Finish my UFOs

I've been thinking of all of my UFOs lying around the house and have challenged myself to get them finished and out of here in 2011. Hopefully this blog will help me accomplish this. There is nothing like accountability, so I hope some of you friends who check in occasionally will keep my nose to the grindstone this coming year. Since most of my projects are for charity, it goes along with a thought one of the women at church said yesterday, "In 2011, may I be fruitful for Heaven." I feel my purpose in life is to glorify the Lord and be His hands and feet here on earth to touch others with His love. I pray that all of my fleece blankets, quilts, and embroidered toys and angels will touch the recipient with the Savior's love.

The end of my Christmas stitching

With two days until Christmas, it is about time that I'm finished with my stitching! The wind is howling and the temperature is ffffrrreeezziing! It feels like Christmas!

This year I made Sonia Showalter's Christmas Angel to include with many of my Christmas cards. It was a chore for me rather than a fun thing to do the cards this year, so even though I was very late with them, they are all sent. PTL! I wish I were able to send all of my friends a stitchery, but that is impossible. One friend always gets snowflakes from me because she loves snow. Another friend got Sonia's nativity angel set because I hadn't given them to her before for some reason. I guess I can chalk it up to a poor memory or thick fibro-fog.

My SIL asked me to make a fleece blanket for her son who is in dental school at the Univeristy of North Carolina. It really was to be a birthday gift, but Hancock's had trouble getting in the fleece at the store. I finally ordered it on their website and had it shipped here. The finished product was mailed yesterday, along with some scarves I made from the remnant.

I can't think of anything else that I did creatively, other than baking a few cookies yesterday. That was an improvement over last year when I didn't get any baked. This year DH helped me and we'll be baking his favorite, pfeffernuesse, this afternoon when he finished a woodworking project downstairs.

Merry Christmas!

Gracie

Another set of Christmas placemats & napkins

I finished up another set of the placemats and napkins. This set is for my SIL in Maryland. She and her DH came for a visit to celebrate my DH's 65th birthday, so I was able to send them along right away. The color is a bit off since they are really Christmas red and not pink,

I also finished a red set for my SIL in eastern Ohio, but I forgot to take pictures. I praise the Lord for His attaching my head to the rest of my body. Who knows where I'd leave it!

More angels

I have a dozen free-standing lace angels ready to go in the mail tomorrow heading to New Mexico. Nathenia Roberts of The Country Needle has generously given free angels for many of us to stitch. She is currently working on a Christmas tree to sell at a charity event and has asked her group members to send her completed angels. I will be busy between now and Christmas, as most people will be, so I will be glad to get thes on their way.

I've also mailed a Sonia Showalter angel to a woman who has just been diagnosed with breast cancer. Sonia's design is the perfect choice for this purpose. She has also been very generous with her Yahoo group's members; this is my chance to pass along the blessing.

Here are pictures of these completed projects.

Another project completed

I hadn't had nice, matching hand towels for my bathroom, so I bought some towels while on vacation. I just embroidered an "A" on the three of them. It is a freebie I got from SewRN's Cameo Embossed alphabet on Sew Forum. The green thread matches the ribbons in the designs on my shower curtain. Even the boss likes them!

Another picture

I figured that while I was on a roll I might as well post another picture. My machine is stitching lace angels in the background while I am posting. Nathenia of The Country Needle has asked for stitched angels to decorate a charity tree she is putting together, so I'm making a few to send to her. When I'm finished, I will let you see them before they are put into the mail.

With six sisters, my DH decided that I should embroider napkin and placemat sets using Christmas Pine designs from Sonia Showalter for four of them. I can't decide what to do for the two single sisters, but eventually I'll figure something out for them as well.

Until next time, may the Lord's abundent blessings be upon each of you!
Gracie

Back to work!

After a summer of travel to northeast Brazil, Ohio, and Kentucky, I am back to work. My progress is a bit slow for now since I have gotten myself into a full fibro flare. OUCH! It seems that every joint and muscle in my body is screaming.

Christmas is fast approaching, gifts need to be finished, and other projects have been on hold for much too long. Judy, I know you have been wanting to see what I have been doing, so here it is!

