For PTQB, Katie sent vintage sheets, a solid, and the Amy Butler rose buds, requesting blocks similar to Oh Frannson!’s Mod Sample Quiltalong.

Also PTQB, Jody requested Drunk Love blocks to be made into a quilt for her (grown-up) stepson… I think the color choices are perfect!

Sam sent over a bunch of Valentine’s Day fabrics for her PTQB block, and told us to make whatever we wanted.  The first thing that popped into my head was the tagline from Gossip Girl… “You know you love me… xo, xo… Gossip Girl.”  So XO, XO indeed:

And…just so y’all have an update of my PTQB month… here is one of the completed 24” blocks.  LOVE IT!

This is what I made most recently for my Facebook bee group… it’s called a Dutch Rose and I’m planning on using the pattern for my 3rd quarter 3×6 blocks.  I’m tired of the interlaced star for that group, and this block is challenging in its own right – there are 89 pieces (which can be cut down to 85 pieces) in a 12” block!  Plus, it’s going to be fun to see how the block changes with different fabrics. 

And lest you think I’m not also quilting, I am… This little quilt went to Steve’s boss’s brand new baby boy.  The quilt was made primarily using Michael Miller citron fabrics from the Fabric Shoppe, backed in dark gray fleece from Joanns, no batting (this is a SoCal baby).  Baby John has been using the quilt for tummy time, the bold patterns are good stimulation for the brain!  That was actually an unintended bonus – I’m just not into teddy bears and other cutesy baby fabrics – I think you can make anything baby appropriate just by making a smaller size, lol!

The agenda for this weekend includes finishing up a slew of gifts for my friend Shannon’s baby shower (the first of my SoCal friend group to have a baby – very exciting, but the group dynamics will be a-changin’).  Steve is also running the Disneyland 1/2 Marathon again, this time with our friend Christina.  Christina’s hubby Jason & I are going to be ChEAR leaders (yeah, see what Disney did there??).

More crafty to follow!

 
just navy & white solid – love it!

lots of scraps – completely beautiful!

tiny pieces

raw-edges

“modern” quilt 

this one was really neat – it was all done on black fabric & just thread gives it the color

wonky bento

just love this

I can’t remember how big each of the 9 blocks was in this quilt – maybe 8”??  It was tiny and the piecing was amazing!

Part of the exhibits were some vintage Texas/Lone Star Quilts, plus other types of radiating patterns:

So probably 2/3rd of the floor space was devoted to vendors…I did buy some stuff, but limited myself as I bought 16 yds. during fabric.com’s $3/yd Free Spirit blowout (w/coupon & free shipping, I dropped the price to $2/yd. – craziness!).

More details with pictures to follow…we’ll see if I can stay awake long enough tonight to sort thru pictures (we didn’t get in until about 11pm, and I had to work today).

Sometimes I do miss a good window-rattling thunderstorm.  While the beautiful weather is a very nice perk of living in LA, I get tired of the always-the-same-color-of-blue skies, and sometimes wish for weather drama.  Heck, I was happy it rained while we were camping up @ Kern – rain in the summer is pretty much unheard of ’round these parts.  Steve was in Denver for work last week, and he was completely giddy while watching lightning streak across the sky (he had called me while this was going on).

I also miss Ames and ISU football games…maybe next fall??  A 7-years-after-graduation group reunion, perhaps??

The following Saturday, Steve’s ENTIRE family arrived – Mom, Dad, 2 sisters + their 2 boyfriends.  Oh, and have I mentioned we’ve had a friend staying w/us while he gets some personal things sorted out??  Yeah, we have a temp roomie…  So we had 9 people in our house.  For a week (except friend left halfway thru to visit his dad over the 4th holiday weekend).  The in-laws got the guest bedroom, friend got air mattress in my craft room (since he’s allergic to the cats, need to keep things as dander free as possible for him), sistas + boyfriends got air mattress strategically placed in living room. 

The fam is fun, but they are tiring!  I got a reprieve from them (of sorts) since I had to work a couple of days.  But we did watch Toy Story 3 in 3D IMAX (LOVED IT – might be my fav Pixar EVER…deffo my fav Toy Story…deffo "Day & Night" is my fav short!), hit the beach, did some indoor electric go-karts (no smelly diesel fuel, and they are FAST!), outlet mall in the desert, pool-floating, and entertaining friends (including Steve’s godson + parents for a day).  The Foxes + boys went out shopping one day, so I took some time to recharge (at home) and work on my MIL’s Christmas present…ya know, from 2009!  This is what I finished piecing + quilting:

I have 2 more pillows to quilt and send to her…by this Christmas, maybe??

