I MADE THINGS!!!

Oh, I'm SO happy! I finally got some time to sit down and MAKE something! A few somethings, actually! Today was the first time I sat down and sewed since October 6th. That's WAY too long!

First off, for the Sweet Dreams Quilting Bee I made these blocks for Missy:

She sent "Katie Jump Rope" Fabrics... some of my all time favorite fabrics!!

Then for the Buzz Cuts Bee I made these blocks for Andrea:

She sent Michele D'Amore fabrics- also some of my favorites!!

And finally for the day I made a laptop case for my sister!! The print is a Kaffe Fassett fabric, and the pink is a Moda, but I don't know what line it's from.


I also did the fall cleaning in the kitchen today... emptied all the cabinets and scrubbed them, washed ALL the dishes (yikes!) cleared off all the counters and scrubbed them, scrubbed the appliances, swept and scrubbed the floor... it looks so nice and clean now :)

Tomorrow I plan to make November bee blocks, make a quilted backpack that was commissioned by a friend, and finish up the set of 6 grocery bags I'm making for myself. I also have a few quilts I'd like to get quilted, so I may load one on the frame tomorrow and get going on that, too!

It feels good to have my creative mojo back :)

At Home

Wow, this has been a busy few days!! I cleaned the house like mad before we left for vacation... and I am at a loss to explain how it got so out of shape with no one in it!! I've been cleaning like crazy! I think I finally have it how I like it now.

I've also been catching up on the blogs I read, baking, prewashing and ironing the fabric I bought on vacation... the list seems endless!

I actually plugged my sewing machine in this morning... I'm making progress! I have some bee blocks to make for October/November. Then I want to get back to work on my Park Slope log cabin quilt. And I might work on the Heather Bailey wonky cabin quilt a little, too!


Finally.... I just got home from a fabulous vacation, full of scenery and beautiful autumn colors... only to find the prettiest tree I've seen yet is the maple in the back yard, just outside my kitchen window!

The Kancamagus Highway

The Kancamagus Highway is a road in New Hampshire that goes from Conway to Lincoln, through a pass of Mt. Kancamagus. It's one of the most beautiful highways in the world (in my opinion, anyway) and it offers a wide variety of scenery... and weather, as we found out!!


This is still on the lower part of the road... the fog was VERY thick in some of the higher elevations!


The fog cleared away as we went along (we went from East to West). But wait... is that SNOW on that peak in the distance?!?


Why yes, it IS snow! Lots of snow! There was about 4 inches of snow on the ground at the highest part of the mountain pass.


There was still some gorgeous fall scenery, though... I love this picture!

All in all it was a wonderful vacation! We put 3,400 miles on the car (and ourselves... that's a LOT of driving, folks!) and spent about $3,200, including gas, lodging and food on this vacation. I am so glad we went, and we have many memories and pictures to keep it fresh in our minds for a long time to come :)

Favorite Vacation Pics

We got home from vacation last night! It was such a wonderful vacation!! The only thing we would change is the length- we were gone too long. I guess Hubby and I are both homebodies :)

Today I've been unpacking and cleaning and doing laundry and making bread and getting a grocery shopping list put together. I'm also suffering the sadness and homesickness I experience every time I leave the place I consider to be home (Victor, NY)... it's so hard to leave the friends and the area I love so much. I've been praying every day for nearly 8 years that God will open up a way for me to move back there. So far, nothing. But I keep hoping!

Anyway, enough of the weepy stuff! We got some AWESOME pictures on this trip! Here are my favorites from my camera- Hubby will download his camera tonight and I can show you some of those pics, too!

This is the Portland Head lighthouse in Cape Elizabeth, Maine. This is my second-favorite lighthouse (my all time favorite is the St. Simon Island lighthouse in Georgia). It's SO pretty, and we had the perfect day to be there!

There are paths along the rock shore that you can walk in the park near the lighthouse. This picture shows you why there's a lighthouse there- I'm thinking a ship would NOT win against those rocks!

The ocean was very calm and scenic that day :)

Hubby took this picture of me sitting on the rocks near the lighthouse, looking into Portland Harbor.

In Vermont. This is called the "100 mile view". It's near Hogback Mountain.

