What's new?

A new idea for honey buns and looking to trade some old sheets

I had a pretty good idea for a tutorial to post at the Moda Bake Shop.  It will be up on the site tomorrow morning. The idea was for a beaded window covering. The only window I could think to use it on in my house was my bathroom. So I ordered the fabric and then set about making it.  I was pretty pleased with how the idea came to fruition, but I have to admit it is just too busy for my particular bathroom. Here is how the bathroom normally looks.

 

I got all clever with scrapbooking papers a couple of years ago and I still like it. Unfortunately, adding the window beads just made it way too busy. Here they are--

 

So, they had to come down. :-(  Anyone out there have a window in a pink and brown room where they might could use these? The current dimensions are 37.5 x 40. They can  be widened by 4.5 inches, made narrower by however much you need, and can also be shortened.  Leave me a comment here if you think you can use them. I still like the idea...I just shouldn't have tried to make it happen in that particular room! I was sitting out at grandson's b-ball practice earlier thinking up quilt ideas for these strips combined with the charm pack I have so I'm going to withdraw my offer to give it away. I know--how rude! Sorry.

Now that I've seen Des's sneaky peek, and all the photos found via a Flickr search I'm all ga-ga for vintage sheets this week. I had already bought a few, because I just really do love their vintage appeal, but I didn't really 'get' until I saw Des's pics how much I'd like them in little snippets like that. I missed a HUGE swap at Oh, Fransson! last summer. WOWEE on the work it must've taken Elizabeth to pull that off! Here's the group of 13 fat quarters that I've been cutting today.

 

The front left three are actually vintage yardage, but they feel kind of like cotton sheets to me and I think they go nicely with the group. If you have some vintage sheet pieces that you'd like to do a one to one swap with send me a photo and maybe we can work something out.

April 20

There is a fabulous quilt show going on that many of my fellow quilting bloggers seem to be showing in, so I think I better hop on the bandwagon, too! Amy @ Park City Girl is the brains and the hostess of this awesome group share. Join in! All you have to do is show us your favorite quilt. I realized a minute ago that doesn't even have to mean one that you yourself have made. A favorite is simply a favorite. But the few I've looked at were favorites that the person had made herself so I found myself going that way as well. I don't have many quilts that I've made. I mean; we give them away, right? What else are you going to do with it? This one that I finished late last year will probably be a favorite for a while.

   

Will probably hang there for a while, too. I'll never forget seeing the example for how to get a square abc quilt. My world changed right then and there! I love the way it looks in the grandkids' play area. It's a happy looking quilt.  I like how I sashed the blocks in the sun, blue sky clouds, and green grass. :-) I don't always get it right with color, but I think with that, and the combination of pink with bumblebees and Dick & Jane text for the pinwheels, I did get it right. Here's a post I made when I first started it last summer. Has a good clear photo of the letters (LOVE that red script fabric, too!)

The favorite that comes to mind that was given away was actually a group project that I put together about four years ago. I belonged to an internet group of 23 women. One of them got pregnant after waiting for quite a while. As a surprise to her, I had the 21 other gals create an 8" square scrapbook page, featuring a quotation about babies. I scanned each page and printed them on fabric, set the blocks in a quilt, had it professionally quilted, and presented it to her with the original pages in an album. 

 The numbers couldn't have worked out more perfectly. The other 21 gals made just the right amount for the top

 

and my "dedication page" was used as the label on the back. It was picked up for an article in a Creating Keepsakes magazine at the time. I scanned a couple pages of it as seen here.

 

A tip I like to share for that crisp print is to adjust the contrast up pretty high when you scan your photos or images. Otherwise printing on fabric is often kind of washed out looking.

Won't it be fun working through 400+ favorite quilts of other people? I must remember to add that link to my sidebar here :-)

Here's a photo of my new favorite collection.

" Five pounds lost" Weight Watchers stickers!!! I earned my third one today, and it looks like I have just enough room for the five more I need to add. After my "Lost Weekend" with three pounds of candy corn I was pretty desperate for all the help I could get today. I was actually weighing my clothes on the kitchen scale. My jeans were 1.2 lbs, and that didn't even include a top! All my short sleeve polyester dresses I bought for the cruise a couple years ago weighed 10 ounces. So I picked one of those, didn't eat all morning,  and drove to the meeting. Took off everything (glasses, flipflops, keys, sweater, purse) but the dress and YAY! , just over 2 more pounds lost. Of course, that left me in a quandry--I can never go back *up* to wearing jeans to weigh in again! So I warned my group that starting next week they will only ever see me again in the same dress (at least until this is all over) and I drove to Target and bought a cotton sundress. And the best part is--it only weighs five ounces, so I already have a head start this week!  

