Slow Stitching

For my slow stitching Sunday I hope to start this little stitch.  Oh you say why is she starting another one, well....

because I finished stitching this one. I think it will be a little pillow like how Primrose Cottage finished theirs. This was a fun one to stitch.

Saturday I quilted, bound and appliqued this snowman runner.  If you want to see the whole one you can check out this POST of a previous one, same thing but different border fabric.

This is what my design wall looks like today. These snowman blocks have been up there for over 2 weeks. I hope to make them into a runner but haven't decided on the design yet. Thinking it would come to me as I see them there every day...hasn't worked yet!

Linking with Slow Stich Sunday , Design Wall Monday and Sew and Tell Monday.

 

Holiday quilting

 It's been a productive week, lots of quilting happened. From the start to the end, picking fabric to binding each one.  And all from the stash. First up a 10 degree round wedge topper for the holidays. I picked the focus fabric, the holly one first and then picked the coordinating and background fabric. I have a tutorial for this topper on my tutorial page if you are interested.

Definitely time to finish some snowmen for the shop. This is my Snow Dudes pattern. I pieced two of these and only quilted the one for now. 

Buffalo Plaid has been a favorite in the past and I hope they continue to be. Two of these pieced and only one quilted for now. I have two other table runners and a wall hanging I am working on too. 

I received some sad news yesterday, my Wisconsin quilting friend of 20 years passed away recently. We connected online over our knitting machines and then learned we were both quilters. I have been to her house several times while we attended the Wisconsin quilt show and always looked forward to when we could get together. The last two years she invited me to a quilt retreat that she attended with friends from her area. I am already missing her as we texted often sharing our ideas and accomplishments of our quilting projects. I knew something was going on with her health this summer, but wasn't expecting the end to come so soon. My heart goes out to her family. RIP Sandi B. 

Linking with Free Motion Maverick's, Beauties Pageant, Finished or Not Friday, TGIFF

Retreat day 1

A beautiful morning for a drive to quilt retreat. There was no nearby interstate or four lane for me to take. I had to go over the Mississippi river and was it ever foggy, I couldn't see the river even! Fifteen minutes past the river the sun cleared the way. I saw a pair of Eagles having their breakfast of squished racoon. My path took me past lots of farms including a few Amish ones. After two hours I arrived at retreat. This is the same place I went last year, it is perfect for the 12 of us. Six bedrooms with twin beds, four bathrooms and two large rooms that are connected for sewing in plus two kitchens. We take turns making meals, a team of four each day with two meals a day. Don't worry we didn't go hungry, there is always the snack table!

Lots of projects were brought along in various stages.  I finished the applique on these two buffalo plaid snowman runners plus binding them and sewing on their button eyes. The quilting and the stenciled snowman were all done at home prior to retreat.  

After that I moved on to the applique and binding of two of my Tilting Trees runners. I still need to bury my threads in these four as I forgot my self threading needle. It won't take me long to do that when I get home. Once again the quilting was done on my longarm prior to retreat.

Don't worry there was plenty of time for socializing and munching. The first day we were on our own for meals. But watch out for the second day! 

Accuquilt sales...Fall Flash Sale - Free ground shipping on all orders  ends today 9/26/24  No code needed.

Linking with NTT

Red Truck/wreath panel

This panel grabbed my eye a couple years ago, I made it up and sold it right away. I went on the hunt and found another one. And then it seems several other panels made it into the lineup to get finished first. In looking through my holiday panel stash a couple weeks ago this one finally made it to the top for piecing! 

And it took until this week to quilt and bind it. Too many other things needed doing first.

I even had the same fabrics still in the stash to go with it!

And why not quilt it the same too. So much easier/quicker to follow the same idea.

It feels so good to have another holiday wall hanging ready for my shop.

There was a need to remake this runner too.

I hope you all are having a very productive week! Why not show your creativity in these Wednesday linky parties. Wednesday wait loss and Midweek Makers

Weekly To Do Tuesday Goals

 Every Tuesday Texas Quilt Gal hosts a 'To Do Tuesday' a linky party for us to set goals, publicly announce them and hopefully get them done. I'll be linking there today. 

My goals for the week were:

1. Snowman with a short hat-⍻-see that symbol-to me that means NOT done.  Instead of finishing one I started 7 snowman runners in three different styles! I cut out the backgrounds and stenciled all of their snowflakes. They are hanging off my ironing board drying and then I heat set them before adding the borders.

2. Tilting Trees table runner-hope to make two while I am at it.✅ 

3. Buffalo plaid snowman table runner-the long version. ✅ Yes I made two of these while I was at it and a good thing I did... they are both gone already.  

I also made the matching hexagon ones.

