Upcoming - Put a Little Love in Your Heart

Coming soon is a super fun Blog Hop, brought to you by Carol over at Just Let Me Quilt .  It will be all about quilty items with at least one Heart contained in it. Right now I believe there are 35 + participants. Can't wait to see what this talented bunch comes up with.

I'm posting on Feb 7.  I am currently working on my Heart item.  I thought, just as a warm up, I'd post a couple of items I have made over the years that would qualify.

The item doesn't have to be big.  Here is a mug rug that I made for a friend who was recovering from surgery. Originally posted in August 2012

This one is from my December  2011 post.  It has hand stitched hearts.

How about this row quilt from September 2012

 Or a table runner from July 2016

Well you have the picture.  It will be a super fun few days, all heartfelt.

I did find, while looking for examples, that I have done a great many more quilted pieces with hearts than I would have guessed.  Several I forgot about until I clicked past them. When we get a bit closer I will include a list of links of all of the participants.

Post #2 for 2018

Not too bad, 2 weeks between posts.  Better than I've been in some time.

I want to start with a couple of pictures of my Christmas gifts from my crafty friends.
My friend P is a knitter first and a quilter second.  This year I got a lot of knitting from her and a tiny bit of quilting.

First is the phenomenal knitted table runner with snow flakes.  These were what made my Florida Christmas, White.  Here are 2 Pictures of it. 

My first thought was that it was a scarf, heaven forbid that I read the note that came with it telling me it was table runner.

Then there is the fun Flamingo Sun Glass holder, I just love it.

And last but not least is the set of coasters that match the Quilted Place-mats she made for me last year which match the Quilted Table Runner  from the year before.  It is amazing how far scraps can go.

My friend B, made me a scrap fabric wreath for the second time.  The first one apparently disappeared during my move from NJ to FL.  She kindly, with just a bit of verbal abuse, made me another.

 We have been making each other gifts for the better part of 40 years.  Visiting either of our homes during the holidays gives a running list of what we've been doing in the way of crafting for all of that time.  Some very lame items and some beauties. All made and given with love.  Over the years we have postponed holiday celebrating til a gift was completed.  One year I was late to a holiday party at her home because I was finishing her gift between the family brunch at my home and cocktails at hers. 45 years of friendship, can't beat it.

Now back to my handy work.

First up are the blocks made for the #venturamodernquiltguild who are making quilts for the victims of the Thomas Fire in Ca.  Sent blocks and prayers.

Up to 18 of 30 blocks in 30 days. definitely started using scraps.

My sister requested some vinyl zip bags for travel.  This is the start of the first of  four.

Last year closed with a biggy.  I  got my first new car in 8 years.  It's a Rav4.  I got it on the 30th, my  birthday.  MJ thought I needed to catch up with technology.  I think he might have been right. I am having a great time with it.  The color is Aqua, which is a sparkly darkish Aqua in bright sunlight.  It changes color based on the light.  Sometimes its a beautiful Navy and sometimes jet black.  Let me tell you it is a bear to find in a parking lot when you don't know what color car you're looking for. : }

I think that gets me up to the minute. Hope to get back before month end.  Take care.

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Happy New Year

Happy New Year

2018

One of my goals for 2018 is to blog a bit more regularly. This is my official start. The other goal is to work my scraps and stash, both of these collections are ridiculous.

Stash

Some of the Scrap Problem

I 'm kinda following along with Sarah over at Confessions of a Fabric Addict. she is doing  Scrap Attack 2018  Her process is clearly explained if you go to the link. I already have projects that I need to get done on a time line that I will now be using my scraps for.(scraps mostly and stash probably for background). So I will not be following her process for deciding when to do what, but I will now use scraps which was not my original plan.

Looking at the scheduled list below I will get at least one scrap project done a month if I stay focused.

My goals so far for the year look like this: (those in bold print are now designated scrap/stash projects)

SCHEDULED
January - 30 Quilt Blocks in 30 Days
February - Put a Little Love in Your Quilt
March - H2H 2018 #1
April - H2H 2018 #2
May - H2H 2018 #3
May - Guild Presentation Samples
June - Christmas in July (I hope we're doing that again)

UFO's
Veterans Quilt for the Church - Sandwiched, needs quilting
Remainders Quilt - Top complete
Christmas Tumblers - Hand Quilting Big Stitch Started
Ladders Quilt - Blocks are completed
Black and White - Mini Tumblers
Knitted Shawl - Started
Knitted Hand Towel - Started

ON GOING
Bracelets for Operation Shoe Box
Plarn Mats for the Homeless
Projects for the FHFC NICU
     Preemie Gowns
     Preemie Quilts
     Hearts and Hide My Eye Covers
Small Animal Shelter Quilts

Some of my UFO's

FHFC Preemie Project

 Current Plarn Mat in Progress 

Cut Plastic Bags for future Mat

As we can see I am ready to hit this new year running.  As soon as I hit the publish button for this post I'm heading to my room to start cutting some of the scraps for the 30 blocks in 30 days quilt.

