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.