Designing Monday

I spent some of my Thanksgiving weekend working on the last Jo Morton quilt top in the pattern package for this year's club. It is a cute little quilt and I really want to make a scalloped edge on the border. I am not sure if I have enough fabric to do that, so I am rethinking right now.

Just look at all those HST's!

We enjoyed having our son home for a week and are even more excited that he will be back again in just a couple of weeks after finals AND he will be home for a whole month. I hope I am still that excited at the end of that month. I sometimes forget what it is like to be so young and full of energy. He is really a great young man and I can't wait to see what the world holds for him.

Hop on back to Judy's blog to see what everyone else is doing.

My Good Fortune

In the last few years, October has become known as Breast Cancer Awareness month. The NFL dons pink shoes and lots of people wear pink hats and pins. The bread that I buy, Healthy Life, sponsored a contest as well. On the back of the bread wrapper, there was a contest entry form for your name, address, and the name of a person who has been affected by cancer. So I filled out the form and mailed it in. Last week I got a call that I was a grand prize winner.

Yesterday I met my friend and the rep from Lewis Bakeries at my local grocery to receive our prizes. I received a 6 month supply of bread. Yum! My friend who I nominated received 12 months of bread plus a tote bag full of great stuff. She received gift cards for gasoline, bath & body products, spa treatments, a Visa gift card, a blanket and a whole slew of promotional gifts. Plus we each got a loaf of bread!! LOL!

It was such a treat to receive a prize and have my name pulled out of the drawing. But to be able to honor my friend, Joyce who has endured so much through 2 bouts of cancer was the real prize for me. She is one of those people with an indomitable spirit and incredible inner strength. We have been friends for over 30 years and this was definitely one of my favorite moments.

Our families have been doing Thanksgiving together for many years. Joyce makes hot rolls from my grandma's recipe plus she makes the gravy. Now you know why she is my best friend.

News from the Marshall Islands

Our daughter has been in the Marshall Islands for almost 5 months now. We get letters infrequently - once or twice a month. We have Skyped with her twice. The last Skype was last Friday night and lasted nearly 2 hours. What a joy! She is well and has adjusted pretty well to the conditions there - no electricity, no running water, no phone. There is a CB radio for emergencies or communication between the islands.

Before she left, she asked me to talk with our Sunday School director and see if the Sunday School would be willing to collect books for her school and use the offerings to ship the books. Our Sunday School leaders and children have embraced this mission wholeheartedly and we collected over 200 books. Most of the children cleaned off their bookshelves and found lots of easy reading material for the children of Imroj. I have mailed off two boxes already and the photo is the remainder. I have even thrown in lots of old National Geographics and Time and Newsweek magazines as the adults like to look thru them and see all the photos even if they don't read the text.

We have sufficient funds from our offerings to also purchase some bookshelves and mail those off, too. They have none to store all these wonderful books. I also continue to send her paper and pencils and markers and any other school supplies that I think she can use.

I was able to get a donation of toothbrushes from my dentist's office a couple of months ago and my daughter sent photos of the kindergarten brushing their teeth. She said they are so excited to have them and love to brush everyday.

My next care package has lots more toothpaste, bandaids, more Tylenol, and eyeglasses. She seems to be a dispensary for everyone on the island and the older people are grateful to be able to read and get some relief from aches and pains. I didn't realize when she left that we would become a part of this bigger mission to the whole island.

Our biggest concern right now is an outbreak of dengue fever in the capital which is now starting to spread to some of the outer islands. This seems like one of those diseases which I read about in school like scurvy and beri beri, that should have been eradicated, but not so. There is no vaccine or cure. The treatment is hydration and sometimes hospitalization. They have had over 300 cases in the last two months. The WHO, the CDC and the US Navy have all been brought in to help. The Navy is working on spraying to eliminate mosquitos. So far our daughter's island has been unaffected.

Turkey Fun

I whipped up two of these placemats yesterday for my little niece and nephew who are 4 to have a special Thanksgiving surprise. I will need to get them into the mail today to make sure they arrive on time. I googled Dresden plate turkey and found several ideas. The ones I found were all in browns or fall colors. I remember as a kid making turkeys with all the primary colors in construction paper and my kids did too. So that's the way I decided to make these little rascals. The eyeballs look kind of spooky, so I may need to add some black dots to make them a little friendlier.

It was a fun and colorful way to spend the day.

Finished in Time

I finished the quilting and the binding on the Star of David quilt for my friend. Now I am going to try to print out a label for it. I have not done this before, so it is a new learning for me. Yea! This quilt will commemorate my friend's Bat Mitzvah. The date is Nov. 26, so I need to get in the mail in the next couple of days.

I have a couple of holiday projects that I am starting today. With luck I will have them done in time.

Pieced at Last

Remember this?

And this?

And this?

I spent yesterday afternoon piecing them all together and here is the final result.

Isn't it lovely? Even though I had a picture on the pattern, I really was not sure how it was going to turn out and just how big it would be. I absolutely love it. It was all paper pieced and I managed to pick out all the paper during the Packer game.

This is gift for a friend who is having a Bat Mitzvah later in November. I can't wait to surprise her with it.

I would like to quilt it with a thin, thin batting as it will be for the table or a wall hanging. Does anybody have a suggestion? I want something heavier than interfacing and flexible like batting.

Any ideas would be appreciated.

Prairie Points

At our monthly quilting group this week, one of the members demonstrated continuous prairie points. We started with a piece of fabric that was 8" wide and 21 " long. We ironed a crease down the middle lengthways, then marked off sections and cut and folded and Voila! -- we had prairie points. It was pretty easy and fun to learn something new. I googled continuous prairie points and found a really good tutorial, if you are interested.

To make two color points, we started with two fabrics, both were 21" long and 4.5" long. We sewed them together along the long edge and used the seam as the fold line. From there the process was the same, except the points were alternating colors.

The solid color was a little easier to work with since there was no bulk at the fold like the two color one, but overall, I think it is a pretty nifty technique. The person who showed us how to make the points, also had a quilt that she was finishing that used the technique. Hers were all one fabric and came out great.

Little Quilt Finished

I hand quilted and bound this little quilt over the last couple of days. I don't hand quilt often, but I find it a nice challenge from time to time. My stitches were pretty even altho not too small. I am happy to have it completed before next week's deadline.

(Guess I should have wiped off the chalk lines before I took a close up. Oops!)

Now back to my other projects.

Tonight the quilting group from my church is meeting. One of the members is doing a demo on prairie points that are continuous. Should be interesting.