And Another Week Rolls By

I feel like it's been a short week in the sewing room, do you feel that way also?  I still accomplished what I needed even with taking off 2.5 days from sewing!

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

Three of them were done.  Two of these Snow Dudes were identical in every way. They both sold already. I need to cut and stencil more.

And I finished one of the buffalo plaid snowman table runners.  I changed up the fabric on this ones hat. Usually the brim matches the outer border and the hat itself is the gray. 

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. ✅ 

Last Wednesday I took time to make 4 placemats and one small center mat. The fabric matches my valances in the kitchen/dining room. We had lots of fun with friends for turkey dinner on Thursday.  Isn't that a gorgeous floral arrangement, they brought that over for us! They said they don't fix Thanksgiving dinner so it was a treat for them to have a traditional turkey dinner.  Afterwards we played a few games of Farkle. 

3. Might start decorating for Christmas. ✅  

Yes the tree is up.  The grandkids were over for a few hours on Friday and then helped put the tree up and a few snowmen in various places. I might do more over the course of the week.

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

I am so happy to say I am officially done with the last four toppers for my local gals!  I'll be calling them soon. All in all I had 12 things to make for them, eight of them were these identical table toppers.

The first four went to one lady, she was using them for Christmas presents.  These were done by November 7th.

The second set are for the other two ladies.  This pattern is Christmas logs by Connie at Freemotion By the River.  Thanks Connie for a fun pattern!  But I have to say making 8 identical toppers with each one having 8 holly leaves makes for a while lot of drawing, fusing, cutting and appliqueing!!!!  That's 64 holly leaves:0

That's it for last weeks To Do Tuesday goals, now lets see  what I can accomplish this week.

1. Two Gnome wall hangings

2. A Gnome table runner

3. Snowman table runner

4. We'll see what might be needed in the shop

Linking up with lots of quilt blogging friends over at To Do Tuesday at Texas Quilt Gal.

Happy Tuesday!

Alrightee, let's get right to it today. To Do Tuesday goals last week were...

1. Finish another snowman wall hanging-or maybe even two!  ✅  ✅ Technically there were two finishes, the first one I blogged about on Friday, you can see that HERE.

And this was the second snowman wall hanging.  They are two blocks from a panel to which I added the red sashing to bring them up to size. This time for the checkerboard I cut 2.5" strips of black and white, strip pieced them, and cut them into squares using my Accuquilt 2.5" strip die.  And here is that fun red and black plaid again. 

And a close up of this cutie!

2. Finish another sunflower table runner ✅  I found a fun print for the backing and just enough.

3. Start piecing the 8 identical table toppers. ✅ ✅ ✅  I get three checks as I pieced three of them!

4. Attend a longarm class-we are having Julia Quiltoff come do a day long class for our local longarm group ✅  This was a fun time to be with quilting peeps again.  Friday night was a trunk show but I didn't go as it was a 40 minute drive and I didn't want to drive home in the dark. So I just went to the class on Saturday. Julia is such a sweet little gal and so eager to share.  She shared many quilting ideas/designs and then we could draw them out.  I bought one of her templates for my longarm.  And yesterday I used it on the outer border here.  She calls it her zig zag template.

5. Prepare blog post for the Gremlins, Goblins and Ghouls blog hop. My day is October 19th ✅  Photos taken and post written!  I hope to see you back here tomorrow for my share on the hop. 

6. Whatever else I can fit in ✅  I had this wall hanging pieced last year and ran out of time to quilt it. So out of the closet and onto the longarm it went. Then it was off to the sewing machine for applique time on the pumpkin and sunflower.  All bound, photographed and listed.  Yippee another UFO done! 

The stars are small as this is only about 24" square.  But oh so cute!  I used flannel for the pumpkin and wool for the stem and sunflower.

I think that is enough for one week don't you think?  OMG I didn't even touch my machine for 2 whole days over the weekend!  Almost unheard of, LOL.  

Goals for the week:  

Table runners- Definitely more snowmen are needed, and I will try to piece a couple more of the identical 8. 

Thank you Linda for hosting To Do Tuesday, that's where I am heading to link up!  

Fall into Winter

As usual I am jumping from one season to another and back again!  The first craft show of the season is done.  I know some of you will ask how it was.  While not fabulous it was pretty good, all of my snowman table runners sold at this show.   One of the other items that sold was my Christmas S swirl table runner.  So I came home and whipped up two more. They, along with lots of other items were delivered to another craft show yesterday.  That show starts on Halloween and goes through mid November. 