April 15

Anybody else (who has to pay taxes) wait til the very last minute? We haven't even picked ours up at the accountant's office yet. We're making a lunch date of it later this morning. Fun! :-) One of these days we should start paying quarterly so it's not one big "Where are we going to get THAT lump o' money today?!" every year. I guess there's going to be "tea bag parties" held all over the US today. Some version of "we're mad as hell and we're not going to take it anymore!". Which I totally understand, but I wondered aloud to John while watching the news this morning, "How can people already be so amped up when our new government hasn't even been in office for three months?" He quickly reminded me, "They've just been scared for their lives the past eight years. Lord knows they might've been drug out back and shot in the face if they complained too loudly. " And as quickly as I'd already forgotten, it all came rushing back to me. How drastically things changed on September 12, 2001. Overnight, we went from emailing each other three page Bushism's and jokes, to television personalities being fired for being *unAmerican* if they even remotely dissed Bush. How many times I stood in a long line in an airport, waiting my turn to prove there were no guns or bombs in my flip flops. Surrounded by other passengers averting their eyes to the ground. If enough of us ever did pipe up too questioningly the country would be thrown into a SECURITY CODE ORANGE!!! mode and we'd all shuffle back into being passively controlled by fear. Whether one admits it or not, that IS how we spent most of the past eight years. I personally think a lot of today's anger is stemming from the pent up anger over the past eight years. A collective PTSD of sorts. So when you join in a teabag party or even just drive by one today, remember how it used to be and be happy that we can feel safe venting our frustrations again.

In honor of having NO MONEY, I spent much of the past few days seeing how many quilts I could cut out of my scrap bucket. By the fourth day of standing there cutting 1.5" strips, I felt about as mindlessly ho-hum as my dog looked

 

I finally quit last night... out of boredom more than anything else.

  

I now have five baby quilts and one twin size quilt ready to sew up. All log cabin blocks. In the smaller quilts I didn't repeat any fabrics. That was about the only challenge involved. :-) It looks like I have at least six quilts left in the bucket!

I better get crackin', huh?

Easter was low key around here. I had Madison and Caleb. Hiding the big plastic eggs that Melissa brought over pre-filled was a challenge in our dwindling/overbuilt backyard.

 

One of the first ones he found had a dollar bill in it so the focus thereafter was seeing what was inside! I think we hid them five times that day. I remember my mom used to hide them at least that many times for us...hardboiled eggs. They got all cracked and downright crumbly by the end of the day. Anyone else remember that?

 

Here's a fun flashback. My little brother and oldest daughter, both about this size in the late 70's, used to go up and down and up and down the street on a Big Wheel exactly like this. I was about as excited to find this *classic* in Target as I was to find the carrom board recently.

I saw a 20 ounce tub of pretty pastel candy corn a week or so ago and thought, "OH, how nice would the pink ones be for Kadence's princess party next September!?" (six months is like a day in the world of candy made in China, right?)  Well, of course I had to eat the remaining yellow, blue and green ones. And I hardly got any pink ones. So I had to go buy another 20 ounce tub. And then yesterday, knowing it would probably be on sale, I bought a third 20 ounce tub. And there's just a handful left of the yellow, blue and green ones this morning.

 

This is all the pink there was. Eleven ounces. Which means I ate 49 ounces of candy corn in a week. See why I can't have this stuff around? I'm a downright addict. Which ultimately is the worst part about eating all of that, because now I have to go through at least two weeks of withdrawal waiting to get it all out of my system. Bottom line on the weight report I passed on this Monday: I was on the treadmill most every day and I stuck pretty strictly to Weight Watchers guidelines, and thanks to three pounds of candy corn I stayed the same. :-)

PS I'm sending that pink candy corn far away from my house for safe-keeping today, so that when I'm doling out eight pieces each to the party girls next Fall we can all have a good laugh. ;-)

Well, it's a good Friday for at least two people we know!

When I googled "random number generator" I used the one found at mathgoodies.com  for drawing the winners of the Birthday banners. The first return was #38-- Angela Davy. As soon as I realized it was someone I know I thought, "Oh heck, who's going to believe that?!" Well folks, on this religious holiday of all holidays, I swear to God and you, that I in no way controlled these results. Promise! Angela is a very talented longarm quilter. I am currently going out to her studio on a weekly basis, and she is helping me see if I can get any good at it, too. Guess I'll bring your banner next Tuesday, Angela! :-)

The second number drawn was 

#92, who has a new blog called nazquilts . She refers to herself as a 'quilter wannabe'. :-) Go check her out, answer her survery and tell her congratulations! It's a "good Friday" after all.

