Sunday, March 31, 2013

Happy Easter


Wishing you all a very Blessed Day.  We spent our holiday having dinner with our girls and grand-daughters.  The little ones loved their Easter Egg hunt.   Kiara and Jayda found all that the Easter Bunny hid in our yard and Jayda( the littlest one) ate enough candy to walk completely around the block own her own power.  That was a first for her ---normally papa has to carry her most of the way.  She is a little doll.



Jayda slept thru dinner but woke up in time for dessert. Both girls were so beautiful in their Easter dresses.  Nana and Papa sure enjoyed our day with them.  We are truly blessed with some great grandkids. We missed Pyper but the Easter bunny sent her eggs home to her
 March has been a whirlwind of quilting.  I finished the last two March BOM blocks this weekend to quickly end my March Madness.  I am only behind on the Forest QAL.  I picked out colors for my feather block and hopefully can get it done this week. I believe the Forest QAL is taking a week off so it should allow me to catch up.  Now onto April...but first a peek at the two blocks I did this weekend for the Pile 'O Fabric Skillbuilder. This is the first time I took the sketches of the blocks and colored them in.  I think it was a very useful tool.  Seeing a preview of the color selection helped ensure I liked how they would turn out.  
  

 The Woven Star


and

The Woven Chevron



Easter Blessings to each of you,

Saturday, March 30, 2013

Foxy Finish

  My Maple Fox is finished. I really love how he turned out. He was a couple days in the making but not as intensive as the Aspen Grove.  I love seeing how everyone else is creating these blocks on the flickr account.  Some of the ladies are using the red orange of a red fox but I am wanting to try to stick with the turquoise/sea foam greens and vibrant purples.  I do love how he looks as a red fox though.  Here is my little foxy fellow:



I think when I finish the block after quilting I will add a couple buttons eyes to him.  

I still need to make my Skillbuilder blocks for March for the Pile 'O Fabric BOM and the feather block that goes with the Forest QAL to get my March projects done.  

The quilt show last weekend was a great start to the shows in our area.  Here are a few of the ones we loved

I loved these elephants.  The fabrics are appliqued over the top of the black.  It makes the skin of the elephant look so real and rough and wrinkly.  Plus incredible fabric selections!


I thought this was gorgeous and took a picture of it only to find out it was the back of the quilt.  Can you believe that?


This was the front.  Note on it said it took 428 hours and 29 bobbins of thread to do.  WOW!  I don't think I could ever do that !!!



Loved this garden spider


Loved the wacky legs on a couple of these cuties!


I want to do something similar to this some day ---so charming


This one made us giggle as it is so representative of the age we live in---There is certainly an APP for everything

Love the skier heading down the mountain


The applique on this one was impressive.  I could NEVER do this!
Beautiful


Some day I will need to create a stained glass quilt.  I have always wanted to work on a real stain glass project but it is a spendy hobby to get into.  Seriously it would take to much of my fabric budget away!  I should make one of these instead : )

But a lot of the reason I went to this show especially on opening day was the garage sale this guild puts on each year.  I spent quite a lot there.  I am not so much into modern prints as I am in color.  I love to paper piece and what I am usually interested in is the right value or color so I pick up a lot of fabrics at these kinds of sales.  Here is the stuff I came home with.




Did you catch some of those prices?  
I love .35 cent pieces, Half yards for 1.50 and yards for 3.00.
We also found quite a few fat quarters for .75 cents to 1.50 but even at 1.50 they are a bargain now days.
Magazines 5 for 1.00

It was a fantastic day!!!

Keep Stitchin'






Wednesday, March 27, 2013

"Chicks Rule"

During the ' Beat the Winter Blog Hop ' that the Quilting Gallery recently hosted,  I was the lucky winner of a mini quilt wall hanging made my Nina Lise at Mrs Moen--the not so secret life of a quilter blog.  She is a very accomplished and published quilter in Norway and I am thrilled to now own one of her piece's of art.  She made two of these--- the sister quilt of mine is called  "Rå kylling" which she explains is Norwegian for raw (bad ass) chicken.  I love learning new cultural things and this tickles my funny bone.  Although my chick quilt is called "Chicks Rule",  I can't help but think this chick inherited a little "Rå kylling" from her parents as well.  She arrived safe and sound at my house yesterday and quickly let me know she wanted to check out her new surroundings.  Since she helped me beat my Winter Blues I thought I would take her to see how Spring has arrived in our part of the world finally!!! We had a great time today.  Check out how this little chick spent her first day with me...

She loved the flowering plum trees that have recently started blooming.


She certainly wanted to make sure the ducks knew she was the chick who rules



 I don't even know what kind of flowering trees this is but she couldn't resist stopping and smelling the blooms


She loved how the white blooms matched her coat of white


My favorite was when she wanted to hang out in the weeping willow tree for a while.  I could have spent all day her with her she is so beautiful in this tree.


I loved how the sunlight played on the leaves and I just adore the green returning to the Pacific Northwest after a long Winter.  I am sure my chick enjoyed the change of weather from her home in Norway,too.


