stitching therapy . . .

Two days in a row . . . please don't pass out!

I wanted to share my finished "Cattitude" piece from Saturday's workshop.  I had a little Nook time yesterday afternoon and managed to get it quilted.

Nothing fancy ... I did a little stitch-in-the-ditch machine quilting and then I tied it with yarn (because Gwenevere loved playing with yarn and string) which felt like the perfect touch.

Really pleased with this finish and have it hanging over my laptop!

I couldn't do the workshops on Friday, but I saw a lot of the finished pieces from the afternoon session.  In fact, I shared a picture of Meg's 'word quilt' in yesterday's post. I got the itch to do a word quilt of my own, and while I was brainstorming for an appropriate word, I realized I needed to stitch while the stitching is good.  Tomorrow is D-Day . . .

I know, right?  If they'd skipped everything between "shoulder" and "procedure" it would have meant the same to me! But what it will mean is limited mobility for at least five weeks, aka, no stitching. As I thought about all that, the perfect word hit me . . .

Heal! And since I had taken the photo workshop, I pulled up a png of a band-aid and printed it off to lend a visual to the project.  That was a fun and easy finish, too, and it's hanging over the space where I'll more than likely do most of my "recovery" for that first week! This was my pre-surgery therapy. Very fulfilling.  :)

It seems like there's always something blooming at the camp . . . but these yellow water lilies were so beautiful, I had to share them:

And in the same area (the turtle sanctuary), the lettuce had gone to seed and produced some beautiful purple flowers:

Yellow and purple are a favorite color combination of mine! That lettuce has never flowered before. Funny how nature works, isn't it?

Not sure when I'll be able to manage a keyboard, so it may be a little dry here for the next week or two. But I'll be reading (if not commenting).  But when I do post next, I'll expound on this pretty little picture . . .

Fits right in with my lilies and lettuce, no?!

Have a GREAT week!

:)

checking in . . .

Y'all, I was utterly dismayed (no, seriously, I was totally and utterly dismayed) when I pulled up my blog this morning and realized that I had not posted in nearly a MONTH.  How has it gone from August 26th to September 16th and I've not shared a single darn thing?  

Rather selfish of me, huh?!

I'll spare you my typical (and truthful) sob story about living life . . . family/grandchildren keeping me busy . . . ministry . . . working fulltime . . . blah blah blah.  Nothing's changed! ;)  Instead, I'll get down to business and share some photos!!

First and foremost, Everley Jade turned ONE!  The littlest of the littles is now a full year old.  

Isn't she beautiful?!  And quite the personality, too!!

Ellie and I had a 'sleepover' and we drank tea, watched movies, and colored.

Yes, we both colored.  Hey, it's how we cool Neeseys roll.

The whole crew of grands was at the beach for the Labor Day weekend . . . 

Sawyer, June, and Olivia had a blast playing in the sand!  

And the three bigger kids had fun being *buried*! While the kids were on the beach, Todd and I spent some time on the lake with friends . . .

It was a lovely weekend! And just so you know . . . that's as far as I got into the water! ;)

I finally finished up this sweet little piece and got it to my mom for her annual Autumn gift (she and my dad celebrated FIFTY-FIVE years of wedded bliss on September 10th)!!

I love this little pattern!  I had a lot of fun with it -- so I'm not sure why it took me so LONG to finish it!

And since I'm enjoying the heck out of working with wool these days, I immediately picked up another wool project . . . 

Simple, but quite a lot of fun!  If I can stay focused and get it finished in time, it would make the perfect little mat to go with my September mini!

And, if you look closely at my stand, you'll notice it's sporting a sweet new look!  I got a new wire topper for it!  Just in time for fall! Oh -- and just above the stand is a picture of my folks, the anniversary couple!

I've also been playing with some of the wildlife photos I took while in South Dakota.  Here's two of the shots I've turned into notecards . . . 

I've done several more, but have already used them! It's a fun way to enjoy my trip all over again and share it in part with others.

And finally . . . it's coming up on that time of year of all things PUMPKIN!

I kicked it off this week with my first pumpkin spice latte.  Yummy!  Fall is my favorite!

:)

boxes, babies, minis, and linky parties . . .

Good gravy ... what a busy two days this has been!  It started off yesterday morning, with me headed over to James and Kim's home to watch Sawyer and June.  I stopped off at the post office on the way there (just in case) and sure enough, there was a *box* there for me!!

Traveling stash box #5 had arrived from Yvonne, of That's Sew Creative. YES! Only I didn't dare take it into the house, so I knew going through it was going to have to wait (note:  I did get into it finally, but will save the contents and its giveaway for a post of its own).  Ah well.  Ummm, and please pay no attention to all the 'organic' material on the floor of my car.  It happens, especially when you live in the middle of the woods in a campground!

