My Last Quilt of 2013

Winter Trees

My Winter Trees is finished, hot off the sewing machine, and it will be delivered tonight. I am a little anxious about giving this one away because I am not sure if the recipients will like it or not. Of course they will be gracious and say they do but......there is always that little doubt.

Sorry about the picture quality, it is over cast today and I can't get a good picture.
This shows some of the close quilting that I find I enjoy doing, sometimes....

I changed the direction of the quilting in each section. Some of the quilting even looks a little like the grain of a tree, a happy accident.

None of the lines are straight which makes it a whole lot easier and a lot more fun to do.

I think I may make another one in different fabrics or maybe not, my list of "to do" is a long one.

Kevin, Jim, Caitlin and Ann

Did you have a nice Christmas? I had almost all of my husband's family for Christmas Eve, all 36 of them! It was a lot of fun. Next year it will be 37 as my niece is expecting her first child in the spring. I do notice that the older I get, the more it takes out of me and by Friday I was about to turn into a not very nice person. It passed and I am back on track.

Jimmy, Rick and Bob

Three of the 6 brothers, which one do you think is the oldest? Most of my pictures did not turn out, lucky you!
Back soon with a real post and some sewing.
Go Eagles!
Happy New Year!

Kelly

Winter Day

It's cold today.....a good day to sew.

I like where this is going.....today.

Kelly

Friends

Friends that quilt are some of the best friends to have around. Many years ago I belonged to a bee. In January we met and everyone decided on a theme for their quilt. All the members made a block for your quilt throughout the year. In December we had our Christmas party and gave each other our blocks. My theme was snowman and these are the blocks that were given to me. Sorry for the dark pictures, it is snowing again today!

This one was made by my friend Suzanne. Some of you may remember her quilts from our quilt show. She is an amazing appliquer {is that a word?} and really captured the wind blown hat. You can tell how old this is by that blue background fabric that I chose and gave to them.

This was made by Mryna, who can sew anything and it turns out perfect. I love how daring she was with the purple and green.

The embroidery in this makes it extra special and again adds some unexpected touches.

This one was made by Terry, who I have not seen for a long time. Life goes that way sometimes. Everything except the overalls is made of wool, a cozy snowman! I love how the scarf which is flannel has the little fussy cut nest.

Cynthia made the biggest one in the quilt! She is a prolific quilter with a wonderful color sense who we all miss very much ever since she moved to Arkansas. Hi Cynthia!

Her snowman had a little blush and a flannel scarf.

It was fun to find these blocks that I had put away and forgotten about. I found them when I moved my sewing room. It's one thing not to finish your own UFOs but quite another to let blocks languish that your friends have made for you. I am still surprised to look at these and see the date 2001! It seems like yesterday.
I am not thrilled with the way I set it together but the memories of that time are really what matter.

Kelly

Winner

Wow thank you so much for all the nice comments on my Lone Star, I really appreciate all of them. The winner of the potholder scraps is Lynne L. Congratulations Lynne!

A few of you guessed that is was my birthday and you were right! My husband took my out for dinner and then Saturday we went shopping and I bought these.........

This is an aluminum ruler that is 6' long! and about 3" wide.

At Bob's insistence I also got a carpenter's square.

I also got a laser level that tile guys use to lay tile on floors. It shoots out a perfect 90 degree angle and also the diagonal line to make sure things are square. My plan is to use these to square up my quilts. Bob of course will use the laser for work but technically it is mine! I will let you know how it works.

And because I have the attention span of a gnat, I thought I would show you these....not sure where I am going with them yet.

Kelly

Lone Star Quilt

I am so happy to be able to show you  this quilt today. It fits right in with the Christmas season but it was not made to be a Christmas quilt. I love red and green together, it is such a classic! It is not yet quilted and I am trying to figure out what I want to do. The center really does radiate!

The pattern was an antique quilt I saw in an old Fons & Porter magazines years ago. I tore out the picture and saved it.

The quilt did not have any instructions so I drafted my own pattern and tweaked it just a bit to work with my style of sewing.

The center was giving me issues.....I could not line up the center lines even though I tried 5 times. I gave up and used a solution my friend Suzanne used, put a circle on it. I think it draws your eye to the center. I like it better with it than without.

This quilt makes me happy every time I look at it.

Is it making you dizzy? You will notice I had to have some more red....

I also did some sewing for myself. I am having 36 people here for Christmas Eve. New potholders were in order!

I used up lots of scraps....

just had some fun....

and added a little bit of quilting.

A Christmas plate was used as a template to keep with my theme.

The back of one

So do you know what today is? Do you want some of my scraps that were used to make the potholders? Take a guess, leave me a comment and I will draw a random name on Monday and send them out.

Have a great weekend, we are getting snow again!

Kelly

A Little Sparkle

I am not a huge Christmas person much to the chagrin of my friend Judie. This year I decided to put a Christmas tree in my sewing room after my friend Barb sent me a picture of the one in her sewing room. Another friend, Lynne ( no blog but she really should start a cooking one! hint hint) has a pink Barbie mini tree. I had the room and thought why not.

Last night was Maddy's school Christmas concert. All she needs for Christmas is her 2 or 3 front teeth! It is so adorable to see little children sing and just be themselves. It puts you in the Christmas spirit.

Kelly

Seeing Red

I think one of the things I enjoy most about the Christmas season are the colors, especially red! It is so cheerful and just adds a bit of spark to the dreary landscape.

Last night we attended a Christmas concert. My granddaughter, Fallon plays the clarinet. It was so adorable.

It is snowing again today, we got about 4 inches or so. It is so pretty and quiet outside.

I was up early to use every single second of the day. I baked some cookies......

 sugar cookies spruced up for the season.

This tray of cookies is going to a super nice lady who is 86ish. My husband and I call her "the nicest lady in the whole world". No, she is not one of our mothers......but we have never heard her say a bad thing about anyone and would do anything for anyone. Her name is Mary....kind of goes with Christmas?

The smells of Christmas are also wonderful. I found these at Wegman's, the hand soap is called Mistletoe and the dish soap is called Frosted Fir, they smell so fresh and Christmas like.

They sit right next to my poinsettias that I bought from the Boy Scouts. I am going to try and keep this going after Christmas.

As I was finishing up my baking the snowing was almost over. My husband who plows snow came upstairs and said he was leaving and did I want to see a little sewing he did? The normal jacket he wears is in the wash, so he improvised with one that is a little too small in the sleeves.....more like cutting than sewing.

Now for some more red and white.....what can I create?

Kelly