Playing Catch up ~ A New Quilt is in the Frame!!

I missed blogging last week because my best girlfriend came for a quick visit…

Connie lives about 4 hours from me and because her life is so busy.. she had not yet been to our home!!  She visited at least once a year when we lived near the beach but not since we moved to the mountains… so she left us with this souvenir shot of her visit on an old oak tree 🙂

While she was here she worked on some hand quilting… while I finished up the stitching on this purse for our friend Debbie!

 Molly is watching out for me as I stitched it all together too! lol

And here is the finish…

 It was Priority mailed this past week and already received and put into use!!

Also Connie brought gifts when she came including this cool quilt hanger that my honey installed in our kitchen…

 She also left us some apple juice bottles that are glass and she uses the leftover glass bottles for flower vases… well we loved that idea!!!  So my honey went into our yard and made me a vase for the computer area…

And once I got my quilt loaded in the frame … He also filled another vase with more flowers when I napped one day!!! 🙂

Here he is suprising me with flowers on a day I didn’t feel so good…

 And here they are posed from the opposite side of the jar on the quilt I am working on intermittently 😀

And last night it was to freeze here… so this was the last of the flowers from our yard … so I wanted to share their delightfulness with you all!!!

Molly is now officially 4 months old !!!

 And after celebrating her birthday with a nice bath!!!  We prepped our guest room for Connie’s soon arrival… I love this quilt but soon I think it will be time to wash it one last time and send it to it’s destiny… to be with my darling daughter (dd) Brandi ….

She chose this quilt top and the quilting plan and colors … I just did the work! lol

Once I finished the bag for Debbie… while Connie was here I started prepping the Rooster EPP project …

 And even got out the organizer I had bought for this project too…

Pulled fabrics from my stash… and that pin cushion on the neutral fabric on the left… a gift from Connie too!

 Glued the templates to the fabric as the directions called for using scrapbooking adhesive I had in my stash 😀

 Soon my pattern had MY colors in place of the makers colors… so it will match the vibe in our home…

 Here is a close up of that sweet hexi pin cushion Connie gifted me too …

 And long after Connie was gone back to her home and her crazy busy life… I finally got it all organized!!!

Now to find the time to work on it some more… time to glue baste down all the edges with my Fons and Porter fabric glue sticks.

I removed the doggy themed border fabric and not jiving cornerstones and made this more civil war looking with remaining fabric left from Roberta’s quilt finish….

 Daisy’s Stars is now “Stars Among Us”  Tutorial to the scrappy star blocks is on my blog HERE.  It is truly more of a memory quilt we will use on the foot of our bed in honor of her… as none of this coordinates with Connie’s decor! lol

I chose these stencils … both I have never used before… for this quilt…

The left for the border and the right for the body of the quilt where the stars are 🙂

With batting and backing already pulled long ago for this quilt loading went quick…  First was the backing to put on the 2nd rail and the bottom rail… winding it twice to make sure all was straight…

Then the top and batting were added first to the top rail and rolled on (twice as well) …

 Until they were going on straight and even…

 Then pinned to the backing at the bottom rail and tighted all up….

 Now I am ready to mark and begin quilting once I baste the bottom edge!!!

 Molly is my steady companion when I quilt… she tries to squeeze her growing body in this little box… so I traded it out for a larger box but she teethes on everything right now.. so don’t know how long that will last !!! lol

 Soon the bottom border was all stitched in place…

 And I am now making great headway on the slow stitching of this crazy triangle pattern from my stencil!!!

 Here is my set up.. early each morning I bring in the day slow stitching…

 And here is how I am marking these designs.. with pounce chalk and with a piece of pink chalk in a marking tool…

I am linking this fun slow stitching … where I will be today and every day… with Kathy’s Slow Stitching Squad of hand work specialists HERE!  Come see what others are doing following the link and if you blog come join the party too ❤

This week Bonnie Hunter posted this Bonnie-ism…

 And I received all this wonderful fabric in fat quarter form…

 Then I organized it with some in my stash like this…

 And checked value like this (Batman is for sale and was just a quiet space to rest your eyes between the colors at the top and those same fabrics in value only in black and white at the bottom! lol

 All in hopes of making 16 big 14″ blocks of log cabin bear paw blocks like this…

 So this weekend I cut out the log cabin blocks in medium and light with red centers to keep the home warm 🙂

 And here is a close up of my piecing plan per bear paw block… with the first 4 log cabins pieced on Gloria the Glorious 301a!

