Sewing Like Mad!

Are you making gifts for Christmas?

Suddenly sewing like crazy? (Please say yes so I don't feel so alone! LOL)

I finished 2 gifts I want to get in the mail this week so the kiddoes have time to enjoy them.~

I purchased the shirts and added the embroidery designs.

I made the skirt and stretchy pants.  I have to just guess at sizing as the kids live so far away!

I also made this pillowcase for DGD. The front is a feed sack towel from Wal-Mart~ when I saw the design I knew it was meant to be for one of the kids. A friend shared a photo of the one she made on Instagram and I had to do the same! LOL

I'm sorry if my photos are a little washed out~ I was trying to compensate for our gray and rainy day here and it looks like I took it a bit too far. :-/  I sure wish I had a program that just did it for me with no guessing! LOL

Until next time~

and more projects completed (I hope)!!

Happy stitchin'!

A Finish- Delivered!

This was one of my secret sewing projects over the past few weeks.

Some friends and I got together and made a 'friendship quilt' for one of our friends who is dealing with some health issues for both herself and her dear hubby. We wanted her to have our hugs near at hand since we live too far away to do them in person. ;-)

We chose a block from Quilters Cache~ The Dandy Quilt

And set about making blocks in both a positive and negative colorway, reversing the color

placement in the negative block. Everyone sent their blocks to me and I assembled and quilted.

I thought the quilting would do me in as my thread kept breaking and I couldn't figure out why!  I eventually got 'er done!

Everyone also sent a 2½ inch strip of their main fabric for a scrappy binding.

I always hand sew bindings down, so that took a few nights in my easy chair. ;-) 

Any extra blocks went on the back with a great embroidered label one of the gals did on her machine.

 I am so happy to have this quilt in the hands of its new owner!

That's all for today~ back to my machine for some more 'secret sewing'! :-)

Untl next time~

Happy Stitchin'!

My Friends 'Get' Me!

LOL Isn't it a great feeling when your friends get you? :-)

Yesterday was my birthday and I got some amazing mail!

One of my girlfriends (no blog) and I always gush over the Buttermilk Basin and Primitive Gatherings designs. She is a great cross-stitcher, and I have convinced her that hand embroidery is pretty fun too. ;-)

She sent me this wonderful mini hanging, and ornament along with honey from her own bees!

Yes, she is also a bee keeper. :-)

My photo really doesn't do either of them justice! It is a gray and rainy day here. 

The hanging pattern is from Buttermilk Basin and the ornament from Prim. Gatherings.  Just last week we had been talking about all the Ball jars you now see with mini scenes in them. LOL

Another friend who doesn't blog knows my love of scraps. ;-)  She found a great little bag of Ricky Tims hand dyed fabrics  and sent it to me. The colors are really intense, again my fault for the bad photo! ;-)

I have started pressing them and they are all a nice size~ 10" x 10" or larger. Now to decide what to do with them!! :-)

I have been working on a few things I still can't show you, and just today I realized Thanksgiving is NEXT WEEK!! :-o  How did that happen??!! I really need to buckle down and work on my Christmas sewing!  How about you?  Are you Christmas sewing too?

Until next time~

Happy Stitchin'!

Happy November!

We are well into my favorite time of the year!

Lots of 'secret' sewing of gifts for family & friends, cooler days, colorful leaves,

hot chocolate! Love it!! :-)

I have been doing a bit of Christmas sewing, and since most everyone on my list reads my blog (Hi Mom!), I won't be able to show you those projects.  Luckily, I do have a few other things in the works.

I am making the 12 Minikin patterns by Sara of Sew Sweetness and gearing them toward certain recipients. We have two Harry Potter fans in our family, so this could go a couple places. ;-)

This is the medium size Cotton Candy Pouch. (the pattern comes with small, med & large sizes).

You can find the patterns here~

Minikins!

Yes, there are a set of 12 and it may seem a bit pricey, until you divide it out.  Also factor in that Sara is making free videos to those who purchase the patterns, so if a step or technique is new to you, she walks you through it.

 

I don't have them all printed out yet, but when I do I plan to make a booklet so they are easy to reference and use.  Last year my DH purchased a binding machine for me to store my patterns.  I love it! I can put all the patterns I plan to take to retreat, in one little booklet.  I went to the dollar store and purchased a bunch of index dividers to separate patterns.  The nifty thing is that I can also remove them without hurting the binder comb or the patterns and switch them around if I want to take others the next time. ;-)  I use a heavy card stock for the back cover. (from my scrapbooking supplies)

That is all for today~

I am knee deep in making binding for 2 quilts I hope to share with you in the future. 

Until next time~

Happy Stitchin'!!