Finally!

I am back! As most of you know we moved the week before Christmas and it has been absolutely crazy. All the kids were able to be here, at least for a few days, and we had a fantastic Christmas amongst all the boxes and with out a couch. We ate well (too well!) and laughed and just had a great time. Here are the little ones in our new front yard.

Lexi, Daniel, Ephram, Keira, Becky and Ephram's dog Pretzel.

I did get to go to Road to Ca a few weeks ago and took a class called "Lets Make Waves".  Here's my piece made from silks I received from my sister, which I have been hoarding for three years.  It needs some more work and beads!  I thought I would have time to work on it when I came back but I spent time on the Whisper Challenge I am involved with and quilted two charity quilts.

Here are some pictures of my art group wearing the scarves I gave them for Christmas.  Aren't they cute!

Here are by birthday mini quilts from Loose Threads.  Each one made two, one for each month of the year.  Two months are missing but are promised to come soon.

Here is a quilt I finally finished.  I started this years ago and had Jeremy quilt it for me.  I just finished the binding on it.  This is in my new quilt studio but you will have to wait for the next post.  We have the slowest Internet and I am having a hard time downloading the pictures.

We have been busy trying to fix up the house.  Every room needs to be painted.  Notice the lace curtains.  The whole house is full of them.  Just not my style.  This is the family room and we painted this room first and got a new couch.  My original plan was for the walls to be more grey than blue but they didn't come out that way.  It looks good with all the oak trim.  Sometimes you just have to work with what you have.  I also just finished painting the hall way two shades lighter.  We have a ranch style house.  The hall is very long with lots of doors so painting the hall wasn't any fun!

I did get my sewing room painted which is the only room upstairs.  It once was a game room. But I think I will keep you in suspence.

Barbara's Birthday present

Here is the quilt I made for Barbara.  It if for National Zipper Day in April.  She wanted a holiday quilt.  We had a fun time coming up with different "holidays".  This is made from zippers, of course, and some of my hand dyed fabrics.  I really want to do some more hand dyeing but this apartment is not conducive to that.  Maybe some day!

The End of Vintage Moments

Here are some of my student's work from the last Vintage Moments class I taught two weeks ago. 

                                           This is Barbara and Janice's pieces.

By the end of the class Barbara had most of her top done. 

Here's Linda B.'s center.  Don't you just love the soft colors.

Here is Sara's center.

I was not able to get pictures of every one's but hopefully they will send me pictures.  This was a great class and I have the greatest students.  I hope they learned at least one thing from the class.  It concerns me when a student says they haven't learned anything new.  I always learn something especially when I am teaching.  I hope my students learned something and had a great time while doing it.



Opportunity of a life time

First, remember the blocks from the last post.  Well, I finally got it all together.  The only reason I stuck with it was the extreme stress in our lives right now, I could focus on anything else.  Here it is with more than 600 pieces.  I had a hard time matching seams but it is done, except for the quilting.  I don't mind the quilting.  I'm actually looking forward to it but the pinning and then the binding on this is not going to be easy.  It doesn't really lay flat.  I am going to have to quilt it on my Sew Ezi table since everything else is still in storage.

While strolling through the Valencia mall with the family Friday night, we came across a taping of NCIS.  For those of you who know me well, know I am obsessed with the show.  I have all the DVD's and watch them all the time while I'm quilting.  We had finished dinner at BJ's and walked down to the mall.  When we had gone for dinner we noticed big lights shinning on one of the store fronts that had the windows blocked.  We joked that maybe it was NCIS.  Their studios are only a few miles from our apartment.  When we were heading back to our car, my son-in-law went over and started talking to the someone.  It turned out to be the assistant director.  We started talking to her and out came Mark Harmon.  It was so surreal. He was very gracious to take a picture with me.  This is going in my quilting studio!  And yes ladies, he is just as good looking in person!

Rambling on and on and on...

Here's my latest project.  It may not look like it but there are over 320 different sections here.  I have been sick for over a week and I started to put these on my makeshift design wall in the apartment but got frustrated.  I don't have the room to lay this out.  I feel for those of you with limited space.  It really is a struggle.  So I gave up and went back to watching TV.  So today I am feeling a little better and my goal is to put this together is sections if I can.  I won't be able to quilt this till we move, which I hope will be during Thanksgiving week.  Still waiting for our down payment money to come through.  Patience is not my virtue!

I did take a class at Bolts in the Bathtub in Lancaster, Ca last Thursday.  I thought I would take anything just to meet some people.  I was feeling pretty miserable but decided to go anyways.  I made this pin cushion (it is suppose to be a birthday cake) and had a great time but I only met one person - the teacher.  I was the only student.  She was a great teacher and I really enjoyed getting to know her.  I hope to sign up for something else but they only post their classes one month at a time and they still don't have the ones for November out yet. 

