a decluttering story . . .

Do you remember when you first started quilting (or any craft, for that matter), and all the tools and gadgets that seemed so necessary were overwhelming in both the scope and the cost of it all? 

I do.

The biggest for me was the rulers and squares.  They make such a difference in cutting pieces accurately!  And while you can get away with a few select sizes, it's just easier to have the range.  It just is.  So over the last twenty years or so, I've been diligent in collecting.  Let's face it; I've never been shy in my love of gadgets and collecting them.  Rulers were right up my alley.  

It started with the OmniGrid rulers, then I switched over to Creative Grids.  Then Quilters Select rulers were introduced.  And finally I replaced (almost—95%) all my OmniGrid rulers. 

Only I didn't really replace them.  I just added to my collection.  Which was unintentional . . . I didn't really want multiple sets of 2.5" squares, for example.  I just wasn't sure what I wanted to do with the ones I didn't use anymore. I sure didn't want to just <gasp> throw them away! Until I found a friend who has just taken up quilting (and taken to it with a passion), and you know what? She needed rulers.  So guess what?!  I don't have multiples anymore!  Well ... I may have multiples, but I don't have any more (almost) OmniGrid rulers . . . they went to a good home where they'll be used to make lots of happy quilt beneficiaries smile. 

The end.  :)

In other news, the drive to cull my rulers started a welcome chain reaction and I spent the majority of yesterday cleaning/organizing my Nook space. It had gotten a little (a lot) out of control; I'm much happier with it now! 

Large rulers and specific job rulers are easy to find.  I love this screen.  It does a great job of corralling my creative space, and is terrific storage.  Here's the front:

The entrance to the Nook is right there at my front door.  I hated the thought that the first thing people would see when they walked into my home, was (potentially) my creativity in the throes of progress.  We all know what that looks like! So the screen was the perfect solution, and provided both storage and display space.  Win/win!

I had started using the cubicles as catch all.  I went through each one and tamed that to manageable. 

Part of that was pulling fabric out and putting it into bins in some sort of system.  So this is what that looks like finished . . .

Bins of fabric, just waiting for me to sit 'n sew. Shew!

And then my cutting table had also become a bit of a disaster site.  Some of it was paper clutter, some of it was fabric clutter.  It was an easy drop off point.

Now it's just ready for projects! As you can see, my next wool project is ready to set and sew! Aaah, and you can also see where my finished cross stitch pieces go to wait some sort of final finishing inspiration. Ahem.

I still need to do some reorganizing with my Nook book shelf.  

I have magazines on it that I need to move to the cubes.  Magazines don't really do well on this shelf.  It's the rotating that does it in. (And the cats.)

Ellie and I found our next cross stitch pattern to stitch together.  Teresa Kogut's Give Thanks. 

At first I wondered if it might be too stitch heavy for Ellie.  But then I thought about the samplers 8-year-old girls worked way back in the day . . . I think 13-year-old Ellie can manage this just fine! I had to order the linen and some of the floss, but we should be ready to go sometime next week!

I continue to work on Lady Halloween. Actually, I had to go back and look at my last post to see if I had in fact worked on it!  I have.

Not much, but I've worked on other things, too!  Maybe this will be my slow stitching project for Sunday!  I'll link that up with Kathy's Quilts on Sunday!

Speaking of working on other things, I finished my little Halloween orts tray . . .

I'm so pleased!  The "BOO!" was an add-on by me.  I centered the design horizontally, but misread misinterpreted the instructions, so there was a whole lot of space at the bottom.  Which was perfect, because I really wanted some purple in that stitchery, and "BOO!" was the perfect place for it!

I'll leave you with a little game of Where's Waldo (aka Starry)?

Have a great weekend!!  :)

tried and true . . .

Have I ever mentioned how much I enjoy binding?  I really do.  I love the rhythmic stitching motion.  It's soothing and settling. So I often volunteer to do the binding on group quilts.  (I dislike giving blocks for group quilts ... not because I don't want to give or participate, but because of comments someone once made about my blocks in a swap.  It hurt my feelings and I'm just afraid to stitch up bad blocks for a quilt someone else is having to piece. So I bind.)

