are you squeamish?

If you are, then please move on to reading the next blog on your list. I'll wait....


Ok,I warned you. If you are still here you are A. either not squeamish or B. very curious... I took the son to the surgeon today for what should have been his last post surgery visit...

hm...not so much.

His incision is infected. I am not sure...but I think it has something to do with swimming in the lake of the ozarks for three days and not showering.. I'm just sayin...

So as I sat there, she sliced it open, let it drain and packed it. And then she said I have to pack it every 24 hours until next Wednesday. Yes folks...I have to shove stuff that looks like wet grograin ribbon into a small hole in his ass. great.... i am so excited....

And now he is outside and the girlfriend is shaving his head... sheesh...

going...



going....



crap....



luckily he didn't like it, so now the top looks like the sides... much better.

I think I'm off to the sewing room.. as soon as I have some lunch..

Hey guys...want some grilled cheese?

Nancy

funny story...

I know...I know... 2 posts in one day...what is the world coming too..

For a quick story, check this out... almost as good as the video in the previous post...

Nancy

You Can Quilt That Out....

make life a pile of wood....

he he...make life a pile of wood... more like make life painful with a pile of wood...

Here is the base of the shed BEFORE it hit me...

(disclaimer... that tall grass is the lot to the side of us.. we cut ours, they don't)



here is what it looks like now... growing some grass...



As punishment for dropping me off my feet, I made the hubby stand outside on the front porch and hold the latest finished quilt. (btw, he locked us out of the house!lol)

My sister asked me how much it would cost to make her a quilt for her house to use for the grandson.. She wanted this quilt, but bigger... so I gave her the link to the Fat Quarter Shop, she ordered Make Life by Sweetwater and had it shipped directly to my house. Cause they are nice like that...

I added some white and had my LAQ quilter do her magic and here it is....




and the back where I used some leftover charms...

We are hoping to find a night next week to go out to dinner so I can deliver this quilt.

Nancy

on my design wall...

I got these done before this happened... I have 2 weeks and 2 days to get the rest of them done before the meeting...

Oh...and my birthday is coming soon, so you know what that could mean....

Nancy

ah shucks....

Thanks for all the well wishes... I am doing much better.... I have 4 bruises on my left foot and leg, one or two on my right foot and my wrist is still very sore. I slept last night with it propped up on a pillow... I haven't tried any sewing with the machine, but I was able to finish the binding on the commission quilt..

We took off at 6am this morning to take all the lumber to the county dump...which isn't in our county so it took 90 minutes to get there and 90 minutes back but once again I didn't have to help unload the truck... :-)

Then the hubby took another run to our daughters where he dropped off the shed in pieces. It is a rubbermaid shed so the sil said he wanted to put it up at their house. Tomorrow I will get out early and rake the bald spot in the yard, lay some dirt and grass seed. Of course I can't pick up the dirt so the hubby will have to do that... :-) I think the neighbors will be happy the shed is gone. We were unaware when we put it up that it is against the association to have a shed and before we were told to take it down, the builder went bankrupt and the neighborhood association was kaput... Of course there is also nothing we can do about the trampoline, swimming pool, hot tub and various crap in the yard behind us either...so there is good and bad...

He really feels bad although I don't think a new sewing machine or a tropical vacation is in the works... dang it..

I'll try to get the hubby to hold the quilt up tomorrow and get some pictures... surely he can be persuaded to do that much...

Nancy

like Kim....or "I said STOP!!!"

Together, Kim and I could type... seems she had some surgery on her right hand and my husband just killed my left.

But, I digress...

Our shed was blown down in a straight line wind last weekend. After lunch he asked if I would help him pull up the foundation which is made of wood.. Sure! Why not?

He hooked the chain up to the truck and as I was standing there trying to run to get out of the way he jerked the chain with the truck and the board came loose and knocked me clear off my feet. I had yelled "STOP", but he thought one more jerk would take care of it. It surely did...

Then of course he helped me up and halfway across the yard I fainted... {sigh} I knew it was going to happen, but of course I was down before I could say anything..

Now my left shoulder, arm and wrist are very sore and I have a gouge out of my left ankle that is now bandaged, but hey....

Let's all look on the bright side...

I didn't have to help finish loading the truck!! LOL

Nancy
typing one handed...

another one?

Do I need another project?

I have these on my list so far....

1. finish binding my sisters quilt
2. crazy stars blocks done
3. 3 little pigs blocks cut out
4. redwork quilt stitching started
5. Patches BOM blocks done
6. Civil War Love Letters - 65 (of 121) done

Well, that's not so big of a list, right?

So lets add another shall we?

Jenny of ELEFANTZ is starting a new BOM next month.. she is giving a sneak peak here along with the list of supplies..

