Under a blue moon

And we have a winner...

 

Is the suspense just killing you?  I was going to go all high tech and use an online random number generator (and assign numbers to each name based on the order they were left) but it didn't present quite the picture taking opportunity of using something prettier and doing it the old fashioned way.

Other than drawing names I was quite productive this morning.  I actually FINISHED something - can you even stand it?  Okay it needs to be quilted and finished but looky here:

 

The colors are a tad wonky (they are a little lighter than depicted here) but look at that!  It actually came together really quickly.  The middle part took no time at all.  I probably spent the most time cutting out the applique bits.  I adore that kind of hand work and I can see more applique in my future.

The hairiest part was sewing the four corner squares onto the border pieces so they would all line up properly with the main part of the topper.  My seam ripper and I really bonded this morning. 

Oh I just realized I'm not technically done (beside all the finishing work) - I still need to hand stitch around the applique pieces.  I'm telling you fusible web applique is the way to go.   You get really precision edges that way (like I've ever tried any other method of applique - but whatever).

I took some liberties with the layout of the applique because I ran out of usable charm squares.  I have this dream of living close to my sister and having a big old studio on the property where we can set up sewing machines and craft tables and have tons of storage area for someone's (ahem) stash.   If that was the case I could have just raided her Celebrate Spring leftovers. 

I guess it's back to embroidery now.

What?  Oh you want to know who the winner of the book drawing is? 

Congratulations Julie!  If you could just shoot me an email with your address I'll ship it off to you.  Thank you to everyone for playing along.

Bloggy giveaway

A few weeks back Turkey Feathers had a giveaway - she finished this book and wanted to pass it along to another reader.  I was actually the second name chosen (the first was out of the US).  So I was the lucky recipient and now I want to share the love.

Leave a comment and I'll draw a name on Saturday morning and if your name is chosen then the book is yours.  And maybe a little something extra too.

While I won't put any rules around this drawing I would love to see the book make the Internet rounds.  Perhaps, dear winner, when you finish the book you will do the same. 

I just love the idea of many hands turning the same pages and wondering what a previous reader may have thought about a particular passage.

Let's move on to the apology portion of the program, shall we?

I wanted to say thank you for all the lovely comments regarding my work in progress and the margaritas (seriously you must try the recipe - if you don't like alcohol use a little sparkling water instead) - I'm just SO miserably behind in responding to comments and emails.  I hope to catch up this weekend.

Thank you for being so kind and so patient.

WIP

During our foray on Saturday to the local quilt shops I was keeping my eye out for lilac/lavender and medium blue fabrics for my morning glory table topper.   I bet 98% of all the fabric I've purchased in my lifetime has been 30's reproduction.  I must have been a housewife in the 30's in a previous life.

There is just something so sweet and friendly about those prints. 

I have a hard time collecting random fabrics.  I really need a quilt shop to have a line of fabrics displayed together with a few examples before I can envision the fabric in my life.   I have NO creativity in that regard. 

I had a hard time finding blues that I liked or that matched, rather. 

Last night I had a sinking realization that I have to do this same embroidery pattern three more times for the topper.  I am going to be so tired of those colors by the end of this project. 

The next project (already mentally moving on) is going to be a white on white throw pillow.  I found a pattern with a circle of vining flowers with the following sentiment in the center:

He loves me
He love me not
It matters little
I'm all he's got!

Weekends

We had last minute guests this weekend - Sara and Nicole decided to come up and play.  They drove up on Friday afternoon in Sara's mini - stopping at quilt shops along the way. 

We started off the weekend with watermelon margaritas:

2 cups frozen watermelon chunks
Juice of one fresh lime
3 Tbsp. frozen limeade concentrate
1 oz. Watermelon Pucker schnapps
4 oz. white tequila
handful of ice cubes (just add enough to get the right amount of slushiness)

Whir in a blender and serve in chilled glasses.

They were so good we had them again on Saturday evening.

The entire weekend wasn't spent drinking.  On Saturday morning we hit up a few more quilt stores.  I bought two charm packs of Moda's Celebrate Spring to make my Acorn Quilt &  Gift Co. Meadow quilted table topper.   The example on the pattern cover was made using Moda's Faded Memories charm packs - I think Celebrate Spring has very similar colors.  I am planning on making mine square (so it's table topper shaped) so I'll need less charm squares then the pattern calls for.

I've never appliqued before so we'll see how that goes.

We spent the entire afternoon sewing.  Rick was a really good sport about all the bits of fabric and loose threads that were floating around the house.  We worked on two projects for Sara - a skirt and an apron.  Man - the apron was tough.  The instructions were incomplete or just plain missing steps and I think if Nicki's cooler head hadn't prevailed Sara and I would have just abandoned the entire project.

It was a perfect way to spend the weekend.  Just the right amount of shopping, sewing, laughing and productivity.  After a week of 30 (!) meetings - it was really needed.

Happy Summer Solstice

 

I've never met a hydrangea that I didn't like.  I like the big, floppy mophead ones, the lace caps - all the variations of colors.  Love them all. 

And right now they are sharing the love - this picture doesn't do them justice.  The shrub is huge and just opulent with blooms.

