Weekend Finishes

2 shirts for a little girl turning 4. She lives in Omaha so I figure she can wear long sleeves into May or June.

I finished my Pickety Stick quilt top. My rendition of Tula Pink's Spiked Punch. I really like how it turned out. Can't wait to get it on the frame and quilt it. That probably won't happen until the end of February or beginning of March though. I really want to get a bunch of projects finished before I start quilting anything.
Sissy thought she needed to be in the picture. I tried throwing some things over the rail to get her to move, but she would just meow at me. I'm sure she was laughing and saying something like Oh that's the best you got, come on give me a break.
This week I will be working on the 2 projects that I lost - horse quilt and bright stripes. Hopefully I can get those tops finished. Along with the tops, I'm hoping to get 15 bags sewn up and delivered. I finished the embroidery before taking the the machine into the shop for some TLC.

Speaking of taking my machine into the shop, boy oh boy what a trip that turned into. First the crazy embroidery machine weights close to 100 lbs so it takes 2 of us to get it upstairs and loaded in the car. I get to listen to my husband grumble every time it's time for service. I just ignore him, so we are good. When we load the machine, it goes into the front seat of my Mazda 6 and then I put the seat belt around it like I'm belting in my best friend. Well yesterday when I arrived at the shop, I released the seat belt and instead of it coming loose like I thought it would, it just kept getting tighter and locking. I figured screw it, I can mess with it when the guys come out to get the machine out of the car. So you would think that guys (2 grown mechanic type men) that work on sewing machines (mechanical things) would be capable of figuring out how to move the machine so that the seat belt would give. No, not the case. The one guy panicked and actually told me I would need to drive to the car dealership to have them release the seat belt. I just looked at him like he had 3 heads. I got in the driver's seat and grabbed the belt and asked him to turn the machine slightly and I could get the belt off then. He just couldn't figure it out. So in my nice lady like voice I yelled at him to grab the machine so it wouldn't pitch out of the car when I turned it. I grunted, turned the machine and released the seat belt, waaa laaaa, machine free. The guy just looked at me like I was the most amazing person for figuring out how to do that. All I could think was HOLY CRAP I let this guy work on my very expensive embroidery machine. So that was my entertainment for Saturday.

I took Grace to the pool today. Not sure who is more tired, me or her.

Have a great week.

Accountability Report - Jan 27th

Wow, where does time go? I can't believe the week is 1/2 over. YIKES.

Onto my report. This week was good, although not as productive as I would have liked.

1. I found the missing projects that I misplaced in my organizing frenzy. They are now sitting next to the sewing machine and will be worked on next week.
2. I donated the sheep baby quilt project to the guild to use for Project Linus. At least I know it will be put to a good use. Lesson learned - draw a picture so it's not a guess as to what I was thinking at the time I started cutting.
   
3. I found an extra project while trying to organize some fabric on my shelf. It's a lone star that I started 5 years ago. I belonged to KQO (Kansas Quilters Organization) and took a class from Jan Krentz after her Lone Star book came out. I didn't finish the project because I was freaked out by the fact that Jan wanted us to "block" the pieces before putting the entire thing together. Block? Do people really block? I get the concept for knitting or crochet, but quilting? Very very tedious. Well, since I've decided it's OK to not always follow all of the quilting rules put out in front of me, I will use some other instructions that I found on Lone Stars. They don't call for blocking. Wonder what I did with the rest of the fabric?
4. 15 minutes a day of sewing is working for me. Although I wish for more some days. I really think it's helping me get some things done.
5. Extras this week, bags for Brandi. Fired up the embroidery machine and put logos on 5 bags.
6. I worked on my Pickety Sticks top (Tula Pink Spiked Punch pattern). It's not going together as fast as I would like, but it also seems that I get a bit distracted. The top 12 rows are completely sewn together. The rest are either sewn as a single row or just positioned on the wall. I'm really hoping to put a dent in it this weekend.

All in all, not a bad Accountability week.

Last night was guild. It was so much fun to go. The speaker talked about borders and letting the quilt talk to you. Not all quilts need borders. Great ideas.

Saturday was the first meeting of the Kansas City Modern Quilt Guild. Wow. Fun Fun Fun. I was very excited to see how many people turned out. Very young group and very excited people. The room had a completely different energy which was GREAT. I'm really hoping to gain some spontaneity from these ladies. I don't have to have a pattern for everything. It's OK to wing it.

TTFN!

UGH....

In my frenzy to organize myself and figure out what UFOs need to be finished, I have misplaced 2 projects. I know they are in my mess somewhere in the Girl Cave. Question is where???? I hate when I do stuff like that.

Design Wall Monday - 1/18/2010

I finished my circle top. Feeling rather pleased with myself at this point because I challenged myself in 2 ways. I wanted to see if I could inset circles into a square, which I did. I also wanted to learn how to figure out how to "do the math" for setting and corner triangles. I did that too. I found a very handy worksheet that helped me out at lot. It's at the Patch Pieces website.

Because I was able to finish 2 projects this weekend, I gave myself the OK to start a new one. I'm using a new Tula Pink pattern.

...and my rendition.

I'm off work tomorrow, so I'm hoping to get a little bit of sewing done.

