Tea for Two

This past May I turned 50 and one of my best friends served me this most lovely tea in her new diningroom. It was so special, I felt like a queen and to top it all off she bought me this beautiful Johnson Bros. cup and saucer....I'm blest!

Yesterday that same friend turned 50...hahahaha....I'm not alone anymore!:) I wanted to do something special for her but I am not as adept at making a nice tea so instead I made her this runner.

The first time I visited our LQS I saw this fabric with tea cups and was inspired. And what made it even more fun to make is I got to use my new labels for the first time!!

So Sandie....Hippo Birdie Two Ewes and I love you!!

~d

Wonderful little package from France!

Forgot to check the mail yesterday and didn't get it til dusk today....look what I found... a cute little package from France! Labels for my quilts!!!

I found this etsy seller on Red Pepper Quilts blog. http://www.redpepperquilts.com/ Rita makes the most amazing quilts and leave it to her to find really cool labels!

The very sweet Anna of Lilla Lotta http://www.lillalotta.etsy.com/ made these wonderful labels on cotton twill tape and to top it off, inside my package was special surprise... Merry Christmas labels!! Now what more could one ask for?

So if you are needing quilting inspiration go visit Rita and if you need something really unique to label your extra special projects go visit Anna!

Thanks bunches Ladies!!

~d

I've Been Busy....

I've been busy.

Do you see what I see? And I'm not talking about a Christmas song....not just yet anyway!:)

Greetings All,

The trees are almost bare which means we have some serious raking to do but it looks like we are getting ready to have a bit of rain so I guess that is going to have to wait. Shucks!;)

Totally changing the subject, I was looking at the picture I have as my desktop background, it is a great picture from last October when Dear Husband and I went on a hike in Shenandoah National Park. It was an incredibly clear day and we were enjoying a snack before we headed back down and of course I had to take a picture.....the above picture.

Do you notice something about the picture? Do you see what DH is sitting on? It's a giant face!! He's sitting on the bridge of the Giant's nose, his eyebrow and eye are just below him and a little further down is his huge stoney smile and Jay Leno chin...with a bit of a barnacle on it!:) See it?

What a glorious view this Giant has all day, everyday! Glad he shared it with us!

~d

Circle-Dots Giveaway Winner(s)!!

WhooooHooooooo…this has been such a fun week reading all your entertaining comments. Thanks so much! An extra big thanks to those of you who became followers….I’ll try to make it worth your time to come visit my blog!

Now for the main event…..
Drum roll please…..the 1st winner of my very first ever (and definitely not last) giveaway is…….

CRAFTNOSIS!!

craftnosis said...
oooh, ahhhhh, such a lovely prize! I would love to win :)ylheidi@verizon.net
Nov 6, 2009 6:15:00 PM

.....and continuing that drum roll, I had so much fun with the Random Generator I wanted to do it again so my second winner is......

KAREN/CRAZYFUN!!

Karen said...
Welcome to the blog world! I love those dots, and I've never used a circle cutter so I would love to try it out! I need to have a giveaway on my blog one of these days! Oh and just so you know, I'm crazyfun on flikr!
Nov 5, 2009 7:09:00 PM

Craftnosis, you win the circle cutter and polka dot fabrics (and a little surprise) and Karen, you win......

So 4th Round winning ORBC peeps….email me your address and I’ll post your winnings ASAP!

To everyone else….thanks for playing along and I am SO looking forward to seeing your 4th Round quilts!!
~d

Three Generations of Star Wars Geekdom

I can't tell the story of our weekend better than Maria did so here is a link to her blog...

http://mgoodson.blogspot.com/2009/11/are-my-buns-straight.html

....but I will say this....the folks in my family are good sports and are up for just about anything and I love them for it....and yes, this past Sunday I was Obi -Wan Kenobi....and my 75 yr old mom was a young Luke Skywalker!!

~d

4th Post 1st Giveaway for ORBC Quilt-Along!!

WhoooooHooooo! Lucky me I get to do a Giveaway! Heidi said to keep it simple so here it goes...

This is a giveaway for the group Old Red Barn Quilt-Along, a great group started by Dana and now 990 members strong. Since I am keeping this simple here is the link just in case you want to learn more about it...

http://www.flickr.com/groups/oldredbarncoquiltalong2009/

Well, now we are on Round 4 of the quilt-along....yep, we are learning how to sew our 4th quilt!! And what a round it is thanks to Heidi.....

http://potteryandeverythingelse.blogspot.com/2009/10/old-red-barn-round-4-curves-and-more.html

So we are now cutting fabric and we thought someone might like a circle cutter....here's your chance to get one for free and in keeping with our quilt theme I am throwing in three Fat Quarters of fabric with......Circles!:)

You all know the drill, leave me a comment on this post and at 8am EST on Wed, Nov 11th (Vetern's Day) I will, for the first time ever, use the Random Generator and pick a winner. Please make sure I have an email address to be able to contact you and get your winnings in the mail ASAP!

If you aren't a member of the ORBC...please join so we can get to 1000 members and have another giveaway.....hint, hint Dana!

Happy Sewing,

~d

Tale of THE Dress

There once was a girl who gave her mom two pictures, one of a black dress and one of a white dress.
The girl asked her mom, “Mom, can you make me a dress that looks like these?”
The Mom said, “Uh, both of them?”
The girl said, “I’d like it to be black….but have red on it.”
So the mom looked in her stash of fabric and lo and behold there was some black fabric (leftover from making flags for when the girl was in Color Guard) and some red fabric (leftover from the girl’s Can-Can outfit four Halloweens ago) and some satin black paisley fabric (leftover from the girl’s pirate outfit from six Halloweens ago) and a few odds and ends of lace and trimmings. All the mom had to buy were the buttons; heart shaped buttons, for the back because the mom refused to do zippers if she could get away with it.
Soon the mom got all her stuff together and then proceeded to set it aside for a week, then another week and another and then she made a quilt, then another quilt and…well….you get the picture, she procrastinated and the next thing she knew it was five days before Halloween.
So the Monday before, she fixed herself…..a hot cocoa (bet you thought I was going to say a drink!)….looked at her piles of fabric and started cutting out the dress. The problem was she didn’t have a pattern, just the pictures. So the mom took a pattern that sort of looked like the dress (from her stash of many, many costume and dress patterns) and went to work.
She lowered the back and the front and added ten inches to the sides of the front and the back of the skirt to make it fuller. The mom made some templates out of cardstock for the card suites and cut them out, ironed on double-sided fusible webbing, then ironed them on to the skirt and did some machine appliquéing for the first time ever! (Getting ready for Round 4 Circle quilts for the ORBC Quilt-Along) She made some double fold bias tape out of the satiny paisley fabric (which is a bear to iron) for the trim and bows out of the paisley and red satin and next thing she knew the Deck of Cards Lolita Dress was born!
All this sewing didn’t take place in one day, no, the mom made the whole top one day and the whole bottom the next and on the third day (after multiple cups of tea and cocoa) the girl was able to try it on and never was there a happier young lady!

So with a little extra red fabric and trim the mom made an underskirt and the girl found her top hat, black netting stockings, black shoes and necklace and she was ready for the ball…um…Halloween! And the mom….she put something stiffer in her tea, put her feet up and tried not to think about what the girl was going to ask her to make next Halloween!!

Hope you all had a wonderful Halloween and are enjoying the change of the seasons be it Spring or Fall!:)

~d

PS. If you want to see some of the other things the mom has sewn for the girl see her Flickr page...

http//www.flickr.com/photos/29893965@N08/sets/72157622613879034/