Giveaway Going On

there is a great giveaway going on over at Little Lady Patchwork for some Pure fat quarters. you all should go check it out!!!!

NaBloPoMo

NaBloPoMo

Wow!!!! whats that i thought when i read it on Karrie's blog? so, i did some investigating and decided to participate.

NaBloPoMo stands for National Blog Posting Month & the challenge it to post something on your blog each day for the month of November. at 1st i wasn't to interested but the more i thought about it i thought 'why not'?

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so, this is my 1st of what should be 30 posts for this month. i do have some traveling to do during November but i will have that all figured out when the time comes.

speaking of time..... where the heck did January thru October go? if you know would you please tell me. i would seriously like the month of May back right now. its cold, windy & rainy outside today and i would rather be here.

in May i spent 5 days here on the island of St John in the US Virgin Islands. it was heaven partly because of the location and partly because of the company i was in. i wanna go back & i will someday, but until that someday comes i visit often in my mind.

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i hope you all have a place in your mind that you can escape to when needed.

Blogger's Quilt Festival

this is the quilt that i have picked to share with you for Amy's Blogger's Quilt Festival. i have never shown this quilt on my blog before because i made it prior to even starting a blog. i made this quilt about 3 years ago when my SIL was pregnant with my 1st niece. my SIL is a HUGE butterfly fan & when they picked the theme of the nursery and it was pink & browns with cute little bugs in the bedding print i knew i had to make this quilt for them.

the pattern is all done in brights but that just wasn't going to work for a little girl so i head to the Buggy Barn when i was in Spokane for the weekend and picked from their Sherbet line of fabric & started on this quilt. the background is all pieced squares & the butterflies & bugs are all appliqued on. i used my machine to do the applique and i love it. this quilt is hanging over the changing table in my niece's room and she knows that 'aunt anna' made that for her.

totally love this pic of her.

of course she is bigger now and the joy of our lives.

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the great thing about this quilt is that my brother & SIL are expecting another girl in March & so my new niece will get to share in the butterfly quilt as well. i can only hope that this quilt will be one of those that will get past on to the babies of future generations. as i type this i am beginning to wonder if i put a label on it or not. i will have to check with my SIL & if not that will get add to the to do list.

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i hope you have enjoyed this quilt as much as i have & make sure & check out the other quilts over at Amy's Creative Side for the Blogger's Quilt Festival.

A Quick Bag

this past weekend a little LQS shopping took place. they were having a sale & almost everything was 30% off so i had to at least go take a look.

this is what i came away with. a super cute bag kit with a pattern from Lazy Girl Designs - who I love. i also got a stack of 20 fat quarters. no idea what i am going to do with them but i loved them as well so they had to come home with me.

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since i am trying to spend sometime every evening in my sewing cave this week & i wanted to do an easy/quick project i decided to sew up the bag kit that i bought this past weekend.

pretty cute huh!

it was a fun bag to make & it went together really easy. i think that Lazy Girl Designs does a great job on pattern writing.

each side is different which fun as well.
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game 2 tonight of the World Series..... what should i work on????
check back soon to see what it was....
happy sewing!

The Ups & Downs of Life

the last week or so has been very sad with the passing of some people who had touched our lives & we are left wondering why. anytime someone leaves the face of the earth expectantly i always turn inward and re-examine my life & my purpose for being here. i tend to stop & notice the simpler things more - from the moon on a clear night to the local high school football game going on down the road. i realize just how truly blessed i am to be living the life i have & i thank the Big Man upstairs everyday for that & the people in my life. taking time to pause & be grateful for what we have should be a daily occurrence for each of us.

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i was very grateful that this past weekend my BFF Shelly got to come to my house for a weekend of sewing & hanging out. Shelly missed our quilt camp so this was sort of a make up mini camp for us.

i got the above quilt quilted which had been prepped and ready for ummmm 3 months or so. i put the binding on it last night but no pic of that.

i made my bee block for Sue in my Bee Splendid group. these were something that i had never done before & it took me a bit to get it all figured out but once i did i really enjoyed making them.

i hope Sue likes them.

i also got the next block in the Fat Quarter Shop's Mystery Designer BOM done.

the other HUGE item on my weekend to do list was to finish my Hexi QA quilt that i did from Julie's website Jaybird Quilts. i had laid it out a couple months ago & cut all of the setting triangles. thank goodness i was smart enough to take a few pictures before i picked up all of the rows and labeled them. i ended up going back & looking at the pics to confirm a couple of the block placements.

so once i got the main center of the quilt together i decided that it needed something extra. the 1st thing i did was add a navy boarder & then i used a honeybun in Neptune to add a 1" square pieced boarder around that & then finished it off with another navy boarder.

i am pretty much in LOVE with this quilt. if you have been reading my blog for awhile you know that i like to set blocks in darker fabric & this is my 1st quilt that i have done in navy. i loved doing the quilt along that Julie taught. it was easy to follow & yet it challenged me & i learned new things as we went along.

the next big question. how to quilt it???

i will quilt it myself & i have a few ideas but this is one of those quilts that will sit for awhile until i am 100% sure about what to do. i am sure you all have had those quilts & then one day it hits you & you know 'yep' that's how i am suppose to quilt it.