 Here was my inspiration block found on Pinterest and shared there by the Stashing Sisters…

 If you are into log cabins…mine are not quite as intense as theirs… but I think it will work!!! lol

In closing this long post… I want to reward you with a glimpse of the Valley Eagle!!!  A bald eagle that lives in this area but we had never seen him… until the day before we got these photos and this day too…

 Here is my dd… now in Kentucky with some of her tribe.  We have a growing friendship now that she is grown up…she is in the center with Jasper the 6  year old sitting on her back! lol

So until my next post … NEXT SUNDAY!!!!  Have a blessed week and…

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Happy Sunday Y’all!  Thanks for stopping in as well!!!  From the North Carolina mountains to you I wish you all well!

The views here are amazing and birds are always out chirping and singing happy songs!  We just love it here 😀  And this Bonnie-ism really seems appropriate today to share with you all…

Have you designed a life you love???  It can be quite tricky to accomplish I agree!

It has been a busy week here at the Lazy Daisy 🙂
 Last Sunday I spent time hand quilting and designing this wholecloth pillow from stash and leftovers of the quilt I am quilting currently…

 Why does my honey need a new snuggle pillow??  Will #1 his current snuggle pillow is getting worn… and #2 I made these cool pillow shams and the current snuggle pillow he sleeps with just doesn’t coordinate… it is cool batik colors and as you see… this calls for more warm muted colors…

 I used some tips from a Craftsy Unlimited class to make the Friendship Braid pattern on these pillow shams… the rest was all my design though 🙂  I love creating things in this environment!

I also am FINALLY a North Carolina citizen with voting priviledges and all!!  I am waiting for the official driver’s license to come in the mail… for now I have this paper ID to show my pride in my forever home state!

 I have been looking for this pattern and after successfully getting my driver’s license we made a run to Walmart down the road and in waiting for my honey I found this pattern…

 Yahoo!  It is for making memory bears… I can’t wait for the opportunity to make one with this pattern too!!!  Have you seen/made this pattern yet???

Also this week my honey got a close up on one of our resident FROGS!!!!

 He was by our water wheel… his favorite place to hang out… but rarely will he let us get close enough to get photos of him….. Yay!

I got 2 different orders of fabric… first came some backing and batting I ordered for the charity quilt I will be machine quilting later this week… I shared the quilt top last week….

 And I got this cool fabric to make a wall hanging for my sewing room!

My deal with myself is though… I must finish the pillow for my honey to snuggle before I bite into this next project… and I haven’t started to hand quilt his pillow top yet! lol  So it sits on my ironing table waiting for me to finish 1 to get to the next!!!!

After chatting with a good friend who machine quilts a lot… I decided to invest in some pool noodles at the dollar store for pin basting on the big island in our kitchen … I will be pin basting all 3 layers following a youtube video by Melanie Hamm.  She explains the process in 5 minutes and includes info on spray basting if you choose that.. I don’t but pin basting is my fave way to layer up a quilt for any type of quilting… I will be using Zena my 401a to machine quilt as that has the walking foot on it 🙂

The above photo is 2 pool noodles per “pole” and each pole has a long piece of quarter round to make it stiff and long … my honey came up with that idea!  I was gonna use mop handles we had picked up at the dollar store… so now we will return those and use what we had… being ingenious is my honey’s favorite talent btw! lol

Finally we are getting to my favorite part and where I have spent a good bit of my week…

 Hand quilting IS sooooo powerful…  I have made lots of progress too!!!

 From marking with my pounce pad (check out a YouTube video by Leah Day if you are interested in trying this method)… to stepping back and realizing I am 1/4 done with ALL the quilting on this quilt!!!

