Quilts and Teeth

Last post, I showed you the quilt top I made for a friend for her engagement pictures/wedding and now that she has actually seen the top, as well as the back (in person) I will share a couple of fun personalization "labels" I added to the back.

I wanted to add something with a monogram, the bride and groom names and their wedding date (which I said she cannot change now that it's on the quilt for EVER) but I wanted it to be something I would be sure would never wash away.  Thought of writing a label, but have heard even those will fade over time, heard a technique of printing on fabric with the printer, but didn't know too much about that, and I'm not good at hand embroidery type stuff so that was not an option either.  As I was chatting about my dilemma while on this year's Treasure Shop Hop (14 hours, 450 miles, 8 quilt shops, 8 women, 1 Suburban...I'd say those numbers deserve their own post, no?  Maybe someday I will get around to it).  So, anyway, a friend of mine who has her own business and own commercial grade embroidery machine suggested embroidering something on the quilt.  So, one afternoon I spent a good 5 hours with her working on the design we wanted and finally came up with something I love.  

Soon I will get around to taking pictures of the complete front and back.  As you can maybe tell from that bottom picture, I quilted around the circles on the front of the quilt, a technique I've done on 2 "circle" quilts now and I love doing it!

Now, and update on the "and the Boys" front, Hunter has lost another tooth (this makes 5 now):

Things I've Been Working On

This one started as a Crazy Nine-Patch Lattice Quilt, but after I made the nine-patch blocks I discovered it was a baby quilt and I didn't have enough to make more....so, enter a little improvisation (mess?).  This is an early picture, there will be the thin yellow border around all of that center grid and the outside border of the larger squares may still change several times as I go.  Back when I did the Treasure Shop Hop I decided to get 1 fat quarter from each shop, these are the fabrics from that adventure.

Geeze, lady!  Been sewing long?!  These blocks for my local quilt group are supposed to look like that.  Beth got her inspiration from the Waverunner quilt along.  Some of Beth's fabrics are also from fat quarters purchased on the Shop Hop, this was a fun idea we plan to do again next year (buying a fat quarter at each shop, I mean).

Veggie Tales is a blanket for West Coast/Central Oddball Knitters (although, I think our group name has changed several times so I don't really know what to call it anymore).  If you are a knitter and would like to join our group, feel free to leave a comment and I can email you more info, or you can find us on Ravelry, I think we're called Western Regions Oddball Baby Blankets there (see how one could get confused on what to call the group?).

For my local quilt group.  I'm unsure of what the pattern is but Terri will end up trimming those little points to create "square" rows and then place them side by side in zigzag form.

Sara borrowed some of my Crazy Curve templates, used up some of her fabric scraps she had on hand and asked us to make a block that looks like this - I'm not sure what she plans to do with them.

I bought this quilt kit awhile back and pieced together the top.  It also came with the binding fabric and I purchased the backing fabric at the same time.  Last week I bought some batting so one of these days I can get it all together.  The pattern is called Fire Escape.

Look Who's Back

Hey...did you miss me?!  

My last post was on Mother's Day and I mentioned we were spending the day moving.  I kind of think we went about things all wrong because we spent all month moving!  We had to be out of our house by the end of May and now that we're finally out, we can start getting things more settled in at the new place (maybe soon I won't have to lie on my belly to type on my computer that's on the floor!)  

Thanks for waiting for my return, I'm glad you're still here because I have a surprise for you!  I guess all of my traveling for the Shop Hop paid off because I got a message a couple of weeks ago from one of my local quilt shops that I had won a prize!  While it wasn't the coveted $50 gift card to each shop (the grand prize), I was happy to have won anything at all!  Here's my loot:

Twelve Days of Christmas Appliqued Quilt pattern, Christmas note pad, miscellaneous Christmas charm squares,  length not yet determined cut of "minky" fabric, baby quilt pattern and some kind of ribbon

 I haven't decided what all I really want to keep and use so maybe you'll be seeing some in a giveaway soon, but in the meantime, while I was picking up my prize, I decided to get a prize for one of you as well - paying it forward in a giveaway prize type of way!  I'm a complete sucker for a lot of the wonderful holiday fabrics out there and these are some I really love, but have yet to even use for myself.

