Pulling Fabric and Biscuit Baking at 3:30 a.m.

Our niece is expecting baby #2 in January. Bethany's always been such a neat kid and she is the first grandchild. She spent lots of time with us on the ranch during holidays and summers - treasured memories!  Alas, we don't get to see her much anymore, but when she had her first child, I made this quilt for him:

                                   

Bethany is a teacher now and she loves to fish so this was definitely the perfect quilt for her baby boy. Now he is going to be a big brother to a little sister and this is the quilt pattern I have chosen for her:

Bethany was very involved in 4-H and her Mama taught her how to sew. She sewed all sorts of clothes while she was growing up so I thought this little clothesline filled with cute little girl outfits would be just the ticket and now I am in the process of pulling fabrics. I love this part and end up creating quite a mess before I settle on my final selection.

Maybe this:

Perhaps this:

It's a start:

I'm trying to shop at home. My bins of fabric hold their breath when I open their lids and wonder who will I choose?

Oh, boy! I think I've been spending too much time inhaling bleach fumes. I've been cooking for a crew all week and if my fabric is beginning to talk, that's probably the first sign that I need a break. :)

The second sign? Well this morning I stumbled into the kitchen at 3:30 and starting mixing up a batch of biscuits. Gosh they looked nice as I popped them into the oven. Time ticked away and said biscuits wouldn't brown. And they were flat. Who messes up biscuits? -Raises hand- Then it hit me. I had added cornstarch instead of the called for baking powder. Seriously? Yup. Yes, I know. The cornstarch container looks nothing like the baking powder container.

                           

That's what happens when a 50 yr old has too many 3:30 am wake up calls in a row. And I've still got 2 more days this week.

I texted my friend M, who was also up at that ungodly hour slaving away over a hot stove, feeding a cowboy crew in Texas. I knew she would commiserate with my situation. She's so tired and has cooked so much that she said she even cooked in her dreams. We're a sad lot us two, but I love and miss her and we are planning an escape in the not too distant future. And what do you wanna bet we'll get together and end up talking about food!

Machine Embroidered Snowflakes

Well, my goodness! Y'all sure do know how to make a gal feel good! Thank y'all so much for taking the time to stop by and leave such lovely comments on my blog hop post. I begged off from ranch duty on Saturday  in order to reply back to y'all. :) If you haven't heard back from me, you came across as a non-reply blogger.

Many of you commented about how much I got done. It just looks like a lot when its all shared in one post. Truth is, these photos are from last year and the year before. I participated in a project called Christmas Through the Year hosted by Darlene, a dear lady. The idea was to make a Christmas gift each month. Brilliant! It was so nice to give so many hand made gifts to friends and family. I didn't do that this year, but you can bet I'll be doing it from now on!

So there you go. I am not super woman - FAR from it! :) If you saw my windows right now, I promise you would be fussing at me - they are scandalous.

I had some requests for more information on how to make these embroidered snowflake so I'm sharing more details on those today. These are the best kind of snowflakes - not only are they pretty - they don't need shoveling!

As for you reindeer lovers, I'm working on a tutorial and hope to have it ready to go on Friday, the day after Thanksgiving.

I bought the snowflake pattern at Embroidery Library a few years back. They often run great sales and I have never had a problem with any of their designs. They stitch out so nicely. Here's the link.

There are 6 different snowflakes in this set:

                                           

I use Fabric-solvy to stitch on:

I can get 36 snowflakes out of this 9 yd roll. Once your design is stitched, you simply place your snowflake in a warm bowl of water and the foundation dissolves, leaving a pretty embroidered snowflake.

These designs take a bit to stitch out. It varies with each design, but it averages just over 40 minutes per flake.

I don't have to baby sit it much. I just go about doing other things while keeping one ear open and peeking in every now and then. My machine was stitching up a storm...a snowstorm. :)

Until I ran out of thread:

I've only made them in white, but you could of course use any color. I wouldn't recommend using a metallic thread because it may tend to break and snarl with this much stitching, but you could spray some glitter on them for a sparky effect if you wish.

I am charmed by these little snowflakes. That is, if one can be charmed by a snowflake. :)

If you stop in on Friday, I'll have that reindeer tutorial. They're kind of charming too! :)

As I Escaped Town, I Shopped

Once I left my Mom's on Thursday morning, I pointed that truck west and let the diesel scream. However, I hit the brakes when I stumbled upon a cross stitch store. Shoot, I haven't been in one of those for 20 years. No pictures since I didn't have a camera with me. I know. Bad blogger. Still, very cute store called Stitches From the Heart.

