The Lazy Daisy and Sewing Adventures too !

While Spring on the calendar started a while ago… it is just now springing up here in the mountains of North Carolina! 

So Happy Spring Y’all!

Here is a view of our pond and the back of our home on a panoramic shot…

The building on the far left is our pump house… then those big trees across the pond are Bradford Pears that have bloomed and now turned green 😀 … the grist mill or water wheel with house is next then my honey has his “mancave”… a 500 sq ft building for all his woodworking and home reno stuff to be stored… plus stuff for the garden and plantings all over this property… finally is a greenhouse and outdoor storage from the mancave.. and the Valley River is viewed on the far right… it is a busy stream that never dries up… we are thinking that is the difference between a creek and river! lol

In our pond (about 1/4 acre large) we have rainbow trout, bass and crappie in there… we realized this week when feeding the fish… there is a nursery where the active grown fish don’t go and it is overseen by a grandma fish who is quite large (over 2 feet long!!!)  The fish we feed are from 1 foot to 20″ long themselves… and they all look quite healthy.. we have yet to find one floating!!!  But it is all a learning experience…

Above is a video of feeding time on the hascienda!  Enjoy 🙂

Onto sewing adventures… first are the curtains I made for the bedroom…

 they are 2 layered and have raw edged covered with binding….

I copied them from the curtains left in the sun room portion of our living room…

But using fabrics from my stash that would coordinate with quilts we have and that I will be making… my goal is to have a quilt to change to for each season 😀  We shall see how long that takes!!! lol

Now that you have seen the sunroom curtains… look at the new leaders I have for my quilt frame…

They are olive green and off white stripes running the length of the poles… I have directions on how much to cut them for proper use… I had a wider fabric than typical quilting cotton so I got to adjust these a bit which I like… makes it easier to load and unload when done!

Someone had asked about my quilt frame on Facebook… it is a Hinterberg wood frame with 3 metal poles.. a 3 pole frame is the easiest and most user friendly to use for hand quilting.  The front pole holds backing  layer of your quilt sandwich… then the top and batting layers get attached to the 3rd pole and pulled taute once the bottom of these 2 layers is attached with heavy straight pins to the backing… This picture may make more sense than my explanation

So if have a 3 pole frame of any brand… try this way of loading … I get great tension with no issues 😀  And there is no pin basting with this hand quilting frame… BUT I have used this frame to load a quilt for machine quilting too to pin baste for that… it is so much nicer than crawling on the floor… small quilts can be taped to a countertop to pin baste… but large quilts twin or bigger… you need a way to baste or a frame like this to not need to pin baste.

Now to my sewing room reno… I have a few craft boxes to unload still but all the sewing room boxes are unloaded and my room is full of fun!!!!  Here is a peek in the door just off the living room now…

 And here is a panoramic view showing 3 sides of my sewing room…

My cutting table is waiting for a large cutting mat… my cutting mats are all gouged up… I had replaced my Olfa cutting mats with Fiskars only to realize the quality was NOT the same… so I have an Olfa 24 x 36 on order now to fit my cutting table and get it in order…

Above the cutting table is my ruler holder my honey made me several years ago from plywood… it works sooo good!  Next to the right is the closet I will show you in depth below in pictures… it holds all my fabric and notions and batting and stores my scraps and books… LOVE THIS CLOSET!!!

next is the window with a great view of the river and my honey’s man cave… with pics of all my friends with friendships to span a lifetime! 🙂  To the right of the window is a chest I want replaced in the near future that holds my hand quilting marking pens/pencils/chalks… and threads specific to hand quilting as well… plus a few patterns and some glue baste I may use in the never future! lol.

Around from that is Zena my Singer 401a and the Quilt frame my honey made… it has a vintage chair for it now where in the old place it had a stool I couldn’t stand so we left it behind for someone else to enjoy… then my one and only Ott light that I simply move to my sewing spot of the moment… right now I am working on Gloria my Singer 301a… making apple core table topper!!!

Now don’t miss my “k” thread and bobbin holder and the organizer shelf below it… to the right will be my design wall… more on that when we make it but Zena has the flannel for it on her cabinet!!! lol

Above is my closet in snipet shots for you to enjoy… the top right is the next big quilt to go in the frame… for our bed!  My sewing room sign that hangs over the door to this room… and sooo much other fun stuff… we spent under $200 on all the wood and screws for this closet reno … and boy was it worth it.. ALL my stuff is in one room now!!!  Except my hand quilting frames of course! 😀

And now to my darling new project… a string of apple cores !!!

These are about 4″ finished size…

 These are waiting to be joined up… I do a few at a time as it is fun but a bit tedious too!

