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!

Advance or Retreat!?

My household has taken a dramatic turn!

I've gone from just me and the boys -- easy living, really.  There's the running, but we mostly foraged for food and went to our corners of the house:  Sam with his drums, Will with his video games, and I in my sewing room!!  So from me and the boys to me and the boys and the husband (home on Sunday)and the college age daughter (home on Wednesday) all home at the same time!!

Yesterday morning I was struck the by the CROWD!!
In my little sewing room, first one boy then the other came in.  Then Emily, then Jeff....FIVE people in my sewing room. Asking me stuff.  Needing or wanting my attention. All talking at the same time.  Wanting to be fed!!

Calgon take me away!!!!

Advance or retreat?  Too late.  I already retreated BEFORE they came! LOL  I spent Thursday, Friday and Saturday at a retreat center in Central KY far out in the country.  I live in the country! This was even further out in the country. And it was lovely!  The gals were such fun. Games, giveaways, stories, projects, food -- all the good stuff!

I mostly worked on one UFO -- my Thimbleberries Hometown Christmas -- and a new project, Spools, from Edyta Sitar's book, Friendship Strips and Scraps.

Autumn took some great photos of the different projects and quilts at the retreat and you can see them here.  I took photos while I was there, but hers were so much better than mine. So pop over and take a look!!

I came home from retreat on Saturday and picked Jeff up on Sunday.  Then Wednesday, we packed up Emily's dorm room at Asbury and headed south. 

It really is good to have the whole family under one roof again for the first time in over a year!

It will take a while to get back into our routine.  Jeff will return to his "real" job in a few weeks; he's an Agriculture Extension Agent for a local county through the University of KY Cooperative Extension Service.  He'll take some much needed R & R time at home, though. :-D  My sewing time may get curtailed a little! :-D

Emily is spending her summer home with the family, too.   In previous years she did summer missions work with a camp in Lafollette, TN, but this year the luxury of our family being together is one she's going to take advantage of.  Jeff says there is work enough here at home to keep her busy if she doesn't find a summer job locally.

So advance it is!
Into renovated routines.  Into postponed projects (UFO #9 - the Circuit Rider and another recently  "discovered" (that's what I get for cleaning out the closet! :-D)  UFO, Star Sprinkles from Adkinson Designs).

Into the haven of home!

I am so very, very, blessed!

Psalm 13: 5-6
But I trust in your unfailing love;
my heart rejoices in your salvation.
I will sing to the LORD,
for he has been good to me.

Blessings!

Getting Ready!

Twice a year, a bunch of my Quilt Club gals and I get away from it all for three days and two nights of games, food and quilting!! It's always a hoot -- and I was so afraid I wasn't going to get to go!!  Jeff was scheduled to return from Afghanistan this same week, so my plans were to skip the spring retreat and hope for the timing to be better in the fall.

But the army is never predictable! LOL and Jeff's Welcome Home ceremony is Sunday!! Which means, I get to go to retreat (which ends Saturday), AND I won't have to keep him waiting at the armory while I diddle-daddle with the gals! :-D (As if I would!!)

So I've got double duty for getting ready.  Retreat stuff, the house, my toenails!! :-D

(Don't mind the grime; I just fed the cats and chickens -- and Oh! Look at little "Smokey" (? tentative name since we don't know if it's a he or a she, yet! :-D)! It's a wonder my feet didn't scare the little thing!! LOL

I've got most of my sewing stuff ready to go:

I always take way too much.  I wanna be prepared for whatever I'm in the mood to sew, you know? That's the thing with UFO's ....the reason they are UFO's is that you get out of the mood to finish them!

Some things are mandatory, though.
My leaders-and-enders 2" squares.

Chocolate (the good stuff! :-D)

My annual hauling out of the scrappy-spools-which-I-have-already-made-two-large-quilts-and-one-lap-quilt-of project:
Then, of course, there's the new project that I'm totally inspired with and wanna get started on!
I spent the better part of this week sorting my scraps by color. I'll eventually cut  them into Bonnie Hunter's Scrap User's System, but I had to sort them so I could find scraps for this quilt by Edyta Sitar in her Friendship Strips and Scraps book!!

The pattern calls for 1" strips!! I'll be using some small stuff on this one!

(What is it with me and spool quilts!?!)

So after cleaning up my messes and packing clothes (I should probably wear some on retreat! Jeff probably won't mind if I don't! LOL), I'll be ready to walk out the door. 

I can't wait! No dishes. No phone calls ('cept to check on the young-uns). Just friends, fabric and fun!

And Jeff on Sunday, home for a good while, thank the Lord!  I'm so ready!!

