Vanity, thy name is....

My Mary Kay adventure has been so good!! When I started this new career back in October, I wasn't sure where it would lead.  It was just months after Sam passed away, and all I knew was that MK would give me a platform to bless people. 

Quilting does that (and I always receive sooo much more than I give!), and now MK gives me even more people to know and love.  Weird combo, huh?!  Quilting and Mary Kay??!!  Imagine my great surprise when our make-up artist Lori Hogg trained us in "color correction" -- how the color wheel helps determine what we can use to conceal skin discolorations and blemishes...COOL!! I know color wheel stuff!!!!!

I have qualified for the "Court of Sales" -- a major accomplishment for this newbie and totally NOT possible without the fabulous people who buy from me and (can you believe it!?! LOL) trust me when I talk about make-up.  This plain-jane homeschool mom has enjoyed the unlikely transformation to "glamour guru."  LOL

But it's not without some serious pitfalls!! The business!? GREAT! MK is a fabulous product. The recognition...?  Well, I thought I wanted it....

Enter Exhibit A...

Black Sequined Dress.

The Court of Sales includes a Royalty Reception complete with formal attire, an appearance on stage at our convention (Seminar in  Dallas!!), and if I'm #1 in my national area (I'm currently #2) or my Division (I'm currently #18), a speech.  That's been my motivation.  To talk about a life well lived.  To talk about making a difference.  To talk about Sam.  LOVE! LOVE!!

Problem? 
Um....
The dress is a size (or so! :-(  too SMALL.

Vanity, thy name is IDIOT!!! LOL
So I'm working out.  Walking 3+ miles every day. Step Aerobics three times a week.  Weight Watchers.  I have 7 weeks.

Aren't there better ways to spend my time!?!?!  Perhaps a little machine quilting?

I'm still very much a novice on my home machine.  But I'm enjoying the process.  This "little Jo" -- a Jo Morton pattern (can't remember the name) from her club -- is a veritable eye feast of her fabrics and colors. 

The original was square...I got so wrapped up in those quarter-square-triangles that I ended up with a rectangular quilt.  Can't wait to put on the binding!!

I'll be binding another quilt before long.  Judi Madsen at Green Fairy Quilts emailed today that she hoped to finish Sam's Darlin' Hearts very soon.  Be watching her blog for pics!!

I worry that I won't fit into my dress.  That my hard work will be for nothing!! :-)  In quilting there is always a payoff.  Same with a walk with God!!

The apostle Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 15: 57-58, "But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain."

Isn't that a great promise!?  I like knowing that what I invest with Christ is not vanity. 

Unlike the fiasco my black-sequin-dress may prove to be! LOL! :-D  And in case I get discouraged, I need to remember how to weigh....

 Blessings!!





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Tribute

You can tell by my few blog posts in the last several month that I've not quilted a whole lot. Farmer's Wife blocks for a class I was teaching, memorial quilts that I'd contracted before Sam passed away, the club mystery quilt...That's about it! :-(   Very unusual for someone who usually quilted every single day!!  My friend Jennifer says it's 'cause when I'm sewing at home, I'm usually alone, and too much alone time was resulting in too many tears. True enough, I suppose.

The gals at the local quilt shop talked me into doing Bonnie Hunter's Orca Bay mystery.  I got them into Roll, Roll Cotton Boll last year, so turn about was fair play.  Just rifling through fabric and cutting fabric and sitting with them each Friday to work on it together -- all these seem to have brought some of my quilting joy back!!  And after completing a particularly difficult (for me) memorial quilt for a friend, I tied into Sam's Darlin' Hearts!  And today, I finished the quilt top.

And I'm just in awe.

Not of my work. Far from it.

I'm in awe all over again of the beauty of friendships and heartfelt sympathy and prayers and love that was given to me in the weeks following Sam's death. Who could believe people are so kind! And to me!! As I've looked over the blocks, many are from "close" quilting blog friends. And just as many are from people whose blog paths I've never crossed, or if I have, it was a periferal thing. And yet they cared enough to make a block (or two, or FOUR!) and send them to me in the most difficult days of my life!!

There are no words to properly thank you!! I tried to send cards (I saved every card, envelope and note! :-D), but my tears smeared the ink.   Maybe this small recognition will let you know how grateful I am.  Each name is a link to their blog (if they have one and I know it :-D ) Check them out! They are all amazing!

