Saturday, May 18, 2013

Blooming Flowers And Vintage Buttons

Our front yard was in bloom this weekend with these...


...and these. I think they bloomed just for me in honor of the
Say it With Flowers blog hop that's coming up.
  A trip to a vintage and handmade jewelry shop, Main Street Boutique,
in Hurricane, Utah, had me digging in piles of vintage/antique buttons in search 
of some old coat buttons to use on my next quilt. I wasn't disappointed 
in my search and was so lucky to have Janet dig out even more big buttons
just for me. It was so fun and it was such a cute shop!

In just a few more days we'll start seeing some hopping going on with 
flowers, flowers, and more flowers. Be sure to come back to see what 
blooms from May 27th to June 4th (we added two days)!

Friday, May 17, 2013

New Blog Hop Alert!

This one will be so fun...well, all of them are,
but this one is ANOTHER really fun one!

Thearica will be hosting this one so head
on over to Sew We Quilt for the details.

Say It With Flowers Blog Hop Schedule


+
TWO EXTRA DAYS!


May 27th

May 28th

May 29th

May 30th

May 31st

June 3rd

June 4th


 

Wednesday, May 15, 2013

Winner Of The Bird Hop Is...


FIESTA!

CONGRATULATIONS!
She'll be getting an email from me letting
her know she won. Thanks everyone for playing along!

It's For The Bird's-May 15th!

It's time to fly away and enjoy some projects
that are FOR THE BIRDS!

A big THANK YOU to these two ladies:

Mary's the mama bird for this hop...she's kept
us all from falling out of the nest and on track.

Madame Samm's got some great giveaways going on
over at Sew We Quilt, so don't miss going over there
everyday to check out her top choices and giveaways.


Check out all the bird projects on Madame Samm's Pinterest Page

Thanks for stopping by to visit!

Sunday, May 12, 2013

Happy Mother's Day!

I'm the lucky mom of three daughters and one son.

Over the years, my family expanded to include two son-in-laws,
four grandsons, and a couple others mixed in the bunch.

I love them all!

Yesterday my son-in-law gave me a great Mother's Day gift
by graduating from college with a degree in education.
All the graduates could decorate the top of their caps...
this is what his looked like:
His cap says it all.
My daughter and my sweet Monkey Boys are so
important to him and he's a wonderful husband and father.

It's just as sweet being a mom as it is to be a mother-in-law.

Happy Mother's Day to all of you!

Friday, May 10, 2013

Rolling With My Quilt-As-I-Sew

Geta at Geta's Quilting Studio is having a linky party
called Quilter's Favorites. Check it out!
She's got lots of links to other bloggers with their hints, ideas,
tutorials, and all sorts of fun ways to make sewing easier for us.
Go add YOUR link so I can learn something from YOU!

One of my favorite quilts to make when I'm in a bit of a pinch for time is
 the Quilt-As-I-Sew method...it is so EASY!
The best part of making it is that I get to use my favorite quilting tools:
spray adhesive and my wooden seam roller.

This is one I made quite a few years ago as a baby gift.
It has so many possibilities!


On some of the quilts that I've made using this method, I've added a ruffle in the
middle, an applique in a corner, fatter strips, thinner strips, and even different
sizes of strips to add variety. Really, I love making this quilt.

It takes a jelly roll, batting, and a fabric for the back. See that on the left...I love
that little seam roller--it's well used at my sewing table! The spray adhesive
is in the pic, too, and I use it whenever I'm quilting my own projects.

 There are lots of tutorials out there for this method, but this is how I do it:

Cut a piece of batting and fabric to the size you want for the quilt,
but make sure it isn't larger than the length of your jelly roll/fabric strips.

Use the spray adhesive to attach batting to the wrong side of the backing fabric,
making sure it is nice and smooth with no extra folds in places they shouldn't be.
If you don't like spray adhesive, tack the fabric to the batting, but
this post is about what I like to use (it's all about ME, ME, ME) 
and I like the spray adhesive to keep my fabric in place while I sew.

Take two strips, right sides together, and lay them evenly centered
across the batting. Sew a 1/4" seam lengthwise from edge to edge on one side
(see the picture above, right top corner for a visual of this.)
Press the seam open with a seam roller (or an iron...but, once again,
this is about ME, and I like using my seam roller for this project.) 

Continue adding strips to both sides of the center strips (pressing them open as
you go)  until you reach the sides of the quilt or run out of fabric strips.

Trim the fabric/batting/strips evenly around to square up the quilt.
Add a batting and you have a quilt. Just like that!

Thanks, Geta, for letting me share my favorite tools and quilt method!

Tuesday, May 7, 2013

It's Me And The Birds Today

It's my day!

Mary's the mama bird for this hop...she's kept
us all from falling out of the nest and on track.

Madame Samm's got some great giveaways going on
over at Sew We Quilt, so don't miss going there
everyday to check out her top choices and giveaways.

During the Wicked blog hop last October, Kris at
Kris Loves Fabric made a really cool quilt with black birds on it.
I loved it and rushed right out to find the fabric she used
for the background. It took a little searching, but I managed
to find it and have been holding it my stash for just the right project.
(That "other lady" went looking for the fabric, too,
but I'm sure I found it first...not that I'm competitive.)

This was the right project....
The lines on the fabric were perfect for machine quilting and
I added some hand quilted stitches for some additional barbed wire.

The fabric on the back has feathers...loved it, too!

Poor little mouse!

I have a giveaway, too!
I found these cute little measuring spoons at a store in Utah
and HAD to have them because they had birds on them.
Perfect for this hop, aren't they!
I'll throw in a Stonehenge fat quarter, too. 

