Weekend Projects

Christmas ornaments that look like icicles. I will put some rhinestones on them to make them a little shiny.

Valentine's day hand towels. Made some for me and my mother in law. I have some for Grandma, but they just aren't stitched yet.

My favorite creation for the 2 days. A bag for Grace to carry her tap and ballet shoes in. Poor kid is going to have to be my poster child / walking billboard.

Just so you know, I love my new machine. The thread is doing what it's supposed to be doing. I can hit the button and walk away and not have to babysit the machine. I'm happy happy happy. Or as my dad would say, as happy as a pig in slop. Yep that's me!!!

I also got the Dresden plate quilt trimmed so that I can stitch the back to the front. Then off to it's owner. I'm planning to spend Tuesday watching inaugural festivities and quilting.

Have a great week.

Resolved

It is with great pleasure that I'm announcing the resolution to the BabyLock embroidery machine issue. This morning bright and early my brand spanking NEW machine arrived and was set up for me. I have been happily stitching away WITHOUT any thread breaks. Being nasty wasn't the most fun thing to do, but I finally showed that side. I think I finally made it clear how frustrated and disappointed I was with the way things were being handled.

I will be sure to show you pictures tomorrow. I'm just so excited that I need to go stitch more!

Have a great night!

My Baby Turns 5

I've been reading Judy's posts about her son leaving to go live in the dorm and trying not to laugh. I truly understand because today my baby turns 5 today.

From this

to this

to this

to this

and now my all time favorite that will go in the boyfriend photo album

It is truly AMAZING how quickly they change and grow up right in front of your eyes. She's only 5 and I'm the biggest sap about it today. I can hardly wait until she's 16 (yeah I'm kidding).

I took pizza in for the kids at daycare for lunch. New respect for those women who do daycare for a living. If I had to be around that many 4 and 5 year olds on a daily basis, I would be ABSOLUTELY nuts.

Serious Whining

Turn away now, this is going to be some serious whining. If you don't want to read my whines and complaints, run quickly.

I think I have mentioned several times that the embroidery machine I got went back to the shop. Well I still haven't gotten it back. Purchased on 12/10 and it's now 1/12. Can't seem to get anyone to respond to me. Today I stepped it up and went directly to Babylock. 2 phone messages and an email. I figured that I would have heard from someone this morning. No nothing.
I do have a loaner from the shop that I've been using, but it's not my machine. My brand new shiny machine.

The retailer was supposed to send the machine back between Christmas and New Years. I was told it went back on the 8th of January. I don't know whether to believe them or not now. It's probably still sitting there in the shop.

I couldn't get the machine to work with any of the thread that I have. My good old Singer worked/works just fine. No thread breaks, no rethreading. It likes rayon, poly or metallic. This new machine hated all my thread. Then to hear the retailer tell me that I just needed to replace the thread and not use Sulky or Maderia made me want to scream. For the money I spent, that machine should be able to work with yarn should I want to embroider with it. OK, so I'm not going to try yarn, but you get my point. You can't just make a blanket statement about thread and expect me to jump and replace everything I have purchased. Not going to happen. Yes I understand there are bad spools of thread that you run into OCCASIONALLY. Not every spool of thread I own is bad.

I so don't want to throw a big old stinking hissy fit, but boy it's coming close. The hubby is about to get involved and let me share that just isn't going to be pretty.

Seems like customer service just doesn't exist anymore. I feel like someone should be bending over backwards to help. I don't feel like I'm getting that. So I have a loaner and they didn't have to do that for me. Then again, they would have seen the ugly side of me if I didn't get a loaner.

I keep trying to remain calm, but the blood is starting to boil. I feel like I've made a HUGE mistake and everyone is just laughing. We have the money, now lets see what she's going to do. My fear right now is that should I choose to return everything then the next fight is going to start because I'm out of my 31 day return window.

UGH, UGH and triple UGH!

Finally Some Quilting

This is a quilt from one of the girls at work. It's for her daughter's birthday tomorrow. All she wanted was a big meander. Took me all of a 1/2 hour to quilt. I put the binding on for her and will start the hand sewing before I give it back.

I will need to remember this quilt every time I think I want to quilt for a living. This one will make me re-think that whole idea. I did flowers with leaves in the sashing. Then I quilted around the edge of each Dresden plate. The quilt was made by an 80 year old and was partially sewn and partially done by hand. Nothing was really straight. I'm not the straightest person, but this one was really hard for me to try and get straight. There are prairie points around the sides and I need to figure out how to finish the edges.

We celebrated Grace's birthday with the family today. That was a lot of fun. Nothing crazy, just some cake and ice cream with the great grandparents, grandparents and aunt & uncle.

I'm hoping to make it down to the basement to do a little bit of embroidery, but who knows. Dance starts again tomorrow, so I need to get the bag together with all the shoes and clothes.

Have a great week.

Thank You Blogland

Above is my inspiration for tonight. I thought that I could do it on a quilt I'm working on for a girl at work. Knowing that I couldn't do it exactly, I gave myself permission to be me and make up my own variation.

My variation of the same flower. I didn't get a picture of the leaves but I'm even impressed with those.

So to all the Bloggers in Blogland of whom I peruse, thank you for giving me the courage and the understanding that I can be me and that not everything has to match exactly or be perfect. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you. It's very freeing to know that I can do something and it looks nice even though it's not exact.

And last but not least, the new little helper that's come to our house. Thankfully I never tell anyone that I'm pet free. Thus it's easier to explain the hair. Buddy likes the quilt.

Thank you! and have a great night. I'm off to bath one small child who will turn 5 next week. 5, yikes, that number doesn't seem possible.

Back to Work

Today is the first day back to work. I don't know if I'm going to make it all day without a nap. Grace continually asks my boss if I take naps under my desk or if she can come to work with me and take a nap under my desk. Who knows, that's where they might find me today.

Buddy got a bath this weekend. Couldn't resist sharing. He was so good in the tub, but as you can see he didn't like the event. The dog is definitely all fur.

I was able to play on the embroidery machine this weekend. Here are a few of the items I embroidered. In case you are wondering, my machine has gone back to the manufacturer. I'm hoping to hear something this week.

I also go to put a baby quilt top together. No pictures, sorry. I was just too lazy to walk to the basement to take a picture. I'm hoping to get it on the frame tonight and work on it.

Have a great day!