HAHA MOMENT!!

Oh, I have so much to learn about posting things on my blog.  Hahahaha..........it seems that one of my post headings got a lot of attention.  Attention like this I was not trying to get.  My "Happy Dance" heading was referring to some accomplishments that I had made due to my quilting.   NOT what "Happy Dance" may mean to others.

LOL

So..........I will try and pay close attention to what my "heading posts" say from now on.  I just had to put this out there in the "universe".....:-)

A Week of Some Accomplishments!

Well, another week passing by so quickly.  It is true, the older you get, the more time flies.

I did get a few things done:  I finished my March Challenge Quilt from my yahoo Small Quilt Talk Group.  Boy I am on a roll......... So far, I have finished all of our challenges for 2014.  I pa-roused the photos of the other members, and they have quilts galore hanging on their walls.   I have substantial wall space in this house, I need to get something on them.

This is my completed March Challenge Quilt.  I finally named it:

Sailing Into The Future?  

The blocks just reminded me of sailboats..........hence the name.  LOL 

Oh, and of course, my surprise fabric from Kathy Tracy's recent give away.......Andover Fabrics.....I received them in the mail on Saturday.  They are beyond anything I thought I would receive.  The fabric line is just beautiful, and I can't wait to use them.  Also, I of course will have to look into buying some of this line as it will make a beautiful quilt.  NOTE TO ME:  Have to make a quilt for the guild quilt show this fall, WOW, wouldn't this make a gorgeous quilt?  Such rich colors, I am a very happy camper:-)  Will update you on the progress of this.  

I hope my ramblings have put a smile on your face, and get you in the mood to sew?

As always, thank you for stopping by, please stop back.

Sharon

One of Those Days :-(

One of those days:  I think we all probably have one, now and then.  I seem to be having more than my share lately.  But, more about that down the page.

Okay, I did actually accomplish a couple things from my craft room this week!  I finished the March challenge from the yahoo quilt group I belong to, Small Quilt Talk Group of Kathy Tracy's.  I also finished hemming my son's curtains for one of his bedrooms in his soon to be moved in house:-)  I only have 4 more windows to do for now, which will be a total of 8 more huge panels.  So far, so good.  The 2 I did came out even.  Like that is going to happen again!

Oh, I should have led with this.........I won a fabric give-away held by Kathy Tracy from her blog., Sentimental Quilter.  I was notified on St. Patrick's Day by her that I had won.  I'm looking at the e-mail she sent me, and it just didn't register in my brain that I could have possibly won.  But, there it was, asking me for my address so she could mail me some fabric.  Well, that definitely set the tone for the day.........lucky me!!!
I am hoping that it might be into day's mail.......I haven't ventured out to the mail box yet.

Now, show & tell of my sewing progress so far this week:

March Challenge Quilt

These really aren't colors I usually wood choose; a little bright for me, but my daughter said she liked them, so, maybe it will go live with her:-)  I really like this little fabric sign I made a few years back, so I had to get it in the picture! My Contrary Wife Block Quilt is peeking out from underneath it.  I am trying to come up with a good name for this little quilt, my mind keeps wanting to use "flags" something.  Flags waving in the breeze, flags sailing on the water, flags (what)?

Okay, topic of the day:  One of Those Days:  I decided it was time to start on a quilt challenge from September 2013, Little Red Schoolhouse Quilt.  The quilt is taken from Kathy'Tracy's quilt book, Prairie Children & Their Quilts.  I collected red and blue fabric to make this challenge.  Put them in a container so I wouldn't end up using some these fabrics for another project.  Usually I am not this smart :-)

Anyhoo....I am thinking I might like to paper piece this schoolhouse block.  I am in no way a great paper piece/foundation sewer.  LOL  I tried to find something "free" on the internet to work from for the size of the block I needed. Couldn't find anything.  So, I actually drew up a worksheet for each piece I needed.  I attached the different paper pattern pieces together, and they matched.  Good for me.

So, I constructed my first block.....squared it up to the 4" I needed, it worked.  Now, this process only took me about 6 hours to do, and that is not counting the hours I spent on making the pattern the night before! Okay, one side may have to be kind of worked into the seam.  All that work and not perfect, I am thinking I am going to make a block from the book's instructions!

Well I did, and it turned out perfect!!!! I had made the block, maybe under an hour.  WOW, I am so proud of myself..........setting back and admiring my work.........what do I see?  Let's see if you can find what I did wrong. LOL

  

Yes, the dormer is another fabric.  I took my time, made sure I had my 1/4 inch seams, matched all my dots.... perfect.........except for the fabric that doesn't match the house.  What you gonna do?  Get my trusty seam ripper and rip those seams out!!! 

I hope I have made you smile, no matter how we try to be perfect, sometimes that little "craft prankster" that lives somewhere in our sewing rooms.......has fun at our expense.

Until next time..........gotta go check my mailbox....maybe my surprise has arrived.

Sharon

HAPPY DANCE!!!

It is a blistery day here in Northern Ohio, but I am doing a happy dance!!!  My signature swap block quilt is finally done.  I belong to an online small quilt group (Kathleen Tracy's Small Talk Quilt Group) and we had a Snowball block swap last summer.  Our blocks were mailed in early fall to our hostess, and I am thinking we received our bundles early in November.

This is a special quilt, and I wanted it to tell it's own story.  So, I titled it and put a descriptive label on the reverse side.  I attached them alphabetically.  That was the easy part, because I didn't worry that same colors might "touch"..........

