SOH2 hearts have arrived

This heart is from Lori.

These are from Peggy (top), Susan (left), and Donna (right).

These are all from Jaki.

Crazy quilt horse saddle and Happy New Year's Eve.....

Here's the horse that Michaela got for Christmas. At 12 1/2 years old, I wasn't absolutely sure she'd like getting a stuffed toy, but I needn't have worried. She's a horse girl and probably always will be, and she loved it. I made the saddle and bridle for this horse, and it was way easier than the vests on the bears.


This is my New Year's Eve wish for you: May you rest easy, basking in the warm glow of your Christmas tree, with dear ones nearby. May the New Year bring you health, gladness, and fulfillment in your pursuits.

A Christmas card and some presents!

This is our Christmas card this year. Every Christmas for the last 21 years, I've done an original drawing and had prints made to send as our Christmas greetings to family and friends. Some years have been wildlife drawings, or more religious drawings, and sometimes they're just plain silly, like the year I drew our likenesses as reflected in shiny Christmas ball ornaments. We call those "monkey balls" because they make everyone look a little ape-like. I even wrote a poem to go in the card that year, to explain about "monkey balls". This year I used the boys as models, or I should say I used photos of them. They don't sit still long enough to pose for a drawing. Unfortunately, I don't do well with likenesses in humans, so the little boys don't look a lot like themselves. The dog, however, you could pick out of a crowd. I really captured him, except he's a bit bigger than the drawing would lead you to believe. Anyway, I'm pleased to make this my first ever on-line Christmas greeting. If you're reading this, please know that I wish you a blessed Christmas season and a wonder-filled new year.

This is the third and final landscape cq piece I'll be doing for Christmas. It has a mother of pearl fish, and a school of fish that I made up, or as my grandson would say, I imaginated them. He thought (or hoped) they were piranhas, and when I explained that I'd made them up, he insisted that I make up a name for them,too. So they are "high-finned yellow-bellied sparkle fish". They were made with a small piece of sparkly fabric appliqued to the background (moire taffeta) and then embroidered with the black, yellow, and pink details. They really catch the light and seem to almost swim in place. The lace fan coral is made, oddly enough, from lace, and the sea weed is eyelash yarn. A lot of the buttons in the rock piles are mother of pearl, as are the coin shaped dangles. There are also some real tiny shells in there, and two tiny pewter charms. Can you find the sea horse? He's hiding in the seaweed on the right. There's very little embroidery in this piece; mostly applique and tacking or couching of the lace and yarn, and sewing on the buttons and beads. This one is a gift for my husband's brother and his wife.

This is for me!! It was made by Sharon Rowe. We both participated in the Victorian boot swap on the CQ4N list. I love the snowy white patches and all the colorful embroidery. I think she did an especially good job on the shape of the boot. And it came with 4 baggies full of threads, buttons and beads, fabric, and trims. I am in crazy quilt heaven this afternoon! Thank you, Sharon!

Snowy landscape CQ

I tried doing a landscape in CQ, and this is what I've come up with. It's a mixture of velvet (snowy hills and dirt hills), moire' taffeta (pond), cottons (background), and satin (sun). The details are done in DMC perle cotton, size 8, and some of the Sassa Lynne threads that I bought from Susan, with tiny beads and a few buttons.

My next project is also a landscape, and both are intended for Christmas presents, but I really like them and may try to make more for possible sale.

Another craft show....

...has come and gone, and thankfully, this one was a little more profitable.

Lauri and I shared a table at this year's Mesa County Employee Association craft show. Last year was the first time they'd done it, and I did all right. This year, I think more people came prepared to actually shop, not just look, and Lauri and I both did alright.

Lauri's items are the purses (not the squarish totes), which she had in two sizes; a cell phone or MP3 player sized pouch, or the larger shoulder bags. She also made some really cute little denim pocket purses that did very well.

We'll never get rich doing this, but we had a good time, got some good feedback, and were able to sit and stitch for a few hours.

