come and gone . . .

Can you believe we're already into November??  How did that even happen?! And did everyone that needs to, fall back an hour? 

I know that a lot of people don't like the time change ... and *I* don't enjoy that we switch back and forth, but I do love the return to standard time! Oh -- and don't forget to change your smoke alarm and carbon monoxide batteries! (nod to Sarah!)

October was a fun and busy month. I feel like I got a lot accomplished, too. I finished two Christmas quilts and designed (or rather, resized) two more . . . 

The two I finished.

The two I've resized/redesigned, but not yet stitched. From table toppers, I think.  

The Heritage Quilters of Huntsville held their 15th bi-annual quilt show. My "The Pineapple Quilt" was in the "large quilts - one maker" category. 

It didn't place, but I overheard lots of nice comments on it!

We had a blast with the girls and my parents at the pumpkin patch!

You know my October isn't complete without a visit to the pumpkin patch.

Janet, that rogue quilter, and I had a mug rug swap for October. She gifted me with a LOT of extra goodies, too, in honor of my October birthday!  

Isn't this mug rug darling?  And perfect with my fall china! She knows me very well. :)  My mug rug to her was a combination of all my favorite things . . .

Hexies, English paper piecing, handwork, wool, batiks, embroidery, and pumpkins!!  Unfortunately, I (once again) forgot to get a pic of the finished product, but Janet has one in her post I've linked to, above.

Halloween was fun.  We started the festivities at my folk's house . . . 

My mom loves to decorate and cook for the theme, and the grands love it, too!

Joc and family costume as a family.  Can you guess who they were?

Ellie was Princess Peach, Evey was Mario, Joc was Luigi, Jason was Bowser, and sweet little Edie was a super star! Aren't they fun? Evey, in particular, in her mustache, just cracked me up!

Anyone who's followed me for a long time will get a sense of deja vu with this sweet capture:

Edie as Raggedy Ann. Originally, I stitched up the costume for a baby Ellie! I wonder who wears it best?

The California crew had fun trick or treating, too! Only their temperatures were a LOT hotter!

Sawyer was Darth Vader, June was a ninja, and Olivia was Rapunzel!  She *loved* the wig! They had a blast . . . wish I could've been in two places at once!

Now it's on to a time of Veteran's Day parades, turkeys, and cornucopias! (Not Santas or Christmas trees ... not yet!)

Happy Sunday!

:)

a mixed bag . . .

I did some VERY BADLY needed organizing and deep cleaning in the Nook two weekends or so ago, so I've been able to spend snatches of time as they come along, working on an assortment of projects.  One of those is actually two of the same piece, mostly, which I created as a gift and then did another for a swap.  It hasn't been gifted yet, so I'll just show a little intriguing bit . . .

Ha!  In another week or so I'll share it in its entirety and by then I may have made a third one!

I've worked on a couple of UFOs that were (literally) hanging around . . .

I don't know why I let things like this sit around for so long, unfinished. This fun little Halloween piece was a flimsy -- now it just needs some hand quilting.

And I'm not even going to begin to make excuses for this one. I've pulled out the second quarter panel and have been working the alphabet embroidery on it.  It's only been a year and a half. The first panel is pictured in this post.

And this only qualifies as a UFO in that I can't submit it for our quilt show until this label is properly secured to The Pineapple Quilt. Oh yeah, and a sleeve, too.  Ugh. That's my LEAST favorite part.

I started and finished this campy little wool piece . . .

It's a skinny-mini project; isn't it cute? Can you smell the fire? Taste the s'mores??!

And who would I be if I wasn't--in the middle of it all--creating something new (on paper) to add to my project list?!

I got to thinking that each of the grandkids needs a Christmas lap quilt. This one would be easy enough to construct in a day (the four blocks measure at 15" X 18") and could be done in a variety of mix 'n match Christmas fabrics. It's an enlarged version of a Kathy Tracy small quilt.