Row 1

Sharon, Miki, Jacque (1 block of 2 she made!), Stephanie (1 of 2 she made! and I think that's the right blog!) and Ann...

Row 2

Selma Jean, Rhonda (the first block I received!), Cassey, and Rebecca...

Row 3

Debbie (the strawberry fabric was a definite clue! :-D), Sarah, and Teresa...

Row 4

Mary, Crispy (this is the one that sparked the quilt name --  because it made me cry like Charlene Darling on Andy Griffith! :-D), Barb (the sparrow story is amazing!), and Janet...

Row 5

Diane (my Hands 2 Help quilt-for-Romania exchange partner through Sarah's blog), Ann (1 of 4 blocks!!), and LuAnn (who also checked on me through Jeff's deployment! Thank you!!)...

Row 6

Sue (1 of 2 blocks!), Jacque, Ann, and Stephanie...

Row 7

Ann, and Sue, and Cindy Lou :-)...

Row 8

Beth, Tonya,  Paulette, and Staci (this is the only one I'm not sure of...and isn't that a hoot, Stace, since your blog is The Confused Quilter! :-D)...  Correction! :-) The last one on this row is Kate's (Kathleen, below)!! So. is the blue pieced one Staci's!?!?  LOL  Let me know, if you know!)

And Row 9

Kathy,  Ann, Robbie, Kathleen, and Karen.

Many of the blocks came from quilters who participated in Sarah's Hands 2 Help challenge.  Such generous gals!! Thank you so much!

I think the quilt top is just stunning!! I have a couple of quilters in mind to complete it, and then it's snuggle time. :-)

This is the first of three pieced quilts I'll make in Sam's memory -- I'll be piecing one with his boxers :-D (there are 24 pair of them!! :-D) in the next couple of weeks, and I have a bunch of blue fat quarters that my quilt club gave me to use in another. 

I received a quilt from Mary at Quilt Hollow, and it's already a favorite. She won the quilt top, then quilted it and sent it to me to bind.  What a blessing!!

And then I have his t-shirts and other memorabilia to place in quilts for Emily and Will. Sweet!!

Philippians 1:3-8 expresses some of what I feel for you all. :-)  I like the Message translation...

Every time you cross my mind, I break out in exclamations of thanks to God. Each exclamation is a trigger to prayer. I find myself praying for you with a glad heart. I am so pleased that you have continued on in this with us, believing and proclaiming God's Message, from the day you heard it right up to the present. There has never been the slightest doubt in my mind that the God who started this great work in you would keep at it and bring it to a flourishing finish on the very day Christ Jesus appears.

 It's not at all fanciful for me to think this way about you. My prayers and hopes have deep roots in reality. You have, after all, stuck with me all the way from the time I was thrown in jail, put on trial, and came out of it in one piece. All along you have experienced with me the most generous help from God. He knows how much I love and miss you these days. Sometimes I think I feel as strongly about you as Christ does!

Thank you for being God's grace to me.  Thank you for giving from the heart.  Thank you for, as was said of Sam, loving "without filters."  Thank you for being a part of my finding my quilt joy again!  May you be blessed  a hundred fold!!

Blessings,

Following

I have always enjoyed Bonnie Hunter's pics.  You know the ones...taken from her car as she travels along.  Sunrises, sunsets, trees, highways, byways... It's a fascinating look at her perspective in life, a snapshot of adventures we are all taking with her as we quilt!!

I was traveling home after spending Thursday, Friday and Saturday with my "posse" of Mountain Laurel Quilters at our fall retreat, and I had to pull out my camera and snap what was in front of my minivan!

Let me get a little closer so you can see...

Uh-huh.
Bonnie gets vistas; I get...
Well!  LOL

That would be the worst of my retreat this past weekend! :-D  I got some much needed quilt therapy, working on some projects that have been lanquishing far too long (kinda like my blog!!)!




I finally got the alternate blocks pieced for Sam's Darlin' Hearts! I was able to put them up on the design wall when I got home.  My wall is not quite big enough to hold all the blocks (and it's behind my sewing table, so I have to get an angle shot to capture the bottom. :-D)...but they are simply gorgeous.






I also pieced blocks for the Shiners View quilt that I found through Sarah's Confessions of a Fabric Addict blog.  I love how the big prints play in this design!!

