wow! its been a while!

Ok between my computer screen being broken and the fact that we left our camera in a friends car, so it took a trip across Texas... i haven't had anything to post! But... as if karma... i finished a quilt here at zippys today, AND the camera finally arrived in the mail.... so i have another FINISH! woo hooo...

lol... so the photos aren't the greatest, my battery died while taking them... but darn it its been so long i want to post anyways!

this one is for Bridgette. She is Travis' other half and momma to one of the recent grand babies. I started this one in January, inspired by a box of scraps someone gave me... they were so small most of the squares i got from it were 1 1/2 and 2 1/2 but i spent 2 weeks cutting squares out of it!

 I used the 2 1/2 squares for this one, the yellow background is a sheet.

It is kinda flannelish, but not.. its just soft. The blue border is another sheet and the back is made from 2 vintage sheets i had. I just L-O-V-E this one!!

So... another one bites the dust... (I'm an 80's girl)

I have finished: Ralph, Trinity, Destiny, Alyssa, Tristin, Sharon, Bridgette, Waylon, Wesley, Chris, Coleman and Buck... I have finished 12 of the 23! I am seriously doubting that i will get the next 11 ALL done, but here is where I'm at:

Caty: just finished borders and back this morning, will start quilting tomorrow.

Jess: i am half finished with his back, should have it done by Friday and can quilt it over the weekend (its an easy one)

Trevor and Landon: borders... i just have to sew the borders on and then i can quilt them both. They are twins so it shouldn't take but a day or so to finish them

If i could finish all of these by Sunday... i may just make it!!

Jonathan: i have an easy peasy plan for his back, the denim part is finished.

Travis: another easy peasy back and i still have to sew the denim together for him.

Faith and Harley: I have pieces of both sewn together, shouldn't take much to finish and quilt them

Adrianna and Dallas: both are HST's and i have all of the HST's sewn into squares... shouldn't be that much work!!!

Lea: have an idea now of what I'm making but I'm going to have to buy fabric to do it and money is tight, hopefully next week i can swing it. It will only take a few hours to make if i can get the fabric!!!

More Friday Finishes!

Can you you believe I was in Houston this week and i did NOT go to the International Quilt Festival!! I was so bummed, we just didn't have time. We live 3 hours from Houston, we had to go pick up restaurant equipment down there and we were leaving early enough that i could have went and looked around 3 hours or so.. but the life of owning a restaurant, my sales person didn't get my cheese on the truck and i had to run  to Lufkin to get it or we would have been without cheese all day! You just cant make pizzas without cheese! So... there went the quilt show. I am going next year... I'm taking time off work, staying a night or two and I'm going!

But its "Finish It Friday" So... i have 1 finish to post. (and an almost!)

If your new to my blog, I am making quilts for everyone in my boyfriends family for Christmas. One for him, 4 sons, 2 daughters, 2 son-in-laws, 3 daughter-in-laws, 6 grand-daughters and 5 grand-sons.

For the sons and son-in-laws I am making denim throws with different backs. I am really using this to explore a more modern quilt side of me and I'm really enjoying it. For me its coming out with more solids and large geometric patterns (ok, i admit... I'm doing large geometric patterns so that i can finish them quicker as well) I really like how both of these turned out.

First is Son-in-law Chris and I'm calling it "Connections" I had planned on connecting the rows of snowballs as well but it just wasn't looking how i had it planned in my head so i just pieced them together.

Chris is kinda a complicated deep type person and i think the colors in this really go with that. I also think he is one of the guys who is secure enough with his masculinity that i could include some florals in it (trust me, some of the younger ones commented that the baby quilt for Tristan had a floral in it!) Chris is married to Dallas and he has been in the Coast Guard for i think about 15 years. He is looking at retirement soon! They just moved from Albuquerque NM to Mobile AL and they are closer now so hopefully we will see more of them!

The grey was a sheet i bought at a yard sale and i love how it looks with the deep reds that were in one of those "i don't quilt anymore" boxes. I had several fat quarters to use.

Almost finished one is for son Coleman. I'm calling this one "Quatro Cajas" and i should have pictures of it next Friday.

So on the denim, i have 2 finished, one I'm quilting, two I have the denim part done and the last is still a pile of denim squares.

I also pieced the back to Bridgette's queen sized postage stamp quilt. I had some problems with this one because i am running out of large chunks of fabric to work with. I should have this one finished next week too.

