Finding my Rotary Cutter

 The condition of my sewing room has deteriorated over the last month or so to the point where I could not find my rotary cutter... it was time for a clean up.  I spent over an hour putting things away, folding fabric, sorting through piles, etc. and still no rotary cutter.  I tried to think of the last time I used it...then, I remembered I used it at a recent guild sewing day---it was in the bag I took to the sewing day.  Oh well, the sewing room is looking much better and I had a new project planned!  I gathered up my supplies and got started. 

My MIL lives in a long term care home. She loves to have her room decorated for each season so I decided to make her a small wall hanging for Valentine's Day.  I got out my red 2.5" squares and some other red scraps as well as some white solid for the background.  It did not take long to get the top together, pin basted and machine quilted. 

I will finish hand sewing the binding and hanging sleeve tomorrow for Slow Sunday Stitching. 

I finished knitting the pink dish cloth this week.  I ran out of yarn before I ran out of pattern, so I just made the top border much narrower than the bottom one.  By the time I wove the ends in, I had one inch of yarn to spare.  If I use this pattern again, I will have to use smaller needles. The resulting cloth is still quite usable, even if it isn't square!

As I mentioned earlier, Christine and I went to the guild sewing day with the Oxford Guild this past week. I brought along my "Coming Home" BOM quilt which I started in January 2019.  This will be my project of choice for upcoming sewing days so I can see if I can get it to the finish line.  I spent the day adding more doors and windows to this house border. Some of my doors and windows are a bit wonky but I don't mind this a bit--it gives my fabric neighbourhood some personality and charm. 

Here is a picture of what I have done so far...I am working on the fourth street which goes on the bottom.  The blue house with the pink doors and windows above is part of the fourth side. 

My husband's sister and her family gave us a mushroom growing kit for Christmas.  It has been interesting watching the mushrooms appear out of this brown blob on our kitchen counter.   We harvested four mushrooms today and added them to the sauce on our spaghetti and meatballs tonight.  Delicious!

Finn is back to running around in the snow and sticking his face in.  We are so glad to see him back to his usual self. 

Here are a few more of the circle pouches I made as Christmas gifts. 

Last week, someone asked me about my book with the Christmas ornament patterns in it.  Here is a picture of the book, published in 1991 by Carol Siegel and the Dimensions Design Studio.  This book includes the Bethlehem and cabin ornaments I showed last week.  The other patterns were from a very old crafting magazine.  

I will link up with Kathy in the morning. 

Slow Sunday Stitching 2023

 I have been missing in action the last couple of Sundays for my weekly blogpost.  Our Christmas took some unexpected turns this year ---as the saying goes, life happens when you are making other plans.  Our daughter's dog, Finn, had surgery on Dec 19th to remove a broken tooth. After the surgery, he went into kidney failure and was in the animal hospital for 10 days in intensive care to receive treatments to improve his kidney function.  Thankfully, his kidneys are now working normally again and he is home and feeling much better.  The vets at the hospital called his recovery a miracle as his prognosis was initially very poor.  We are all very happy that he is now home with our daughter and is mostly his usually perky self. We spent the holidays at our daughter's place and are thankful that we could be together to support each other through the stress of Finn's illness.  Finn is our daughter's faithful sidekick and COVID lockdown buddy and we all love him.  This picture was taken a couple of days after he got out of the animal hospital. 

Now, it is time to show off my secret sewing projects!  I made several counted cross stitch ornaments on wooden spools.  This one was for a friend who is a minister.  The pattern was in a book published in 1991 that I have in my collection.  

The next one was given to a friend who likes snowmen.  I didn't realize when I started this one that this Aida cloth is not 14 count--it turned out to be very small and a challenge to stitch.  It is on a very small spool. 

These next few were made using spools from my husband's grandmothers' sewing boxes.  The price on the spools was 29 cents!  We certainly pay more for thread now!  I gave these ornaments to my daughter, my nieces and my sister-in-law. There was also a snowflake ornament which I do not have a picture of. 

I finished my Mother-in-Law's wool appliqué sheep.  She has always been very fond of sheep!

I cut out the pieces for a blue and white block for the Elgin Piecemakers January comfort quilt the other day and will get them sewn together this week. My sewing room needs a major clean up before I can back to doing some sewing. 

I made my husband and my daughter small pouches for their headphones or their charging cables.  I made a lot of these as gifts this year for other family members and friends. Here is a link to the pattern. 

I brought some knitting with me to my daughter's and worked on a dishcloth.  It is not quite done yet. I hope I have enough yarn to finish it!

I will link up with Kathy and the Slow Sunday Stitchers in the morning.  

Slow Stitching

 I have been furiously sewing this week to finish off some Christmas gifts in time for the big day.  Just a little bit more to do! My cousin and her husband came for lunch on Friday.  We do not get to see each other very often but often talk on the phone about our mutual genealogy project--shaking the family tree on our mothers' side of the family to see what we can find out.  The majority of our family members are Scottish with some Irish as well.  I made my cousin a wide open zippered pouch with some fabric I bought in Scotland at a small quilt store in Inverness in 2019.  I picked up a few Scottish themed fat quarters in that shop. 

I am making my MIL a wool sheep ornament.  I bought this kit at a quilt show in October and finally got around to cutting it out this week.  I fused the pieces to a black base and got to work on the stitching. 

You can't tell, but I have most of the head and ears stitched down. I have to add eyes (French knots) and a mouth as well as blanket stitching the snow at the top of the wreath.  There are a few small buttons to add as well.  This will be my slow stitching project for tomorrow.  If you know my MIL, please keep her gift a secret!  I worked on some other gifts too, but this is all I can share for now.  I have a bit more stitching to do on the other gifts as well. 

