FIRST DAY OF FMQ CHALLENGE

For you non-quilters, FMQ means Free Motion Quilting.  In other words, quilting by machine mostly without marking a design on the quilt first.  Of course, you will have a design in mind.  The design that I want to learn is feathers and below are my practice pieces.  The one on the left is my first one.  The right one on the darker fabric is my second practice section and on the left is my third.  I think the third one is definitely better than the first two, so I am already encouraged.  I want to quilt feathers in the border of my Mansfield Park basket quilt.

Here's part of my basket quilt.  I have about half of the block quilted and I would like to finish the quilting before we leave on our next trip.

 Next, below is my current Jo Morton's Little Women class project.  The next class is Tuesday, so I'm going to try to get this quilted by then.  Not sure how I will quilt it.

On my trip I worked on hand quilting this Cheddar Cheese & Crackers quilt.  I'm about 80% finished with it and I'm trying to work on it a little every day.

I know I'm nuts, but I have wanted to at least get started on the Gone to Texas quilt.  I will be making blocks in between other things.  The ones in this picture were pieced in the camper because I had cut some fabric ahead of time.

Here's a picture of the Gone to Texas quilt.  It seems like this is a "pioneer" quilt, so I'm trying to make it with "old" looking fabric - in other words, reproductions - so what else is new.

I have been busy this week making some play outfits for Abigail.  While I was in Florida I made her a couple of these tops and a cobblers' apron.  This time, I made some shorts to go with the tops, along with a couple extra shorts.

These shorts are made out of fabric from Guatemala.  Do any of you remember Jackie, the missionary from Guatemala?  She sent me this fabric and I thought it would make good play shorts.

 This baby afghan was found at a garage sale in Florida for $2, so I'm going to donate it to children's hospital.  It was new and made by a 92 year old woman.  The garage sale was to raise money for a missions trip and the lady holding the garage sale goes to the same church as my DS & DIL!  My DIL is hoping to go on the missions trip to India and then stay longer to spend time with her family.

Today I'm meeting some friends for lunch, so I better get going.

GETTING BACK IN GEAR

Jonah ready to go to Mother's Day Out - Notice stick in hand!

One of the first things I wanted to do when we got home was to get caught up on my Civil War blocks.  So I finished up the last 3 blocks.

Below are some paper piecing that I worked on in the camper while we were gone.  This is a perfect "Camper project"  because I just need a bag of scraps and can cut pieces as I go.  I have 5 1/2 of these circular blocks all paper pieced now, so soon I need to start sewing them together.  I blogged about these a while ago here.  I've never pieced curves before, so that will be a new challenge for me.

I joined the Free Motion Quilting Challenge led by Thread Head.  Here is my first try at feathers.  Kind of wonky!  The idea is to practice for 15 minutes every day for 2 weeks, because practice makes perfect. We will see.  Hee Hee!  I am hoping to quilt feathers on the border of my basket quilt, so that gives me good motivation.

Well, I'm going for a walk now.  I need to get back to walking every morning, so see you later!

Home Again!

Friday we arrived home safe and sound after being gone 4 weeks.  As always, it's good to get home.

We had a wonderful time with our sons and their families!  While in Pensacola, I did manage to go to one fabric shop - A & E Pharmacy.  Yes, it's a pharmacy on one side and on the other side, it's a fabric store with a huge selection.  Below is a picture of my purchases.

 On our way home, we stopped in Natchitoches, LA to do some sightseeing.  Below is a picture of the house where the movie "Steel Magnolia" was filmed.

 Then we went to the Cane River Creole National Historic Park.  The Prud'Homme family begain farming the land in 1785 and continued living in this house (built in 1821) until around 1990 when it was donated to the National Park Service.  We received a very informative tour of the home with much interesting information about the family and the plantation.
In the girls' bedroom, there were some quilts on the beds which I took pictures of.  The tour guide didn't know who made the quilts.  I asked her because I always wonder about the person who made the quilts and like to know when they were made.

This is the master bedroom with it's beautiful appliqued quilt of red flowers.

If you ever go to Natchitoches, LA, I hope you will take the time to visit the plantation as well.  BTW it is free!

Finally, there is a great giveaway at onemorequilt.blogspot.com, so go there to sign up if you are interested.

A LITTLE SEWING IN BETWEEN MORE IMPORTANT THINGS

More time spent with our DS, DIL & Abigail.  Below, Abigail is eating some strawberry shortcake.  Yum!  Yum!

 Flying a training jet at a local park!  We are real close to the Naval Air Station where the Blue Angels are based, so the local park has a training jet for kids!  We also get to see the Blue angels practice right over where we are camped!

 We spent some time at the beach too!

 Abigail playing with dominos in the camper after eating lunch here.

 Some beach pictures too.