Ing's flower fairy heart

This is a heart pieced by Ing in California. We are doing a one on one round robin. I have just finished my block for her to work on, and will be sending it to her with her completed heart.
I did a silk ribbon embroidery daffodil on this heart, and the fairy's skirt is organza ribbon and beads.

A winter block to work on

This block belongs to Mary in New Orleans. We are trading blocks temporarily to work on each others, then send them back. She has requested that hers be winter themed only; no Christmas. It reminds me of sparkling snow, but I didn't photograph it very well. It is so much prettier in person.

Three more vested bears

These are 3 more bears for the upcoming craft show. I had so much fun doing the first two, and actually sold one of them, so I've tried a few more. This one is one of the $3 bears that you can buy at Hobby Lobby. It (and the following green one) are smaller than the first two I did, and I don't think I'd attempt to make a vest any smaller than this.


This is a bear that my sister gave me to work on. He's a dark green, and I thought his vest would look really nice in shades of purple with green, purple, and gold stitching.



The last bear is snowy white, and again, I thought he'd look great with shades of purple and pink. He's big enough to use the larger vest size like the first two bears I did. I'm really pleased with all of them, and hope they'll find good homes at the craft show.

Elvis! Nancy's CYOT block

This block is for the Choose Your Own Theme round robin that I am just finishing up. There were only 5 of us in this round, but I've gotten to do some really fun blocks. First there was Lauri's romance novel theme, then Anne's Japanese, Flora's pineapples and palm trees, and now Nancy's Elvis. I was never a huge Elvis fan, (though I didn't dislike him) so I wasn't feeling very inspired at first. Nancy included with her focus fabric (which is the shiny, sparkly blue/green) some images printed on fabric of Elvis through his life. I chose one of him that might be an album cover (the larger one) and a smaller one also of just his face. There is just a bit of salmon pink in each of the images, so the main color scheme is from the blue/green, gold, and that soft salmon.

To the left of the smaller photo, I did a button trail that includes symbols of several of his gold and platinum hits. See if you can find them first, then check at the end of this post to see if you got them!

Zack and his grandpa were sharing a Kodak moment last night. Zack is probably wondering why grandpa's chin looks so different, and just had to have a feel of it.

Did you find:
A rose, for "Mama Liked the Roses"
A dog, for "Hound Dog"
A heart for "Heartbreak Hotel"
A teddy bear for "Teddy Bear"
A cross for all the gospel songs

Boxes for the craft show

These are some of the boxes I'm doing for the show. The dark grained wooden ones are some unfinished wood boxes that I have purchased at either Hobby Lobby or Michael's. Wood working is NOT my strong suit, so they are not what you'd call masterfully finished, but I did stain them and applied a varnish. The tiniest boxes, which I don't think are in the pictures, have a CQ piece that measures about 1 1/2" square on them. The smallest pictured ones are rectangular and the CQ piece is about 2 1/2" by 1 1/2".
The white boxes and the black one in a previous post were also purchased from Hobby Lobby, and were already finished. The white ones were startlingly white, so I gave them a gold wash to antique them and tone down the glare a little.

The brown bear gets his vest, too

I did this guy's vest in Christmas colors of reds, gold, green, and black. Black a Christmas color? In my world it is, just because it makes the other colors pop! The bear has an SRE poinsettia as well as a button cluster.

I really like the gold seam treatment on the left in the photo. It is from JB Montano's Elegant Stitches.

Another craft show project

I found this odd colored teddy bear and thought he'd look awesome with a CQed vest. So I made a pattern and cut the foundations from muslin.

Then I pieced the muslin with fancy fabrics. The hardest part was choosing colors that I liked with this bear. Finally I settled on purples, pinks, and navy blue, with some gold lace overlaying some of the fabrics.

It's not all together yet, but I like the way it's coming so far. The bear is odd, don't you agree? He's sort of purply-pinky tie-dyed, but he's cute, and he might just be the best dressed bear at the fair. I also have a garden variety brown bear, but he may end up in camouflage overalls. We'll see.....

