Saturday, August 10, 2013

Saturday Already?

SATURDAY, where has the week gone?  Yesterday I had a visitor for a few hours while her human family went hospital visiting.....Isn't she just so cute?  Missy kept me company while I sewed, then we went for a ride to the post office and the store, after that we took a walk came home and played and then when we were ready to have our evening meal, her humans came to collect her.    


Her human mum said Missy wasn't feeling well and that she wouldn't be eating any food, or so she thought.  Aha, after doing her duty outside and our romping inside, she ate some kibble and had a nice long drink, good doggie!

A young man who worked for a family member has been in a terrible accident and the doctors have determined that he will be a paraplegic.  Sadly this young fellow managed to retain high academic scores in school, hold down a part time job and manage to attain his private pilots' licence.  Now the Villagers, his friends and acquaintances are going to throw a huge fundraiser to assist in defraying costs for his rehabilitation which will not be covered by our health system, so, I will be donating a quilt to the Silent Auction.  Since the fundraiser will be in the fall, I am thinking something with earth tones and something not too busy.  Was thinking the Desert Nine Patch pattern.  What do you think?    


or the double Irish chain pattern all done in fall colors?

I am thinking the Desert nine patch might look nicer, but I am a sucker for these types of quilts, especially for fundraisers....who really knows, but I must make a choice and soon otherwise it won't be finished, knowing me!!! I am nearly finished quilting the outside pockets of the tote I am making, then I will be in a good position to make the interior and the handles and then put it all together.  It is my goal to finish it this weekend but I believe it is like I am hoping to get it finished....I never delay interruptions...LOL

I leave you with my thanks for stopping in this  morning once again to share my rambles with and I wish you a wonderful weekend and hope you'll give me a moment and comment with your ideas for my donation fundraiser quilt, I could use all of the help that I might receive and gratefully too!

It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see.  ~Henry David Thoreau





Thursday, August 8, 2013

Thursday Rambles

Ulla is a Quilting Teacher who lives in Finland and who also blogs.  WOW I am enthralled by her talents and how freely she shares and teaches in her Tutorials.   I was drawn by the mention of Sun Dyeing, and sure enough here on her blog is a beautiful themed quilt and pillow which Ulla did herself.  She also shares the link for anyone interested to the actual Sun Dyeing site and there is where you will see how the actual technique comes about. 
This is what caught my interest at first:
Having gone to tour Ulla's Quilt World site to see this beautiful quilt and matching pillows, I somehow, like Alice lost myself inside the blog.  Her skills and talents are fantastic at least I think so. 

I know Ulla is not the only foreign quilt teacher with a blog, I just haven't found them all yet.  I so enjoy my visits and oooh and aaah over the craftsmanship I find there.

This morning I was outside caring for the plants and flowers, got some waling exercise which I really needed.  Returning from my walk I noticed just how yucky my windows looked to I made busy with cleaning them (14 in all)!  They get so dirty because of the heavy traffic that flies past my house.  My living room windows face the road and all of the dust kicked up from cars and farm equipment travelling past leaves a residue of dust on the windows.  Thank heavens the windows are so easy to clean and the polyurethane sills are just as easy to take care of too.  I want all of the sun shine I can possibly get to come into my home.

After cleaning the windows I decided it was time to come here and share my rambles with you, I certainly needed the rest and a nice steaming cup of coffee and another mystery tour around the Quilting web-world.

Now it is time once again to bid you adieu and get back to finishing what I should have finished Monday.  I confess I have been distracted..oh well that's not a big deal having only myself to care for I have all the time in the world, not!!!

Thank you for stopping in and I leave you with this wonderful quote I found which makes more sense to me now than ever before.....

Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.  ~Mahatma Gandhi

  






Monday, August 5, 2013

What Does Today Have In Store For You?


Hey there, since today is the Civic Holiday across Canada, I have been wondering just what everyone else is using this Monday for.  The weather this weekend has turned a tad chilly at nights so that those sitting around camp fires are definitely wearing sweats and sweaters and the swimming is while not quite finished the waterways seem to have only those stalwart people who don't mind the lower water temperatures in there splashing about and using summer to its fullest. 

