Hi!

Hi!  I'm getting into the swing of the sewing again.  I finished stitching the numbers for the Advent Calendar.  See?

And I pinned all the red squares to the off white wool and started sewing them down.  I'm doing that on the machine.  I love hand sewing this wool, but it's a bit faster doing it on the sewing machine.

It's coming along nicely.  I just am kind of sad that it's not going to be done as soon as I had hoped.  But the grandchildren will have it this year, just a few days late.  Do things like that ever happen to you?

Happy Thanksgiving!

Things are getting busy around here with Thanksgiving just two days away!  I won't be blogging as I have cooking, etc. to get done.  Plus the window repair people are to be here on Wednesday to finish the skylights.  When I'm back, I hope to have all of my numbers done.  Keep your fingers crossed!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

More Numbers

I finished some more numbers on the Advent Calendar.

 And an update on Sophie, she was acting more like herself yesterday and the swelling in her eye is going down.  But her mother and her brother now have pinkeye and the illness that goes with it.  Fever, etc.  Hope that they are all feeling better soon!

Pinkeye Can Be Very Serious

What a panic the last few days have been.  No sewing has been accomplished during this time.

I received a text from my DIL that my granddaughter was being admitted to the hospital for pinkeye.  They had been to the doctor on Monday and received an ointment to put in her eye.  By Friday it was worse and they headed back to the doctors.  They then admitted her and were talking of doing a CT of her eye.  It was decided to give her some antibiotics first and have the eye doctor check it again on Saturday. No CT.  They are back home now; the fever is gone and she is feeling better.  But. they are are quarantined for the next 2 weeks.  Which means they won't be coming for Thanksgiving and I will need to mail the Advent Calendar to them.   I'm so bummed.  But I hope she is over this soon.  Keep your fingers crossed for her.

Watching Spongebob with Mom at the hospital.

More Numbers

I have some more numbers done!

It's Coming Along Nicely.

My Advent Calendar is coming along nicely.  These are the numbers I finished Tuesday night at Quilt Guild.

Last night, Wednesday I finished 8 and 9.  Didn't have time to do much more than my 15 minutes of sewing last night.

And check out all these wonderful quilts!  Aren't they an amazing group of women?

Great Day!

Tuesday was a GREAT day!

First Sandy of Stitches and etc. sent me an email letting me know that I won My Memories software to use for making digital scrapbook pages.  I'm so excited!  I can hardly wait to play with the it and my pictures.  Sandy had made the most beautiful pages of her garden flowers.  Just think of the fun!  Thanks Sandy!

Second:  We got half of our skylights put in.  I'm not sure if the person putting them in had every worked with skylights before, but he put in only the dome.  He forgot to put the flat piece in.  But at least we don't have tarps blowing in the wind.  When he was installing the window, my husband asked him about that and he said it didn't come like that.  So my husband was reviewing the bill last night and the bill does show that the flat piece is part of the package and so now we have to call him and have him come back.


Third, I finally figured out my numbers.  I did freehand them and I am stitching the number with Perle cotton. I took a picture, but my camera battery died.  I'm heading to the grocery store tonight, so will pick up the new battery than.   I stitched the numbers on 1 through 7 and half of 8 last night while I was at Quilt Guild.

Fourth, Quilt Guild was amazing.  There are so many talented women in that group.  I know I have said that every time I go, but it's true.  I get blown away by the talent every time.  As I have in the past, I will post the link to the Guild blog when the pictures are up.

Have a great day!

Frustration

I'm rather frustrated.  I'm all ready to go on the Advent Calendar and I can't get my numbers to look nice.  I love the look of uniform size and shape of the printed numbers, but I don't have the Clover transfer pencil and I'm not coming up with a good way to do this.

I tried writing my own numbers, free form, and was not happy with that.  I tried using "Saral" transfer paper and it wouldn't work as the wool is too soft.  I'm whining here as I don't have the time to mess with trying to find a solution.   But, I'm not going to get it done if I don't come up with something soon.   And I really don't want this project to have that dorky, homemade look....

Advent Calendar

My DIL asked me to make an Advent Calendar for my grandson and granddaughter, and of course I said "YES!".  The pattern is based loosely on this one at The Purl Bee .  I played with squares on my cutting mat to decide the size, I'm not going as narrow as shown.  And I'm placing 4 squares across.   So I got it all cut it out on Saturday night.

