Mini Road Trip

Well I had my little shopping fix today, went to Lynden Washington and shopped at Tangled Threads and then over to Folk Tales, they are both very nice shops. At Tangled Threads I bought a Buggy Barn pattern and 3 FQ of 30's fabrics which you can see I've already started to cut up. Folk Tales is my favourite store, she has all the latest patterns, books, and lots of hand dyed embroidery thread. She had a display of Crabapple Hill's newest patterns "Pillow Samplers" of all the seasons with beading, "Frilly Ribbons" needle case and pincushion and "Pocketbook Charmers", they were all very cute but I held back since I have so many of her designs that I haven't stitched yet. I always find something I like and get so much inspiration from this cute tiny store. The store is part of her house, the entry is at street level and her house is up above, not a bad job...no commuting. Too bad she doesn't have a website to show you. I did find some things I needed to purchase, 2.5 yds of beige with tiny blue stars and another 1 yd of beige with small clusters of flowers. Also there was a patten that found it's way into my bag, Miss Rosie's "Going Buggy" pattern. I should visit Folk Tales more often because I love to go there.

When I got home my book I ordered arrived "Prairie Children and Their Quilts". I really love these small quilts. This book also has some interesting history on life as a pioneer.

Wool Applique

I'm not sure what I've been doing this week, a little of this and a little of that, mostly a lot of not finishing anything. Started hand sewing a binding on a quilt, working on my pincushion swap, sock #2 is waiting to be knitted and my sewing machine has been in the shop, not that should stop me because I have another machine I can use. But it's a good excuse anyway.

I thought I'd show a couple of felted wool quilts I made in 2004, yes I did both in one year. The first quilt is queen size by Quilt Country, called Midnight Garden. The flowers are felted wool by Moda and I hand appliqued them on black flannel background. I machine quilted this myself and still don't know how I managed with such a heavy quilt. All that wool!

The second one is folky and primitive called Wooly Flower Sampler by Starry Pines. I tea dyed the white flannel background and hand appliqued the felted wool flowers and embroidery. The wool was hand dyed so it has much more colour variation with each flower. I also machine quilted this one, can you see the wavy lines in the sashing??, that's where I used the wavy ruler (see previous post). The background of all the blocks I did stippling, my favourite for filling in spaces. This is a wallhanging size 44x52.

Arbor Window Quilt

I've finished the top to my "no name" blocks. Thanks to Pam my quilt will now have a name "Arbor Window" wahoo. She found this name in EQ6, I think it's a perfect name. I made mine a little different than Libby's, she made 16 blocks and I did 12 blocks. She did a funky piping for the inner border. I might try her method on another quilt but on this one I did a 1" inner border. I'm not sure yet if I'll do the scalloped border. I have a "WaveEdge" ruler which I might use instead for a wavy border. I never did use this ruler for what it was intended to be used for. It has a book that can be purchased separately. Instead, I've used the wave ruler for a border on a baby quilt and it worked very well. And I didn't need to cut the binding on the bias. I've also used this ruler to mark wavy lines on my quilt for machine quilting.




Here's a close up of the quilt, I really like the background fabric. I don't know if you can see good enough but the beige is circles and dots all over. It's really nice fabric with the small check squares.
















In my garden the roses are now in bloom. I have 5 roses bushes around the deck and 3 are blooming now and 2 will come in the next month.

Special Surprises

Friends are like purses...you might have a whole collection, but some are certainly more special than others. Isn't that the sweetest saying, it was in the card I received yesterday from Darlene. And I was the recipient of really big surprise box of Apron Strings fabrics, Holly Taylor charm packs, several patterns and the cutest pincushion. As you can imagine...I've been drooling and fondling this package since it arrived. Whatever am I going to make with this lovely pile. Darlene this is absolutely the best gift, I "Thank You" dearly.

No Name Block

I was looking for this block pattern for months and wasn't able to locate the name of the block or a pattern anywhere. I guess I wasn't looking in the right place because I found it on Libby's blog, check out her baby quilt. Libby is a sweetie and didn't mind sharing the cutting sizes with me. I don't know if you can see but the red is a small check fabric and the cream fabric has tone on tone little egg shaped circles and dots. I've done 7 blocks, 9 more to go. Does anyone know the name of the block? It would be nice to know what to call my block.

My first lace pattern sock is from Knitty, they are called Monkey Socks, I'm using Lana Grossa yarn with cotton and wool, nice combination for a very comfy sock. Still have one more sock to make.

Happy Quilting.

Pincushion Exchange

I was visiting May Britt this morning and saw she had signed up for a Pincushion exchange. I too love pincushions and I'm very excited about joining. I quickly clicked on the link to The Country Cellar and joined right away. This will be fun opportunity to get that special pincushion. Maybe one of you will be my swap partner, that's if you decide to join.

Redwork Ladies

I've been busy trying to finish these ladies and just when I thought I was done, my thread ran out. Madge in the bottom right corner is missing 2 squares of satin stitching in the border. How could that happen, I bought several skeins and since I love redwork I always have extra on hand. So out I go to Loving Stitch to pick up more DMC 498. I love all the samples they have in the store, it's so tempting to buy a cross stitch pattern or two. I was browsing around and found some hand dyed floss in a variegated red for $5.50, wow that's expensive thread but guess what I bought it. I looked at some vintage yellow linen that was on sale but I was very good and put it back since I knew I wouldn't get around to using it and it too was expensive even on sale.

These patterns are from Red Brolly by Bronwyn Hayes. There names are Libby (top left), Louise (top right), Cynthia (bottom left) Madge (bottom right), check out how Darlene is doing on hers.