Season to season winter block

This is my half-done winter block. It doesn't need to go to Gerry until November 1st, but I have that craft show coming up and wanted to get it done in plenty of time. It is a mixture of cottons and fancies, including white velvet. I built the whole thing around that piece of slate blue moire taffeta in the center. When I saw it on the bolt it reminded me of an iced over pond. So here is a winter scene with snowy hills and some bare patches leading into a frosty woods. The time is sunrise or sunset (I honestly can't tell which), and a blue jay has found a perch in a winter stripped tree. The jay is a button I bought during the great button buy, and two of them on a card only cost 50 cents!
I used some of the Sassa Lynn threads to good advantage here and there on the crests of the snowy hills. One that I have is very pale pinks blending to blues and greys. It picks up just enough of the colors of the sunset (or sunrise) to look like reflections on snow. I also used quite a few white iridescent beads and silver lined clear beads.

Craft show products

This first is a box I bought on clearance at Hobby Lobby. I also have two white ones just like this. With a box with an inset area on the top, it is easy to make a cq piece to fit into it. I made quite a few boxes similar to this for a small craft show last year and did fairly well with them. This year Lauri and I are doing two craft shows. One is with Holy Family School, a very large and well attended show on Saturday, November 3rd. The second is the same one I did last year, held by Mesa County Employee's Association on Tuesday, December 4th at the old court house. It's an odd day, and a little late in the season, but we probably won't sell everything at HF, so it'll give us a second chance to sell some things. If you're in GJ, please come and see us at one or both shows!

I meant for these to post in the reverse order, but this is how they came out. The second photo is of the finished velvet boxes. They are pieced with fancy fabrics and embellished with buttons, beads and embroidery.

I bought these two boxes at Walmart in the after Christmas sales in January. They were supposed to be sewing boxes. They were empty, but had a strange felt and ribbon corset-like decoration on the top that was to be used as a pin cushion. I pulled those off, and that is why there is a nasty glue glob in the center of the top. I also pulled off a row of sequins around the edge of the top and covered that glue with braid trim.

Fall swap blocks

On CQ for Newbies, we are doing a Season to Season "swap", where we each piece a block, embellish half of it, and then send it to a partner to be finished. My partner is Judi in.....Washington, I think. After the block is completed, we will get our own back, so it's not a true swap, just a temporary one. This is Judi's block as I received it. She did some very clever little pumpkins using orange felt and floss. She also used a nice variety of textured and printed fabrics.

Here it is with my embellishment added. I used some lace motifs that I dyed at Lauri's house last week. The flowers in the motifs are a softly muted lavender. There wasn't much purple in Judi's block, so I hope she doesn't mind that I've added a bit. It is very soft and doesn't scream purple. The color reminds me of chrysanthemums. I gave each of those flowers a center of a single orange bead. Just had to find a way to put orange and purple together, didn't I? I also used a lace motif that Lauri gave me; the gold one in the upper right corner. It adds a nice balance to the gold leaves in the lower left corner.

And of course, that black center patch just begged for a spider web. The spider is made with two iridescent gold glass beads for the head and body, and perle cotton legs. The web is a Kreinik blending filament (by itself). This was a delightful way to spend a Sunday afternoon and evening, thanks for letting me work on it, Judi!

Hand dyed lace

These are some of the things I dyed at Lauri's house last week. I'm really having fun with the perle cotton size 8 that I've been dyeing in variegated tones. I also tried some braid trim that has a bit too much nylon in it to take the dye very deeply, but for a soft colored block, it does make an interesting trim.

Antique CQ blocks and fabric

I haven't finished anything in the last few days, so I thought I'd show you a couple of the antique blocks I've purchased on Ebay over the years. The first one is a nicely done single block, about 10" square.