I'm still planning out my hexi-flower-waterfall quilt. If I get the paper pieces and the acrylic template for my birthday, then it's meant to be!

Finally, another little wool finish, running across the 'mantle' in the living room:

I don't know why I've become so banner-crazy in the last year, but there it is.  And I adore this simple, easy, leafy banner!

Y'all . . . it's October . . . hurrah!!

:)

♫♪ i'm baaaa-aaaaack! ♪♫

I had a lovely time with the Panter crew in Irvine . . . lots of hugs and snuggles and kisses and laughter and good times. I hated getting on the plane, on the one hand, and leaving that precious family behind, but on the other hand, it felt good to be home and to sleep in my own bed and be surrounded by my Merkel girls and my sweet husband. Conundrum.

I'll share more about my visit, complete with pics, later.  For now, I really want to share whats going through my brain on the hexie train!

This past Thursday night was guild. I'm on the board again this year, in a rather innocuous position. My monthly job is to produce an article for the newsletter, relating to A Quilter's Journey.  I may share more on that later, too. Really what I want to share now was a little about our national speaker, who was Catherine Redford. She was a lot of fun and her lecture, Lessons Learned While Quilting, made me laugh. Her quilting style is quite a bit different from mine, but I enjoyed it and certainly appreciated her incredible talent!  

That being said, as she shared pics of her incredible quilts, I was very appreciative. Like I said, the lady has God-given talent!  But when *this* quilt appeared on the screen . . .

I sat up and took notice!!  (Sorry for the poor quality.  Lights were off! There's a better, albeit smaller, picture of this quilt on her site under the gallery.)

In fact, I couldn't get this quilt off my mind and had to pull up EQ to make up my own version . . .

Of course, my version is purple.

And bigger.  And has more hexies.  Two hundred thirty-two hexies, as a matter of fact.

I wanted my hexie flowers (and parts of flowers) to be BIG. So at first draw, I did 3" hexies and colored away. Then I looked at the overall size of the quilt: 158" X 179".  Holy guacamole!  Nice thing about EQ is that with a few simple keystrokes I could change the size of my hexies to 2" and change the overall quilt size to a more manageable 105" X 120".  Still a HUGE quilt, but wow, what a quilt! I'll be basting for a loooong time. But I've put the papers and the acrylic template on my birthday wish list!  ;)

I'm handstitching on a project I really can't share . . . I'm making my second (those little orangish hexies from my last post).  One was a birthday gift, the current one is for a swap.  Post-swap I'll try to remember to share a pic!  I'm also planning on getting into some wool later this after noon.  Pics to follow.

We spent the morning at Ellie's soccer game.  HOT!  But a lot of fun . . . they are so cute out there on the field, like little bumblebees!

Plus, I got to cheer with this sweet little gal . . .

Happy day!

Linking up with sarah did it! and her HeLP linky party.  Have a great rest of the weekend . . . Happy Fall, Y'all . . . and Roll Tide!!!

:)

it shouldn't be this hard . . .

I mean, right? I can't tell you the number of times I've pulled up this blog over the last four months (I'm not counting my 'Happy 4th' post!) and have just not been able to click "new post".  In fact, I just commented on another's blog that we go through seasons that just make it difficult.  So it's been.

I've been doing stuff . . . I've been quite busy, in fact.  But not really quilty/crafty stuff, though I've managed to keep some handwork going.  I finally finished (after only thirteen months) my strawberry candle mat:

And a wool flag:

And I think that's about it.  LOL! I said I'd worked on things, not that I'd finished things.  ;)

We've been out on the boat this summer, but not a lot; it's been such a rainy summer. But when we have gone out, it's been good!

We've enjoyed grandgirls . . .

And Friday I head out to California to love on my Panter crew! I'm so excited! 

Plus *my* baby turns 30.  I can't miss celebrating that!

So essentially I've jumped on here to wave hello and goodbye . . . I'll be back in two weeks and share some things on which I'm working (like orange hexies) . . .