“Hallelujah!
For our Lord God Almighty reigns.
Let us rejoice and be glad
and give him glory!
For the wedding of the Lamb has come,
and his bride has made herself ready."
Revelation 19:6-7

Blessings,

Well Laid Plans

It's amazing what you can accomplish if you set your mind to it!!

Jill, Jennifer and Norma hard at work!

Paula's Quilting Pantry, just outside of London, KY, hosted a Sew-In Retreat -- an opportunity for a bunch of us to sit-n-sew with the main purpose of getting things done!  As this is an issue for me (Do I not have an "Accomplish Something Today!" sign on my wall!?!), I figured it was the perfect time to make some get-r-done plans.

Dear Jane was my first attempt.  I was able to get the whole center of the quilt together!!! (Isn't she just wonderful!!!!).  Then I set to work on the triangle borders.

I've made the sashing on DJ bigger so I can do some handquilting between the blocks.  Bigger sashing, though, necessitates bigger triangles for the border!  I tested the design on the Dear Jane software made by Electric Quilt, printed the larger templates and had everything ready to sew at Retreat...

We pinned the triangle border where it will need to be cut to make it more in proportion with the rest of Dear Jane! 
I'm sewing the top and bottom borders!! Don't I look like I'm ACCOMPLISHING something! :-D

Thing is....what looked good on EQ didn't translate well in Real Life!!!  The triangles I put together for the border looked positively GARGANTUAN beside the little delicate DJ blocks.  All of us at the retreat stepped back in the room to check it out, and with the help of wonderful quilt friends, we decided the best option was to cut off the triangles to make them more in proportion to the rest of the quilt.  The background triangles will have "blunted" tips -- but that's OK.  I can put another border of muslin on (just like the "real" DJ) and scallop it, and I think it will turn out well.

I managed to get a few more things done on Saturday -- some blocks for "Hometown Christmas," a Thimbleberries project I've wanted to complete for a while.  It won't take me long to finish that up if I stay diligent.

Dear Jane has taught me a lesson though.  Sometimes we think we know the outcome of our plans.  I love to plan, but the reality doesn't always turn out like my well-intentioned diagrams and computer programs and ideas.

Blessedly, though, God's plans always turn out exactly as He wants them!  "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future."  (Jeremiah 29:11)  I John 3:2 tells us, "Dear friends, now we are the children of of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is."

I know Dear Jane will be beautiful! (She can't help it; it's in her design!)  Similarly, you and I will also turn out beautifully because that is how God designed us.  If we trust Him, he promises we will "be like him" -- the spitting image of Jesus.  He promises we have a hope and a future.  We don't know what that entails, exactly, but it will be good.

And God may have to make adjustments on us like I'm making on Dear Jane, cutting here or there or adding what's needed to make us complete, to make us in the image of His Son, but it won't be a surprise or frustration to Him, more's the praise!!

Do you trust Him with the design? the process?  the finished product?  Let Him accomplish something in you today!

Blessings!
Mary Lou

Accomplish Something Today

About a year ago I put up a sign in my sewing room:
My dear friend, Jennifer, said, "Good idea! Does it work!?" LOL!

Well it worked for a while.  Surrounded as I always am by unfinished projects, I desperately penned the motivational message (so much nicer than "Get your butt in gear!!!") and proceeded to, well, accomplish something.

My motivation has waned, though, so it's time to crank up the old "get-r-done" attitude and tie in.

Today is the perfect day.  It's raining, and there's a retreat looming on the horizon -- on Friday a bunch of the gals in my club are converging on Paula's Quilting Pantry for two days of finishing (or trying to!) projects.  Today, I'm getting projects ready for retreat!

On Friday I think I'll work on Dear Jane.  She is still dear to me :-) And as I put her upper torso on the design wall, I feel the kindling of romance for her again.  The wider-than-the-pattern-indicates sashing will be the backdrop for hand quilting.  I've opted to forgo the pieced/appliqued triangles, too, prefering to hand quilt the designs on the blank canvas. :-)

Jane's "upper torso" on the design wall.  She's so heavy I had to use pins!

Corners and triangles

Jane's lower extremeties!

I'll use all day Friday to work on her, then on Saturday I may move to other projects on my "to do" list.  I plan to work very hard.

To accomplish something!

Proverbs 31 offers the picture of the perfectly efficient super woman (not a new concept, at all, is it!?) who manages to accomplish everything -- from running Wall Street to designing haute couture to ranching and ending world hunger!

For this weekend, I'll draw inspiration from verses 17, 18 and 22 --  "She sets about her work vigorously; her arms are strong for her tasks.  She sees that her trading is profitable, and her lamp does not go out at night....She makes coverings for her bed..."

And just to be safe, I think I'll bring my "Accomplish Something Today" sign with me!

Blessings,

Mary Lou

http://quiltersend.blogspot.com/2010/06/road-trip-to-paulas-quilting-pantry.html