Monday morning roll call

This morning when I was checking the cows in the back pasture I noticed this fence (pic #1). When your fence is only waist high it is not good. Back to the house I went. I got 4 buckets of grain to get the cows closer to the front,wire (farmers can not live with out wire) & a piece of paneling. I called the cows & they came running for their feed & I headed off to fix/patch the fence. Once the fence was patched pic #2 &3 it was time for roll call.
Everyone was present & accounted for! I am so thankful! My dear husband will fix it correctly but this should work until he gets gets to it. Now it is time to sew/quilt!

Pumpkin Wall Hanging

I finished my pumpkin wall hanging this am. I added borders & then I put it on a canvas & stapled it down. I think it turned out really good!

Playing in the scraps

I stopped at Quilters Quarters this afternoon. I hadn't been in for a while & it was good to see everyone. While there I went digging in the scrap bin. The first pic is before I went in. The second is my pile/treasures on the floor & the last is all of it in 1 bag! While there the FedEx man dropped off some boxes & wanted me to sign for it. I laughed & said that I didn't work here. I must be in there too much!

A Scrappy Reputation

It is so much fun having a scrappy reputation. At my local quilt shop I'm known as "The Scrap Lady" and I love it! It is sooo much fun digging through the scraps to find all of those fabric treasures. There are a few stores close to me that also have scrap bins and I went to one of them on Friday. Friday's adventure was down to Quilting Bits & Pieces in Eudora Kansas. I REALLY like that store. It is serious eye candy. I had fun looking at all of the fabric but the best was the scrap bin. I should have taken a picture of it. It was an antique washing machine. I had lots of fun digging & choosing. I left with 3 scrap bags. This is what was in my scrap bags.

There is a lot of fabric here & I'm supper excited. When I was checking out they were teasing me saying "We should charge you by the pound not by the bag!" It is a mostly gold's, greens, reds & blacks all with a Christmas theme.

When I got home I didn't stay long as there was more fabric to go & pick up. On Thursday I received a call from one of the quilt guild members. She said that her sister in law was at the Mystery quilt lock-in back in March & she heard that I liked scraps. There was a Wal-Mart bag with scraps waiting for me in town. Oh so much fun! I am very thankful for all of the quilters who have gifted me their scraps over the past couple of years. I have had so much fun looking through them and putting them into my scrappy quilts.

Off to make supper. It is a lasagna night (for my husband & kiddo).
Have a great night!

Vicky

Embroidery

I have done hand embroidery since I was little. My mom was "in to" cross stitch. She did it a lot. I got on board and did it a lot too. I know that I still have some of my old projects that I made. One of them is a purple Popsicle. I'll see if I can find it and post a picture. Both mom & I cross stitched sweatshirts. I still have the ones I made and the one she made for me. If someone has made me something or written me a card I can't get rid of it. Anyway, my last cross stitch project was a "quilt" for my niece Elle. I started it when I found out my sister was pregnant and gave it to Elle when she was 18 months old. It was the letters of the alphabet with kiddo's around the letters. I quickly gave up cross stitching when I started quilting.

In the summer of 2010 I was looking for a hand work project that I could do on the plane ride to Hawaii. I knew that I was going to want to do something for 5 hours. I found twilling. I saw the most beautiful wall hanging in Quilting Bits and Pieces in Eudora KS. It was twilling and I thought that I was hooked. It turns out that I was not. It took to long for me to finish. I am not very patient and I like to see results quickly. Problem with that is I had purchased a lot of pearlized cotton thread. (that is the type of floss for twilling). What to do? It sat for almost 2 years. I was cleaning in my sewing room & found it and I was determined to use it, but how? I found an embroidery book that I had also got at Quilting Bits & Pieces and found a butterfly pattern that looked very easy. Then I went to YouTube and looked up embroidery and learned how to do stem stitch embroidery. I am using the pearlized cotton. The cool thing is that it really looks like twilling. I made 24 butterflies and made them into a 30's quilt. Here's the quilt

All of the 30's fabrics are scraps! I purchased the yellow at Quilting On The Square in  Holton KS. It really turned out great & I am happy with it.

 

Now I have started another embroidery pattern. I am making this one using white fabric (I had all of this on hand) and red thread. Here are pics of the 3 blocks that I have finished.

 

 

This one reminds me of candy canes

I think I'll make this sunflower again using different colors. That will be for another project.

 

There are a lot of sources to learn new techniques. Some are free and some you need to pay for. Look for them and you might learn something that you'll love to do.

I'd better get off of my toukis and get some things done. I have a current craving for coffee cake. It's time to go digging in the cookbooks or the Internet for a good recipe. I hope that y'all are having a great day, Talk to you more later,

 

 

Vicky

What a busy weekend.

The title says it all. We did have a very busy weekend. It all started on Thursday with quilt guild meeting. Friday was dinner with some quilty friends and then Saturday I was at the Heartland Quilters Network meeting. It was my first time at the meeting. I had a great time and I learned a lot. Thank you Theresa W for helping me get started. This was my table

I got my first booking while at the meeting! So excited! I will be going to the Calico Cut-Ups in Bella Vista Arkansas in August.

I'm off get some lunch and sew some more. I hope y'all have a great day.


Vicky

It's been a gloomy day outside but inside I have been full of activity. Lots of cleaning & sewing going on. I try to split up my cleaning and sewing. I break up the tasks of each so that when I get one done I can go back to the other. That way I can see progress on both fronts.
I think that maybe I have bitten off more than I can chew on this blog. I'm still learning on how it all works and getting frustrated when I can't figure out how to change things. I'm currently trying to figure out how to upload pictures from my cell phone to the blog. I think that I also want to change the name of the blog just a little. Hopefully I'll be able to figure this out.

On to quilting! I've got 2 immediate projects that I am working on for other people. The first one is a block exchange that I am in with some of my quilty friends. I am supposed to have my 12 blocks done by sometime in May. They are coming along just fine. It is a bit of a slow process as there are lots of pieces in them. I can't show pictures (even if I wanted to) because I think that it is supposed to be a surprise.
The next project is one that is stretching my skills. I am making it for my dear friend Liz. I've had the fabric for too long probably. I also want to make myself one. That way I can practice on my fabric and work out all of the kinks. It has lots of odd shaped pieces and I don't think that it will be a fast process. Both of the quilts will be spectacular when done.
I had finished my last L/E quilt and so I have been cutting more fabric for the next one. L/E stands for Leaders/Enders. Instead of using pieces of scraps to start and finish your seems use planned pieces. For instance have a stack of  2" squares by your machine and feed 2 through behind your main project. I think L/E's are magical. It is amazing how much you can get done. It also saves on thread, you don't throw much away. I learned about L/E from Bonnie Hunter. She has books and a website quiltville.com where you can learn more. I took what I learned there and tweeked it so that it worked for me. My current L/E is from her book "String Fling" it is called "Jamestown Landing".

Time seems to be getting away from me. There is still lots to do before quilt guild this evening. Chores, bread is about to go into the oven & I need to print some things. Have  a great night.


Vicky

The very begining!

Hello everyone!

This is my very first post on my blog. I am very excited and a little nervous all at the same time. I am looking forward to sharing my love of scraps, quilts (especially scrappy quilts) and life on the farm. I try to get some sewing time in every day. Some days I am very successful and others not so much. It all depends on what is happening on the farm. So far today it has only been about 20 minutes but I am hoping that I'll be able to add to that this evening. My goal is to have a post a day but we'll see how that goes. I'm going to keep this first post short. Chores need to be done. Till the next post,


Vicky