 I am using THIS tutorial for machine piecing my apple cores… she is a bit hard to listen to BUT WORTH THE LISTEN!!!  If you are interested in trying this project grab a charm pack or some 5″ blocks and a template and lay it out first 😀

Have you seen a corkscrew willow?  Or have you seen a conehead evergreen like the one to the right???  I love this home!!! ❤

 And of course my honey is enjoying the first mow on his completely renovated John Deere… had a deck painting, new blades, spindles, oil, spark plugs, air filter, seat, and leveled… it is now mowing so nice and making a sweet fresh cut grass smell in our home 😀

Now that it is raining he is focusing on painting…

the bottom half of the wall was a pastel green that belongs in a baby room or something… that was the color of our walls all over.. now we have a nice linen color covering them.  A little yellow a little peach and a very light color called Malted Milk and totally elegant with the white chair rail… here is a photo of the wall with the white touched up and all the wall painted and cut in 😀

Well I think this is quite long enough for now… if you would like pointers on making a apple core by machine just ask and I will post more on this next week when HOPEFULLY I will have a finish to share with you all as well!

Have a happy Sunday all and remember….

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Washi tape heat embossed card with video!

Today I have a video for you!

I made a card for my mom and decided maybe some of you don’t know how to heat emboss or how cool it can make a project look…. professional!

Today we are going to make this card…  with washi tape!

adding texture and height to a card or scrapbook layout using basic tools.

Now wasn’t that easy and fun!  I love heat embossing and don’t use it enough!

So for this process you need a heat gun… some folks will say that a hair dryer will work in a pinch… it is too windy… a heat gun focus heat more than a hair dryer and works much better.. use your coupon as this tool runs about $30.00 for a decent one.

Also, I used pigment ink to “hold” the embossing powder until I heat set it.  Pigment ink is different from regular dye ink and takes longer to dry… so you must heat set it or be VERY careful until it is dry if you don’t heat set it!

Please send me any questions you have about heat embossing.  I used clear embossing powder but colored pigment ink.  You can use a Versamark pad and regular ink dipping first in the Versamark and last in your color then stamp, add embossing powder, and heat set that for the same effect with different materials… I have these products if you would like to see a video doing it this way.  Let me know.

Have a blessed crafting day!

Kathi

How to hand sew on paper with video!

Hello my bloggy friends!  I have discovered inlinkz and am going to try to share with you today using that at the bottom of this blog entry!

I also have finished the video I showed you yesterday… yep, the 2 cards are all done!  And I also sewed on a scrapbook layout…

wish a close up on that zig zig stitching I did….

Using my AWESOME CTMH Piercing Tool and Mat set!

Here are the cards I made in the video before…

check out the video then check out my cards AFTER below that 🙂

with a close up of each card so you can see the stitching 🙂

Hope you enjoyed this post as much as I did making and editing it!  Even if it did cut me off at the end you have the idea how easy it is to sew on your projects!

Hope you have a blessed day and try the paper piercing and sewing on a project in your future… please feel free to email me your projects and have them shown on my blog!  Email me here!

Here are the links to the products I used today.  I make no money from this… just want to help you out be giving you these links 🙂

Piercing Tool Kit

Ruler

InLinkz.com

Kathi

How to make a basic card with video!

Hello my bloggy friends… I hope this day finds you feeling crafty!

I have decided to make a video series for beginners to more advanced… todays video is a good example of things you may see weekly on my blog.  A video one day on something that is a basic skill then later in the week a video with a more advanced skill… As always your feedback is coveted in this process… I want to make videos of what you want to see.. but we all have to start somewhere and some may be new to skills I am showing… so we will start at the beginning with a couple of quick cards today!

Aren’t those cards fun and festive… here is a close up of them that I featured in the video…

As you can tell neither card is glued together yet… that is yet to come 🙂

Meanwhile… my honey is working on getting our patio built with stepping stones… take a quick peek at the beginning of the path and patio coming off our Florida room 🙂

Have a blessed day and please let me know what you would like to see on video!

Kathi ~ AKA Gypsy Chik

How to make a basic scrapbook layout with video!

My first crafty video is now on youtube… please watch it there and like it if you will.  I was so camera shy you will probably laugh but I had a blast and learned a lot! 

This is also an exciting post for me because it is my 100th post blogger tells me 🙂  Yipee!  I started blogging in earnest in June of 2012.   I first posted some things in 2011 but didn’t find my niche and some great friends too until I came back with focus in June!

So what I learned making this video starts with the video being 23 minutes long!!!  I thought I had only gone about 15 minutes… so I had to divide it into 2 videos to upload to youtube or blogger… neither site liked it long… I hope you will watch both vids as they have a wealth of knowledge in them and I would love to share with you as so many have shared with me!

Get a cup of coffee or a soda and enjoy it!

Hope you enjoyed the vids… would love your feedback here or on youtube!

Have a blessed day!

A special shout out to Sheila with She’s a Sassy Lady for helping me with this!

Kathi aka the Gypsy Chik