I don't think I can resist...

Can you?

I added a permanent link to my right sidebar just in case you have to think about it awhile ....

Nancy

The end...

Congratulations, you've reached the end of this internet. Look for another?



This is what I see when I have successfully read all of the blogs I subscribe to...

Is there another internet with more blogs? Cause I don't want to be out of the loop or anything...

Nancy

prep day...

In the states tomorrow it's Fathers Day.. so today I am prepping for dinner. Pork steaks have been on the grill since 9am, i will shuck the corn and a cherry pie just came out of the oven...
The kids and grandkids will all be here...to surprise the hubby, although i am pretty sure he knows what is going on..cause i don't usually bbq at 9am and i don't usually bake in the summer. But he is a good guy and won't say anything and he will act surprised when they all show up tomorrow...

Although...2 of the grandkids are showing up tonight. The SON asked if he could pick them up and take them to the movies and then they could spend the night. Then I made sure that since HE asked for THEM...he gets to make sure they get showers, sheets are put on the guest beds and they get breakfast bright and early tomorrow morning.. should be fun...and quite interesting....and possibly a form of birth control!! HA

Today i must also clean out the sewing room... Our guild program Monday is to take up to 5 UFO's... we will show them and sign a contract to have them finished by December. For each one we finish we will get an entry into a drawing for some supposed to be good prizes... At the budget meeting we talked about getting quilt shop gift certificates and i proposed that we just use cold hard cash... then you can spend it where you wish...and it might be more of an incentive...
So as soon as the pork steaks are 1/2 cooked (i will reheat them in sauce on the grill tomorrow, there are 12 of them!) I will head up to the sewing room to find my 5 projects...

Have a great weekend!!

Nancy

every time i spell check they tell me that grandkids isn't a word....but hey granddad is...what's up with that???

Have you ever visited the Missouri Star Quilt Co? They have a blog, tutorials, videos, a quilt shop and the best yet... A DAILY DEAL... Yes, at midnight the deal changes..It could be a jelly roll or a layer cake or a notion or like today it's a charm pack of Awesome by Sandy Gervais for Moda. Click over to see the price.... I have a button on my tool bar that says "Missouri Star Quilt Co." and it's the first thing I click on when I open my computer in the morning. Day before yesterday I got there early! And found that the daily deal was a jelly roll of Arcadia by Sanae for Moda. It was, are your ready? $7.77...yes... $7.77 for a whole complete jelly roll.and they have $5 shipping no matter what you order.. and guess what!! It already has friends waiting for it to arrive.
One of the local quilt shops was going out of business and I bought a hank of yardage because i loved it so much... yes a hank... like that's a lot... and I can't wait for it to show up...

Nothing on the agenda today....except....

IT'S THE SON'S BIRTHDAY!!!

He made me update his photo over there on the sidebar a couple of days ago..

Aren't I too old to have an 18 year old???!!!

That's what I thought..

I spent yesterday having a small outpt procedure, getting his birthday present and buying an already roasted chicken for my dinner. Well, ok. I didn't really eat the whole chicken, but when the hubs is out of town I can eat roasted chicken for 4 meals and be perfectly happy with a side of veggies...

We have no plans for his birthday today. We will take him and his girlfriend out to dinner tonight and I think I will go by and get him an ice cream cake. That's what he wanted for graduation, but there were too many people invited...

Maybe I'll be able to snap a few photos...

Nancy

ok... and some Make Do help needed...

I know I wasn't going to post today...see this PS.. BUT.... and you know everyone has a BUT...

I was a featured blogger over at In Stitches, you know the The Quilt Shoppe blog... They are running their Bingo game right now and will feature all the blogs during the game. Which is a good thing, cause I'm sure not good at Bingo.. I am one of eight being featured today... Thanks In Stitches...

So I took off with some friends yesterday to Hannibal.. We did a little shopping, a little eating, and a little budget planning for the guilds coming year... It all went really well.

This quilt shop puts little 20 fq bundles together and sells them cheap..so I found this one that said "take me home!!".. so I did...


And then I had to add some Civil War repro's to the stash for my Love Letters quilt. These are the ones I could tolerate bringing home with me. I am NOT a cw fan, but hubby is and it's his quilt and really it's his money, so whatever...

And then the heavens opened up and I found another charm pack of Kona Brights... Now I have two... cause you know 1 charm pack really doesn't do anyone any good. you know? I ruffled them and took a quick pick. Aren't they pretty? i LOVE them...



