Time Flies!

HOLY COW!!  Where the heck did the last two weeks go???  I can NOT believe next week is Thanksgiving already, can you??

Well, in my defense, I have not been slacking… been busy in the sewing room… just not posting.   

I get a bit frantic this time of year making gifts for friends and family for Christmas. 

If you check the list on my sidebar, you’ll see I’ve made several things already this month. 

When I decorated the house for November, I found a few places I needed some smaller quilted things to use on tables and such,

so I pulled out my scraps and made a few new things. 

Let’s see if you can find them in my photos of my house all decorated for November!!

I save all my scarecrows to put out in November.

Back when I designed, sewed and sold dolls and critters at local craft fairs in Florida,

before we moved here to Virginia, scarecrows were always a big seller and I loved making them.

You’ll see lots of scarecrows in these photos!

By the end of November, after two months of orange décor from Halloween and Thanksgiving,

I am always SOOOO ready to put it all away and get out my red and green Christmas decorations, aren’t you??!!

Thanksgiving foods have really never been my favorite…

but I do love the whole cooking all day and family coming and

pick up football games outside the the parade and college football on TV inside stuff.

I always go out on Black Friday and get our live tree from a local store

and get my husband and kids to bring up the 8 big tubs of Christmas decorations from storage in  the basement.

Because I always worked, until now, I always decorate my house the weekend after Thanksgiving.

Now that I’m retired, I can take more time…

but probably will still do it all in a week, the day after Thanksgiving!!

When do you decorate? 

Do you go out and fight the hordes on black Friday to shop for gifts?

My husband and I used to do that …waaayyy back before we had kids…

but not since then for sure!!

I hate crowds and lines!!  YUCK!!

And I do make most gifts for my sisters, parents and friends…

but not so much now for my sons and hubby anymore.

Do you make allot of your holiday gifts??  Do you start early??

My Entry to the Festival

I’ve got just a few minutes to get this posted and entered into the awesome online Blogger’s Quilt Festival.

It always takes me forever to decide which quilt to enter into these fun online quilt shows…

But with fall in full swing here, I thought it should be autumnish!

This was one of my first quilts! 

I got the leaf block pattern from a friend, who also helped me miter the corners of the border!

This was pre-free motion quilting, so it is simply stitched in the ditch!

At least this was post-“learning about a walking foot”!! (You should NOT see the backs of my pre- walking foot quilts!!  LOL!!  Pleats galore!!)

The backing is a soft buttery gold flannel…very toasty!!  So is often fought over on cold nights in front of the TV!!

It was made in 2003 and is about

60” by 72”! 

Make sure you check out all the other wonderful quilts in the Festival!  They will really inspire you to get busy quilting!!

Hubble-icious!!

I never post twice on one day, but I fear with Hurricane Sandy arriving today, that our electricity will go out, and then I’ll miss getting my October Schnibble posted in time for the parade!

But, I did get my quilt made!

And I LOVE it!

And although I’m not really one to use white for a background, I really do like it with this fabric collection and design!

I used charm packs from Kate Spain’s Terrain collection.

I did make my outer border a bit more narrow than Carrie’s pattern  directed.

I use a fun print from my stash for the backing.

What a nice large lap quilt it made!

MUCH bigger than our usual Schnibbles!!

And I named it “Hubble-icious”!!

Well, I am trying to get some Christmas gifts made now and am using this cool technique from the Missouri Star Quilt Shop YouTube video to make some placemats and table runner using an older Christmas jelly roll I had in my stash!!  Check it out- so easy and fun!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5Ixvjje310

Hope you are not in harms way with this monster storm!  Keeping my fingers crossed we all get out of this with minimal damage to life and property!  Say a prayer, OK?