The quilt was finished and given on time! I was finishing up the border at 1:30 a.m. and gave it to my parents at 2 p.m.! I finally finished a skirt I had been working on for 7 weeks. It usually only takes a day or two, but because life is so hectic around here these days everything takes a lot longer. Christmas is coming too fast and I need to start sewing for that, but I have some embroidery to do for a client. That and mending piling up. I need some more skirts too. Hmm, can I hire a stunt double for my life?
Here's how far I have gotten. I am going to embroider a big 50 on the top as the cake topper. I am also going to embroider their names and their date of marriage and the date of their anniversary. I also am either going to embroider or applique the berries and leaves to match the material that I am using for the border I need to add. I am missing the names of two great grandchildren because I can't get hold of any one to find them out. Even my Momma doesn't know these names. Close family eh?
Our little beekeeper turned 12 on Friday and we ran away for a couple of days.
My sewing for this past week consisted of a trip to the fabric store to admire fabric. I didn't buy anything. I am on a mission to find some home dec fabric to make new curtains and possibly a comfort for my bedroom. Yes, we are going to move bedrooms around again.
My only sewing project this week was embroidering this sweater for some one. It took over 74 minutes for just the embroidery to sew out. Next week I doubt I will get any sewing in. We are planning a short trip to the beach in honor of our youngest's 12 birthday and our oldest heads back to college next weekend. He is heading into his 3rd year! This year will be a big year for him.
After spending an enjoyable morning with a friend of mine and her children at the park I came home and dived into finishing the curtains. I did! I didn't line them because I justed wanted something to filter the light. I wanted more natural light to come in. I love them, they are exactly what I wanted. The give the room a cozy cottage look. 
I was especially pleased with what worked on this window. We have central air, but the general put a small a/c unit in the window because there are two computers in this room and only one vent and it can get quite stuffy when I have to have the door closed. The small a/c has given us a two fold benefit, it keeps the room cool because of the computers and it also keeps down the noise from the neighbors on this side of the house while I am working. They are lovely people don't get me wrong, they just have a lot of people living there (three generations) and lots of children and for some reason they chose to play really noisy games right under my window. Don't get me started on 4th of July. They went out of state to buy fireworks and they bought some really big banging explosives. I had to work that night and oh the noise when I was trying to answer the phone. Oh well. It feels so good to have completed a project. I probably will not get a lot more done until next week. Tomorrow is the dreaded grocery shopping day and Saturday is the general's day off. 
A few weeks ago when the general had vacation we used it remodeling my office/sewing room. Since I work from home I spend a lot of time in this room. The general built a desk to fit in the corner of the room with shelves above it for me. I didn't like the curtains in the room, but the would do since they covered the windows. I decided since we redid the room to make new curtains. I wanted cafe curtains so I could see the sky from my chair while working. I also decided I needed to find the material to do the curtains in my stash. I found this cute checked fabric and decided it would match. Today I finally got around to starting the curtains. I cut out both sets and began serging and sewing them. This is the only piece of them I got completely finished. I love the way it looks, so much more feminine than what was up there. Tonight I may work more on them. Today is one of my days off. Hopefully, I will finish them up by the weekend. Doesn't it feel good to get in a few hours sewing?
photo by my daughter
I have embroidered some shirts, worked on some crochet, and did some beading, but I have been so busy getting people in the house ready for camps, going to graduation parties, and such. I have barely had any time to keep up with what every one is doing and this makes me sad. My two sons were in an auto accident. An elderly gentleman hit them and totaled the vehicle they were in. That alone took two full weeks out of my life. I had to make what seem like millions of calls to get everything taken care of. My job (the one I get paid for-grin) has been very busy lately and I have worked quite a lot of overtime. I have been so tired when I haven't worked. I joined Curves with my daughter because I was doing horrible trying to motivate myself to get some exercise and sitting for 8 hours five days a week was getting to me.
This is the latest of my projects for the nursing home. I made 80 of these little patriotic pins for them for July. I now face August and have no creative idea of what to do. Hopefully, I will get some time to do some web surfing and come up with something. I have an embroidery project waiting for a customer and clothes to repair for our daughter's upcoming camp week and some one just brought me a shirt to repair for them and ironing to do and...well you get the picture. Does everyone have all these things looming over them?
Meanwhile I have started on these necklaces for June's door prizes. I also made 20 bookmarkers. I was thinking with Father's Day being in June I need to find a special something to make for the just the men. There are less than 20 men who come to the party. Any ideas would be appreciated, remember these are men in there 80's+.
And I just have to share what I received for Mother's Day from my daughter!
She spent a long time beading each of these flowers and making this necklace for me, she even made a pair of matching earrings! She is so talented!
