Christmas Sewing or lack there of!

Just an update.  I've been sewing, just nothing worthy of posting pictures of.  I made 4 stockings to hang on the mantle and they came out OK, nothing too special. 

I have my Mama's Boy quilt all layered and pin basted.  It is ready for the quilting part....scary!  I also have the purple dress all cut out and the serger is threaded and ready to go.  Before I can get in there to work on those items, I need to get into the guest room and prepare it for Christmas guests.  My daughter and my grandson are coming in on Thursday and leave next Monday.  Then my brother and sister-in-law are coming in on Tuesday next week and leaving on New Year's Day.  So.....if I don't get to get in there to sew tomorrow, I won't get to until next year.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Finished with Thanksgiving Weekend PJ Sew Along

I didn't get to spend all day in the sewing room today, only a few hours.  I did finish the PJ's ---and they are VERY bright!!

I totally forgot to mention that I made a tote bag from this pattern last weekend.

Here is the finished bag --- shhhh....it is a Birthday present for my sister!!!

Tomorrow is Christmas decorating day so I won't get to sew much, if at all.  Maybe I will get to cut out my deep purple knit dress and jacket during the week and sew a bit next weekend.  Until the next time.....

After Turkey Day Sewing

I got to spend the ENTIRE day in the sewing room!!!  That hasn't happened in a very, very long time.

First I finished the pajama pants

for the PJ Sew along with Ann from Gorgeous Fabrics.  (Thank you Ann for starting this sew along...I needed the push to get these PJ's made since I had originally cut them out in September of last year!!)  And then I started on the top, but stopped for a bit to let the collar cool on the tailors ham before I attached it to the neckline of the PJ top.

So I made this - a thread catcher with a pin cushion attached.  A practical bit of sewing.  Then I got back to my PJ's and this is where I left off for the night. 

Tomorrow after I go to Weight Watchers, nail appointment and then to buy groceries for the week...I will attach the cuffs on the sleeves, the pocket, the hem and then the buttons and buttonholes.  I should finish by Sunday.

Wednesday night I re cut the PJ's from the Large that I had original cut back in September 2009 to a Medium, but after trying them on...I think I could have cut the Small.  Oh well, they will be extra roomy and comfortable for sleeping and lounging around in.

For the next project after the PJ's are finished I have a deep purple stable knit that I will make another dress and jacket with.  I made this same pattern here.  I LOVED this dress and jacket and wore it many times but when I was putting all my summer clothes away last weekend and pulling the fall clothes out, it was too big and I wasn't going to be able to alter it to fit..at least the dress.  I probably could wear the jacket but the dress armholes were too big along with the rest of the dress.  So I decided I would just make a new dress and went to Hancock's the other day.  It is actually the same knit I used on the grey dress except it is purple.  I know how well this knit washes and dries, so there will be no surprises.

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving!

I'm back in the sewing room!!!

The quilt class was fantastic!  I now feel much more confident that I can machine quilt!  I know I will need to practice, but I really think this is something I can do.

My new serger arrived on Friday, so I got to sew with it Sunday and I've been using it a bit each night.

Here is my Tissue Tote that I made from the free pattern I received at The Teacher's Pet booth in Houston.



And then I made.....12 more!  Gifts!  Free!  Made with fabric scraps in the stash!

I also made a cute little pin cushion.  And I have 5 more of those to make.....because they are cute!  I'll post pictures of all of them later.  Tomorrow night is the quilt guild meeting, so no sewing then.   Friday night I plan to start on the PJ's out of the same fabric as the gift tissue totes.  They have been cut out since last September and now I have to adjust the pattern size used because they will be too large now.  Hopefully it won't be too much of a pain to fix that.  Until then..... Happy Sewing.

Houston Quilt Festival - What a weekend!

I actually made it to the Houston Quilt Festival this year, my first time!  It was fantastic awesome fabulous!  I made the decision to go last Tuesday afternoon after getting a bit of feedback from some posts on PR and the idea was given to me to try Priceline.com for a hotel room.  I didn't even look to see if any of the Host Hotels still had rooms, so I gave Priceline a try.  First I put in $60 and it came back and said to try $75 for a 4 star or better hotel.  So I gave it a try and low and behold it came back at $75 at the Houston Hyatt Downtown just 11 blocks from the convention center where the Festival was being held.  So, I got up at 4 am Saturday morning and headed out to Houston.  I arrived about 9:15 into traffic due to road construction right downtown at my exit to the Hyatt.  I made my way to the Hyatt Valet parking and the valet suggested I try to check in.  As luck would have it, they let me check in!!  I put my stuff in my room and then headed to the convention center and the weather was perfect for an 11 block walk!  I met up with my neighbor and her sister and we proceeded to have a day of SHOPPING!!  Here is a picture of the loot I purchased. I know I said I wasn't becoming a quilter....but I think I might be....it is just so much fun.