These 2 charm packs of Flurry can be yours, all you have to do is leave me a comment telling me what type or color or line of fabric you're a sucker for.  If you want an extra entry, leave a comment if you're a follower (become one if you are not yet following).  If you so desire to have a 3rd entry, feel free to blog about my giveaway and leave the link to your post in the comment.

I'm going to give you a little bit (or a lot) of time to enter this giveaway.  I'm going on a little vacay and I'll choose the winner on June 15th, so get your entries in before then!

No-reply bloggers must be sure to include your email in your comment or your entry will not be considered - thank you!

I've won 2 other giveaways recently as well so I'm thinking I'll be having 2 more giveaways of my own soon...so stick around!

Treasure Shop Hop Day #4

Day #4 found Beth, my 2 boys and I taking a little road trip north, to the mountains!  Our first stop of the morning was at Stitch n' Snip in Garden Valley, ID, an approximate hour and a half drive.  This was a small shop packed full of goodness!

Another hour and 45 minute drive to McCall, ID and we visited Granny's Attic and Huckleberry Patches.  At Huckleberry Patches, I found this beautiful Yuletide Magic panel that I absolutely love - I cannot wait to turn into something wonderful (hopefully).  I decided I'm a sucker for Christmas fabric, I really could have purchased a fat quarter bundle (or more) of the coordinating fabrics in this line.  I haven't noticed this fabric at any of my local quilt shops, but I haven't actually looked, I just happened upon it while in McCall.  I'm either going to have to search down here or find an excuse to go visit this shop again.

Thanks for joining me on our Shop Hop journey.  Next year I'm thinking we'll get crazy with it, maybe have more interested members from our quilt group go with us, do all shops in a weekend and stay in a motel somewhere overnight, dress up - crazy hats, huge sunglasses, sequins...I'm not sure.  I just think it would be fun to get as crazy as we want with a large group of people.  Though, don't get me wrong, I really did love the quality time with Sara and Beth on day 1 (and Beth on day #2 and #4) - we've been friends awhile, but it has been a long time since we've spent so much time together and it was fabulous!

Treasure Shop Hop Day #2/#3

So, my Day #1 post was titled Treasure Valley Shop Hop because that's what I thought it was...turns out, I included the "Valley" on my own (we do live in the Treasure Valley so I thought that's what it was).  Anyway, Day #2 (Monday, April 18th) consisted of my friend Beth and I traveling to Kuna, ID (not much of a travel really, Beth lives about 2 minutes away) where we went to Knit One Quilt Too (no website that I could locate), a quaint little shop that is great for knitters and quilters alike.  Of course, wouldn't you know I didn't take any photos of the local quilt shops...I guess because they're closer I didn't think about it.  Next we went to Nancy's Quilts and More (again, no website) - you might remember me talking about the shop in this post.  After Nancy's we thought we'd take some of the back roads to get to downtown Nampa, ID (Nancy's has a Nampa address too, it's just out in the country).  We figured it was going to be an easy trip and surely we could figure it out despite the fact that neither of us had ever been this way.  This is another reason I really wish I had a camera with me (we did have our phones, but thought about taking photos after the fact): we got lost!  It didn't seem like we were driving for very long (time-wise) but we ended up about 10 miles from where we wanted to be, though, probably drove an extra 20 or so at least to get there.  Well, we weren't really lost, we just ended up taking the back roads, the more scenic route.  We were driving around something neither of us had ever heard about - the Deer Flat National Wildlife Refuge and it was really quite peaceful.  I happened to glance out of the window and saw a huge body of water of which I couldn't see the other side...I had thought, up until this point, that it was just a swampy/marshy area.  I exclaimed, probably rather loudly, "is that a giant body of water?!!!!" And Beth just started laughing hysterically - that was a yes.  It was such a memorable moment and I wish we would have taken our pictures by some of the Wildlife Refuge signs.  