Oops, when I made these I didn't pay attention to how I laid the two halves together.  Thus, the different curvature of them.  It does not affect their functionality so I left it. 

I've had two cute fat quarters of  brown with modern color leaves for well over a year and just could't decide what to make with them. After seeing the Christmas S swirl runners selling, I decided I should make a fall one.  The brown fat quarters were in the right place at the right time;)

 Isn't it fun with the pop of teal in there.  The brown leaf print has teal leaves although they didn't appear as strong as I would have liked to see after cutting it up. 

I know you have seen my snowman runners many times over, but I have to prove I am getting things done!  Or perhaps it is my way of documenting them for myself:)  These two made their way to the delivery yesterday.

 These are from my Tilting Trees pattern which I used to have on Craftsy.  They let me keep my shop but they deleted all my patterns but one. So I still have Through the Window pattern on bluprint.  But I am looking into opening up a second Etsy shop with only my patterns.

This is also one of my patterns, Three Snow Dudes.  I made two of these, one for the upcoming craft show and one went into Etsy last night.  They were identical and I didn't remember to get a picture of them together.  Oh shoot, I didn't get a photo of my 60 dishcloths I machine knit this last week too!  Yes it was a nose to the grindstone kind of week, crunch time.  Thankfully my sweet hubby helped out by making dinner for us every night this week.  Another busy day today of finishing up two runners and then getting a start on more snowman ones.   Have a fabulous fall weekend!

Linking with 

Can I get a Whoop Whoop

Finished or Not Friday

TGIFF

A few WIPs for Wednesday

I have been doing a little piecing, a little longarm quilting and a little binding too.  I am making the most of my time when we don't have other things planned.  Jumping a bit from one season to another, not that I am wanting summer over with.  Seems summer just finally started weatherwise.  But I do need to stock the boxes for the crafting fall and winter season.

First up I finished up these two pumpkin table runners.  You might remember that I made these last year also.  The pumpkin applique is from A Bright Corner.

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These two jumped into the quilting que this past week also.  They were pieced last winter while we were traveling in the southwest.  One of them is now listed in my Etsy shop.  

Yesterday I went through some old photos from several years ago to see what I used to make.  Just looking for something different to add to my craft show boxes and Etsy.  This pattern was from Stitching Friends and is called Seasonal Star.  I don't see anything about them online so I am wondering if they are no longer in business.   So I whipped this up in just over an hour.  It measures about 24" across.  Perhaps I'll go quilt it now.  How would you quilt it?

I can hardly believe this is the last day of July, where has this year gone!!  So much done and so much more to make:)  

Linking with 

Midweek Makers

Wednesday Wait Loss

A new table topper

The month of June has just begun and a squirrel already attacked me!  Oh boy what does the month have in store for me.

It is sometimes strange how we quilters come up with ideas for a new project.  Friday afternoon I actually took some time to relax and enjoy the beautiful mid 70 degree day by laying on my deck.  That is when the idea came to me to make 60 degree triangles for a hexie table topper and applique a snowman head to each triangle.

Given that I was in the middle of piecing three other table runners, I filed the idea after quickly drawing a pic on a post it note pad.  That evening the hubby and I went for a bike ride, during that bike ride I kept picturing the hexie snowman topper.  Now I should have been just enjoying the scenery shouldn't I have.  Saturday morning arrives and I quickly finished piecing the tree runners I was working on.  We thought we were going for another bike ride Saturday afternoon, but the weather wasn't the best so we decided to stay home.  Enter the squirrel, and I let him have his way.  He helped me gather my gray and red fabrics, he even pulled out my 60 deg. ruler!  Yep it was going to happen.

Piecing the triangles was easy peasy, sew three together, press seams open and then sew the sets of three together.  Then applique on the snowman heads, I saved the felt noses for after quilting along with the button eyes.  I didn't want the gray fabric showing through the white so I used a fusible interfacing on the back of the faces.  I didn't use any fusible web then, but next time I might try it in addition to the interfacing.  I used Elmer Glue on the edges of the faces to hold them in place while I blanket stitched around them.

Add a small red border for a pop of color and a different gray for the outside border.  And it was off to the longarm to quilt.  A quick stipple in the center around the heads.  When I quilted the outside border I used a ruler for my straight lines and stitched right off the edge, I like how the lines intersect and give a nice pattern of diamonds in the corners.  I had this pieced and quilted before it was time to make dinner!  