Thank you all for entering the drawing. I really did love reading all your memories and fun stories.

Here's what made my Friday good so far.

 

Jennifer Murphy had a Spring update this past Monday, and Benny and his spool arrived today! I always feel so lucky to be able to purchase one of her treasures, because they literally sell out in minutes. I don't get to buy them as often as I'd like, but it makes the ones I've been fortunate enough to afford even more special. Here's the one I got last year.

 

Sweetness!! I love this creative Jen.

I hope you all have a lovely Easter weekend with family and/or friends. I want to share with you (as I will likely soon forget) a quick story to help explain why I feel so blessed to have young grandchildren in my everyday. Yesterday I took Caleb and Madison to the mall to buy them new shoes. Caleb, my almost 8yo first grandchild, has always been a shoe fiend. He'd trade an armload of new clothes for just one cool pair of shoes. Even if he didn't need them. So without much begging I buy him the skater style white with graffiti *cool* shoes. Even tho they're for school and he wears a uniform. Then we swing into the movie store to rent a new Wii game for the weekend. Then we stop and get him a fresh doughnut. As we're coming out of the bakery I say, "My goodness! New shoes, a new game, and your favorite doughnut. What on earth could you possibly have to complain about?" and without missing a beat he said, "If I didn't have you." awwwww. I think I see LOTS of new shoes in this boy's future. :-)

More Easter dresses and new fabric love

I was thinking after I posted our old Easter photos that I pretty much carried on with raising my two girls like my mother did us. Made them coordinating dresses for most major holidays. I don't remember buying them much at retail. That might explain a lot re their overstuffed closets today. ;-) Hey-- I got to stay home with them. Life is a series of trade-offs.

 

This didn't scan well but you get the idea. This was taken 25 years ago. Where on earth does the time go so quickly? Come to find out Melissa has issues with Erica "ALWAYS getting the pink version"...be it a dress or a bunny or whatever, but that's another story.  Nostalgia rules around here this week. I bought a carrom game board at the thrift shop this week. MINT, I tell you. Has the dated 1966 rules book and all the pieces. One look at this box and I was rushed back to Christmas in the early 60's.

John came down the stairs and saw this yesterday morning and exclaimed, almost as if I had found the shroud of Turin, "WHERE did you GET THAT!" Apparently it hit his nostalgia button, too. Often, when my older sister is remembering something from the past, my mom and dad will look at each other with raised eyebrows like, "wonder what planet and with what parents SHE grew up on 'cause I have no idea what she's talking about!" and I hope that's not the case with this memory of mine, but I swear; it could have been this exact board!

 

I certainly remember it being around, but I honestly don't remember playing with it much. Wonder if we'll play with it now?

In "new to me" fabric news, have you seen Mary Engelbreit's Christmas 09 line?  She just never disappoints, does she? Well, I have to say I was pretty darned disappointed when she cancelled her magazine, but I do love her bright and happy fabrics. And look at this fabulous line I stumbled upon today!! OH I do love it. If you need a reason to bother clicking that link and going to look at it, how about this? yep, now I bet you clicked over! I got a good deal on 15 fat quarters over at hancock's.

Kids are here, baby's awake, gotta run. I should share this final pic.

 

Look's like Mia's been replaced!

Easter dresses

This used to be the week that we girls were gearing up (for some; against our own will) for Easter Sunday. The biggest dress-up day of the year! Nanette's recent post in her Easter finery led me to  Eileen's adorable photos and a call for us all to share our Easter wardrobe memories. The pictures I am about to show you had to be scanned in the books they are now GLUED into because they were my first scrapbooking attempts 12 years ago and I was a twit. I used/cut original photos and glued them right down onto these black page albums.

 

My first "digital scrapbooking" attempt! I was so proud of printing those cartoonish images and cutting the photos to fit. argh. shoot me now. Anyway, that's me in the yellow dress.

 

I'm guessing I was five. 1963. I still remember standing patiently while my mother pinned the hem all the way around that dress. When I would hem my own daughters' dresses 25 years ago I'd pinch it up in one spot, say "looks good to me!" then bring it up the same measurement all the way around on the ironing board. My sister looks like she feels pretty good about herself. I'm glad. She didn't have many days like that. My mother wasn't even 30 when these were taken and she'd been making us these coordinating dresses for all major holidays for quite a while. Back then I guess it was cheaper to sew than to shop. Not sure when that was reversed, but it certainly has been. I used to go up to Bergman's dept store and try on all these chiffon party dresses. They'd let me put them on hold and I'd run home and plead with my mom to come look at them. I just knew she'd want to buy one when she saw it on me! She was such a good sport about going back to look with me. I don't remember ever getting one of those storebought dresses, but I will always remember having a mom who was home for us and always made sure we looked nice.