Kim and James got home and I got to hear the good news that they're expecting baby number THREE on June 13th! WHOOHOOO!!!!

(I already knew they were expecting ... we just weren't sure *when* they were expecting!) They also know *what* they're expecting ... but I have to wait until the 31st when they reveal it!  

From there I traveled on to my regular weekly bookie job ... errr, *bookkeeping* job ... and from there I headed into town to meet with a friend for some Bible study.  I felt like we'd hardly gotten started when it was time for me to leave for dinner with my Stitchers' group before guild!

We had a local speaker for guild last night -- Barbara Black -- who blogs at My Joyful Journey.  Barbara gave a fabulous presentation on the International Quilt Festival/Houston.  

She did a great job and I learned enough to put the Festival on my quilter's bucket list!  ;)

I got home with just enough time to peek inside the stash box, print some documents for our board meeting, and go to bed.  This morning was all a scramble as Todd and I finished up preparations for our seventh annual board meeting for our ministry -- Restoring the Church Ministries.  Once we finished up there (great meeting -- we have a terrific group of men on the board), we headed back to the camp, but I was just there briefly before I headed out to visit a friend who'd just had knee surgery.  *Whew*  It's good to be home for the evening!

On to other things . . . I've (finally) been scanning through my Miniature Quilts magazines and stumbled upon this little (and I do mean little) hexie quilt gem that caught my eye.

Isn't it sweet?  I was really excited about it . . . until I looked at the hexie template for it:

WHOA!  That is the *tip* of my index finger -- the "full-size" template is just shy of 1/2"!  That means in each those 3-1/2" square blocks is a hexie flower that's 2-3/8".  Yikes!!

In that same issue, I also stumbled upon this little Calico Cat quilt...wouldn't this make a darling gift for a cat lover??

It's really quite precious -- and just as tiny as the hexie quilt!  I love the caption under the title, "Hand piece fanciful felines to frolic on floral fabrics."  Say that three times fast!

Another shocker of a template, right?!  I love that they always notate their patterns as "Full-Size".  I think it's for people like me who might be inclined to blow it up by about one hundred twenty percent!!

Ummmm, maybe an easier gift for your cat-loving friend (or yourself!) is to make them a set of note cards from a picture of their favorite feline!

I started with this fairly generic pic of my sweet (and sometimes salty) Gwenevere. I cropped it down to a super tight shot of her face and used some embossing features (found in most photo editing software *and* in EQ) and turned an ordinary pic into something really worthy of the front of note card:

Isn't that fun?  And boy-oh-boy, that pic sure did capture the spirit of our Gwen, too!  The embossing feature is particularly cool with cats because it catches the pattern of their fur...pretty neat looking!

Printed out on note card stock (which you can purchase at most craft or office supply stores) and tied with a ribbon, it makes a lovely thank you, hostess or birthday gift!

And speaking of birthdays . . . today is the birthday of my darling friend, Sarah, of sarah did it!!!  She's celebrating with *two* linky parties ... and *prizes*!!  So go on over and wish her a happy birthday and while you're at it, check out the HeLP for Hexie-aholics and the Feline Friday linky parties!!   Happy birthday, Sarah!!

And that about does me in will do it for me today -- but I'll be sharing *stash* box contents soon!!

:)

busy, busy, busy . . .

I'll be right upfront about this ... it's going to be a long post with lots of pictures.  I've been so inspired and so (sew) BUSY!! 

But first things first, I wanted to share about my doctor's visit yesterday morning. Thank you for all your kinds wishes yesterday -- it went well.  After looking at the x-rays, the doc said that the bone growth was progressing nicely and the new growth was encompassing the donor bone.  I mentioned to him that I had some discomfort when walking on the heel.

He looked at the x-rays again and noted that the screws do jut a little ... and he brought up last visit's x-rays to see if they were in the same place.  They were, which is good; it means that the screws haven't moved from being walked on ... they just stick out a little far.  If the discomfort continues, he might go in later on (4-6 months) and remove them.  Nice!

He will see me back in two months.  During that time I'm to progress to boot-free, full weight bearing walking, starting with an hour a day (which I'm doing right now -- LOL!), and to let pain be my guide as to how much or little I do.  And to continue the ultra-sound treatments.  So, good appointment.  As an aside, when I asked him about his weekend, he told me it was a good one:  he'd been fly fishing in Utah on Sunday and snow boarding on Saturday, and jetting about on Friday.  Heh.  Glad I could help.  Hahaha!!

From there we went to one of my all-time favorite places for breakfast . . . 

Cracker Barrel!

Yesterday was busy, full of meetings and errands.  I did find an unlikely smile popping up . . .

Everything here thinks it's SPRING!  I'm afraid they're all in for a rude awakening. Perhaps not, but I don't think winter has given up the ghost yet!