They left at the crack of dawn on the 4th, and Steve and I didn’t do anything for the rest of the day…we even ordered Papa Johns so no effort was exerted on food making. 

Sounds exhausting right?

Here’s the kicker… my mom & stepdad dropped in on us last Wednesday.  From Nebraska.  To Los Angeles.  For a night.  And then they left.  Apparently, the "hey we’re thinking about visiting you guys from the 4th-10th, are you going to be around?" email my mom sent a couple of months ago really meant "we already have vacay scheduled that we can’t unschedule, if you’re around, we’ll stop by."  A fact which wasn’t clarified until a couple of days before.  So my mom stopped on by, bearing the gift of my grandma’s cedar chest, plus some other things she wanted to get our of her house, including my boxed-up wedding dress.  You mean I can’t use my mom’s house for storage anymore??  WHAT?!?!?!?!?  Crap!    So we went to dinner, and hung out w/them while trying to pack up the car to go camping for the weekend. 

Then we left civilization on Thursday to go to the Upper Kern.  After work.  Driving thru LA traffic.  Which is the WORST on Thursday evenings.  We drove 8 miles in 45 minutes.  Took us nearly 5 hours total (with a stop to eat crappy dinner).  And set up the mansion tent in the dark, being attacked by moths.

We took a drive on Friday up to the Trail of 100 Giants.  Y’all, I was standing INSIDE a tree (photo is with me & my friend Kevin)!  A giant sequoia, to be exact.  It was craziness.  One of the trees bit me – dropped a branch that gave me a cut on my arm. 

We also tubed, but the water was moving fast, and I punked out after the first run.  That’s ok, I had a new book to read.  On Saturday, we went on a wild goose chase to find a natural waterslide…with success!  And hoo-doggie, was that fun!  However, the pretty-much-direct-snow-melt-water was C-O-L-D!  Thank goodness the 90 degree heat melted the chilled skin right away!  As you can see, Steve wasn’t all that crazy when going down the slides, but some crazy dudes were going head first into flips down the slide!

By the time we got home on Sunday afternoon, 3 days of no showers plus excessive heat caught up to me.  I cleaned myself up, ran to the store for milk + easy dinner, ate, and fell asleep on the couch.  9:30 bedtime, go me!

And there’s really no rest for the wicked…  apparently, my lil bro managed to squeeze some vacay time, and is coming out to visit for a week.  On Saturday.  Flight booked 1 week in advance.  I just found out his flight details.

Entertaining visitors = lots of trips to Costco…for food…more towels for the pool…discounted tickets…gas…  And the kicker?  We had to go again tonight, we ran out of laundry soap, and the toilet paper is getting low.  Costco for a household of 2 should be a 1x/month trip – MAX!  I think we’re averaging just over 1x/week this summer…

Also, Work + entertaining visitors = barely any time for crafty!  

We leave on August 4th to drive to Seattle for a week-long trip – we’re going up so I can be a bridesmaid (bridesmatron??) to the aforementioned Carrie & Dave.  I’m hoping I have time to crank out a quilt top, but I doubt it… *groans*  I’m behind on bee blocks, plus Steve wants a baby quilt for his boss & wife (wife is also a co-worker).

I actually received my quilt back from Margaret a couple of weeks ago, but let other things get in the way (like watching Glee).

Here’s a detail of her quilting – I really think it looks wonderful, I just wanted a simple, swirly all-over pattern.  The only problem I have with the quilt has nothing to do with the quilting…rather it’s the blue solid RK voile I used as the background fabric.  I’m positive now that all voiles are not created equally, and I should have just buckled and bought the 3x more expensive, but likely 10x better quality, AMH voile solids (or maybe the dobby dots).  The RK voile was just a bit too sheer, and I don’t like how the seams show underneath.  Fortunately, I think the AMH Little Folks prints work quite nicely in distracting you from looking at the solid fabric too much!

Margaret said the voile quilted up beautifully w/out any tension issues – she used a light-weight thread (and an appropriately sized needle for the thread).  I had sent her some Quilters Dream Select Loft cotton batting to use – I wanted something not terribly puffy & with a nice drape, and she mentioned she had a customer send that batting to use recently and thought I would like it.  I quilted my MT mini with some of the leftover batting, and let me tell you, it was fantastic to work with!  Definitely some fuzzies, but that’s to be expected with cotton.

Anyway, Margaret did a really nice job of quilting and didn’t really quilt outside the basting lines…and I was *thisclose* to just self binding with the backing fabric, machine stitching to the front.  However, the quilt guilt factor got a hold of me, and I stitched the binding on to the front like a proper quilter, so I could hand-stitch it down to the back.  I made Steve drive at least partially the past few days so I can work on it in the car…plus a marathon session on Friday night (because I’m slow as molasses when it comes to binding).  I think the only way it worked so well in the car was because the voile and the batting were so EASY to sew through (no wrangling the needle through tough layers).

