Material Girls Christmas Luncheon 09

Material Girls Idaho Oct 09

Went to my quilt group today, Material Girls Idaho, and as usual it was motivating and fun. Here's a slide show of the quilts and wallhangings, etc that were shown in the "Sew and Tell". Enjoy!

8 Years

This month marks 8 years since we moved to Idaho from South Carolina. We moved to be closer to family, most of them live in the West. But leaving South Carolina was hard. It's a beautiful state and I have wonderful friends there. My quilt guild on Hilton Head Island was especially hard to leave and I was part of 3 smaller quilt groups that met monthly too.

This is a quilt that one of my groups made for me as a good-bye gift. Each friend paper pieced a square and also signed one of the squares. It hangs in my family room and is such a treasure to me now. That's what quilts do for you. They become a legacy of love long after the makers have moved on.

Table topper

Finally finished my table topper which I'll probably use in the fall and winter months. I think I may have to start making more table toppers and back of the couch quilts because they're so quick and I can actually machine quilt them myself. There's some wonderful series of books called Toppers by Nancy Smith Lynda Milligan which gave me the idea. She has lots of fun ideas for topper quilts.
With this topper, I was able to use scraps from my stash. Now that's a great feeling.

End of the year Teachers presents

I saw these online one day and thought they'd make a cute present for my daughters' teachers. It just so happens that they each have a teacher whose name starts with "W" so I'm only showing one picture. But I think they really turned out cute. It's the one time my girls got to break crayons legally. We actually ended up putting a couple 3-D scrapbooking stickers on a couple corners just before wrapping them up also. The girls signed their names on the back. Shadow boxes have so much potential for lots of cute ideas.

Aprons for Argentina friends

Before my trip to Argentina I decided I wanted to take some gifts. We picked up books, posters, candies, etc and I also made 2 aprons for ladies I had been exchanging emails with, Maria and Marcela. (My daughter Kristina is here modeling them for me so I could have a keepsake of what I'd made.) Another email friend was Susana, but I had previously sent an apron to her through the mail. I was so excited to meet them and wanted to take them something home made from me. Both of them are amazing and fun women and I thoroughly enjoyed being with them, eating with them, talking and laughing with them, shopping with them and just being in their company. Oh how I wish we lived closer! But what a blessing it is to live in a day and age with email and instant communication.

Argentina trip

Just got back from a wonderful trip to Argentina to pick up our son who was serving a mission for our church for the last 2 years. We spent a little over a week with him meeting people he had taught, eating with families who loved him and seeing the sights of Cordoba Argentina. It was amazing and we made such wonderful friends there. It was very bittersweet to meet such wonderful people, love being with them, then realizing that we might never be able to see them again. When we got home we had a great reunion with family and friends. Here is a slide show of some of our pictures from the last few weeks.

Playing without a full deck...

Two things we have plenty of in the house are duct tape and playing cards, but very few full decks. So my daughter and I made this fun purse from all the Uno cards we could find around the house. We got the idea from a project on craftbits.com. We were lucky to have pink duct tape too which makes a cute interior for the purse.



Here's a little peak at what's on my design wall right now. I'm using all scraps from my stash and I'm working on border ideas.

5th Baptism quilt complete

Number 5 of 6 baptism quilts is now complete. And this time I actually finished it before Leah turned 10. Considering they get baptized when they're 8, I'm pretty happy about this. My youngest gets baptized later this year, so I'm hoping to get started on hers pretty quick.

My friend Terri Hair quilted it for me and she did an awesome job as usual. Leah's quilt was the first baptism quilt that I hand embroidered instead of hand quilted. I really like how it turned out and the pictures are so much easier to see because of the thicker thread. I also printed the center scripture onto fabric straight from my computer. I tested it ahead of time to see if it would wash out or bleed. I hand washed the test strips with cold water, hot water and detergent and it held fast. Even so, I will only wash these quilts with tender loving care and only if they need it badly.






Because Leah was born in Samoa, I embroidered the Samoan islands and the city she was born in.

I've also depicted the family,the temple in Boise, her baptism and confirmation and an "I am a child of God" square. Leah picked the colors and blocks for her quilt. She insisted on putting polynesian looking fabric on the back even though the colors had nothing to do with the front. At first I was hesitant, but after all it's her quilt, so I went with it. Now that it's done, I really like the back and Leah is so happy with it. She loves to show it off to anyone who comes over.

January 09 Show and Tell

My quilt group, Material Girls, met this past Wednesday. What an amazing group of friends I have!! They are all so talented and it's always a treat to see their handwork each month--so inspiring. I have all kinds of ideas swimming around in my head now. Where to begin is the big question. Enjoy the slide show.

Finished tops and boggle fun

We went out of town right after Christmas and look how long it's taken me to get back into the swing of things here. We've been back for over a week. Our new family game is Boggle and it gets very intense. It's also pretty hilarious to hear the words that my littlest girls come up with. Sometimes they really surprise us!

I finished 2 quilt tops over the holidays, so now comes the fun and scary part, machine quilting them. This first one I will attempt to do myself since it's not very big. Any ideas for the white space around the flowers would be appreciated. Should I echo quilt or just stipple or what? I'll post a picture of the second top later. In the meantime I need to call the quilter and get on her waiting list. I can't believe how long her list is now. She's really become popular but I know it's because she's so good and worth the wait.