4. Finish three snowman wall hangings.✅ You might have seen these already as I posted about the snowman trio HERE.  Two of these are now gone. 

And that my folks was my week, a busy but very productive one, I worked most of the weekend. I did knock off early on Saturday to go to our daughters house to be with the grands while daughter and hubby went to a function. 

So let's see what I need to do this week:

1. Finish up at least three of the seven runners I stenciled last week.

2. Make 4 quick and easy placemats for Thanksgiving dinner-we are inviting friends over to share our turkey since the kids are busy with their in laws.

3. Might start decorating for Christmas.

4. I need to work on the last 4 square red and white toppers for the local order. 

I hope you all have a wonderful week and eat just the right amount of turkey and trimmings so you don't feel stuffed:)  Happy Thanksgiving!!  

Also linking with Wednesday Wait Loss and Midweek Makers

Crazy busy week

I found the perfect backing for my snowmen table runners.  It is 108" wide, at Jo Anns and I had a 50% off coupon, I bought 90 inches of it.  For these runners I cut the wide backing down to 45"x108" and pinned the 45" sides to the long arm.  Earlier in the week I cut and pieced 6 table runners in three different styles.  And then I became a quilting machine. All 6 were quilted in a day, that was a full day and I was tired at the end.  

Next came the applique, better to applique a bunch with the same thread color and then change to the next color. But I was getting sick of applique and couldn't quite finish them all. So, I decided to just stop doing that and finish up  three of them as I needed to replenish ones that sold in the shop.  I know I keep talking about items selling, I am just thrilled to bits that people love my quilted items and keep coming back for more!  Never, ever did I dream it could be like this.  I mean I hoped I could sell some here and there but it's more than that.  And I thank each and every one of you that has cheered me on!

These are the three I totally finished and now I have their mates to finish when I need them.  In the meantime onto the next;)

It's getting close to Thanksgiving!  We have anywhere from 21 to just a couple at a time. This is part of the 21 trying to get a drink from our pond in the backyard 15 feet from the house!

Linking with Mondays parties, Monday Making and Design Wall Mondays.

Fancied Up Snowman Panel

 A Happy Holiday Snowman panel is just what one needs to make you smile don't you think!  It's no secret that I love snowmen and working with panels.  The center and the eight little pictures in two of the borders are from the same panel. They are so happy I just couldn't resist getting it made, not that I am in any hurry what so ever for snow.  I love the addition of the tall flying geese tree!   

And just look at what I did in the red border, stenciled snowflakes:)

And I had the perfect aqua on hand for the backing.  

While we are on the subject of snowmen, I just finished these yesterday.  Why make one when you can make two, LOL.  

Linking with:

Midweek Makers

Wednesday Wait Loss

Stitch and Sew and Show

NTT

Put Your Foot Down

Two more of my cold weather friends

You know how much I love my snowmen friends!  Must be the hot weather we had last week that made me want to dip into snowman land.  I pieced five of these buffalo plaid snowman runners, then stenciled on the snowflakes.  They are now resting and waiting their turn to be quilted as they are needed.  One made it to the finish line though😉

I made so many of these last year that I sorta got tired of making them, but after having a rest it was fun again.  I mean who can resist that cute face!

The hexie snowmen toppers came along with me to Arizona last winter and a few were pieced and appliqued.  So why not push one of them to the finish line also.  I have a tutorial for this one under the tutorial tab at the top of this page.  A few of you have made it and they were so cute!!

After that I kinda hit a brick wall on Friday.  Do you ever get yourself in a tizzy over having a large stash of fabric or a big stash of UFO's?  Who am I kidding I know I am not in this alone...am I?  But it just all got to me on Friday and I went whining to a friend about it.  She told me I was too hard on myself.  I decided to do a little something about that, out came a UFO lap size and I quilted it up that very afternoon!  It felt so good I got the backing ready for another, I felt like I was on a roll, but it might come to an abrupt halt for at least a few days.  Other things are calling my name😊.  After I get the binding on the UFO's I'll share. That won't be for a few days. We have an ATV ride planned, going to a grandson's baseball game, and I have two local customers coming over this week.   Okay I better get hoppin!

Linking with:

Design Wall Monday

Monday Making 

Amazing things can happen

Back in July, while we were on vacation, something amazing happened.  You know I have two Etsy shops, one for my finished quilted items and another for my patterns (which are only .pdf's).  Links to both shops are on the right side bar.   I wasn't checking my pattern shop daily, I mean we were on vacay;)  But one afternoon I checked and there were a few messages from customers who were having difficulty downloading their purchased pattern.  Upon further investigation on my part, one pattern was selling tons!  This one, The Snow Dudes.  I am so glad I checked that day so I didn't keep anyone waiting to download their pattern.  It was only a few hours into the rush of buyers.