This morning I heard the Loons on the Lake, I just love Loons, don't you?
Then also this morning I heard geese honking, lots of geese who seemed to be on their way south or so it looked to me as if they were flying south, maybe getting a head start on their annual flight to their winter quarters....

just guessing of course.

My neighbors' pumpkins are growing fast and furious too, so who knows better than nature about the changing of the seasons?

IT'S 53.6 degrees outside on my veranda this morning....up from 52 earlier and I have dressed appropriately to allow for some extra body heat while still keeping all of my windows open to enjoy this wonderful fresh air.  Thank heavens this cooler temperature has scared off those pesky mosquitoes...LOL 

Today is catch up for me after yesterdays throbbing headache and company it is time to get back to my tote bag quilting and creating..I say creating because I never follow a pattern and end up changing it as I go along, a little like Ms. Mary Ellen Hopkins who sadly passed on July 11th, 2013, Ms. Hopkins was my all time favorite inspirational Quilting Guru.

I never got to Skype with my friends yesterday so I'll be sewing and Skyping today, can you feel the anticipation here?  I should be looking to finishing the many quilt tops I have but this tote idea got in my way...LOL

Are some of you like me?  Always eyeing that next project that takes your fancy?  I have so many quilt tops to sandwich and quilt and while I have good intentions to work on those I allow myself to get sidetracked.  No wonder I am always behind my own schedule! 

It is my cousins' BIG 60th Birthday today so HAPPY BIRTHDAY CUZ I wish you a fantastic Birthday this year....WISH YOU WERE HERE AGAIN?

Seems like I have rambled on enough today, so I leave you with my thanks for stopping by to read about what it is I am sharing today and hopefully tomorrow if I don't once again get sidetracked may have something more than just the fabric I am quilting for my new creation to share with you. 

Let us be grateful to people who make us happy, they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.  ~Marcel Proust

Saturday, August 3, 2013

A Taste of the Frugal

Sometime last year I introduced you to a friend of mine, Emma MacPherson,  whose talents are many, then as a photographer and author, now Blogger.  
Today I would like to introduce you to Emma's Blog, Living The Simple Life!  I am certain as time goes on if her introduction to her blog is anything to go by will prove to be of great interest to many.
Congratulations and welcome to the world of Blogging Emma, I for one am so interested in your point of view and am certain I too will be learning something new as I follow along with you!
As I sew on my latest project today the scent of the baking beans I am making are wafting throughout the house....Mmmmm I so enjoy home baked beans and freshly baked bread of which I have a loaf of just waiting for me to cut into....YUM



Several weeks ago a good friend gave me these freshly grown peas from their garden and these have been blanched and are now residing in my freezer for good eating come this winter....so, what's in your freezer?


As Quilters and Crafter's we all search for ways and means to support our hobby habits and in this endeavor many of us follow similar rules to acquiring our materials to create something out of.  As said in some of my previous posts I so enjoy hoking about for remnants to make my quilts from as well as up-cycling different types of fabrics to create my tote bags from as I so enjoy selling that "one of a kind" item I have created and I have Bonnie Hunter, to thank for the taste of frugality I now practice.   Bonnie has been advocating this type of scrappy fabric gathering forever and she proves it with her glorious quilts.

What about you?  Do you up-cycle?  Do you scrounge the 2nd hand shops and remnant bins for your quilted and crafted items?  I see many shops on Etsy that practice up-cycling and these people create very beautiful items.

I had to learn to be frugal due to my being on a very fixed income from pensions so that after paying my living expenses I find not sufficient left over to spend on my hobby.  To this end I made myself a promise not to buy anything new if at all possible and to this end I keep pulling from my stash. This provides me still with lots to work with and at times when I am looking for that one of a kind piece to make I go scrounging the second hand shops and as many of the remnant bins as I can find.  
My recent forays always have me searching for zippers and nice sized buttons to use in my many projects.   Not only do I sew for charity but I also make things to sell near Christmas time and to add as inventory to my Etsy Shop (which is woefully empty at the moment).
Stretching the few dollars I manage to save from selling items is very gratifying. 

