Blogging Fun

Well July is over and I found some new background that I like but it leaves my signature with a white square around it. How do I solve that? It will have to wait until tomorrow. Now it is time to go to bed.

A Surprise!

On Wednesday evening our daughter Kierra and her boyfriend Will had us over for dinner, with his parents. So I thought they were just having us over to dinner to show us how much they have done on their home, to meet the new puppy and to celebrate her graduation from the Community College. But after dinner she said, "We have an annoucment to make." "We have decided to get married." Music to my ears!

My husband always the tradition fellow asked, "Did Will get done on one knee and ask?" "No, it came about as a result of a discussion. We had talked about it a couple of times and we decided to get married. We do everything together and share everything, so we are going to get married." Kierra is not a romantic, not a tradition gal or a foo foo type of girl, which is OK and she seems happy, which is very good. So it's all good.

The big day will be on Oct 31st, Halloween her favorite day of the year at 11 PM in a wedding chapel in Las Vegas. Well I'm happy they are getting married, Will has been good for her, she is happy. They are both working she has graduated with her Associates Degrees in Computer Science. Her goal this summer is to obtain her A+ Certification and her Cisco Networking Certification and plan a wedding. So she is a busy girl.


MySpace Countdowns

Kierra we are happy for you & Congratulations to you & Will!!

Sunday Quilting Upate

The first thing I did for quilting this week when I came home was go to a quilt store for their Christmas in July sale, everything was 30% off. That was on Friday. On Saturday I drew the 11th block in EQ6 for my Caribbean Sea Block of the Month. I probably won't make it until I finish my August monthly mini.


I did finish all my flying geese and pin wheels for the Washington Medallion while in CO. I finished all the half square triangles but I haven't made the blocks yet. So I didn't take a picture of them. That also will wait until I finish the August mini.


Here it is the August mini, the Sand Castles. I pieced the background and the borders last night. I had traced the designs for the sand castles on the fusing material before I left for CO. Tonight I fused the sand, and cut all the pieces and fused them to the background. I hope to have this finished to take to work on Monday August 3rd.

Sights from CO

This is the first time I have had to post some of the fun things I saw in CO. On Saturday I had a day off and I went to the Rocky Mountain National Park. I saw lots of beautiful things, only a few of them are here. It was free admission day, what an extra bonus that was. Yes even thought it is summer, there is still snow on the mountains. I understand that it is present all year long. But what would I know I live in AZ.


I learned how to take black & white pictures with my camera and I took a few just to try it. This is the same scene as the color one above.


I took a dirt road up to the top, it was the Old Falls River road. It was 9 miles long with lots of switch backs. Luckily it was one way only. There were lots of beautiful water falls, here is the biggest one I saw and I walked a ways down the path. My husband was very surprised I took the rental car on a dirt road. I look at it this way if I would do it with my car, I can do it with a rental car.


If you click on this picture you can enlarge the picture. You will notice as the rocks and snow meet, there is a start of a stream. There were lots of these streams that all merged into the big stream below, where I took pictures of the water falls. Since I never spent a lot of times in the mountains I found this very interesting.


Well I finally reached the top. I could have gone on a hike and go a little higher, but something told me I'm a lot higher than usual and I'm not as young as I used to be, so maybe you better not climb that hill. So I didn't. I think it was a good thing I listened to myself, because after I ate lunch I had a little issue with altitude sickness. I began to feel mildly nauseated and dizzy. So I drank more water, rested and looked out a window at the scenery for a while. And I moved to lower altitude, as the directions on the wall said to do. I can follow instructions. It was amazing at how deep the snow was in places. This store is above the tree line.


On my trip back to the bottom of the mountain I was scared. The road was narrow plus on the passenger side of the car, there was no guard rail and a very big drop off. I'm a girl, so I know my depth perception is a little off. Needless to say I hugged the double yellow line. I didn't want to be anywhere close to that edge. This was a magnificent elk I saw sitting in this field. He hardly moved, he was so statuesque. Lots of people had their tripods out and were taking pictures, it was almost like he was posing. I did finally see him move his head. So he was real. My next sight was a herd of elk. I would say there was about 50 of them. I took a picture but I didn't post it. I didn't want to bore you to tears.


The night before I left to come home I and two co-workers Lydia and Andrea went to Estes Park, we went to the Stanley Hotel and we were able to join a tour. Our tour guide was Patti and she was excellent. It was the last tour of the day, so she took her time, it was two hours long. She told us all the ghost stories. Steven King, the movie The Shinning and of course the Stanleys. Afterwards we had a great dinner at Twin Oaks. It was a good way to end the trip.

It was nice to see all this but it is nice to be home.

Charmed Gift Bag Giveaway

Charmed Gift Bag Giveaway
I see many give aways while I'm out there in Blogland, but I don't sign up for them all. Here is a quilter I like to follow. She does lovely work. Anyway take a minute or two to check out her blog and her giveaway. She has a great tutorial at Moda Bake Shop on how to make this little gift bag. I might have to make one to take to my Quilt Get-A-Way in Sept to put my door prize in.

New Books

While checking out the local quilt shops here in CO. I found some interesting books. Now I need another quilt book like a hole in the head, but I can't resist them. I'm really excited about the new techniques each these books demonstrate. The Shifting Perspectives really peaked my curiosity I almost have a block design in mind to do with this technique.

The Beyond the Block has a design in it I want to use for my Boo DJ Swap blocks. That one has really taken over in my mind and I have all the fabric for that one, so I just might have to move that up my list of things to do soon. This will be a more interesting quilt then the off center blocks I was thinking of doing. Plus it will allow me to use a larger variety of fabric and I have a lot fabric set aside for this project.

