Catch Up and New FO for October

I've missed the last few New FO link ups, nothing to show and no time. My daughter went through a major crisis and I was running back and forth to Ft. Lauderdale helping her through it. She needed to move, not easy with her two dogs, but we found a safe place and got her settled. Proud Mom here, we moved her on a weekend and on Wednesday she defended for her doctorate and passed perfectly. I honestly don't know how she did it since we were all pretty brain dead from stress. Next step is intern and she'll finally be done :)

My birthday arrived in the middle of all that and David and Cori surprised me with a visit to a private rescue and rehabilitation zoo. What a great day! I was nuzzled by camels, had a monkey on my head and back, carried a marmoset around on my hip like a baby and played with so many different animals. The icing on the cake was playing with this guy

It was just like playing with a domestic cat with bigger claws and teeth, he loved playing tug of war with that towel. Are you jealous Barbara? It was an amazing day!

Crisis past, it's time to sew again. Here's what I did in October.

When I was growing up, Christmas was time for my Dad to bring out his trains, lots of happy memories there, so I made this with my embroidery machine using Designs by Juju's Santa Express designs, if you do machine embroidery you really can't go wrong with Juju's designs, they're always perfect and she has some great sales.  

And this is my first ever table runner, I love how he turned out. It looks small in that picture but it's about 46" long. Table runners always confused me about how big they should be, so a little research and now I know they came from a time when people ate mostly with their fingers, I imagine knights and round tables, they used the table runner as a napkin, now you know that too, enjoy that mental image, :). 

So that's it for October, but I'm back in the game and once I'm caught up I'll hopefully be getting more done. Famous last words, right? 

There's still a little time to link up to the New FO, remember just start something then throw it in the UFO pile, no finishes required says Barbara the great enabler, LOL.

Later Gators,

Dana

Let's Book It for October

Wow, I think I forgot how to blog it's been so long. I've seen the Let's Book It come and go, but some ugly life things have kept me on the road and away from my machine. I've really missed it. 

Anyway I'm back for one of my favorite link ups, Let's Book It over at Vroomans Quilts. 

I call it "Lightening Strikes while Stars Fall" yes, I know, but that's the frame of mine I've been in for these past months, LOL. At least I used my beautiful blues that are so soothing.

Oh, they called it Blue Streak, but I like Lightening Strikes while Stars fall so much better, much more drama. 

I found it here, Love of Quilting from Nov/Dec 2006.

I have to tell you, I sat on the floor with a huge stack of magazines and couldn't find anything I wanted to make. The whole stack was by the front door to be donated when David came home. He asked what's up with them and I told him they didn't have anything worth making.

David: But you want to make everything you see.

Me: I know it's weird, right? A whole stack with nothing.

He picked them up and took them back to my sewing table, saying "you're going to want these, don't make decisions when you're crazy". He was right, this magazine was in the great purge.

If you're not familiar with Let's Book It, it's the wonderful idea of Sharon over at Vroomans Quilts, pretty much anything goes from magazines, books, patterns whatever you have that you've been planning on making. You know you have them, it's a great way to actually get them done. 

Later Gators,

Dana

A Couple of Things

I've always liked the saying "Man plans and God laughs", it's so true. In this house just recently "mom plans and the twins giggle" was the order of the day. Family has had me really busy but, with Pets on Quilt coming I planned an easy quilt.

More practice for my free motion feathers, beautiful colors, what more could I want except a dog on it. They wouldn't come near it, I'd pick it up, they'd run out the door, throw it on the floor, they made huge circles around it to avoid it like it was hot lava, this from a dog who grabbed a quilt and tried to run away with it while I was sewing it. 

So I'm showing it without dogs, first time I didn't have to crop the little buggers out.

I think my feathers still look like toes and some of them I'm pretty sure I've seen in an Alien movie, inspiration is everywhere, but I'm still proud and think they're beautiful.

I used stencils on the white parts

The back is more of my hand dyed fabric

I've been making quilts specifically to practice feathers, Debbie at Stitchin Therapy has wonderful tutorials on feathers, I can't tell you how many of her ideas I steal  borrow. Just today she posted another tutorial for a free motion vines and leaves that are gorgeous. Lots of tips and drawings, you should check it out. 
Yes, you can thank me since I told her I was going to wait patiently for the tute, but she knows I won't, she'll start getting emails from me asking where it is, telling her I'm turning blue from holding my breath and of course the ever popular "don't make me come up there". 

Pets on Quilts ends tomorrow (Monday) at midnight so if you haven't joined in, hurry, it really is the best show on the internet, you meet the nicest people. 

The closest I came to having a picture.

In other news, about a month ago on my morning walk we saw a trash truck back into a parked car and then drive away, big crash, it took them awhile to get the car off the truck, then they just drove away. I banged on the door and told the car owner what happened and now he's remodeling his home. Yesterday on our walk, we saw a small fire, which grew into a big fire and I had to call 911, police, fire trucks, yep I saved an entire neighborhood :)

I walked around all day yesterday telling everyone I was Batman and singing the song, David is thinking about not letting me out of the house anymore, he says I attract trouble. Life you've got to live it, LOL.

Later gators,

Dana (Batman)

New FO July 2014

August already? Yikes! Sometimes I think if Barbara wasn't reminding me of the end of another month I'd still be living in May, darn it Barbara! LOL. 

