So, on my sidebar for quite some time has been “Alec’s Car’s Quilt” (as in Cars the movie). I’ve had the fabric for forever. however, no sooner had I purchased it than he up-sized to a double bed and all my fabric purchasing, etc.
Well, that threw me into a tizz. So, it sat for 2 years!!
A few weeks ago, I asked my “expert advisory panel” (aka, my stitch group) for advice and they told me it was no big deal…yeah, right.
However, this past weekend, I picked out a size I liked from the best quilt sizes here, drew it up in Adobe Illustrator and then laid out all the 8×8 boxes I thought I’d need. The design to the side is what I came up with.
Then I laid out my blocks and have come up with a pattern like below. The blocks on the left are the blocks in the middle. The black with the red square represents what I’d put in the “border of blocks” on the outside.
It’s going to work out pretty well – however I have NO idea what I was thinking when I got the black fabric with the motorcycles. I know there’s some really cool Route 66 fabric out there, so I’m going to get a black one to go behind the red Lightning McQueen blocks and then I’ll need to find a border fabric (no ideas – I’ll take them all into a store and work it out.
Now I need to figure out how much fabric, etc. Wish me luck!
The good news is I’m making progress. I should be able to quilt it myself too – I’m not planning on doing anything too fancy – just in the ditch!
Any other suggestions?
Oh and I’ve added some new items (and will be adding more soon) so keep an eye on my sidebar! I’d love to find homes for those last little spirit dolls!
I’ve been working away at my cross stitch. I really have enjoyed working on this and I think it’s the variation of colors and textures I like the most.
As for books, nothing too exciting. Do you ever have too much to read and books your not that thrilled about but feel the need to finish? That’s where I am. Hopefully this week I’ll get through those books and on to some others I really like.
Taking a few weeks off from stitching – and I guess it’s not fair to say it’s a stitching injury, but it is an injury that keeps me from stitching. I pulled the upper muscles in both my arms. I’m under Dr’s orders to not strain them, but sheesh, do you know how much you use those muscles? crewel is totally out of the question and even beading and cross stitch are hard on it. So, I’m on a break – hopefully better soon!
I have however been reading!
First, confessions…do you ever read Harlequin Romances? In college I had a roommate that would bring in grocery bags full – I could read two a day. Some were well written and some were junk. So, last week I took a break and read “The Inconvenient Duchess” – cute, historic, fairly predictable, but a fun quick read.
Tigers In Red Weather – I had a hard time rating this book. I think it’s beautifully written, but on the other hand, I really hated the characters. I felt the story was interesting in how it was told and the language it was written, but it left me wondering – and not in a good way.
The Art Forger – Really enjoyed this, multilayer plot and interesting insight into the art and art forgery worlds.
One of the most outstanding books I’ve read in a while. One reviewer wrote that they don’t normally like books about old people (ha, ha) but this book is so amazingly about love and attraction that the age of the characters don’t matter.
I just adored the setting and I kept wanting to take quote after quote out of the book to remember (isn’t that a sign of a great book?).
Above all this book made me laugh, the dry British humor makes this one of the most enjoyable books I’ve read for quite some time!
I’ve been holding back on the stitching because of wrist pain lately, but the gals in my stitch group are coming tomorrow for an intervention to help me finish projects! I’m sure there will be lots of pictures and maybe some progress?
I’m still working away at my cross stitch and my crewel project. However, I took a side trip over to the sewing machine to catch up mending – I think that’s my biggest annoyance with the machine is that it can be used for so many practical things! ha ha!
The crewel project is coming along, despite the fact that I took out a bunch of stitches I didn’t like.
The cross stitch is moving along nicely – however, I realized I stitched it onto the canvas sideways – ugh! The good news is that there’s enough room to finish it, but can you believe it? It almost seems like this has been cursed!