What a weekend

I have to share pool party pictures. Everyone had a great time. Hopefully all 15 kids went to bed as early as mine did. They swam and swam and swam some more. The picture below CRACKS me up. The little blonde is quite a card. You never know what she is going to say or do.



Frosting, oh my gosh did that cake have frosting. The kids were in heaven. The only part of the cake that didn't get eaten was the cloud at the bottom corner, so it came home with us. Those kids can put away some cake. I must share that Costco makes very good cakes. Grace picked the strawberry mousse and boy was it TASTY!
OK, onto project news...

My monster top is officially finished. I added What's In Your Closet? to the blue section. Love it, love it, love it. Had to share some of the funny guys. I think I like the little monster in the upper left with her hands on her hips, well I guess it would be hips. Do aliens have hips? Anyhow.

(click the picture to view larger version)

I even managed to get 10 bags done for Brandi. I have a ton more that need to be embroidered, so I'm going to try to fire up the machine this week and get some of those going. I will have kids here on Tuesday because there is no school. Maybe while they are entertaining each other I can sneak to the Girl Cave. I'm also going to get some Valentine towels done and listed on my Artfire site. The circle top will also be finished this week. This challenge has served me well so far because I really have finished some UFOs up. I have also started some new things and finished those as well, instead of turning them into UFOs. So go Becky go.

Have a great week!

Saturday Plan

You can ignore this post. It's more for me to list what I HAVE to get done today. I have to do this to force myself to get moving. Lots to do and not enough daylight.

US Toy for birthday gift bags
Quilt shop in Lee's Summit - just because I will be on the highway and I need some me time.
Finish putting handles on bags
Finish saying on quilt top
Pick up birthday cake
Deliver Bags

Have a great Saturday.

Some Progress

The monster quilt top is almost done. I finished the applique tonight. I want to put some words in the blue space, but I'm still trying to figure out what I want. Monsters Monsters Monsters - different colors, different angles. Or maybe What's in Your Closet? Not sure. I'm going to have to sleep on it.

This is the circle top. I have the blocks laid out. The setting triangles are going to be a bit of a challenge for me. I've never done those, so I got out my Quilter's Reference Guide to figure out the math. I'm sure it won't be that hard to figure out, just a little too challenging for tonight.

This is the sheep top I was going to try to finish by the 23rd. I'm throwing in the towel. I don't like the colors anymore and just don't want to mess with it. I'm going to take it to guild in 2 weeks and put it out on the give away table. Someone else can have fun with it.

I need to get bags done this week for Brandi. I'll spare you the pictures of those. I think I have about 20 bags that need handles. Hopefully I can get those done on Thursday night.

Someone turns 6 tomorrow, so I don't think that I will be allowed to do any sewing. I'm not sure what we are doing for dinner. Possibly pizza. Who knows. Sunday there will be a pool party. I'm pretty excited for that considering it's been barely above 20 this week.

Have a great rest of the week.

Room

Finally done painting and the room is back together. Definitely pink, Pepto Bismol Pink actually. Grace loves it so that's all the matters.

Eventful Weekend

Well here is yet another tumbler quilt top that I made using my Go-Cutter. I think I'm going to go and check out other dies this afternoon.

Last night Miss G spent the night with grandparents, so we got to go to the movies - Avatar (3D). First, I've never been to a 3D movie so that was quite and experience. I really didn't think I would like the movie, but I loved it. I like science fiction, so this movie was great in terms of sci fi. My husband made the comment that James Cameron had dreamed of making this movie for a long time. It's awesome to think that someone can take something so out of the norm and turn into something so visually cool. After the movie we got to go for coffee. Then home to watch another movie - The Flying Scottsman. Great flick too, but you have to like bicycling.

Miss G turns 6 on Wednesday and she asked for a pink bedroom so we are painting this weekend. OH MY. It's going to take about 4 coats to cover the lavender that was on the walls. My hubby is there now putting the 2nd coat of primer. I'm hoping we can get one coat of paint on tonight.

Well, until tomorrow. I've been working on another top that was on my list. Hopefully I can get it all done tomorrow.

First of the Year Finishes

I don't know what got into me this weekend, but I managed to get some things done. Even something on my list. I even manged to clean the house, take Grace and a friend to the movies and make the family dinner today. YIKES!

I finished my Rick Rack top. I had 2 more rows to finish on it, so I'm not sure why I stalled. I really like it. This one calls for feathers so I need to do some serious practicing before taking on the quilting.
Then I whipped up this little pinwheel top. It's Sent With Love from Moda and I absolutely love it. I've never done pinwheels before, so that was fun for me. I have 3 blocks that don't match the others and I'm not sure how I pulled that off. Anything related to triangles is a bit of a challenge for me though.

I got an Accuquilt Go Cutter for Christmas. The tumbling block dies is my all time favorite, which means you will be subjected to many variations. I had a bunch of fat quarters that I had ironed in December and hung them over the drying rack that's living in the Girl Cave. They screamed tumbling blocks, so I started cutting. I love how this top turned out.

So I can safely say I'm off to a good start in 2010. I don't know if I can keep up this pace, but I do know that I have a lot to accomplish during the month. Bags for the photographer and a custom t-shirt quilt for some one at work are now on the top of the list. Grace also asked me to make her a shirt that has horses embroidered on it.

Have a great week!