She seemed to like my favorite flower, the daffodil


Or maybe she just likes my favorite color yellow.  It must be kismet that brought us together ...two birds of a feather who both have a little
"Rå kylling" 
in them and we both know

Chicks Rule

Thanks so much to Nina Lise for letting me adopt this little chick.  My chick and I are going to be best friends and she is going to keep me company in my sewing studio and maybe from time to time have another fun day with me on a new adventure around town.

Hugs,



Sunday, March 24, 2013

Adoring and Aspen

  I received my mug rug from my Quilting Gallery partner, Holly, this weekend.  I love quilty mail and Holly made me an adorable set of mug rugs that I am so proud to call mine!!!   I have been enjoying my coffee all weekend on them and look forward to many more mornings with them.  These are my only mug rugs which make them all the more special since my daughter swiped my other ones.  Holly's are perfect and they match the colors in my house really well.  Big plus!!!  



Holly's bird mug rug looks so much like the pattern one she really did a great job creating it...see what I mean...awesome!!!


Her applique is fantastic and I love all the quilting she did on both of them.  Thanks so much Holly!!!   I adore them and look what else she included in my package.


Well you know I adore that...that was very kind and thoughtful Holly and I appreciate your kindness and all the hard work you put into my new mug rugs more than I can eloquently express.  THANKS!!! 

I will share a little about Milwaukie's quilt show in a later post but know that we enjoyed it very much and spent too much money there.  Good thing it is a couple weeks before the next one so my wallet can recover.

I shared my woodpecker Forest Quilt A Long Block recently and although the next block is two feathers that I really do look forward to making, the third block in the series really piqued my appetite to see created so I skipped ahead to it.  WOW!!!  This block is entitled Aspen Grove and I love the fall colors of aspen and birch trees...especially since yellow is my favorite color and I adore the beauty of fall trees.   I called this a kick ass design but didn't realize it was my ass that would be kicked creating it.  SIX hours of creating is what it took to put this block together.  Can you believe that!!!  I don't think I will be making another on of these anytime soon but thank goodness it turned out fantastic!!!


If you overlook that thread bomb in the center that I should have swept off there before I snapped the picture...I think you will agree it was a successful endeavor.  This block was designed by Caroline of Trillium DesignThe pattern is available for free to anyone brave enough to accept the challenge she has set for us. 

You know that reminds me of one of my favorite quotes  "Challenge is a dragon with a gift in its mouth.  Tame the dragon and the gift is yours" ---Noella Evans

Well thanks to Caroline for putting this dragon in my path because the gift he held in his mouth is now mine!!! LOVE LOVE it.

Friday, March 22, 2013

Sew Busy


I really wanted to have a post up last weekend for International Quilting Day but found myself sew busy that I never found time to show what I was up to.  Before I show you let me show you what Barbara received from me as her little surprise in the last giveaway.


Not the additional fabric...this little owl just seemed to like perching on it...but the little owl pincushion.  She said he certainly did put a smile on her face. I need to find time to make one for me now.  He is a cutie patootie!!!  Although he does kind of have a face saying don't stick me again please.

I spent last Saturday working on the quilt laying in the background in the picture above.  I still need to buy border fabric and would have taken a better pic to show it off but the weather isn't cooperating around here.  Lots of gray skies and rain.  The cherry trees are starting to bloom and I would love to get a picture of it with one of those if the sun would just make an appearance.

On my sidebar you might have noticed I have decided to join another QAL.  This one (Forest QAL) needs intermediate paper piecing skills per its creators Julianna and Joanna.  You find them at Sewing Under Rainbow (Julianna) or Shape Moth (Joanna).  This promises to be outstanding.  If you have the skills or want to stretch yourselves you should definitely check it out.  Next block is two feathers and the third one is a kick ass Aspen Grove that I just saw a moment ago for the first time when I created these links and I am astounded at its beauty!!!   I bought the fabric for the first block this weekend to celebrate Quilting Day.  Did I ever celebrate too,  I ended up buying  28 fat quarters, 2 third yard cuts and a 1/2 yard cut.  Wahoo!!!  Boardwalk Quilts in Long Beach, WA had a special on fat quarters... buy 20 and get them for $1.69 a piece and they had tons to choose from.  It was worth the drive put a big happy smile on my face. 

First I should show you what they mean by intermediate paper piecing skills needed.  Here is what the pieces look like that needed to be put together again.
 

 Problem is you can't even see a bird in all those pieces...now add in that they are all mirror imaged of what you are creating and it was a little messy to figure out what colors go where.  Luckily they had a colored diagram representation of the block that I kept referring back to a lot.
 

I love how he turned out though.  I used unconventional colors for him but love how he looks.  I love how the designer added a shadow for him. The picture probably doesn't do him justice.  The crown at the top of his head and throat are a vibrant purple and I love that color with the turquoise and teal.

Lastly I have spent some time this week starting to piece together my fontastic blocks into the baby quilt that I have planned for my daughter's baby due in September.  Here is a pic of the first section only and I love how this is turning out so far.


