Wow, I just saw that it's been a very long time since I posted on this here blog of mine. However, I have been busy crafting away on quilting and cross stitching, just not much to show. I am almost done with Block 1 of the Houses of Hawk Run Hollow, I was hoping to finish it by this weekend, but at the rate I'm going, probably it will take a couple more days. Cross stitch moves slow for me.

I have been doing a bit of quilting though. I got in and did some more reorganization of my sewing room to make it more inviting to sew in (or manufacturing and construction as my husband calls it) and it seems to have worked. I started a little table topper quilt that I bought in a kit a few weeks ago, it's not quite done, so no picture of that yet. Today, while organizing my orphan blocks, I got a bit sidetracked, I found just enough little 3 inch 9-patches to make a cute little doll size quilt, I got all the fabric needed from my stash too. It feels good to finish something, even if it is small. Here's a picture. I think if you click on it, you can see the colors better. The background is a really pretty deep brown I found in my Civil War bin.

Well I guess I'll get back up there and strike while the iron is hot as they say. I'm not wild about how bright the colors are in that other quilt I'm working on, so it might need a tea bath when it's done. I was right in the midst of watching Kate and Leopold on Netflix on my laptop so I have to finish that. For some reason I can't get DVD's to work in it, so I'm stuck with whatever Netflix offers instantly until I take to the Geed Squad.

Tootles!

I'm on day 2 of my 3-day weekend. Yesterday was spent doing yard work and errands, today we cleaned house, and we're finished, so now my time is all mine! I found this tutorial to make tuck pillows to put finished cross stitch projects in for display. So, knowing myself and challenges, I got up in my sewing room and made a prototype. Man was this an easy little project, it probably only took me about a half hour to make. Now all I need is a cute little Halloween type cross stitch to put in it. Here's a picture. It felt good to get in my room and sew a bit. I have a quilt kit out that I want to start working on, so maybe this will get me motivated.

You'd never guess it from the beautiful weather we're having right now, but it's supposed to start raining here tonight and continue raining until NEXT Monday. I'll believe it when I see it. We sure do need the rain though.

Well I'm going to head back up to my sewing room now. I have been telling myself I need to go through my huge scrap bin and at least organize it so I can close the lid.

Tootles.

I keep seeing the on the news all the sadness and pain that is going on right now in Haiti, it just breaks my heart, for example, I saw a young boy who was getting stitches on his leg without anesthesia, and his cries of pain just made me want to cry. I can't even imagine the suffering. Well, I don't want to imagine, because I am sitting here on a huge earthquake fault myself, it's called Southern California. Anyway, I sit here and think how pretty danged lucky we are that this sort of tragedy hasn't happened to us here, but if it did, I know I sure would appreciate it if fellow human beings would come to our aid. I hear horrible comments from the Pat Robertsons and Rush Limbaughs of the world and I just don't know how anyone can say the sort of things those kind of people say. Anyway, I digress. I made a donation to the Red Cross last night and even though it wasn't a huge amount of money, my $20 added to another person's $20, and another's $5, think of all the good that could do? It made me feel pretty darned good. So if you can afford to donate a few bucks, I know for sure it would be appreciated by many people. And heck, it's good for your Karma!

On a happier note, lately, I seem to have lost my quilting mojo. It will come back, my attention span with my crafts ebbs and flows it seems. Right now I'm all hot into cross stitch. I have a very ambitious set of projects I'm working on right now. They are from the designer Carriage House Samplings, I love her designs, they are called the Hawk Run Hollow series. Here are pictures of what they will look like when I eventually finish. I am rotating them so hopefully I'll get all 4 of them done by the end of the year. That's my ambitious goal at least. I hear she's coming out with an Autumn at Hawk Run Hollow in a couple of months, so that could throw a wrench into the gears...

Christmas at Hawk Run Hollow

Shores of Hawk Run Hollow

Village of Hawk Run Hollow

Houses of Hawk Run Hollow

Oh, I decided to update this post to add this one, it's called Paradise Lost, I might have to throw that one into the rotation too. I just love this one. Sheesh, everything has to be labor intensive for me or I get bored.

Paradise Lost

Well, TGIF and the start of a long 3 day weekend for me! Yay!!

Happy 2010!

Happy New Year, here's to the start of a new decade!

Happy Holidays!

Happy Winter Solstice!

Today is the first day of winter. Nope, this isn't where I live, I live in Southern California and we don't have seasons here, we just seem to have warm, warm, warmer and hot here anymore these days, the climate is changing so much. I told my husband whenever we retire, I want to move to a place that has seasons.

I don't have anything else to report for my weekend. Did a whole lot of nothing really. I keep picking out quilt kits out of my massive stockpile of them, and then I change my mind and put it back and pick another one. I have one out now that I think I really want to start. The colors are so pretty. It looks like a pretty simple pattern, I need a finish under my belt to get me motivated.

Well, that's it, tootles!

I was working merrily along on the "A" block I started the other day for the Prairie Schooler ABC Bee and wham, I found that I had made a counting mistake (NOTE TO SELF: DON'T stitch when husband is talking). I decided to keep going and start working on the block from the bottom up and meet up at the boat where I made my mistake and improvise, well, it just kept getting worse, I think that block was doomed and it was starting to tick me off. Started thinking I needed to start this project from the bottom and work up, so, with that said, here's my re-start on a fresh piece of fabric from the bottom up with the "S" block. It's coming along fairly quickly now. I ordered some 25 count fabric, but I don't think I have it in me to re-start AGAIN, so I'm just going to keep going.
We had rain most of the weekend here in SoCal which made for some very nice stitching weather. I sure didn't want to go to work today!