 Here is a close up of my current progress point….

 And here is a long view…

So all this hand quilting goodness I am linking up with other hand work lovers over at Kathy’s Slow Stitching Sunday linky party… Come on over HERE and see ALL this different kinds of hand work going on today all over the world!!!

Update for those of you following my honey’s sciatic pain… he did a steroid dose pack and muscle relaxers and heat this week and took it easy… the hardest part… and is not much better once the steroids finished up so we will be calling his primary doctor on Monday!

Also his newly acquired oxygen concentrator has a yellow flashing light… we thought we had solved the issue with a bit of water in the line… but this morning it is flashing again!!!  So we will be investigating both issues this week….

Keep him in your thoughts this week please!!!!

I will be making a comment first as soon as I post this so hopefully all your comments will come to my inbox today (that was a solution offered by another blogger last week)… otherwise if you don’t hear from me and you are nice enough to leave a comment on this post… come on back later and see if I saw it yet… I comment on EACH post every time! I love comments 😀

Have a blessed day and remember to…

Slow and Loving Stitches Here!!!

Happy Sunday Y’all!!!

 This week I have had a very busy week to be slow stitching… but I find the beginning of a project busy as I gather supplies and make final design decisions on the hand quilting…  So I have been to the beach a few times!

We also were celebrating here more this week… my honey celebrated his birthday this week!  This was a pic I posted on facebook 🙂

 My bestie Connie took a couple of good shots of us when she was here… nice to have an ocean background as that is our fave place of late!

There is NOTHING to me besides hand quilting that equals beach visits for therapy of the soul!!!

Speaking of stitching let me show you the progress I have made slow stitching on this beauty Amethyst Stars…

I shared this planned stencil to use on the outer border…

 Here is where I marked it with Pounce Chalk… and enhanced those markings as I went along with a chalk pen I have…

 Here is the right side stitched up…

 Here is the joined area… this is a directional stencil… so because of that at the center of the sides, top and bottom I have a “join” area to deal with… which I prefer actually so it is all good…

 And here is that joined area stitched and cleaned and dry 😀

 Here is a fun photo I caught in the early morning one day this week too…

 Thought you would enjoy that shot! I love catching the stitching in different light.

Here is the inner border in the design I had planned… and argyl-esque look with 2 colors of perle cotton in use here…

Here is a shot of the “Argyling” I did… it looks oh so cool in real life.. I hope that is captured in these photos taken with my iPhone though! lol

Now I have rolled the quilt yet again (yep that is twice in a week!!!) and have ordered some stencils… I get stencils from 2 different places… The Stencil Company and Quilting Stencils International.  Both can be google searched and ship in the USA as well as overseas for a price I think!  I had exhausted the fun charm square sized stencils from the first place so I checked out the second place… I am now patiently… NOT… waiting for my stencils to arrive via mail.

I do wish there were local hand quilting outlets… I live 1 hour from a big city but there is no hand quilting shops near me … so most of my shopping is done online.  So I wait PATIENTLY! lol

As I wait I am using the stencils I had in my stash/or had ordered from the first mentioned place anticipating my need for charm sized stencil designs.  In this shot you can see my markings from a stencil to the far right charm square…

 And in this shot you can see that charm square is now stitched … as are the 3 stars …

So how many different threads am I using on this quilt all together you may wonder??! hahaha… let me share this shot with you then…

Yep, I am using Aurifil 28/2, YLI 40/3, Valdani 12 wt perle I get from the Rusty Crow online shop, and DMC 12 wt perle cotton too!!!  Each different brand has it’s own texture though so just like using lots of fabrics can make a quilt scrappy.. using lots of different types of threads can make it more scrappy in it’s finish too… I only bought a couple of these for this quilt… the rest if from stash!  I LOVE THREAD!!! lol

And here is my Pounce marking pad…

It comes in white, blue and pink … there is a good video on YouTube by Leah Day showing how to properly use a pounce marker… there is a definite learning curve to this way of marking… and when you “charge ” it to use you have to whack it against something pretty firmly and it makes a startling noise to others around who may not be expecting it! lol  So if you need a quiet environment or quilt with others in the room work out a communication for when you are charging your pad to mark is my advice 😀

I have a Facebook group that I started several years ago… it hums along usually but of late has been languishing… so I am trying to resuscitate it…

 Here is the group name and the Facebook header I just put up this morning 🙂  I have been so preoccupied with my honey and his health and my own health concerns… I am just getting back to keeping up with things I enjoy like this Facebook group ❤  If you are interested in quilty talk and sharing in a small group setting… as to join in this group if you like!  Would love to get to know you each better… if you aren't already in my group that is.