It's time to show off what we started in July for the linky party over at Cat Patches, remember just start something, no finishes required. I appreciate that this month since a family emergency has kept me away from my machine for far too long. 
I had actually forgotten this quilt from the beginning of the month, until I pulled it out for the Pet's on Quilt show. 

I've been working on sewing curves, so this quilt was perfect, each block has 8 curved blocks and by the end they were easy. 

I played with my dyes to make the back, something I love to do. Anything that makes me feel like I belong in the kitchen is good, not like cooking, but I can whip up some mean play doh when needed.

I started this quilt, using up a bunch of charm squares that have been hanging around way too long, it was going to be bear paws but I really liked the look of the stem for the maple leaf.

Hopefully I'll find time to sandwich and get the quilting started soon.

That's it for me this month, please think about joining us for the linky party at Cat Patches, it's really a great way to keep track of the months. :)

Later Gators,

Dana

Pets on Quilts Show 2014

Welcome to the greatest, coolest most fun quilt show in the universe! It's happening right now over at Lily Pad Quilting.

Mom's been really busy lately so she said we can write this post, but she'll be checking up on us with her red edit pencil, whatever that means.

We are:

Brady Bug

Maya Grace

And together we are known as the Terrible Twins, that means we are the most well behaved, never do anything wrong dogs ever!

Dana here: They're lying

You may have read stories about the land crab, the sticks and the opossum, but they were accidents.

The land crab was dead and you cooked him in the sun for three days before bringing him in to feast on, (OMG, the stench), that one stick was 4 feet long and you chewed it to pieces on my bed after stripping the quilt off so you could lay on the cool sheets and I'm still not over the opossum. Get on with it!

Let's start with a huge Thanks to Snoodles, Padsworth and Dragondrop for all of their hard work. They've really been working their fingers, paws and wings to the bone (we like bones) putting this all together. They have great sponsors who really appreciate how wonderful pets make our lives.

Mom says this is also the hardest show since we won't cooperate, but look how great I look on this quilt.

I bribed him with a cookie

And look how beautiful I look on the quilt.

I held you in place and two seconds after this was taken you were gone. 

Mostly though, we are known for our photo bombs, Mom collects these all year long and says shes become so good at cropping because of us. We've got a lot of style, here's a few:

This is the turn and jump

The secret service, protect the quilt at all costs

The running plume

These are all "Daddy's Girl" I adore my dad and want to be wherever he is.

That's true, she's sweet and cuddly with David and bites my toes if she wants something from me.

Well that's it from us this year, we hope we made you smile. We are two rescues living the good life, bringing joy every day.

That's true :)

Why not hop (that's for you Padsworth) on over to the show and enjoy lots of wonderful pictures and stories, there's so much love in this show. Quilters and pets are perfect together.

Thanks for coming by,

Maya Grace and Brady Bug with help from Dana (mom)

Dogs on quilts category.

Ideas? Help!

I was asked to make a baby quilt for a new arrival coming in October using parts of the father's baby quilt which is much loved and falling apart. I just love this idea so I asked for pictures of the quilt figuring I can use at least pieces of it. 

Here are the pictures:

My first thought was OMG impossible, it's a log cabin with stitch in the ditch so pieces would be tiny. BUT then I found myself thinking about the love sewn into that quilt and I'd like to salvage what I can. 

Here's some of the thoughts I'm having: 

Would the fusible cotton interfacing I used on the t-shirt quilt strengthen the fabric enough that it could survive a baby and the repeated washing's. 

The baby quilt doesn't have to be a log cabin, so maybe razor cut the usable fabric out and make something completely different? 

Some of the blocks look in decent shape, could I cut them out batting and all, then incorporate them into a new quilt, removing the old batting and again maybe use the interfacing?

Could I applique new log cabin blocks, or pieces of them, onto this one, leaving usable sections open, then do batting and backing enclosing the old quilt? 

I'd love to do this, but my mind is all over the place, so please help! Any ideas you have would be much appreciated, you guys always have such good ideas :)

Thanks,

Dana 

New FO for June

June's NewFo linky is up, the first of the summer (Barbara's words), it feels like next she'll be writing about Fall and we'll all wonder what happened to summer. 

I don't have much to show, but I did a lot in June, you may remember the pile of T-shirts I showed you last month, they turned into this:

I'm really pleased with the end result, laying it out was a chore and there's a ton of Y-seams, but it was all worth it.

I made the back out of his childhood sheets that she had saved, it's all pretty special for him. 
Cute little side story, the mom wants another quilt for her daughter when she graduates, one problem, because she wore girly dresses and had pretty princess sheets, the mom passed all of her things on, so now she's watching ebay and haunting thrift stores looking for similar items to pass off as the daughter's. She said she'll just hide them in her closet and hope the daughter doesn't catch on, LOL.

After that big finish I made my Let's Book It quilt:

For the Let's Book It challenge I'm not only getting rid of old magazines, but I'm trying to use up stash, I had the perfect fabric for the backing, so that's a big plus.

That was it for me in June, I spent a few days dying fabric and managed to dye my hands bright red, normally I dye them blue. There is something a little more horrific about bright red, when they're blue people just act like they don't notice, but the red was a real attention getter, LOL. 

Gotta run, summer is calling, please check out what everyone else was doing in June, remember you only have to start something for the NewFo, no finishes required. 

Later Gators,

Dana