I volunteered to do so for a quilt we were doing for a gal in our group that had breast cancer.  This is the third of these quilts I've bound in the last year for our Stitcher's group . . .

Binding is a great activity for the boat in the spring time, when the days can still be a little cool!

What I wasn't thinking about when I also volunteered to bind the guild's President's Quilt for this year, was the possibility that they might end up in my lap at the same time (figuratively speaking, of course)!

Whoops! But I made it work.  It really did provide some good boat projects this month.  Hahaha—win/win!

I got those two quilts finished and had the urge to do some things for me (or at least for my own) . . .

With a baby boy on the way, I needed something in blues!  I love this pretty pinwheel design (I reworked it up in EQ).

After getting Joc's approval, I pulled fabrics for it.  It was a super easy thing to do, now that most of my stash is in the storage room!  Whoop whoop!

I also pulled one of the UFOs I'd purchased last year from an estate sale, and got busy putting it together.

She had the individual 8" Flower Girl blocks pieced, and I put them together, stitched the sashing, and added borders.  I LOVE IT!  It finishes out at about 56" square.

There are enough leftover blocks to do a table mat, and maybe a smaller (single block) table mat.  Which would make this ensemble just perfect for our screened room . . . 

Right?!  The summer colors are just perfect!  I love it when a plans comes together all by itself!

I also pulled out this big boy . . . 

Now that I've got room to work, I went about adding borders.  I wanted it to be at least 72" square for the girls to use as a picnic blanket.  I think this will do it!

Then ... I did another thing.  April's been a really quilty month.  I took a longarm class, along with my friend, Gail!

One of our LQSs offers longarm rentals, but you've got to take an introduction class first.  It was a lot of fun!  I've got time scheduled soon to work on a quilt.  I need a LOT of practice!!  About the only thing I showed any promise with was quilting my name.  Baahaahaa!  So if I want a quilt quilted with my name in cursive, I'm in good shape. *insert eyeroll here*

I wrapped up the month with an evening with the girls.  I love our Thursdays together!  This night, mommy and daddy were the meeting hosts, so we all went upstairs for dinner.  The girls set a lovely table complete with a quilted table runner and a vase of flowers.  They called it a "peaceful and quiet" dinner!

How I love these sweet girls.  They are so precious ... I love spending as much time with them as possible.  I know how fast they grow up!  Memories. ♥

good things happen . . .

To those who wait? To those who do?  Randomly?  I dunno.  All of the above, I guess!  This month kicked off with Easter, and we celebrated with the Merkel family at my folks' house.

Assessing their plunder!

It was a lovely day . . . the weather couldn't have been more beautiful!  Or at least, so I thought.  We had Monday off, so Todd and I took the boat out.

That was pretty exquisite, too! 

We found our first hatchling in the turtle sanctuary and moved him/her over to the nursery.

They are always so bright-eyed and bushy-tailed when they make their first appearance in the Spring!

I convinced Todd to do a thing for me.

I desperately needed working space in the Nook.  Desperately.

Now I have it!!  I'm so excited!  At some point, when the weather is a little warmer, I'll go back through the tubs and organize them a little better.  But I'm very, very pleased with both my storage *and* my new found working space in the Nook!  Plus, I have a lot more space for storage than I thought! *wink*

So immediately I had to do something fun to celebrate . . . 

These Moda blocks had been on my to-do list for a while.  And these colors are yummy.  The photo doesn't do them justice.  And I know I'm always saying that purple is my favorite color, but I really think it's blue.  Blues draw me every time.  I adore purple, but I want to quilt with blue.

I also got a new rotary cutter, which I LOVE!  It is a delight to wield.  Seriously.  If you've not used these, you should give them a try. It cuts like a dream.

I got some more 'spring' color to add to our yard!  

Usually we do hanging baskets for Mother's Day, but I was ready for some color NOW!  Heh.  I love impatiens ... and they last all the livelong summer!

Speaking of plants, usually Todd waits until after his birthday to plant our little vegetable garden, but this year, he went ahead and got it in a little early.  

I should get more pictures.  He's expanded our raised beds and it's looking so good! This is one of the new beds, in which he's planted three blueberry bushes.  Whoop, whoop!!  We love blueberries, for sure!