The other two I'm working on is Trevor and Landon with the flying geese border. I have decided i do NOT like flying geese borders! way too much cutting, sewing, cutting, ironing, sewing, cutting, ironing, sewing... and more sewing! I think i have enough for one of them to have flying geese...

Ive decided the other one will have triangles, kinda a broken dishes thing going on... SOOOO much easier!

Hopefully i will have a couple more finishes for next week!!


For now... I'm going home! I didn't get to post this until after we closed because we had such a busy Friday night! I worked so hard, i feel like my shoulder is going to fall out of its socket!

Fall Bloggers Quilt Festival

I was just wondering if i missed the fall Bloggers' Quilt Festival.. guess what... i didn't! woo hoo. If you want to see some beautiful quilts go over to Amy's Creative Side and check it out.. its page after page of inspiration! I am also adding this to "Finish It Up Friday!" Wow.. finally a finish in time for that too!

 

This time I'm entering the quilt that i made for Wesley. He is my grand baby and I am his Mimi. Wesley started school this year and he is about to move into a new house with his own big boy bed and I hope this quilt ends up on it! Wesley is actually my boyfriend's (Ralph) son's (Buck) girlfriend's (Sharon) child from a previous relationship... but like I said, he is my grand baby and i am his Mimi. Wesley is both a holy terror and a sweetheart rolled into one child. Hes smart as a whip when it comes to the computer and computer games. He started pre-k this year and is doing well (well other than that holy terror part, he had to learn not to give other children bloody lips)

This is him almost 2 years ago helping me make another quilt. His Dad, mom and baby brother lived with us at the time. I just realized, we need to take more pictures of our grand babies, we have tons of pictures of the babies.. but not the older kids!

The inspiration for the quilts is Ralph's closet. He wears cotton plaid shirts. ALL the time. (He looks rather good in them, at least I think so!) He has short sleeve for summer and long sleeve for winter. Anyways, the shirts are colorful and bright and cheery and well, what should I make all of these grand kids but a quilt from Paw Paw's shirts! On this one I kept the pattern simple, I guess its kinda a split rail with a fat rail in the middle. I'm calling it the plaid puzzle quilt.

The plaids are from Ralph's closet he gave up a few of the ones that had stains on them and there are a few from goodwill as well. (probably bought 5 at $1.00 each) The white is a sheet i bought at goodwill for $1.50.  The green border is an alligator skin looking print that my sister gave me a whole bunch of yardage of. I used it here and in his baby brothers matching quilt. I had a hard time choosing a binding on this one. I auditioned reds, blues, yellows and greens and this red gingham kept screaming at me to pick it. I was reserved about it because it seemed a little "christmasy" or bright. But once it was finished, it is the perfect binding for this little boys quilt.

For the back I think the polka dots came from the clearance rack at hobby lobby and the yellow was in one of those "I don't quilt anymore" boxes that someone gave me.

Ok, so there aren't any close up of the quilting, it is simple squares, I followed seams on both sides of the squares. I love the texture it gave it.

I made his brother a baby blanket with the same plaid puzzle. I'm making his cousins Landon and Trevor plaid X's.

This one really did go together quickly and easily and I think the results are cute!

On a side note... see that puddle in the picture of the back (behind the quilt) it RAINED here last night! That's almost as big a deal as the quilt! That was the first good soaking rain we have had in at least 10 months! If you look at the sky it looks like rain but I don't think it dropped any today. It went from balmy and breezy here to cold and wet overnight and fall is definitely here... I'm praying for a very WET fall and winter. Our 3 acre pond is now about 100 ft across.

And I had to include a post of this little fella. He really liked Wesley's quilt too when I was outside taking pictures. (and yes, thanks to him i need to rewash it.) This is Tupelo. He was abandoned by his momma and I bottle fed him for a while, then got him on solid food. He is a sweetie but very very poor mannered! His name is Tupelo because i felt guilty calling him Tupe, which was short for Tupid Puppy which is what Ralph started calling him when he was a baby. my poor dogs, we also have a dog named fat gal which is short for "hairy legged fat gal".

bad news but im still in denial so its ok... lol

Wow another Wednesday...(which i missed and its now Thursday) I'm getting more stressed about finishing Christmas presents each week! (for those who are new I'm making 23 quilts and I've finished 8!) I think i finally have Ralph convinced that i cant come into work at 8 am everyday when i don't need to be here until 10 and those 2 hours, oh i love those two extra hours of MY day, not my work day but MY day. (and the housework is getting done again... that is what really convinced him lol)

