Great Give-A-Way

Hey y'all, Debbie over at http://die-steppdecken-des-quilter.blogspot.com/ is having a great give-a-way. Drawing is August 1 so hurry on over and get your name in the hat...hmmm, or maybe not, I would really like to win this one!!

The Good News is.....

The Good News is my new countertops have been installed...Yippee!
The Bad news is they scratched the countertop putting the sink in...sigh. Called the contractor, a new countertop on the way, but now we have to endure the mess and smell of the glue all over again.

The Good news is...I now have under the cabinet lighting that I have been wanting for 30 years now, and a new faucet !

The Bad news is that the contractor left all the lighting wires exposed...how tacky is that!! Hubby said he will fix it this weekend.

The Good News is that hubby and I got a new ceiling fan installed and it runs smooth with no wobbling! WTG Fred!!

The Bad News is when the contractor put in the new switches, changing out the cream for white, he did something that we have not figured out yet and sometimes the switches work and sometimes they don't. Guess you should never have a countertop/cabinet guy to electrical work.

All that is left to do in the kitchen now is to paint the walls, new flooring and knock a hole in the wall to create a passage way from the kitchen to the dining room...hmmmm, think we will ever finish?

The Good News is I got three days off work for this project. Two spent at the house while the workers were here and today I am headed to Columbia to see my good friend Darlene. I also got in some sewing time, finishing up my braids for the French Braid quilt and completing the July Redwork stitchery. No bad news here!

Happy Stitching!!!

Christmas in July give-a-way!

Be sure to check out Blue Bird Quilts (http://bluebirdquilts-lyn.blogspot.com/) for a Christmas in July give-a-way!

Happy Anniversary, Overall Quilter!

Its been a good day, inspite of having a flat tire and getting rained on...but I get ahead of myself. Today is the two year anniversary for a LQS nearby, called Overall Quilter. Its a great shop and I went to the celebration this afternoon with three of my quilting buddies - Cheryl, Carol and Diane. I did not buy any fabric, but I did pick up some goodies I have been wanting. One is a Kaleidoscope template needed for my KScope quilt - I have been looking for one of those for weeks now. This morning I was watching a video about hand quilting and the instructor was telling about how wonderful these mechanical pencils are that are made for quilters - gotta have it, and now I do, along with some extra yellow and red leads. Then I found the perfect miter binder marker - woohoooo, now I will have perfect mitered binders. (I wish it were that simple!)

So we head back home, and I notice the car is starting to ride a little rough, and I ask Carol - are we getting a flat tire? She kinda thinks we are...but not sure...we are on I77 going pretty fast, heavy traffic, no place to pull over...and then all doubt is removed. Flat tire, grey smoke, and I am pulling over on a very narrow shoulder on an interstate overpass. So after placing a call to dear hubby to come and HELP, I think to call the insurance company as we have roadside service on our policy. Trying to convince them that I need a tow truck rather than just someone to fix the tire is interesting. Now I ask you, would you want to change a tire, standing on a interstate with heavy traffic and 4 panicy women watching? So they agree to send a tow, hubby arrives and takes my friends off to their cars, and I wait on the tow. There is this very high median in the road that separates the interstate road from the on ramp, - about 3 feet high and 4 feet wide...so I decide I am probably safer sitting on that instead of in a car that could be rammed by a big rig at any moment...so I climb up on the median and enjoy a nice breeze that was blowing , watching traffic speed by. Speaking of that breeze - its actually a severe storm blowing in. The tow truck gets there, this rather interesting looking fellow gets out and tells me he is going to fix the flat right there on the interstate. Now I am thinking...you see the traffic going 80 mph, a storm blowing up, and you want to change it here...but what do I know? Hubby back now...I sit in his truck and it is starting to rain...uh, more like a downpour. Tow truck guy (TTG) having trouble getting tire off...you see you have to unlock the lug bolts or something like that...hubby gets out in the rain to get the tool to do that with, but too late, TTG has already ruined the rim of our tire. We now have two police cars parked around us with blue lights flashing...pouring down rain...tire rim destroyed, and you might know where this is going....TTG gets the spare out and it is flat! We have had this car for 6 years, never needed the spare. How was I to know it would be flat. TTG should have checked that BEFORE he started changing the tire. So he has to tow it after all. I just have him take it to the repair shop and leave it there. Hubby takes me home and all is well...for now. Sorry no pictures, guess I need to learn to carry a camera with me at all times.