I "leader-ed and ender-ed" 1 1/2" squares for my Crabapples (one of Bonnie Hunter's
:-D), and just for funsies, also worked a little on a Tumbler quilt for which I've had a kit for at least a couple of years.  These 5+" blocks make for easy piecing!! And wonderful scrappy, dark fabrics -- my usual pallette, unlike the other blocks I worked on during the weekend!

It's the most time I've spent on quilting since Sam passed away.  It was much needed therapy!!  Being around other quilters is always good for the soul!

And following a donkey all the way home was a reminder....

I need to be sure I'm following the right people!!
I don't mean the rich or famous, or government leaders, or ambitious or even influential people, or even people exactly like me...

But people who are positive.  People I want to emulate because they are excellent quilters, excellent designers, excellent people.  People who have HEART!!

Paul writes, "Follow my example, as I follow the example of Christ" (1 Corinthians 11:1 NIV).  Jesus said, "My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand" (John 10:27-28 NIV). 

I pray I'll be someone who always follows the right Person -- so that if others find themselves behind me, they won't be jerking out their camera to capture a jackass in all her glory!! :-D

Blessings!

Hearts Fly Free

I've been sorta paralyzed for the last several weeks, getting only a little bit done on projects with deadlines, but not really accomplishing as much as I'd like, nor getting to projects that are burning in my brain to be started!  And the truth is, I don't really function well in chaos....which is a shame, 'cause I don't really function well as a housekeeper, either! LOL

We had a bunch of friends over on Saturday night, though, and the impending cook-out/games night meant getting my house in order for company!  My sewing room looked like the villains from Raiders of the Lost Ark had come through, ransacking for ancient powerful artifacts!! Is that the Ark of the Covenant!!! The Holy Grail? Glowing stones for ancient gods or crystals left by aliens!?! 

NO! just gigantic piles of fabrics, scraps, and tools, thank you very much!

Since I can't seem to clean the rest of the house until the sewing room is done, I tied in and got-r-done!

Finally, then, I'm free from the weeks of  clutter and ever-mounting piles of stuff! in my sewing room (although I dare not open the closet door too fast for fear of an avalanche!!  That is a project for another day!), and I'm able to start something I've been wanting to do for a while.

I delved into my scraps today to make a leader/ender project.  Many of the pieces had already been cut into 1 1/2" strips, so I started whittling them down into squares for "Crabapples" from Bonnie Hunter's Adventures with Leaders and Enders book.

I'll feed my leaders and enders through as I work on a couple more quilts for others (I've got a t-shirt quilt and a couple of memorial quilts on the burner) and on Sam's Darling Hearts.  Last week I received a block from Teresa at Fabric Therapy, and it's another beautiful addition to the quilt:

That brings the total of blocks I've received up to 34!!!  I'm eager to start putting them together!!

I love the words Teresa embroidered on her block:  "Hearts Fly Free"

I've been reading in the gospel of John this month, and Jesus talks a lot about freedom!  "The truth will set you free," He says in chapter 8, verse 32.  A little further in the chapter He says this...

"I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin.  Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever.  So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed."  (John 8:34-35)

There's no doubt in my mind that my son Sam is free!! What a blessing! What a testimony!  So Teresa's block is another beautiful expression of Sam's life and death.  I've been amazed at how people have understood his heart and made blocks that just "fit," you know?

Now if I could just get all my sewing stuff to fit....
I'm not sure even Indiana Jones could help me with that!!

Blessings,

More Heart

I arrived home from camp on Saturday to find some lovelies waiting for me!
Two more beautiful blocks for Sam's Darling Hearts:

One from Mrs. G at From the Strawberry Patch and one from Janet O. at Rogue Quilter! They are perfect! I took the other blocks to camp to show the gals there, and I haven't put them back up on the design wall with these yet, but I will.  I can't wait to see how they all look together.

I can't just yet because of the I-can't-reveal-it-yet project that I'm working on.

I have another sneak peak (or two)....

For those of you who guessed states last time, yes...!  We are journeying through the south.  I should know by this weekend where I'm going! LOL  (Sorry, Crispy! I know how you hate sneak peaks!! :-D) 

I also received a package containing my Farmhouse Quilt Kit from Laundry Basket Quilts.  Just look at how Edyta puts her kit together!