The Miniatures in Minutes looks interesting also but doesn't grab me like the Beyond the Block. So I will have to wait and see which one wins out but for now my bet is on the Beyond the Block book.

Monday Quilting Update from CO

See how much progress I made this week sewing flying geese for my Washington Medallion. I made 92 of the required 100! I have 8 more to make but I have to wait to see if I have any background fabric left from the other blocks I'm making this week. I also made 6 pin wheel blocks for the WM and started some of the other blocks.

In this picture you can see the pile of preparation I did for the rest of the pin wheel blocks and border blocks. Lots of half square triangles to make.


Work has been going good, but I'm ready for Thursday to be here and to head back home. Enough for now!

How to Sew in a Hotel Room?

As many of you know I'm in CO for 11 days for work.
So to answer your question..
First you need to have a good friend and co-workers loaned you a sewing machine.
Here is a picture of me all setup to sew. I cut my fabric into the big pieces before I left home, so here I'm just doing the finial cut and the sewing and the post construction trimming. So far I have made 60 of the 100 flying geese I need to make for my Washington Medallion. It's slow work and stuff I can get bored with, but a little at a time will get it done.

Here is my cutting area, small than what I have at home, but it works!

Sunday Quilting Upate

I have to tell you right off the bat that the new panels for the French doors worked wonderfully. No light to bug my slumber last night!!

Yesterday I was able to attach my floating border and the checker board border to my Washington Medallion, which I haven't worked on for the longest time. It's looking good, even if I do say so myself!

Today I worked on cutting the fabric for the next border, which is all flying geese, plus the fabric for the next section of the Block of the Month. I'm taking this with me to CO. One of my CO co-workers is loaning me a sewing machine, so I hope to get some sewing done after work each night.

I'll try to post from CO, but I'm not sure what my computer availability will be. But until I come back take care and stay cool!!

Both Sides Are Up!

 

I sewed the sleeves on and the binding, my honey drilled the holes and screwed the screws in and we have the second side up!! He also measured them so they hang the same. After I come back from CO on the 23rd I'll start doing the binding on the back side by hand. I'm happy for now! The room is a lot darker now!

I have one side up!

I am so excited!! I finally have one side of the door panels up. I just have to go get the binding and the sleeves on the other side. You might noticed that the binding isn't sewed down on the back. The reason why is I don't have time right now and I wanted to get them up to block the light out.
 
This picture is from inside the bedroom.
 

This picture is with the door open to the Hobby Room. That's the corner of my computer desk there with a pile of things to take to the sewing room.

I downloaded Picasa the other day and this is the first time I have used it to edit pictures and upload them to my blog. I need to figure out how to get them on opposites sides of the post like I usually do.

I was also playing with my signature, because my maiden name is Mary Hartmann, I used to be teased a lot when that show by the same name but spelled differently was on TV. So my friends shortened it to Mary Mary. Which I still like. Don't ask me how I got them like that in the program I was using, because it was a pure accident.

Sunday Quilting Upate a Little Late

The reason why I'm posting late is, I couldn't find my camera last night when I went to take a picture of my progress. I had it earlier in the day but I couldn't find it. I retraced my steps and still couldn't find it. I even looked for it this morning for just a few minutes before I left for work. No luck. After dinner I made another round of looking. I finally found it under some fabric on my cutting table. I thought that was where it was and I had patted down the fabric a couple of times. Obviously that was enough, I had to pick the fabric up and move it to see the camera.
The first picture I took Saturday evening before loading it on my frame.



This second picture I took this evening before I did today's quilting. It is where I stopped last night. Tonight I finished all the pink centers and made it about a 1/3 of the way down the green borders.
My husband asked me after I finished eating dinner, when are you going to quilt on this again. I think he is a little anxious to have them finished. You see we had these young adults move back home, the oldest son and his wife and she works until 10:30PM. Which is after our bed time. The kitchen light shines right into our bedroom, so I'm going to use these to cover the glass in the door. And of course they have to fix something to eat. I did the same thing when I was their age, but I lived alone or had roommates so it wasn't a big deal. Us old farts just don't like our routines upset too much. Now I know I'm getting old!

The year is half over!

I just thought I would mention that because everyone always rushes around at the end of the year wondering where the year went. So I thought I will let you know that the year is half over. Actually it was a couple of days ago and I was going to post on July 1st but somehow I was busy. I wonder how that happens? So I was taking a mental inventory of the quilts I have finished and what I still have on my to do list. I'm thinking I have to do a little adjustment to my to do list. Of course there is always next year.



So is my list I started with:
Winter Wonderland 9 Patch Pizzazz DONE
Festive Santa DONE
Dear Jane Boo Swap
Dear Jane Christmas Swap
Dear Jane Scrappy Happy
Dear Jane Nurses’ Swap
Horse for Krystal
Mystery Quilt DONE
SW Frog DONE
Valentine’s Mini DONE
Other Minis: Easter, May, July, Aug, Dec & Sassy Cat
Sea Breeze
Blue Moon
SW Batik Stars
Mystical Horse my own Design
One Block Wonder DONE
One Block Wonder for French Doors (adding borders today & plan to load on my frame today.)

I also added on the Washington Medallion and the Caribbean Sea Blocks of the Months to work on but not finish. Even thought it isn't on my list I have a Quilt of Valor I want to make and donate this year. Like the staying goes, "So many quilts and so little time!"

The way I see it today, I defiantly want to finish these quilts this year:
1. the One Block Wonder for the French Doors,
2. DJ Boo Swap,
3. DJ Christmas Swap
4. Mystical Horse
5. Sand Castle mini (Aug Mini)
6. Quilt of Valor
any of the orthers will be a bonus! Of course I am women and reserve the right to change my mind!

Have a great 4th of July! Freedom is a wonderful thing.