Ballet Angels

My daughter and I made these little ballet angels and she gave some of them to her ballet/dance teachers. I had most of the materials here at home and they went together quickly. Underneath is just a short dowel with a wood bead on top for the head. The arms and legs are binding with a knot tied in the middle for the hands and a knot at each end for the feet. The dress is a piece of lace and the wings are made from some wired ribbon I had around the house or you can use some light tulle. At the neck, we hot glued a little rose bud from some wedding type ribbon. The hardest part was working with the glue gun and lacey, dainty objects. After a couple minor burns, I switched to the low temp gun. It worked beautifully and my fingers were much happier.

Stockings galore!

I don't remember why we got started with this, but my husband and I both needlepointed all of our family Christmas stockings. We bought a kit one day after our first son was born and just plowed through it. It was actually very relaxing back in the days of our sweet and simple early married life. Then we ventured into the world of painted canvases and haven't looked back since. They are so beautiful, expensive, but beautiful. There was a lot of detail on each canvas and these stockings took hours. My husband made mine by himself and I made his, but we both worked on each of our children's stockings. We bought a book with hundreds of different stitches and believe me, we tried many of them. I love how they turned out. They are truly one of a kind, all six of them so far. We are now slowly working on the last 2. The enthusiasm for the project has waned a bit and the eyes are not as sharp, and I've even rationalized my way out of it by saying I'll make a beautiful quilted stocking for each of them, but I just can't quite justify that, so where there's a will... Wish us luck.

Burritos and Lists

The burrito pillowcases are quite addicting and I find myself making more and more. Today I made 2 more, this time with the accent trim. These are going to my missionary son in Argentina. He loves music, so I couldn't help using the fun black and white fabric. This method is so much easier than the traditional method of pillowcase making. I mentioned before where I found the tutorial, but here it is again. Google the words "Designer pillowcases" and it should be the first link that pops up. It's a pdf file from Univ. of Utah.

My youngest presented me with her Christmas wish list. She has high hopes for someone so young. It all looks as I expected until I got to #9...where am I going to find a real elf??? The only one I thought of was Will Farrell and although he'd make quite a funny addition to our family, it might feel a bit awkward. So for now, I'm on a quest, a Christmas mission, to find a real elf. Craig's List perhaps??? Any help or leads would be appreciated.

Scrappy Wreath

Just brought this out and put it on the wall. I made this wall hanging a few years ago and have taught classes on making them too. It is another project from the snippets method from Cindy Walters which I talked about in a previous post. I love using up scraps and not having to use templates of any kind. All the strips are just cut randomly with scissors after placing Steam-a-seam on the back of the fabric. Then place your strip on a background fabric. It's a little sticky so it stays where you put it and it's also repositionable so if it doesn't look good, lift it up and try it somewhere else. It doesn't become permanent until you iron it. Endless possibilities!

Burrito Pillowcases

These pillowcases were the easiest yet to make. They're called the burrito style pillowcases and I made them to give to my son in Argentina so he can give them away to kids down there. I made 4 in an hour and I've also made one with a 3rd trim on it. I found a great tutorial download by googling "designer pillowcases" and it's a download by Utah State University coop extension. I had to see the pictures in order to understand it and this download had good pictures.

Tall Paul

I love snowmen and when my quilt group decided to make these Tall Paul wall hangings, I was more than happy to start another project. This went together quickly and of course, it got cuter as it went along so I was motivated to get it finished.

I'm slowly putting things up around the house, putting up a little here, a little there, a little today, a little tomorrow (some years I get it done faster than others. For some reason, this is a slow year). Today my wall hangings went up and Tall Paul has his place front and center in the dining room where his smiling face is there to bring a little cheer.

Show and Tell

My quilt group, Material Girls, met today for our annual Christmas luncheon. Fun, food, gifts, gabbing, showing and sharing...

So Full of Thanksgiving, but Loving It

Our Thanksgiving came and went almost like a blur. Can you believe it's already December? Maybe our global warming is also speeding up time. I wish we could at least have our holidays with our families in slow motion. My brother, Steve, came with his family and #1 son came home from college with his girlfriend. We only had 14 at the table this year. I say "only" because that might be our smallest group yet. Coming from a family of 12 children, I seem to need large groups around me at the holidays. We had a wonderful time though eating, talking, playing games, watching movies and eating some more. We had tons of great food prepared by many hands. Thank you Steve for making the trip here. It means a lot. My heart (and stomach)are full of thanksgiving for such bounteous blessings and I know they come from a loving Heavenly Father. He loves all of us unconditionally and that's probably the greatest blessing of all.



In the midst of all our fun I received a prize in the mail from a giveaway(Yeah! I actually won something!) by Melly & Me. It's the cutest pattern. My daughter has already declared ownership of it and wants to make them. Melly & Me has lots of cute patterns, go check them out.

Fun in the Mail and in the Air

Look what came in the mail. While reading Sarah Smith's blog, I saw that she was asking for volunteers to test her new product, a microfibre screen cloth. Just the day before I had been so frustrated by my dirty screen and had tried everything, including using the cloth that actually came with the computer. But there were still streaks everywhere. So when I saw Sarah's request, I quickly signed up and to my surprise they came in just a few days. Not only are they cute, but they did a great job, no streaks anywhere. In fact I was pretty ecstatic about it since last week's cleaning was such a failure. I showed my family and they immediately went about the house looking for "screens" to clean and were also impressed. Now they all want one of their own. Thanks Sarah. You definitely have a hit. I'll get the questionnaire back to you soon.


We're getting ready for the guests to arrive this week. We have 2 here already (college son and girlfriend-more on that later), but most of them don't get here until Wednesday, but that didn't stop Nikki from happily giving up her bed for the incoming cousins and setting up post on the pull out sofa. This is half the fun of family coming into town-stirring things up and changing things around in the house even if it's only for a couple of nights. There's a wonderful and undeniable magic in the air during the holidays especially for 7 year olds.