Look Ma, no hands!

Well, almost….

Today is day 6 following rotator cuff surgery. I picked up plenty of books and videos from the library to keep myself entertained during recovery. I also thought it was a great time to visit the world via blogs.

Well, my attention span is rather sort due to pain meds and I hate watching TV and videos without my knitting. I have visited a gazillion blogs though! The down side to that is, it makes me want to sew!

Today is the first time I have felt like doing much of anything and decided to give one handed sewing a try. I had some half square triangles cut and ready to sew……hmmm…..forget anything requiring accuracy.

Free pieced letters is something I have wanted to try again…

There, that’s better! Until next time….

Stash Enhancement….

….at the LYS. I consider myself a real novice when it comes to knitting so I have not splurged on really nice (read “expensive”) yarn. Until today….

On top is a superwash merino wool for socks. The brand is Happy Feet! On the bottom, is a mercerized cotton. I will likely use that for socks as well. It is DK so it should be a fairly quick knit.

Both of these came from The Grand Emporium Knitting Studio here in Saginaw, MI. It is a lovely shop and I spent quite a lot of time there just wandering around.

I am hoping to get these knit into something before my shoulder surgery which is scheduled for next month.

Until next time….

This and That…

I have had this charm pack for at least a year and finally decided to do something with it. It is from Moda but I do not remember the line. I found a tutorial for making 9- patches out of charms and thought I would try it.

I have 36 done now and that will be all for this little quilt. I cut a couple wrong and a few charms were solids that I didn’t care for in the group. They will be 3 inches finished. I think I will finish the Hawaiian top before I return to these.

I have also been doing a bit of knitting. And since spring may never come to Michigan, I finished these for myself:

Until next time….

Accomplishment

The Lord will accomplish what concerns me. Ps 138:8a

Until next time…

Happy Easter!

This is what we did today at our house:

Okay, we don’t have any little kids around any more but we still love to color eggs. We have a bit of a twisted sense of humor as well….

All kidding aside, Easter is a very important holiday for us. Easter is the day we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ. He died on the cross to pay the penalty for my sin. He did for me what I could not do for myself.

But…He did not stay dead, He rose again to prove that sin and death have no power over Him! Because He lives, I live. Because He lives, I have hope for tomorrow and every day after that. And He did this all because He loves me and wants to have a relationship with me. How incredible is that?

He didn’t die only for me, He died for you too.

Want to know more but haven’t been to church in a while? That’s okay. Going to church doesn’t make you a Christian any more than sitting in a garage makes you a car.

Want to try something different? Check out LifeChurch.tv.  There are over 40 services each week. You can go in your pjs and eat chocolate bunnies while you watch . Just look at the upper right hand corner of the page and you will see how long until the next online service starts. You can watch anonymously, join in and chat with others, even have someone pray with/for you.

It’s nontraditional. Jesus was too.

Until next time…. have the most amazing Easter ever!

What I have been up to…..

I  just finished this t-shirt quilt for my middle daughter. We worked on it together but I did the quilting and binding. Some of these shirts go back to her preschool days! She will be leaving in just over a week for the Air Force and I am glad we were able to finish this before she went.

I have also been doing a bit of sock knitting. Our new dog, Lucy, decided to help me out one day:

I swear we have a tiny goat disguised as a cocker spaniel! You really have to watch her because she will eat anything! Good thing these DPNs come 5 to a package. I did finally get the tangles worked out and the socks finished:

I also got inspired to use some of the fabrics I picked up in Hawaii during our trip in 2008.  I cut the pieces to the size of a standard postcard. It will be a twin size when I am done.

Since my sewing room is pretty darn clean, I thought I would share a shot from the doorway of that as well:

So, what have you been up to?

Until next time….

A great deal!

I always use Warm and Natural batting. It is my favorite. I usually buy it by the bolt and look for it on sale at JoAnn’s. Well, here is the best deal I have seen them offer in a long time!

This bolt is 40 yards of 90 inch wide 100% cotton batting. This little code will make it an even better deal: FAFS40 gives you free shipping as well!

I have no affiliation whatsoever with JoAnn Fabrics. I just love this stuff and if you do too, I wanted to pass on this great deal. I have no idea how long this sale will last.

Until next time….

Northeast Arts Council Show

Every year, the Northeast Arts Council hosts a small, traditional quilt show. They are based in Standish, Michigan and the show is held in their building which is an old brick church. It is a lovely place for a show.

I have entered quilts in this show for a number of years. I have never made quilts specifically for this show, just take what I have on hand that fits their categories. These categories are mostly based on size. They specify and range for length and width for crib quilts, large and small wall hangings, bed quilts, lap quilts etc. Most of my quilts don’t fit neatly, they are too long or too short in one way or the other. Often I end up pulling out some oldies.  Here are my entries for this year:

This last one I made to hang in our school room back when we were homeschooling. I never expected it to win anything but like I said, it is a very traditional show. It was fun to make and it would be fun to do a funky modern version of this some time. Hmmmm….

Until next time….

Wishing for green….

I so long for spring to come. I cannot wait to look out my window and see green!

So I suppose that is my motivation for pulling  out several of my hand dyed greens today, along with some cool batik strips I picked up somewhere.

I just wacked away at the hand dyes with my scissors, no measuring. They may get hacked some more. I am thinking about using these with them:

Maybe something long these lines:

I should have cropped these photos and clearly not a lot of thought has gone into design yet but I think I will play some more with this today.

Until next time….

Spring in Michigan…..

Looks like this:

Nice, huh?

Until next time….