Okay, on to quilty things.  First up, NewFO projects!  I started and finished the quilt for Ellie:

I started the HQH 25th Anniversary BOM:

I was going to do a mock-up of the tiled pinwheel block I'd first drawn and then put into EQ:

But when I printed it out, it looks so complicated, I need to go back and see if paper piecing it might be easier.  I did simplify it by making it just three colors instead of the original five ... that will cut down a little on the bits and pieces, at least for a mock-up block.

And I was *completely* inspired by a piece of art work done by the daughter (Heather) of one of my dear friends (Reda):

When I asked Heather if I could use her painting as a basis for a quilted wall hanging, she said no problem, she'd been inspired by something else!  Okay then!

Looking at our flatscreen, I decided I not only wanted it that size, but that it would be the perfect cover for the TV when it was not in use (which is more often than not) and it would give me a terrific place to hang it.

  

Then I printed out the Scripture (which I'll eventually use to trace onto my fabric to be embroidered) on blank paper and taped it together so I could sketch it out.  Mind you, my drawing abilities aren't top notch, but I think it gets the general idea across.

Then I spent some time trying to figure out how to translate this onto fabric.  Applique?  Fusing?  Oh wait ... what about faux applique?  That's something I've wanted to try, too!  So I got out a little piece of scrap fabric and my colored pencils and went to work . . .

Here's what it looked like after putting on the textile medium to set it.  I didn't have a brush and it would definitely need to be spread more delicately, but I think I like the look of this.  I would stitch the verses on my four back ground fabric quarters (the green, blue, pink and grey) and then stitch the quarter panels together, and then draw the tree and leaves.  I'll probably need to buy more colored pencils -- you have to press really hard to get the color!

I'm linking up HERE at Cat Patches for the NewFO's.  There's been some really gorgeous new and interesting work going on that worth checking out!

And then I'm happy to report that I *did* work on the Free Motion Quilting challenge.  Yay!!  After lots and lots and LOTS (and lots and lots) of drawing out the leaves on paper . . . 

I finally bit the proverbial bullet and put needle to fabric sandwich.  I think this was a tough design to start with, and it went against what I'd been previously taught in FMQ (that the space you are going to stitch in should always be in front of your needle), so I had some overcoming to do.

One thing I always struggle with is ... nope, I drop my feed dogs (in fact, I need to remember to pop them back up) ... I always, without fail, forget to lower the pressure foot!  It cracks me up and it always takes me a minute or two to figure out what's wrong!

I did find Leah Day's suggestion for using a self-threading needle to immediately bury your thread endings incredibly helpful, and I also was encouraged to see Frances Moore, in the tutorial video, stop and start ... in my mind I've always thought that FMQ equaled continuous, non-stop motion.  Duh -- it's so much easier when you can stop and reposition your fabric!

 I also found that the gloves really, really made a positive difference.  My level sewing space if very small, so I definitely need to have a good handle (haha--pun intended!) on my material as I work with it.

It's not great, but it's much better and I do feel a little more confident in my abilities.  I should really spend 15 minutes a day practicing FMQ ... practice makes perfect, after all!  For the FMQ challenge I'm linking up over HERE at SewCalGal's blog for the January entry.  Right now there are over 250 quilters who have participated!!

Okay, that should do it for me for today.  I'm headed out to do a little [silver] fabric shopping (and I want to get one of those self-threading needles) and then I'm going to spend some quality time with my darling Ellie (and her mommy) and then tonight it's off to a Stitcher's Group sewing circle!  A pretty darn good day laid out, if you ask me!

:)

my design wall is singing . . .

Well, not really.  But if it could, it would, because I've been keeping it relatively busy here of late!

This week I've got my first HQH 25th Anniversary BOM up there, and I'm very pleased with the look of it.

Here's the pattern for the second block:

Here's the colors for the second month (our guild year runs September through August):

And here are the three fabrics I picked:

I'll use the orange and the cream tonals for the stripes, and the black for the corner triangles and the center appliqued square.

This is so much fun!  (I've decided, 2012 is going to be the year of Fun Quilting.)  I mentioned yesterday that I had a project that was begging for new fabric ... I think I need to find some tonal silver or light grey with a sparkley thread of silver running through it.  I mean, since 25 is the "Silver Anniversary", right?! I'll use that as the sashing.  I don't think, after some careful consideration this past week, that I want to use it for the FMQ challenge.  Which means I need to figure something else out for it and pretty darn quick! 

Last, but not least, I also have this . . . 

It's not on my design wall.  Yet.  And I'm not sure what I'll do with it or how, but a quilt WILL come out of this.  It's been bouncing around in my head forcefully enough that I had to at least get it on paper!

Be sure to stop by Judy Laquidara's Patchwork Times to see what's up elsewhere!

As for me ... headed to the doc's and **really** hoping to hear happy news!!  Have a TERRIFIC Monday!

:)