SILLY LITTLE RULES TO ENTER MY GIVEAWAY:
  1. Leave a short and sweet comment. 
  2. This one is important! Make sure I can contact you if you're a no-reply blogger. *If you don't get a reply from me, you're a no-reply blogger or something else is screwed-up.
  3. I'll mail it anywhere...yes, even to the other side of the world.
  4. Giveaway ends at 6 p.m. PST on May 15thEntries after 6 p.m. PST on May 15th will not be included in the giveaway.
Look who else is hopping today!


Check out all the bird projects on Madame Samm's Pinterest Page

Thanks for stopping by to visit!

An Okay Day Made Even Better

It's not a big deal and I wasn't even going to mention it, but today was 
my birthday. I had to work so it wasn't much of a day of celebrating.
BUT that changed when I came home to 60, yes 60,
of these notes from my family spread out ALL over my house.
My youngest daughter asked each of my kids and their families (and my
husband) to write five memories or things they liked about me.
(Each note had the writer's name on it--I just smeared it out on this one.)

(My son didn't like sauce on noodles when he was growing up so I always
had a separate dish of just noodles set aside for him.)


I laughed and cried as I walked around the house reading each one.
Some were so sweet, some were just hysterical.
There were lots of those inside jokes families always have.

#18.  You're an amazing cook, even when you forget the tuna!
(I once forgot to put tuna in a tuna casserole...none of my
kids have let me live that one down! I admit it was pretty funny.)

#8. Thanks for helping me move out...and then back in again...multiple times.
(My home has a revolving door on it when it comes to my kids.)

#56. I loved it when we made tooth fairy pillows.
(This Monkey Boy just lost his first tooth so he got to use his pillow.)

#43. You would be my phone-a-friend if I needed help with
a question on a game show. You know a lot!
(I have her so, so fooled about that.)

#57. I like it when you buy us stuff. Like Slurpees!
(I'm a good grandma when it comes to buying things for my Monkey Boys.)

I can't put them all here, but just know they were all so special!

This was an amazing gift and such a great idea!
These little notes and the slice of cheesecake I brought home
 after dinner at Cheesecake Factory made it a very nice BIG birthday.
I loved it!

Reliable Iron Giveaway!

There's an amazing giveaway going on for these irons...
check it out at sewwequilt.com!

Friday, May 3, 2013

Just Write It Down...My Smash Book!

I had a coupon and there I was, walking around the craft store...
....so I bought one...I HAD to, you know.
My new SMASH book is just so dang cute!

The cover page just cracked me up. It IS all about ME!

The first page...how appropriate with a bird on it..my quilt is almost ready!

Writing in a journal is something I've done for years. I have plain brown notebooks
and binders, plus quite a few years worth of journal writing on my computer.
I think I inherited this journal-writing thing from my gr-grandmother,
grandmother, and mother who wrote in journals, too. I love looking back
at some of the things they wrote...it's very interesting stuff!

These books are from my private blog that I started back in 2008.
There's 10 of them so far (I used Blog2Print to publish them.)
I'm way behind on that blog for some reason...MAYBE sewing and
blog hopping have gotten in the way? LOL!

Do you journal?

P. S.
Have you seen all the blog hops Madame Samm has planned?
WOW!

Here's the list from her blog:
HO HO HO, it's Christmas ( july)
Take 7 hexies, call me in the morning ( july)

Kitchin Stichin ( aug) ( all kitchen related)
Pin it HERE (aug) ( pin cushions galore)

Its the  Peanuts Gang ( sept)
Colour me Batiks (sept)

It's in the ROUND ( oct)
Wicked ( oct)

Pecking ORDER ( nov)
Let's turn back time....( nov)

December we are still baking on that one...
shhhhh


I definitely need more plastic containers and
SMASH books to keep up with all of these hops!
Love it!

Thursday, May 2, 2013

Quilty Smash Book? Organized?

Maybe I'm just too buried in fabric and blog hops to know what
a Smash Book is, but I saw one over at Ooh La La...I Love 2 Organize
that she made to plan a wedding...now I think I need one.
Not for a wedding, but for my quilt/blog hop ideas, etc.

Have any of you made a Smash Book?
Would this work for quilty ideas?

My sister is SOOOOO organized! Linda has buckets to put all her stuff in 
for future projects she'll be using on her blog at Food Storage Moms.
I loved that idea and since SHE did it, of course
I HAD to try it for all those blog hops I keep signing up for.

I bought six of these containers and some removable stickers so that
when a blog hop is announced (you know the ones...over there at Sew We Quilt)
I label a container with the blog hop name so it's ready for me to throw 
stuff into as the thoughts and ideas pop up. I even have one labeled "Peanuts"
with fabric in it just waiting for that fun hop Jane will be hosting in the future.
Sadly, this "Say It With Flowers" bucket is empty.
I really need to get busy because I've heard some people
have their projects finished already...wow!
I wonder what "that other lady" is up to with her flowers?
She's so competitive (which I'm not, of course) and has
probably made several flower-amazing projects. I have to get sewing!

Blog hops that are coming soon:

Birds, birds, and more birds for this one. I've started
my project (whew!) and just need to quilt and bind it.
I get to host Say It With Flowers which actually has a couple
extra days added because so many people wanted in
I begged whined asked for a little more time.
It is TOTALLY FULL with no more openings...
how fun is this going to be!
Madame Samm will be hosting this one for the Tammy Bag...so cute!
I have a bucket for it, too, but all it has in it is the purse frame.

So much sewing to do...so little time!