As other projects come up and are posted on my blog I will note if I used scraps, stash or new fabric. This will hopefully keep me on both tracks, a couple of postings a month and Scrap work.

Now that I have committed in writing to these not too difficult goals  

I wish you and your families a Happy and Healthy 2018.

Christmas Gifts (outgoing) 2017

Got a note from a friend this morning reminding me that I was overdue for a post. Well now that all handmade gifts have been received I can do Christmas holiday gifts in view. Warning - picture heavy.

One of my quilty friends celebrates Hanukkah so I made her a Hanukkah version of the #berrymerrywreath  , a free pattern from Spring Leaf Studios.  The original pattern by Anne is done in Greens and Reds.

And what Christmas goes by when a bottle of cheer isn't gifted.  I always have holiday scraps enough to whip up a gift bag to give a gift a little personal touch.

Following is a string of pictures of the most fun sewing project I did this holiday season.  They are actual candy bags turned into lined zip pouches.  

The idea started when my sister and I saw a few of these pouches at a craft show.  My sister's daughter gave her a mothers day gift of monthly treat boxes from around the world.  

She decided that it would be a great thank you if I  turned  a bag from one of these boxes into a pouch for my niece.

Before I would risk ruining her bag I did a  couple of experimental bags.

The bags are carefully cut open and cut into 2 pieces.

Then covered with iron on vinyl carefully following package directions and sewn into a simple lined zip pouch.

I then made a couple more to add to other gifts for my quilty crowd.

The finished pouch was a super place to use up the candy from the pouches.  The first couple of bags I used had unwrapped candy in them. Not good for rebagging.  Glad I was making the samples at a quilt chapter sew in so I had help in eating the unwrapped goodies.

I made a few more but forgot to take pictures. I tried one without lining and it worked out fine. That was from a Famous Amos individual bag. Washed the bag inside with Windex and a paper towel before adding the vinyl. It was a bit difficult to turn a bag that small right side out as the vinyl makes the bag rather stiff.  Need to try again with a wide mouth zip and see how that works.

And then there were my gifts made with fused glass.  Don't see this craft taking up much more of my crafting time.  Yes, I enjoyed the outcome but glass makes fabric look cheap. We're talking $11 plus for a 12 inch square. The glass doesn't always cut nicely either. It also is a project that makes an almost invisible mess to clean up with teeny, tiny pieces of glass that are really hard to see and are a potential hazard to my noosey dogs. I do have a tiny stash to use up so there will be future posts.

Earlier this week I saw an IG request for 12" Perliomen Valley quilt blocks for the  Venture Modern Quilt guild.  They are collecting blocks to make into quilts for the victims of The Thomas Fire in Ca.

Details can be found HERE

A really easy quick block to make for such a great cause.

And last but not least are these adorable little crocheted stockings that I found after most of my presents were in the mail or delivered.

The free pattern for these cuties are HERE. They are by Melanie Ham.

Pretty sure I won't be back here before year end so wishing you one and all a 

Very Happy and Healthy New Year.

 

Virtual Cookie Exchange 2018

First and foremost - Thank you Carol of Just Let Me Quilt for coordinating this wonderful annual event. And thank you fellow hoppers for sharing your cookies, quilts and traditions at this fun filled time of year.

Ok, I need to start with the fact that I don't bake.  I can cook anything but I lack baking skills. I Quilt.

This cookie recipe is short and sweet (and gluten free).  I got it from my sister who bakes and was confident that I could do it.

I am writing this portion of the blog on November 10.  Today I made my trial batch of easy Peanut Butter cookies.  I did photograph the entire process just in case it was a perfect outcome. In the past hour I have taste tested at least 5 of the cookies, and can report that they taste wonderful.

The recipe is
1 cup creamy peanut butter
1 cup sugar
1 egg

That's it.

Who knew you didn't have to put flour in a cookie mixture.

Mix the 3 ingredients together and using a 1 inch scoop drop on a cookie sheet,  press down with a fork in 2 directions and bake for 12 minutes (see the edit below) in a 350 degree oven.

I don't know what a 1 inch scoop is so I used  a heaping 1/2 a tablespoon full.

I have taken a picture of my uncooked cookies with a KCup on the pan so you could see the size of my pre baked cookies.   I got about 24 cookies from this batch.  You can also see in the pictures that I added a chocolate chip or two to a few of the cookies.  I can not leave well enough alone.




I thought that my sister got way fewer cookies so I cut the cooking time back to 11 minutes.

I took another picture with the KCup to show how much they grew.