I have caught up on my mending again, I seem to end up with a lot of mending around here. I need to finish my quilt. Of course my mind is always thinking of more projects to sew!
Another skirt finished for me. This one out of a soft brown suiting material lined with a cream lining. April's been a busy month. I haven't done a tremendous amount of sewing, but I have gotten a decent amount of crochet done.
I have crocheted a supply of dishclothes, and because of a swap I participated in I made some potholders also.
The nursing home door prizes got attention too. I made 20 brooches out the above fabric. I made big yoyo's out of the pink gingham and then sewing little yoyo's out of the print, I placed those in the center of the larger yoyo's. I topped that off with a button in the center of the smaller yoyo. The brooches look like flowers, something out of a Mary Englebreit picture.
I did work on getting some mending jobs done when we got home. The general has a new zipper in his coat and our little bee keeper has the hem let out of some of his pants. Boy, is he going through a growth spurt.
I cut out two skirts that I hope to work on today. I also started a new project for door prizes for the nursing home's May party. I haven't gotten any further on my quilt though. I hope to work on it soon. I need to get some clothing items done first before I continue.
Here is the quilt I have been working on, I want to make it bigger and I think I will add some more sashing to do that. I want to make it throw size.
I have also been making hotpads to go with my dishtowels.
After years of use mine seem to have worn out. 
I have also been crocheting dishtowels and dishclothes. It gives me something to do when I sit through piano lessons, violin lessons, 4H, and other such activities that I take the children to or while the general watches tv and I just want to sit with him. I must admit to enjoying Treasure Hunters.
Thanks to my friend Linda's advice I picked a lovely burnt orange fabric to use as the sashing with the blocks I made. Now to just work on it. I finished up 20 clover pins for the nursing home party late Saturday night. I had to give them to coordinator Sunday morning. Sewwwww, I forgot to take a picture of them. I could kick myself because they were so cute. I used a Criswell charm design for a clover I had and did 20 free standing embroidered charms. Then I tacked them on white felt that I had cut in the same shape a little bigger then the charm. Next I cut green felt to match the color thread I used a little bigger than the white felt still in the same outline. I hot glued the green felt on and then put a pin back on each one and put them on card stock with Happy St. Patrick's Day written on it. Now I need to start thinking about April's party.
I have also been working on dishtowels. I dislike fluffy dishtowels, they leave lint. I saw on Amanda Jean's blog how she found some waffle muslim and put binding on it. When I was in JoAnn's the other day I picked up 2 yards of waffle muslin. I began dividing it and cutting it to decide what size I thought would be good for a dishtowel. I also have a couple of the feedsack ones and they are just too big. I finally decided on 18 1/2 inches by 13 inches. With this size I got 16 towels out of the 2 yards. I have loads of premade binding that a lady gave me last fall. I went through it and found some cute binding with a floral pattern and some with dots. I covered the raw edges with binding on all the towels. I think I will add a little to something more to them. I was thinking maybe a row of pieced blocks across the bottom.
Sew Long for Now
What crazy week. The last time I posted we had just had 6 inches of snow, then the last couple of days the temps have been in the 70's. That would explain why I am suffering a terrible head cold. I have been sewing some though. I have completed ten of the block above. I haven't decided what color I want to use as the connecting strips yet. I have went through my stash and not found a thing I like. Sew it's off to the fabric store one day soon to find something. I have also been working on making dishtowels. I will post some of them in the future.
On a sad note, our bees did good all winter and then we lost them this past weekend. We have ordered a new queen and nucs to start again. Since this was our first year we feel this is all part of the learning process. Hopefully in a week or so the new bees will arrive and we can get them settled.
Sew Long for Now!
Our first snow of the season! Can you see the cardinals in our bush? I tried so hard to capture their picture today when they were at the feeder, but they are a little shy and kept skipping away when I went on the porch.
I love to watch it snow. March is coming in like a lion, so it should leave like a lamb...right?
Here are some of the other tissue holders I finished over the weekend. I did a total of 20. I decided to do a pin with a clover for some of the other door prizes. I also spent some time this evening cutting out blocks to start either a new table runner or a wall hanging. I will post a picture of it as soon as I get the first block finished.
Our daughter and our oldest son away at college have had the flu this week. She spent most of the week in bed. Since he goes to a military institute he didn't have that luxury. He ended up in the post hospital for a day at the end of the week. They had what they are calling type A. The general went up to school and picked him up yesterday and brought him home for some rest. He seemed much better when the general took him back today.
I have been spraying the house with Lysol to try to kill the germs and keep the rest of us from being sick.
Sew Long for Now!
