Stripping Girls

Oh this was a fun class of ladies……what characters! They all did amazing and all are almost completely finished their strip jackets. These “Moonlight” jackets are quite complex and a great deal of work. Made from 2.5 inch strips and what seemed to be a million log cabin blocks, their pattern is a sweatshirt which acts as the pattern.

Marg, Anita and Corrine along with Pat and Candy were like machines….I couldn’t believe what these ladies were able to accomplish one week to the next.

The jackets all looked amazing and I’m inspired to do another one in different colors!

Stick a pin in it!

Along with the really cute charms we brought back  from Houston, we also picked up quilter’s pins….they are always such a big hit. “Just Charming”, the company that sells them had tons to choose from…all kinds of blocks, all kinds of tools, so hard to pick just one, so I bought 6! Enough to make this little pin quilt sampler.

The sampler is a simple court house steps with a slightly larger centre square to show off the  pins. I chose neutrals so that the little pins would really pop.

Just Charming

When I was in Houston, Michelle and I purchased some wonderful charms and pins from a company called “Just Charming”. They carry a whole array of pins and charms for quilting enthusiasts and  a really sweet selection of dogs to.
It was so hard to choose which ones to pick, but I opted for a pincushion, the sewing machine, rotary cutter, a Dresden plate and of course I had to have a westie to celebrate Jock. They all fit lovely onto a antique sewing machine pin.
Such a fun piece to wear!

Here comes the bride

Dear Eldest daughter, bless her heart, gets up this morning and says…

“Hey Mom, what should I take to our Marriage Encounter Retreat tomorrow, I need it for 20 people.”…she says this as she’s walking out the door to work, she is babysitting her cousin’s daughter tonight, right after work, and the retreat starts promptly at 8:30 a.m. tomorrow. You and I both know she doesn’t have time to get nor prepare anything. What she was really saying was “Mom, what can you make so that I can take”.

So Mom gets busy, makes rice krispies squares, cuts them into little  itty bitty hearts, stacks them in the shape of a wedding cake and tops it all with  the cutest little bride and groom…adorable. What a perfect treat for couples hard at work preparing for marriage.

Sneak Peek

I’ve been playing around again, trying to get my ducks in order prior to May, which by the way is only 6 months away.

I’ve been practising my daughter’s wedding cake, trying to get it perfected prior to special day. I like to get a head start on things, as I know the months will fly by and I’ll be panicking if I don’t have a solid idea and plan in place.

It wasn’t suppose to even look like this actually. Dear Eldest Daughter had requested something “Vintage” looking and  I had in my mind a ruffled frill going round the tiers. Once I started, that quickly went for a _ _ _ _ as I just couldn’t get the knack of it. So I stood there, racking my brain, with the royal icing hardening on my spatula, and thinking, crap, I’m totally screwed.  I can’t do this, I’ll have to take out a second mortgage now to pay the bakery to do this wedding cake!

After a few minutes of panic….I decided I really had nothing to lose, as the icing was already made, so I just started to play a bit.  A few more try's produced even worse results…..if  Dear Eldest Daughter wanted vintage, she was certainly getting it. The cake looked like it was iced thirty years ago, thrown in cake box, and transported on the Titanic.

I was absolutely determined and with a few deep inhales of vanilla bean and egg whites I persevered and came up with what I thought might pass as a vintage look.  Dear eldest daughter and her better half to be loved the look and all is good. This is what we are going with, if I can recreate it again.

One pattern, 5 amazing ways

I’m always amazed how one pattern can look so different depending what fabric is chosen for it. Look at all the variations that were possible with the pattern, Labyrinth.

This is the second class I’ve taught at Kindred Spirits featuring this quilt. No wonder it is so popular, it looks amazing in every fabric.

Look at all these shy students…everyone is hiding behind their works of art. Fran and Leigh both chose to make the larger versions, which absolutely look amazing. Ann, Corrine and Shelly just have to attach their final borders and their beauties are complete. Amazing fabric choices ladies….they all look fabulous.

This stuff is amazing!

For the longest time I’ve been substituting spaghetti squash for pasta, not totally loving it but still substituting. I always found the spaghetti squash a little watery and a bit tasteless no matter how I cooked it.
Recently I bought zucchini, both green and yellow and with my julienne vegetable peeler, shred the zucchini into pasta like strands.

Adding a little olive oil to a fry pan, I sautéed the zucchini until tender. Then heaped it all in a dish, topped it with a couple of Dear Hubby’s finest meatballs, lathered it with pasta sauce and parmesan and ate the whole dang thing!

It was delicious, and so much better tasting than spaghetti squash, plus the texture was a lot more like pasta as well.  What a great alternative to pasta and so much healthier too.

Houston we have a problem!

