waves and bees

I finished putting all my blocks together for this waverunner.

They are all 10" square.

I didn't follow the directions completely....surprise, sursprise!!

As you can see I used that inspiration fabric

and saved myself some time. Didn't have to piece those blocks!

Thanks Victoria!

It was a fun quilt to make!

And this little girl is ready for a parade!

Thankfully...Mommy finally got her act together..


and whipped together this....

Busy BEE costume!!!

I'm probably MOST proud of that little bee and flower
on her shirt!!!
I have a leftover bag of fabric pieces already attached to
that iron-on stuff...steam-a-seam.
I cut out that little bee and the flower was already in there..
woo hoo!!
THEN...After ironing them on....

I just ran around them with my sewing machine..
feed dogs down...just like I was quilting!
VIOLA!!!


I'm adding this to amylou's sew and tell!!

my creative space....

Here's ONE of the things I'm working on today.

A little costume for the school parade tomorrow!!!

Sometimes inspiration comes a little late.

Those antennae and wings were in the halloween box.

Don't know how long I've had them...

You see....I've been a mother for a LONG time.

:)

My oldest is 23 and youngest is almost 6.

I've fostered children over the years...

So you can imagine I've been throwing together costumes

for a long time now.

What do you think???

Will this little skirt work for a bee???

I think I'll gather those petals and have my

little girl tie it on like an apron.

I DO know how to make aprons!

We may get her to model it soon!

And right next door to that creative space is this one:

My KITCHEN!

I do some creating here too.

Heather gave me the recipe and I just

tweaked the serving suggestion,

Putting it on lettuce along with rice!!!

chicken and salsa

several pieces of chicken (I used boneless)

1 jar salsa.

cook all day in the crockpot.

I lOVE my crockpot!!!

Now layer...

1. lettuce

2. rice

3. chicken

4. sour cream

5. cilantro

YUM!!

A whole list of creative spaces await at....

kootoyoo.

red and green

Well, if you haven't figured it out yet...

I sew.

I sew a lot.

I use my sewing machine almost everyday.

I like to make things with fabric.

BUT....I haven't made a quilt for a while...

WELL...o.k.....just a little while.

I HAVE been making little things...

or starting things....

but I haven't finished a quilt recently.

So, I finished this quilt yesterday.

Isn't that fabric sweet???

I had a little piece of it.

Just enough to use in this lap sized quilt.

47" square.

I hope it will make a nice Christmas present for someone.

:)

waverunner

I bought a new machine (toy) this weekend.

Isn't she beautiful?

It doesn't look like she's ever been used!

Her inauguration quilt is thoroughly

MODERN....

I joined a quiltalong with Victoria who said this

quilt was easy...

so I thought I'd give it a try!

The inspiration fabric.

One quilt block.

A whole bunch of quilt blocks!

And my new machine just hummed along.

She had been waiting for years to make a quilt...

I just RUSHED her into the future.

Hope she wasn't too sad that the first quilt wasn't a classic..

You know...You don't know what sewing machines

dream about when they're not busy.

I bet she WASN'T dreaming about the

waverunner quilt I've got her working on!!!

Fall flower!

Look at this!

Heather at Needles-and-pens made one!

I'm so excited that someone actually was able to

follow my directions and succeed!

Let's all cheer!

And THEN she sent me a picture!

Isn't that TOO fun???

Thanks Heather.

You made my day!!!

AND isn't it CUTE?

scrap buster.

Remember this pin cushion from the summer?

Today I made a few of these with my friend Jenn.

Since it's scrap buster month over at sewmamasew,

We're going to try to give a little tutorial .

How did we do IT?

9 patch with 2" squares.
Remember those bags of squares I have?
We were able to rescue these little squares
out of one of those bags.


Here's another 9 patch.

We trimmed the corners a little.



THEN.
3" strips for the petals.
We don't need anything fancy for the back of the petals
so we used muslin.
USE WHAT YOU HAVE!

Now that you have the front and back of your petals
put right sides together
cut eight 3" squares.




Sew along two adjoining sides.





Trim a little arch around that unsewn side.
Turn right side out.




Eight beautiful petals.


Press.




Sew a large running stitch along that unsewn edge.




Gather....but not too tight.

lay those petals onto the right side of your 9 patch.

baste them on along the edge there.

Here's the back of our pincushion.

I wanted blue.

so-o-o since my scrap was not big enough...

I added another piece of blue.

Nice, huh?


Lay that flower (petals will be on the inside) onto that backing.

sew. sew. sew.

I trimmed the back to match the front

AFTER I sewed them together.

You can do it before if you want. :)

BUT stop!

Leave a small opening for the filling!

Turn it right side out!

We're on the home stretch!

We filled our pin cushions with this.

I've used it before and am wondering

HOW many pincushions will this make?

There we are.

Ready to be closed up!

Take a needle and thread.

Careful!

Don't want that to spill all over!

Whip-stitch that opening closed.

You did it!

That's it.

And guess what?

It didn't even put a DENT in my scrap basket!

punkin time!

My family's favorite cookie...all year long.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

1 C. Butter, softened

3/4 C. brown sugar

3/4 C. sugar

1 egg

1 tsp. vanilla

2 C. flour

1 C. quick or old fashioned oats

1 tsp. cinnamon

1 tsp. baking soda

1 C. canned pumpkin

1 1/2 C. chocolate chips

Mix it all up!

drop by spoonful on greased cookie sheet (I like baking stones!)

Bake 350 degrees for 12 - 13 minutes.

YUM!
Now I need some pumpkins in my house!

I played with my scraps yesterday and pieced a chair.
Lonely looking, huh?



Much better!

unexpected quilt show.

Who would have guessed?.....

An October camping trip coincided with a local quilt show!!!

This beautiful blue and white quilt greeted us as we walked into

a quilt show put on by the ladies in Idyllwild, California.

My Mother-in-law and I took a little break from the camping experience

and traveled about 20 minutes to see some

LOVELY quilts.

What a wonderful coincidence!

Here's the first place winner.

Hand appliqued and machine quilted.

It was gorgeous in person!

My pictures don't do it justice.

I loved this bowl of fruit.

Well, I loved looking at all the quilts.

But, you know what?

I think the highlight for me was...

This pile.



Do you see that price tag?

There were a few tables FULL of
Quilters' castoffs.


Heavy fabric for bags and who knows what else?

Plaids to add to my collection.

Someday I'm going to make a plaid quilt!
I'm now closer to my goal!

Someone had sewn all these strips together

and decided to quit.

Well, I just might finish the job for her.

And last but NOT least.

This LOVELY piece of unusual Christmas fabric!

My husband wondered how much fabric they had on those tables.

I said, "a lot".

He wondered why I

didn't buy MORE!

Then I wondered....

"Can I go back?"

camping....

I'm touching down into blogland.

I'm FAR away from my sewing machine,

computers, and the normal hum drum...

Isn't this beautiful?

And this?
We can still camp in October here where I live.
The weather is soooo perfect.

I did pack some supplies.....


A peek at a small quilt I'm working on
for a local art show.
The due date is soon, so I'd better get busy!




The back of this small quilt.
See all my stitches?
I'm using a large needle and 2 strands of
embroidery floss.



My weekend sewing kit!
Hopefully everything I will need.

The kind of supplies that the kids care about.

:)

Everyone wants some!

I'm sleeping under these.

L-O-V-E-L-Y!!

Here are the troops!

The four big kids couldn't make it,

But the too little whippersnappers came along.

SO did GRANDMA AND GRANDPA!

YEAH!