WIP Wednesday and projects to be...

I was looking through the photos section on one of my Yahoo Groups quilt groups I belong to and I came across a quilt that I MUST MAKE!!!! It looks very complicated to me, but the talented woman who made it said it was actually pretty easy. It's called 3rd Weekend in October.

OMG, I absolutely love this quilt! Since fall colors are my favorites anyway, I think this is the perfect quilt for me--plus the fact that I've always wanted to make a leaf quilt. The design is from Innovations and the designer is Ruth Powers and she has quite a few patterns I would like to make---given the time and the money, I'd have them all done by the end of the year, LOL! Her website is called: INNOVATIONS Quilting patterns designed by Ruth Powers
Ms Powers is a very talented designer and I look forward to bulking up my stash to make some of her quilts!!!


I'm still working on the baby quilt, I'm wishing I had machine quilted it instead, I just don't seem motivated to hand quilt it, with all that is going on in the home with my son and all the other kids, it's been hard mustering up some energy to work on this quilt. As I've always said, I'm more of a piecer than a quilter.




I was searching all over for flannel plaids for the snowman quilt I wanted to make from Fon's and Porter's Love of Quilting magazine. Their website did not have a kit, even though it was advertised to have one in the magazine---which I didn't mind so much as I'd rather pick my own fabrics, but when I spent 3 days online looking for plaid flannels and coming up empty, I was getting very discouraged and I had wished I could have gotten a kit. My local quilt shop had nothing, lots of kiddie flannels and floral flannels, no plaids. I went to Jo-Anns and they had a few flannels, nothing to write home about, though. I picked up the few I found there and I figured that it's just gonna take a couple of years to gather enough flannel plaids to make this darn quilt, since no one seemed to be making them this year. Then, I went to Wal-Mart. Now, I've been pretty much boycotting Wal-Mart---partly due to the layaway fiasco, and then I hear they are getting rid of the fabric/craft section and so I decided that I am no longer going to shop there. Part of their reasoning to getting rid of the fabric department is, according to a Wal-Mart higher up, Wal-Mart is trying to appeal to an upper class of people and rich people don't sew. WHAT?????? But, I digress.....

Anyway, I had to go to Wal-Mart for canning supplies, since no one else around sells them and I stopped in the fabric section and what did I find???? FQ bundles of plaid flannels and tons more flannels on the rack!!! They were all quilt shop quality fabrics, too!!! You wanna see my flannels? LOL!

Geesh, don't ya just love fabric????!!!!






Homespuns have always been my favorite fabrics but I think plaid flannels are now joining them in the favorites list!!!

Now, here is the time for a shameless plug/request. Do you have too many scraps laying around and not enough room for them? Would you like to clear some room for some new yardages or FQ's? Do you have lots of scraps and just no ideas of what you may ever want to do with them? Let me take them off your hands and help you clear up some more storage space! I am looking to make a scrappy string quilt in the near future but my scrap stash is very, very small. Over the years, stuff has gotten thrown out during moves and spring cleanings and I have been left with very little quilting fabrics scraps (yet I have tons of scraps from my costuming fabrics, none of them got thrown out :-(!! ) So, if you would like me to help you and therefore help me, just write to me at marsaili at cox dot net and I would be glad to help clear some space for you!!!!

Ok, shameless plug/request over!

Another project I am looking to make soon, which should be fast and easy, is to make a few denim rag quilts. The nice thing is that I don't have to quilt it if I don't want to and I can probably make 3 or 4 of them in a week. I've been saving all of the kids outgrown jeans--and with 2 pre-teens and 3 teens, they grow out of their jeans FAST!!! Even the baby's outgrown jeans can help towards his rag quilt. What I will do is get backing fabrics that go with each kid---Hello Kitty for my 19 year old daughter, something rock and roll for my 17 year old son, Pokemon or Sonic the Hedgehog for the two youngsters and something Garfield for the 15 year old. I love the look of the frayed blocks and it goes with the homey look I'm trying for in the house. Plus, I think the kids would all like one, as well! The quilt in the picture is from Patchwork-and-Quilting.com

Ok, that's it for me this week! Hopefully I'll have my current WIP done by next week---but that is a tall order, we'll see!

He is home!!!

Thank you all for your prayers and hugs, my son came home today, he is fine. He's lost probably 10 pounds and doesn't look like he's slept in a month---but he survived on the kindness of friends and only spent one night in the cold. Now that I am relieved and happy he is home, it's time to start thinking options for him--something that will work and keep him on the straight and narrow. I am not putting him back into the treatment center, we'll work on an out patient basis and try and get the help he needs that way. Thank you again for your prayers and kind words, I am going to actually sleep tonight, I think. Lord knows I can use more than 2-3 hours of sleep!!!

Son ran away again.....

