the bonus hour

I find myself with an extra hour of life this morning, so I am on my keyboard to update both here and over at the Bear Patch blog.  This comes after a yummy and what-seems-like-decadent breakfast of almond croissants.  Easy almond croissants from the frozen food section at Trader Joe's.  I had not tried them before, but they turned out great.  Also from my last trip to Joe's--

Very tasty!

Here's a little sewing tip and another good excuse to go to the office supply store!  I read about this from someone else but can't remember who.  Scotch, maker of all of those adhesive hooks and hangers, also makes these adhesive patches.

They actually have adhesive on both sides and are thick, like maybe 1/16th of an inch.  When I need to sew something that requires a seam allowance other than 1/4" this is the perfect temporary tool.  I was sewing a hem on the back of a pillow cover, and wanted to make my stitching line 7/8" from the folded edge.  I peeled the adhesive from one side of the strip and put it on the bed of my machine after measuring the correct placement.  Then I could run the fold right against the edge of the adhesive pad and get a nice straight stitching line.  When I was done, I put it right back in the package for another day.

 That hem was on the back of this pillow cover--

which now is complete except for the lack of an 18" pillow!  Previously posted here.

Another pair of mittens for my favorite little guy--

These are quick and fun, and no doubt he will need more mittens in bigger sizes so I should have no lack of knitting!

in the works...

I have been a busy girl lately, getting quite a few things accomplished and crossed off the list.  Here is the report:

A road map playmat for Ian, whenever he gets big enough to be entertained by little matchbox cars.  This was a printed panel which I quilted to a layer of craft felt.  I outlined around the roads and railroads, then serged around the outside edge for a quick and easy finish.  I am thinking that it needs a little tote bag to keep it with the appropriate cars.  This makes me remember when my kids were little, and how the car/truck thing seemed to come naturally to my little boy, more so than my daughter.  And little boys seem to be able to make that little buzzing motor noise naturally, too!

I think Ian is already thinking about playing on his mat!

Little boys need little mittens to match their little hats and blankies, so here you go!  We are going to try either mitten clips or the cord through the sleeves, and hopefully they will stay on better than his socks!

Pair #2 for Ian started.

I found the metal clips with the sewing notions at Joann's and sewed the elastic to the clips.  Next time I will look for colored elastic!

This looks kind of messy, but it's a work in progress.  This is a lattice strip quilt that I have started and have about half of the blocks made.  I laid it out to get some perspective, and have concluded that it's just not right.  Debbie suggested that the solid gray squares would be better white.  I am thinking at this point that I might just stop and start fresh with a different group of fabrics.  We have a lot of great solids at the store and I am thinking about using those.  I would like to get this done to teach as a class this winter, it is made with the use of partial seams and that would be a good technique for our quilters to know.

 Time to get some binding on a quilt that was wonderfully hand quilted for me by my mom--

I made the top a few years ago and when she told me that she was looking for something to go on her quilting frame, I was more than happy to provide this!  Her little stitches are so straight and neat!


I just took this Christmas quilt off my machine frame and will deliver it to Leisl later today.  She will put the binding and finishing touches on it and then we will display it at the store.  Not distinguishable from here, but I quilted a poinsettia design on it in red thread, and it turned out great.

There are a couple of other customer quilts that I have recently done that made it out of here without photos.  One of them was another lesson in perseverance for me, due to the fact that I had a lot of problems with skipped stitches. This resulted in hair-pulling, headaches, curses, tears, ripping stitches, tweaking thread, tension, timing and anything else I could think of.  Some advice from my company rep finally got me back on track, and the quilt was finished and delivered to the owner, who loved it!  99.9% of the time my machine works like a precision tool, but every now and then something goes wacky and makes me very cranky!


 Next up on the quilting frame--