Finish-Along Goals 1

I've decided to join in on a "Finish-Along."  Basically, the idea is that at the beginning of each quarter (January-March being the 1st) quilters make goals on what they hope to finish during those months.  Then for each finish they write a blog post and link up to the Linky Party.  I decided to try this out so I can focus on finishing projects, rather than starting them!  New projects are such a temptation and I could use a little motivation to finish a few things.  So here's my list of things I want to finish:

1.  Kaleidoscope Quilt -- made this quilt, but it's too small.  Want to add a border and hope that the quilting will distract from all the non-matching points.

2.  Cross Mini Quilt -- just started this and hope to be finished soon!

3.  Pine Sugar Quilt -- it's on my design wall and I'm almost finished with the blocks.

4.  Grandma's Quilt -- need to finish the border, quilt, and bind.

5.  Bluebird Park Quilt -- started this a while back, set it aside having only sewn one column together.

6.  Ombre Pinwheel quilt -- not loving this one and not sure what to do about it.  I'll put it on this list and hope I get some inspiration to finish it!

7.  Quilt Sampler from Vintage Modern Sew Along -- I just want to straight line quilt this one, but it's so big!  Ugh.

8.  Jewel Tone Sawtooth Quilt -- I have the fabric pulled and ready to cut.  Pretty excited about this one.

9.  Solids Charm quilt with Essex Linen -- I have the fabric, want to try out the Essex Linen.  Hope I like working with it because I love the look of it!

The nice thing about this Finish-Along is that you can make lofty goals and then just roll uncompleted ones to the next Quarter.  I'm sure I'll be doing some of that.  I don't usually manage to finish several quilts in one year, let alone three months....we'll see how it goes!  You can check out all the other quilters making goals at the Finish Along Linky Party.

Small Gifts

I made a few small gifts for friends this year.  I wish I would have taken better pictures -- but I only took pics with my phone I guess.  I'll share them anyway.  I'm linking up to Finish it up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts and to Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation.

My favorite of these projects is my "Here We Have Idaho" pillow.  I made it for my best friend -- we grew up in a small town in Idaho and I will forever love that quiet, beautiful, super-cold-right-now, but rarely-too-hot town!  When we were in the 4th grade we had "Idaho History."  Here are a few of the highlights from that fine history Unit:

1. Potato Pillows -- one of the projects we could choose to do was make a potato shaped pillow -- I don't think I made one, but remember seeing other's.  Whatever project I did, I did not keep it.  
2. County song -- My best friend also memorized the county song....I didn't have to, but I do enjoy asking her to sing it for me once in a while.  ;)  
3. State song -- We both learned the State song -- part of which is "And here we have Idaho, Winning her way to fame."  That line always cracked us up so i wrote it on the backside of the pillow (just along the edge of the envelope closure.)  I wanted to stitch it to the front, but I'm not that experienced in hand-stitching and wasn't sure anyone would get it anyway.  :)  

I got the idea for this Idaho pillow from another blog -- but I cannot find the source!  It's been a while.  

Another pillow I made using the same reverse-applique technique was this heart pillow I made for a friend who was having a birthday.  The fabric is a mini charm pack from the Moda Wishes line.  I used corduroy for off-white the background.  

Lastly, I made my first attempt at zipper pouches.  I used a couple of online tutorials.  My first attempt was on the blue owl pouch -- I didn't have interfacing so I used some batting instead.  Not sure this was a great idea because I struggled with those bulky box corners.  My second and third attempt were more successful -- the octagon bag is made with fusible fleece, and the tan corduroy/owl one is made with medium weight interfacing.  These were gift-able.  Phew.  I gave the pink one to our babysitter.  I really debated one what a teenager would like.....I don't have teenagers and wasn't sure which one to give her.  Hope she liked it! 

Happy December!

As I was loading pictures onto my computer I was reminded of some fun times we've had this past holiday season.  We spent Thanksgiving in Idaho with my parents and sister's family.  It was great.  The weather was surprisingly warm, but the men in the family went up to the mountains to find a Christmas tree and some snow.  The highlight for my boys was being pulled on sleds tied to the back of the truck.  Some good country fun!  The other bit of "country fun" was packing all 3 adults and 4 children into the Toyota Tundra -- no, Brian, we can't take the booster seats.  :)  Luckily, everyone came home safely.  You can see the boys were pretty thrilled!

A highlight for me was going to a Cherie Call concert.  It was a small venue, probably only about 100 people there.  It was great!  I love her music and love hearing the background of why she wrote the songs.  Here's a very reflective picture of her at the concert.  :)

It has been a very dry winter here.  So when it snowed a few weeks ago I found it extra fun to see the little bird tracks across our driveway.  I got a picture before Tanner stomped on all of them.  

We had a Ward/Neighborhood Christmas Breakfast one Saturday morning.  It was a lot of fun and we all enjoyed the Photo Prop booth.  Santa came at the end.  Tanner is the first of my kids to brave talking to Santa.  He wouldn't sit on his lap, but agreed to stand beside him as I took his picture.  When Santa said "What do you want for Christmas?"  Tanner hit his forehead and said "I can't remember."  Out of the blue, later that morning, Tanner said "Santa forgot to take a shower.  He did not smell good."  :)  I'm sure that suit gets pretty toasty!