Don't I have the greatest secret pal (Kings River Quilt Guild).  This is what I got.  Love everything and can't wait to use it.  Hoping to go to the Christmas party in December to meet her but I don't know what to do for her for Christmas.  It has to be something special.  Got any ideas?

Here are some pictures of Becky and Daniel when we had lunch two weeks ago.

This is from the church picnic Saturday.  We just went up for the day.  This is Daniel and Aggie.

Here is Becky (she won't let anyone take her picture anymore) and Ben.  They thought it was fun grabbing the tree and jumping off the rock they are standing on.  Sorry Genelle!  It was a great time but a long day.

This week will be one of waiting to hear about the farm escrow.  It better close soon or we are in big trouble with our escrow.  Hoping to look for a couch again this week.  Found one I really like but it is too much money.  I don't know what to do.  I can't find anything else I even remotely like.  I just need to settle on something cheaper and hope I don't regret it.  It really shouldn't be such a big deal but when all you do all day is sit here thinking about what you want to do with a house you don't have yet, you get a little crazy!

Enough of that.  I hope you all have a great day!  HAPPY HALLOWEEN! (I think we will go out and drink tonight!)

Update

I have been busy in the quilt room (apartment extra bedroom) quilting some little quilts and also busy outside the apartment.  Here is a piece I just finished.  A few weeks ago Sara, Barbara, and I got together and played with decolorant.  This is a piece I did on black rayon.  Then I quilted it with metallic thread and beaded the edge.  I'm not sure if I like it.  It looks childish or maybe it's because it is more "artsy".

This is a piece I made from scraps of some hand dyes I did sometime ago.  The more I work with my own fabrics, which I do not have many of, the more I like it.  I think once we move, I want to do some dyeing.  This is called Cattywampus.  It is for a friend who was criticized for using that word.  I like the word and since I could not get the squares and rectangles to look straight, hence the title.

Last week I went to the Pacific International Quilt Festival.  There were some amazing quilts but there didn't seem to be as many as last year.  There were too many vendors.  I really didn't seem to come home with that much stuff for all the money I spent.  Some patterns, thread, projects for Christmas presents and more decolorant.  I did get an embellishment book that I have almost read from cover to cover.  When I make some of the embellishments next week I will post them and the book title.  On the way back we stopped at the San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles.  I just had to take this picture for all my friends who are coffee lovers.  Besides her clothes being made out of everything coffee, her boots had coffee beans allover them.

On Saturday I taught the fifth in a series of six classes on the Vintage Moments book by Marsha McCloskey.  Here are some of the centers of the class.  Three of our students were missing but I am hopeful that they will be there next month for our last class.  We came up with another class to be done in a series for next spring but I have to make the quilt first.

Well we are in escrow on a house in Acton.  We are still waiting for the farm to close but are hopeful that all will be in order and we can move in on Thanksgiving.  Believe me, it cannot happen soon enough!

The lastest

Remember my "I Spotted a Frog" quilt?  It was selected for the Kings Art Center's postcard for our quilt exhibit.  Barbara emailed me  a picture of the postcard but I haven't seen one in person yet.  I think the show starts this week.  I wonder if I'll get to see it.

I have been working on my fans for the vintage moments class.  Here are the 48 fans finished.  Finally, I thought it would never end.  Now all the parts are done, including the middle, and I can start putting it together.  I'm working on a birthday quilt for Janice right now so when that is done I can get to it.

I made these place mats to add some color to this boring apartment.  Here are the six I made for us and I have four more for someone else.  Can't say in case she reads this far down the blog.

Here I am holding the baby quilt from the Hanford church for Tami's new baby Anna.  Genelle and Peggy came down to help me put it together.  We whipped it out in one day.  I wish I would have had more time to do some quilting on it besides stitch in the ditch but it had to be done.  The shower is this Saturday.  I hope she likes it.  I found the fabric at Bolts in the Bathtub in Lancaster, Ca.  It is a great shop and no, Jeremy, it's still not better than Thimble Town!  Thimble Town is still the best quilt store for my money!

  It is suppose to rain tomorrow so I hope to get a lot of quilting done.  I love the rain and am always more productive when it rains.  Spent today running around town after getting a flu shot and having lunch with Jeff at the Saugus Cafe.  Great food, been there since forever, diner where the movie stars have gone in the past.  Don't know why the movie stars go there.  It is kind of a hole in the wall from the outside.  Come to visit and I'll take you there!

Off to see "Money Ball" with Brad Pitt. My son-in-law Stephen's brother, Bryan, is in the movie as one of the Pitchers. It's suppose to be a great movie.