Gift exchange at Thimbleberry Club

The Thimbleberry Club at our local quilt shop had our Christmas party and gift exchange this weekend.
I  received this lovely "Twister" Christmas tree with all the emblishments on it.  I love it.

I received this in exchange for the Snowman in my previous post.

Hooked on Knitting

After watching several of my friends knit I thought I would give it a try.  At one of our girls day out Gerry surprised me with a starter kit and DL was kind of enough to sit with me and give me some tips. 
I am no way at the level of knitting as these girls but I am enjoying making dish cloths. Will share a few pics of the ones I have made.

And one more for the season.

Another one of the grils shared  her Neck Warmer Parrellagram pattern with me.  It  is a good one for a beginner.  This can be worn several different ways.

I have not given up on sewing.  Just a few of the things I have made.  Cannot show everything because some are Christmas  gifts and I don't want to reveal them  just yet.

Four placematts.

A small snowman wall hanging using from my stash to finish.  I did hand embodery this one. 

Two more placemats. This time machine embrodery.

This is all for now.

Pot holder exchange

Our guild had a potholder exchange this month along with our annual picnic.  What a wonderful turn out we had. There were no two alike.
Here are three  of the four I made, I made one last minute and forgot to get a pic of it. The red one and the butterfly ones are mitts.

These are the four lovely potholders I cam home with.  The red and white one is hand quilted.  Each one too pretty to use.

Tomatoes instead of flowers.

We decided to put tomato plants in my backyard flower bed this year.  We have gotten some really nice tasty tomatoes.  Last nights storm blew all the plants over, we restaked them so hopefully they will be OK.  Sure would love to have some more of these yummy fruits.  We have been having some great BLT's the past few weeks.

Shop hop and meeting with Cyndi...

I just returned from a three day shop hop bus trip to Ohio. We shopped at the following shops on the way.


Jackman's Fabrics – in St. Louis

Quilted Garden- Edwardsville, Ill

These are all in the Columbus area:

Red Rooster, Quilt Beginnings, North; QuiltTrends; Glass Thimble; Sew to Speak; Quilt Beginnings, East and Always in Stitches - .

Quilts Plus, Indianapolis ( on the way back home).



I think the 33 shoppers on the bus helped out the local economy in Columbus, especially the quilt shops.



All the shops greeted us and had treats for us. However the best part of my trip was that I met up with Cyndi from bluebirdswing.blogspot.com at Quilt Trends and then she followed the bus to two more shops before she needed to head home. We had a nice visit and had a friendly chat.



Cyndi had a nice surprise for me. She made me one of her lovely handbags just for me using "Hello Betty" fabric. Now just how special was that. She included some lovely smell good items inside the bag. .

One more picture.  Now just how clever is this? 

 

Made if home safe and tired last night.



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Another Pot Holder

Since I  decided to keep the two applique pot holders featured in my last blog I have made another one for our pot holder exchange at our August guild meeting.  I hand embroderied the block and machine quilted around it.  Now I have one more to make.

Applique pot holders

I have recently started doing some applique with a group of ladies in our local guild.  We had a few of the experienced appliquers kind enought to help us get started with different techniques  to try.  I had two of my first samples just lying around and decided to make them into potholders.   Our guild is having a potholder exchange in August.  I cannot decide if I want to give these away or keep them since they are my frist two pieces I appliqued.    If I decide to keep them I will need to get busy and make a few more potholders.

Also going to share a few pictures of my lillies that are in full bloom.  I have 7 different varieties, I won't bore you with pictures of all of them.

Recent visitors.

I have had a nest of Phoebes on my front porch light this Spring.  Look what I noticed yesterday. You may need to look closely to see two little birds in the nest.  There were three of them.  One good thing I got this picture when I did.  They flew the coop today.

More visitors.

These little pest are the 13 year cacadas that have invaded our yard.  They are on all my hostas and around all of our trees.  We could scoop them up by buckets full.  They have not started flying are singing yet.

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Where have I been??????

Can you guess where I have been the past three weeks?  This was a welcoming gift from my friend Carol who we stayed with for 12 days.
This is your first clue.

OK, need a few more clues??

If you guessed London you are correct.  We spent several days in London and then hopped on the train to go  stay with our friends in Arnesby, England  for 12 days.  Our friends were the best host anyone could have asked for.  They took us around to the Cotswolds, Cambridge and several small villages in the area.  We truely saw the beautiful country side of England.  The four of us went to Edinburgh by train for 3 days.  We had a great time with memories and friendship to cherish  a lifetime. 

We escaped London before the Royal wedding events.  You can bet that I will be watching it on TV.  We walked the very aisle that the royal couple will be walking on this Friday.

Yes, I did get to visit a fabric shop.  We went to the Bramble Patch http://www.thebramblepatch.co.uk/shop/index.asp

My First

I have finished my first large hand applique project.  I choose this kit because it had large pieces and not a lot of sharp points etc.  I enjoyed doing this and imporved my stitches as I went along.  I know the bunnys on the bottom are not centered on the quilt, this is how the pattern was so I followed it. I hope to start another hand applique project soon.
This  is a Jan Patek pattern.

Spring has arrived.

Spring came to my front door today in a priority mail package.  Just one day after my birthday I received this lovely gift from Cyndi at Blue Birds Wing.

Not only did she send me a lovely bag but a wallet to match.  Then she topped it off with some chocolates and a very nice message inside a cute card.

Now all I need is for the Spring weather to arrive and stay.

Thank you very much Cyndi for my birthday gift.

Snow storm in Mid-Missouri

Sharing a few pictures of our recent snow storm.  We have not had a storm like this in many years.  Our street still has not be plowed.  Don has kept the driveway and sidewalk clear with his snow blower.

Walk to front door

Front door looking toward the unplowed street

Bushes in front of the house.

Don with his winter toy... sure glad we bought this last year.

Road to Jericho

My 90 year old mom made this quilt for her youngest grandson.  I finished quilting  this oversized queen quilt yesterday.

Ready for Valentine's Day

I made this walhanging last year from a charm pack.  I added a small lace edge before adding the boarder.  I think it added a litt to the project.

Flowers in full bloom

I had flowers blooming in December.  That is until I gave them away to special friends.  I actually made three more but failed to get pictures before I gave them away.

These lotus blossom pin cushions were fun to make.  It did require  a lot of hand work but I found it to be nice to make something without sitting in front of a sewing machine for a change.

Half way there...

I have my Raggedy and Friends BOM caught up.  This should be the big half of the quilt.  If interested in the BOM by Kaaren Johnson from "The Painted Quilt"  go to  http://thepaintedquilt.blogspot.com/2010/07/coming-soonraggedy-friends-bom.html   you will find all the patterns for this project on the right of her blog.

I have enjoyed this project and cannot wait for the 20th of each month to see what the next block will be.

Sorry that the picture is sideways.  It is not like this in my file but for some reason it came in like this.

New Year's Day Mystery Quilt

Myself and a few friends got together yesterday to do the mystery quilt sponsered by Planet Patchwork http://planetpatchwork.com/Case133/case133part1.htm. 
I got all but the last border done by the end of the day.  I just finished the outside border and have it ready for quilting.  Overall I am happy with the small wall hanging.  A few points could be better but after it is quilted and you don't stand real close it will not be too noticable.  Not sure but I may add some applique to the border.