Framed!

Yes, my Homespun House quilt top has finally been sandwiched onto my hand quilting frame!

I am keeping it simple…big stitch quilting around each house…inside and out… using a variegated size 12 Valdani thread.  

I really love hand quilting…

…while listening to an audiobook, downloaded from our local library…

                          

Don’t judge a book by it’s cover…this one has me sitting on the edge of my seat…stitching like mad!!

A lovely way to while away a hot and sunny afternoon…

I hope that YOU’RE having a lovely afternoon too!  Thanks for stopping by to have a look over my shoulder!~) P

There’s a Little Red Schoolhouse…

…and it’s coming my way thanks to Julie from Julie K Quilts!  

Julie had this VERY generous Give Away and I won!!  I bet you all heard my “YAHOOOOOO!” bouncing off the Rockies and echoing down your way!   Love the pattern and JUST LOOK at the fabric!!  A bundle of goodness, for sure!

THANK YOU, JULIE K!!

I hope that YOU all have a winning week too!  ~Po))

On the Frame Friday…

…is this old quilt top that I made ages ago!  Now that my quilting frame is full size I am able to get this quilt top quilted…FINALLY!

It is a good top to practice vines and leaves…

Can you see them…maybe it’s just as well that you can’t!  :o))  Key word…PRACTICE!!

I have been slipping in and out of the sewing room all week…and got to spend time in there with my quilting daughter, Erin!!  Such fun!  WE managed to cut out a quilt for her to take back to Calgary to sew!!  Now THAT’S exciting!!

And on the baby front…little Mason and mommy, Carrie arrived yesterday for a few days!  Maggie and her BF arrive today!  Our house is overflowing!!

Isn’t our wee Mason the sweetest…and the dogs loved him…all FOUR of them!!

Have a wonderful weekend…and I hope you get time to play too!!~P

Another Scrap-Happy Day!

Another topper down!  This one was fast and easy…maybe because the scrappy nine patch blocks were found on the Share Table at Heritage!!  What a great find! 

**FYI…Whenever the members of the Heritage Guild have something ‘quilty’ that they no longer want, use or need they put it on the Heritage Share Table.   Then anyone can buy it in the form of a donation…the $$ is put into a can and later donated to our favourite charity!…We usually collect about $300 every 3 or 4 months! It’s a quick and fun way to raise money for charity and a great way to re-cycle quilty stuff…a win, win for everyone!!  And in this case I won BIG time!

SEW…I added the beige blocks with the nine patches, set them on-point …

…and then added a scrappy hand appliquéd vine, leaves and flower border! 

  Scrappy goodness!

Hope you like!

Thanks for stopping by!  I hope you have a wonderful, scrap-happy day too!~P

This and That…

My eldest daughter, Erin and her boyfriend, Greg, are visiting from Calgary!  You might remember that she is the daughter who has started dabbling in quilting…:o))  Yes, she is starting to take an interest in Mama’s stash…and has lots of questions about the whole quilting process!  I am loving it!  Nothing like having a daughter who is cut from the same cloth…!

However yesterday we thought we would take the dogs out for some much needed exercise…and enjoy our sunny day…and where better than a hike up Cobble Hill Mountain!

You will have to agree…nothing like having a picnic lunch while gazing down on our beautiful valley!  That spectacular mountain in the distance is Mount Baker!  Gorgeous!

But enough about hikes, views and company…let’s talk quilting!!

LOOK at what was waiting for me in the mailbox when we got down off the mountain!!  Yup…it’s the Fall 2013 Primitive Quilts and Projects Magazine…

Let me give you just a wee taste of some of this year’s Fall quilts…

A Tonee White design…love the Fall colours and that vine around that ties it all together!

This little mat just screams Laural Arestad  from Simply Put Plus!  Her work is always gorgeous…with a sweet message and just a dash of stitchery!

 

And who wouldn’t love to put this on their table in September?!  Love it!

That’s it…that’s all I’m going to show you!!  I don’t want to break any copyright rules…so you are going to have to hustle to a Newsstand to see the rest of the projects!  I’m such a tease!

Have a great day…and I hope you have a sunshiny kind of day!~P

Birth of a Neighbourhood!

Strike Up the Band!  (Geeze where are Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland when you need them!) Let the streamers and confetti fly! 

We’ve got ourselves the Birth of a Neighbourhood…which is what Claire is calling her Homespun Houses as it took her NINE long months to finish!  And like all good ‘things’, it was well worth the wait…what a beauty!