Well that's one swap block quilt done!  Our group also did an Ohio Star swap block last summer.  I just had to participate in both of them. I am thinking maybe over 110 blocks I made for these two swaps?  Anyway, the Ohio Star is going to wait a few more months before I get involved in putting that together. LOL

Now, my next project will be our March's challenge of half square triangles.  This unfortunately is a challenge for me...I seem to have a hard time making my squares turn into the same size half triangles.  LOL  But, yesterday I bought different size marking rulers to maybe help me with this problem.  I'll let you know.....

As always, thank you for visiting, please stop back.

Sharon

P.S.:  Well, trying to enlarge the quilt pictures didn't work.  This is where the quilt is going to live for the time being.  I'll have to have my son play with getting me a better picture.  Ho Hum!!

 

 



SAMPLER DILEMMA...PART II

Last month my friend and I were contemplating what quilt sampler we wanted to do.  So, a week ago we headed to the book store to actually view the two sampler quilt books we might like.  Both quilt books are by Jennifer Chiaverini; Sylvia's Bridal Sampler and the Loyal Union Sampler.

Of course, the only one they had in stock was the Loyal Union Sampler.  But, viewing the block squares, my friend and I agreed that we liked the blocks that were offered in this quilt book.  So, now we are awaiting the arrival of our books via the mail.

So my blog readers, have you or someone you know sewn from the Loyal Union Sampler?  I am thinking that once I get organized and start working on charts and fabric choices, I am going to share my trip through Loyal Union Sampler Land by blogging about my experience.  I hope it proves to be a fun journey and one I can accomplish in not a so distant future.   Give or take a year, or two, or three......................................

 Currently, I am working on the last border to my swap quilt of last fall through SQTG.  I hope to have it quilted by tonight, and maybe early tomorrow I will be able to do the binding.  I like to give my hand quilted quilts a little gentle wash and a little run through the dryer.  I like the old time, crinkled look.

Until we meet again,

Sharon

DESSERT DAY!!

I actually started the day as a sewing day.  But boy, things chance quickly around here.  My husband thawed several cups of sour cherries yesterday, hoping for a cherry crisp.  Then, he decided he just wanted the cherries in a sauce and he would go out and buy an angel food cake.  Okay, that is a doable thing.

Then, my son-in-law and grandchildren are coming over for dinner.  Daughter will join us after she gets off work, or maybe not because we are having meatloaf..........everyone really likes it except her!  It's my husbands, remember, he is the cook around here.  I am the clean-up person:-)

Okay, back to the dinner:  so he's going to the store to get angel food cake, he decides to pick up some canned pumpkin and evaporated milk and I will make 2 pie shells and have pumpkin pie.  Okay, another doable thing.  What he bought was a new pumpkin pie mix that I have never seen before.  I know there is already a pumpkin pie mix that calls for sweetened condensed milk.  So not really paying attention to the directions....cause I am use to doing regular pumpkin pie, I opened both of the evaporated cans of milk.  DUH.... cause this mix calls for 2 eggs and 2/3 cup evaporated milk!!!!  What the heck am I going to do with the rest of the opened milk?  Yup, here is where I get creative.

I already had 2 pie shells made while he was shopping, so I had an x-tra shell and I didn't want to end up making a cherry pie cause we now have angel food cake.  So, I found this chocolate pie recipe on the internet from allrecipes.com.  It has been many years since I have really made any cream pie from scratch.  But, I had a can and a half of evaporated milk left.  Let me tell you, this is a great pie recipe......very chocolaty and smooth.

                              3 egg yolks, beaten
                              1 1/2 cups white sugar
                              3 TBL. cornstarch
                              1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
                              1/2 tsp salt
                              3 cups milk (here is where I used the can and a half of evaporated milk, plus
                                        2% milk to make the 3 cups
                              1 TBL butter
                              1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

  Cream egg yolks and sugar.  Mix in cornstarch, cocoa powder, and salt.  Add milk and stir gently.

Pour mixture into a large saucepan and cook over med. heat, stirring constantly, until boiling.  Remove from heat and stir in butter and vanilla extract.  Cool slightly, stirring every once in a while  ..........pour mixture into a cooled baked pie shell.

Really very, very good.

This is all that is left.........lots of compliments on this one!!

Now the cherry sauce.  I always pre-heat my frozen cherries and the juice, and cook a few minutes.  I separate the cherries, add the required sugar and almond extract.   I bring the juice back to a boil.  I then thicken it with some corn starch and add a couple TBLS of butter.    After I get it to the thickness I like, I start adding some of the thickened sauce back into the cherries a little at a time until I have enough for a pie or whatever.   This way I don't end up wasting sugar and extract if I have too much juice in the beginning.

Nice and juicy, but I am not a great fan of sour cherries! 

My husband and middle daughter like them!

So, desserts were a success.  Funny thing is, my husband and I proclaimed that tomorrow we were starting our diets, again.  He doesn't really need to "loose" anything..........but me, I lost like 40 lbs. in the last year, but this cold, depressing winter has me seeing some pounds creep back on.  I even went thru last year's holidays without any weight gain.  I guess I need more time at the sewing machine, or make sure I have something in my hands besides food!!!  LOL

Thanks gain for stopping by......... if you are the owner of a blog.... leave a comment and your blog address, I would love to check out your blogs, and I am sure other people popping in here would like to also.  I am seeing like 500 plus views a month, so someone is out there and they could be visiting you too.

Spring is around the corner........... I know it is.  LOL

Sharon