We hosted family parties for both the Frankman's and Poelman's.  I have often left this to my siblings because they have roomier homes, but we decided to utilize our dusty old basement and offer to host.  It went fine and didn't seem too crowded (at least not to me.)  Here is Tanner and his good friend and cousin, Max.  We were listening to Aunt Susan's presentation on her trip to Israel and all the places Jesus lived and served.  And below is a picture of our niece, Savannah, with our newest nephew, Sam.  

When we celebrated with the Poelman's we also celebrated December birthdays.  I share my birthday with our nephew, Matthew, who was turning 4.  I don't have many pictures to share from this event because so many included me!  ugh!

We had our family parties a few days before Christmas, so our Christmas was spent with just our little family.  We had a nice time.  On Christmas Eve we watched a film about the birth of Christ, made some Ninjabread cookies for Santa, and opened a gift.  When I was young we could choose any gift from under the tree to open on Christmas Eve.  As I got older I started specifically choosing a book to open so I would have something fun to read when I struggled to sleep that Christmas Eve night.  So I've started to give the boys a book each Christmas night.  This year Andrew and Eric both got Minecraft books and Tanner a Ninja Turtle book.  

Eric kept asking what time they could get up in the morning.  Brian told him that it depended on what time they went to bed.  So as soon as we opened the books Eric went to bed.  :)  We told him we could start opening gifts at 6:30.  He came in at 5:00 AM....that wait does seem awfully long when you're a child.  

After such a dry December, we were very pleased to wake up to a lot of snow on Christmas morning.  We probably got about 7 inches at our house.  So Brian took the boys out sledding.  They had a great time and I love this picture!  (I stayed home and enjoyed the quiet.  That was fun too!)

Tanner got a Minions hat and a Harry Potter sword (I made it the night before.  He liked it, but did inform me that it should be black.  I thought the metallic brown was pretty cool!)  Tanner often has the scar drawn on his head.  And I'm amazed at how long he can wear those glasses.  He will wear them almost all day sometimes.  I guess it's good preparation for the inevitable day when he gets real glasses.

I took the kids sledding the day after Christmas too.  After a while Eric walked up to me and said "I am so cold.  My chin is freezing." I said "Maybe that's because you've been rolling around in the snow."  He said "That's lesson #1 today.  No rolling in the snow."  :)  

So I'll leave you with that little lesson to ponder on.  Hope you had a very Merry Christmas.  

Mini Quilt Swap

Okay, so I know you may have seen this mini quilt before, but since I actually sent it away to my swap partner, I thought I'd share it with the new binding.  Originally it was green....didn't like it.  So I swapped it for grey.  Much better!  I guess I forgot to take a pic with my regular camera, but here is the one I took with my phone.

And the back with the old green binding.

And last week I received a mini quilt from my swap partner.

I love the text print and the algebra print...I started out as a math major in college and I love those numbers!

I have been sewing quite a bit lately -- after this swap project I started on a couple of quilts for charity.  The BOM class I go to each month is gathering quilts for a homeless shelter.  And I've also been working on some smaller projects for gifts.  One of them I love -- but can't show it until I give it away!

Fall Fun

It's almost Thanksgiving so I've decided to take the time to talk about Halloween.  :)  We had a fun Halloween this year.  We carved pumpkins for Family Night -- Tanner picked out his own large pumpkin, Brian picked out the other two pumpkins on his way home from work one night.  Because none of us like to clean them out, he chose pretty small ones.  That wasn't what the boys would have chosen, but they were good sports.  It was a fun evening.

Tanner was sick with a cold, and because he has Asthma it hits him pretty hard.  He gets this awful cough and wheeze, but for some reason that boy still doesn't slow down!  Tanner was a Vampire for one party, and black Spiderman for Trick or Treating.  Eric decided to go easy on me with the costume purchasing and wanted to be a Soccer Player.  And Andrew got one of the Morph suits that covers your whole body (from feet to head) in one color.  However, his eyes bothered him too much with the mask over them so we were lucky enough to have his face painted at his school class party.

Okay, moving on from Halloween -- we have only had one significant snow this year so far.  I guess the East is keeping it all for themselves.  ha ha.  I love the first snow and how excited the boys get.  They spent a lot of time shoveling the yard (since it melted on the driveway.)  This is the "huge" pile they were able to make.  Here you can see they are simply amazed at the size of their creation.  :)

The boys have been studying Native American history lately.  Andrew had to create a 3-D model of a Native American dwelling.  We chose to do a Wikiup.  The Wikiup was one of the dwellings of Native American's in Southern Utah.  

Since Southern Utah has orange sand I went to a nearby baseball stadium and took some of their orange sand.  We also used a bunch of dying plants from our yard and hot glued them to the paper mache dome we made.  We finished it off by making some burlap "baskets" and filling them with seeds, roots, and berries. Andrew made the fun fire flames and we glued little "tumbleweed" plants here and there.  It was pretty fun and Andrew was pleased with the results.

