Nail apron

My husband asked me to make him a nail apron today, so I did. He drew up what he wanted, and I had a canvas drop cloth I'd bought to use as tote bag lining, so away I went with the scissors and sewing machine.

My handsome guy wearing the apron:


A close-up:


Cletus investigating:


After all that, he wound up not using it today. The roof that needs fixed is just too high.

Creative goals for 2010

- Organize my craft space so I'm more able to create
- Use what I have and buy only purposefully
- Complete a journal quilt every month
- Enter at least one quilt in a juried competition
- Continue working on UFOs and WIPs
- Start back up with Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain

I won the vintage goodies!

Thanks, Cathy, for the vintage happiness.

I've been doing a whole lot of nothing. Tonight I need to get my son's blanket hemmed for a Christmas present, and sew up some gift bags.

Grand giveaway

Cathy over at Crazy by Design is having a wonderful giveaway. SIX different wonderful packages. I'd like any of them, but my vintage gene won out, and I picked #4. So if you follow my link, pick something else to enter for! See:

A bit of work on ATC

Not much creativity around the house today - I continued picking up stuff, but mostly I watched the James Bond marathon on SyFy. (How stupid a name for a TV channel is that, anyway? When it was SciFi, I had no problems, but with SyFy, I want to pronounce it "siffy.") I did get the rest of the applique pieces for my ATC cut out and ready to go, and trimmed up about 3 more bases. Hopefully I will have enough done for the bases - otherwise I'll need to change the foot on the dang machine again.

I can't post any photos until the recipients get them - only little teasers, and that's no fun.

If I'm going to do the ornament exchange this year at Guild, I also need to get busy on that as well.

ATCs

I made my first few ATCs, and they've turned out about as well as I hoped. No pictures, because they're going to be traded with other people, and I want it to be a surprise :)

If I was going to post pictures, they'd just be weird pictures of sunsets with contrails hidden behind trees, so you're not missing much.

Halloween Sweatshop

The annual costume extravaganza is over. The mid-kid had to have TWO costumes, since his dad thought up a great costume for him for his karate Halloween party.

The Lovely Daughter costume: a Dandy-Lion.


There was unbelievable angst this year about not buying a costume. Tears, shouting, the whole nine yards. The major problem I have is the incredible skimpiness of nearly all of the adult women's costume. Simply NOT appropriate for a teenage girl, no matter what the teenage girl thinks.

The Mid-Kid costume #1: Squire/Knight/Prince. [his idea, the one that went trick-or-treating]


The Mid-Kid costume #2: Mr. Derek, his karate instructor [his dad's idea] - the picture is of the mid-kid with the real Mr. Derek.


Small Man's costume: King De-de-de [a video game character]. This is at the KinderCare Halloween parade.


All kids together before trick-or-treating:


The trick-or-treating group [we picked up a couple more along the way]. This group has been going together for many years.


Much candy was acquired. I was the only casualty of the evening - my ankle went out from under me and I went down on a concrete path, scraping the heck out of my wrist.

Art Every Day Month - Day One

I've officially signed up for Art Every Day Month.

I'm off to a good start - I made these little flowers this morning:


At least one, and probably both, will go to my Lovely Daughter for her birthday next week. I have a few beads sewn into the center of the big one, and a pin back sewn on. Just need to find [or break down and buy some more] hairclips and sew one on and it's done.

Pay it Forward

Man I'm behind. But I need to pay it forward.

I was the happy recipient of a lovely little bag from Moneik. Unhappily, I can't upload photos from this computer, even if I could find the dang camera. You'll have to trust me that it's really really cute - turquoise and brown batiks. AND not just pretty - it came in really handy doing the tourist thing in South Dakota; just the right size for a camera, room key, some cash and a credit card.

Now it's my turn. The first three people that want to participate will get a handmade goodie from me. I have no idea what it will be :) Knowing how things are going around here later, it'll stretch the 6-month envelope as well!

Giveaway at the Pumpkin Patch!

http://pumpkinpatchprimitivequiltshoppe.blogspot.com/2009/10/its-happy-halloween-giveaway.html

Lots of lovely fat quarters being given away. Hopefully I'll win them - but if I don't maybe one of my friends will!

I'm not dead...