I'll describe...Bottom left is a pair of curved snips to cut those jump stitches in my machine embroidery designs, a pair of reverse tweezers- for changing those needles, a quilt pattern to make the with the fabric in the upper left, a slip pad for machine quilting, a tote bag pattern and the fabric that I will use that is folded in the star package and a straight stitch plate for my sewing machine.  In the next row is a freebie of a tissue holder pattern with the fabric and then a few pins that were freebies and the luggage tag from Babylock that was a freebie along with the tote bag.  Also here is the ergonomic rotoray cutter and some nonslip pads for rulers.  I also bought the ruler that has a lip for this rotary cutter to fit on but they were sold out so it is being shipped.  To the upper right are 3 different sized rulers from Quilt In A Day by Eleanor Burns and her cute shopping bag.  I even got to meet her in person!  Then there is the red halo for machine quilting and the last 2 items shown are 2 different patterns for quilt in the hoop for the embroidery machine.  My neighbor and I split this purchase - it was buy 2 get 1 free so we split the cost and will share them.  She took the other one to her house.  And the biggest and most exciting purchase is the ......

Babylock Imagine serger!!!  It has Jet Air Threading for the Upper and Lower loopers!  Wow is all I can say.  It is being shipped and I can't wait to get it.  That means that I can actually change threads when I am serging something.  I have had the same white thread in my other serger because it takes my 30 to 45 minutes to change the thread on the darn thing.  Anyway, we spent the entire day shopping at the vendors and then we all had dinner at a wonderful greek restaurant somewhere in Houston.  I'm sure I could never find it again!  Sunday morning I had a leisure breakfast at the hotel then went upstairs and packed and headed down to checkout around 10:00 am and then headed to the parking garage next to the convention center.  I parked then contacted my SIL and we met up and viewed the award winning quilts and most of the other entries.  Wonderful quilters out there!  I then left my SIL and moved back into the vendor floor where I visited the Floriani booth to talk with them about my software.  She spent a good 45 minutes with me and I feel much better about trying to digitize now.  I headed back out around 1:30 and made it home around 6:15 pm!  Whew!  What a weekend.

As you can tell, the Quilt Festival was a great success for shopping. 

This Saturday I'm taking my machine quilting class that was cancelled from a few months back.  A few of the items I purchased will be used in the class.

I'll post how the class went!

Completions

I'm finally back in the sewing room after my working/R&R trip to Porto, Portugal.  I returned late Wednesday, Oct 13th and needed a day to recover!  Last Sunday I finished trimming the binding for the quilt and then I took 4 evenings to hand stitch the binding to the quilt.  Today I made the label and attached it.

I took the quilt to my Sassi Srippers Quilt Guild club on Thursday and they told me the name of the pattern was Hole in the Barn Door.  I had no idea what the pattern was and surely appreciated the info.  Here is the finished quilt.

Then I worked on the embroidery of the book cover for our Iota Epsilon yearbook, for our newest member, Joan.  I finished that and will give it to her this weekend at our "Get-A-Way" weekend in Tickfaw State Park.  I'm giving Paula the quilt then as well.

Those were 2 items needing to get finished before the end of October!

Now I want to finish the Mama's Boy Quilt that I started in January and work on a few items that I had plans for gifts.  My machine quilting class is now rescheduled for November 13th.  So I'm looking forward to that too.

Here is a few pics of Porto!

Until next time.....

Purple, Purple and more Purple!

Want to see what I've been working on all weekend? A purple quilt!  My friend Paula's mother-in-law passed away almost a year ago.  She was a quilter.  Paula found this quilt top along with the backing fabric in a bag and I volunteered to quilt it for her so that she would have it finished for the anniversary of her death next month.  I found the fabric to make the binding and bought the batting and finally got started Saturday afternoon.  I tell you, now I know why it is SO important to press your squares after you have pieced them going a certain way!  It sure has been a challange getting this quilted when the blocks aren't exactly square and the seams not pressed properly.  It has been a wonderful learning experience.  Here is the quilt top layed out for the basting with safety pins.

I've worked on it all weekend, today ALL day except to eat lunch and dinner. I've finished the quilting and have made the 30 yards of binding.

Here is  a close up of the binding.  I couldn't believe I found something that would match so well.

Here is what the quilt looked like when I finished quilting.

The back is the solid dark purple that was used on the blocks.  It seems that the blocks were made in 1986 since 2 of them were dated with the person's name that made the block.  The story is that Rita's (Paula's mother-in-law) quilting group made the blocks and then they were put into this quilt.  Several are signed by the person's name and others aren't.  It is pretty remarkable for me to be working on something like this.  I feel like I've finishing up a piece of history.  I wonder if the other ladies that worked on it are still living and do they wonder what happened to the quilt?  Some of the blocks were hand stitched and others were machine stitched.

I hope to get to work on it a bit more next weekend, but if not it will have to wait until the middle of October since I am leaving on October 6th for Porto Portugal for a work meeting....and a bit of R & R with my husband since the 8th will be our 34th wedding anniversary!

After this quilt is finished, I'm going to finish the Mama's Boy quilt I started earlier this year!  I'm really not turning into a quilter...full time at least, I will get back to garments one day!!

Later!