A pretty red print for the backing finished this off nicely.  This piece was one of several yards, 42 yards to be exact that I picked up at our Walmart for only $1 a yard!!  Yes you read that right, I hit the jackpot on Friday morning, As I walked past the fabric department, there was a bin in the main isle.  I should just check it out I said, EEEK $1 a yard, what unheard of!!  The whole bin was from their calico wall they were just clearancing out and getting ready for the new stuff.  SCORE!!  So many great pieces for backings.  I checked to make sure they were of nice quality before I said I'll take what is left on the bolt!  Now to find a place to store them in my already full sewing room.  Guess I better get these fingers off to the sewing room!

A little bit of nature for your enjoyment. Jack in the Pulpit grows wild in our yard. 

These are growing wild in lots of places in our area.  These happen to be by our mailbox.  Gotta love me some purple flowers.  I think they are a type of phlox.   Yesterday we had a nice bike ride on an awesome paved trail that goes through town. Down by the river there are just gobs and gobs of these purple patches with a few white ones thrown in here and there.

Linking with:  Monday Making, Design Wall Monday DrEAMI

Snowmen in May for OMG

It's not that I want winter again, but I have 3 snowman table runner finishes.  While we were traveling this past winter I had taken along kits I made up for my snowman table runners.  Yes I have to have my sewing day/s therapy even while having other kinds of fun!  I pieced 6 of these cutie pies but have not had a desire to quilt them yet.  So when May OMG rolled around I figured that would be a good way to get on with the finish.  My goal was to quilt and bind three of them.  

Here they are all finished, it happened a week ago but just didn't get it into the blog schedule:)

I used a cute grey and white bubble fabric for the backing. 

These will soon be appearing in my Etsy shop again.  People are starting to buy fall decor already so why not get a head start on getting winter decor also!

Linking up with OMG at Elm Street Quilts

Snowman crazy time! Love it

What a week it has been.  Monday I inventoried a lot of items to take to the next craft show which starts this coming Thursday.  Tuesday I delivered them with promises of bring more to her on opening day. 

I hurry home and start in on the next batch of snowman table runners, piecing, quilting and binding 10 of them by noon on Saturday.  OK I am feeling really good about the supply so far.  Oh but wait 2 snowmen sold on Etsy so I took 2 from the pile and relisted them.  That's just fine by me-I love sales!  In the afternoon I decided to quilt a turkey runner I had in progress and get it listed-it sold Sunday:)  Love my customers!!  Plus I packaged up a Valentine quilt and another snowman too:)  

I know you have all seen my many repeat snowman runners, but I didn't want you to think I was sitting around idle, hehe.   These guys are known as tall hat and squatty hat runners in my book.

And then there are 2 Snow Dudes(I have 3 more ready to quilt).  Plus one of the pineapple snowman(made with a pineapple ruler).

Closeup of pineapple snowman.  I still have one more of these to quilt.

Last but not least 3 Tilting Trees snowman runners.   If you are interested I have patterns for these and the snow dudes in my Craftsy shop-see the link on the right side bar. 

Sunday morning I had play time making my Island Batik October project-it turned out so cute!  Come back on Wednesday for my Halloween showing:)

So that is my week, what has happened in your sewing rooms? 

Linking with Monday Making, Design Wall Monday, and MCM

Tilting Trees Runner

I have been wanting to get more of these guys made up. This is one of my patterns in my Craftsy shop.  This 16" x 40" table runner is very quick to make up.  The quilting is done and then you shape the rounded corners and applique the snowmen and trees on.  Add some snowflake buttons and round black buttons for his eyes and you are ready to bind and enjoy this winter!

 

 I love the striped gray/black/white binding which I had to cut on the bias to go around the curve.





















Since I was quilting yardage it was just as easy to whip up 2 of them at the same time.

Linking with Connie, Susan and Michelle

Pineapple snowman

Pineapples are so sweet and delicious right?  But I think this cutie is pretty sweet too!


Remember when I made THIS pineapple snowman wall hanging using a pattern from The Cottage Rose?  These snowmen are made using the mini pineapple ruler from Creative Grids(not affliated with them).  Ever since then, I thought about how it would look to make a larger snowman for each end of a runner using the large pineapple ruler. 


Tuesday a friend came over and she dug in my neutral scrap bin and pressed and cut for me while I sewed these 8 snowman blocks.  So awesome to have a wonderful friend that wants to come play with my scraps while we have a good time catching up on chit chat.   Ok I confess I only had 8 bodies sewn when she left mid afternoon, but I carried on and by nightfall I had them all this far.