I did manage to do a little sewing tonight, finising up my third braid on my French Braid quilt. This is just a glimpse of it. These braids are very long so hard to get it all in one picture. Yesterday was my Stitchin Friends club meeting and they started their braid quilts. Some very beautiful fabric combinations - I will have to show pictures next month when they bring their braids back and we assemble the quilt tops.

Darlene brought me a birthday present she had on order back in May. I just love it. Have you heard of The Gypsy Gripper? Here's a picture...and boy does it grip. Thank you Darlene!

Thank You, Jane

Look what arrived in the mail today, from Jane, over at Crazy Here and Now blog. Thank you so much. I just love the fabrics and the book.

Remember this cool phone I showed you in my blog that my hubby installed in my kitchen. Well, here is all that is left..sniff sniff.

We were having phone problems, and repair men came out, and discovered the culprit was the new phone. It was directing all our incoming calls to voice mail. So, it had to go.

Hey, the good news is my counter tops are to be installed on Wednesday. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

Kitchen Re-do

My kitchen is still a work in process, but I wanted to show you the nifty things my wonderful hubby installed for me. We purchased the cabinet organizers for the lower cabinets and they are wonderful back and knee savers. Back because now I don't have to bend way over and twist to see the back of the cabinet or knee because I don't have to get down on my knees to actually get something out of the back of the cabinet. I also have a place for my trash and recycle stuff that I can close up. (I guess I should have emptied the trash before I took this picture, but hey I am all about reality shows!)

The counter tops are still not redone, which is why you do not see the tops of my counters - this reality show just goes so far! I am working on the Be Patient block in my Golden Rules of Attitudes quilt and as I said before - this quilt is talking to me. You think, maybe, when I finish this block the counter top man will have my new counter tops ready to install???? I think I will get on the new phone my dear hubby installed this weekend and give him a call, and just remind him that these were supposed to be in over a month ago!

Happy Stitching everyone!

Lasagna and French Braid

Now how is that for a subject? I do mean French Braid, not French Bread. I took a day off from work today and spent most of the morning cleaning out a closet and my sewing area. Made a trip to the dump (live in country) with a lot of stuff that I have no earthly idea why I kept in that closet, and have another big pile ready to take to Goodwill for folks to pick over and take home with them as a treasure. This afternoon I made a cherry cheesecake and lasagna for supper. This is only the second time I have tried to make lasagna, and it came out so much better than the first time. Note the casserole dish..that is a "treasure" I brought home from Goodwill. Kim had inspired me to check it now and then. For those of you read an earlier post I wrote about renovating my kitchen, you see I still have the same tired counter tops...another long story for another time.

This afternoon I worked on my French Braid quilt, cutting out all the sections for the braids. It was a lot of cutting, but I enjoy cutting and organizing my pieces in neat stacks (ok, maybe that is too much information). Anyway a very quiet, relaxing afternoon. Tonight I hope to get a braid put together, so stay tuned if you're interested in seeing how it goes. The picture looks like I stood on my head to take it! I was actually trying to get a pic without all the background stuff showing up. I guess that is what cropping is for.

Wishing you all a safe and fun July 4th tomorrow!

Be Kind

Another block finished on my Golden Rules of Attitudes quilt - this one is Be Kind. This quilt is talking to me, or maybe I should say lecturing me, as I make the blocks. I had a couple rather unkind moments during the construction of this block and each time I picked it up I felt chastised and reminded that I should BE KIND to others, even if they were frustrating me beyond any measure. My next block is Be Patient, and I hate to think what is headed my way as I learn to be more patient.

I also began a Block of the Month with QBee Quilts, a LQS, and completed the first block. I must say a big thanks to May Britt who explained to me the benefits of placing a "lining fabric" or white fabric behind the the one you are stitching on to protect those pesky shadow lines from appearing. I tried it on this block and it worked like a charm. I have learned so much in just the short time I have been blogging!

God bless!

Friendship Quilt Block Swap - Swap 1

What a fun day. Inspired by Thimbleanna's Friendship Quilt, two friends (Carol and Cheryl) and I have started our own Friendship block swap. We meet on our lunch hour on Wednesdays to applique and will be swapping our blocks on the fourth Wednesday of each month. Well...today was the big day for our first swap and we were all so excited to swap our blocks with each other. Carol and I had the same idea and made friendship stars. I embroidered a butterfly on mine to symbolize a beginning. Cheryl really surprised us with cute shoe blocks (needle turn applique)embellished with beads, buttons, bows. This is going to be so much fun and Carol has already finished her blocks for July! I told her she needed to go ahead and give them to us...but she was having none of that.