 

I felt like Martha Stewart this morning, wandering out to the grounds and cutting huge armloads and bringing them in (along with a few disgrunted spiders).

The picture above is a bit misleading - it looks cool and shady and in reality it's been in the 100's up here.  It takes a lot of water to keep these lovely shrubs happy.  Can't wait for THAT bill to arrive. 

Crazy busy

I love these address stamps from Room Service Home.  I think I could even be happy about paying my bills if I could use a return address stamp like that on the envelopes. 

Work has been crazy busy since I got back from Washington.  I counted the hours I will spend this week just in meetings and it is about 30 hours.  I'm not sure, exactly, when I'm supposed to get my work done if I am in meetings all the time. 

When work gets hectic like that I start longing for a more organized office space.  That's what led me over to the Room Service Home site - they have some nice office furniture and accessories. 

I keep dreaming about turning my dining room into an office/tv room. 

I could be more organized and productive if I only had a set up like this.   Right.

Mail love

It is truly lovely to be back home.  Especially because there were so many nice things waiting for me when I got here. 

Ginny, a reader and fellow embroiderer was kind enough to send me some interfacing she likes to use when embroidering - it adds stability and helps hide those pesky end bits of floss that no matter how hard I try to weave them in the back they still manage to make their presence known. 

Ginny also sent me a Redwood quilt sampler pattern - designed by a Canadian quilter named Jean Boyd.  It is absolutely adorable and I can combine my fledgling embroidery and quilting skills in one project.  In fact it has inspired a quilted table topper (more on that in a sec...).

I received a book in the mail from ~V of Turkey Feathers and Pattern Bee fame.  She had a 'drawing' for a book she had just finished and enjoyed so much she wanted to pass it along.  I was actually second runner up since the first drawn name, sadly (for her anyway), was outside the US.  The book is Astrid and Veronika and has been on my 'to read' list for ever.  I never win anything so I'm doubly thrilled. 

I'm also going to keep in spirit and pass the book along in the same fashion when I am done with it.  I love the idea of it making its way around blog land like that. 

~V also included a slew of embroidery designs with the book and I now my little head is spinning with embroidery ideas.  This may turn into an embroidery blog after all (not really but it may seem like it for a bit).

So after seeing the Redwork sampler pattern I got the idea for a table topper using a morning glory transfer I've had for a while.  I like the simplicity of the Redwork pattern but wanted it to be a little bit larger for a table.  So I came up with a modified version of it.

The embroidered flowers will be in shades of periwinkle and lavender and I'll find material in those same colors for the scrappy checkerboard effect.  The idea is to have less contrast than the image shows but you get the idea.  It will be contained with a pale green containment border and will have a smaller embroidered morning glory at each corner.  The images here are just clipart and not the actual embroidery pattern.  Just fooling around with Excel - much better use for it than spreadsheets, don't you think?

Question for the quilters - when you have embroidered blocks in a quilt do those blocks get quilted?  Or no?  I can't picture how you would quilt it and not have it interfere with the embroidery.  The embroidered blocks will end up being eight inches square - is that too large a block not to quilt?

Home again, home again, jiggity jig...

Goodbye Puget Sound...I'll miss you and your totally reasonable temperatures (today:  Seattle 65 degrees F.  Granite Bay 101 degrees F.).

Let's play "Spy the National Landmark"....

I heard it rained in Washington ALL the time - not a drop while I was there.

Sorry for the poor quality of this one - I had to really zoom in on it - I was looking out the window trying to figure out why it looked so familiar.  Then I realized it was Crater Lake.  The one place my Dad wants to see before he dies.  He has been to every single state except for Hawaii (and for some frustrating reason I can't convince him that he should go - even if it's just for a weekend and I'd certainly be happy to escort him...).  He wants to see Crater Lake and stay at the lodge there but man they book up fast.  I wanted to take him last year and they were booked up for about a year and a half.

Look at that - I'm practically home!

Ode to the peony

Okay so no ode, exactly - it's a bit early in the day for that.  But I do have to rethink my whole 'peonies are more trouble than they're worth' stance.  Pike's Place Market was loaded with them and they were gorgeous.  So lush.  Buckets and buckets of them in the most amazing pinks, corals, creams, peaches. 

Tonight we are going to a restaurant that my coworker who lives here says is the best local seafood and the tourists haven't found it yet.  I probably shouldn't mention the name (I can't recall it anyway) - try to keep it a local secret.  Yeah - like my mentioning it is going to affect the tourism in Seattle...

I love this postcard of the Space Needle.  It's so Tomorrowland looking.

No bears yet

 

Pike's Place Market - Gorgeous looking vegetables but man was it ever crowded.

And the seafood looked amazing - They'll even pack it up for you to take on an airplane.

Everything was huge - scallops the size of baseballs, huge lobster tails, Alaskan King crab legs that were so enormous they were kind of alarming looking.

My coworker is afraid of heights but she still gamely went up to the top with me.  She hugged the inside wall the entire time.

We lucked out with the weather too - it sprinkled a teeny bit when I first landed but cleared right up. 

Well that was the fun part of the trip - it's all work now so things will be kind of boring around here.

Unless I spot a bear.