Monday morning has come around again.

WARNING!!!! THIS IS A LONG POST WITH LOTS OF PICTURES! Get your favorite beverage put your feet up & enjoy!

This is the first Monday morning of my kiddo back at school. He started last week but this will be his first full week. How did I commemorate it? I took a nap! Man that felt good, but now it's time to get some things done. I've got my Pepsi & I'm ready to tackle the day!

First off I want to thank the two quilt guilds that hosted me the last two Tuesdays. The first was Walnut Valley Quilters Guild in Winfield/Arkansas City Ks. That was a fun fast day. Mom & I drove down (3 hours) the morning of the presentations. We made good time, because you can drive 80mph on the turnpike. We had enough time to hit the local quilt shop Field to Fabric.

Mom was funny. You see the wire rack right behind us? It stopped her in her tracks & within the first five minutes she had 3 things already on the table ready to buy. What was also different was that she bought more than I did which never happens. We were able to have lunch with her cousin & get to the church to set up in plenty of time. They have 2 guilds and afternoon & an evening. I had a great time at both. I was busy & it completly slipped my mind to take pictures :(

Last Monday we were in Salina KS with the Silver Needlers. It was a great time with a bunch of fun & talented ladies. I did remember to take a few pictures

It was fantastic location for their meetings.

On our way home Tuseday Mom wanted to take the long way home & go through Concordia KS to visit the Orphan Train Museum. She's found out in recent years that we had ancestors who were riders. I was good with that so we maped out all of the quilt stores on the way there. First up was

Kansas Troubles in Bennington KS. Yup all of those KT fabrics that you love this is there home store.

We had to finish our coffee before we went in so we soaked up some Vitamin D at the cute table outside. Here's a peak at the inside of the store

Lots of things to look at.

Next up is No Place Like Home in Minneapolis KS. I love that these small towns in KS have quilt stores!

This store had the best deal on their scraps that I've ever seen, a large bag for a quarter! That's just about free. It was a great store.

We moved on to Concordia KS but the museum was closed for lunch so we found their local quilt store Fabric Essentials & had fun looking around.

 

We went around the corner & had lunch at "Heavy's" That cracked me up & it was good food. 

Now it was time for the Orphan Train Museum. Mom had waited a long time to go so we had planned on taking our time.

She had a great time & we both learned a lot. A lot of orphans found new loving homes because of one man who started it all. She's started the process of finding out more on our ancestors. If you're ever in the area I highly reccomend it.

Now we were headed to Belleville KS. It is located right on HWY 36 which is what we needed to get home & lucky us there was a quilt shop! I could have spent a lot more time in Sew Country. 

There was so much to look at that we had to browse quickly but we both left with treasures & had fun.

I feel like I'm rambling but I'm trying to catch up on whats been going on. I should split it up into multiple posts but if I don't do it now chances are I will forget. 

Saturday August 15 I took a wool appliqué class with my local guild. I love appliqué but have always been intimidated by it, therefore I've never done it by hand. I'm not a big fan of appliqué by machine. If I'm on the machine I'd rather be piecing. I bought my pattern & a kit 

& I was ready to go. Now the original pattern background used a light blue, well that's just not me so I switched things up & my background is black! Here's my first block laid out.

 

I'm really enjoying it. I have finished this block & I have moved on to the next block, daffodils. I'll keep y'all updated on my progress.

I found the time to finish up the alternate color way of "Prairie Stones" 

Sorry that it's not the best picture but I LOVE how it turned out. All of the fabric except the purple outer border are all scraps from my stash. This is a fun quilt to make. I've almost finished writing the pattern. 

   

Now that it's finished I need to decided what to work on next. There are lots of projects to start, some to finish. This pattern from the recent American Patchwork & Quilting caught my eye

I've got all of the fabrics for this beauty. While I was cutting strips for the latest 10,000 piece quilt I was cutting the scraps to get the best use out of the scraps. So that left me with 1.5" strips (used those in the 10,000 piece quilt) 2' strips ( you can see my daffodil block in progress). We'll see how far these strips will take me. The pattern says that the quilt is 75.5"x78". Well thats just not big enough for me. As of right now I'm going to plan on bigger.

 

The 2.5" strips I'm going to be using those for my next Leader/Ender quilt. There were so many that they filled the container.

I'm cutting them into half square triangles. There's a pattern idea floating around in my head on how I want to use them up. 

Lastly I've not done as well as I had wanted to on my embroidery. I have worked on it a lot more but I've just not been able to do a flower a day. Just a few more stitches & block 3 will be done!

 I do hope that y'all are doing well. I'll try & blog more often so that the next post comes to you quicker & isn't so lengthy. I'm enjoying the weather here in KS. It's in the 70's with sunshine & low humidity (which is crazy in August). Check out what other quilters are up to at patchworktimes.com

More later on,

Vicky

Unexpected gifts

In May I was able to go to Manhattan KS & speak to both quilt guilds. I had a great time & was able to meet some wonderful quilters. A few weeks ago I got a large box in the mail. My kiddo asked what I had ordered & My reply was nadda. I was curious. Inside I found a wonderful letter & box full of scraps!

