was wonderful. We went to Sarah's in Lawrence (Emily & I) and I think we were in there at least 2 hours. They probably have between 7 to 10,000 bolts of fabric and no I'm not exaggerating, so it takes some time to get acclimated.
I like it because you can find new fabric and old, but it takes time as they don't have kits or even many fat quarters, which I don't buy anymore anyway. They kind of un-thread/cut the fabric on the grain and I've not seen that done any place else.

Happy Father's Day to all of the wonderful Dad's out there. I miss my Dad everyday, but today most of all. I'll try to make this day extra special for my husband, he's such a great dad to his girls. Well I'm off to make some breakfast!

A gift from a friend....

 

My favorite flowers are Hydrangeas. I love them I think because they remind me of my Grandma Verna, a very fun loving grandma to be sure! Well this morning I woke up to a wonderful bunch of hydrangeas on my front porch. My friend Kathy (no blog) picked these yesterday at her Dad's home in Tulsa and she was kind enough to give me a bouquet. Thank you Kathy, I love them!

On the quilty front, I did get a quilt top put together last night. Still have to add borders and get the back ready. I'll post a picture when we get back from Emily's on Friday. I'm hoping to get to 2 of my all time favorite quilt shops, Harper's and Sarah's....

See you on Friday!

Pure Bliss....

 

I'm going to make this someday...Really I am!

 

Oh and look what came in the mail for me yesterday from Messy Karen

 

Thank you so much Karen! I'm not sure I will use my wavy wiper and scrubbie, they're just too pretty and I hate to mess them up on dirty dishes.
Well I'm off to sew some before the day really gets started around here.

And the winner is......

Wow 63 comments....how exciting! More entries than that by the time some of you posted about it on your blogs. I really enjoyed the comments and looking at the new blogs that I hadn't seen before. I decided to do this giveaway the "old school" way and write down all of the entries on paper and draw one. Here's a picture of all of the entries in a biscuit jar that was my Grandma's

Here I am drawing a slip of paper
And the winner is......

Tonya from Tonya's Sewing Room
Congratulations Tonya!!! Tonya's blog is a new one to me, but I do know she's having a 100th post giveaway that looks pretty cool and she has a cute, cute little boy. Tonya I will email you later today when my husband fixes my email...for some reason I have Internet, but the email is only working sporadically! Oh also to those of you that didn't win this time, stay tuned because I picked up a couple of other things for another giveaway, maybe in a couple of weeks.

Okay, remember the picture I posted of my outside front entryway? Here it is again just to remind everyone.
Well we had a huge hail storm on Friday morning. This is the third one in 2009 and it was way, way worse than the other two that we had. It went on for about 20 minutes and I actually saw baseball, tennis ball and golf ball size hail. In fact most of it was golf ball size and now look how the entry looks.

Well the hail stones are gone, but the hostas are still shredded and it looks terrible. My husband is going to try to cut the hostas back today and we're not sure what that will do to them because they were just about to bloom. The hail took out a lot of our tomato plants and really damaged just about everything. We had already been told by our insurance company that we needed a new roof, but we had just put off scheduling it. Well good thing we did because I have a feeling that some of the neighbors that already got new roofs will have new ones soon. Here's a picture of the back deck with the hail.
Both of these pictures were taken after it had started raining and everything was melting pretty quickly.

I have been sewing some. A couple of Nearly Insane blocks (better get busy Janet :o)


Also I'm back to working on the red & white quilt that I started a few weeks back.
In the evenings I'm stitching away on my Truly Scrumptious block. I should be done with this one soon and then only one more to do and I can put this quilt together!

Well I'd better get started on my first day of vacation....the plan is to putter around the house for a few days and then we'll go see Emily later in the week. I plan on getting lots of stitching done and some applique on the car trip. Thank you again for reading my blog everyone and for the compliments on my girls. I am a very proud Mama! Oh and they do get their looks from me....lol...oh and their Dad too I guess. I enjoy making connections with people who have the same passions as me, family and quilting. Have a wonderful Monday and I'll see you later!

I have such pretty girls!!!

My oldest daughter Emily, who turned 21 earlier this month just informed me that I hadn't posted about her on her birthday. Oh no....I thought that I had, but I checked and she's right. So now I'm going to show you a picture of Emily, my oldest and Kara, my middle daughter, taken a week ago.

 

Emily is the taller, but she's not really that much taller...she just has high heels on. Here is a picture of my youngest daughter, Allie, who will be 16 soon.

 

I am so Blessed. Not only are they pretty, but they are turning into wonderful, smart, giving and talented young women. So in honor of my three girls, I'm going to have a little give away! Here's the giveaway...two cute little honeybuns by Moda Bake Shop

 

Here's a picture with the box open

 

The fabric is Glace and Crazy 8. There's also a pattern for a cute Christmas Stocking included.
Just leave a comment for one entry and if you post about it on your blog with a link back to me, I'll enter you twice. I'll draw the winner Monday June 15th because that's the first day of my vacation!!!

Good luck!

It's Truly Scrumptious isn't it....

I've been working on The Truly Scrumtious quilt from Cinderberry Stitches for at least a year and a half.

 

I have 7 blocks done and only two more to go. I have a date of August 15th booked with my favorite longarm quilter so I guess I need to get busy and get it finished don't I...lol

The birthday dinner last night was delicious if I do say so myself. Mexican food is a comfort food around here and we all love it so that makes it fun to cook. I think the birthday boy was a happy one!

Here's a picture of a new book that I recently bought at The Savage Quilter in Oklahoma City (no web page)

 

It's a wonderful book! Have I ever mentioned that I love books and I love quilting related books most of all.

I've posted 3 days in a row...WOW...that must be a record for me. I always think I'm going to post and then I'll think, no that's too boring or I'll run out of time.
Oh, I'm thinking of joining the Cakestand block exchange on the Jo Morton Yahoo group. Would somebody please talk me out of it....please?!?! I'm not sure why I need to do an exchange when I could just make all of these blocks for myself. I'm still on the fence about it though. I've done 2 siggie swaps and I don't think I'll do more because I got terribly bored making and stamping and signing. But I do like to look at the siggie blocks that I have and maybe someday I'll make quilts out of them.

I'm thinking that I feel a giveaway coming on around here so keep checking back this week and I'll see if I can come up with something really good! Enjoy the evening!