Oasis

Happy Friday peeps! I'm particularly happy today because my backyard is getting a good clean up and it's the start of a long weekend! Bret is off today making sure the backyard work goes as planned and I just plan one thing...

 

...and it's going to be delicious! Hope you all have a fantastic long weekend! Enjoy and be safe! Tell me all about it next week!  See you in September!

P.S. Those candies.. well if you have a 'problem' with Thin Mints .. don't get one. Like me, you'll be forced to scour the town for them and when you find out you have the last one available in the whole town you'll be too traumatized to eat it. Just saying.

 



Blur

Don't know about you but Tuesday was a total blur for me.  What did I do, when did I do it? No idea. The one thing I do know was I had a nice lunch. 

I didn't make these enchilada's myself, well except the microwave part, but picked them up at the grocers. Tasty. And a complete treat.  

Have you seen what Lori is up to? She's got a Row Along project coming up, and it looks pretty fun. Have you seen it? Are you going to do it? She's got some cute fabrics lined up there, and I think I could shop my stash for it, like she did. I really like how she's broken down the selection criteria for her first row. Honestly, even if you're not doing it, it makes for interesting reading just to get insight into how to pick fabrics for a scrappy quilt.

Ok, that's about it here. Have a happy day peeps!

Daily news

So it's Tuesday, the week is perking along! Did you get a good start on it yesterday? I managed to get a lot of things done, including my block.

Unlike most months, I'm happy with it.  Of course the second I type that I realize, I'm probably not that happy with it. I'm more likely mixed.  Most of my blocks have a light background, so I was trying to keep the block light, but of course now when I look at the picture I just see HEY THERE'S A BIG BLUE SQUARE THERE.   I will say that even though my points don't exactly match, I feel pretty satisfied with them. Do you have a secret for matching a half square and a quarter square triangles? I find those challenging, probably because my piecing isn't perfect. But in real life it's visually on, and that's good enough for me.  (for the most part) (on any given day)

Are you making the quilt? I'm really looking forward to seeing how they all turn out. In the meantime I'm also looking forward to new projects. My personal yardage should be here next month, and I'm excited to begin sewing with Pam Kitty Love.
 

On another note.. GOOD WEATHER! Have a happy day ! xo

P. S. Yes I know, I think I'm cool with my fancy tape. I  actually have had this tape for ages, Frankie gave it to me in my Christmas stocking and I've been hoarding it. Why? Because that's what I do. I love it when I see the cute taped blocks, like here. Of course she's just darling anyway, but the little taped blocks, sigh. And hers are so nice and flat!  

Getting it done.

Good morning and welcome to the last week of August! The weather was perfect his weekend, I don't think the a/c came on once! What made this weekend extra good to me was the fact we managed to actually get some stuff done! Next weekend looks pretty promising as well! Yahoo!

Couple all that getting stuff done and finally figuring out some stuff that has been plaguing me on photoshop, I ended the weekend on a pretty happy note.

Saturday was Bloggers Block of the Month day, and this time it was Amy's turn. I really like her block and the simplicity of the cutting instructions! Hopefully I'll get on my block this week. Have you seen the flickr pool of blocks? I am really enjoying the fabric combinations people are using.

Hope you had a great weekend! What are you up to?

Routine

So what did Wednesday hold for you? I love back to school season, everyone seems so excited and energized. Long in the past for us, but I remember the reluctant return to a scheduled life. It has always been a better life for us though, I know a busy organized routine helps me get more done than my normal lackadaisical approach to each day.

Recently Melissa sent me this darling set, a little mat for my coffee and a sleeve for my french coffee press. I've taken quite a few pictures of it, but my coffee press is so water marked and gross looking I've finally decided that I won't detract from the set with it! It was a lovely surprise and I really like using it. (although carefully of course.  I DON'T WANT COFFEE TO GET ON IT.) Its a pretty set to start the morning off with and I always feel cheerful when I use it.
 

