Busy, Busy, Busy!

This is me right now!

I've spent the day taking down and packing away the 3 plastic tubs of Thanksgiving decorations, taking them down to the basement for storage, bringing up the 9 plastic tubs of Christmas decorations and putting them out. In between, my son Anthony and I went to Home Depot and got our live 7' tall live Fraser fir tree. Then back to decorating.

I got the family room and kitchen finished. Tomorrow I'll do the living room and dining room. The live tree is in the living room, so that will be done, tomorrow, too. If I don't run out of steam, I'll also do the front steps outside... but that may have to wait until Sunday.
Tomorrow, I also have to run to Joann's to get some interfacing that's on sale for Anthony's T-Shirt quilt that I haven't even started yet... a Christmas present. YIKES!

Well, I'm exhausted, so gonna put my feet up and relax a bit.

It's been a longgggggg day!

Sew Thankful!

Work is over for this week. Not that tomorrow is going to be no "work" at all...but it is fun, family work. Making the dressing, stuffing and roasting the turkey, making the sweet potato casserole, green beans, cranberry sauce and setting the table and cleaning up afterwards... it is work, but beloved for sure!

Happily, we all can sleep in tomorrow, and I'm sooooooooooo very thankful for that! And I can sew for most of the day, until it's kitchen time! And I'm sew thankful for that! I've got the "It's A Wrap" quilt top almost done. I'm sewing the rows together with the sashing. I'm hoping to finish it before I've got to cook. Then maybe I can get it all pinned together and ready to quilt while the turkey bakes.

I hope everyone has a wonderful and

heartwarming Thanksgiving!

Laid Back Sunday

What a nice relaxing day! We did get up early to go to 7:30am mass, then out to breakfast at Silver Diner. A nice walk outside with Yogi... can't believe how warm it's been here lately! I still have my geraniums in big pots on my front steps... usually by this time in November all my geraniums are long dead and thrown out from freezing cold temps.

Can you believe I snuck back to bed and

took a 2 hour nap mid morning??? AWESOME!!

When I got up the second time, I spent some time in the sewing room and finished the blocks for the "It's A Wrap" quilt. The pattern requires only 25 blocks for the quilt and suggests you use the leftover 5 blocks to make a table runner.... but when I laid them out on the design wall, I decided to just make another row on the quilt so it's a bit bigger. However, I do need a bit more light fabric for the sashing now, so will get that tomorrow.

I really love these funky bright blocks!

I'm looking forward to quilting this one!

Tonight I was checking email on my laptop and watching the Grinch on TV... Yogi really didn't like the Grinch at all!

Every time the Grinch came on-screen, Yogi started barking and trying to jump up to get him!

What a good protector

of the Christmas spirit!!

His heart is definitely NOT

three sizes too small!!

Well, did ya see it yet??

I've been in my sewing room most of the day. This Sandy Gervais pattern called "It's a Wrap" is what I'm working on using the very same jelly roll used in the one shown on the front. I love jelly rolls! :-)

I love the funky bright fabrics in the collection and especially the addition of the bright aqua blue and lime green! I hope to get the top completed and pinned together ready to be quilted tomorrow. It is just one of several new Christmas quilts I'd love to finish and put out this Christmas. Do you have lots of Christmas quilts?

OK, so did ya see it yet??

My husband and I went to see "New Moon" last night. The movie was reallllllly good.... however, a word to the wise-

NEVER GO SEE A TEENAGE MOVIE

ON OPENING NIGHT!! UGH!!!

The theater was packed with teenage girls who screamed and yelled whenever their favorite heart-throb came on the screen. YIKES!!

So? Are you on team Edward or team Jacob????

Santa's Ready!

I finished my Santa wall hanging for over the mantle! YESSSSSSSS! Have you ever made one of the fusible grid method quilts? I love making them! They are so easy and fun!! You cut the little squares from scraps 1 7/8" . You place them on the fusible side of the grid following the gridded pattern.

This Santa was made in three pieces-

two mittened arms and the head.

I like placing the squares on the grid...

kinda like a mosaic puzzle!!

Next you sew all the seam in one direction-

I did all the vertical seams first.

Then you press them in one direction.

Then you clip all the seam allowances

at the opposite cross seam spots.

Then you fold and sew the opposite direction seams.

And you're done with the quilt top! Then use it as a pattern to cut out the batting and backing. You sew it wrong sides together, leaving an opening to turn it through. Turn it through that opening, press it well and hand-stitch the opening closed. The quilt it as desired and add the embellishments.

I bought the finishing kit for this pattern which included the fuzzy beige trim, the eye buttons and glasses, the wooden nose and the jingle bells.

I used a heavy variegated thread and grid quilted Santa's suit. I quilted fall lines on his hat and a big curl on her mittens.

My favorite part I quilted was his beard with big curls using a shiny silvery thread. I can't wait to see how it looks hanging above the fireplace. I'm thinking I could make a garland for him to hold at each end in his mittens that would spell out

"We Believe"....

WADDAUDINK????????

New Stockings Done!

Yippee skippee!! Another UFO crossed off my list of millions!! But I am very pleased with how our new Christmas stockings turned out! I think they will look great on our mantle in a week or so! I decorate my house on Thanksgiving weekend. When do you start your holiday decorating?