Today, instead of appliquing...I finished sewing on buttons on my pincushions. What started out as a project of making a 25 pin cushions for kits I am putting together for a workshop and to contribute some to my guild boutique coming up, ended up with me making 62 pincushions!!! What can I say, I get carried away. They are made with four patch blocks and I was having so much fun making the four patches I just kept on sewing. Soooooo, I think I have enough to last awhile. I have a pincushion swap going on through this blog too, but only had 4 people sign up, but they will soon be getting one of these pincushions.

This also empties out my project box - so now I am free to start my next big project - the French Braid, Wooohooooo! (I have two project boxes, have to complete one to empty the box before I can start another big project - just a way I have of keeping myself under control. But hey, Hobby Lobby has more boxes and I have a 40% off coupon!)

Storage container contest

Sweet P is having a challenge to post interesting storage containers you use. This is a gift box that I received one Valentines Day years ago and I can not even tell you now what was in the box. I loved the box and keep my embroidery threads in it now. These gift boxes are a favorite of mine!

Whew...Fabric hunting is exhausting

Today I went to Mary Jo's Fabrics in Gastonia, NC to hunt for fabrics for a French Braid Quilt the club is going to work on starting next month. We met this morning to discuss fabric selections, and then headed on the big hunt. For those of you who have never had the fun of going to Mary Jo's, it is a quilter's paradise of fabrics with hundreds and hundreds of bolts to ooooooohh and ahhhhhhh over. And then they also have every other kind of fabric possible for sale as well. Prices are great. Today there was a bus load of women there from Virginia and I have met folks from all over the country that know of this place, including one lady that travels from Hawaii every year to purchase her fabrics.

Anyway, back to our hunt. We each had selected the quilt layout we would do and had to find our fabrics. Now a French Braid can take anywhere from 11 to 14 different fabrics just for the braid and accent colors and then you have the braid separator fabrics and the borders. Here are the fabrics I chose. The picture does not do them justice. Everyone selections were different and we are going to have some really nice quilts - but man were we tired.

I also found a Kaleidoscope ruler to use in cutting out my fabrics for the KScope quilt I am making. Interesting ruler - but looks kind of complicated. Any of you every use this ruler?

Check out Lynette's blog for a neat redwork pattern give-away!

Thank you, Kim!

Look what arrived in the mail yesterday. I received this from Kim. I just love it and will definitely use it this winter when I have my hot tea in the evenings. Thank you again for such a great give-a-way!

Kim is a real inspiration with the treasures she finds in her thrifting adventures. (She's a darn good quilter, too!)

K-Scope Design

I have been playing around with this design in EQ6, trying to get the border the way I wanted it and I think finally have it. Here is the design I will make the quilt by. The inner border which completes the stars will have to be paper pieced at least that is how I plan to do it. I have made one K block so far and I sure hope I can do it a little better on the next 98 blocks.

And here is an alternate color scheme - all in blues. Same quilt, only change is the color. EQ6 is just so much fun!


Hope you are all staying cool!

Question??????

When I am looking at a picture on someone's blog, and I click on the picture to make it bigger, I can not get back to the original blog. Is there a way to get a close up view of a picture, without losing the blog site the picture is on?

Be Positive

Finished the third block of my Golden Rules of Attitudes from the Be Attitude pattern. This one I think is my favorite - at least for now. The pattern calls for a cherry on top of the cupcake, but I just could not bring myself to put a red cherry on my pastel quilt...so I have a pink cherry. I used a pink button turned upside down so that it would be smooth and curve down towards the cupcake rather than stand out so much. I do love the attitude of this ant hauling away that cupcake!

I also did a little "thrifting" this weekend and came across this decorative plate that is just perfect for my kitchen, at least it will be when we get the walls painted. The green check border is the color I plan to paint the walls. I was so pleased when I got the plate home and compared it to my paint sample! It is just perfect with my white cabinets, golden countertops and the red accents I want to use. This is a signed Bob Timberlake plate and on the back of the plate is his signature and a message to the "Hooks" family. I personally do not know the Hooks family, but I sure am glad I came across their plate!