Just a bunch of little things

Howdy!  Spring!  Spring is here!  The sunshine and warm(er) temps feel SO GOOD after this lousy, cold winter.  I'm hearing rumors of a 70'F+ day on Sunday.  Already promised Punk a trip to the park and maybe a stop at Dairy Queen for a soft serve cone.

I've been getting some things done in the sewing room.  No, not cleaning.  That can wait until after Easter.  Truly?  I think I will be putting off the clean and re-organize the sewing room for months and months.  It is just a chore I don't want to do but then again, who does?  My machine does have to go in for a cleaning and service.  We are headed out of town for a few days soon and while I'm gone, my sewing machine will be headed out for some spa treatments.  I've been fighting lately with my walking foot and/or the dual feed on my machine.  I'm really pushing/pulling some of my projects when I'm sewing.  My machine isn't happy right now.

Onto what I've been working on.  Michele posted her Lollipop bag and I thought it was just too cute.  I haven't made one for myself yet but I made 3 for little Easter gifts.  I left off the rosette since I knew it would give me fits and I wasn't in the mood.  LOL.

I'm trying to get away from baskets full of candy for those that I give Easter gifts to.  I'm trying but it's hard not to load up kids with candy.  LOL.  I also don't care for the little $1.00 trinkets out there.  I end up throwing all those out.  They just clutter up the house.  With that said, I made the smaller size of the Lollipop bag for Amelia, my God daughter, and my cousin's daughter.  They can load them up with pencils or whatever.  A small bag of candy with the bag and I'm good to go.

I plan on making the larger one for myself.  It will be good to have in the backpack with band-aids, ibuprofen, and other smaller items in our upcoming trip to Disney this summer.

I found a tablerunner online using the Charming Stars tutorial on MBS and I shamefully copied it.  My fabrics are slightly different but not by much.  Everything was stash for this one.  I'm pretty proud of myself for digging in the stash first.  I'm getting pretty good at it too.  :)

Last up for now, I made a wall hanging for my God son using the Spell it with Fabric blog hop that Moda did a couple of months ago.  I made letter pillows for his big brother when he was born but I wanted something different for Jimmy.  While Jimmy is still a little guy, I used more sophisticated fabrics for him.  I just didn't want a baby look for his letters. I hope my cousin likes it.

One of these days I will make myself a whole alphabet quilt.  The letters were fun.

Enjoy your day!
Jen :)

Darling Quilts

I have made it my goal for 2013 to clean off my banister of all my quilt tops.  They make a nice decoration; hanging up there but enough is enough.  One of these days, I will take a picture of how I store my quilt tops.  They are "in my face" every day.

Since my goal is to get them off the banister and into usable form, I sent my first 3 that were ready (meaning I had backing for them but just too lazy to assemble said backing) to Jill.  She did her quilty magic and I got them back this week.  They are wonderful!

I sent 2 lap quilts and a table runner.  I machined on the binding for the table runner last night so I could use it ASAP.  Love it.

Here are the 2 lap quilts.  One for me and one for Amelia.

Amelia's

Mine

The next that will be leaving are my pinwheel quilt and a Christmas gift for my in-laws.  I'm on a roll!

Thank you Jill!  You did a fantastic job and I can't wait to use them once I get the bindings on.

Enjoy your day!
Jen  :)

Friday Night Sew In Results... A few days late

Hello there!  Well, I DID participate in the FNSI but just took the time now to snap a couple of pictures.  The weather here has just been gray and cold, wet and dreary.  And my motivation went with it.  Truly has been lazy weather.  Today, the sun is trying to peek out and it has warmed up.  My heart goes out to those in the Midwest with the weather they are having.  I hope that sometime soon, they will catch a break.

A few years ago and a visit to TX, I purchased a table runner pattern, charm packs and yardage to go with it.  I started making the blocks when I got home from that trip and never thought of it again.  It's been my mission since I've been home to work through at least some of my WIPs and get them done.  I finished piecing the table runner a few weeks ago and I quilted it during this last FNSI.  Nothing fancy.  Just some straight line quilting.

I used Cotton Blossom charm packs.  It will be for my buffet or table this Fall.

Today I pulled out another WIP and I'm getting blocks pieced.  Maybe by the end of the week, I'll have a top to show you.

Enjoy your day!
Jen

Weekend Sewing

Morning!  How's everybody today?  Today is my first official day with no job.  How exciting.  But we're not going to dwell on that.  I want to show you what I worked on this weekend.

I started a couple of my many de-cluttering projects and one of them was my china cabinet/hutch.  It tends to be a "drop it here" area and then it becomes out of control.  I got it cleaned up and thought it needed some quilty pizazz.

I hit my favorite "just for me" stash and made a cute, quick stripped table runner for it.  I even got the binding all hand sewn yesterday afternoon.  I'm getting quicker with the needle on this task.

I also made a little blanket for Punkie's babies.  I practiced my free motion skills on it.  Oh boy.  It's not pretty.  But she loves it and that's all that matters.  I'm not going to show that project off.  ;)

Okay.  I'm off to work on thinning out Punkie's toys.  That is a whole day chore in itself.

Enjoy your day!
Jen

Friday Night Sew In Results

This Friday's sew-in was a bit of a bust for me.  I took the day off from work to get some things finished and started around the house for the upcoming holidays and sewing just didn't fit into my schedule the way I would have liked.

Only thing that I sat down to finish was finishing the hand sewing the binding on my 12 Days of Christmas table runner.  It's on my table now.  One more Christmas decoration on display.  LOL.

I found the backing at one of the LQS here and I really like it.  Red snowflakes.  Coordinates will with 12 Days of Christmas.  They also had it in blue but the blue was too royal blue for the top.  I have plans to get more of both for my stash.  Would make a cute stocking cuff, wouldn't it?

Other than that, I got some cleaning done.  Our tree is up and lit but not decorated.  That is on the agenda today.  I got some dark chocolate almond cranberry bark made and some dark chocolate cookies baked.  Oh. And some gifts wrapped.  Today's plan is to make the dough for oatmeal chocolate chip cookies, continue wrapping, decorate the tree and have Amelia finish her last beaded snowflakes for her gifts.  Busy busy day!

Have a good one!
Jen

Stash Busting

I've been hoarding my stash of red and aquas for while.  I made some of it useful for myself and made a little Nifty Note.

I've been using it all week.  Keeps all my little notes and shopping lists under control.  My purse ends up with a lot of little bits of paper in it.  Then it starts to weigh a ton.  Hopefully this will help.  I showed it to my cousins and they really liked it and hoped that one will its way to each of their Christmas stockings.  I guess I can manage that.

12 Days of Christmas.  I had 4 charm packs and I used 2 of them; one to make my Secret Santa project plus another for myself.  Then I had a bunch of leftovers.  Instead of letting them sit and collect dust and then finally handed to Punkie for her fabric habit, I made myself a simple disappearing 9 patch table runner.

I have big BLISS plans in my future so I thought I would see how I like the disappearing 9 patch block.  I like it.  Quick and easy but looks cool too.  I took it to my local favorite fabric store to buy some backing because I didn't have enough of something here at home and the ladies there liked it too.  This is going into the mail today for Sharon and some quilting magic.

That's all I got.  Hopefully I will get some sewing done this weekend.

Enjoy your day!
Jen