This one is mine! Gotta love that mistletoe!! :-)



This one is my younger son's- Anthony!

This one is my husband's! Love the stripes on the curled toe!




And this one is my older son's- AJ!

Love the slouch socks and curled antlers!!

Now on to another Christmas project...

the Santa wall hanging for above the mantle!

Are all your home-made holiday presents made???

Looongggggggg Day Yesterday

Yesterday was a very LONGGGGGGGGGGGGGG day for us. My husband and I drove to Virginia Tech to spend the day with my son Anthony who is in grad school there. He's been sounding really sad and lonely on the phone lately. Working on his Master's degree at Tech, all his friends have graduated and gone on to jobs instead of staying for grad school, so he has few friends still there to knock around with. We took Yogi with us, too, as we thought he would also cheer Anthony up a bit.
Anthony was happy to see us and we had a nice but short visit. The trip takes about 4 hours by car... so that's 8 hours in the car yesterday. We left at 6:00am and got home about 9:00pm... WAAAAAAAAAY too many hours in the car!! But we are glad we went. He did seem very happy to see us! :-)
Today I'm finishing up the new Christmas stockings for the mantle. I finished the machine work on them, but am now sitting in front of the TV watching football with my husband while I stuff the curled toes of each stocking and hand sew the lining closed. I'll post photos of them later!
Here's the last quilt I had to bind from the long-armer. It's a simple snowman panel quilt that I'll put out in January. I love the soft colors of mostly pale blue and teal with bits of green and butter yellow.

The coordinating fabric looks like a knitted cap. I appliqued a mitten on the four corners with blanket stitching around their edges. The faces of the snowmen are just precious!



Hope you are having a wonderfully relaxing Sunday!

The sun is finally out here!! :-)

See Me Now!!!!

I got my Bernina back!

It's all fixed! :-)

It'll be humming tonight!

This Is Me...

Without my Bernina!!!!!!!!! Sob!! :-(

Maybe I'll get it back tomorrow...

Clickety Clank...ARGHHHH!

I'm so bummed! I was happily quilting away on some new Christmas stockings this afternoon when my machine started clicking and clanking I was frankly scared to keep stitching...afraid that I'd further damage the machine. So, I stopped...sigh.

Tomorrow I'll call my Bernina guy Fred, and see if I can bring it in. RATS! :-(

But I can show you how far I got. I love this panel of 4 stockings. I fell in love with the illustrations and especially the curled toes. I embroidered our names at the top of each stocking with black thread. I free-motion quilted with multicolored metallic thread on the outlines of the illustrations and the stripes and checks and toe and heel patches. I finished the quilting on 3 of them and was about half done with the fourth when the machine problem began.

This one is mine!! Here's what the quilting

looks like from the back.

Here's a close-up of the name at the top.

This one is for my husband.

Here's his from the back!

This one is for my younger son, Anthony.

Here's his from the back...

not sure why this photograph is so yellow?

This one is for my older son A.J...

and is only about half done!! DANG!

Well, once I finish the quilting on this one, I have to cut them out along with the lining and back side and a loop to hang them with. Shouldn't take long at all to finish them up.

Wonder how long my machine will be out of commission... not too long, I hope!!

November Decor

My house has now been decorated for Thanksgiving

since the day after Halloween.

I put out all my scarecrows in November. I've probably made a zillion scarecrows back when I had booths at craft fairs back in Florida many years ago.

I love my pie safe which is chock full of quilts.

I love that maple leaf quilt on my red chair.

The border fabric has scarecrows dancing around it!

As you can plainly see, I love maple leaf quilts for fall.
They are everywhere!




The quilt above the mantle is my design, too.

It's quilted in swirls and embellished with crystals.

This scarecrow is one of my first!!

It's about 20 years old now.

My sisters and I all made these bears with

4 different seasonal jackets and hats.

The ceiling looks curved in this photo...weird!

This happy guy is another favorite scarecrow of mine!

Love his hat with seed packets!!

Everyone has to have at least one HUGE acorn, right?

This turkey is really old, too!! Maybe 25 years old ??

Love this quilt! It's the one at the top of my blog.

The batiks really pop!

I didn't make this little lady...but love her dearly!!

Here's one of those new panel quilts I just finished last week.

A little pie safe to go with the big one!

This happy guy has a heart-melting grin...

my sisters made him, too.

I bought this guy at Homegoods last fall!

Love the button-hinged elbows!

I made this little low bench in the kitchen

bay window for my Westie Yogi.

He sits on it and watches the squirrels

sunbathing on the deck...

they drive him NUTS!!

I made those placemats at last year's fall guild retreat.

The kitchen has some resident scarecrows, too!

Yogi would be mad if he knew I have a

perky squirrel on my counter!

I even found cutting boards with scarecrows on eBay!!

The hand painted fall scene on the

middle shelf is also a favorite of mine!

Darn that flash... my photography skills need allot of work!!

This guy has a pumpkin face on the other side of his head... versatile...like Voldemort in the first Harry Potter book!! :-)

The little wooden car on the window sill holds special memories. My sister Patty and I both bought them together at a craft fair I had a booth in many years ago. It has "Over the river and through the woods to Grandmother's house we go..."

Don'tcha just love the purples and gold and oranges of fall??

Only a few weeks until Thanksgiving! Can you believe it?