Yes, these are very small cookie sheets, they measure in at 9 x 12

I guessed that I was supposed to cool on a wire rack, it's what's done right?  Well I don't own a wire rack so I used the rack that goes in the pan to hold your roasts with parchment paper so the cookies wouldn't fall through.

The cookies came out very tasty but very close to, but not burned.  I guess 10 minutes would have been better.  Good thing I like crisp cookies.

So next week I will try again baking for only 10 minutes and maybe adding a pecan or something else to the top.

Edit for retrial Dec. 5 

I know this is a last minute retry.  I forgot I needed to retry this process with different timing. 

I checked with my sister and she did make much bigger cookies.  Hers were actually thicker, so that explains the need for a change to the cooking time.

I made my cookies the same size as my originals.

This group got M&M Christmas Trees.  I know that M&M melt in your mouth not in your hand.  I needed to find out if they melted in the oven.

I made basically no changes in the recipe or the size of my cookies with the exception of replacing the chocolate chips with the M&M's.

Also found that I had these mesh racks that came with my little cookie sheets that made pretty decent cooling trays.

I baked today's batch for 10 minutes and that seemed perfect.  I did notice that I needed to let them sit on the cookie sheet for a few minutes to set.

You can see the cookie on the top right got a bit broken up because I moved it a little too soon.

If you look closely you will see that some of the M&M's cracked but none actually melted.

I took this batch of cookies (both the M&M's and plain) to today's Guild Meeting.  Didn't have to bring any of them home.

I think that says it all.

So if you got this far you have a chance at winning a Christmas Goodie bag.  I have a few small Christmas goodies that need to be given to someone to help brighten their holidays.  To have a chance just leave a comment.  I'll pick a name after midnight Friday (bright and early Saturday) December 9.

These are the links to all of the great participants in this fun hop.  Stop by and get some super ideas for the holidays and chances to win things and get free patterns and wonderful cookie recipes.  You have nothing to lose and so much to gain (couldn't resist).

Thanks for stopping by for the holiday visit.  Enjoy

December 5 

Creatin’ in the Sticks

Creative Latitude

Gray Barn Designs

Domestic Felicity

Pieced Brain

Quiltscapes

Ms P Designs USA

Cynthia’s Creating Ark

 December 6

 Sew Incredibly Crazy

Freemotion by the River

Moosestash Quilting

One Old Goat And Her Little Farm

A Little Bit of Everything, from Mike & Alisa

Hazel’s Daughter

Patchouli Moon Studio

Bumbleberry Stitches

Selina Quilts (you are here)

Brenda’s Blog

 December 7

 Quilt Doodle Doodles

Kris Loves Fabric

Life in the Scrapatch

Home Sewn By Us

For The Love Of Geese

Stitch Days

Val’s Quilting Studio

Tu-Na Quilts

It’s A T-Sweet Day!

Just Let Me Quilt

The latest crafting adventure

A couple of months ago I saw a sign for classes for beginner Fused Glass.  I truly had no idea what that meant but curiosity got the best of me. Well actually it got the better of us.  I was running errands with my sister at the time and she got dragged along on the adventure.

The class was broken down into 4, 3 hour sessions.  Going in I thought this was overkill but it turned out to be a great system to get exposure to several different elements of the craft.


We did jewelry,  picture frames, dishes and on the last day we made a fish with some of our left over bits and pieces. This is my fish and it is very boring in contrast to most of the fish in my class.

If we had only done jewelry  I would have dropped the whole glass experience.  While what we did was lovely, I'm not a jewelry person.   My sister on the other hand liked the jewelry and wasn't big on the dishes. 

These are some of my pieces of Jewelry.

My dishes. ( about 5 in across)

My sushi type dish (3.5 x 12 in)

This craft will not take over my quilting obsession.  Glass isn't predictable enough for me and it is very expensive.  I see me doing birthday gifts this year for my crafty friends and then making small pieces for Christmas presents.  I have been experimenting with ornaments and like where that is going,


This is a photo of a couple of the pieces of jewelry I gave a friend for her birthday.  Timing is everything, her birthday was the week I finished up the class.

Another buddies birthday was 2 weeks later.  I had her send me a photo with no explaination.  This is what she got back  for her present.

My most fun creation so far is the birthday cake. One of these went with the picture frame. It is about 1 1/2 x 3 inches.  I added a little frame stand so it can be propped up for display.

Another crafty friends birthday is in December and we decided to move it up so I could surprise her with my new adventure.  This went in the mail to her yesterday. Oops forgot to take  a picture. She did receive them yesterday and she will send pictures for me to add here at a later date. She got a frame, a piece of jewelry and some cake.


It really is fun venturing out of ones comfort zone and trying new things.  You just don't know where the process will lead.