A WINNER AND A FINISH!!

DH drew for the winner to my giveaway and Marsha at Grandma's Quilts won!  Enjoy!  Thanks to everyone who participated and for all the lovely comments that you sent.

Gone to Texas is finished !!  Yea!!  Inside pictures aren't the best, but it is too big to hang on the fence and hold up - 82" square.  Pattern is published in the Gone to Texas  by Betsy Chutchian.  I love this book.  It contains excerpts from her great-great grandmother's journal from mid 1800 along with 12 quilt patterns.  The journal is wonderful and so touching in parts.  I would recommend the book to you for just the journal excerpts.  I'm so glad Betsy came to my guild meeting!

 Quilted on my DSM (domestic sewing machine) with Baptist fans.  It was hard to stay on the lines, so I'm not sure I will machine quilt this pattern again.

Friday I'm going on a quilting retreat with my guild!!  It has been a long time since I've gone on one, so I am really looking forward to it.

KEEPING BUSY

One morning I needed to do something easy, so I was looking through some boxes and saw the leftover pieces of charm squares from when I made my tumbler quilts.  I decided to sew the pieces together randomly and make a table runner and I got the top finished.

Another finish is "Amy's Choice" quilt from my Jo Morton class last year.  It's 22" square and the blocks in the middle finish at 3".

I even put on a label!

Some time in the past I bought this book of iron-on labels, but it wasn't until last November that I decided that I needed to get all my quilts labeled.   (I couldn't get this picture to go in straight - sorry).

 I had forgotten that I had the book, but came across it in my sewing closet.  You can iron on the same design more than once.  These are some of the ones that I haven't sewn onto quilts yet.  At first I embroidered on them and the one on the left has some embroidery.  But then I got the idea to use a colored gel pen.  I decided to finish the one on the left with the pen - a lot easier!  The others were done with gel pens too.  It's kind of fun!

Some labels have a blank to put in the name of the quilt and some don't.  I find it hard to come up with a name, so I usually use the name given by the designer.

This weekend I'm going to finish quilting Gone to Texas and maybe even bind it.  Yea!

Don't forget to comment if you want to get in my drawing (see last post).  I will be drawing a name on Feb. 29 at noon.

2 SMALL QUILTS AND A GIVEAWAY!!!

I put aside my quilting for a few days, but plan to finish quilting Gone to Texas within the week.  I wanted to make a couple small table toppers for my Etsy shop.  I love sawtooth stars and have made numerous of these little 4 star runners.

I thought I would try something different on this one.

Right before Christmas I reached my 300th post!  I decided to wait until after Christmas to have my giveaway because of all the busyness of the season, plus we were going on a trip, etc.

I will be giving away these 4 fat quarters of reproduction fabric.  They are some of my favorites!

I will also giveaway this pincushion that I made out of wool and stuffed with crushed walnut shells.  The FQs and the pincushion will go to one lucky winner (the table topper quilts are NOT included).  All you have to do is leave a comment.  At noon on February 29, I will draw.

I have enjoyed blogging and have met so many wonderful friends - some in person and some just over the internet.  I've learned so much from other quilters and I want to thank all of you that have inspired me and left sweet comments.  I'm still amazed when I get a comment from the other side of the world!

So, be sure to leave a comment for the giveaway!

STARTING TO QUILT ON GONE TO TEXAS

It doesn't look like it is a good time for me to use my friends quilting machine to quilt the Gone to Texas quilt, so I have started doing the quilting on my own machine.  I decided to quilt in the "Baptist Fan" design.  I wasn't sure how to do it, but I found a long arm quilter on Youtube doing it, so that helped.  She had some circle templates.  I made some half circle templates out of cardboard.

I started marking the archs with a chalk marker, but that didn't show up very well.  Then I remembered I had a hera marker, so I used that.

Here is the hera marker and the first template.

I am marking the first line.

I'm marking the second line.

I mark 4 lines with the templates.

Here you can see the indent left by the hera marker.