Finally (and I'll wrap this up), we got a load of supplies delivered for the construction of the bathhouse!  We are so, so excited about this!  

The completion of the bathhouse will complete the vision Todd was given for the camp when we first started out here as camp hosts, 12 years ago.  Two bunkhouses and a bathhouse; a place where churches could being kids and youth and enjoy God's creation. And God has been so faithful!!  Work won't start until May, but building materials are hard to come by and Todd wanted to get them early, instead of taking a chance he couldn't get them when he needed them.  Yeah, we're very excited!

:)

ides of march . . .

March came in like a lion and it's staying that way.  LOL!  We were glad to enjoy the time change ... or rather, we enjoyed the daylight that came at the end of the day. 

And we got a full moon, to boot.  A full moon on a clear night always makes me smile!

Along with the time change, spring flowers are popping up all over the place! These also make me smile!

Okay, no flowers, but a sweet view!

Something else popped up . . .

Whoohoo!!!  We're so unbelievably excited!!  And a little bit in shock!  Hahaha!! 

Todd and I had a lunch date at Sam & Greg's on the square, in Huntsville.

They have terrific pizza . . . and the best gelato!

It was lovely outing with my best friend! ♥

James and Kim took the kids to their first wedding . . . 

LOL!  Sawyer is dashing, but both the girls are a little overwhelmed!  They're coming to visit this summer.  I'm beside myself!  It will have been over eighteen months since we saw them last, when they finally get here.  

Mid-March also means it's time to change up the decor a little.  Merging seasons.  :)

A little Valentine's, a little St. Patrick's Day, a little Spring, and a little Easter (jelly beans)!  :)

The Nook is still a hot mess, which means I've gotten NOTHING done in there.  But I need to take care of it.  I can feel the need to create becoming a burden on my soul! Does anyone else get like that?  So watch out, Nook ... your time is coming!

:)

time well spent . . .

The association I work for had its 182nd Annual Meeting last Tuesday.  It's a big deal for me and a lot of prep work and a long day . . . but we get the Wednesday and Thursday following the meeting off, giving me a long, five-day weekend.

And I made good use of that time!

Wednesday, I met Joc and the girls at Tate Farms for my annual pilgrimage to the pumpkin patch.  I didn't bring home a single pumpkin (can you believe it?!), but we spent an hour or so hanging out in the corn crib!

Literally. 

We all sat (or lay, as the case may be) in the corn crib for an hour and talked and played (and napped). Needless to say, I did bring home some corn, though not intentionally.  I think we all did! LOL!

I also spent quite a bit of time cleaning, organizing and making the Nook habitable (again).  It was bad.  I have 'before' pics but I daresn't show it!  However, I'm quite happy to share a couple of 'after' pics:

I work so much better when my space has, well, space!

One of my quilty birthday gifts was Creative Grids 8" hexagon trim tool.  I wanted it specifically to make these fabric trivets . . .

So easy to make and such fun! These will make good hostess gifts over the holiday season!

I also spent a couple of minutes finishing up my little squirrel embroidery--just a simple border and in-the-ditch quilting.  Not a great pic, I know . . . 

I'll get another one (cuz it's really cute) before I gift it.

I spent some $$ on Kathy Schmitz's website and picked up a couple of patterns. I've already finished up one (that's some secret stitching), and am ready to work on this cutie . . .

Isn't that fun?  My whole reason for going there was to get this darling new pattern:

It makes me SMILE!!  And while I was there, I signed up for her monthly One Stitch at a Time monthly embroidery club!  I adore her designs.  ♥

If you're working on new stitcheries, you've also got to have new floss . . .

It's almost as satisfying as new fabric!  And costs way less! 😆😏

And finally, while I was cleaning the Nook, I came across a bag of felt and templates for the poinsettia pins.

So I decided I start working on those, too.  Because they also make a sweet (and easy) hostess gift or "tag-a-long" for gifts. 

So, there I am.  Stitching pretty much daily.  I've still got the bicycle stitchery that needs to be finished, as does the secret stitching project.  I'll share pics of that after the fact!  Have a great week ahead!

:)