Today Bret has the day off and we're going to work around the house a bit getting things organized. The weather has temporarily cooled off so the timing is perfect! If I don't get back to you tomorrow, HAPPY WEEKEND!!! I will want to hear all about it on Monday! xo

Coffee and Granny Squares

Good morning! What are you up to? I had a fun day yesterday, meeting my friend Debbie for coffee. It's great to catch up with friends you don't see often. And even better, making plans for future meet ups. Only thing missing .. Famous Deb Silva, she's the other half of my sewing Debbies. Yesterday it felt like it was cooler than it has been. But more than that it seemed like the sun just wasn't so stinken hot. We sat outside for coffee and it was quite pleasant. I felt rejuvenated, but that could have been the effect of caffeine after noon, or  more likely,  it was  having a chance to chit chat with a friend that really boosted my morale!

The other day I pulled out my grannies. I don't know why it's taken me so long, THERE'S ONLY SIXTEEN OF THEM! I spent some time cruising through flickr and pinterest looking up granny square quilts and trying to decide on using posts with my sashing. I went with no posts, but of course totally doubt my decision.  Next up finishing up the sashing and deciding on the border situation.  There are some fantastic granny square quilts out there and I totally want to copy all of them.  My blocks are a bit 'flexible' so getting them nicely sewn together has been a time consuming challenge.. I want all those points to show. Maybe I'll be done with it later this week.

What are you up to?

Bounty

Hi there! What's new in your neck of the woods? Did you have a busy weekend?

My big exciting news of the day is some of my figs are ripe! I've had my eye on them and SUDDENLY Saturday they were dark and by Sunday midday there were a handful of ripe ones. I'm not a  fan of figs myself, but my mother LOVES THEM. This year has been the best year for them! Back in May when I went to Quilt Market and Minnesota for 2 weeks, Bret was in charge of watering, and when I came home the tree was loaded! Clearly he has a green thumb when it comes to figs.  

I'm sure that there were other things, I'm on a fig growing high. Maybe tomorrow I'll have some sewing to talk about.

Fabulous Friday

Good morning sweet special friends! How are you? I see we've made it to the end of another week. Thank goodness!!!

Yesterday morning was much cooler and I was able to head out back for some coffee first thing. Lovely. I haven't spent much time out there since the arrival of the heat and the wasps, but yesterday was very nice. Hummingbirds, cool breezes.. pretty close to perfection. Maybe just  a chip away?

I finished off my pretty posy with a Pam Kitty Morning green gingham leaf and some rick rack. I love that my fabric 'goes' with Bari's fabric. All us friends together, Penny, Bari and me! 

Nothing much planned for the weekend. What about you? Have fun and tell me all about it next week! xo

The cool down

Hi there! What's happening in your world? It's a busy week here in PKMville but kind of boring on the blog topic front. Yesterday I had a bunch of stuff to do, but carved out some time to use my LillyBelle fabrics for a little something.

The weather has been hot, and I've been thinking of my Arizona Pals BariJ and Penny, so I pulled out my Pleated Posy pattern and some LillyBelle and went to town.  Ok, it's just a start, but tomorrow the glue will be dry and I can attach a leaf and it will be a darling accessory.   Somedays something small is the best you can do! Hope you guys are keeping cool! xo

Strawberry Delicious

Hi there! How goes it? I see a lot of your are excited about the RED MAT like I am. I got mine from Julie at Keepsake Cottage Fabrics.

Recently I had been to IKEA and found the cutest dishtowels. I grabbed them up on a whim, and now look how perfect they are with my PKM  pink strawberry fabric!  Yesterday I appliqued those strawberries from Holly's basket quilt on and it rounds out my little collection of kitchen goodies.  I think that's what I think is great about applique patterns.  They're not just great to make a quilt from, later you can add the motifs to other projects.  