 After sewing the first 4 lines of the fan, I just "eyeball" the last line.  I mark one fan at a time, quilt it, then mark another one.  This is how it looks so far.  I have done about 1/3 of the quilt and I hope I'll be able to finish it on my machine

Happy quilting!

FREE MOTION QUILTING CHALLENGE FOR FEBRUARY

First of all, here are the last two Civil war blocks!!!  I'm glad that I stuck with it and finished all 53 blocks (there are 53 because that is the number of Saturdays during the year).

I decided to join the Free Motion Quilting Challenge (FMQ) hosted by SewCalGal during the whole year.  I participated in one last year and that helped me so much, but I know I still have a lot to learn and that practice makes perfect.  I was gone for just about all of January, so I didn't do that one (maybe I'll do it later), but I decided to get the one for February done right away.  February's tutorial is by Diane Gaudynski and her quilting is amazing.  It's still not too late for you to join if you are interested.

I didn't use good quilting thread on the first part of this and that part of it didn't look too good, so I changed the thread and it really helped a lot.  I'm also practicing some other FMQ designs as I will be quilting the Gone to Texas quilt soon - possibly next week.  Thanks for visiting!

Pink Lemonade all Finished

I finished my pink lemonade quilt and hung it in my entry hall, which has pink wall paper.

I even put a label on it!!  I've never put a label on this quick before.  I was thinking about hand quilting it, but I knew if I did, it would be a long time before I even got to it.  So I just went ahead and machine quilted.

It was a fun project to work on.  Now, hoping to finish some larger quilts...

PINK LEMONADE and Trip Projects

I finished the Pink Lemonade top yesterday and took this picture so I could link to Lori's blog.  Thanks, Lori, for the quilt along!  This was a fun quilt to make.

As you know, while we were on our trip, I had my sewing machine with me.  Since the 5th wheel is a lot bigger than our former camper, I decided to bring extra fabric and projects "just in case" I had time to work on them.  Am I glad that I did!  I had 10 extra days due to the truck transmission going out, so I sewed and sewed and sewed.  Until I almost got sick of sewing!

Last summer when Beth took me on a shop hop in the Chicago suburbs, I saw a log cabin quilt that I really loved.  Eventually, I started making some blocks and they are addicting.  I made about 26 before the trip and took some 1" strips with me.  Now I have a total of 92 blocks that finish at 4 3/4".  These are some of them on my design wall.

I decided to participate in the Temecula Quilt Co. mystery quilt and the top is finished.

One thing I threw into the camper is my basket of 1 1/2" strips that I use to make postage doll quilts. I got started on those one day and made 3 little quilts.

I started hand quilting this one.  

I finished the Gone to Texas quilt top.  After adding an additional row and two borders, it measures about 84" square.

I hand quilted this little courthouse steps that I made for my Jo Morton class.  The piecing isn't very good, but I like it anyway.

I ironed on these applique pieces for the center of this Oak Leaves and Turkey Feathers quilt by Jan Patek.  I have been wanting to do something like this for a long time.  I'm going to machine applique these on.

This is going to be a pincushion from the Primitive Quilts and Projects magazine, Winter 2011.  I really like that magazine.  These are ready to stuff and sew together.

My next priority will be to quilt the Gone to Texas quilt.  The Thread Head quilt along blocks are ready to be put together for a king size quilt.  I also need to finish a couple civil war blocks and get those put together.  I should get some large quilts finished this year, since all the blocks are ready.  Plus other things that I want to do.  I think it will be another busy year!

HELP ME CHOOSE

As I mentioned in my last post earlier today, I am participating in Lori's Pink Lemonade quilt along.  I didn't have enough yellow for the alternating blocks.  I took pictures of the blocks set on top of the two choices that I have.  If neither of these works, I will go buy something else.  But, maybe one of these will be OK.  Please let me know your opinion on which of the yellow looks best - or, if you don't like either one, tell me that too.  I think I have enough of either to cut the pieces required.

A.

B.

FINALLY HOME!!

When we were towed in Pensacola, this is the HUGE tow truck that was necessary to tow our truck with the 5th wheel camper behind it.  We were towed again in Vicksburg, MS, but I didn't take any pictures.  Instead of arriving home on January 18, we arrived home yesterday, January 28.  We had 10 days of sitting around waiting for the truck transmission to be fixed!  