As little gifts to give to my friends in Brazil, I made personalized Marie Osmond free-standing lace angels and bookmarks from Embroidery Library. I also squeezed in time to finish a blanket for Project Linus and an apron to give as a present.

I'll post more pictures later.

Blessings!
Gracie

Angels for Nikki & Zach

I got up too late to get these in the mail today, but tomorrow is another day. (It seems to be the story of my life just now.) I made these for a friend of a friend and her son in Georgia. The mother was in a terrible accident last week and the doctors say she will never walk again. As any mother can imagine, the thought of never walking again with your little boy is heart wrenching. Please join me in prayer for Nikki and Zach during her hospitalization, therapy, and as they face the future. Our God is a mighty God and the things said by doctors can be over-ruled by His grace.

On another topic, today's mail brought a sweet surprise. I got a thank-you note from Joe, the little boy for whom I made the quilt. He loves it, especially the football and dog designs. Also enclosed was a picture of him with his quilt. It is a treasure!

Kyla's Pillowcase

I kind of forgot to post the picture of the pillowcase I made for a friend to give to her granddaughter the end of May. It was a fun project for a young horse lover. Pillowcases are a sewing project I enjoy making; not so much sewing and ripping as in most of my other sewing projects. I wasn't nicknamed "Grace the Ripper" for nothing back in home ec. in high school!

I posted the picture on artisticthreadworks.com and it was selected as the picture of the week. As a result, I got a three-month subscription extension. I am so happy that their computer randomly chose my posting!

I also made a boring window panel for a friend's back door and made two batches of black raspberry jelly since my last post. They weren't really creative, but they are finished projects! I have more than enough UFOs hanging around, for sure!

I've also been cutting fleece fabric for blankets for Project Linus. I'll post pictures when I get some of them finished. I am procrastinating on them because I don't know what to embroider on the plain ones.

That's it for now.

Free-Standing Lace Angels

I have not been very productive since I finished the quilt. I really did in my left hand and wrist machine quilting Joe's quilt and have been in a lot of pain since. I did manage to shorten a set of curtains for a friend, but that isn't very interesting stitching, for sure!

Two of my friends have lost loved ones in the past two weeks. I like to make free-standing lace angels for people who are dealing with grief or illnesses, so I made two of the Marie Osmond angels for my friends. While I was stitching, I made a couple of angels from The Country Needle to have on hand when the need for an angel arises. I hope you enjoy seeing these bits of lace; they are one of my favorite things to stitch. It would help if I could keep the angels straight while I shoot the picture, too!

YWAM Arpons

My left hand is still hurting, but I have been able to hoop the aprons and now have four of the five finished. I am so happy to be able to get back to some embroidery again. It is still my first love in creativity. The Jamaica team works so hard raising money to go to the YWAM base and then works even harder once they get there. So much work and so few workers it seems. Our DOVE Westgate team just works their hearts out, as well as their bodies. These aprons will keep some of the people a bit cleaner, I hope. 8-)

Yipeee! It's finished!

PTL, it is finished at last!!! I stayed up late last night finishing Joe's quilt and it will be going to the post office this afternoon. It was an adventure, for sure. I have learned so much during the process. Some of the lessons I could have done without, like the blocks not stitching out to the proper size and the bobbin thread pulling to the top during some of the stippling. I have learned that I hate using invisible thread! It is a pain in the patootie because of its tendency to curl. Next time it will be plain old cotton thread.

I hope the little guy likes the end product. I am afraid when he compares his to the ones made by experienced quilters that he will be disappointed. I have seen pictures of quite a few of the other quilts made for this school project and am embarrased to have some of these women see the pictures of mine. I am hoping that the children will just be happy with all of the quilts and realize that some of them were made by long-time quilters, but they were all made with love.

From now one, I guess I will stick with blankets for Project Linus. We have such a wide variety of people making blankies for PL in many different styles that the children can always find one they love. I won't be making my blankets for any one child in particular.