Now I need to head out and mail these off to my sister for her extremely belated birthday! Hope you guys are keeping cool!

Seeing Red

Yes you do see that right! It's a RED cutting mat. Does it make you all "HOLD YOUR HORSES RED CUTTING MAT!" like it did me? Because yes, indeed I did do a stop and double take when I saw Julie commenting on Facebook that she had the RED Miracle Mats. I didn't know such a thing existed out in the wild for us to purchase. 

A few quick messages to Julie and the next thing you know I have one of these babies sitting on my table. You'll also notice that the wrapper is still on it. Come on, I'm still me! I'm traumatized over using it. So for now I'll keep it all pretty and contained.

Tomorrow I should have a finished project to show. I hope. If I'm not to busy staring at my mat. Hope you had a good weekend!

Chatty

Happy Friday everybody! This week seemed pretty good, went by at a nice pace, not to long, not too short! Not spending much time out back right now during the Great Wasp Rebellion, but it's nice to catch some of the cool air before they come out and ruin everthing!

Yesterday I decided to play around with an idea I had. Elizabeth cut out a bunch of little felt flowers for me ages ago. I've had that idea floating around in my head but so far I haven't done anything with it. Still might not. I noticed that my tension is pretty bad and I need to see what's going on. That might be a good task for today. Lets face it, I'm a starter but not really a very good finisher.

I've been remiss in reminding you to head on over and check out Aurifil's Designer of the Month for August, the Very Famous BariJ! She's got a great block for you.

Be sure and check out the flickr group as well. So many great blocks. I love all the improvements made to my June block! Holy cow people are so clever!

Now it's almost the weekend so get out and have a good time!

Long story

Yesterday I read somewhere that it was Happiness Day. I'm not sure where I saw it, but it reminded me of something Bret said to me earlier in the morning. "Go buy something today." I'm not sure what prompted that, but I asked him like what? He said something that would make me happy. Of course I countered with you can't buy happiness.... but it was just a conversation, nothing deep or thoughtful. Just morning chit chat before he left for work.

About 11am I stepped out back for a minute. I was checking on my birdhouse 'situation'. Wasps (yellow jackets, hornets whatever they are)had taken up residence in my beautiful birdhouse. Last night we took shipping tape and taped off all the open edges so all the wasps inside would be trapped and all the wasps outside couldn't get in. It's a classy look for sure, all taped up. But anyway, I had my camera so I could zoom in and not get too close, then examine the photos on my computer.

I think this is one of the juveniles from my nest! It flew right up, and hovered in front of me for almost a minute!!!! Not even 2 feet from me at about eye level. I stretched out my hand and it didn't even flinch.

Then it hovered around me for a few more minutes till a second hummingbird joined it and they flew off together. Not to get all sentimental on you but I did tear up over it.. indeed it was Happiness Day. I guess I didn't realize how much I needed it!

You know who didn't have a Happiness Day?

These jerks.

Checked off the List

I finally made myself buckle down and get this quilt machine quilted. My reason for putting it off, a table chock full of stuff.

Thank goodness for Law and Order:SVU to keep me company, along with a side order of CSI. I can make myself stay on task knowing that I can't squander these L & O episodes now that they're so few and far between. Short attention span.

For those who've asked, this quilt is a small version of my Criss Cross pattern. Instead of using 2 1/2 inch strips I used 1 1/2 inch strip.. a little more baby sized. One thing I like about this pattern is that it's just one block and all it takes are 5 fabrics.

I hope you guys have a fun day! xo

Frosty

With temps heating back up this is all I can think of. We saw this fellow stuffed back in somebody's yard downtown. Pretty crazy right?

I managed to stitch some blocks together and run some errands, nothing really all that photo worthy I'm afraid. It wasn't for Law and Order:Criminal Intent I wouldn't have gotten that much done! What about you guys?

Special!

Hi there Monday! How was your weekend? Kind of blah around here, didn't do much really. I hope yours was much more exciting!