Needless to say, I haven't spent much time quilting this weekend. I found out on Wednesday that my son ran away from the treatment center on the 16th. 5 days after he disappeared, someone finally informs me, his mother. Their excuse was that their policy is to contact the guardian and the police--since county took emergency custody of him to place him in this facility, they are now his guardian. The problem was, all county workers were off Monday for Presidents day, so my county worker didn't find out until Tuesday and he didn't inform me until Wednesday. In the meantime, my son has been gone for 5 days by the time I am informed. Now it's been over a week, one friend saw him the night he ran away and no one has seen him since. I am literally falling apart with worry, I've contacted all the friends I knew he knew and asked them to contact any I didn't know. My daughter has asked everyone she knows---but no one knows anything. He left the facility---in the tail end of our blizzard week---dressed in a hoodie, jeans and checked tennis shoes---that's it. He has no money, no ID, nothing. The treatment center has all his belongings locked up, so he had no way to get his money or other things. I have his ID, his guitar, all the "stuff" that he cares about, I am surprised he hasn't come back for them, which worries me even more for his safety.

I am just blabbing at this point, I've done all that I can physically do, it's a waiting game now, although I have been driving around everyday trying to find him. It's taking a toll on me, my health, family---it's just awful!

Ok, I'm done, I just needed to get that all out. If you are reading this, please pray for my son, for his safety and a safe return very soon!
Thanks

Heirloom Quilts

Well, I've been working on the baby's quilt, I was going to machine quilt it but decided at the last minute to hand quilt it. I sent DH up to the attic crawl space to find my quilting hoop and he came back with treasure! Oh, and my hoop! About 17 years ago, my ex's great aunt had died (of old age, she lived well into her 90's, she was a wonderful human being!) When the family was going through her condo to take things, clean it out and give stuff away or throw it out, the ex and I had gone to help and to pick out what we wanted (what was left, anyway--the rest of the family got the best stuff and as usual, we got the pickings---but personally, that was the best stuff to me!) Among the stuff to go to the trash was a big box, so I lifted it up and got stuck by a sewing needle. So, I opened it up and there inside was tons of sewing stuff, most of it very, very old! In the big box was a smaller box and when I opened it up inside was a treasure trove! His great aunt was a quilter, she had started a grandmothers flower garden back in the 30's and worked on it here and there throughout the years but never finished it. When I found it, it had a large completed panel, some completed rows and some completed flowers---along with many cut hex's and all the fabric that she used for the hex's AND a homemade template made by her husband. I was SO excited, I wasn't a quilter yet---in fact I knew nothing about quilting but I knew that this was special. I took the whole box to my ex's mother and asked her if she was sure she wanted to throw it out. She said yes, no one in the family wanted it. I asked if I could have it and she said yes. So I took it home with the intention of finishing it, but I soon found that I needed much more quilting experience before tackling a job of this magnitude! So I packed it up and put it away until I would be ready to finish it and from that day on, I've been a quilter ever since! When my ex and I were splitting up, he told me he took it and destroyed it, and I was heartbroken, I never expected to see it again. But Lo and behold, DH found it in the attic---along with long forgotten quilting books and templates and patterns and cross stitch patterns---lots of stuff I thought was gone forever! Needless to say I am tickled to have this quilt back, after I get some of my UFO's done, I am going to finish this quilt! There is a lot of scrap fabrics (original 30's fabrics!!) left and tons of cut pieces, but there isn't much of the yellow solid used in the center of the flowers. I am hoping that I can find a fabric to match!

About 10 years ago when I was really going full steam ahead with my quilting, my Aunt had given me a quilt for Christmas. She had inherited it from her grandmother and it was made by her great grandmother, my great, great grandma, sometime in the late 1800's---they say it was made in the 1880's. I know she died in the early 1920's and it was finished way before she died so it was most certainly started at least in the 1800's! It is a log cabin, I believe it's a barn raising pattern.

It is made primarily of silks and velvets but there are many cottons and some woolens as well. Many of the silks are fraying, I'm not sure I want to fix them---well, I'm torn. I know if I repair it is takes away from the value of the quilt. I also know that since many of the silk strips are fraying that there probably isn't a whole lot of monetary value anyway---and even if there was I am not getting rid of this quilt for any money!! I would like to hang it eventually, but I worried that exposing it to light and air will speed up more deterioration of some of the fabrics---some are perfect, however. I can't put it out on my bed, with the baby, the boys, the dogs and the cats, it would be sure to be ruined very quickly. I hate keeping it hidden and folded up with acid free paper, looked at maybe 2 or 3 times a year. If anyone has any advice on how to handle this quilt, please leave it in the comments section!

For now, I am still working on the baby's quilt, stitching away---hopefully I'll have it done in a week!

Stitch on!!

More winter pics...

My little snowbunny boy, LOL! The snow is melting and by this weekend we are gonna be knee high in mud. Not looking forward to that! This is his first time in the snow!


Click on the pictures for
a bigger view!