This has never happened before, after helping those people who were having problems I asked a few of them how they happened to find my shop.  A couple responded that on some FB group someone posted their finished runner and linked to my shop as they were all so excited about it!!  But it seemed they didn't know which group, so I never discovered how it all happened.  I would love to have heard all the chatter!!!! So within a few days over 80 patterns sold of The Snow Dudes!  There were more that trickled in but I stopped counting at 80.  I am still flabbergasted:0

Flash forward into early August and I got an email from a gal who works for a quilt shop in Texas called Fabric Fanatics.  They wanted to know if they could purchase my patterns and make kits up.  What, another amazing thing.  But to be honest I have never done anything like that before and wasn't sure how to approach it.  But I talked to another gal who has worked with them in this manner and after that I felt good about it.  So they bought 30 patterns consisting of several different ones.  

Now September is off to a great start!  An Etsy customer purchased 3 runners on Friday and then asks me if I would consider taking an order for 14 runners!!  She has two nieces getting married later this year and wants to give them each 7 runners with various Holiday themes.  Holy cow!  Why yes indeed I accepted the order!  I have two of them done already. 

Thank you for letting me share my amazing news with you!  Happy Labor Day my quilty friends.  I will be doing a little sewing and a little baking today.  I have two table runners on my design wall for today.  And soon I will be working on my idea for Hello Fall blog hop which starts September 21st.  And then I am participating in From The Heart blog hop in October also. 

Linking with Design Wall Monday, and Monday Making.

Buffalo Plaid round two

Or perhaps that is round four and five!  Yep the long one has been popular:) This is the fourth one. They all look alike so you wouldn't know, but I just wanted to let you know that I am still quilting away.  I even ordered more of the buffalo plaid.  Gotta stock up while it is in season.

 And then a certain friend suggested I do a hexie one.  Of course I listened to her, LOL

I have been keeping the quilting simple on these as it doesn't show much.  Stippling on the center polka dots,  and stitching on the vertical lines in the border.  With stitch in the ditch around the black and white check. 

Don't forget today starts a new week of the Piece Of blog hop from Island Batik Ambassadors.  Go to the Island Batik blog for all the information and links to the Ambassador blogs and get signed up for the give away of a precut of Sand Bar! 

Linking with Monday Making, Look What I Made, Design Wall Monday 

Buffalo plaid snowman and light box

When I visited the craft show last Thursday I noticed a lot of buffalo plaid decor.  So of course on the way home I kept thinking about how I need to get some and make a runner.  I stopped at Jo Ann's and sure enough they had one with snowflakes in their Christmas fabric.  Well you know I had to get some (I might have gotten a few other prints too). I mean with a sale and then 25% off coupon too how could I pass that up!

I opened up EQ to see what designs I might be able to pull together in there.  Next thing you know I had these cutie pies drawn up and texted a friend to run it by her. She liked it;)

Over the weekend I cut, pieced and quilted it.  After cutting my applique pieces I just wasn't sure I liked the red and green.  Something about it bothered me.  Again I texted my friend, Wendy, she still liked the red and green because it was a pop of color.  I decided I needed to set it aside for the night. I really appreciated Wendy's input but...

The next morning I knew why it was bugging me, I didn't want it to look like he was wearing a santa hat.  I just wanted him to wear a regular stocking hat.  I auditioned many different fabrics and even had my hubby involved.  He encouraged me to look at what I liked about my other snowmen runners.  They are all gray/red/white/.   Hmmm that got me to thinking and it came together quickly then.  Here is the finished one.  I even redid the shape of his hat cuff.

After snapping several photos I managed to get ones I liked and he is now listed in my Etsy shop, well he was in there last night and he sold in a couple of hours!!  Guess what I'll be making again this week:) 

Did you notice the striped binding, it makes me a bit giddy!  The snowflakes are stenciled on.  I used a fabric paint from Pro Chem and stencils from TSC Designs.  

I have something new to show you.  My new light box for tracing designs onto fusible web!  I know there are many light boxes out there to purchase. But I asked my hubby if he could build one and a week later I am using it!  I love it.

He ordered LED light strips from Ebay and used double stick tape to hold them down to the box he made.  On top he placed a sheet of plexi glass. 

Here you can see the Precision Fusing Mat I lay over the top of the pattern pieces. The mat holds the pattern in place and I place the fusible web on top and trace away.  Plus those lights are super bright and hurt my eyes if I don't have the mat over the top before I turn it on.  For someone that never really liked doing applique I sure seem to be doing a lot of it!  Of course it is all done on my sewing machine.  And I know that I will be using this light box a lot!  

Linking with Monday Making, Design Wall Monday, and Look What I Made