This block is the very first one I ever bought. I'd been looking at antique crazy quilts and blocks on Ebay (as well as restoring them for some time through Rocky Mountain Quilts) and when I saw this single block for a reasonable price, I just had to have it. It was slightly unfinished; the space just around the little girl's patch was not done. Actually, it had been done at one time, judging from the stitch holes on the back, but someone, somewhere along the line, had taken it apart and not refinished it. I was able to finish it out, and now it awaits my further consideration. I fell in love with the chubby little girl with her tricky cat, and have seen this same motif on another quilt since I bought this piece. She might have been an embroidery motif that was printed in a magazine, or possibly a Kate Greenaway girl.

This fabric was also bought on Ebay. I've called it the world's most expensive fat quarter, though that may not be true. It's certainly the most expensive one I've ever purchased. It is cheater cloth; printed to look like a crazy quilt, right down to the spider and web (one of which includes a trapped fly). Sometime after I bought this, I finally got to buy Penny McMorris's book titled Crazy Quilts. Imagine my surprise and delight when I discovered, on page 24, a picture of this very fabric! It was made in 1886, according to the book. My piece was on the back of a quilt at one time; presumably on a crazy quilt, though I don't know that for sure. It does have tiny holes in it that are obviously tie-holes. I have since seen a whole cloth quilt for sale on Ebay that was done in this fabric. How I would have loved to see that in person!

Christmas is coming.....

On the CQ for Newbies group list, we are doing a swap with Victorian shaped boots in place of traditional Christmas stockings. Each boot is to be CQed at least on one side and will include 4 squishies. Squishies are bags of goodies, usually fabric, buttons, threads, charms, ribbons, lace, etc.; anything a CQer might use in embellishment. I pieced one side of my boot last night. I should know better than to try to piece something after dark; I just can't see color anymore after the sun goes down. I didn't like my first attempt very much, but recognizing that someone else might like it, I opted to simply cq the other side of the boot as well, and leave it up to the recipient which side she would use. I went ahead and pieced the other side last night, too, and wouldn't you know, the light of day has me liking the first side best anyway. Oh well, it'll still give the receiver a choice or a change from year to year. By the way, the side on the left is the first one I did.

This is a more traditional shaped stocking I've made for a great-niece who will celebrate her first Christmas this year. My sister Gayle, who is little Kiera's grandma, chose the colors, and asked for a lot of embellishment. I'm not an encruster, so this is stretching it for me. I've done another button "clutter" and the meandering braid is a first for me. I really like it. I hope Santa fills it well for Miss Kiera on her first Christmas morning.

Vintage peacocks

Here are the peacock doilies that I found at Salvation Army recently. I'm not really a peacock person, but these are just so lovely. Someone who was a peacock person obviously put a lot of time and energy into these, and I think they deserve to be in a loving home again.
The first one is smaller than the other, and the tail is done in a varigated thread of spring, or Easter colors.

The second one is done in more neutral colors on the body, with the tail in ecru. It is the same pattern as the smaller one, but the thread used is larger (thicker). The body is the same size in both.

I think either of these would be extraordinary as the focal point of a peacock crazy quilt, perhaps stitched down on a velvet center block, with beads and embroidery enhancing the crocheted "eyes" of the tail, and with cq blocks with peacock colors and motifs all around them. I might even be tempted to part with one of them, if someone comes up with a great project idea they want to do.

Egypt revisited.

Okay, so I've never visited Egypt, so I shouldn't say REvisited, but this is only one of the Egyptian styled cq blocks I've done recently, so just go with me here.

This is the wall hanging I made from a block that I did in the Ethnic round robin earlier this year. I pieced it, then it was worked on by 5 other ladies in the US and Italy. When I got it home, it still had some embellishment work to be done on it, but the other ladies did some fine work. Simona in Italy added a little metal cartouche that she'd bought on a trip to Cairo, so it even has a true bit of Egypt
on it. I still need to add a way to hang it, and I think I'll make a pocket on the back to hold the little booklet that traveled around with it and has the comments from all the ladies who stitched on it. The buttons in the corners are some that I found in a container of buttons that I bought at a yard sale last summer. They are gold-tone and have Nefertiti's head on them. They may have been the first inspiration for doing this block....