Back from vacation and still trying to catch up.
1. I'm still going through e-mail, and will try to track down my winners for the giveaway at some point.
2. Meeting Moneik was even more awesome than the quilt shop she works at, and that's saying something!
3. I'm too lazy to take a picture right now of the awesome little bag Moneik gave me for pay-it-forward, but will have one when that gets its own post. Sometime in the future. Hopefully not TOO far in the future.
4. A box of flannel came in the mail today from Jill. Thanks! Again, too lazy to photograph. Now I just need to transmogrify it into baby quilts.
5. I took DD13 and 2 friends to the mall tonight for less than successful shopping. Wiped out; chasing teenagers around is as hard as chasing toddlers around.
6. My new bobbin case for the Featherweight came! Now I have good tension and have a perfect seam.

Giveaways!

This is post #191, and at the rate I'm going, #200 would be well AFTER Christmas, so I'm going to do my giveaway now. These are all patterns that came in a Christmas basket I won at our guild show, and I really will never use them.

Let me know which one(s) you'd like to put your name in the hat for, and I'll draw after I get back from vacation, the last week of August.

1. Christmas mailbox. This is SO cheesy, I don't imagine that anyone will want it, but Jen found a home for Harvest Spice, so clearly anything can happen.


2. Thimbleberries stocking.


3. Thimbleberries book of Christmas quilt patterns.


4. Advent calendar.


5. Snowbaby ornaments.


6. Sports Santas.


7. "Angels all Around" tree skirt

New toy

Just because.
I haven't bought a new machine, ever - my last new machine was my 12th birthday present. That's been a while ;^)

So far, it's lovely. The kids sat next to me last night trying the fancy stitches out.

I haven't completely drunk the kool-aid - I also ordered a new bobbin case for the Featherweight in hopes it will fix my tension issues.

Hopefully back to the land of the living?

Officially diagnosed with Lyme disease and took the first dose of doxycycline this afternoon.

My house is even more of a cesspit than usual, I haven't sewn anything in 2 weeks, and work's been a struggle. I look forward to getting closer to normal.

Ready for the pool

TMOTH took the kids to the pool last week after the big kids went to the dentist. Small Man was ready about an hour before they got home!

This'N'That Fabrics

My order from This'N'That fabrics came yesterday. Three pounds of scraps all crammed in a big squish envelope!


I counted 40 different patterns! Most are in the 10-12" WOF range; a few are more fat quarter-ish, and the ones on the far right are 4-6" WOF strips.

The best part? Mostly, these are fabrics that would NEVER have come home with me if I were "picking" them. They're just not what usually catches my eye - so I think it's a good thing that another dimension just got added to my stash.

Retail angst

Something I have to do when I go back to the grocery store...
Do these look like porterhouse steaks to you?



The one on the far right does - the one that was on TOP of the package of steaks. The other ones? Not so much. The three that aren't vacuum sealed we ate, and they were good. But. NOT what I thought I was buying.

I'm not sure what I actually want, if anything, from the grocery. They need to know, though, that it's a concern for me if I can't trust their labels.

Setting up the new [old] aquarium

We've had the tank for a long time - since we lived in Mobile, and that's been 1994 or so. We had it set up for a while here, but when the last fish died a few years ago, we just never got it back running again. Well, we [I] got all the gravel and rocks washed, and filled it back up. Filter runs, heaters run. YAY! Go to the pet store on Saturday - each kid is allowed to pick out ONE fish. Gotta let the aquarium cycle, and 3 fish is a reasonable start-up load for a large aquarium.






Well. See those little silver dots in the upper left corner of the aquarium? Less than 24 hours after release into the tank, the female molly is popping out baby fishies. A few more than 20 so far, as best as we can count. They're cute, and growing fast. Hopefully the big fish won't eat them all!

Great giveaway

Oodles of Amy Butler scraps and a cute bag pattern over at Sheree's Alchemy. Stop by and register - you can always share with me if you win :)

Peach-Mango Sorbet

I was going to call it "Orange Sherbet", but the Lovely Daughter insists that it's not orange. I made a bunch of blocks this weekend, but I don't think I'm caught up on the 9-patch challenge. Closer, but not there yet.

I was only able to get that much done because of this:

Everybody seemed to be lazy on Sunday. Possibly because the Small Man was starting to get sick, but it's not clear yet that he's germy. Maybe just ate too fast.

I believe I've confessed here before my sad addiction to scraps. Just love them. Am entranced by them. Well, I went to the new location of G Street Fabrics and managed to leave with only two bags of scraps (mostly NOT quilting fabric, BTW) and a nice not-quite 2-yard piece of backing fabric.