baby quilts on the frame

Finished quilting this 'baby quilt' for a friend of mine last week.... its for her new granddaughter...

I have several more that I quilted over the weekend that are all charity quilts for Project Linus, or whoever ends up with them.....

that's about it for this morning - gotta get a move on!

note to self.... back up!!!

It has been over a week and my computer is still at the shop.  Apparently, if the caps lock and num lock key lights start blinking simultaneously, it is a very bad sign - back up the hard drive and make arrangements for a new computer.

So, after we dropped said computer off at the TECHIE, we realized that I seriously need a back up computer, so we went directly to BestBuy to see what is on the market these days.  DH found a sweet little DELL notebook at an almost affordable price and after a few questions with the sales rep, proceeded to try to purchase said sweet little DELL.... this was at 5:30 PM.  We were expecting to spend about an hour or so making this purchase, getting the set up details resolved, etc.  I went off to test the Wii PingPong game on the Wii Sports Resort demo across the store.... it took me several tries, but I eventually won a game!  It's a lot of fun, and now I know what to ask Santa for... 8-)

I went back to see how DH was coming along with the process, only to find a larger assortment of techies gathered around trying to figure out how to actually SELL the computer since the BB System would not let the sale go through without a serial number, but it would not accept the serial number on the computer...???? what the????  I went back to the Wii game and tried my hand at flying the plane - not successfully - crashed it into the first thing I came to... went to the archery - again unsuccessful...  went back to the table tennis - that's my game!

Much to our surprise and dismay, we were STILL THERE at 9:30 PM - 30 minutes after closing, with store managers, techies, and department head STILL unable to complete the sale.  It was almost bedtime for us, so dh told them "I'll be back" in his best Scwhartzie voice and we left.   I'm not blaming anyone at the store - they all seemed baffled, but I'm sure they are all actually very compitent people (and very frustrated, too!)

DH went back the next day and they were still unable to complete the sale... and dh was told that it is a "BestBuy system wide issue" with that particular model.  Another WHAT THE?????

.... so he called me from the store to discuss.  I had really liked the DELL model, but he came home with a TOSHIBA, which is working rather well, and has satellite installed, so now I can get internet reception anywhere I can get cell phone reception.  This is a good thing, altho a tad expensive - at least I can keep up with the cyberworld friends even if I'm on the road - as I love to go places, this is a good thing!

Now if only they had thrown in a Wii as a consolation gift....

Here's a sneeky peeky at my latest

inside pocket

finished bag

Back to the studio to clean up the clutter and then to quilt a baby quilt that is almost a twin size~!

Yes, I'll try to snap a pic for you before it goes off to it's new baby owner. 

Bye for now!

finished at last....

This is the Turkey Tracks quilt - mentioned in a previous post - I said I would put up another pic when it was finished so here it is with its proud new owner.

And yes, this photo was taken at the Drive In - it was Friday night, after all!
See you again soon.... watch for a peek of my new project in a day or two.

EQ7 - a learning experience

I recently installed EQ7 on my laptop... about a month has gone by... this software is so totally different than what I expected!  It has taken me a bit of concentration to get from start to finish on a quilt design - and this is a very simple little wall hanging - but here it is!  If you are interested in a class on this block, let me know!

Streak of Luck BOM

The Block of the Month I've written recently is available at Quilting Weekly Streak of Luck BOM

Sure would love to have you quilt along with me!

busy hands

I have finished the embroidery I was working on over the past week and thought I'd share this pic with you...

I used some heavy weight linen for the background, little scraps of felted wool, an assortment of threads and a few dozen beads.  No preplanned concept in mind before I started, I just went with my impulses.  For a change, I was not led astray!  I worked on this over the 4th holiday weekend, since our plans fell through and we watched our fireworks on TV this time!

I also put a few charms together for a swap using old stamps and tiny little frames that I found in the bead dept. at Jo-Anns - these were so easy and quick, I wanted to make more!

I've also been stitching up some blocks for a sampler quilt that I'm teaching - these blocks were 6" square T blocks - they came out pretty well, and I remembered that several of my students have asked me to post some hints and pics on precision piecing, so here are a couple of tricks that I use:

pin low - notice the block on the left is bumpy from pinning straight down and back up.

the pieces on the right lay flat because I pin 'low' - meaning I pin from a slant instead of straight down.  I pin abut 1/2" away and parallel to my seam lines.

and before I sew, I hold the pinned pieces up to the lamp and check the seam alignment one last time...

and in the event that a seam allowance gets pushed in the wrong way in the seam - it isn't usually necessary to remove all the stitching - just take out the stitches that are holding the seam allowance,

and resew from the other direction....

and on smaller piecework, it often helps to press seams open, as I've done here.
Hope this helps answer a few of your questions.

Must be going - I have a long to do list this month.  Watch for more pictures coming soon.

summer camp for quilters...

Castle Peeps Summer Camp for Quilters

http://lizzyhouse.typepad.com/

Free projects from quilt designers in pdf downloads.... one a day all week!