Trying to take pictures on a rainy day is so hard.

 

When we went to orientation for our daughter we also stopped by an arts and craft show afterwards.  There I met a blogger that I have read for many years, Deb from Mountain Musings.  She lives near where I grew up and I always love to read and see happenings she post about things familiar to me.  Her daughters both have cottage businesses and we bought some of their wares from their booth.  The coconut pie didn't last long enough for me to take a picture of, but the boys assure me it was delicious!  We also bought some of their homemade soap.  The two bars in the picture are ones we haven't used yet.  I just love to smell them.  The two we are trying are a lavender one and one called grass that my husband loves the smell of.  I highly recommend you checking them out at Pleasant View Soap!

This is the latest quilt I finished.  It's made from the dogwood fabric and I got the kit on our area shop hop last summer.  I like it and when I quilt and bind it maybe the weather will cooperate for a better picture.

I have some more of the dogwood fabric and I want to make a quilt using all the colors next.  I just have to decide which quilt to make.

Sew Long for Now!

May all of your ups and downs in life be with a needle and thread.

 

Life here has been full.  One of the things I participated in this past weekend was orientation for new students at Bridgewater College.  Our daughter will be transferring there this fall.  The last two years of her homeschooling journey have been spent going full time to our local community college where she graduates next Friday with her Associates Degree in Liberal Arts.  Instead of a high school graduation she will be participating in the community college graduation.  Then in the fall we will be moving her into the dorms at Bridgewater, where she will major in English.  She still has to narrow down what her emphasis will be in because she is interested in library sciences and restoring old documents, or editing, or teaching.  The exciting thing is that just a couple of miles down the road from where she is going to school is one of my favorite quilt shops!  Below you will see that while we were gone I stopped by there and picked up a few things.  The grey material to use in the background of my youngest son's quilt.  I also bought several packs of those red clover binding clips that I have wanted.  I picked up a pack of straw needles after reading on another blog about how nice they are to sew binding on.

 

I put the black material I bought with the new grey.  This is not a black and white picture!  I am searching for just the right green and brown to add to these two and then I will start his cross quilt.

These two blocks are the quilt I am working on now.  I love the colors.  Now that I have all the blocks done I look forward to putting the top together.

What are you working on?

 

Sew Long for Now!

I finished the April BOM this week.  I am unsure about the busy fabric used on the outside of this block.  I am finding my taste runs more to smaller prints or solids.  It will be interesting to see how this fits into the quilt as a whole.

I have been cutting out the pieces to work on the green and blue dogwood quilt.  This picture doesn't do the green of the fabric justice.  I have 72 flying geese done and next I will use them to piece 18 of what is called the King's Crown block in this quilt.

I have been seeing so many patterns I want to try!  I have been crossing things off my list and may be able to rewrite the list with new projects soon!  That is so exciting!

Sew Long for Now!

It took me a lot of time to add 25 3D dogwood flowers.  The centers are yoyo's.  I scattered them across the bottom and top.

I also scattered them in a connecting line up the wall hanging.  My family liked the way the wall hanging turned out.  Now to find a place to hang it.  First I want to add a label.

I started on another kit I purchased last summer at the local shop hop with the dogwood fabric.  I love the colors in this and I am excited to work on it.  I began cutting out pieces today.

At our April quilt guild meeting I won a panel with a pre-print for an apron.  I love aprons and have several so this was just perfect for me!  I look forward to making it.

 

Sew Long for Now!

 

The wall hanging is pieced.  It went together pretty easy.  It was fun to see what it would look like.  I have the back and batting ready and I am going to quilt it this week.  The pattern also calls for applique dogwood flowers.  I am thinking of using a method I have seen where you use stabilizer. You sew the fabric to the stabilizer right sides together and then cut the back of the stabilizer and turn it inside out.  That way the edges are turned under, and I thought since it was a wall hanging it would be interesting to make the flowers truly 3 dimensial.  The pattern called for a 7 inch border on the bottom only.  I didn't like the material in the kit for that border and used the matching material of what is in the body.  I think I will scatter the 3D flowers across that bottom border.  I will see after I make them up and lay them out to see what it looks like.  Isn't it fun to personalize a kit so that it is truly your own!

Sew Long for Now!

 

Life has been hectic lately and I have not been able to complete as much sewing as I would like to.  I did quilt the VA quilt and put the binding on and it is now ready to donate.  I finished the March BOM which is pictured above.  I really need to get back into the rhythm I had in January.  I am going to start working on small quilt that I bought a kit for last summer when they had the rally.  It is a bargello pattern made with the dogwood fabric exclusive to that rally.  I have two tops to quilt, but I would prefer to work on those another time.

Here is picture taken by our quilt quild of my finished cross quilt made for our daughter's 18th birthday.

 

Sew Long for Now!

I finished the February BOM a week ago, but have been working so hard putting the binding on the cross quilt and dealing with life's ups and downs that I haven't posted it.

I am happy to report that even though my husband's company closed the part he works at, he is still employeed.  He has worked there for 23 years.  140 of his co-workers are not.  It is so hard to see this happen to our friends and neighbors and so hard to pray and hope we make it through the cut.  The past several weeks have been nerve racking.  We only have peace and strength through the grace of our God.

 

Sew Long for Now!