On yet another topic -- I got to go to Portland to see my sister a couple of weeks ago.  We went to Time Out for Women, and her two oldest girls went to Time out for Girls.  We had a great time.  It was such a nice break (thanks to my husband who willingly took off work and stayed home with the kids -- he even got the full stay-at-home experience when Andrew got the stomach flu.)  Anyway, here is our "selfie" at Time Out for Women.  I came home from that weekend refreshed and ready to face the troops again.  

Mini Quilts

I joined a mini quilt swap recently -- my first swap ever.  (For those who don't know, a swap is where you sign up to create a specific quilt project and then mail it to an assigned partner.)  We are keeping our partners secret, and have never met them.  So we guess what they might like by looking at their blog, instagram, and any other online clues you can find.  I thought this would be a fun challenge, and since I love good mail, I thought it would be fun.

Turns out it has been fun, but it's also made me a little nervous.  I made one mini quilt and then decided maybe it wasn't right for my partner.  So I made a second.  I'm happy with the way both turned out and am happy to keep one for myself.  :)

Both are blocks from the Vintage Quilt Revival book.  I've posted a few projects from this book -- love it!  The top quilt block has wonky stars.....I made the first two (gray ones) a little too wonky and ended up cutting off the star points.  I figured it out by the time I made the blue blocks.  :)  I also tried Spiral quilting for the first time.  I love how it looks, and I wouldn't say it was difficult.  However, it was not fun for me.  All that twisting, turning, same ol' stitching...it got a little old.  I don't think I would attempt it on a large quilt, even though I love the look!

Although both of these blocks look finished, the one below is still a WIP.  The center block of the quilt is also from the same book.  I added the borders and like how it turned out.  However, I don't love the binding.  Too much green or something.  I will most likely replace the binding --- any suggestion on what color I should choose?  I would love any suggestions!

I am linking up to Freshly Pieced WIP Wednesday, 

the author of that blog is also the author of the book I've been raving about!  

Trick or Treat Quilt

5 days before Halloween I finished this Trick or Treat quilt.  Now I'm too lazy to hang it up for just 5 days, but I'm sure we'll enjoy it draped over a chair for a few days anyway.

This is a pattern from Moda Bakeshop called the Neighborhood Charm Quilt.  The fabric is Boo Crew by Sweetwater.  Rather than the light colored background in the original, I decided on a Black/Gray Ombre so it looked like nighttime.

The original was quilted with straight lines -- making paths to the door, which was cute.  But I wasn't sure I'd be able to continuously quilt all the lines without stopping/starting a lot.  Since I don't know how to bury my knots (something I just need to take the time to learn) -- I decided to do my own quilt design.  I thought of all the little children meandering the streets on halloween night, and did some curved lines on the "streets."  On each house I did some echo stitching and a little door.

For the back I used up some old fall fabrics.  Don't love it but it'll be hanging on a wall so I was just happy to use up some fabrics from my stash.  Yay!

Points I pondered:

1.  Once again, I was a little unsure of what color thread to use.  I wish I would have used black on the top portion and gray on the bottom portion so it blended better.  But I went the lazy route and used all gray. I need to always use threads that match the quilt top because I'm still not a great machine quilter!

2.  Working with Ombre -- I need to think ahead a little more.  For the first two rows I didn't cut the roads (sashing) out first -- by the time I was going to cut it I was down farther in the fabric so it was lighter.  It's okay, but would do it differently next time.

3.  I didn't use my walking foot and the back looks just fine (minus the fact that the thread is gray. :))  I think my walking foot sits too low on my sewing machine and I probably need to get the Janome foot (rather than the generic) to see the real benefits of using a walking foot.

4.  I got the binding right on this one!  Yay!  I just finished a mini quilt and am still wondering if I should swap out the binding.  But for this quilt I went with this cool black/cream binding and I love it!

Below is a picture of a mini quilt I finished....I don't love the green binding.  What color would use?

I am linking up to Quilt Story's Fabric Tuesday.

Zoo Fun

It's been a year and a half since we went to the zoo, so we decided it was time to go back again.  We knew Tanner would be particularly excited to see the animals.  A couple of times he surprised us with animal facts -- when I asked him where how he knew that, he's say "Wild Kwatts!"  (Wild Kratts is actually what Tanner is watching right now.)

We especially loved the Apes.  Unfortunately the Ape house is indoors and the pictures were too dark.  Overall the animals were kind of sleepy.  We got there about 3:00 PM.  When we were leaving around 6:00 it seems the animals were waking up for dinner.  Next time I think we'll go closer to 4:30 and hopefully see some more activity.

We always enjoy seeing the Elephants.  I just think it's amazing that there is a creature that large.  The highlight for the boys was that one of the elephants went to the bathroom while we were watching.  They laughed so hard!

Brian always loves the Rhino.  Another amazing creature.  

Here are the boys in the eagle next.  It's hard to get a picture of Tanner just smiling anymore.  Can you tell?

Last year I took pictures of the boys by the bear painting.  You can see how much they've grown when you see this years picture.  (Top pic is this year -- bottom pics are last year.  I couldn't get the boys to hold still enough for individual pictures this year.)