 Here are my Civil War blocks that I've completed while here.  I didn't have enough fabric to complete the one on the bottom, so I'll have to finish it at home.  Other than that one, I'm up to date on them.  I didn't really bring very much fabric with me - a mistake I hope I don't make again.

Thanks for visiting!

ABIGAIL'S TURN

We arrived in Florida on Tuesday without a camping site reservation and a couple places we checked were already full!  Spring break going on!  We were very lucky, however, to get a spot just around the corner from DS's apartment!  I had checked with this camp ground before, but it was more than we wanted to pay.  Guess what!  They had lowered their rate!  So now, we're just a stone's throw away - literally!  If the fence wasn't up, we could take the shortcut because the apartment complex is just on the other side.

Here's a few pictures of Abigail at a park climbing on the climbing wall!

 What a big girl!

 Looking down from above.

Shortly after arriving in Florida, our truck starting making a noise.  Uh Oh....   We took it to a mechanic that our DIL has known quite a while and he's going to look it over.  We need it to be in good working order as after this trip, we have a BIG trip planned.

We will be posting more pictures of Abigail soon.

NOT MUCH SEWING GOING ON HERE!

We have been having lots of fun with Jonah and Eli.  Every day since we arrived, we have eaten lunch in the camper with Jonah.  It is the highlight of his and our day!

Me with my two adorable grandsons!  (Am I being obnoxious?)

Eli is soooo cute!  He is such a good & happy baby too.

Thanks for all the comments on my last post!  I haven't had much computer time, so haven't answered them.

I took my sewing machine to be serviced the day before we left town and got a call from the repair man on Friday that it was finished.  He fixed the automatic needle threader!  That will really be nice, because the holes in needles seem to be getting smaller nowadays.  He also had to replace a part in the tension area, which should really help in my quilting.  The tension hadn't seemed to be working as good as it used to.  I don't remember when it was serviced last - several years ago, I guess.  

Tomorrow we leave here for Florida and will visit another son and family.   Come back for another visit in a few days for some pictures of Abigail.

FUN WITH GRANDSONS

We are visiting our 3rd son & family for a week and having fun with our two grandsons.  Eli is just 3 months old and is getting so aware of things.  He is a very happy baby and content to watch and grab his toys.

Jonah is almost 3 now and is getting to be such  a big boy.  

 He loves to play outside and seems to always have a stick in his hand.

Monday we took a trip to the zoo and got to ride on a choo choo train!  He wanted to go again.

 I think we looked at the elephants 4 or 5 times.

Yesterday we took Jonah for a "day camping" trip.  He loves the camper.  He has trouble saying the letter "c", so it comes out as "hamper."  He got his first ride in our truck and while at the state park we ate lunch and he had a short rest with grandpa in the camper bed.

I couldn't resist making a special quilted wall hanging for the camper.  The Team Grandpa was embroidered on Eli's jammies that we got him when he was first born and I got the idea from that.  All the little ones seem to gravitate to Grandpa.

After playing on the playground at the state park, we went to the visitors' center and Jonah loved looking at the displays which included a stuffed alligator.  We had to go back to see that more than once.  Below he is looking at a pretty lake with paddle boats.

A tired boy fell asleep on the way home.  We were all worn out!  Only a few more days here, then we move on to another son & his family!

THIS AND THAT

Monday night was my guild meeting, so I took the 3 quilts that I finished as well as this baby afghan that I made with mostly donated or leftover yarn.  I did have to purchase some to finish it because it wasn't quite big enough.

This is the civil war block for week 11.  So far I'm all caught up, but Saturday we leave on a trip, so I will probably get behind.  Check back for pictures of grandchildren in the next few weeks!  We decided on the way home from our Christmas/birthday trip in January, that we HAD to go again before we take our long trip to Oregon in June.  Then DS#3 called to see if we could come there in March for a week and that worked out great.  We will be visiting Florida also.

I'm getting projects ready to take along.  Here I'm basting my second Cheddar Cheese & Crackers quilt for hand quilting.  This time I'm using Mountain Mist batting for the first time - recommended for the Jo Morton quilts that I'm doing for Jo's Little Women club.

Here's some fabric for making Abigail a dress and apron.  I don't know if I will do this or not, but I like to be prepared.  My DIL said she is very attached to the Christmas pillow case I gave her in December.  Two year olds are so sweet!

This is my hand work bin with embroidery projects.

A bigger bin with quilting projects.  The "birds in the air" block is for my Jo's club quilt.  I will need 48 of those blocks (4 1/4" unfinished).  The HST's finish at 1 1/4".   Also, my paper piecing project (which I haven't touched since the last trip.  

The hand work projects will be for riding in the truck.  I will have my featherweight in the camper so I can sew at night.  I always take at least twice as much to do as I even touch, but I don't want to run out of things to do and get bored.

Happy St. Patrick's day!  Now, I'm going to put on my shamrock earrings!