Everything is labeled and folded beautifully so that you can see all the colors and textures.  I love her use of color!! And since I'm terrible at using batiks, I figure I'll take advantage of her flair for them to make the Farmhouse quilt from her Friendship Strips and Scraps book.

We also received word while I was at camp that our Sam died of cardiac disrhythmia of unknown etiology. Which means, of course, that his heart stopped and they don't know why.  Profound, huh!?

:-) We will probably not know in this life the physiological cause of his death.  Paul tells us, though, in 1 Corinthians 13 (Amplified) that the time will come when we will understand "fully and clearly":

¹²For now we are looking in a mirror that gives only a dim (blurred) reflection [of reality as ^[a]in a riddle or enigma], but then [when perfection comes] we shall see in reality and face to face! Now I know in part (imperfectly), but then I shall know and understand ^[b]fully and clearly, even in the same manner as I have been ^[c]fully and clearly known and understood [^[d]by God].

Our family doctor looked over the medical examiner's report and commented that Sam had a large heart! Not at all unusual for a runner like Sam.  But we knew he had a big heart long before he started running! :-)  Sam's best friend, Luke, commented that Sam loved without filters.

Like Jesus.

Paul ends his chapter this way:

¹³And so faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Sam's Darling Hearts will be a visible reminder of what love looks like!  I hope my own legacy is that my heart was big and I loved without filters!  .

Blessings!

Hearts and Sparrows and a UFO or two

July is passing too quickly!

I'm hoping to put the Heart blocks together along with completing this month's UFO's for Judy's UFO Challenge. My #2's are the top of the Victory Quilt (for which I have all the blocks done!), and quilting for Somerset (a Jo Morton pattern).

I've decided to name the Heart quilt, "Sam's Darlin' Hearts." :-)  Mostly because all the blocks are sweet and because they make me cry like Charlene Darlin' on Andy Griffith! :-D

The latest addition to the collection of blocks in memory of Sam comes from Barb at Fun with Barb.

Somerset (I "tweaked" Jo's pattern
by putting the blocks on point)

Barb pieced the background of her block from scraps of her Mother's Garden quilt.  She designed the beautiful memory quilt, completed the top last year, and she is hand quilting it.  It's a stunning tribute to her mom, and you can read about it here: Good Mourning. 

Her card said, "...I have only scraps left over from my 'Mother's Garden' quilt and very much wanted to use it for you.  I have one of my sparrows flying in with a double dose of Friendship and Love."

Quilt-in-a-Day's Victory Quilt blocks

The sparrow....well, that's another beautiful story.  Barb wrote about it in  The Sparrow Story and you'll be blessed as I was to note it's symbolism. 

I had to look up the lyrics to the song by Simon and Garfunkel that Barb referenced (it'd been a long, long time since I'd heard it!).  The last verse says this....

Who will love a little Sparrow?

Will no one write her eulogy?

"I will," said the Earth,

"For all I've created returns unto me,

From dust were ye made and dust ye shall be."

The little sparrow is a perfect addition to the quilt!

I've started planning the setting for the blocks...

I'm gonna use Sam's favorite blue to frame the lighter blocks, and a creamy delicate floral to frame the darker ones.  I've not arranged them yet in their final layout (there are a couple of blocks still coming, I think!), but I love shifting them around, standing back and listening as they sing to me. 

They are an orchestra of color, and the sum total of them more amazing than any single block.  And each has a story or a card or an encouraging word to go with it.  I'm making a page to tell their story (see above, Sam's Quilts) and the story of the quilts that will be made in his memory.

Barb references Psalm 84 --
³ Even the sparrow has found a home, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may have her young— a place near your altar, O LORD Almighty, my King and my God.  ⁴ Blessed are those who dwell in your house; they are ever praising you.

She couldn't know that one of my "life verses" is Psalm 84:11:  For the LORD God is a sun and shield; the LORD will give grace and glory;  no good thing will He withhold  from those who walk uprightly. 

Coincidence? Maybe, but I prefer to think that even in these little details God is being Himself and watching out for His little sparrows!

I think God is all about the details...

See what He says (another passage with sparrows...):

Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows. Matthew 10: 29-31

You are more precious than many sparrows!!!   Don't that'n just make you wanna cry!!??  :-)

Blessings!