2012 Here we are........are you ready

Happy New Year
Wishing everyone a fabulous year, be happy.....share your smile and have a great day every day!!!!

The best way to cheer yourself up is to try to cheer somebody else up.  ~Mark Twain                   


If you want to be happy, be.  ~Leo Tolstoy

Happiness is like a butterfly which, when pursued, is beyond our grasp, but, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you.  ~Nathaniel Hawthorne


We tend to forget that happiness doesn't come as a result of getting something we don't have, but rather of recognizing and appreciating what we do have.  ~Frederick Keonigways 

Mystery Quilt.....Christmas is coming

I should be Christmas baking & decorating but all I want to do is sew. Did some more aqua/teal string blocks this week and started clue 4 which in my colors is orange strings, they are turning out awesome. I can't wait to see how this is going to go together. Tomorrow morning Christmas decorating although we won't put up the tree until next weekend. Then some baking and maybe I can sew while things cook LOL. I did finally do some shopping today and don't have too much to do but I am excited to have a large part of my family together for Christmas. My Mom is coming and we haven't spent Christmas together in a number of years and she hasn't seen her grandkids(they are 27 & 30) for probably 10 years. She will also meet her grand son in law who happens to be from the same hometown(the world is such a small place really). I can't believe it is only 2 weeks away.........................

Pleasure is spread through the earth
In stray gifts to be claimed by whoever shall find.
~William Wordsworth, 1806

Mystery quilt update

Orca Bay continues; so far I have 62 quarter square triangles completed. I have all  the triangles cut( I think) a lot of halves sewn so it should come together quite quickly if I could stop making step 2. I am totally addicted to string blocks and loving these little guys; I have 49 of them done. My HST will not take long either as I have all the strips cut and using a ruler similar to Bonnie Hunter's suggested Easy Angle makes them go very quickly. I have always loved using Thangles and never thought I would switch but this ruler makes them very accurate. You still use the same size strip as with Thangles and no paper to rip off. I have 48 completed. 2 more evenings until next clue I should be close to caught up but if not.......oh well......
Now off to bed so I can get up for work tomorrow.

Orca Bay Mystery quilt

So far I am loving this quilt, another great mystery I'm sure. I am way behind on step 1, I have all the strips cut; a stack of triangles cut and a few made just to make sure the size is right.

I am using black as my neutral just to see how it works.
I have also started step 2...I love string blocks and these little guys are soooo cute.

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Maybe I can get caught up before step 3 on Friday

My 1st quilt

Bonnie Hunter has done a post about your first quilt and has invited others to share (using her new "linky" thing) I love that she calls it the "linky thing".
Anyway my first quilt is not a thing of beauty but was a long time in the making. I think I started it when I was 10 or 11. My Dad had made me a hope chest for Christmas where you stored things for your own first home and I decided to make a quilt. My mom had always sewn all our clothes so there were lots of scraps to use including velvet and poly/cotton. I cut squares and sewed them together and then after a few rows it got put away for a few years. I then cut new squares and sewed some more rows apparently in a different size but added the rows anyways. It was going to be twin size and when I get engaged I decided it should be queen size.
In the spring of 1977 before I got married my mom helped me pin it to a quilting frame made by laying 2 x 4's on sawhorses in the basement and my fiancee(still my fantastic husband) helped to hand quilt it. We used an ice cream pail lid as the template to draw half circles ; what a memory. Now I have to go find a picture to post here :). Here is the link to the other first quilts on Bonnie's page http://quiltville.blogspot.com/2011/11/first-quilts.htmle

And here we are a day later....................

Quilt 1 done; Quilt 2 almost-great weekend

So among other weekend activities which included making 3 pots of applesauce (=13 jars) I finally completed my dark string quilt with rail fence type sashing and nine patch cornerstones. I added smaller string blocks as the border-will have to take a picture when I get my camera back. It is 92 x 102 and I also got the back made. It is sort of like a large nine patch using up a number of pieces of fabric that have been aging for a long time as well as a couple of newer pieces. I had a great cat print that I hadn't decided what I wanted to use it for. I didn't want to cut it too small and lose the cats so now I have used the whole piece as a portion on the back of quilt that is going on our bed, I thought that was a good solution.
I also have completed my RRCB top; just need to stay stitch around the outside edge and complete the back. Wow it feels great to have that done and I love how it turned out with the pieced border. I will complete that tomorrow night so i can send both of these quilts back to Alberta with my sister-in-law for my niece to quilt as they are too big too fit on my quilting frame. Now I can pre-wash my fabrics and start Orca Bay sometime this week........................can't wait.

Happiness is like a butterfly which, when pursued, is always beyond our grasp, but, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you.  ~Nathaniel Hawthorne

New Mystery Quilt

So............................I couldn't resist. Bonnie Hunter started a new mystery quilt today. Everyone has been talking about it for weeks and I keep thinking no,no,no. I'm just finishing last falls mystery RRCB and I have a number of quilts under way including 2 new Bonnie ones I just started at my retreat a month ago.
I have done 3 of her mystery quilts so far and they turned out fabulous so here I go again. I've been wanting to do a brite quilt on a black background so I am going to use orange, turquoise and purple on black( I think) for Orca Bay.
My niece Cathy and possibly my SIL Betty are also doing this quilt. Check out Cathy's blog for her progress http://CathyTomm@blogspot.com.


"Well," said Pooh, "what I like best," and then he had to stop and think.  Because although Eating Honey was a very good thing to do, there was a moment just before you began to eat it which was better than when you were, but he didn't know what it was called.  ~A.A. Milne


I wonder if eating Honey is like quilting, there is a moment before you start when the anticipation may be the best moment........what do you think?