So then after spending the ENTIRE day out, I turned around and drove down to my Civil War Love Letters quilt club.... One lady has already completed her quilt top and we got to oh and ah over it... She says she would like to do a similar one and someone talked about a quilt called Make Do...apparently it is like the civil war quilts but follows the woman of the wagon trains traveling from the East to the West. I would love to know what the book is called, if anyone here has ever heard of it. I googled and checked Amazon and can't find anything....

edit-I called the shop that lady talked about and apparently the Make Do is a "made-up". There is no book...the quilt shop put it together and pulled projects from other books and is doing it as a club. Since they are more than 100 miles from me, guess i can't join...

Then home... and very tired...but not as tired as hubby who spent ALL afternoon at the airport waiting for his flight to take off to Detroit and by 7pm he was changing his flight to early this morning at which time his flight was an hour late... ah Delta...get it together..please?

Nancy

crazy blocks trimmed ...

i got the last blocks sewn and all the blocks trimmed. The pattern said to trim all the blocks to 9 1/2 x 14.. what? That is way smaller than necessary. I trimmed mine to 11 x 15 1/2 and those points aren't anywhere near the seam allowance. I will put them 4 across and 3 down and it will be almost square. I think it needs a sashing...what do you think? Since all the lights are white with black prints I thought maybe a nice thin black sashing. I already used all the extra to piece the binding.. and then maybe a narrow black border? I am thinking 1 inch finished... maybe the border will be bigger. I will probably look for fabric today while I am in Hannibal...at The Hickory Stick.. I might add to my civil war stash too. I am getting low on reds/yellows/green and I have no black... Then lunch and then a budget meeting for the quilt guild. busy, busy, busy...
so busy that I forgot I had a dr's appointment today and had to reschedule..

And for those that wondered (silently, since no one asked) this is the pile of trimmings from 4 blocks. That's it. Now the trimmings from cutting the blocks down to size was considerable but I actually cut them into strips and have another pile that I know will sit in the sewing room until later when I pitch them...or maybe I will do some string piecing and make some new pot holders...





And Miss Nancy got some of her crazy blocks done. She is doing the Harvest Moon pattern and you can see how hers look here.. she has two posts on her crazy blocks...

Nancy

round and round and round we go....

Circle quilts are popping up all over the place...

Here...

Here...

and

Here...

I love them....so Monday I decided to use my new tool...

To cut out all of these...

but what do I do with these?

Any suggestions??

Nancy

PS blogger is giving me fits... I set this to post on Wednesday..and no matter what I do, it keeps posting NOW... so whatever...read it already... just don't expect anything on Wednesday!!

Just in the nick of time...

I finished these yesterday afternoon

this is the group that is due tomorrow at my civil war love letters group meeting

Now I can sew on more crazy stars today and maybe get them all trimmed...

Nancy

Buggy Barn help....

Let's start at the very beginning...
a very good place to start

in this case we start with a freezer paper pattern

All of these crazy buggy barns patterns start with you tracing a full size pattern

here is mine....for star crazies optional setting

now comes my first mistake on my first attempt of this pattern some years back

The pattern says to cut out along the outside rectangle on the freezer paper pattern. Ok. I did..

Then you put all of your fq's right side up and iron the pattern to your stack of fat quarters.

so far so good

THEN...i added another step

a step NOT included in the pattern

I cut along the entire outside of that pattern and trimmed all that extra fabric off

DON'T DO IT

your fat quarters should look like this after you have followed the pattern
and moved the top background pieces to the bottom.

he he.. i had on my radio and i was dancing to the tunes..

hey, see that little parenthesis up there on the top left..

that's one my leader/ender pieces that i lost and didn't find until i was downloading the photos...lol

Do you use leaders and enders? If not, this pattern is a great time to start cause there are some very sharp points coming up. and you all know what leaders and enders are right?

Just a little scrap of fabric folded in half and you sew through it after you finish a seam.
That's an ender...then when you sew your next seam it's still there holding your threads and it becomes a leader... got it.. it keeps those sharp points from getting
sucked into that little hole in the sole plate..


and yes, I use my left foot on the foot pedal. and yes, i am right-handed.
but i use my right leg for my knee lift and if i am using my knee lift sometimes i would
hit the foot pedal and my fabric would sew all wonky..
so i learned to use my left foot
really!
it's ok

So now we are going to sew the first two pieces together

those two that the hand model is pointing out

i don't remember her being there, but it has to be a model cause

my hands surely aren't that old looking...

I picked up the two pieces and and have off set the seam by 1/4 inch

Offset (verb) which means that the ends of the two pieces are not even. the top one is 1/4 inch down from the end of the bottom one. See that?

geez...here's a better photo...for those old eyes we all seem to acquire before we even
realize it..

see the little 1/4 there on the left? (don't look at the hand models lack of manicure, I really
need to do more interviewing..)