Good Gravey this is the largest box of scraps that anyone has ever sent me!

Mandy R thank you so much for thinking of me & passing these beautiful bits of possibilities on to me.

Now it's time to sort them & get them into their proper homes so that they can be used up! I hope that y'all are having a great day. It has started early here but it's good so far. More later on,

vicky

You never know what life will bring your way

I was having a peaceful afternoon with my kiddo when I got the call. My husbands uncle was bringing over a 30lb ham & would I please take care of it for him. Ummmm, sure. Well this 30lb ham turned out to be a bag of shaved & sliced ham that is frozen, solid. 

Well I was at a loss on what to do. I don't have a large fridge to put it in to thaw ( besides the uncle wants it to go back into the freezer)so I call my knight in shining armor, my husband.  His solution was for me to get the cordless sawzall with a fairly aggressive blade & cut it up

Very thankful that my kiddo is home because this is a 2 person job. We're being careful not cut anything but the ham. 

I had no idea that I would be doing this today. Gotta love life's curve balls. More later on,

Vicky

Doing a little house cleaning & some motivation

First I've never claimed to be the most organized person. I have found though that the more organized I am the more smoothly my life is. Realizing this has been huge for me. I was recently introduced to a Facebook page called "Quilters Classifieds". You can sell all things quilty on this page. I thought that I'd be tempted beyond control & be buying fabric. Turns out I've not bought a single thing but I have sold!

That is huge for me. The first two items were fairly small but today, today I listed quilts. I always thought that I'd never sell any of my quilts. I'm a very sentimental person & I attach memories to my quilts. So it makes it very hard for me to part with them. Well my DH has been very patient with me & has asked where we are going to store all of the quilts. My standard response was I was just going to start another pile. Well when my dear friend Liz asked me the same thing & it got me to thinking. Life got in the way and all of those thoughts were soon lost until today. Today they came back & I went to see if there were any that I was willing to part with. I found 3. 3 is not much but its a start.  (I'm not going to be selling all of them just some of them. That way I can make room for more.) What I did notice is that these 3 quilts were not scrappy at all. They were all made from yardage. I can't think of selling my scrappy quilts but the yardage quilts that's ok.

We'll see if they sell. If any of you are interested just let me know.

Now comes the motivation part. As I was in my sewing room today I noticed that I've got lots of hand embroidery projects waiting patiently to be started & completed. The only thing is is that I'm in the throws of a huge project.

I'm working on these panels & in a year I've only gotten 2.5 done. Thats not good on the completion rate. I need to step up my productivity if I'm going to get this project done. So here's my plan: I want to complete at least one "flower" a day. There are 29 flowers on each panel. I have 10 more flowers on this panel & 5 more panels to finish so that should be 155 more flowers to finish. That should take me a little more than 5 months to finish these up & that happens to be around the end of this year. I think that is a fantastic goal to shoot for. I'll keep y'all updated on my progess.

I hope that y'all had a fantastic day. It was a beautiful day here. Check out what other quilters are up to at patchworktimes.com

More later on,

Vicky

Labels, labels, labels

I've never been a big laber on my quilts. I think that my reasons for not labeling is that I'm not a big hand sewer, yet I love hand embroidery, go figure? I've never had much luck writing on fabric with those fabric pens & I guess the top reason is I just didn't want to do it. By the time I have the binding done I'm ready to move  on to the next quilt.

My mom had some of her mothers quilts appraised a while back & was told how important to have labels on your quilts. So for my birthday this year she gave me an incredible gift. She found a local design/t-shirt shop that would make my labels & print them on to fabric! She will write the name of the quilt & the date on for me & the biggest part is that she will hand sew them on the back! Talk about incredible, right?!

We were able to get 4 pages done yesterday but the process took a little longer than we expected. We found out that if we provided the fabric & had it cut to the size they needed our price would be much less. So off we were to find the local Jo-Anns. We found it & got our cream Kona solid. Only the problem was that Jo-Anns wouldn't allow us to cut the fabric there. We understood but then we were off to find the local quilt store to see if they would allow us to cut the fabric there. They did! WooHoo!

We took the four pieces of fabric back to the printer & had lunch at Red Robin while they did the printing. It was a fantastic long day.

My mom likes to visit quilt shops when they are on vacations. While on the west coast mom stopped in a shop in California & they had a fantastic scrap bin! She texted & asked it I'd like a bag, ummm YES PLEASE! I think that she did very well. All of this for $3!!!