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i am challenging myself to sewing every night this week. so i am signing off to head to the sewing cave to maybe start on a new bag for myself.

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happy sewing to you all.

PS - we find out Thursday if my SIL is having a boy or a girl. once we know let the sewing begin for the upcoming addition to the family.

Randomness.....

lots of random things in this post. sort of how my life has been lately - very random. got back from our mini quilt retreat in McCall (love that place) & i unloaded all of my bags and my project box in to the sewing cave & it sort of just stayed there. its amazing how that works - in my dreamworld everything would have been magically put away the next time i went down there. didn't happen......

since my BFF is coming into town this weekend to sew i have been working at getting the above mess cleaned up & ready for 2 people to sew in. to some this might not be a mess however i am very TYPE A so its a mess to me. also, this is only my sewing, cutting and ironing area. my fabric & projects are kept in 2 other areas. lucky girl with a whole basement to myself for sewing.
i have also been working on Christmas gifts. yes its that time of year again.... this is all i can show because you never know who might be looking here.....

since Shelly is coming into town this weekend i needed to get the guest room cleaned up a bit or should i say the bed uncovered. the bed in the guest room is where i tend to pile my quilts that i have either just finished, am not using at the moment or not sure what i am going to be doing with them. i took them off of the bed & stacked them up. crud 11 quilts... & that's just in the bedroom. there are 6 more in the living room, 3 more in my bedroom & 2 more in the spare room in the basement. i have 11 tops needing quilted. i have never really stopped to count or to think about how many quilts i have made or am in the process of making. from there i start thinking about all of the ones i have given away. a little over whelming so i think i will stop thinking about it now.

saving the best for last.

this is my latest crave that started at the 1st quilt camp. a requirement of quilt camp is that you bring a snack to share with the group. so me checking out the snack table put the above combo together & now i can't get enough of it. its super YUMMY!!!!! give it a try.

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this weekend will be fun sewing & hanging out with Shelly. it seems like forever since we have spent any length of time together. i hope to finish my hexi QA top & a lot of other little things that need to get marked off my to do list.

wish me luck!

When It Rains

why is it when it rains it pours? that has been my life for the past few weeks. a couple quilt camps, an eye infection that required a few trips to the doc out of town, people on vacation from work, just life in general has been busier then normal for me - that's why i haven't been here blogging. but, today is your lucky day & i am here with pics from quilt camp this past weekend.

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there were only 4 of us the aka Renegades & we headed to my aunt & uncle's place in McCall, ID which is about 2 1/2 hrs from here. this is an annual trip for our group as its one of our members birthday. this week i received a thank you card from her with this on the front of it - a perfect depiction of our little group!

pic of the lake at McCall. its an awesome little resort town in the mountains.

pic of my aunt & uncle's place that we stayed at.

so, for actual sewing that i got done at this camp.... at the last camp i did some quilting so at this camp i bound what i quilted at that camp & then i decided to quilt some more.

out of the 5 quilts above i quilted 2 of them in McCall the other 3 at the last camp and got the binding done on all of them in McCall. a couple of theses quilts are gifts - 1 for a little person & 1 for a dear friend who is recovering from back surgery.

this quilt i started about 1 1/2 yrs ago & got the top finished about 6 or 8 months ago. i quilted it in McCall with the advice and help of Denise the 'quilting master'. i love how it turned out - i gave it to my mom for her birthday & she loves it. its her 1st Christmas quilt from me.

i love that the tassels on the hats are felted wool.

Fat Quarter Shop Mystery Designer BOM finally all done.

i pieced this at the last quilt camp & got it all finished in McCall

something i spent 1 1/2 days on but i can't show it all just yet.

giant pincushions from Julie's pattern. i actually filled them with crushed walnut shells - that was fun & they turned out way different then filling them with doll beads and stuffing.

did a block for my monthly block swap.

hope you like it Kitty.

got 5 rows of my hexi QA quilt put together - this is very time consuming but i am loving how its coming along.

life is starting to get back to normal for me - whatever normal is. i plan on spending sometime this weekend in the sewing cave maybe finishing up the hexi quilt & moving on to some Christmas gifts.