Field Day

Today was Field Day at my son's school  They have about 20 different stations from parachute to duck, duck, Dunk to tug of war to squirt each other in the eye.  The goal is to tire them out so they sleep well before the last day of school.  Mission accomplished!

Mindless sewing

I'm still working on cleaning the sewing room and finding half finished projects.  I'm creating a new rule.  When I have leftover pieces from a quilt, I"m going to make 12 inch blocks because I have no idea how all of these pieces were supposed to go together!  There are tiny triangles and tiny squares and medium size triangles and squares and after sewing them together I realized that the medium triangles and squares were supposed to be square in a squares.  Oh, well, they are now random 12 inch blocks that will go into a big ol' scrappy quilt like the one above.  I LOVE the super scrappy quilts.  I love looking at all the different fabrics and remembering the different quilts they came from.  To me, that is what a quilt is supposed to be.  I think I was born in the wrong generation, but I don't think I could have lived without air conditioning and internet.  I can't even remember what it was like without internet and instant access to everything happening in your friends' lives.  For example, friends of mine from church are host families for twin boys whose mom is in drug rehab.  Today they found out the mom wants my friends to adopt her twins.  The mom realized that she just can't take care of the boys and that they are best off with stable families.  My friends are super excited.  One of my friends has already adopted two beautiful children and the other family has 6 kids of their own.  Without the internet I wouldn't be able to celebrate with them.

I made quite a few of these blocks.  Just random leftovers from a comfort quilt.

Have you checked out Bloglovin?

Ok, so Bloglovin is the new Pinterest for me.  I could spend HOURS on there checking out new blogs and learning new things.  I think I'm addicted.  I love the way it is set up, where you can see what's on the blog posts and decide if you want to click on the link after reading a couple of sentences.  I love that it can read your mind and make suggestions for you (which is a little creepy cuz you know they have to be searching your computer browser history or something to figure out what you like) but I've found a lot of new blogs that I'm not sure how I've missed before.  My husband thinks I'm crazy for spending so much time reading about quilting when I have so much fabric and should really BE quilting.  But, hey, I need some inspiration.

I'm cleaning my sewing room in what may be a strange way.  I'm picking a bucket of 'stuff' and sorting and sewing my way through it.  I found a bunch of 12 inch blocks and bits and pieces to make more 12 inch blocks and am going to put them all together to make some quilt tops.  I sat and sewed for a couple hours yesterday and emptied out a Ziploc bag of random pieces.  I did the same thing today and have quite a few blocks that need to be organized into something beautiful. 

I woke up again today feeling weird and BAM, super mega migraine hit me like a MAC truck.  Tried going for a walk and taking some Maxalt and it got a little better, but I think the random sewing of blocks helped the most.  Oh, and the eating a whole bowl of fresh peas from the fruit stand.  I love summer and fresh fruits and vegetables. 

Bloglovin

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I have no idea what I'm doing, but supposedly you have to claim your blog on Bloglovin, so here goes :)

This is a great story

http://www.andiejohnsonsews.com/2013/06/quilts-matter.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+AndieJohnsonSews+%28andie+johnson+sews%29

This is a great story about why quilts matter.  Take a minute to read it and then go make a quilt :)

This should have been so easy

Ever have one of those 'everything that can go wrong will' kind of days?  Well, today was it for this poor little quilt.  It is from my book challenge and I had cut out the pieces maybe a month ago.  Decided that since hubby and kids are at the movies, I would sew it together.  Simple squares and sashing right?  WRONG!  I forgot that I had already precut the smaller sashing pieces, so am happily sewing all the blocks to the long strips, sewed more than I needed, cut them and then find the precut strips.  Have to unsew some of the sides because I've got sashing on more sides than I need since there aren't any corner pieces and some how end up with one extra block.  I'm having to sew all of the cut sashing strips back together and the whole thing takes about twice as long as it should to sew together.  But, at least it is done.  The colors in the picture are terrible so I will be sure to take a picture with the real camera when it is done quilting.  But that won't happen today.  Everyone should be home soon and we will have peanut butter cupcakes and open presents. 

I baked cookies for the returning wounded this morning in addition to the cupcakes.  For the cupcakes, I just added a cup of peanut butter to a white cake mix.  I have no idea if it turned out good or not.  They smell like peanut butter so I'm hoping they taste good.  My husband had some peanut butter cupcakes from a bakery at work and he said they were the best thing he ever ate.  Let's see if I even came close :)  If not, I have chocolate chip and sugar cookies as a back up.

3 quilts in a day?

So I finished the blocks on the string quilt this morning and finished putting that together, then ironed and trimmed the UCLA quilt and put that top together for my daughter.  It needs borders and then will be ready for quilting and then I made myself cut into the clothes from my friend who passed away was it almost 2 years ago?  I got them at the end of last summer and didn't feel like working on them during the year.  Making memory quilts is emotionally draining and with all the migraines I've had I just didn't have the energy to deal with the emotions.  So, today, since I didn't feel well, I figured I'd deal with my issues and at least get started.  Once I started cutting, there were only 6 pieces of clothes and it didn't take too long to get everything cut.  I couldn't decide on a pattern so let the fabrics tell me what to do.  I cut 6 1/2 inch squares and 3 1/2 inch squares, as many as I could cut out of each dress and skirt.  I remember my friend as wearing some of the craziest pants, but her daughter gave me these beautiful colored dresses and skirts.  Those were her memories of her mother.  I wanted to make two quilts, but there just isn't enough fabric for that so I'm doing what I can and hoping to get the rest of the top at least pinned tonight and sewn in the morning.  Tomorrow is hubby's birthday so not much sewing perhaps, unless he lets me stay home from the movies.  I'm not much of a movie fan and the kids want to take him to see the new Superman movie.  Aren't they all the same?  I'm sure I've seen at least one of them and part of the TV series. 

So, you can say I've done a lot of sewing today.  I think that is what summer is all about.  I can't wait for my little guy to be finished with school so I can have a day where I don't even have to leave the house.  Just think what I can get done then :)

Better go pin that quilt before the dogs walk on it and mess it up.

I love string quilts

My daughter says they are 'homey' if that's a word :)  I just love the look and heaviness of them and the ability to take nothing and make it into something useful.  I've been working on this for the past couple of days and I love just sitting and sewing mindlessly.  This one will be quilted and given to a returning wounded soldier coming through Travis AFB on his/her way home.  My first project of the summer.

This morning I woke up feeling a bit 'off' and now have the aura of a migraine.  Bummer.  I was doing so good.  I think I will drink some of the Valerian Root Tea.  It seemed to help last time.  Of course, more sewing to relax the mind.

I'm going to start working on the memory quilt for my teacher friend who died last year.  Her daughter has two kids and I plan to make two small quilts so they can have a keepsake of their grandma.  Each quilt shouldn't take very long to make.  The hardest part is deciding on the pattern. 

from yesterday

 three quick quilts.  I used some prequilted stuff for the backing and batting and am working through both tops and donated stuff, trying to clean out the sewing room.  It's slow going, but at least it's going.

more about the dinner

This is my first plate, I had 4!  This was the fanciest food I've ever eaten.  There were stuffed mushrooms, cucumbers with crème cheese and salmon, dried pears with crème cheese and nuts, lots of different cheeses with crackers, tri tip roast, fancy dill dip with lots of veggies, fresh fruit, chocolate covered strawberries, cake, crème puffs.  I ate and ate.  The scale this morning reminds me that it's probably a good thing I'm not super rich and can't afford to eat like this all the time.  So glad my daughter worked hard and earned that scholarship.  I'm going to have to learn to cook like this :)  Yummy!