Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Well, you can see from my lack of posts that No Sewing Seems to Be Occurring - -and you would be correct. Between work and my online masters coursework - there is little time left. I can see the fabric and the piles of "to be completed" from where I sit - online at every spare moment - but they are merely gathering dust.

Here's hoping your springtime is allowing you some sewing time!

Deer is Nearly finished.....

This wallhanging is a gift for a family member. Unfortunately it had some mysterious item spill on it - so I had to bind and wash several times...even though I really hadn't done all the quilting I intended to do on it....so - it needs a little more stitching and its done.

Flannel Quilt Done!

Daughter's Flannel Quilt is done!

Christmas Quilt is Done!

This Quilt is another one that I quilted on the long arm machine at the local quilt shop. The design is snowflakes.

Thorns and roses

This quilt is called Thorns and Roses. The roses are my 3 children.

The Thorns are the divorce and difficult times throughout the years. I cannot believe how far back I had to go to find where I started piecing the blocks

and wrote about the beginnings of this quilt: February 2008.

When I wrote:

Long long ago there was a bedroom in a home with the most beautiful cabbage rose wallpaper on the walls. A young maiden bought this lovely fabric for a quilt for that home. She knew she wanted it to be an Irish Chain because she had admired a similar quilt made with the large blocks of the irish chain done in floral fabric. And it was sooo lovely. Many many years later that maiden and her stash of fabric - having survived a divorce, then a 400 mile move and then 5 local moves later - realized that fabric lay uncut - in a clear container in the front of the garage where the maiden now parks her vehicle. Every day when she backed out and every day when she pulled in - she saw that fabric for the Irish Chain quilt. For many many days. One day - she decided - even though she no longer had the lovely wallpaper and room - that it was TIME for the fabric to reach its destiny. It was meant to be an Irish Chain Quilt. It was not meant for the garage or the yard sale pile. It has begun its journey to becoming an Irish Chain Quilt. How much longer will it be before the journey is complete and the quilt is resting on the bed? This is only the beginning... The local quilt show rents time on their long arm machine. Here you can see Thorns and Roses on the long arm and the pattern that you follow to create the quilting. It is so much fun to quilt this way!
I used a solid back so you can see the beautiful feather design I quilted into the quilt.
The Moral of the Story is - Some patterns and fabrics it seems - just need lots of time to gel before they actually start to become ANYTHING.

Merry Christmas

There is something about Christmas that seems to require some snow - so here's wishing everyone a very Merry white Christmas.

When all these

end up here - -

I guess SOMEONE needs to rake!

Sailing Under the Harvest Moon

Our Quilt Guild's Show is next weekend. This is the quilt I entered for the Challenge and is called Sailing under the Harvest Moon - also the Title of our Show.

Finished...though I was working on it right up to the last minute I could submit it. Show next weekend... Maybe my fingers will heal from all the hand stitching of bindings and hanging sleeves by then. Maybe I should reconsider the strategy of starting the quilt 2 weeks before it is due. And have reviewed the pattern so I had some sense that it was TWIN BED SIZED - not a small wallhanging as the pattern picture implied. Hurrying does not lead to good workmanship, though overall I like the look of it.

Also entered: Breland's Stars - which was the only quilt I originally intended to enter so it was totally finished for his graduation gift. Machine pieced and quilted by me on a long arm quilting machine. So this morning I simply had to make the hanging sleeve.

And my Mermaid from the Challenge in the fall. We were given a gift bag and had to match the % of the colors in the gift bag to what we used in our quilt. I got one that had all my favorite colors and it was my first attempt at a quilt like this. It has a lot more detail than the photos show here...buttons, yarns, beads, shells

Now it is on for the mad dash to finish Christmas gifts...would be nice to Not be sewing at 3 am on Christmas eve.

October October - how the time does fly

Soon - you will see the Harvest Moon submission for the quilt show....

It's been a long long time....

Yes, my world has been busy - but here's a few little things I have completed for Block in a Bag

Summertime was the theme for the first

And Girly things for the 2nd

And finally Bugs- here is my Lazy Bug