Heffalump

 She is known as Shorty, but she is often referenced by a few other names. This morning Heffalump came to mind as she positioned herself on my lap.  She knows how to get quite comfortable. 

Shorty is an old kitty, well semi-old anyhow... 13.  Since we left Wildflower, she has become an indoor kitty and has lost her youthful physique as a result of a "less active" lifestyle. She does not like to be picked up, but has no problem invading your space... if she is in the mood. Very lovey at times.

One of the hazards of kitties in the house is the occasional mishap that can occur.  I think it was likely Boston, who loves our bed, who put a hole in one of my prized quilts.  The hole was towards the edge, so I just think she grabbed ahold when she was jumping up on the bed.  The resulting hole was only about the size of a quarter, but if left unattended would certainly have grown larger.

Once the hole was discovered, I removed the quilt from the bed to keep it safe while I hunted for a scrap of fabric.  I was sure it could takes months to locate the scraps I knew were hiding someplace. 

I had made a few expeditions into my stash to explore all the nooks and crannies that fabric can hide in, without success. When I finally found this little stack of triangles, it was kind of like when you stop looking for something and it just shows up.  Totally not on my agenda to search for this scrap yesterday.  I was in my quilt room and decided I should do some reorganizing when I discovered this little plastic container with random stacks of little cut scraps.  This little stack of triangles are the only scraps I found from this quilt.

I thought it was amazing that I made this discovery, but even more pleased at how well fabric glue can work on little holes. I know where the hole was, but even I have to search for where the hole was.

Quilts are in the queue

I have been focusing on some of my completed tops that have been waiting to be quilted.  Some have been in the queue for a long time.  I gathered them all in one place and proceeded to measure them. It was then that I found out there were no appropriate backings to be found in my stash.  The backings for five quilts have now been ordered and should be here soon.

First on the list is my Star for a New Day quilt that has been waiting for more than ten years to be quilted.  It was featured as a block of the month project and it used paper piecing. This project gave me the incentive to hone my skills with my paper piecing.  It was quite a challenge to take on.... the center medallion star does not show in this picture, but some of the pieces were quite small, which would have been next to impossible without the aid of the paper piecing technique.

These are a couple more small references for the other quilts.  I have accumulated quite a stack of quilts and decided it might be time to let some of them go. If any quilt I post happens to catch your eye, there is a possibility that it could be for sale. Make your inquiry and I can let you know what I think is a reasonable price... that is if it is one that I don't have a special attachment to.  This also includes many quilts I have posted previously.

 

Now back to the kitchen... the new kitchen, or so it seems.  We removed the Over the Range Microwave and put a new range hood and a shelf for some racks to display my favorite plates... they are red.  Of course the strip lighting creates a nice glow to enhance the new look.

The new microwave moved to the other side of the kitchen.  Did I say that my kitchen is not very big.  The addition of the new island finished off the ambiance of my great little kitchen.  The stainless steel top has already proved to be a quite awesome work surface, and the additional drawers are great.  Even though we added an additional, semi-large piece of furniture to the middle of the kitchen, the whole area feels more roomy and organized.

I smile when I walk into the kitchen... it makes me happy.

Flag Day

It is standard procedure for our household to display our flag on the appropriate days. Since we have been in our new house Ron has taken down my hanging plants and hooked our flag on the two rings that held the plants. We have a nest with two baby Purple Martins in the corner, right next to where he usually hangs the flag. Also to avoid having to remove the plants each time, we made the decision to put up a bracket for our flag... then Flag Day arrived and we had not taken care of that project. At 7:30 this morning we made a quick trip to Walmart and found a flag pole, complete with bracket and a new flag in one package.  Took about 5 minutes to get the bracket attached to the house and the new flag was blowing in the breeze before we headed off to church.

This is my latest project which started out as a panel.  I know, it doesn't look like much more than a panel at this point. 
The outer border was not part of the original panel and the star sashing and inside mini border were 3" strips running on both sides. I should have taken a photo before I started cutting.  I needed to change-up the panel before I started the quilting.
The intent was to use material I already had on hand. I will have to post a picture once this is done and hanging in our "smallest" room.

My attic window quilt has been complete for a while already.  This one has not found a new home yet, but is neatly folded in a stack of my completed treasures.



Below my Springtime Critters was assessed by Cabbage, my resident inspector... this one got her stamp of approval.
The back was almost as nice as the quilt top.

Fun Quilts

January has already been a busy one. These two quilts have been pieced for quite some time, but before I could send them to their new home, they needed a little brother quilt to accompany them. If not for Ben I might have never known who this Dragon was.  Minecraft has a multitude of characters to choose from, but the Ender Dragon I thought was the most impressive.

Another quilt for the wall

This is a quilt that I completed the piecing about 4 years ago.  When I finished it I folded it nicely into a box, put the box on a shelf and made a mental note that one day I would make time to quilt it.

I did alot of the piecing on this quilt in the loft of our cabin out in Colorado. With the cabin not being ours anymore, this quilt brings fond memories to mind.

It measures just shy of 80" square.  It really would not be big enough for our bed and I think one reason it stayed so long in the box is because it had no destination in mind.

Earlier this week we moved some furniture around that opened up a big space on the wall in our living room.  I knew I had plenty of quilt tops finished, but not quilted yet.  So between Ron and I we decided this was the one that I would quilt to fill the space.  None of the quilts on the walls have to stay where they are.  That is one of the reasons a quilter needs to have lots of quilts around.  Changing out the quilts on the wall can change the whole look of a room.

 

As I stood back to take this picture I looked to the left and saw another great picture opportunity... there is another quilt hanging over our bed.  Almost like a quilt gallery.

