The Goose is Getting Fat...

Oh Christmas. It's going to be a new adventure for the Hub and I. No young 'uns at home to make us decorate... or even better, to decorate for us. DS1 used to do it for us in the old days. Maybe he'll do it for us this year now that he's moved back to the hometown.

With the girl child off preaching the gospel in "foreign" lands (California... it's like foreign, but with domestic shipping rates) I know how important the holiday season will be for her to feel support from home. She starts with her birthday, then skips right into Thanksgiving (she was born on Thanksgiving Day) then jumps on to Christmas. I'mjust getting started with holiday sewing. Here is my first free motion quilting project ever:

 

See the tutorial from Missouri Quilt Co HERE. I love YouTube... love it ...love it...LOVE IT!!
If you are a coward like me and don't feel confident free-handing a stocking, THIS is the template I used. It's a downloadable PDF and part of a nice text tutorial at fabricworm.blogspot.com.  

Aiming for Accuracy - Week Number Last!

Hooray for done!

After four months of weekly tutorials, the top - or "flimsy" as some (including me, because I think it is the perfect descriptor, and because it's my blog I can do what I want) call it- for the Aiming for Accuracy quilt is DONE! Of course, that's the easy part. I still need to make a back for it and decide how I'm going to quilt it. You can find the tutorials for this quilt at Quilters Gallery. I enjoyed it a lot and I feel like I learned a lot. Michelle Foster, designer and teacher, is pretty dang great at the whole quilting/tutorializing (that's a real word cuz I just used it)/and blogging about quilting and tutorializing (now it's been used twice...must be a real word) thing.




(Promise me you won't let my English teaching friends read that last sentence. It'll be our secret.)

FWQ - October 2013

Yay! Another month's blocks are done. Just that much closer on my Farmer's Wife Quilt. These were assigned for October. Wanna look at the originals?  Here they are at American Quilting.

Alpha Blocks

Finally! I have all the blocks done which represent the letters of the alphabet. Next step is sewing them into 12 large blocks...in alphabetical order, of course.

How many block names do you know? What if I give you a hint?
Album, Bachelor's Puzzle, Chimneys and Cornerstones, Duck and Ducklings, Evening Star, Friendship, Grandma's Choice, Hayes Corner, Illinois, Johnie Around the Corner, Kansas Star, Log patch, Morning Star, Night and Noon, Octagons, Pineapple, Quartered Star, Rambler, Shoofly, Turnstile, Union Square, Virginia Reel, Whirling Whirlwind, X Block, Yankee Puzzle, Zigzag

Click here to see the photo of the very cool, completed original at American Quilters.

Hub's Day

Happy Birthday Bryan.

There is no other hub I'd rather have in the center of my little universe.
You spin my world.

Progess you can sink your teeth into - A4A week 13

The Aiming for Accuracy quilt designed by Michelle Foster from Mishka's Playground is built in three sections. Now, at week 13, section A is DONE! It is pretty exciting stuff. Here is my section A.

The quilt design is much like a puzzle in the way it comes together. Section A is less than a quarter of the quilt. Section B is a bit larger and Section C is more than half. Then the three sections are surrounded by a border. It should come together quite quickly in the next few weeks. Stay tuned...

Click here to see other Section A submissions from the quilt-along.

The Farmer's Wife - September 2013

Once upon a time there were three tomatoes. There was great big Daddy Tomato, beautiful plump Mommy Tomato and little tiny Baby Tomato. One day after dinner Daddy Tomato suggested they all go for a walk in the woods. So they did. Great big Daddy Tomato took great big strides. It was hard for little tiny Baby Tomato to keep up.  Beautiful, plump Mommy tomato stayed behind with little tiny Baby Tomato who stopped to examine every new thing in the path. Daddy Tomato encouraged plump beautiful Mommy Tomato and little tiny Baby Tomato to walk faster but there were just too many things for Baby Tomato to look at. Finally, great big Daddy Tomato lost patience with the slow-pokes. He walked back to where Mommy and Baby tomato were looking at ants. Suddenly great big Daddy Tomato squashed beautiful plump Mommy Tomato and little tiny Baby Tomato and shouted "Ketchup!"

OK so the story is silly and probably promotes domestic violence but I wanted a segue into today's quilting photo.

These are the Farmer's Wife quilt blocks that were assigned for...SEPTEMBER!! (See the originals here.) Now I can look back and say: Remember that time I completed all the quilt blocks that were assigned in the same month they were due? That is not to say I have "ketch-uped". I'm just happy to announce that I'm less behind this month than I was last month. And, since you asked, yes I am getting a lot better at those points and angles.