Also to add to my productivity this week I straightened my sewing room quite a bit…

 The top shot is my 401a (on the left) ~ Zena, and my 301a ~ Gloria ready for action… you can see my design wall and ironing surface there too… then below to the left is my cutting surface and it is MUCH tidier.

My bestie gave me that cool wood ruler organizer/holder over a month ago… I finally made a space for it and put a note she left me LAST summer on it along with my small cutting mat and my most commonly used rulers 🙂

To the bottom right is a collage I made of my next project coming up to piece and thus the reason my sewing room needed this tidy.  I now have all the major cuts made to this Christmas wall hanging… you can see the red and green and white with grey fabrics I am using… this will be a wall hanging for the foyer when the season arrives I am hoping!  While I was ordering the white/grey fabric during a clearance sale online… I found some remnant pieces I felt needed to be added to my existing stash to enhance it! lol  They will be used on a future quilt I am planning also!

Here is a closer up shot of my 401a… Zena… with the cool pin cushion my bestie gifted me for my birthday… I sent it to the lady on etsy that fashioned it from vintage stuff … and filled it at my request with walnut shells!  It is weighty and useful… I LOVE LOVE LOVE it ❤

Here is a cool way to use art to decorate and say something meaningful too that I found on Pinterest I think.  I sent it to my daughter but it has spoken to me also…

 I haven’t heard from my daughter since the 4th of July (my birthday) .. hoping all is well with her and helping her to see a silver lining if life isn’t working out as she thought it might!

For now I encourage you to each …

Stitch and enjoy… come over to Kathy’s Quilts to see what others are slow stitching this week too… that is where I will be posting this too!!   HERE is a direct link to make it easy for ya! 🙂  She has a fun interpretation of this too… this is just mine because it has the ocean in it!!!💕

Y’all … there is PLENTY of meanness in our world of late… please be the change in your area… I will be in mine by showing my love to others… won’t you try it too?!!!  

Have a blessed Sunday and a great upcoming week and grab the opportunity to make a difference around you!

For the love of hand quilting!

I really love to slow stitch… via hand quilting!  So when I saw this design I knew it needed to go on the quilt I am currently quilting!

the stencil…

close up of the design once stitched 🙂

In the blocks of this quilt for my honey ….

The piecing is far from perfect … but piecing is NOT my gift… the hand quilting is 😀

But how to mark these intricate blocks… I tried all my marking utensils (and I have a LOT) but all were VERY labor intensive… finally I found the POUNCE PAD… and baby powder 🙂

Here is my marked block.. I didn’t use the stick of chalk but I am not sure I won’t so it got included in this pic 🙂  It marks well on all the fabrics though… as does the pounce pad with baby powder added to it.

And here is how the bottom right corner looks finished….

see how the powder fades away… it doesn’t fade completely but sunlight is my fave light for this process by far!!!

Here is a close up of my quilting stitches thus far…

Overall do I wish I was doing an overall design as many suggested as these are busy blocks already???

Absolutely not… The joy of the hand quilting process makes it all worth is along with the desire my honey has of seeing these designs come to life forever in HIS quilt! lol  Truly how he feels so it is my honor to quilt these designs.

Feather count is up to 32 of the 49 feathers to do (over 65% done with that part)… here is a pic I showed last week that shows how cool the design is as I stitch a feather too 🙂  I REALLY like stitching the feathers… they are playful and fun!

Hooking this up with Kathy’s Slow Stitching Sunday here.

Have a blessed day and enjoy your day today!  Do something nice for you!!