Do you remember that wonderful old quote "look after the pennies and the dollars will take care of themselves" or something like those words.  Since becoming a pensioner this is what I have had to learn.  

Once again I would like to thank Emma for her timely themed Blog "Living The Simple Life" because again it has reinforced my need to continue on the road I have set for myself being as frugal as I can possibly be.  

Remember that piece of fabric I showed you the other day ?  I plan on turning it into another one of a kind tote bag which I am still quilting the fabric for, so it is off to get back to that.

Thank you for dropping in today to share some of your time with me and I wish you a perfectly wonderful day and I look forward to posting again tomorrow.  

Expect nothing.  Live frugally on surprise.  ~Alice Walker 



Thursday, August 1, 2013

It's All A Matter Of Perception

It seems like it was only yesterday when I was wishing for spring and summer to arrive!  It has been raining since last night and very heavily all morning and into the afternoon.  The summers of my youth just do not seem to be happening anymore, or could it be my memories are failing me?  This morning near 10 a.m. it could have passed for 9 p.m. that is how dark it was.  It has done nothing but rain for most of this summer around here and I am not liking it, how about you?


Have you noticed, the stores are showing fall fashions and pushing brands for back to school, reminding people that it won't be long now before the new school year begins and praying the profits rise before the onslaught of the Christmas season which will in all likelihood begin to appear in commercials this coming October....already I have seen ads for Christmas in July - like we all have an abundance of ready extra cash to throw about.  Yea yea yea I will take a dozen of those and a gross of the other.....Why not a back to giant back to Quilting sale for us quilters?  I'd enjoy that, wouldn't you?
However, I am remaining calm about the whole Christmas thing, what about you? LOL

I guess you could say it is all a matter of perception!!!!

More than likely come mid November I will be in a panic because I never followed through to complete the so called plans to put under someone's tree..

I tidied up my sewing area, set the two tops I have completed aside to be sandwiched and quilted sometime later (they call this procrastination) and set the scraps neatly away in their containers and while doing that came across a very pretty remnant I found last year.  Now I realize I should finish those two quilt tops, but today I just don't feel like working on them so gave myself permission to begin quilting a huge piece of this fabric for a new project.  I am one of those who cannot afford nor have I come across any decent sales on pre-quilted fabrics so I must make my own and knowing I have control I can quilt that piece any way I choose.  
DO you quilt your own fabrics before turning it into something deliciously fantastic to give away?  I so enjoy quilters who go all out and are creative with their quilting.

Leah Day of "The Free Motion Quilting Project" is one of my quilter heroines....she is so inspirational and motivates me to try new and different ideas while learning something new at the same time.  If you have not visited her blog, you can visit her by clicking here.....She's such fun to follow!!!!  

This is the colorful piece I am working on.  Bright red, gold, purple and black with hints of white, isn't it wild?  Wild can be useful and am thinking a large tote!  Time to make some more totes and other baggie items.  I believed I still have inventory, but no the bin is empty. 

Do you shop for those unusual pieces of remnant fabrics?  I simply love hoking about a remnant bin trying to find that one of a kind piece I may never have seen before. Sometimes I walk around a very long time before I feel ready to pick it out and begin working with it, it is like I just said, I got this piece last year and have seen it many times when in the fabric drawer but just never found that idea for it. 

Look what I just found on Facebook!!!  Isn't she just so cute?  LaCrosse anyone?

Time to say cheers to you for today and I hope your day is turning out to be very pleasant and enjoyable no matter what it is your doing.  Do your best to make it HAPPY.

Maybe we should develop a Crayola bomb as our next secret weapon.  A happiness weapon.  A beauty bomb.  And every time a crisis developed, we would launch one.  It would explode high in the air - explode softly - and send thousands, millions, of little parachutes into the air.  Floating down to earth - boxes of Crayolas.  And we wouldn't go cheap, either - not little boxes of eight.  Boxes of sixty-four, with the sharpener built right in.  With silver and gold and copper, magenta and peach and lime, amber and umber and all the rest.  And people would smile and get a little funny look on their faces and cover the world with imagination.  ~Robert Fulghum