This is somewhere in Vermont. I love the contrast of the hill that has the sun shining on it and the hill that is under a cloud!

Killington Ski Resort in Killington Vermont. It was actively snowing in the higher elevations the day we drove through Vermont.

A view of the Rochester skyline from I-390. Rochester is a little city, but it has one of the prettiest skylines I have ever seen! I especially love it at night.

Blogger's Quilt Festival (Autumn 2009)

This is "So Ends A Fair Day", a mini quilt I made in January 2009. I made it to try to break my way out of a quilting rut I was in! It was so much fun to make, too!

I took a 9" x 12" piece of fusible web, and cut the pieces with my rotary cutter! I knew I wanted to make a sunset, and free cut the pieces to give me what I needed. Next, I dug into my batik stash and pulled out pieces I thought would work, fused the web to them, cut them out and re-assembled the piece of fusible web onto a muslin background with the batiks now attached. Then I covered every seam with fusbile bias tape. I then layered and basted it. Sewing the bias down became the quilting, too!

This quilt really helped me branch away from the "every quilt must have a million pieces" rule, and I had SO much fun making it :)

Maine

So, here we are in Maine!! It has been wonderful so far, the weather has been great and the town we are staying in is so cute! We're 1/8 mile from the Atlantic Ocean and have been walking down to the beach to walk before breakfast... can't do THAT in Illinois :)



I took this yesterday... I spent about 2 hours walking and sitting at the beach. It was heavenly!

Today we drove up to Cape Elizabeth and went to the Portland Head Lighthouse! We were not able to climb the tower since it's a working lighthouse and is in the custody of the Coast Guard... but we were able to go to the museum there, and walk MILES of paths and take about a million pictures!



Tomorrow we are spending the day in Boston, then heading up to Manchester, NH, where we will be staying a couple of days. I don't want to leave Maine, though! I absolutely love it here :)

Vacation!!!

Wow- it's almost hard to believe that we are leaving tomorrow for vacation! We planned it way back in June, and it seemed like it was FOREVER in the future then.... and here it is, less than 24 hours until we leave!

I'm just about ready- 2 more loads of laundry and then I can pack clothes! Most everything else is packed already. I have a couple more errands to run, including stopping by the gas station to fill up, and then we are ready! And then I can relax- I've been going nonstop the past 2 days!

Lucky has definitely figured out something's up... I pulled the suitcases out yesterday, and she gave me a look that said "Um, where exactly do you think you're going?". The real kicker was when our neighbor came to get the keys and say hi to Lucky... then she got all clingy and mopey. Now she's laying on the couch, shooting death glares at me whenever I walk past. She is an expert at the whole guilt-trip thing!

The forecast for Maine/New Hampshire/Vermont is calling for rain pretty much the whole time we are there, but I have seen 10-day forecasts change completely, so I'm not getting too upset about it- yet!

I spent 3 hours Monday morning researching places to go and things to see... including quilt and yarn shops! A couple of the yarn shops look like they are just heavenly... they are all programmed in to the GPS and I am looking forward to going to them :)

Thanks for all the comments about my last post! I think Vicki is right- I've been so wrapped up in vacation plans, and I spent a good portion of September either sick or out of town (or sick AND out of town...!) and didn't really get to do much sewing! I'm bringing my sketchbook along with, and I'm really hoping the scenery and the time away from home will bring some inspiration.

I am bringing my knitting with me. I am so close to finishing my sweater! I also have a hat for Hubby to finish, and a scarf for my mother-in-law. I also brought along some sock yarn in case I felt the urge to make socks, too.

I'll be updating my Facebook status and Twittering along the way, but I don't know if I'll have access to a computer to blog. You can follow me on Twitter if you want- just send me a request! I locked my Twitter account after getting several "porno-tweets" :)

The Quilting Blues

I am in a total quilting funk! I have no inspiration, no desire to create, nothing. I look at my fabrics, and nothing happens. I look at fabrics for quilting bees, and nothing happens there, either. ARGH! What is going on with me?

Maybe vacation will inspire me? I'll be visiting some new quilts shops... maybe I'm just tired of the same old stuff in my local shops. I think the economy is hitting them- none of them seem to get new stuff in anymore.