We were just assuming at this point that we were at Lake Lowell - it was the only body of water in that area that we could have been at, unless of course we had drive a whole lot further than we thought.  Stop #3 of the day was Bluebird Quilt Studio in downtown Nampa.  This is definitely not my favorite shop for fabric but everyone is nice and they seem to do a lot of classes, and block of the month type projects that seem fun.

Day #3 was Tuesday, April 19th.  My friend Sara (different than Day #1 Sara) and I were able to go to the 2 shops in Boise, Quilt Expressions and The Quilt Crossing, while my 5 year old was in school (I dropped him off at 1230 and had to pick him up at 3...I was late).  I love Quilt Expressions - it's huge, has a great selection of fabric and my dream is to take their longarm class so that I would be able to rent time on the machines (they have like 5 or so in their shop).  The Quilt Crossing is also fabulous - great selection of fabric and I had 2 gift cards from my Birthday, and I only used one that day!

Join me again to hear about the final day and last 3 shops!

Treasure Valley Shop Hop Day #1

This past weekend was the start of the 10th Annual Treasure Shop Hop.  Last year a friend and I just happened upon the Shop Hop while in a local shop and once we found about it, we were hooked and we visited all of the local shops that didn't require more than a 20 minute drive (because there are also some in Oregon and McCall, ID up to 3 hours away). When we found out that the grand prize for visiting all 16 shops and getting your passport stamped was a $50 gift certificate from each shop (that's $800 in quilt shop money, people!) we knew we'd have to get serious about it this year.

Unfortunately that friend is only 2 weeks away from her due date with her second baby and I think she decided it might not be a good time to drive 3 hours from home in remote areas that we're all unfamiliar with. Though, don't get me wrong, we were prepared - we had talked about a plan for delivering the baby in the car, she was even going to bring sterile scissors for cutting the umbilical cord. We had invited all 12 of the ladies in our local quilt group but most couldn't make the trip, which I think was okay because not really knowing where we were going etc, this gave us a chance to test out the route we were taking and decide if it was the best plan of attack (which, I think it is not). It was kind of a trial run of the entire Shop Hop (which, this year consists of 14 shops) and it was fun, but I think next year we'll be doing things a little differently, as far as driving routes, etc.

Here are a few pictures from our adventures on day #1 - we left about 7:30am and were back at 5pm - lots of miles...I can't remember how many, nearly 300 I think.  I won't explain pictures all in great detail as that may be a bit boring for most of you and I do not want to bore you!

(my traveling companions and good friends Beth and Sara at a rest stop in who knows where)

(stop #1 - Quilts Plus in Halfway, OR)

(Sara at stop #2, Traditions Quilt Shop in Baker City, OR - this was followed by stop #3 at LaDonna's FiberArts, also in Baker City, OR)

(Stop #4 - Charm Shack Quilt Shop in Ontario, OR)

Stop #5 - Marilynn's Pickets and Patchwork in Nyssa, OR

Stop #6 - Cindy's Quilt Shop in Caldwell, ID

It's definitely an experience to visit so many quilt shops, some most have very nice people and others you kind of get the feeling that if you're not a regular, or perhaps fit a certain stereotype, you don't feel as welcome.  Sometimes you go into a shop and wonder how in the world they are still in business.  Some share their space with antiques, coffee shops, and bakeries.  More than one of these 6 shops listed were directly next to a "hole in the wall" type of bar...hmm....

Every shop created and sold kits for a block.  They were all similar in that they used batiks, but other than that I wasn't really impressed with the coordination of the blocks.  Each block is sold for $5 and $2 of that goes to Project Linus.  It's maybe kind of hard to visualize in the picture but these are the blocks from the first 6 shops.  A local blogger has made all of the blocks and posted them on her blog - check it out!  I'm not going to be making all of these blocks.  They are going to be distributed to my quilt group and we'll put them all together for a charity quilt.

  

Maybe, before too long, I'll post about visiting shops #7-14!