Here is our puppy, Raven, attacking Jeremy in the snow, LOL!







Here is Sean measuring our snow---and this was before the storm was even over!






Our snow dogs, having a blast. Annie has to be tied up because she keeps climbing on the big pile of snow by the fence and jumping over! Stupid, smart dog!!!!

Ok, time to quilt!

The baby is better, I'm feeling a bit punky but better than I was yesterday. I'm ready to quilt! I WILL have this quilt done by midnight, Sunday. I am going to machine quilt it, I've decided. Since it is for the baby it'll be stitched in the ditch and around each block---I may attempt to do some stippling for inside the blocks, I'll have to practice first.


I've also decided that my giant Christmas quilt is going to be hand quilted and I even have an idea now of how to do it! I just needed some inspiration and the ladies at the Quilter's Corner Club, Quilter's Who Care and Ohio Quilter's group and of course, Alex Anderson and her wonderful guests on Simply Quilts have provided me with SO much inspiration that I want to make EVERYTHING I see and EVERYTHING I dream up!


After spending the week with a sick baby (poor thing, he's better now!)and being sick myself and having 3 other sick kids, I need a major sewing break. I'm gonna tell DH when he gets home that I need a bunch of time this weekend to sew--but we need to make sure he has time to do what he wishes to do as well. I WILL get this quilt done! After all, I have at least 10 snowmen blocks to make for the snowman swap I belong to--and whatever other swap I decide I have to join!

I will not be posting again until the quilt is done, I hope to be posting pictures of it this weekend, check back, it'll be here!!!

Have a good, safe, warm weekend!

Winter is here, again....

In the past, before taking my kids out of school to homeschool, I have watched the crawl early mornings to see if school would be closed due to the horrific winter weather outside. Time and time again our wonderful school district (NOT) has kept them open, even when every single district around us was closing left and right. This year, we actually had two--TWO! cold days last week (when they have stayed open in the past for the same type of temps) and tomorrow (or really, today) they are closed again due to the blizzard going on outside. I guess they really couldn't be foolish enough to stay open, we'll be lucky to get the service truck out of the drive tomorrow so DH can get to work, let alone the tons of school buses that go up and down our street all day.

We are getting TONS of snow right now! My 10 yo and I went out around 4pm to shovel and there was probably a good 6-8 inches on the ground. My wonderful neighbor came over with his snowblower and did the majority of our long drive for us--so I reciprocated and baked him a batch of chocolate chip cookies! Here is the snow level on our table in the backyard (we use this to gauge our snowfall)at 4 pm. Click on pictures for a larger view.


Here is our table now, at midnight:


We've gotten a foot at least with up to 8-10 more inches possible by morning! Pretty cool, huh? I love snow!

Here is the snow fall as of 10 am this morning! Now the drift against the fence is due to the neighbors snow blower, the rest of the huge drifts are all real!
With the blizzard-like winds, there is major drifting--some areas of the backyard are 3-4 feet, some 3 inches. The dogs are loving it, although when they first ran outside, the snow right outside the door is an almost 3 foot drift! They jumped up and found an area that was less deep---but hopped around the yard in the drifts, LOL!









As you can see, the dogs are lovin' it!



Here are pics of our drive and the street. It's really hard to get a sense of how deep it is--of course, it's nothing like what they have up in Oswego, NY but it's our worst storm since 1993 they are saying. I'm thinking it's almost as bad as the storm of '78, I was twelve and we got HAMMERED with a major blizzard. Too bad it's so cold out, the kids would love to be playing in the snow!


My poor baby is sick still. This started yesterday with a bad tummy and everything coming out from both ends. We kept him hydrated and loaded with pedialyte. Today he woke up all flush, now he has a temp and a high one at that! So, I've been keeping him dosed with motrin and continue to keep him fed with motrin and water and some of my homemade chicken and rice soup and more pedialyte, of course. I'm hoping this will go through him by tomorrow because the roads are gonna be worse than today and the doctor suggested that we not take him out since it will be so cold. If he still has a fever tomorrow, I'm gonna assume it's an infection and he'll have to be seen by someone for a possibly antibiotic. Unless it is a virus, of course. I'm just hoping for his sake, he's better---poor thing!

Well, the baby was up all night, I think he finally fell asleep around 5, although DH was up with him at 6:30, changing him and giving him a pedialyte bottle before he had to leave for work (poor guy, heating and cooling guys have to be out in all weather!). It's 11:30 and the baby is still sleeping, I'm just gonna let him sleep, hopefully he'll feel better when he wakes. Of course, with him up all night, I got nothing done with my WIP. I'm gonna go up and make hot chocolate with marshmallows for the boys, throw some laundry in the washer, mix up a couple of loaves of bread and try to get a little sewing done on my WIP before he wakes up. But, as we all know, the best laid plans..........

It's not like I'm going anywhere, LOL!