Blogger's Quilt Festival

I have seen this on many of the blogs in my reader, and thought I would join in.

Many of you won't be surprised that my favorite quilt is my Dear Jane!! I started this quilt in 2005, and did the quilt entirely by hand finishing May 2008, my probably the only one I will ever do this way (I love hand piecing and quilting, but putting on bias binding around a 92 inch square quilt by hand, not so much excitement there...putting hanging sleeves on by hand....snore!!). I didn't have any civil war era repros when starting this quilt so traded for scraps and was given some by some generous Dear Janers (other fellow insane people making the quilt!), my quilt has fabric that came from the UK, Australia, Canada, all over the US and even South Africa...I love that part of it!

Before doing this quilt I had never hand pieced, appliqued or quilted anything, it was a real learning quilt and you can see the difference in early and later blocks, but they are all in there.

I had this in the Sisters Outdoor Quilt Show last year, and it won a Viewer's Choice award at the Bend Outdoor Quilt Show, my first ever award! My parents live in Bend, Oregon, so hence the international showings. I hope to enter it into some Irish quilt shows and possibly the Birmingham show in the UK, I am proud of it, most of my other quilts are machine made and less than perfect, but this one I took my time on and learned a lot!

I even still like hand piecing the Dear Jane blocks and am doing a swap with a friend to give an excuse to make more blocks. I will probably always have some hand pieced quilts in progress, though I think from now on, binding can go on by machine!!

I am preparing some Dear Jane blocks this afternoon in preparation for my  trip tomorrow (always bring hand sewing and some knitting on trips), a week with quilty friends, I can't wait, and I will take photos of any projects or fun shops we find!

Catching Up!

It is a day late for Easter and it is only a top, but heck, I am working at a slower pace these days, trying to enjoy my crafts and not guilting myself if I don't finish thing by a self-assigned deadline!  It is very naive/imperfect/primitive and drawn by hand from motifs I have liked from other quilts and folk art... I like it, but how should I quilt it?


And look, Katy's socks are finally done!! We did a little swap and she finished 2 cross stitch samplers for me before I got her socks done. Here is a package I got from her that shows the latest cute sampler she sent me, another part of the inspiration for my quilt! She also added some cool cut-outs in pretty papers for me to use in card making, so nice!

I also did a few quick baby onesies for a friend who we visited last week...forgot to take a photo of the onesies before I packed them up in their cute little gift basket...

When I got out of hospital I was surfing blogs as I always do, and came across a link to The Vintage Pearl. She hand stamps these lovely necklaces, and Dave got this for me as a mother's day pressie. Isn't it lovely?


I also finally finished the quilting on my cousins quilt, it is designed for a specific room to match the colors in there and fit an area behind her sofa. I did a Missouri Star for her since she lives in St. Louis, the blue border is great, has the words family, friendship, love...very appropriate... and I even quilted some shamrocks into it, lol! The colors are based on a Navajo blanket she had in her room. Hope you like it Col!!


LOSER UPDATE: I am up to 181.2, which means I am still down 10 lbs despite my side track with my hospital stay and MS diagnosis. I hope you fellow losers can be patient with me, as I still plan on really joining back in the next few weeks, but am not quite  ready yet.

I am going on a trip next week to visit Barbara and Katy, I can't wait!! A week without the girls with crafting, shopping, sightseeing in Stockholm and a show (Wicked!) in London's West End. A bit of mommy recharging time, just what the doctor ordered. And the doc told me to wait till returning from the trip to start my injections...something I am not looking forward to, but will use it as a line in the sand for starting my healthier eating regime, trying to cut out as much processed food as I can, i.e. junk food, my favorite stuff!!

And just because I don't have enough photos in this post, here are several more of the girls.  Mommy did a bit of bunny crafting with the girls and our little neighbor one day, I find these masks slightly disturbing, but the girls had a great time making me make lots of stuff for them, lol!

Here is the one decent photo I got of the girls doing their easter egg hunt Easter morning.

And finally, my big girl Aine learned how to swim and ride her bike last week, all within days of each other...here is the biker girl!