Now it's time to get started on my fun day. I have the day off work and my daughter and I are going to the first quilt show of the year in our area in Milwaukie today.  Last year I was pleasantly surprised at this show and look forward to what  I may find there todayNot only did the small show have lots of great quilts but an excellent garage sale of guild member cast offs and I picked up some great stuff so I look forward to the treasure hunt today!!!

Keep Stitchin'


Saturday, March 16, 2013

Bloglovin It is

Follow my blog with Bloglovin

Well I hate change and was shocked along with the rest of the world with Google Readers announcement it was ending its service on July 1st.  I thought it would best to wait,  gather more info on my choices, and see how they affect all of us before jumping ship.  However, I have to admit that I presently feel like the rat on the Titanic that just followed the pack to safety and have decided to move to Bloglovin following the rat pack exodus.  I have to admit I love how easy the move has been so far and all of the blogs I follow just transferred over there with the click of a button.  Seemed Easy Peasy but now I am giving claiming my blog a go.  Hopefully this part will be Easy Peasy also.  You can follow me on bloglovin by clicking on the link above and you will still be able to find me on Google Reader until July 1st. 

Friday, March 15, 2013

Winner and a frog invasion

It has been an amazingly fun week with all the blog hoppers stopping by.  A huge welcome to all the new followers it has certainly chased my Winter Blues away reading all your kind comments.  You certainly helped me blow way past my 100 milestone I was looking for...144 followers today!!! WOOT WOOT  thanks

Without further ado the winner of the Blog Hop giveaway as chosen by Mr Random is (insert drum roll here) 


Mr Random choose NUMBER 184
Barb said:

I love the fabric. I enjoyed your blog so much that i am now a new follower via email. babscorbitt@gmail.com

Congratulations to Barb!!!
I will be emailing you soon and after you respond with your necessary 411.  I will get these fat quarters and your little surprise out in the mail to you. Sorry I took a picture of Mr. Random but he is hiding on my computer and I can't find him. You will have to trust me he choose 184. Thanks for following me Barb and I look forward to hearing from you soon!

Now on to that frog invasion:

For those of you that remember the great frog round up of last Spring from my backyard (for those of you that are new we rounded up like 29 over zealous ---twitterpated--- frogs and relocated their croaking bootees to the other side of town) this is not that kind of invasion.  A little too early in the year to know if this year will find us having to do that again but look what I have been up to the last few days.



I made this as the next block for the princess castle but it didn't seem right.  The colors were too washed out for one.  I was really unhappy with the light color just too boring.  I thought about redoing the block --- which I abhor but I have limited sky fabric and fretted about not having enough if I did it again. I have looked around hoping to find more of this fabric but no luck. I even put the three blocks together but didn't like it.




Then it dawned on me I could keep most of the sky and would only lose the tiny triangle attached to the roof when I remade that section.  I thought green should be on both sides of the little house to complement each other so I changed it up to this:

 It was at this point that I noticed the
frog invasion.  No wonder this part 
of the castle turned green.  Five frogs 
took up resident in the March castle block. I wonder if they are Irish frogs. With St Patty's day just around the corner they could be. I just couldn't resist having a litlle fun with this after having to ruin my day by ripping out
all the previous work. I figured my grand  daughters would love them!!!  I may have to let more creatures move in soon.


Keep Stitchin'

Sunday, March 10, 2013

Giveaway Update

This weekend you all have put a very big smile on my lips and warmed my heart with your comments on the giveaway.  Spring already feels so much closer with all your help.  A big welcome to all my new followers and a huge thanks for pushing me over my goal of 100.  I have found three more fq's to add to the giveaway as promised for all your help with reaching my milestone!!!  Here are the three fq's that will be joining the three fq's below on a journey to one Winter Blues Blog Hopper soon along with a surprise...you'll have to wait to see what the surprise is a while longer.


The pink one on the end has two 2 1/2 inch square bites taken out of it so I am adding in a seventh fq that you can see in the next pic...lighting is not the best ...the seventh is a brown with pink polka dots!


The giveaway continues to March 14th.  I will let Mr Random choose a random winner on the 15th.  To enter please leave a comment on the original post you can get to it by clicking here

This weekend I got a couple more of my March Bom's completed. 
I made the March block for the And Sew On...BOM @ Quiet Play.  You can check it out more  by clicking on the And Sew On button on my sidebar.  Each month Kristy is posting a free sewing themed paper pieced block on her blog and after the end of that month you can find the pattern for sale at her etsy shop.  So if you missed January and February you can still join in.


Isn't this block sew much fun!!!

Next I finished the March block for the Castle BOM offered this year by Ula Lenz for free.  You can find out more about it here   Remember I do this one three times each month so I still have two more to go.  This one for right now is my favorite.  Each is done in a different theme.  This castle I am making for a bunch of gnomes.  They didn't commission me to do it but it has been a pleasure to make it for them anyway.  I seem to have a gnome crush after making the Quilt U Be Mine wall hanging featuring Gnome-o and Juliet.   You will see one has already moved in a set up residence in this month's block!



I now have the three parts made in January-February-March put together to form this part of the castle. 



Now I will go back and make it in a fairy princess theme and the third remains a secret that you will have to wait till I reveal it in October to see.  

Hope you are starting to see Spring revealed to you a little more this week.
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