I had my camera fully charged when I left the hotel each morning, but the last day when I needed it the most, it ran out of juice. Damn that blue bar in the corner of the camera screen. It kept shrinking from a half bar to a quarter bar…that’s when I knew I was in trouble. I wasn’t even close to finishing the aisles. I can’t really blame it, I think it had a quota and I had far surpassed that, taking pictures of all the quilts on display.  I spent the whole afternoon, sauntering, enjoying and lusting after all the hundreds of quilts on display. The majority of quilts were original designs by quilters.  Totally, totally amazing work.

I wanted to share some of my favourites with you.

This is My friends by Yoshiko Sekine, from Japan, a gorgeous appliqued quilt. Look at the amazing details.

Miniville or It’s 5 o’clock somewhere by Karen Eckmeier. The picture doesn’t really do the quilt justice. You should have seen it in person. Raw edged collage, hand beading, heat set crystals, machine couching and machine quilted.

Eagle eyes by Margery Hedges, a hand pained, machine thread painted and machine quilted. The detail …just amazing. Megumi Mizuno made this delightful quilt in the hopes it would make people smile…and it did. Hand pieced, appliqued and quilted with cotton, beads, spangle and felt balls. She made it during the Japan nuclear power disaster, hoping that life would return to a peaceful state.

Kaffe Fasset’s African Stripe and Overlapping Tiles were vibrant, wonderful quilts to view. Oh I wish I had this talent.

I kept trying to fool my camera into thinking it still had power. The blue bar would shrink and shrink into oblivion, then I would turn the camera off. Leave it a few minutes, then turn it back on…..and I would have a little blue bar again…just enough to get another pic of a quilt. I think I was able to get about 20 more pictures out of it before it refused to co-operate further and would not even turn on….I kept saying to it “ but I’m not done…come on! come on!”…..it had a mind of it’s own and I was done for the day.

I’m not the Houston Stalker

Honest, I was not stalking anyone at Market, I was just so excited to see and meet all my quilting mentors and favourite quilt designers.

Michelle got cozy with Lynette Anderson, all the way from Australia. We loved her patterns and will probably offer one at the store in the near future. I was waving, jumping and yelling for Judy  Niemeyer to turn around, but she was obviously busy. OMG her quilts are amazing. Hey look there’s Camille Roskelley of Bonnie and Camille…she’s making a quick call on her phone….oh crap, she’s dialling 911…all I did was mention that I loved her. She has a wonderful blog called Simplify.

Look at Kate Spain…..she looks like she’s having a lot of fun…or was that when she warned me if I came any closer she’d call security. I think this was the pic when Joanna Figueroa of Fresh Figs commented calmly that she could hurl a fat quarter pack 30 feet when she feels threatened. They were all so nice! I did get close enough to get my picture taken with Debbie Caffery of  Debbie’s Creative Moments…I am a huge fan of her mystery classes and I have taught quite a few at Kindred Spirits Quilt Co.  Just out of curiosity…does anyone know if it’s normal practise for passengers to be fingerprinted at Houston Airport before boarding your flight? Just curious….

There’s always time to quilt

I came back from Houston Quilt Market, totally expired inspired. All my creative juices flowing and just itchin to creative something. I’ve seen variations of the Dresden clock and have very much wanted to create one of my own. Kindred Spirits Quilt Co. had this wonderful new fabric in, covered with spools of thread, ironically called “A stitch in time” by Elizabeth’s Studio. How fitting!

That background fabric was the jumping off point, I had the pink gingham and teal polka dot in my stash, along with a wooden embroidery hoop, which was sitting idle, as you all know I hate to embroider. I was not sad in the least to be able to use the hoop as the frame for the clock, as now I have a legitimate excuse not to do the thing I like the least in crafting. Bonus!

Time well spent!

You can never have enough bling

Or so my eldest daughter thinks. She modelled the shoes and clutch she bought for her wedding day…well what’s a mother to say?

Have you ever watched those episodes of “Bridezilla” on TV, well I have and better to say nothing at this point. I just go with the flow as I’m sure she would go from O to bridezilla in less than 30 seconds if I had mentioned that within an hour of leaving the church she won’t be able to even stand, let alone dance at the reception in them. It’s not about comfort it’s about the look. They are quite pretty in a blingy  kind of way and they do really look nice on her…I just feel for her… when I know  she’s going to be in agony once the ceremony is finished. I’m going to try and get her a pair on those high fancy thong sandals to slip into for the reception. I’ll  just hide them away until that “I told you so” moment which I didn’t tell her comes and I can save the day with a pair of kick your heels up, kick ass, platform thongs.

She’s so funny…she’s excited about the church she’s getting married in. She has gone there since she was a young girl, been confirmed there, had her first communion, attended mass every chance she could, it was her school parish and she feels at home there. She says she loves that there is a really long runway aisle to walk down before she meets Kyle at the alter and my guess is she’s gonna work it all the way!