As I said in my last post, I was happy that I had brought more projects than I ever thought I would work on during the trip.  I also decided to participate in Lori's quilt along.  This is a picture of a few of the blocks and the only yellow fabric that I had with me.  The two tiny pieces were in with some of my Gone to Texas fabric bags and I have more of the small piece on the right, but I think I'm out of the small triangle fabric.  I don't like the large yellow for this quilt.  I will probably buy something different for the 

yellow.

These are the setting blocks.  I don't remember if I made the corner pieces or not.

I also put together 3 postage stamp (1") doll quilts and started hand quilting one of them.

Another little quilt I put together, is the mystery quilt put on by the Temecula Quilt Co.  These are the 12 blocks before I put them together

After our laptop quit, I had to look at blogs on my Iphone and it wasn't the best way to do so.  It is so good to be back with our desk top computer.  I can send emails with the Iphone, but it isn't very easy to do too much typing on it, so I didn't reply to most of your comments.  Thanks so much for all the comments that I received!

Now, we need to get all unpacked and organized at home.  Have a good week, everyone!

NOT GONE TO TEXAS

I can't figure out how to add pictures to this post that I'm sending from my IPhone. Our transmission went out as we were leaving Pensacola FL. Our computer also quit. After the truck was fixed,we left FL. When we got to Vicksburg, MS, the transmission went out again (Friday PM). So we are stranded at an RV park. The good thing is that I have gotten a lot of sewing done. I finished the Gone To Texas top. Hand quilted a small quilt. Pieced 53 log cabin blocks. I don't know when we will be able to go home. Thank goodness I have my sewing machine with me!!

SOME GOOD CUDDLE TIME

My DIl wanted a couple throw pillows covered, so we went to A&E to get fabric.  That's where we met Kim and Karen as I posted about before.  Here is one of the pillows before.

And here it is after.  Since the fabric was regular cotton, I used some interfacing to give it more stability and I think it helped a lot.  The back opening is velcro.  I like the way it turned out.

Abigail is definitely Grandpa's girl, but last night I got some good cuddles in.  We had our DIL and Abigail over to the camper for supper.  DS is working 4 days in a row - 12 hour shifts.  After we ate, she climbed in my lap for some good cuddling.  I was very happy and got DH to take a few pictures.  It was a very nice evening.

Only 3 more days here and then we go home.  It's good and bad.

PROGRESS REPORT AND A WIN!

I have finished all of the union blocks for my Gone to Texas quilt and sewed them together.  This will give me about 10 1/2" extra width for the quilt top.  Next I need to work on the fill-in section that goes on the bottom of this section as well as the right panel which is mostly HSTs and squares.  It's coming along! 

I was the lucky winner of this kit from Taryn.  It is a kit of the Prairie Women's Sewing Circle (from Temecula Quilt Co.) and the name of the quilt is Prairie Huswyfe.  When finished, the quilt measures 27 3/4" x 27 3/4".  Thank you so much Taryn!  I will look forward to making this some time soon!

Right next to the RV park is a place that makes and sells yard statutes.  They also have quite a few junk cars and 30 goats, a donkey and a rooster.  We can hear the rooster crow and the donkey bray from our camper.  My DIL wanted to go there to find out if they sell goats (she is thinking about raising goats when they get a place of their own).  Here's Abigail with the billy goat (gruff?).  I would have taken a picture of the rooster, but he was an ugly thing.  He may have been in a fight with a fox (or other animal) that recently killed their other rooster and 4 chickens.

You can see some of the yard statutes in the background while Abigail beats on the "drum" statute.  I'm not sure what that is supposed to be, but Abigail said it was a drum, so we'll go with that.  Note:  Don't argue with a 3 year old.  Of course, it is made of cement.

My DIL and I plan to go to a thrift shop today that we had some good luck at last time we were here.  I just might make my way over to the quilt shop again.  I need to get some pink for the pink lemonade shoo-fly quilt.  Hope you have a quilty day!