As for books, I just started a new series (the books are .99 on Amazon for the kindle) – the Mac Faraday murder series. They’re cute books with an ultra intelligent dog side-kick. Cozy mysteries. I really enjoy them – it makes them page turners without the gore of a true crime novel!
There’s been an awesome series over on about http://www.greatthoughts.com about books to read if you love “Downton Abbey” (here’s the lastest post – scroll down and there are more posts with more books). – I’m going to put all of these on my to-read list – I love having a selection to pick from when Im ready for a new book!
Ironically, I started this post a year ago – yep! Seems to be my Achilles heel – the desire to learn to sew better and my fear of my machine.
So, last year I fearlessly emailed the author – who has a marvelous blog “Whipstitch” and asked her if she minds if I use photos (can you imagine her gorgeous pictures next to my creations – ha ha!) and she said yes! So, I’m really going to do it this year.
“Stitch by Stitch, Learning to Sew One Project at a Time”by Deborah Moebes
So, I’m going to start to work through the projects. She has a “mini-project” in the book and I’m going to start with that and pick the fabric for napkins.
I’m also going to attempt to try to finish all of my “in progress” or “UFO” projects so I can get those out of the way and start doing things I deem “fun”. They are listed in my sidebar and I’d LOVE LOVE to get them finished this year.
This year I struggled with my word, wanting something that meant moving forward, but not in the traditional sense. I’ve spent a lot of time goal setting and working out my direction, but there’s an element I’ve lost in this journey and it’s more compassion and love. So, the word “nurture” seemed to really embody what I’m missing right now – be it creative, spiritual, my family, my family relationships and my friendships, it all needs nurturing.
nurture
Definition:
verb
1.to feed and protect: to nurture one’s offspring.
2.to support and encourage, as during the period of training or development; foster: to nurture promising musicians.
3.to bring up; train; educate.
noun
4.rearing, upbringing, training, education, or the like.
5.development: the nurture of young artists.
6.something that nourishes; nourishment; food.
Cool quotes:
Nurture your minds with great thoughts. To believe in the heroic makes heroes.
Benjamin Disraeli
Find out what your gift is and nurture it.
Katy Perry
The glory of gardening: hands in the dirt, head in the sun, heart with nature. To nurture a garden is to feed not just on the body, but the soul.
Alfred Austin
Here were some of my goals last year – I will say I did an ok job posting on this blog, but not great, my focus was www.denverparent.net and www.midcenturystyle.net and so as always this is my “hobby” blog. However, my other goals were really mixed – they were:
Chinese Patience Symbol
TAST – I will be doing “Take a Stitch Tuesday” – where we get a new stitch each Tuesday – the goal is to cross post here and on the new group blog I’m participating in.
Sewing Lessons – I’m going to try to each weekend work on a machine sewing projects
Book Reviews – I read enough that one book review a week shouldn’t be a big deal at all. My reading goal this year through Goodreads is 80 books (I read 77 in 2011)
Well, I did NOT do well on the TAST challenge – I did really well at the beginning of the year and completely fell apart at the end. Oh well!
Sewing – pitiful – didn’t do any of my projects. However, this year I have new sewing friends and so hopefully will work out my fear issues and knock those puppies out. This year, I swear!
Book reviews not so great, but I read OVER my goal, so reading was awesome, writing about it, not as good, but I’m hoping to improve this year!
As for patience – I really tried! each time I got impatient, I refocused on my goal and tried to remain calm. It did help to not worry to much about “making” things happen. It’s amazing how slow life goes in some areas and how fast in others – for example, my kids grow WAY too fast!
So, on my sidebar for quite some time has been “Alec’s Car’s Quilt” (as in Cars the movie). I’ve had the fabric for forever. however, no sooner had I purchased it than he up-sized to a double bed and all my fabric purchasing, etc.
One of the most outstanding books I’ve read in a while. One reviewer wrote that they don’t normally like books about old people (ha, ha) but this book is so amazingly about love and attraction that the age of the characters don’t matter.