Then I got stumped.  I was trying to decide on how to do the numbers.  I really didn't want to embroider the numbers and making little numbers out of wool felt seemed like it may take longer than the week and half I have to get it done.  As I was getting ready for church, I remembered a technique I learned last year at Prairie Star Quilts.  You use narrow pieces of the wool felt and couch the wool down.  It makes wonderful curves.  So that's how I'm going to do the numbers.

Saturday was Quilt day and again I spent my time cutting out 8 inch squares and 2.5 inch strips of Christmas fabric.  (Jeanine gave me a HUGH bin of Christmas fabric.)  There were some larger pieces in the bin that I'm saving for backings.  I hope to have some kits together for the December meeting.

And the Butterfinger bars were a success.  I'll be making those again, only with creamy peanut butter.  I think I would like that better, although the crunchy peanut butter was OK.

Where Does The Time Go?

I can't believe I haven't written anything since Wednesday.  I'm going to blame it on Thanksgiving.

I know that sounds weird, but we're having family here and I have been busy getting things ready.  I have guests that stay the whole weekend, so I have lots of planning and prep work to do.  I love having my husband's family here as this is the one time that we seem to all get together.  It's a great day with lots of fun and food.

I'm trying out a recipe for homemade Butterfingers.  I'm ready to start dipping them in chocolate.

 I originally saw the recipe at Ask Anna.  Which is why I decided I wanted to try it.  My problem was, I had chunky peanut butter.  I made them anyway just to see how it would come out.  I also found another recipe at Buns In My Oven which I like because I'm a cup of this and a teaspoon of this baker vs 16 oz of this and a pinch of this.  I'm going to try that recipe next time.  When it comes to cooking, I like a recipe, when it comes to sewing, I like to experiment a little outside of my comfort zone.

I'm taking these to quilt day, so will let you know how they go over.  Wish I had the creamy peanut butter. (It is odd, as I usually buy creamy style vs chunky style.)  Once you get them covered in chocolate, it won't matter, at least that's my way of thinking.

Wiped Out

As I was reading Miranda's blog,  The Craft Bot , I realized what my problem was:  The time change.  I hate it.  Monday night I got nothing done after we ate dinner, I took my bath, fixed some hot chocolate (which I did finish drinking) and then zonked out at 7:30!  No sewing, no cleaning, no decluttering, nothing but sleep.  Which I guess I needed as Tuesday ended up much better.

Last night I worked on my hexagon flowers for 15 minutes.  (Actually longer, which was good.)  And did some decluttering.

Progress

I have one row all sewn together.  I love the orange added to this, it's the pop it needs. (In my opinion.)

I'm still cleaning and decluttering.  I wanted to share another blog that has given me so many great ideas.  It's called Ask Anna and she has so many solutions to things that at times I think to myself, "Now why didn't I think of that?"  Hope you enjoy the site.

Random Thoughts

I have a lot of random thoughts today.  No pictures though, sorry.

I love and hate Fall.

I love the wonderful weather we have had.
I love the color and the leaves.
I love the way the farm fields look before, during and after harvest.
I love going to football games.
I love getting the gardens ready for winter.
I love harvesting vegetables out of our garden.
I love spending time with friends, sewing on quilt day.
I love starting to cook comfort foods, ie, soups, stews, and casseroles.



I hate how fast the time goes, I have no clue what happened to September and October.
I hate that Fall is almost over.....

First Snow Fall

The first snow fall of the year.  Not much, but enough to make you know that winter is on it's way.

We still have tarps on the skylights, so I was really worried about how they would hold up under the weight of this damp snow.  They did OK.  Next Tuesday we should have the new ones in.  It's taken a lot longer to get  them then I wanted.  Originally we were told they would be in by the middle of October.  Hope they really do get put in next week.

So tonight I'm going to finish the pinning and then start the sewing!

Pinning Away

Well, I didn't get all the blocks pinned, but I did make some progress!  I am going to start sewing tonight just because I'm so excited to see the blocks in at least one row.   I've been trying to think of a name for this quilt and so far... nothing.  I'm sure it will come to me as I sew.

And I have the link for the October Piecemaker's Quilt Guild meeting.  You'll love the pictures!

Blocks

I finished the blocks on Sunday.  Love how this quilt is coming along.  I started pinning the sashing on last night.  Maybe I'll get all the pinning done tonight so Wednesday I can sew, sew, sew!