If you remember… Cotton N’ Wool featured this quilt as a sew-a-long project last year and the big reveal was back in January.  If you want to revisit the other Homespun House Quilts then go HERE!  It’s well worth the stroll down memory lane!  This is one of my all time favourite quilts!

Claire would like to thank Anne one more time…for not giving up on her!  But in all fairness to Claire, she started this quilt later than we did…she waited until AFTER she retired…(and between us, Claire has been kicking up her heels ever since!!  Ain’t retirement grand!:o)

SEW Anne…I think we need another project…any ideas out there?? 

Next time, YOU should join us…we had fun…and we all came away with a gorgeous quilt! 

Till next time…~P

New Girl in Town…

Don’t you love it when you meet the New Girl in Town and you hit it off perfectly…and you find out that you have SEW much in common…

In this case the ‘New Girl’ is Norma Whaley who recently formed her own pattern company called Timeless Traditions…along with her own blog of the same name!  BOTH of which I love!

You may already KNOW Norma as she use to be a part of the Geoff’s Mom Pattern Co. team …although she’s not Geoff’s mom…Joyce is Geoff’s Mom.  Now that Norma has formed her own company, we quilters get the best of both world…patterns from both of these talented ladies!

Let me show you a little snippet of what the talented Norma Whaley has created…

We’ve all seen this quilt…and most of us own the pattern…:o) but did you know that it is a Norma Whaley creation?!

I spotted this pattern at Road to California and HAD to have it…yup…another of Norma Whaley’s creations!!

When I was leafing through Quiltmania’s newest Special issue (on their website) I spotted this beauty…and was not surprised when I saw that it was another Norma Whaley design!!  LOVE IT!! 

And of course I was gifted this lovely pattern from Anne…ahhh she knows me well! 

Yup…I predict that we will be seeing A LOT more of Norma Whaley from Timeless Traditions!  Does this woman SLEEP?

Make sure you check out Norma’s blog…it’s a good one!  If you scroll down you will see pictures of her new Christmas tree skirt…yup…you guessed it!  It’s going on my TO DO LIST!!

Thanks for stopping by and sharing your Sunday morning with me…now hurry off to Norma’s blog…you won’t be disappointed!!~P

I am WEAK…

Are there any other weak quilters out there…? 

I took one look at the finished Free Summer Project over at Primitive Gatherings and succumbed to temptation…yup…I had that credit card in hand before I knew what hit me! (The pattern was FREE for those who ordered the Summer BOM.)

I am weak…BUT just LOOK at this project…red and green woolie goodness on a bed of cotton!  Doesn’t get any better than this!

Care to join me??  Just go HERE…but first grab your credit card!

WE will be SEW bad together!  :o)) ~P

Sort of…finished…

The Homespun Basket quilt is finished…well sort of…

Last night I agonized over the border fabrics…I came up with the thin orangie/red border and was going to sew on a wider green…but hesitated….  Nope…just didn’t like it!  Blue was out, I didn’t have any more of the turquoise…brown was blah!

I may end up picking off this border…

…or I may just leave it, as is.

I do like how the red border ties all the reds and browns together…

Yup…I might just leave it…

Or not!  Decisions…decisions!  Why do we quilters agonize over these things!!

Thanks for listening…:o)) 

Have a good one!~P

The Challenge…

Way back last year Bonnie Hunter started a Challenge…a Leaders and Enders Bow Tie/Spool Challenge. 

I had always wanted to try the Bow Tie block and so I hopped on the Band Wagon!  Man, I am so happy that I did!  I have this sweet little guy to thank for it! 

This small quilt is made entirely of scraps…with only two bowties being the same!  Can you find those two?

Doesn’t it look great with the scrappy Civil War tumbler UFO?!  I must get that one finished too!!

If you want to see more Bow Tie/Spool Challenge quilts then you MUST go over to Bonnie’s Blog!  I’m sure there will be a mess of them..and I say this in a good way!

Now I have visions of Bow Ties dancing in my head….  Isn’t this quilt by Need’l Love gorgeous?! 

 

I have started to collect pink and green fabrics…just sayin’!  This pattern can be found in the Garden Gate Threads Book…

The quilters’ lament…so many beautiful pattern…so little time!

Have a wonderful Wednesday and thanks for popping by!

DIY…

My eldest daughter, Erin, has been busy with some do-it-yourself projects…

Erin took an old sisal rug that had seen better days…and gave it new life by taping off stripes and spray painting it!!  Looks great, doesn’t it!  Hard to believe that it use to be a plain beige rug!