It's been a while since I posted. Things have been happening around. It has actually been kind of busy. This is one of the 20 door hangers I did for the February party at the nursing home. I made 40 of the 80 door prizes.
Valentines Day was a big event here. Our oldest and his girlfriend stopped by on their way to the midwinter formal. She is such a sweet girl.
I finished the table runner that I was playing with.
I tried to pull together the blocks with the background fabric by using the same material I used in the corner of the blocks for the backing. I had a fun time quilting it. I decided to machine quilt it and since I had been watching some episodes of Sewing with Nancy by using my DVR I wanted to try an idea I saw. On a recent rerun they showed the lady making the quilts and she quilts them square by square and then puts them together with the connecting pieces. She quilts her's using what she called a wobble stitch. It's just a small elongated zig zag. I loved the look of that. It really blended well when stitching "in the ditch."
I have some things to finish by this weekend for the nursing home party next week, plus it's Captain Kitty's 14th birthday this weekend.
Sew Long for Now!
I spent some time today cutting out hearts. I have been pondering in my mind how to help out our nursing home ministery since I can't attend the monthly parties they throw for the residents. I have decided to make some of the 80+ door prizes they give to the residents. Out of my stash I pulled some Valentines looking fabric. One more femine for the ladies and one more masculine for the men. I am making heart shaped baskets and will fill them with candies. I am also pondering making some small stuffed hearts with something about 2 Cor. on them. The children and I will do some baking to send also. Red velvet cake or cupcakes sounds good.
Sew Long for Now.
My skirt is finished. I cut it out and then serged the raw edges yesterday. I also marked and made the four pleats yesterday. Today I made the casing, adjusted the length, added the lining and put it all together and hemmed it. It is a fairly heavy weight denim that should keep me nice and warm.
I have been doing all manner of other things the past several days. Shopping, taking children to music lessons and 4H, getting the oil changed in the car, shopping, shipping packages, shopping, paying bills, lessons, shopping, cooking. For some one who hates to leave home I sure do spend a lot of time away from home. I have a little plaque in front of me that reads "For Everything There Is A Season." I have to keep reminding myself that this too shall pass. Life will settle down into a routine someday soon and the running will slow down.
After washing up the rice cooker and balancing our bank account, I made smoothies and did Devotions with the children. Then I took a shower and went off to get dressed and start a load of laundry. The children dusted the living room when I was doing this.
Sunlight on the "new" piano in our living room. Some one gave us this 1916 piano. It works, we do need to get it tuned after it had been left sitting unplayed for years. We are letting it set a few weeks because it on a wooden floor and then we will have the man come tune it.
While I was in my room I got together supplies to make cards with the children during art lessons because we have are behind send our thank you cards out for Christmas.
While I read out loud about the Flemish Baroque period they worked on making their Thank You cards. When I finished I made a couple for The General and I to send
A few samples. The one on the left was made by Captain Kitty, the middle one by me, and the one on the right by our little bee keeper. I checked the mornings lessons. Then I puttered a few minutes while getting ready for our afternoon read aloud.
One of the jobs I did was add water to the fountain our little bee keeper gave me for Christmas. It is a lovely fountain that I have put in the living room. I love the way it looks at night when it is dark and the light in the fountain shines. It is very soothing.
We are reading a book by G. A. Henty during read aloud called With Cortez in Mexico. About 3:15 p.m. The General came home. We spent a few minutes talking while he worked on putting a new baking element in the stove. Ours broke last week and I have not been able to use the oven until the new part came in. Then I was off to take Captain Kitty to her violin lessons. Before I left I set up the rice cooker and turned it on.
When we got home from violin lessons I checked the cooker and the rice was done. I had chicken marinating and I cooked that up while CK got out the salad that was already prepared in the frig and helped me set the table. Over supper everyone declared the rice cooker a keeper. Our little bee keeper who usually refuses to eat rice because he hates the sticky way it tastes when I cook it on the stove ate three helpings! It cooked the rice to perfection. I see this appliance being used a lot.
CK and I cleaned up from supper and then The General and I dropped them off at church for Awana and Junior High. The General took me to show me where our little bee keeper went to 4-H. He had been taking him, but I will be taking him now. Then we went to Sam's and did some grocery shopping. We went back to the church to pick up the children and then home to unload the groceries. Everyone had a snack and began to get ready for bed. While the boys were going to bed CK came in to where I was about to get on the computer and wanted to talk about all that happened tonight in JH. We spent some time talking and then I sent her off to bed. I am amazingly getting to blog this on the day it actually happend! Usually, I don't. I will be off in a few minutes to bed. Tomorrow I have the day off from my paying job, but my real job never ends and I will be here doing that as usual!
View off my front porch at sunset.
Sew Long for Now!