Now it is on to finishing several UFOs that I have in the works. I have aprons to emborider for the Youth with a Mission Jamaica team to take with them in June, a curtain panel to shorten for a friend, a pillowcase to make for another friend for her granddaughter's birthday in June, etc.... In other words, I will stay out of trouble for a long time!

Check back in a few days to see what I've been doing. Tomorrow it is our PL chapter's Quilting Bee, so I pray that my serger, Bernie, will behave and that we get a lot accomplished. (He doesn't like QBs for some reason and misbehaves regularly.)

Stippling

Today is stippling day! Last night Arthur Itis came to visit and made my sleep almost non-existant, but stipple I must! Needless to say, I won't get the binding on today... perhaps tomorrow.

At church we are always talking about stretching ourselves out of our comfort zone, so today I am really stretched! It has been fun and is almost like back in my cake decorating days when I did cornelli lace. One big rule of cornelli is to never cross a previous line of icing. Well, if the same rule applies to free-motion quilting, I am in big trouble with the Quilting Police! I don't think the third grade at Sheridan School has any of those around, so I should be safe.

Here is a picture of my progress. BTW, all of the instructions I have seen on free-motion quilting never mentioned what to do if the bobbin thread runs out. I punted and just started back where I had stopped when the thread ran out. My machine only prompts me when the bobbin thread runs out, not in advance of the occurance. 8-(

Progress continues

Sunday I had a peaceful day of rest after church. Working in the nursery in the morning was not restful with more babies than our quota. They were all pretty well behaved, so it worked out with the four of us caring for them. I think I changed diapers on seven of the eight, but the babies didn't all sleep. 8-) Our motto is, "they shall all be changed, but they shall not all sleep."

I spent some time Sunday evening watching videos on YouTube about machine quilting. Several of them had great tips. I was surprised at the abundance of quilting clips on there.

I put the walking foot on Big Ellie and went to work yesterday afternoon with the quilt-in-the ditch part of my quilting. I had a few false starts until I got everything working together. One tip I saw on YouTube that I have trouble remembering is to pull the bobbin thread to the top before I start stitching to avoid the dreaded “thread nests.” Another tip said to use YLI invisible thread, which I fortunately had in stock. Apparently I used it in another project somewhere sometime. At least with the invisible thread it isn’t as noticeable when I don’t stay in the ditch.

I discovered that I have an echo foot in my box of presser feet and I’ll play with it a bit to see how it goes. It may work on the embroidered blocks. I also thought that I might just do a curve in the corners of the blocks a couple of times to anchor the sandwich. I even searched through my embroidery designs last night to see if I had any little redwork designs that I could embroider in the corners, without success except for a freebie little bulldog head from Oma’s Place. I don’t think that would look too hot in my Christmas and Fall blocks though. At least I’m making good progress now and am happy with the way it is turning out. Without too many roadblocks, I may just get this thing finished and in the mail by the end of the week.

Here are two pictures of my progress.

Joe's quilt is now spray basted and pinned. I don't think the layers are going to go anywhere now! I'd be stitching on it right now, but I don't want to get involved and then have to quit before I'm ready.

Tonight is the Triumphant Quartet, Crists, and Browns concert at Lancaster Mennonite High, and DH will be anxious to leave about 2:30, at lest and hour before we will actually leave! He has always liked to be everywhere about an hour before the doors even open, but he is getting better about it. Now we only have to get places a half hour before an event. Aging is a good thing!

Quilts for Comfot-Joe

I've been working on a quilt project the past few weeks and have obsessed much too long on each step of the process. I'm sure it was a moment of insanity when I agreed to make a quilt in the first place!

I am now putting the quilt "sandwich" together and hope to begin the machine quilting in the next day or two. It is the first time ever doing this and I am so thankful for some quilting mentors who are holding my hand while I proceed. Please, dear Lord, help me to complete it so that Joe will enjoy a comfort blankie representing several of his favorite things.

Oh, my goodness!

Oh, my goodness! I had forgotten that I started this blog almost ten months ago. I will have to get cracking here and post pictures of some of my projects and other things!

For a start, I will have to figure out how this whole blogging thing works. I hope I can find a tutorial or something to help me get started. Until then, I'll just keep on working on my projects so I have something interesting to post.