Friday, January 29, 2016

A storms a brewing so time to sew

Last week we got away easy with that nasty storm that battered the US , we didn't get a flake , however the same is not true today , we are in for a possible 40 cm of the white stuff with very high winds to blow it around . This all makes for a great reason to sit and sew . Still unable to sew for long periods but it is amazing what you can accomplish in small increments if you plan it right .
 I have all the pinwheels made now for the Frozen panel but not sewn together yet but I am so happy as that is the bulk of the work completed !!
  I signed up for a BOM on SewSheCan and this months block was a bowtie block , I have had this made for a while now but didn't think to share it .
My sister Donna and I are doing this BOM as well as the Craftsy BOM , should be fun . I must be insane as I also signed up for the Splendid Sampler with Pat Sloan and Jane Davidson , a full year of sampler blocks in the small size of 6" , I know I am going to love doing this . Two blocks a week seems doable at least that is what I am telling myself .
 Now to top it all off I bought some fabric through Craftsy just after Christmas in one of their sales and had a plan for one lot of it as soon as I seen it on sale . I had been drooling over a Christmas quilt in  a magazine called Quiltmania the Special winter edition for 2014 and REALLY want to make it so decided this week to start doing some of the stitcheries involved with this project . Want to see ?
 Sure you do , you are likely saying what is this one up to now .
Three of the blocks had embroidery so I figured while I am sitting watching TV I should make use of that time and get those completed . I am so loving this , lots of reds and browns in this quilt , now I know you want to see what the rest of the quilt will look like so here is a picture from the magazine .

 This  is simply called Merry Christmas and is designed by Jenelle Kent and made by Cathy Stone .  I have just the spot I want to hang this quilt which measures at 56"x56" or I think it will fit . If I am not too late Sharon I would like to consider this project a Lets Book it project . I will work on this as time allows and so glad I have several months before I actually need to have it finished :-)

So you can see I have not been idle , slower than normal but far from idle . I am off now to the machine to start sewing some pinwheels together so I would like to say to those close by , stay safe and warm during the storm and don't go out unless absolutely necessary .
 Thanks for stopping by today , always a pleasure to see you .
 hugs Sheila

Wednesday, January 20, 2016

Two small finishes

Well I might not be able to sew for long periods of time but that doesn't mean I am not sewing . I really wanted to get a couple of things down off my design wall so over several days I was able to finish these two projects. First off is this pillow , I am either really late or really early for Christmas , I will go with the later .
Remember I shared this stitchery with you before Christmas , well I obviously didn't get it made on time for this past Christmas but it is now ready for next Christmas  :-)  .
 Next is my Temecula Mini project , which was a weekly block and are super tiny measuring in at just 2.75" .I decided to make it into a runner on point which was one of the options . Hmm maybe I should have gone with something a little less challenging , my mind didn't want to wrap around getting this together properly .I had to keep it on the design wall and just take a row at a time so as not to mix things up but the good news is I did it !! Yeah for me , there are sure a lot of seams in this tiny thing so quilting it I went with just quilting in the alternate blocks and triangles but being so tiny that is plenty .

 I think it is so darn cute , the colours are a bit off here , that lighter fabric looks white but it is not a pure white for sure . Very fun little mini , love it :-)
Now ,what am I working on now , well I am so behind on everything these days but I just had to start on this quilt for my granddaughter .I had my friend Diane purchase the panel for me last winter when she was in Florida and had plans on getting two of these made for Christmas , well that didn't happen either so the time has come to make a start . My initial plan was to do blocks with appliqued snowflakes but with my back situation and the time it takes me to do that type of sewing I decided on a different approach . Pinwheels , yep , making quite a few of them but only have 8 made so far and 10 more in hsts waiting to be sewn together . If I do a little at a time and then rest my back I can manage this I think . Here is how it looks so far , the pinwheels are not sewn on just beside the panel which I have sewn a border around . There are other colours that will be introduced here so this will get mixed up some but I do like it .
and here is the little pile waiting for construction ...

I sure miss my sewing time , I know what am I saying , I am sewing but not like I normally do and it is so frustrating because my brain wants to do it but my body says wait a minute you can't sit here any longer , take a break and those are very frequent :-(   I have to be grateful for what I can accomplish and stop complaining right !!
 Thanks for stopping by today , it is always nice to see you .
 hugs Sheila

Thursday, January 14, 2016

A little progress

Although slow I have made a little progress , I do have to listen to my body and stop when things tighten up but I have managed to do a little sewing for a few minutes at a time . First off some hand sewing , I had started this little stitchery quite a while before Christmas but never did finish it so thought I would be ahead of the game for next year and get it finished . Not finished yet but I do see a light at the end of the tunnel .



You know since I broke my wrist almost two years ago now I find my stitches are not as good or even , don't seem to have the same control but I am ok with that . I also started and finished another little stitchery , this was in a magazine my friend Dianne had given to me ,Better Homes and Gardens Quilts and More winter edition . I fell in love with it immediately so went about cutting up my small pieces of reds by hand and started basting hexies and stitching the stitchery that goes with it . Here is my work in progress .
The stitchery is finished and the 46 hexies are ready to be stitched together , my next job but one I do enjoy :-) Thanks Dianne for the great magazine , so many really cute projects but I was especially eager to do this handwork .
My sister Donna and I along with my friend Annette are going to do the Craftsy BOM for 2016 , this will be Donna's first Bom , she is not new to sewing but new to quilting and very enthusiastic about starting this quilt , if you haven't seen it you should check it out , you may want to join us too . Over the period of several days I managed to cut and sew the blocks for this month which consist of 15 hour glass blocks and a border . The first thing I did was venture into our local fabric shop which was not easy to say the least but I spent as little time as possible as standing for long periods is not good  but I needed a large print for my border so I could choose fabrics to coordinate for the rest of the quilt . My plan is to use as much of my present stash to make this quilt as possible and I did manage to find a few fqs on hand that worked so here is my block so far . I think this will be a fun project and I look forward to seeing what Donna and Annette come up with .

 Now I am a sucker for BOM's I will readily admit that and even my best efforts not to join in are not good so even in my present state of not being able to sew for very long periods I decided to join Darlene of a Needle Pulling Thread FB page  in her one block a week , crazy or what , probably ,but we will see if I can keep up . Only two weeks have gone by so far and I didn't join until this week so had to play catch up , here are my blocks ..

I won some fqs last year called Line Dried by Connecting Threads and I decided they would work for this project , they remind me of my grandmothers aprons or housedresses she wore and this is a traditional block so I think that works !
 So you see even though sewing is not real comfortable I am doing what I can to remain positive and try to heal without over doing it . 
 Yesterday we had a storm , around 20cm. of the white stuff which today is being blown around but I have to admit it sure is pretty , so white and undisturbed at this time . I do love some things about winter , its beauty being at the top of that list , the cold at the bottom .
 Thanks for stopping by today , I hope you have a great day and do something creative .
hugs Sheila