Well I should probably sort this & put it away in their proper places & get to sewing on my 2 current projects. Shhh don't tell him that I've got 2 going at once :)  I hope that y'all are having a great day. It's beautiful here in the middle of the US. I'tll be time to do chores soon & there are more blackberries to be picked. Yum! More later on,

Vicky

Mother nature & a healthy slice of humble pie

Mother Nature can be very fickle. She can change her mind whenever she chooses. I think that meteorologists need to have the same disclaimer as doctors " that they are practicing".  They tell you in the evening that its supposed to be clear & hot the next day & you wake up to storms. In the past 18 years this is the latest we have ever been in the hayfield. I thought that last year was bad on how long it took but this year has it beat by a long shot. We're not done with our place & we have 3 more fields after we get our place done. We also have the issue of storage. Where do we put it all? The complaints and the benefits change as the weather does in farming. I'm hoping that what was mowed yesterday will be ready to bale tomorrow & there will be no storms until tomorrow night. I can always hope.

I had a very large piece of humble pie today. My longarm quilter texted that my Chess Board quilt was finished. I was excited. Well that excitement went down the drain when I saw my quilt. She had done a fantastic job quilting it but I did not do a fantastic job in piecing it. I'm not entirely sure on what went wrong. Maybe I didn't cut accurately or piece with at a scant 1/4" seam. In any case the probelm was that the body of my quilt was not square & she had to do some fudging to get it quilted.

Is it a huge flaw, nope. Does it prevent the quilt form being used, nope.  Did it wound my pride, you betcha. I also need to remember what was going on in my life during the construction of this quilt & give myself a little bit of grace. What this quilt taught me though is priceless. I poured my life, the good & the bad, from the past 5 months into this quilt. There are spectacular spots of piecing & there are horrific spots as well. I guess I should rename this quilt "Humble Pie". I wouldn't trade it nor will I shy from showing it. I think that sometimes we only want to show our best & never our flaws.

Here are the quilty things that I learned:

#1 Stay on the same cutting mat & ruler that you started with. All mats & rulers are not created equal.

#2 Stay on the same machine if you are not going to test seam allowances on any different machines that you piece the same project on.

#3 When you are piecing the quilt body do your best to be accurate. This quilt is square but the quilt body is not. When I put my borders on I measured down the center of the quilt for the length & width of my borders therefore making the quilt square.

#4 Don't get into such a rush. I get so excited to be finishing such a huge project & I need to keep the same level of accuracy in the end as I do in the begining.

I hope that y'all are doing well & that you have a great night. It's time to finish supper, my fellas are starting to come inside. More later on,

Vicky

p.s.  I think that I have figured out/solved hopefully the tension issue on my Singer 301. I'm thinking that somehow the tension knobs or discs got bumped when I was taking it to Sew night with friends. I fiddled with it for quite a while & it's finally sewing ok but I have my tension knob set at 6 & that just seems high to me. I'll keep sewing with it & if it acts up again she might have to go to the shop. I'm definitely learning that whenever I want to sew away from my house to take the featherwieght. She's in a protective box.

 

Playing catch up

I humbly apologize for being so neglectful in my blogging. Summer always seems to be such a busy time. You'd think that I'd have lots of time for sewing & blogging since we haven't been in the fields making hay because of rain. This funny meme pretty much sums it up here.

 

The amount of rain that we have recieved this year is amazing. Just 3 years ago we were in a severe drought &  there wasn't much hay to make. I guess it's encouraging that if you just wait a bit your circumstances just might change.

I am the VP at my local guild (aka; program chair) & we had our first workshop with me as VP two weeks ago. We had a good time & the instructor, Jenifer Dick of 42quilts.com was wonderful. The quilt we were working on was called "Exploding Nine Patch". I was all excited thinking that I could make it scrapppy & use what I had. This was my first block that I tried

It's a pretty block but it didn't have the 3D effect that the pattern showed. AHHHHHH! I was frustrated. Yes I could have continued but it wasn't what I wanted or expected so I had to shop for yardage. Yup the Scrappy Farmer bought yardage, mercy that was rough. I was seriously out of my element but I needed fabric that would work so that I could make some of the project in class. This is what I came up with. 

I was able to use the same black from the first block & just find 3 more fabrics. Now I was cookin' with gas. I was getting that 3D look. Also I should mention that the blocks in the pattern are 20", mine are 10". I just couldn't go that big, small is what I like. I was able to finish this block in class & that made me feel a little better. Last Friday I was sewing with some friends & decided to work on this project .My new 301A started skipping stitches & making lots of loops on the back, the frustration started to build. So the solution is use one of the floor models ( my sewing group meets at the local quilt shop). Nope that wasn't going to work either that machine was jinxed as well. I knew when to call it quits & go home.  I haven't fiddled with the 301A since then but I"m hoping that whatever ails her it'll be an easy fix.

So last Saturday was my birthday & I wanted to sew but I didn't want to work on the yardage project, I wanted scraps! I got out my new Winding Ways die & started cranking fabric through & sat down at my treadle. It had been a while since I've sat down at that machine.  It didn't take long before I was in my element. I've made a little progress so far. I'm really enjoying making these blocks & will definetly make them again in another color way.

I guess I'd better quit yackin' and get some sewing in while I have a chance. Husband has a 3am wake up call for work tomorrow, man that's early. I hope that y'all are doing well.  More later on,

Vicky