Here's my John. Again---with the rudimentary beginnings of my scrapbooking career ;-)

 

Look at him strut in that lower picture. He is still like that today--just so confident that all eyes are on him. :-) Doesn't his older sister (on the left) look awfully happy?

 

Not so much. Hey! She got an Easter bonnet! Regardless of the song, not many of us did. Wonder why she's not hunting eggs with her little sister over there? Good times....as Caleb would say. Good times...

If you'd like to join the Easter Parade and share your pictures, click this cute button and get busy scanning!

 

 

Happy Monday!

I had my two *usual* grandkids for most of the weekend. Yesterday, when I wasn't out in the alley playing basketball with Caleb, we were riding our bikes to the big park by the zoo. I have a pretty cool bike. I got it for Christmas year before last. At a glance this bike appears to be an old fashioned one with no handbrakes or speeds. It is actually a three speed and has what you'd call an automatic transmission. When you get to going fast enough it kicks up into the next gear on it's own. And drops down a gear when you slow down. Friends, I don't know if this thing can be adjusted but I had to work SO HARD to even get into second gear for five seconds. My feet were going AROUND AND AROUND AND AROUND and I was all hunkered down...trying to get some speed going. Caleb said I looked just like Miss Almira Gulch on her bicycle with Toto trapped in the basket and hellbent on vengeance. Except I had Madison in the seat behind me patting me on the back like, "Go, Grandma, Go!" Between the laughing and the pedaling...wheeee! that was a workout! I woke up today, amazed that I wasn't achier, wondering, "Just how far DID we ride?" so I drove to the park to clock the mileage. And to take pictures for you.

 

This beautiful park on the edge of old growth redwood trees is right in the heart of Eureka. Seriously; it's bordered by standard sized lots of neighborhood homes.  I couldn't even get the full height of these trees in the frame. And to give you some perspective, those dots in the bottom of the photo

 

are people. Pretty cool, huh? And in case you too were wondering; it was 2 miles on the nose. ONE WAY! What a workout. And back on the homefront Papa John put the new basketball hoop WAAAY the heck up there at regulation height...even tho' Caleb is seven and I am old. But we actually end up feeling even better about the shots we do make. I was thinking today how very fortunate I am. I think that every day, believe me. I thank GOD every day for my many blessings. But to hang out with these kids as often as I do... it makes me sad to think of the small joys and minor miracles I would be missing out on without them. And I guarantee you I wouldn't be throwing my hands with all my might way up over my head fifty times in fifteen minutes. ;-)

So for all that exercise I treated myself at the grocery store a while ago and bought beer and a small bag of Easter jelly beans. :-) I truly am my own worst enemy. If it weren't for these small cheats just about EVERY DAY I'd be losing a lot more than a pound a week, but that IS what I'm continuing to lose (as of today's meeting) so I'm still moving in the right direction! (psss; Sharon--that was my weekly report!)

UPDATE ON THE HAPPY BIRTHDAY BANNER

I am loving all the stories about your favorite birthday memories! Getting some good ideas, too! I sooo wanted to respond to each and every one but I can already tell; it's not going to happen. :-(  Please don't think I'm rude. I'm laughing and enjoying and giving each of you a big ol' virtual hug. But I can't pull off that many emails in my short time off from the grandkids. Also, if you read that post earlier in the day, you may have missed that I decided to give away both of the banners shown. So--your chances have doubled...be thinking about which one you might like best!

take good care.

Time for another give-away :-)

Names have been drawn. See this post. Thanks for stopping by!

I have a tutorial on the Moda Bake Shop blog today. I used Sandy Gervais' colorful Objects of Desire to make a Happy Birthday banner. I had so much fun putting all the colors and fabrics and trims together that I just pressed on and made a second one. To give to a lucky winner who leaves a comment on this post!  

Pictured above is the one I am giving away. It is also featured in the tutorial, with plenty of close-ups, too. Go have a look, but don't forget to leave a comment here first. :-) Tell me your favorite birthday memory.  I'll draw a name on Friday, April 10. I'll also show you the one I'm keeping, just so you can get an idea of all the great colors in this line.   UPDATE: I decided to give them both away, so start thinking which one you'd like--the yellow pompoms is approximately six feet across and the blue pompoms is just over seven feet across.

Now I'm off to make a little something with the leftover bits!