On a roll

I got my camera out this afternoon to take some pictures of the last quilt that I didn't have totally finished yesterday.  I had the quilting done, but ran out of steam to stand there at my cutting table and trim the edges last night.  The backing on this quilt really showed off the quilting very nicely, but the picture made it look washed out, so I didn't include it.  Inside lighting sometimes does not do justice to colors.  You can actually see the quilting pretty good on the front.











This will be used as a table topper.  I used a few different techniques on this one and I like how it turned out. 

I was reading about sewing rooms and how some people are envious of the space other people have.  Of course that is the ideal situation to be in... to have a sewing room that is so large that you have plenty of room and all the nicest accessories, and some even have a wonderful view.  Well, I have a sewing room that is very small, and I have a quilting room that is probably equally as small, just configured differently.  I utilize the space I have to the best of my ability... and I am happy with what I have.  There is no way to make any more room in my sewing room, and the quilting room works just fine the way it is.  I actually have a storage closet off my quilting room that I use for my stash overflow... it is used for stash that I might not use tomorrow, but I know it is there if I can't find what I'm looking for in the house.




Everything is convenient, I turn around from my cutting table and the ironing board is right there... two steps to the left and I can sit at my F600, or if I'm getting ready to load a quilt onto the leaders to take out to the quilting room to put on the frame... I step just to the left of the F600 and sit down at my TL98 that zooms through the straight stitching at top speed.  If I want to finish off a seam, I move my little accessory box and slide my serger forward.  Now how much better can you get.  Did I mention that I can view the back yard no matter which machine I happen to be working on... so I have a room with a view.

Now turn around at the cutting table and look out into the hall and there is the design wall.  To the left of the door is the metal cabinet that I covered with fabric because it was starting to rust on the outside.  The wire shelves on top allow me to hang my selvedge strips.  The hanging baskets hold my batting scraps.

Now here is where most of my stash resides.  I did not go in and straighten out all the stacks because that would be way too time consuming... besides give it a few days of pulling pieces out and it is right back to looking disorganized again.  I keep the two sets of zipper leaders for my quilts on a hanger that hangs in front of my book shelf.

My ironing board is a real oldie.  It has a lever underneath on the front that pushes wings out to make the front of the board square.  Hard to envision I am sure... but it is a really cool ironing board that you will not find one like it easily... it belonged to my husband's grandmother.  It is in pristine shape for its age.  Oh yes, I changed the chair I use at my F600 because the back of the other one was hitting the ironing board.  This older chair has a lower back that clears the ironing board. All I had to do was recover the seat and it works great.


It is not always totally neat, but most everything has a place and I'm quite comfortable in my little sewing room.  Being content with what you have is a good thing.

Three quilts in one week

I have been busy trying to get some of the quilts on my list done.  These are not quilts that I pieced, but I did quilt them.  I only have pictures of two... the third one I just finished this evening and my legs won't hold up to stand so I could trim the edges and take a picture.

I'm going to try to do a photo journal of all the quilts I do this year.  I only quilt for friends, but some of those friends have more than a couple quilts.  I try real hard to remember what I did the last time I did a quilt for them, and sometimes that isn't so easy... memory isn't quite what it used to be you know.

 These two will be treasured quilts for special little girls.

 Hope to keep up my momentum.  When I finish a quilt... even if it wasn't mine... I feel like I really accomplished something.

Last day of June

 June has been a good month.  Lots of busy-ness happened.  Among all the busy times we had two birthdays here in our house, and we took an unplanned trip to Ohio.  Being busy is usually a very good thing, especially when you can finish a project or two.  It has been a couple weeks since I had a quilt on my frame, and I completed two quilts in the past two days.  These were quilts that my sister sent me from North Carolina.   I have one more table runner to quilt for a friend, then I can put one of my own quilts on my frame.

I have another quilt that belongs to a friend at church.  The quilt needed to be repaired and he thought who better to fix it than Sallie.  He brought the quilt to me several weeks ago and said he was not in a hurry... I put it on my to-do list.  Today I picked it up and got it repaired.  So tomorrow I can call Jim and tell him the quilt is done, and I can mail off the two quilts to my sister.

On top of all my quilting, today I made a great dinner, and it was not late.  It isn't uncommon for me to get so involved in the project I am in the middle of that I forget that it is lunchtime.  I saw a recipe online that looked real interesting and I have been wanting to make it for more than a week.  Today was the day for Angel Hair Pasta with Chicken.  The significance with this recipe is I changed almost everything in it and it turned out great.  A recipe is great when it gets a thumbs up from my husband.  I gave it a new name and found an image that would work. 

 Angel Hair Pasta with Chicken

8 oz of uncooked angel hair pasta
1 1/2 cup of cooked chicken, cubed
1 cup frozen peas, thawed
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon butter
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1/2 tsp salt & 1/4 tsp pepper
1 cup thinly sliced fresh basil (I used dried basil)
2 oz of shaved parmesan cheese

Cook pasta in boiling salted water.  Add the peas to the pot in the last 2 minutes of cooking time for the pasta. Drain the pasta in a colander, reserving about 1/2 cup of the pasta liquid.  Return pasta to pan, set aside.

Heat oil, butter and garlic in skillet over medium heat for 1 minute or until butter melts. Stir in the chicken - if chicken is cold, stir it around in pan until chicken is heated through. Remove from heat and pour the chicken mixture over the pasta, add the reserved liquid, lemon juice and S & P.  Toss the pasta until nicely coated.

Serve hot with about a tablespoon of basil sprinkled on top and drizzle of olive oil and a tablespoon of parmesan cheese.