Traveling

We decided to take a wandering vacation two weeks ago. It was fun and a little unnerving to not have a specific destination. We don't usually plan too far ahead when we travel unless we know there will be a shortage of hotel rooms like for a college football weekend. This can be frustrating sometimes when we hit a snag, but usually leads to some interesting twists and turns.

We started by visiting our son in Illinois and then off to Indiana to my hometown for a birthday party. Friends there suggested Gulf Shores, AL so we headed off that direction. We spent the night in Birmingham, AL at a beautiful B&B. Here are some photos of all the lovely antiques. The husband and wife who own it have been in business for 7 years. She is a full time architect and selected all the decorations and spent hours and hours at auctions and flea markets buying all the antiques. Wow! Wouldn't that be fun? He is an artist and does beautiful bronze statues and busts on commission and holds a school to teach carving of wooden carousel animals.

Our room had an attached sitting room.

This is the living room complete with a stuffed peacock in front of the fireplace. Everybody needs one of those, I think!

We spent two days in Gulf Shores which was quiet and just warm enough to be enjoyable. We walked the beach and visited the air museum on the Pensacola Naval Air Base. We visited a Civil War fort on Mobile Bay and took a ferry across the bay where we could see some natural gas platforms up close.

We came back thru Tuscaloosa and saw the Crimson Tide stadium and campus plus all the tornado damage there. How sad.

In Tennessee we visited a couple of wineries and the gravesite of Meriwether Lewis of Lewis & Clark fame. What a sad story that was!

On our way back thru Illinois, we stopped at a small graveyard to visit the graves of my great, my great-great, and my great great great grandparents. I always wish those gravestones could come to life and tell me about the people.

Then we wandered back home. Hope you have some warm weather in the days ahead.

Designing Monday

Progress has been made. This is always a good feeling. I have row 3 nearly finished. It gets more beautiful with each block. Yea!

I originally thought I could whip this together in a week or two after I got all the pieces made, but it has been almost 6 weeks now. I have such a good imagination!

My plans did get interrupted by a little vacation. We decided to wander around for a week and ended up in Gulf Shores, AL. What a wonderful vacation spot, esp. since it is warmer that Wisconsin and the hordes of college kids had not yet arrived. In fact the beaches were nearly deserted. We took a leisurely drive from north to south and back and stopped when we wanted. We stayed in a beautiful B&B in Birmingham, AL. I'll share a few photos in another post.

Check in at Judy's blog to see some other beautiful quilts.

Still Designing

Progress was made and I spent quite a bit of time everyday sewing, although it's pretty hard to tell by looking at the picture this week vs. last week. I got all the border pieced and finished the first row of blocks. I am adding the border as I go to make my life easier and that is definitely what it is all about.

This quilt is too big for my design sofa and too wide for my design floor where it is currently sitting. I am thinking I may have to take it outside to my design lawn to find a place big enough to lay it out. I can just see me chasing all those little 2 1/2" squares down the street.

Time to get busy. Stop by Judy's blog to see more great quilting.

A new month, a new class, a new mat

February is here and it's time to change out the decor for Valentine's Day. I have my hearts all over the place.

Our pastor started a Bible study for 2012 called the 3x5 club. We are reading the entire Bible in a year and doing it in order from Genesis to Revelation. We read 3 chapters everyday, except Sunday when we read 5 chapters. I did not know when I started if I would be able to stick with it, but so far it has not been a problem. I sometimes read ahead just in case I have a busy day and can't get to it. Genesis has always been one of my favorite books as there is so much to read about. We are now in the middle of Leviticus which is very tedious reading. It is a wonder to me that the church continued after God gave so much direction. I probably would not have been industrious or obedient enough to follow all his instructions. Of course, God probably would have zapped me like he did Aaron's sons. Our pastor seems to love to teach and really can bring some great insight into our reading. He has only been with us for 7 months and already has made a big difference.

My husband just went out a bought me a new plastic mat to go under my sewing chair. The old one had developed divots where the chair casters sat and the mat had cracked and pieces of the plastic had popped out making it nearly impossible to roll the chair. I can't wait to go try out the new mat and do some swirlies with my chair!! Yahoo!

Designing Monday

I finished hand quilting the 12 Days of Christmas mystery quilt from Temecula Quilt Co. and got it bound while I was at my stitching group this week.

I was hoping to put together 1 block each day for the Eye Fooler quilt, but I was busy doing lots of things this week, so I only finished 2 completely and got the 3rd block nearly done. I am piecing the small fillers around the edge as I go so that I make sure I don't have too many of any one color. It is really a stunning quilt as the pieces go together. I love the high contrast of light and dark. My biggest challenge seems to be getting the seams pressed correctly and to lay flat. There are so many seams!

Happy quilting. Stop by Judy's blog to see what else is going on.

Monday Designs

My design sofa is full of pieces for an Eye Fooler quilt. I have been making all these pieces since before Thanksgiving and I am getting close to having them all done. I enjoy taking my time and trying to get the colors balanced even though it is a scrap quilt.

I have made gaggles of these flying geese.

And a whole bunch of these.

Lots and lots of 4 patches.

Put them together and Voila! you have a block. Hopefully I'll get one or two of these sewn together this week.

I also got my 12 Days of Christmas Quilt basted and have started hand quilting it. I should be able to finish it this week.

Hop on over to Judy's and see what else is going on.

Up in Flames

Our church quilting group meets twice a month and usually we work on our own projects. Today one of the ladies taught us how to make fleece mittens. She brought a couple of storage tubs full of fleece and a large roll of Thinsulate that she had bought on a closeout. She had made patterns and printed instructions for each of us and we were off and running. First we had to cut out lots of pieces of fleece and baste the Thinsulate to each piece.

Four of these.

Four of these.

And four of these.

Then we sewed all the pieces together and Shazam! I made a mitten.

Don't you just love the cool flames? I wasn't really sure I would use these mittens when she first showed them, so I picked a fabric that I thought a boy might like so I could give them to the school near our church since the kids there always seem to lose their mittens, gloves and hats. Our church knitting group has made dozens of pairs of mittens for them. However, now I really love these cool flames, so I may just wear them a few times before I give them away. Just for kicks!