Sunday, March 31, 2013

Easter Bunnies and Winners

 
Happy Easter to one and all.
 
Every year since I stopped doing the Easter Egg hunt for my nieces and nephews I make something festive to stick their treat in.
 
This year I made these adorable Bunny pouches from the Sew Can She website.

 
All together I made 9 of them.  7 are in the picture above.

 
This is the assitant in the chair, she was climbing in as I was moving the bunnies out.
She is so Nosey.

 
They really came out well. they are made using 4 charms.

 
These are the 2 not included above. They were given to a friend last week.


 
this is a back shot.  The hardest part for me was the button hole for the ribbon.  I have made button holes before but could not for the life of me remember how when I needed them.  I even pulled out the book and couldn't make sense of the instructions. Oh well.  The bow covers it nicely
 
I have pulled winners for the slipper pattern for the giveaway from by Stitchin Up Hop. Notes went out this morning to Brenda of Lady Bug Dreams,  Pat of Life in the Scrapatch and the Ranchwife.
 
 

Saturday, March 23, 2013

Misc Finishes

Things here are just settling down. 2 Blog hops that I really wanted to participate in, done.  Baby quilt for nephews baby's baby shower, done.  Vacation, done.  Next up is Easter.  No problem in my family, we all go out for brunch and I already have my outfit.

Got in from vacation on Thursday afternoon and found in my pile of mail the kit to make this wonderful postcard.

 
is where you will find the info about this pattern and kit. Shell at Raspberry Rabbits has come up with this pattern to share and has the kit to make it up available in her shop.
 
 

 
I sat down Thursday evening and managed to put the entire top together including all of the stitching. Friday evening I did the back which is just an inked postcard format and put the pieces to gether. My only disappointment is that stitching around the outside. Never did this type of thing before and probably should have done a practice piece but I'm so not a practice piece kind of gal.

                         Here it is on the mat so you can see the true size of the piece. 

 
This morning I took it to the post office and mailed it to a friend.  It was one of the hardest things I have ever done.  I so wanted to put it in an envelope.  I had a very understanding Postlady.  She was very careful with the stamps and the postmarking.   I'll know later in the week how it went. Fingers are crossed.

 
When I sandwich a quilt I use my King size bed as a staging area.  I roll out the batting, lay the top down and cut the size I need.  I was in a hurry the night I was working on getting the baby quilt quilted and left the roll on the bed and went back to the quilt room.

 
It was very quiet.  Not a peep out of the assistant.

 
She was very busy showing me how assistants use batting.  All of that chewing took place on the fold. Maximum chewing damage.  No picture of the assistant because she heard me coming and knew it was time to abandon the project. Lost the better part of 3 yards of the batting. I will salvage some small pieces but not happily.

 
I did manage to finish inspite of her. This was the last (I hope) of the snow. 

 
I was really happy with how it turned out.

 
Here is the simple back.  It so happens it matches the babies room perfectly. Dumb luck.
 
I'm not a big shower person but they did a fun if time consuming thing at this one.  They had plain onesies and bibs to decorate.  They had a pile of baby fabric scraps and fusible bond and a supply of stencils, cookie cutters and wooden shapes that we could trace onto the fusible cut out and iron onto the bibs and onesies.  Good memories.

 
This is a close up of the quilting I did.  I've seen it on several blogs of late.  It is the number 4 stitch on a Bernina, I think its for elastic maybe.  Anyway it is fun to do and very forgiving. I actually eyeballed it using the grid of the quilt as a guide line.

 
Oops this one got out of order.

 
I have picked three winners for my left over Nancy Drew fabric.  I've sent emails and will post about them once I have heard from all of them.


Wednesday, March 20, 2013

Stitch me Up - Such Fun

I like to stitch on occasion, not big stitching projects but large enough to keep my hand in the process.  Being able to stitch any project you wanted, big or small was right up my Blog Hop Alley.

I was just a bit behind in my Blog projects when I signed up so I didn't have a plan at the beginning, just faith that something would come to mind.

Faith paid off.  One day while I was bouncing around Blog land I ended up at Lynette Anderson's blog.  She is a very talented designer of stitchery from down under.  I found this great project on her sight with a pointer to a Quilt store that carried it in the states.  This is about where my brain went into overload.

I immediately made the call to a shop in Oregon by the name of Quiltz.  They had the project in 4 patterns. I ordered them all.  Sight unseen.  To be fair to myself they were on sale BUT!!!!!!!!!!!

Now that I had the project in hand I wasn't sure of the goal of the Hop.  To do any stitchery or did I need to use one of the stitchery patterns supplied with the hop.  I compromised I used one of the great stitchery patterns supplied by Cyndi Hoeller from bee tree designs for the Hop and the finished project from the Lynette Andersen  pattern.

Here is the first hint of the finished project.   No it's not a hat.



Here is the second hint...........got it yet?




So what do you think? 