And some updated pics of the Panter grands, along with all the stuff that's going on with guild and work and the camp, etc.

Farewell August . . . September is literally just around the corner!

:)

happy independence day!

Happy 241st birthday to the good ol' US of A!!

Hoping that all of you that celebrate have fun and safe celebrations!!

:)
#imstillaround

lots of goodness . . .

Super busy week at work . . . my poor coworker thought she had an ear infection, but it turned out she had shingles in her ear canal. Ugh. Needless to say, she went home and stayed home. I was very glad when 5:00 p.m. on Thursday rolled around!  On Friday, Todd and I launched the boat and took our last 'date day' for a couple of weeks.  

I never, ever get tired of this view.  Gosh, what a beautiful day we had! Not quite as fishy as the last outing, but Todd did pretty good. I opted to pick up my book instead of the fishing rod. LOL!  We've got Campers on Mission coming to the camp for the next two weeks, and they'll keep us quite occupied!  Our next opportunity to take the boat out will be mid-May, when we head to Tim's Ford for a bit.

Baby Edie and her family continue to do well as they make adjustments! They had a newborn photo shot and gosh, it makes me {happy} cry, how beautiful this family is!

Edith "Edie" Rose - isn't she precious?

Evey & Ellie - I adore this picture of them!

The Family - my hearts bursts with love for these guys!

Jason was home from work last week and a couple days this week, so I've not intruded.  But Friday I'll find my way over there to do some serious Neesey/Edie bonding (if Ellie will let me -- I'll have to fight her for holding time with Edie)!!

Yesterday I joined 45 other ladies and got on the bus our guild charters, bound for Paducah!

This was my 'hang out' group!  :)

It was a great day. I didn't take as many quilts photos; I should have brought the camera for this one. I'm so used to just using my iPhone, but the photo taking eats the battery big time, and I didn't want to kill my phone.  My absolute favorite quilt in both the large and mini categories was Christmas-themed (the mini quilt was under glass and I couldn't get a good photo due to the glare):

Interestingly, both of them won second place in their divisions.

I loved this one, too . . .

It was really fascinating to me! There were a lot of beautiful quilts. One trend I noticed this year was the number of whole cloth quilts with ribbons.  In the mini quilt section, four of the six entries were whole-cloth. A lot of Japanese winners, too.  

And then there were the vendors. Let's just say I did my part to help keep quilt vendors thriving.

No need to stop and look . . . keep moving . . . there's nothing to see here folks.

Actually, I'm really pleased with my purchases, which is 50/50/50 wool, hexie items, and fabric. LOL! And since I'm back at work, I'll count this toward retirement stash. Teeheehee!  Would it surprise you to know that I visited both the physical shop Paper Pieces has in Paducah *and* their booth at the show? No?

And of course I purchased something(s) at both locations, too! Another thing I noticed this year was the lighting. The strong overhead lighting really washed out the top of the quilts and photos of them. It may have always been this way, but I really took notice of it this year.

As we left the convention center and loaded the bus, I was so tickled to hear all the happy chatter as ladies got settled in and had impromptu show and tell . . . 

The long bus ride to and fro (about 4.5 hours each way) enabled me to both sleep and stitch.  I got some nice work done on my wool card trick . . .

Now on to the borders for it. And I *finally* finished that second EPP flower . . .

I really love the looks of this . . .

I've pressed it so it's time to remove the papers and applique the flowers onto the background. I hope to have this piece on my table come June! I have a really cute "orange" Yankee Candle that I'll use with it! Anyway, lots of slow stitching still to go.

Okay.  Enough for me. We have another major storm front pushing its way in, and it's given me a headache beyond belief. I hate being a natural weather barometer! Besides, I think we'll probably need to unplug all our gadgets in the not too distant future!

Linking up to Kathy's Quilts and hoping I'm not slow stitching in the dark this afternoon!

:)