I'm hoping to be inspired by the ocean and the mountains and the fall foliage, too. It's pretty flat and boring around here! And I am always inspired by trips home to see my dear friends.

In the meantime, though, I still do have the inspiration and desire to knit! So at least I'm still making stuff.

Have you had this problem? How did you bring yourself out of it?

Terry's Quilt Is On Flickr!!

With Laurie's (A Yankee Quilter) consent, I have set up a Flickr group to share pictures of the blocks for Terry's Quilt!! Please visit http://www.flickr.com/groups/terrysquilt/ for more information and to share pictures of your block.

This is a quote from A Yankee Quilter's blog:

"Today is going to be a huge day for Terry. Her husband will be coming out of sedation to find out what has happened. He doesn't know that he lost part of his leg :("

This totally breaks my heart. Please pray for this family!

What Quilting Is All About

Yesterday I read on Lisa's blog that Terry 's husband suffered a terrible accident at work, resulting in his leg being amputated below the knee.

Today, I read that Laurie is organizing a quilt block donation for Terry and her family! The idea is that you make a 9 1/2" block and send it to Laurie. She will put them together into a quilt, and mail it to Terry!

So I pulled some fabrics and got a block put together. Do I know any of these people? No- but that's OK! Someone needs a quilt, and I can help with that. That's all I need to know!

We were asked to use blue, red, yellow and brown, and use a "scrappy love" theme. I wasn't quite sure what that meant, but this is what I came up with:



It'll go in the mail as soon as I have an address to send it to!

Go here for more information!

Plugging Away!

September has been such a busy month for me- I'm just now catching up on so many things. Including swaps. I feel really bad that I go so far behind, and people are going to be getting stuff a little late. All I can say is, I tried my best! And I'm not going to flake on anyone. You'll get your swap- soon, I swear!!

I did get some done and ready to go. These are blocks for the "A Piece Of Work B" quilting bee on Flickr:





It's my month to send out for the bee. I'll be headed to the post office tomorrow morning with those fabric packets!

We leave for vacation in one week! I have a list about 50 miles long of stuff that needs to be done before we leave, but I'm slowly working my way through it. I can't wait to hit the road! The biggest thing on the list was getting someone to watch the cat and the house. Our neighbor (the retired state trooper) is going to do it for us. I like having a police officer next door- it makes me feel so safe!

The one thing making these preparations a little icky: I have a head cold. I think I need to have a little tete-a-tete with ye olde physician about why I am sick ALL THE TIME. I don't have time to be sick and tired, and I haven't really felt perfectly healthy since I had strep in June.

The check engine light came on in my Jetta, so we took it in. A new thermostat, ignition coil and catalytic converter later, we're ready to roll! Thank goodness the catalytic converter was still covered under warranty- that alone would have been $1200! I think in the future we won't be buying another Volkswagen. LOVE the car, but it's really expensive to maintain.

Both of Dad's eyes are doing very well, and he is able to drive and do all sorts of stuff without glasses! It's a bit weird to look at him, though. I've never really seen him without glasses in my whole life :)

Off to finish up some more of the to-do list!

No Time!

WOW- it's been over a week! SO much has gone on I feel like I've hardly had time to breath, let alone blog!!

I finished up a couple quilts in the last week... they just needed the binding sewn down.



This one has flannel on the back- it will be so cozy to cuddle with in the wintertime!



And this one just looks like sunshine! I had it over a chair in the living room today and it almost shone- it will be so nice to look at on dreary winter days!

I had a really good time at my quilt retreat! I finished Mom's grocery bags and put together 2 quilt tops. I didn't get as much done as I wanted to, I was fighting a bladder/kidney infection the whole time and the antibiotic made me tired.

I intended to do some more sewing when I was at Mom and Dad's Tuesday-Thursday, but I forgot my cutting mat and pretty much couldn't do anything! I did knit some hats for them to take to work- they are collecting winter gear for needy children, so I whipped up a couple of baby hats.



My Mommy made me this GORGEOUS crocheted shawl for winter- isn't it just amazing? It's so warm and soft and cuddly and wonderful! My Mommy is so good to me :) It's made with this amazing superwash wool yarn that's nice and springy and keeps it's shape. I love it!!