 

Then she found another old rug in a thrift shop and brought it for $5…got out the tape and some spray paint and voila…instant gorgeous outside rug!  She said she got her inspiration from Cluck Cluck Sew's pattern called 'Scout'! 

 

Could it be that I gave birth to someone who has a GREEN THUMB?  Love that plant arrangement…and so health!

Yes, Erin is giving Martha a run for her money!! 

Speaking of running…Erin had two very tired and slightly soggy doggies…they had apparently spent the afternoon running through the sprinkler.  Her pup, Scout is the one on top…and is looking mighty grown-up for being only a couple of months old!!  Lola, the Queen of the house is on the bottom…and seems to have lost her crown!

Two very cute and wet Golden Doodles!

Lots of sewing going on here but nothing to show you… yet…

Happy stitching to you and yours!~P

Basket Progress…

Baskets done and trimmed…all twenty of them…! 

(A couple of readers were wondering how I did the handles…they are all cut on the bias and hand appliquéd before joining to the rest of the basket.)

I pulled out my bag of homespun strips…left over from this project. Don’t you just LOVE left-overs?!
 

And I sliced and diced them into 1 1/2 inch squares…to make a colourful border to go around each basket…(I laid them out so that you could get the idea…)

…which is what I will be working on sometime today…or maybe tonight!  The simple basket template was made by me so if you would like a copy just send me an email and I will forward you a copy.  I would hate to become a basket case all by myself!

Thanks for popping by!!  It’s always nice to have visitors!  Hope you have a good one!~P

Heritage Happenings…

Our weather on the Vancouver Island has been spectacular…warm and sunny…perfect summer conditions!  When this happens it is expected that the numbers of Heritage Quilting will go down.  This is generally the case…quilters are busy in their gardens, they have visiting company or they are off on a holiday of their own.  BUT we all know that regardless of the weather there will ALWAYS be those quilters who will show up….and last Monday was no exception!  The numbers may have been down but we still had lots of activity!

Have a look…

Jodi finished her Twister Quilt and Hazel quilted it for her…Isn’t it wonderful!  Doesn’t it inspire you to get out your Twister Ruler and Twist Again.. like we did last summer!
Yea, let's twist again like we did last year…

You go round and round and up and down…Ok, ok…enough of the song BUT isn’t the name of this quilt appropriate!  Seriously…just looking at it makes you want to break out in song…

And Hazel did a wonderful job with her quilting…

Speaking of Hazel…this is her Challenge Quilt…most everyone at Heritage took home a panel to create a Charity Quilt…well Hazel added purple and green stripes to hers and then quilted it with…

…birds and bees!  Can you see them?

Hazel said she used a plastic template and washable pen, traced the shape and then stitched over them!!  Brilliant! 

A very pretty transformation of a panel, don’t you think!

 

Tracy finished her Bears, Bees and Bunnies quilt and was pinning it for quilting!  DANG CUTE!!

This quilt is SEW going onto my ‘TO DO LIST’…for my next grand-baby!  (Just listen to me!  Get one grand-baby and I start talking like there is a whole classroom of them waiting in the wings…just waiting to make their entrance!! Well…I say bring ‘em on!!  heehee) 

Yup…bee prepared is this grammy’s motto!

How sweet are these bunnies!!  Yup, adorable!

Lookie here…it’s WOOL!!  Sandy has started ‘Dress Me Up Frosty’ by Nutmeg Hare!  Sandy didn’t have any background wool so she cut up her hubby’s hunting pants!!  You heard me…practically ripped them right off his body…:o))  Hey, a girl’s got to do, what a girl’s got to do when it comes to making a penny!!  Nice pants too…they have a little red flecks in the fabric…very stylish!

And our newest member, Glynis is stitching ‘To Dance with Flowers’ by Heart to Hand.  LOVE it!

Hey, have a look at Glynis’ coffee mug…it’s like a flower post with handle.  VERY appropriate, don’t you think?

One of the members was working on this beauty!!  Isn’t it wonderful!!

I love the scrappy beauty of this top…

…and the way it starts out light in the middle and radiates out with the brighter, darker  colours!

This quilt has been TEN years in the making…definitely not for the faint of heart!

And finally this was the Block of the Month.  If you make a Block then your block goes into the pile and you receive a raffle ticket…the more you make the more tickets you receive. The blocks are Raffled off at the end of the month.  27 blocks were entered this month…

The lady in green was the LUCKY winner!! 

Well this took longer that I thought…

I am off and running to the hair dresser this morning!  Hopefully she can do something with my mop! 

Thanks for stopping by…and happy quilting!!~P