Aren't they great. They are a gift for my friend J in Florida.  I will be giving them to her before this is posted so for a change it will be a complete surprise.  She tends to snoop before my visits to see what she's getting.  She is one of those people who finds her hidden presents, unwraps and rewraps them on the sneak.




This is one of the most fun projects I have ever made.  The stitchery was the time consuming part in relationship to the entire project.  I did each slipper in one evening. Putting the stitchery into the project took under 3 hours.

 Since  I have 4 of these patterns I thought I could giveaway at least 1 maybe 2.  Just leave a word or 2 in your comment that you would like to be included.



It's thank you time.  Let's start with M Samm for coming up with yet another great time. To Cyndi, Debbie and M Samm for their wonderful stitchery patterns and Jane for being our great Cheer Leader.

Please take some time and visit the other wonder stitchers who are posting today.  Wonders abound.

 WEDNESDAY March 20th


Wednesday, March 6, 2013

Nancy Drew Mystery



This turned out to be a Mystery in oh so many ways. First I purchased a considerable amount of fabric sight unseen and then I had no idea in hatties what I would do with it once I opened it up and looked at it.
From the beginning I thought I should make things book related. Don’t know where the idea came from but it wouldn’t go away. I made list after list over a couple of months, and when I compared the lists just before I started to make things and this group of projects appeared on most of the lists.



 I sat down to start and found I had a problem , I ordered a bundle of the Nancy Drew fabric and some of the pieces I didn’t want to cut up and some I just don’t like but maybe you would
                                                             (Giveaway time see below).

Book mark – Just to get my feet warm I started with an old reliable.   Two pieces of fabric between pieces of iron on laminate. The problem is you never throw out the instructions for how to use the laminate. You should see the iron. Not a pretty picture.




Nook Cover - My current form of reading is my Nook. The poor thing spends a lot of time getting shoved into places like my nap sack or my brief case or my large purse and the leather cover I got to protect it is getting a bit worn looking. This seemed like a great time to do something to save it in an oh so appropriate way.



Playaway Holder – Do you listen to books? My library has books on Tape and on CD but my most favorite audio book now comes in a Playaway. It’s on the self in a book size holder but the playaway itself is only 2 x 3 x ½. That's it sitting on the dollar bill.   You slip in a AAA battery and your own ear buds and your on your way.



 The only problem I see with it is that I believe it is digital and the buttons are on the front and are prone to being pressed in error. That causes the book to skip forward and backward or for your eardrums to explode. I tried putting it in my pocket but I apparently wear my Jeans too tight for the buttons. Well this is my solution and I love it.


 The little pouch holds the unit out of my way. I can drive, clean, eat, quilt etc. etc. I added a little clip toward the top of the strap to hold the cord for the ear buds. I can pop them out of my ears and they don’t go very far at all and they don’t get tangled.



 This would be just as perfect for and Ipod or an M3G player. I think this is one of my favorite pieces of the line. The yellow is great because I can see instantly where I lay my toys down.


Book Tote - I originally thought I would make a messenger bag for my weekly trip to the library. The problem I had was that fabrics I really liked I didn’t want to cover up or hide under the flap or chop up with a zipper. One of the pieces in the bundle was a panel of 6 book covers. Since I had no idea what to do with them since I really couldn’t cut them up I changed my messenger bag to a zippered tote. Each side a different cover.




 Zippered because I don’t want my books wet in the rain. Wide mouth because I could cram more into the bag.




 Can you see the little key fob thingy. Well that’s my Library card. No more hunting for that little baby.



 Here is a picture of the inside of the bag that I have turned inside out. No it isn’t reversible. I did the sides of the inside in different colors with the pockets done in the opposite colors.




 As I age the one thing I really need to have on hand are cheaters. I think I have at least one pair in every room of the house. Here is the holder for the pair that will live in my library tote. My cheaters are rather narrow so I generally stitch a line down the case so that I can stick a pen or pencil in there too and then I’m not rummaging through the whole bag.



While this Hop was a very long time in coming, as usual I put the doing off to the last minute and now all I want to do is sit back and have my cup of tea in the cup with the nice little Nancy Drew holder resting on the lovely little Nancy Drew mug rug while reading this very exciting Nancy Drew Mystery.




Oh, regarding the giveaway. I hope to get inspired by all of the other participants as what to make with some of the Nancy Drew fabric I acquired for this hop.  I know I will not use all of it and I would like to give some of it away. If you are interested in winning some please say that in your comment. I won’t include you if you’re not interested. I will be heading on vacation next week so I will draw a name when I return.


Now onto the really important stuff. You need to visit everyone who is participating in this hop. So many talented people you don’t want to miss any of them.

Thanks to M Samm and Carol of  Just Let Me Quilt for being there for us and cheering us on and keeping us on track. Here is a listing of the others who are posting today. Have fun and as always, be inspired.


Wednesday, March 6, 2013