I did manage to applique a nice "K" on a quilt for a new baby! I've been saving this quilt for a while now, waiting for a new baby boy and Sweet Baby K arrived early, and I'm just getting to finishing up his quilt.  So this week I need to get cracking and machine quilt it.   My mom knitted up two little baby hats for him, two sizes, he's quite tiny now but I know he'll be growing by leaps and bounds.  So we have him covered so to speak!

Don't know what else is on my agenda for the week.. what's on yours?

And....

We're back to Friday! Hard to believe the week can whip away so fast. I feel like I was super busy all week but sadly my output was pretty slim.

Of course I did spend a few minutes out back with coffee before the wasps got too busy. We have a trap out there, a fancy one that will catch wasps, hornets and yellow jackets. Of course I grew up calling these creeps wasps, but it's hard to tell from the trap packaging if they're yellow jackets or hornets. They're probably neither, since we've only trapped one apparently stupid wasp, the rest are buzzing around the trap like it isn't there.

I was lucky to receive a package of Bari-J-Goodness this week! I think this collection with Art Gallery is my favorite so far. Have you seen she's in the middle of 14 days of Lilly Belle? You should check out her projects if you haven't seen them! Lots of things you might want to make, table runner, gift bag, curtains, a cute top! Other things too, all cute. Oh gosh, I forgot, the napkins... go check those out!

I finished this month's Blogger's Block of the Month block, but like most months, I'm unhappy with it. Lesson learned, do not try to cut and sew with inadequate lighting. It's been pretty hot here and I try to keep the lights off in my sewing room because it's already hot with the iron and the sewing machine and the SUMMER. I'm not bitter though, I like my choices, and it will be ok to make again. It's really the center that's bad, so I could simply exchange out that part.

I'm happy with the overall feel of the blocks I have going. It doesn't stop me from feeling envious of everyone else's pretty blocks!

So it's the weekend. I'm not going to bother planning to do anything, just enjoy it. If I get something done, well bonus right? Hope you guys have a happy weekend! xo

Seriously, it's August?

OH. MY. GOSH. Seriously. Oh. My. Gosh. I know I should play it cool like receiving a huge pile of strike offs is just another  day in the life ... except,  I'm so not cool. I just can't thank Holly enough  for making this collection exceed even my wildest dreams. Let's be honest, she's the genius behind the curtain and I hope everyone knows it!

Here's the panel. I love that it's got a hint of Valentine's Day, and a big dose of "let's be friends". Holly has a very cute quilt coming out in the April issue of McCall's Quilting Magazine, which will appear on newsstands in January. Each panel has 15 blocks, and the project just takes 6, so you still have blocks left over for another project or two!

Take a look at the pinks and reds. They're so rich and have such an nice variation in color. See that tossed heart print with the girls? I have some plans for pj's pants for my own girl.  And just how cute would it be to applique one of those larger panel motifs onto a coordinating t-shirt for a cute  little set? Stitch up a matching pillow case and it's an enviable ensemble for a girlie sleep over. My head is just spinning with ideas.

Of course the whites.. I can feel the hoarder in me coming out.. as with some of my PKM pieces, I've used them, but keep replenishing my stock.  I saw that Kristyne is working on a quilt that is all white background fabrics and it was lovely.   I better make a note to myself to investigate that book for inspiration! I love using a white print instead of plain background in pieced blocks and applique.

And lastly, the blacks. LakeHouse is  well known for having nice deep blacks. Working in a quilt shop before, I know those can be hard to find. A lot of our customers asked for black and I hope they'll be happy with the results.  I'm over the moon for them.

Phew! That's it for me today. Thanks for all your comments on yesterday's post. I'm going to tally those up and make a decision on those blocks. If you haven't posted a comment with your two cents, get on over there!  Thanks you guys for being so darn awesome!!! xo

P.S. LIME GREEN!