 

I finished the binding on "Orange it Great" yesterday and washed it... hmmm... i used fusible batting and I'm not very happy, after 2 washings the "glue" stains (see the dark spots on the teal) are still on the back of the quilt. I'm really thinking I'm going to have to remake the back, re quilt it and re bind it... so... the fusible batting... (i did use a cheap brand from hobby lobby rather than the brand recommended and reading reviews i haven't seen where the heirloom has caused this problem)... i think it ruined my quilt... so although i loved quilting with it, I'm not gonna go with that again! I think the walking foot is the next thing i will try to get rid of the puckers. Writing this i realize I'm still in denial that i may have to remake the back to this quilt! Lol... we will see if i cant wash it again!

 

I called it "Orange it Great" because i am the biggest nerd on the planet. Since i was a child my favorite knock knock joke has been:

Knock Knock
Whose There
Banana
Banana Who

Knock Knock
Whose there
Banana
Banana Who

Knock Knock
Whose There
Orange
Orange Who
Orange you glad i didn't say banana?

 

This was supposed to be my Wednesday WIP post... but i didn't get to finish it yesterday. Things are kinda stressful at work. Another restaurant has opened and were taking the hit this week but unfortunately the bills don't know that this hit is temporary and they wont wait! lol. Yes... another restaurant in this small town. There are about 6000 people in the county, we opened 3 years ago and there were 4 other restaurants in town. We are in an oil and gas boom, they are drilling everywhere and i would say at the height of it a year ago it doubled the population... BUT... its dropped off a whole bunch,  but that hasn't stopped other eating places from opening. We are now at about 18 different places to eat. Every time one opens we take a hit for about 2 weeks... everyone has to try it after all. Eventually our customers come back because we make GOOD consistent pizza and who doesn't love that. We ate breakfast at the new place and if they don't improve their food, I'm really not concerned about losing our customers to them!

 

We do know that to survive on just local business, with this much competition, we need two restaurants at least, so we are putting together equipment for the next one. I have become an online auction addict but so far i have gotten our ovens for 500 (10,000 ovens!!) and a prep table for 300 (3000 prep table!!!) So were getting what we need and hopefully after the 1st of the year i will be busy opening that!

opps that was a total sidetrack...

I have been working on "Connections"

  

this is for Ralph's son-in-law Chris. I love the snowballs and the connectors between them. I didn't like the connection between the rows and i have taken that out. I think I've decided to just sew the rows together, snowball to snowball. It will just be these three rows of snowballs going down one side, the rest will be the dark gray which i love. The other side is denim like "orange it great." The red fabrics were in the last "here someone gave this fabric to me and i don't sew anymore" bag of stuff someone gave me. The grey solid is a sheet i bought at a yard sale.

I also managed to quilt Wesley over the weekend (didn't use fusible batting, used some i found while cleaning out my fabric closet!)

Ill show the whole thing when i finish hopefully over the weekend!

I finally finished piecing the X's for this one and i have also been working on more flying geese. I know.. its a pile of fabric... but I'm running out of places to put things!!!

 like i said, its getting closer to Christmas and I'm getting a tad stressed. The remaking bucks is going to really upset me once I'm no longer in denial! lol.

Irene has a new owner

Irene found her owner, I gave her to a local homeless woman.

The student council is selling pizza tickets as a fund raiser. The ticket gives the person a large pizza and 12 wings. We split the amount with them so that they can take their trip at the end of the year. We don't make money off of this, but what we do get mostly covers the cost of the food.

Tonight someone redeemed the wing portion of the ticket, she got a pizza earlier in the week. She was really late picking them up and when she got here, she said he had to walk because she couldn't get a ride. I was about to run to the grocery store so i offered her a ride home.

The trip home was eyeopening. She was a woman about my age and she lives in a van. It doesn't run so she doesn't have heat. Shes waiting for disability, but for now she makes a little money cleaning houses and she gets food stamps. She wasn't drunk or high, she was a very polite, christian woman who just cant get a job and has to live in a van. She had the fundraiser ticket because her pastor gave it to her.

I dropped her off and when i went to back out of the dead end street she "lives" on, i turned around and there was Irene in a laundry basket still waiting for me to mail her... I stopped, called her back and gave the quilt to her. I told her i made it and she needed it more than where i was sending it to and i wanted her to have it.

