Mother's Day a Little Late

I should have posted this a while ago but am just getting around to showing you one of my wonderful Mother's Day presents, this one from my daughter Caryl. She's a very talented young woman and one of her crafting specialties is card making. By the way I (stole) borrowed all these pictures from her blog which you should check out. In this wonderful box is a collection of cards.
But not just any cards. These are cards with a quilt theme.

Like a quilter she pieced this one with little pieces of different papers.

This one says, "May your bobbin always be full." That is a wonderful quote when you think about applying it to everything in life.

And this is my favorite. It says, "When life throws you scraps, make a quilt!"

So along with the gift card to a new restaurant My son and daughter in law gave me it was a very nice Mother's Day. My daughter's blog is Stamps and Stitches and if you wanted to purchase cards from her I'm sure she could put something together. By the way she is a first grade teacher so she is a busy girl, and along with taking care of her house and husband, she also works part time in a Hallmark store which is very ironic! Perhaps she'll put them out of business someday.

A Quilt for a New Grandson

When I was in Tennessee recently for my nephew's wedding I found this quilt at Tennessee Quilts in Jonesboro, an amazing quilt shop. I had been looking for a quilt for my new grandson who will be arriving in July.
You can't see it in the above the quilt, but many of the colors in the border fabrics were very pinkish and coral which I didn't want in a boy's quilt. Here's my version below. Most of the border fabric I had on hand. I did buy the polka dots-who can resist polka dots!

My quilter as usual did a fun quilt design. So I have got to get going on binding on this soon.

I hope everyone has a great Memorial Day. We'll be at my son and daughter in law's house, painting the room that grandson #1 is moving into to free up the nursery for his baby brother who'll be here in July.

More Rebel Roses

I wrote in a previous post about some Fabric, Rebel Roses, that I won in Heather Mulder Peterson's blog giveaway. A layer cake yields a lot of projects, I am finding. I made the table topper in the previous post and I also made this table runner out of one of Heather's Little Charmers patterns.
One of the reasons I like her patterns is that they have simple directions with great shortcuts. This pattern tells you which way to iron everything and by doing that you get those perfect intersections.

The pattern calls for applique on the triangle ends but I think this brown fabric is cute and I'm going to leave it as is.

I love her combination of colors and I have enough fabric for a couple more table runners so I'll be tackling those at some point, probably for Christmas presents. Make sure you check out Heather's blog and read about the amazing house renovation she and her husband have undertaken.

The Guest Poster

Hi, Carter here. I'm at Nya Nya and Ga's (a/k/a Chris and Mike's) house today. It was so nice out we went to the river nearby and walked on this boardwalk over the river. This is my action shot.
Then Ga and I had to check out the river.

On the other side there was a cow! Nya Nya and I liked it alot. Nya Nya said there used to be a meat packing plant here, whatever that is.

Then we got to go to a playground and play on all the slides and we took a walk on a trail around the pond at the park.

When we got home we picked some lilacs from Nya Nya's garden since it's finally warm weather here.

And now I need a nap from all this running! And Nya Nya and Ga do too!

Finally Some Quilting

Way back in February I won some fabric from Heather Mulder Peterson which I posted about here. So using one of Heather's patterns I already had, I made this little table topper.
Then I tried my hand at a loopy free motion quilting design and quilted it on the old Singer I recently acquired.

I need some practice in speed control but it was surprisingly easy to do. I have a Bernina with the stitch regulator but I have never been able to master it. I think the problem is that the Bernina is too fast and the Singer is much slower. So I'm trying to get back in the sewing groove. I work at a college and this time of year is frantic but I'll be off soon for summer so there'll be more going on quilt wise. Next up is a baby quilt for my soon to be arriving second grandchild, another grandson. I can't wait!

A Blog to Check Out

Remember the post about my acquiring the above machine? I really enjoyed the comments from everyone on what machines they had and how many you all had. Among the commenters was The Quilt Rat. You should go right now and check out her blog and especially check out the pictures of her toy sewing machines, which there is a link to in her right side bar. Counting her 78 toy machines, she has a total of 93 machines! Makes my puny 8 machines look like nothing!

By the way, I have used that old machine above to free motion quilt a table topper and it worked great doing that task. I still need some practice but I was very pleased with the results. I'll post a picture next week of that. In the meantime, have a Happy Mother's Day.

The Blog Friends Award

My dear daughter, Caryl, has nominated me for the Blog Friends Award. I kind of like the description of this award;

"These blogs are exceedingly charming. These kind of bloggers aim to find and be friends. They are not interested in self-aggrandizement. Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut even more friendships are propagated. Please give more attention to these writers."

The reason I like blogging is because of the friends I have made from all over the world so this is an appropriate award. Plus I get to see some amazing quilt ideas, many of which I have then used in my own work.

Caryl is a very creative young woman. She's a first grade teacher and also works on weekends at the local Hallmark store which cracks me up because her craft of choice right now is card making! She makes awesome cards and is a master crocheter so check her blog out. She lives in a cute Victorian two-family home not far from me so I'm glad she's close by. She's my buddy for checking out antique and consignment stores.

What Do You Collect?

I think all of us have things we collect. I have several but one of my favorites is Blue Ridge Pottery which I have collected for years. I got introduced to it by my husband's grandmother who had a set of dessert plates painted in a flower pattern that I loved. Here's some of my big dinner plates all ready for the 27 people who came to my home last Thanksgiving. I also have plates I use for everyday-all different patterns. I love their cheery patterns and also love that they don't chip easily.
Here's a couple of others on display at Christmas.

While in Tennessee for my nephew's wedding my sister and I, along with our ever patient spouses found ourselves in an antique store in Jonesborough, TN and imagine my delight when I saw this

display. Hundreds upon hundreds of Blue Ridge Pottery pieces.

I turned the corner and the other side of the display was equally impressive. I then remembered that these pieces were produced in Erwin, TN from the 30's until the 60's just a few miles down the road. I was mentally trying to imagine how much room there was in my luggage but the prices of all the pieces was quite a bit more that the $1 a plate I usually pay. I did buy one small plate that was part of a matching dessert set of 6 plates and 6 bowls. I had recently broken a plate, because even though they don't chip easily, they do break if you drop them on a kitchen floor! I was delighted to find a matching plate.

So I'll keep looking at yard sales and such. The hunt is the fun part afterall. So what do you collect?