Now I'm working on getting some swap stuff done before we leave on vacation in 2 weeks!

I haven't forgotten about my giveaway- but it's going to be a little while longer. I really need to slow down and take time for myself, my hubby and my home. I've been getting sick and not eating well because I'm too busy, and that's just not good at all!!

It's Retreat Time!!

For the third year in a row, my quilt guild is hosting a retreat at a local hotel. It starts tomorrow- and I am so excited!! This retreat is SO MUCH FUN! Lots of sewing, and good friends, and up till 3am... it's just the best- even with my snoring roomate... (just teasing you, Cathy :) )

Vicki already came by to pick up my ironing table for the retreat- she has a minivan, and I can't fit it in my itty bitty Jetta :) I've just about finished packing all my projects and accessories... there is now quite the pile on the sewing room floor!!


I've packed every ruler I own, my design wall, and about 25 projects- quilts and bags and a laptop case for my sister. They are all at various stages of completion, and I am really hoping to come home Sunday night with most, if not all, of them done ("done" for the quilts being completed tops). I am going to go to the quilt shop that's giving us a discount early tomorrow, before the retreat starts. I just need some thread for a couple of the projects. Then I'll be ready to seriously sew!!

I'll send some pictures to my Flickr page along the way- but you probably won't hear from me again here until Monday :)

Oh, yes. This is post #224... I am making something at the retreat that I will be giving away next week!

Five Years

Five very long years ago today my best friend Marie died from Ovarian cancer.

I still miss her every moment of every day.

Ovarian cancer has signs, but most women disregard them, and most doctors mis-diagnose them. Please visit the National Ovarian Cancer Coalition for more information about ovarian cancer, the signs and symptoms, and how you can help in the fight against this deadly cancer.

One Sock...

This past Wednesday my dad had a cataract removed. He's a bit young for a cataract, but it was unquestionably there. I went up to Madison to help out and lend moral support. Everything went just perfect!

I also knitted! I made this sock from start to finish on 9/9/09- I wonder if it will be a lucky sock?

It's a bit big for me, and it's made from superwash wool, which means it's not going to shrink. I blocked it then put it on again last night so I could figure out where I need to make adjustments to the pattern so it fits me perfectly. I think I have those figured out, and I cast on another (not matching) sock last night. We'll see how it turns out before I knit mates for them!

I've got some errands to run this morning, and then the rest of the day will be dedicated to finishing up my DQS7 quilt and getting it mailed off to- ??? :)

Checking In

I've been in Madison WI for the past few days- my dad had a cataract removed and I came up to drive and lend moral support!

I knitted a sock from start to finish yesterday. That was fun! I'm heading home today. Then I can finish up some swaps before Dad has the second eye done in 2 weeks!

My Happy Place

I spent some time today finishing up the organization of my actual sewing area- the place where my machine is. I have been SO happy with this new arrangement... it's so open and bright! I have not been able to quilt fast enough to keep up with everything I want to do :)

Here's where the action takes place! My little sewing "L" has everything I need right at hand to make sewing a breeze!

My trusty Pfaff- I sincerely love this machine and would not give it up for anything- not even a fancy new Pfaff! I have lots of lighting, and a $1 tray I found on clearance just fits under my extension table and holds my needles, bobbins and feet.

I have a ton of little notions all right at my fingertips! I also set up a little cutting mat/ironing surface and a mini iron right by my machine, so I'm not popping up and down every 10 seconds to go to the big ironing table.

My notions pantry! My mother-in-law used to have a huge garden, and she canned a lot. She doesn't do any of that anymore, so she gave all her canning jars to me! These are ones that have flaws or surface cracks and can't really be used for canning anymore. But they can hold my purse feet, magnetic snaps, D-rings, and snaps! The other containers hold the little snaps I use for my flannel "mama cloth" pads, pins and polyester boning.

My "Tub-O'-Heather"... these are my Heather Bailey strips for the wonky log cabin quilt along.

I had intended to to a giveaway for my 200th post, but, um, I kinda wasn't watching the post numbers... at all. This is post #220! So be on the lookout for post #225... more details to come!