I am counting my blessings at the same time. I hadn't sent Irene yet because honestly, i haven't had money for the postage. Money is tight, really really tight for us right now, we are trying to open another store, just paid off a huge tax bill. Its been really depressing to not be able to do what i want when i want, like buy quilt batting to finish the quilts, or go to the movies. In the long run, it will be worth it because we will get thru this and we will have accomplished the goals but sometimes the struggle is tough.

But at least i have a roof over my head, i always have food to eat and a place to cook it, i have people who love me who if a van was my only option, they would take me in and help me out. Doing without right now isn't so bad after all.

Irene found a home, even if the home is a van.

WIP Wedensday - Orange it great!

update: I am using this same post for the Thrifty Thursday linky party at Quilted Cupcake! Im excited about Thrifty Thursdays because well, everything i do is from recycled fabric! This quilt im working on is entirely upcycled or recycled. The orange flying geese are from cotton shirts (and i think one skirt) that i didn't pay more than a dollar for, the teal is a sheet bought at a yard sale, the denim on the front is from blue jeans. Even the binding im putting on is a repurposed sheet!



I'm working on this one still!!!

I'm very happy with it, but i have ran into a few snags!

I started binding it yesterday with orange polka dots and well, the further i went the more i hated it. It was too... pretty and happy for who I'm giving it to. Bucks a hard working Line Man and hes just not a orange polka dot kinda guy. Last night i took it off and i found a dark orange solid that i have sewn on and I'm working on the hand stitching now.

The other snag... dog vomit... the dog was in my lap while i was sewing on the binding.. she looked so cute curled up in the quilt and then ewwwwww! I did some quick hand washing of that part but I'm having a hard time enjoying the binding part of it now and i cant wait to get it in the washer!!

I haven't had alot of time this week and i feel like I've kinda slowed down. I had the morning off today but had to run to town (that's 2 hrs of driving instead of quilting...grr) I don't get any more time off till the weekend. Hopefully tomorrow morning before work i can make some progress on something else!!

Ohhh... just have to post a cute little picture of the two youngest grand babies. (Tristan and Ally) They are 2 months apart and are already growing like weeds. Ally always has that serious look on her face and they both have great heads of hair! Caty brings Ally by the store alot so im spending alot of time with my little Ally Cat!

How much cuteness is in that picture??

Oh, i also ran into Harley's other Grandmother today. Harley is the oldest grand child and even though she doesn't live but 20 miles from us we rarely see her. I asked Mildred what colors she had in her bedroom and what size bed and she said lavender and twin! woo hoo! i was planning on making my striped stars with lavender sashing for her!! that will work!


Im joining with Freshly Pieced Work In Progress Wednesday... be sure to follow this link and find other great projects!

free motion quilting practice!

First let me say even though i didn't have alot of time over the weekend, i did accomplish something. The first denim quilt is quilted and i brought it to work today to finish the binding! I should have it done for tomorrow. Thank you for the suggestion of the fusible batting. All i could find was one at hobby lobby that was 100% poly and it wasn't heirloom, which works OK for the denim quilts (id prefer something with a little more loft and a cotton blend for the rest of what i have to do so i will shop online for those) but... it worked like a charm and i didn't have ANY puckers! woo hoo! even going over denim seams.. which is amazing.

But... yesterday i found Fluffy Sheep Quilting (i love the name) and she is hosting "Free Motion Fridays" which can best be described as a "learn along." Each week she posts a video with a different free motion quilting exercise and then at the end of the week you can link up and show your practice work! I'm joining in, i do believe that FMQ is what i want to do and i can get better so I'm practicing.

Anyways, here is my very first attempt at FMQ:

don't laugh, lol i was excited that there weren't any puckers! I did seem to jump at least once in every line, but i did see where i got better as i went along! Now... knowing the difference with straight lines between a small piece and a whole quilt... i do believe that ALOT more practice in needed!

here is the back:

Yes i know its "Free Motion Friday" but this is last weeks project, i will have another one for this Friday.

I did learn from the videos that she posted that if i had a table to my right, it may help my pucker problem too, so today i moved Ralph's moms sewing machine to my right while working on the top to a denim quilt and OMG how much easier is that!! we will see on the next quilting project how much that helps!

Finally, my next back for a denim quilt....

how cool is that going to be???