Wednesday morning I got right to work on making them into 4 table runners.  By noon I had them all pieced!!   After refueling with a quick lunch I quilted and bound them.  After dinner I scurried right back into the quilting room and sewed on the buttons for eyes and snowflakes.  The scarf ties are appliqued on as well as the felt noses.  Oh I had so much fun making these and so happy with the results!  And to think I used some scraps(snowmen)!!

I am only going to show you the one runner as they are all identical.  As I was quilting the border on the first one, I told myself you are not going to do all the borders the same, it seemed like a lot of work.  BUT, it looked so cool I turned right around and did the second one the same, LOL.  It went so much faster since I knew exactly what to do and where to place the rulers etc.

Here it is as I was working with it on my Nolting Funquilter.  The tools I used were a couple of curved ones I just bought from Deloa Jones, the nested circles from Quilters rule, and my school chalk for making tick marks in the center of each border.  I centered the first arc in the middle of the border and then went out to the side with two more arcs.  Next came centering a larger arc on the end of the runner and then filling in with the partial circle one in the corner.  And repeat for all the borders.  BTW, the yellow chalk holder I have had for a long time, but I think, I got it at either Staples or Walmart. 

This runner is now in my Etsy shop.

Linking with Sarah, Myra, Brooke, Alycia and Cynthia

Fireworks and Quilting

All of last week was spent camping in Iowa so we could attend PGI.  PGI is Pyrotechnic Guild International-think huge fireworks displays and classes to make fireworks. Every August there is a big convention.  We love seeing the nightly displays, three nights are open to the public for viewing pleasure.  Hubby signed us up to be members so that he could attend classes. While he was enjoying himself learning to make some, I was able to stay at the camper and be happily sewing away.  But at night we both went to see the big firework shows.

Here is some of what I worked on, piecing of snowman runners, it was so hot and humid but my AC was keeping me cool.  These six are now ready for their quilting and the finishing applique after.

 After getting all the snowman runners pieced that I brought along, I started a new quilt!  Some improvising was done as I needed a design wall.  Looking around the camper, I decided that the big window in the back of the camper was the right size and I could pin right into the cornice of it.

With all the modern technology with phones now it was funny to see this old phone booth right outside the camper!  It was not useable since the phone wasn't there anymore.  But the pole beside it was like our own personal WiFi tower!  It was the best connection in a campground we have ever had.  

At the PGI displays they set off these big fireballs-wow did it ever get hot!   For this one we were about 300 feet away. 

During the big shows at night there were mulitple shells being shot off at once.  You were looking up, down, left, right, round and round!  So glorious.  It was like gold dripping from the sky, along with diamonds, ruby, sapphire, and emeralds

Just one of the prettiest blue shells that went off.   It is just hard to capture good firework pictures so I took very few, instead I just wanted to live in the moment;)  Usually the conference is over our Anniversary but this year it was a week early.  Today is our 36th Wedding Anniversary!

I just want to let you know that the big Island Batik blog hop is going on right now.  You can get the links to the Ambassador blogs on the Island Batik blog.  There are some wonderful giveaways too!!  I will be sharing my project on Aug. 28th.  Here is a sneak peek of the fabrics I am working with.  Remember that these are the fabrics released at Spring Market a few months ago.  Ask for them in your quilt shop!!

Linking with Connie and Susan

Progress

I feel I made a little progress this week.  At the beginning of the week these 5 snowmen runners were waiting their turn to be quilted.

And by Wednesday morning these 4 were totally done.  On my longarm, I put on a red snowflake fabric long enough to quilt all 4 of them.  Why not all 5 you might ask...well if you look closely at the photo above you will see that the far right one didn't get it's last grey border yet!  I forgot to do them and moved onto piecing something else😕    How's that---blossoming flowers with snowmen!!

Who can resist such a cute face!  I will be listing them in my Etsy shop soon.

Strawberries have been a good buy lately so we have been enjoying quite a few.  I happen to have some on hand and our raspberries are in their third year and are yielding something worthy of freezing a few.  

But I decided to put some fresh ones with the strawberries for a very delicious fruit pizza.  YUM!

 Mama turkey brought her chicklets out for a walk through the backyard.  At first I only saw one baby and then they just kept popping up out of the grass and ferns.  I couldn't get all 12 of them in the same picture!

Yesterday and today I worked on some fall panels, turning them into wall hangings.  Stay tuned for the finishes next week. 

Linking with Sarah, TGIFF and Foto Fun