Now I have sewn the seam and pressed. It doesn't matter on these patterns which way you
press... really it doesn't ...
cause you aren't EVER matching seams, like EVER...

but gosh...look at that... it's not a straight line there on the right..

let's fix that...

trim so it is all even..

this is all i had to trim off

now, let's add the next piece

and again it is offset by 1/4 inch

(i got fancy and used my wingdings on my camera software and it kind of looks like an arrow)

sewn, pressed and now needs trimming

easy peasy

and the third piece

and press and then trim..

yada, yada, yada.
I did it a bunch of times..

sew, press, trim
sew, press, trim
sew, press, trim
sew, press, trim

and ta da...

only one seam left to sew

and here is the finished block

and here is the next block..

did it help?

and next time...i promise to get a better hand model..
you know you get what you pay for

and she didn't get paid

but i might need a manicure

Nancy

please tell me this helped SOMEONE... cause it took like freeking forever to stop to take these photos and get them all in the right way and try to type and everything...

crazy blocks....

my word...they look like wet dish rags hanging on that design wall. They need to be trimmed yet, but apparently I have picked up some kind of sorethroatcrappyfeelingbackache crud.. so they will hang there for a few more days.

I must confess. I tried this pattern about 5-6 years ago. I read the pattern and cut out the pieces and somehow got lost. I took it to the LQS and she tried to help, but I just couldn't get it. I eventually gave up and threw it all away.

Lucky for me there were only 5 people in the class today. Two were doing chickens, one was doing pineapples, one was doing Harvest Moon and me with the stars. After getting everything cut I refused to go any further until the instructor could stand by while I did the first seam.. She started explaining and I had one of those "light bulb" moments. She said two things that made I think I was first to get a block finished.

What I did wrong last time?
You use a freezer paper template. When I cut my block apart, I also cut around the perimeter of the freezer paper. Nope, don't do that. Just cut the pieces apart and leave all that extra fabric until you have it all sewn together. THEN trim to the correct size. DUH!!

AND

She showed me to off set all the pieces 1/4 inch. Seems like a simple thing, but it wasn't how I was doing it before and that's why my pieces weren't right...

So I was the first to get a block done and I had 6 blocks done in two hours. I hope to get the others together this weekend, but I also have 6 civil war blocks due on Tuesday, so we will see who wins...




And when I got home...this man showed up.. He gave my house a much needed shower..

I love a clean house...especially when I don't have to do it..lol





Just like the truck says, he was prompt, friendly.. actually he was an hour early so I was glad I left class early...

Nancy

it pays to be nice....

Hubby asked if I loved him...

if so

would I please call and enroll him in a seminar for some C.E credits..

(he hates to talk on the phone)

so i do

and i did

then i was reading on facebook

that Jackie did a little face lift of her online shop

and of course, i had to go look

and then i think i said

oh look she has Kona charm packs

and

Kona in charcoal

and i think i said it out loud

cause then the credit card came sailing over to the couch

and hubby said i could order some

DONE!!

for being nice..

i think i might be more nice..

Nancy

finally....

I got the call
and picked up the pattern today.

here it is...

I will NOT be using those colors...

I will be using these colors....

Like?

I will spend tomorrow getting my pattern traced
to my freezer paper and getting all my sewing
stuff packed for class on Thursday.

Can't wait..

Nancy

design wall? maybe...

Blogger has been having issues all morning so hopefully this will work out and photos will appear in this post...

I worked on my redwork all weekend. I have 3 of the 4 corner pieces done now and hope to get the center panel traced sometime this week. Oh crap, who am I kidding? There is no way I will get that center panel traced. Wednesday the son gets the last of his stitches out and none too soon. He is going crazy and actually said he is looking forward to going back to work..(away from his "old parents", inside joke)
Thursday I am supposed to be taking a class at a LQS. I say supposed to because I am not sure I will be ready. WHY? I signed up for the class the day they sent me a message. I, of course, didn't want to do the same pattern as the rest of the class (which was chickens!) so they said they had to talk to the instructor. She agreed I could do the star pattern. She said she would order the pattern. That was 1 1/2 weeks ago. I called Saturday to see if the pattern was by chance in so I could use the weekend to see what I needed to get together. "Oh, we just ordered it yesterday". WHAT!! Now I am a fairly easy going person. Really! I am! But I do like to read through a pattern a few times and I need time to get all the supplies together and pick out fabric and stuff. It's Monday and I still don't have the pattern, and the class is Thursday...morning...at 10am... We shall see what happens.

So here is the redwork piece...



And Sunday I convinced the better half to stop at a local Goodwill where I though maybe I would find some vintage sheets, but instead found this cute little pink bowl..



ack! don't say it...I know I don't like pink...it's not for me...so there..

Nancy

I don't know...

is it too bright?



Nancy