Pets on Quilts 2017!

 Hello everyone and welcome to Pets on Quilts. I'm Maya Grace the Princess half of the Terrible Twins and my brother is Brady Bug, but friends and The Vet just call him Bug. 

We are here for the Dogs (best puppies in the world) on Quilts category (why does that say Cat?) Dogegory, fixed it. 

Mom really loves this show and so do we, it's so much fun to show you what perfect models we are. Ready?

Dad took this one when Mom showed us our prize for being the BEST PUPPIES IN THE WORLD

Not bad, but Mom wanted us facing the camera

But Bug was a little too excited about our prize and I'm bored.

So we decided to do action shots

There were a lot of action shots and laughing and begging until Mom gave up and said we win and can have our prize now, so we're off to collect

Want to know what we won? Last year we won coconuts, but I hit Bug in the ear with one and broke him, his ear was all puffy and pretty like a flower, but Mom and The Vet weren't happy. 

This year a big storm came here and broke our banana tree. Here's what Mom was showing us, we love bananas.

Almost forgot, no harm was done to any quilt that a good washing didn't fix. We didn't even get any banana on it. 

Thanks so much to Jacque, Padsworth and Dragon Drop over at Lily Pad Quilting for continuing this wonderful tradition. We always have such a great time visiting all of the other Pets and seeing beautiful quilts being abused. Mom says life is probably easier with cats and well-behaved dogs, but we are the Terrible Twins and have a reputation to uphold. 

Bye!

Where Does the Time Go

I know where the time goes, it goes to two family crisis (only in the minds of the people who caused them), one family celebration, company, one animal rescue emergency and I just came back from Key West where I crashed my sister and BIL's anniversary trip, I was going down to spend a day but my BIL called and asked me to come early to surprise my sister :)  It was wonderful and we had a great time. 

But I have quilts I've been wanting to show you. When I was visiting Cori and going to QuiltCon, a friend emailed and told me they were expecting their second grandchild, Max their first grandbaby has one of my quilts and she wanted something similar and girly. 

This is Max's quilt in EQ

To make "Max's little sister's" quilt I decided to keep the on point, colored sashing and border. I spent a some time on EQ, sent my friend the pictures and she couldn't decide, LOL. 

So I just started making them, it's good to have goals

This is the one she picked

There are two more in that theme that haven't been made, then I went off the rails a bit and made these two, same border though and at least it wasn't elephants which is where I usually end up. 

This is the only one she didn't like, I think it was the yellow

But when I made it I couldn't find the right yellow so of course I stuck with my white, this one is my favorite.

I'm not a planner, so having a bunch of quilts designed and ready was a new experience for me and I liked it, not that it made a difference since I'm sitting here in the "what's next?" place, which usually leads to taking the terrible twins out rather than cleaning the house :)

Later Gators,

Dana

QuiltCon

I've been gone 

It turns out Savannah is 2 hours from Cori's new place

I started playing with idea when I read that

then Cori took off Friday and Monday so we could run the streets together.

How could I resist? It meant driving all day and getting up the next morning for that 2 hour drive

Completely worth it!

The free motion quilting just blew me away

And this was the best part, seeing these in person

Wholecloth! I spent a lot of time just staring at this one. 

Because I went on Thursday I missed seeing some of the "names" that were there, but that's O.K. the quilts left me in awe. I'm home and exhausted, hoping to not drive again for at least a day. 

Debbie did try to tempt with another show in Florida, but by time I hit Daytona Beach it was pedal to the metal heading for home. 

Later Gators,

Dana

Mr. Rex

I hope everyone has had a peaceful and wonderful holiday. My favorite gift arrived on Christmas Eve when Cori came home for a week! I couldn't have asked for anything better. 

Most of you know we do things a little different here, we've had another successful Christmas and things are calming down. Since South Florida has decided not to participate in winter this year Cori and I have been starting each day with a bike ride, just riding and talking with the occasional stop for her to grab coconuts to take back to all of her dog friends (again with the coconuts for dogs). 

I'm so happy that I can finally show the quilt I made for her, I feel like it needs one of those labels that say "this took forever".  I was so excited about it I turned me into a five year old who wanted everyone up at 5 A.M. so we could open presents. 

Cori has always loved dinosaurs, all through her years of education when she would feel stressed I would get a call or text that said "I should have been a paleontologist", when she received her doctorate I gave her a small silver triceratops for the "road not taken" and when a T-Rex head popped on in my pinterest for ideas she immediately messaged "for me please". 

I took the picture and cropped and recropped him down to 42 pieces of computer paper which I put together like a puzzle, then used the sliding glass door (which he was too big for) for a light box to make the individual pieces.

I used Lara's idea from her book Crafted Applique, New Possibilities to treat the pieces so I knew it would last and not fray. 

Then I spent days quilting him, he's mostly pebbled which just about made me lose my mind, make a circle, make another circle, make hundreds of circles, LOL. It turned out awesome and the pebbling was perfect for skin texture. I finished with swirls in the outer blue section. He finished at 50" X 70". 

Cori loves him, I love him and I'm so glad I followed though with this labor of love. It always feels so good to be able to give the perfect gift, I'm still smiling about it.

Later Gators,

Dana

Stalled

All I need to do today is put simple borders on a commission quilt, not lofty goals, but I'm so stalled. I'm sure it's the holidays and so much going on.

Plus this little girl hasn't been feeling well

Her Vet called last night and changed her medication and had me thinking I'd be taking her for a quick run to the Vet's.

So imagine my surprise when The Bug came to me and said "Maya's being mean to me". 

Since Brady usually only fibs about food, (what treat? I didn't get a treat) I went to check it out and found that every time he tried to go out the doggie door, she would pounce on him, when I opened the door she took off and this is what I found when I went after her. 

I think she's feeling better :) She even started throwing coconuts at me, which is a game but they hurt if they hit you. That may sound odd to you, but Key's dogs think that coconuts and palm fronds that magically appear in the yard are the best toys. I have a couple of coconuts put aside for my granddogs for Christmas since they moved out of the land of magic coconuts. 

Our weather is beautiful, a cold front came through and it's in the 70's, so playing with the terrible twins sounds very enticing, but I really need to finish this quilt.

When Cori moved and I knew I would be with her for awhile, I ordered a bed and mattress for her spare room, then decided it needed a quilt (of course). I made this quilt in three days, but I had a lot of incentive and nervous energy, which David called losing my mind. 

I made the rug too, but I had that, I didn't instantly just whip that up :)

So what do you do when you're stalled? Push through it? Walk away? Go play with coconuts? Write a blog post? Please don't say you clean the house.

Later Gators,

Dana