Finn and my daughter got a lot of snow over the last few days.  Of course, he loves to stick his face into the snow!

My grandmother died in 1985.  I remember her always having a knitting or other project on the go.  She made us mittens when I was growing up.  I still have a few pairs that she made!  One year, she made herself and her four daughters (including my mother) each a NOEL decoration.  When my mother died, I received her NOEL which I hang up every year in memory of my grandmother. Each letter is stitched on plastic canvas. 

I will link up with Kathy and the Slow Sunday Stitchers in the morning.  Next week, I should be able to share the other gifts I have been making.  Have a great week. 

Wedding Gift Finished!

I have been working on two wedding gifts for couples who are already married.  The first couple got married in June and were told that they would receive their quilt by the end of the year.  This week, I finally finished their quilt!  I sewed straight lines about an inch apart across the quilt with my walking foot.  Would you believe that this took three bobbins of thread to complete???  I like the texture that the quilting added. 

I used some leftover purple fabric for the binding and hand sewed it down a couple of days this week as I watched Christmas movies on TV. 

My husband and I started our Christmas decorating today and hope to do the rest of it tomorrow.  We had to move some furniture around to make space for the tree.  My friend, Christine, made us this gnome wall hanging for Christmas a few years ago.  It's hanging in our front hall.  (I made the pillow)

Finn is happy as long as my daughter is close by.  He keeps one paw on her at all times, just to make sure she doesn't move.  This strategy doesn't always work...

Our church Christmas Pageant is tomorrow and I was asked a couple of weeks ago to make a couple of curtains for the "TV" at the front of the church where a reporter will be telling the Christmas story.  One curtain is plain black and the other is white with the words "Breaking News" on it. I used yardage from my stash for the curtains and hand sewed (with very large stitches!) some felt letters that I cut out onto the background.  This way, I can easily remove the letters and put the fabric back in my stash.  

I helped to install the curtains this morning before the dress rehearsal.  The top of the curtain is attached to rings with clips on them so the curtain will slide easily to change it from the white one to the black one.   

 We are looking forward to seeing the pageant tomorrow!  

Of course, there has been other hand stitching this week on my secret projects...   I will link up with Kathy in the morning. 

Another Retreat

You may have noticed that I was missing in action last weekend...no blog post!  Christine and I were away for the weekend at Camp Kintail.  The camp hosts two crafter's retreats every year and we try to attend both.  We both made great progress on the projects we brought with us and the meals and accommodations were fabulous!  The camp was decorated for Christmas, inside and out. The other retreaters were sewing, knitting, crocheting, doing paper crafts, making cards, making blankets, etc.  It was fun to see what everyone was up to and to visit with friends, old and new. I'm sure you are wondering what we made at the retreat...

I always like to bring a simple, warm up project to kick off a retreat.  I put my scrappy drunkard's path blocks together and decided on a layout.  I took a picture and then put the blocks away to sew together at home.  I will likely use this as a wall hanging.

Next, I dug into my turquoise scraps, cutting lots of strips between 1" and 2.5" wide.  Such a pretty pile.  

The idea for this quilt came from a free pattern on the APQS website called "Improvised Herringbone".  The pattern recommended foundation piecing the strips on a muslin base.  I didn't have any muslin so I used the interfacing cover from my recently purchased microwave instead.  I grabbed the cover from the box before it headed to the garbage and saved it from the landfill. (the box was recycled) I still have lots left, even after cutting everything I needed for my quilt. 

The blocks always look better after being trimmed!  Some of these scraps have been around for a while.  The heart fabric in the left rectangle is leftover from a quilt my daughter and I made for her bed when she was 12.  (She is 30 now!)

By Saturday evening, I had the quilt top made.  The background fabric is gray, even though is looks brownish in this photo due to the lighting in the room. 

I used lots of turquoise scraps, but, alas, when I put the lid back on the turquoise bin, it still looked full!

Christine did some hand stitching and made a cute ornament for her dog, Charley, for the Christmas tree. 

She also embroidered a name on a Christmas stocking, put the binding on a quilt, pin basted and marked a baby quilt for quilting and made some Christmas bags.  I don't have pictures of her other projects, sorry.

Saturday was a beautiful day so we took a walk down to the beach to see the lake after lunch. 

These friendly snowmen were outside the dining hall at the camp. 

The table centrepieces were made from pinecones and wood slices from the trees at the camp. There was a a big wind storm earlier this year that brought down a lot of trees.  The downed trees were cut up for firewood and crafts/decorations. 

I finished piecing the back of the wedding quilt I started earlier this year.  Samantha was too many letters to make so Sam it is!  As you can see, the wedding was several months ago.  I promised to have their quilt to them by the end of the year and I should be able to meet this goal.  The bride and groom chose the colours and style (modern) of their quilt. 

I spent some time this week working on the straight line quilting.  I'm about 2/3 done and hope to finish it soon. 

Of course, there was some secret sewing at the retreat as well...

I received a parcel in the mail yesterday.  It was from my daughter.  Last Christmas, she gave me piece of paper with the pattern for this embroidery picture to me as one of my gifts, with a promise to complete the embroidery before this Christmas. I was thrilled to open the package and find the finished embroidery.  It is now on the fireplace mantle in our living room. The pattern is by the Barmy Fox.  

Finn didn't want my daughter to leave his side as he slept on the couch yesterday, so he held her down with his paw.  

It's mitten season!  Finn likes to carry her mittens around but he doesn't damage them. 

I will link up with the Rainbow Scrap Challenge group as well as the Slow Sunday Stitchers.  My secret sewing projects are hand sewn...  have a great week!