The quilt went to a college buddy of mine, Chad, and his new wife, Laura.  I really hope they like it – I usually have a strict policy against getting someone a gift that isn’t on their registry, but I’m thinking this is the pleasant surprise off-the-list gift.

Final verdict – I really love the overall look of this quilt and it is amazing soft & drapey.  I’m a huge fan of the 8-point cheater star.  I kind of want to make another one of these quilts with the AMH voile for myself…but using one of her solid voiles for a background.  Even if it costs an arm & a leg… 8 FQs + 1.5 yds of background + 4 yds for backing & binding = over $100 in fabric…plus batting…plus what I paid for the long-arm quilting…it adds up quick!

Handmade is better, but it’s more expensive!

Scrabble clock idea found here.  I cut off the bottom of the picture on purpose – I had glued down more tiles spelling out my mom’s last name onto one of the little stands and then glued that to the board.  I hacked the clock part from a $3 clock from Target…err, rather Steve hacked it for me.

And mom?  To apologize for the delay, I’ll show you this picture of your grand-kitties instead.  Aren’t they cute??

Apologies for the blurry photos – I can’t seem to take a stellar photo on the iphone!

I’ve never been able to find a pair of Levi’s that fit me.

Even as a teenager, I was a pear:

And I’ve accepted the pear…though now I really wouldn’t mind more of the hour-glass shape, ala Christina Hendricks in Mad Men:

(Side note: if I hear/read any more discussion about how she needs to drop some pounds, I might die…she is so beautiful, and no one should take that away from her just because she isn’t a size 2.)

(Side note #2: I could achieve the hour-glass look very simply – I would just have to buy the VS Miraculous bra… lemme tell ya, I tried this puppy on a few months ago, and it definitely does what it claims to do – and it looks really good underneath your clothing.  However, I was entirely too hung up on the growing/shrinking boobs issue – I mean, people are gonna notice the increased cup size, and then notice if it disappears… But maybe for a weekend in Vegas w/the girlfriends?  Then it might be fun to pretend!)

But I digress, as usual.  No Levi’s for me as a teen– not that I’m sure my mom would have dropped that many bone$ on a pair of jeans for me back in the 90s.

I had heard from my friend Christina (who’s a great hour-glass, BTW) that she bought some awesome Levi’s from Kohls that actually fit her curvy hips!  And so when I went shopping w/my friend Joelle this weekend, we went and found the mythical 526s.  Now, I also tried the “Curvy” 529s, but I found the 526 to be a better fit for me.

So I finally own Levi’s.

BTW – Gap’s Curvy Pants usually work well for me also.

First, I finished my mini-quilt for the Modify Tradition Swap.

And in true “Michelle’s a Ding Dong” fashion, I’m pretty sure I wrote “Modern Tradition Swap” on the back for a label.  D’OH!

But since I can’t seem to get past the Interlaced Star pattern, I went for it again.  This time, I tried piecing using tracing paper, which made it heckuva lot easier to paper piece & rip off later…however, tracing paper curls when it meets hot iron.  So…not sure I’ve found the best solution for the paper piecing that doesn’t cost an arm & a leg (and is the proper size).

I think the quilting is pretty fun (if not pretty time consuming) – each little section is quilted with echo triangles.  Unfortunately, I didn’t get a good photo of the back on my DSLR (which I’m stuck w/this weekend, the little camera is touristing DC with Steve).

And better late than never, I finished my first ever Dresden plate for my Facebook VQB.  Actually, part of the delay was that I decided I needed the Easy Dresden Ruler (link is to the seller I purchased from, very happy w/the transaction).  I’m glad I bought it, I think this was a fun process!  BTW – I followed Elizabeth’s instructions on SMS, down to how she did the circle applique in the middle – super easy!

And I need to give a HUGE THANK YOU! to everyone who answered my plea for fabric help – you came through in a big way, and I’m actually sending almost a gallon ziploc full of extra fabric with the block (because I’m sure as heck not going to use it either).

So I can’t seem to get in contact w/my SMS giveaway winner, so if I don’t hear anything in the next couple of days, I’ll draw another name out of the hat.  Cuz there are a lotta people that were interested in the Hope Valley fabrics, and I want to make sure they’ll go to a good home (well, any home at this point, lol).

Is anyone interested in a crafty book trade?  I have a copy of this:

that I’m looking to trade.

On my wish list:

• City Quilts
• Sewing Bits & Pieces
• Small Stash Sewing
• Handmade Beginnings
• Bend-the-Rules Sewing
• The Modern Quilt Workshop
• maybe something else??

Make me an offer!