Again...Where Has The Time Gone Since Last I Blogged!?

Time flies when you're having fun and retired!

Right after the kids headed back to Switzerland, I headed out on a four day shop hop excursion. It was the Mystery Harvest Quilt Shop Hop, a tri state hop with shops in southern Ohio, West Virginia and eastern Kentucky. The hop officially had 16 shops but we hit 3 extra (one or two in Tennessee) and we zigged and zagged over 1,400 miles on Interstate roads and back roads (turn right at the goat farm)to get there and back.

What did I learn while on the trip: West Virginia and Virginia are beautiful states, there are some really scary motels out there, I loose my sense of adventure (really sense of humor) after eating mediocre/bad food for too long, I would do a shop hop again.


I signed up for a 2011 BOM quilt (above) at a shop in Ohio (I think) and should start receiving the blocks in a month or so.


Sweetie's SIL bought this book for me when they were here. Since he and his father like a lot of the same authors that I do, he was sure I would like these authors. He was right. The good thing about their books is that most of them don't have to be read in sequential order...this one falls in the middle of the list.


The Guild christmas blocks are done and will be turned in on Tuesday.



I've been working on making HSTs and pinwheels. It's still a work in progress...trying a variety of methods to make HSTs. Also, I made a couple of square in squares.


This past Tuesday, some of the Guild ladies and I headed over to Dahlonega, GA to visit two quilt shops and check out the downtown area. What a cute little town!!! We had lunch at the Oar House, a restaraunt outside Dahlonega, on the banks of the Chestatee River....would love to tube that river some day!

The Kids Are Back In Switzerland...Back To Blogging

It's come to my attention that I was having a problem with readers trying to post comments to my blog. A while back I had made some changes in Settings in an attempt to eliminate comments from the orient that were just links to sex sites. That may have been the start of the problem. Also, upon investigating comment issues, I learned that Blogger has been having issues for awhile now with the embedded comments section. So, I followed the recommendations and selected the pop-up comments page feature. It seems to have taken care of the problem.

Now to the post topic...

Sweetie's DD and SIL were with us for most of the two weeks that they were in the US and it was a most enjoyable time.


Our first excursion was to Fort Mountain.


Next, we tubed the Coosawattee River (pictures are still on Sweetie's cell). Then we went up to Copperhill, TN for a trail ride. Even though we had a mix of rain and sunshine, we all really enjoyed the ride.


The next day we took the waterfall hike on the Wildcat Tract in Dawson Forest. What a beautiful place! They felt the need to climb even higher up (have movie of it) while we discussed the chances of getting a medivac helicopter in if one or both of them slipped.


We were more than content in the little pool at the base.

Going in(first 4 miles)the trail was rates white (easier) and the last 2.5 miles was rated blue (harder)...ALL UPHILL!!!!! OMG!!! Again, at times, I was wondering what our chances were of getting a chopper in to lift our old behinds out of there!!!

Tomorrow morning at 6 a.m., I leaving with three other ladies from the guild to go on a Shop Hop in eastern Ohio, Kentucky, and West Virginia...should be a great time.

My Home Made Stencil Is A Success

I had to get the Dremel out again to make the holes into slots and the Pounce Pad just wasn't giving me enough chalk. A cotton ball dabbed in the chalk worked just fine.


You won't have to look real hard to be able to see a few problem areas, but all in all, I'm pleased with the results.


I'm liking the look of the back.

I also experimented with the quilting direction on my machine, turning it so that it was perpendicular to me and not paralell to me. It preserved the marking lines better that way. However, as with most newer machines, the needle sits at least 3 to 4 inches in under the machine and does limit visabililty somewhat.

My New Spray Basting Area

Sweetie and I just finished putting this up in the storage area of the basement. Since I don't have a midarm (yet), my projects will be on the smaller side so there won't be a problem with over spray. It's 8' x 8' with a foot or two of concrete beyond.

I have a cheater top (guild donation quilt) to baste and then try out the stencil that I made!!!!

Neapolitan Piggies Are In Trouble!

This is the first redesign. After I had the first design on the wall it was total chaos in my eyes. The rail fence idea just didn't work with the solid squares of piggy material thrown in. Out came my high tech quilting design tools...crayons and copy paper...and I had me some pinwheels. This is what a rail fence boarder looks like...not pleasing.



Since I still wasn't loving it, I put a post on Quilting Board to get some instant feedback from the many quilters that frequent the website. Within minutes, I had a new design on the wall and another picture posted on the website.



There's more changes to make and I'm not sure that I can "man up" this baby quilt enough to please all parties...but I sure do love the brown/pink/white combo...almost as much as turquois/brown/white.

What's wrong with a baby boy having some softness and pink....after all, he's soft and pink right now...he has the rest of his life to "man up" and it will probably happen way too soon.

A New Place To Read And Ponder Quilts

 

...and view nature...love those little hummingbirds...love to watch their aerial battles.

 

These two were taken with my cellphone (when do you think someone will come up with zoom on a cell camera?) and the last one was taken with the watercolor option.

Quilt Guild Badge Done!!!

I'm very pleased with how my badge turned out. Members wear their badges to the monthly business meetings, quilt shows, or other guild related outings.


Everything is cut out for Neapolitan Piggies and ready for sewing of strip sets.

Yesterday, I dropped into my LQS to check on some guild members that were taking a class and while I was there the owner was talking about accurate seam allowances. I mentioned that I was going to get some mole skin to make a guide. Pam, the owner, knows that I have a Brother machine (which she sells) so she said to follower her over to the machines, where she showed me which foot and what setting will give me an accurate 1/4" seam on my particular machine. I had already given up using the 1/4 inch foot with the guide bar...to big a seam.

One of the reasons that I started a blog was to have something in place to keep me on track (nag me), get me going (pester me) on a project....pretty much be there in my face to remind me to get going on something...to reign in my ADD tendency to bounce from one new thing to the other!

Ouh! Ouh! Ouh!...I'm going to try and make my own stencils? Now where's my Dremel?