From This to That

Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Hairbrained

I took Thursday and half day Friday off work so I could clean my poor neglected house. Thursday, I did really well, worked all day and got a lot accomplished. Friday…. Well, after making snow ice cream with cherries on top with my residents and walking home through a winter wonderland, I made the mistake of cleaning off my nightstand. "Why is cleaning off your nightstand a mistake?” you ask. It was a mistake because my charm pack of Nancy Drew fabric was there. It was such a lovely snowy day I ended up sewing instead of cleaning. (I know that none of you have *ever* done such a thing.) <wink>

I had some issues with my math ( you can't get 2.5 inch HSTs out of 2.5 inch squares unless you have super powers or magic and my wand is broken and I am out of fairy dust!)

so I needed something brainless to work on to rest after fixing all my calculations.

In retrospect, I should have started cleaning house then but instead I thought I would start a scrappy trip around the world- I have this wonderful bag of strips already cut. ( Thank you Fairy CaMom) I sorted some of the strips and then realized they were NOT all the same size and some were a wee bit diagonal. “Ok, no prob- I will make a wonky trip around the world” so I started stitching strips together. I cut the first set of strips and realized it wasn’t going to work as I had pictured but I could still do something with the strip sets.

I love the tropical colors in these strips

I must have dreamed about the strip sets because as soon as I woke up on Saturday I had an AHA! Moment. I could make some herringbone blocks. I sorta used the tutorial here at bijou lovely –except the pictures didn't come through at all on my phone AND I already had these lovely strips sewn together so I just started cutting my wonky strip sets into diagonals.

I was late for work at the store because I was having way too much fun. I had some yellow marble from Moda in my stash (again thanks Fairy CaMom) added some sashing.

I told my moms it was a wild hair –ing bone and then decided it was because I am hairbrained, so I have dubbed this my Hairbrained Herringbone Quilt.

Since I can’t show you Nancy Drew yet ( my day is the 14^th) I shall share this with you!

I still have quite a ways to go before it is done- I want it Cuddle size for a snowy day.

On another note- I also wanted to share my Dr Seuss What's Happening Board that I did for the nursing home each of the trufula trees, stripes and hands has the date and time for an activity happening in march. I love celebrating Dr Seuss with my residents. We have a group of kids coming to celebrate with us - we will be making oobleck!

Thursday we are having a Quilt Show at the Nursing Home- I will share pictures next week!

Thursday, February 14, 2013

OXOXOX

Happy Valentine’s Day! Once again Madam Samm and her cheerleading squad deserve lotsa Hugs and Kisses for putting together a fabulous hop for us! Jane has done a great job of keeping us organized!
Before I share my block, I have a short story. My Sunshine Boy, Nehemiah was about 6 years old and just learning to read. It was close to Valentine’s Day and we were all at Nana’s (Nana also loves Valentine’s Day and always has great decorations,) Miah looks up at me and says “Aunt Bobbie, why do all the Valentine’s decorations say Ox Ox on them?” I had no idea what he was talking about “Ox, Ox?” Then he pointed at Nana’s tablecloth which had hearts and hugs and kisses (XOXO) on it. He was looking at it upside down and sure enough, XOXO upside down is OXOX.

As I was thinking on Hugs and Kisses for this hop, I knew I had to incorporate this story into my project. So here is my OXOX block- which I will turn into a pillow case for My Sunshine Boy.

I used the pattern from Debbie Mumm’s

Quick Country Quilting to make the Ox (ok ok he really is a cow)

and CaMom had sent me the longhorns fabric in

one of her moo-velous stash enhancing boxes.

I was going to make just one thing for this hop but- when we went shopping I asked EmmaBean to pick out some fabric for St Patty’s Day and she picked the ladybugs- I just had to make something for her and then Jayme over at finding sweetland reminded me of Rachel's ( ps i quilt) cute little friendship bag- I used some of my gazillion 2 inch squares and tweaked the pattern a bit – her strips were a different size and I wanted a two tone handle. I made EmmaBean this cute little bag- it worked up in less than two hours (not counting the fabric choosing.)

I added a fussy cut laddy bug and some rickrack too

the back

inside

EmmaBean loves her new bag!

Then Amanda over at Jedi Craft Girl used her Jedi bloggy tricks and *forced* me to make this little guy- He took less than 10 minutes! I will be making more for sure!