A while back, Carol over at The Polka Dot Chicken, mentioned she was going to stitch the Santa's Village from Needleworks and I had to stitch along (well, Carol didn't TELL me I had to...I just HAD to) so I ordered the pattern.

  Each month you get a house to add to Santa's village and they're just tiny little things with all kinds of cute details. The second one should be here shortly - they had already stitched it. (Shhh...I was told the third one is the Post Office.)

However, I didn't have anything to stitch it on, and since Carol was not here to hold my hand, I figured I would take advantage of the next best thing. I have been wanting to try linen so I picked up a piece of that...ouch! Expensive stuff! Good thing I had some birthday money in my pocket! One minute it was there, and the next minute, it was gone. Funny how that happens.

The manager was there and happened to be stitching the Santa Village too. As soon as I mentioned "Santa Village", their eyes lit up and the manager was so sweet to show me hers and visit with me about it. Looking at the linen, I had a conversation with my eyes. When they first saw the linen, my mouth said, "Oh! That is lovely! I'll take it!"
But my eyes replied, "Hold on there girlie! Just how do you expect me to SEE those tiny squares? Did you not notice that they are MINUSCULE and that WE are OLD?"

Not to worry. The kind lady magically presented me with this handy dandy magnifying glass. DH laughed when I called it my magic microscope. All set!

I was good. I only picked up one more pattern and it is a small one, but I can't wait to get started on it. When you see it, you will say, "Well, OF COURSE she would get THAT!"

See why it had to come home with me? I think I'll have to switch a couple of things on the shadows though. I don't like the way you can't see the details of the letters on the T, A, and S.

And this is a piece I have on the back burner. I've had it for a couple of years, but haven't decided what to stitch it on. I bought it the same time I bought my Little Bit Kit, but I needed a break after stitching that little guy, which by the way, was a HUGE hit with my in-laws. White is not my favorite thing to stitch on, but that may be the best option with this or the clouds would be rustic-y if I used something with a tea stained look, and I think the white will make the colors pop on this piece. I'll be saving my pennies for more linen.

The best thing about this windmill is that we don't have to pull it!

Wrapping Up Christmas

I don't know what's come over me. I've mentioned before that I'm a firm believer in no Christmas anything until the day after Thanksgiving. I LOVE Christmas music, but don't even THINK about playing it until the day AFTER Thanksgiving. And here I am promoting Christmas each and every month of the year! I'm going to blame it on Darlene and Cheryl and their Christmas Through the Year program. Yes, I am very thankful that I have a box overflowing with handmade Christmas gifts, but I am still struggling to come to terms with this new train of thought. However, I think they have created a monster.

Last week I started stitching up a couple of the Lined Drawstring Bags that Jeni designed last year. Click HERE for her tutorial. I bought her pattern which includes a variety of sizes as well as instructions for figuring how to stitch up any custom size. I highly recommend it! I love, love, love these little bags! One:

turned into 2 

and then 2 turned into 4

  and before I knew it, 10 little bags were perched upon the table.

And I wouldn't be a bit surprised if they continue to multiply.

The Dirt Road Gypsy Quilt

The Dirt Road Gypsy Quilt is home! On Tuesday I picked it up from Jackie and with the Blogger Quilt Festival beginning on Friday, I set about getting the binding on:

Stitching to the front:

And then I was eager to hand stitch the back down. I love binding quilts and I these little red binding clips are my new favorite notion:

Its been a busy week, but yesterday DH left for an Elk hunt and our girl came home for the weekend, dragging along a friend and two kitties. In order to get this quilt bound in time for the Quilt Festival, I had to work on it while she was home. This was my solution:

I just tossed a big flannel sheet over the top of the quilt. Problem solved! I'm sneaky like that. :)
The girls went to town last night to conquer the corn maze and I worked on the binding all night long until they came home.
I had help:

My binding buddies:

I'm cutting it close for the festival, but who needs sleep? I'm multitasking, as this will be my Christmas Through the Year project for October as well.

  Darlene and Cheryl have been wonderful throughout the year and because of them, my hand made gifts are just about finished! Thanks ladies!

If you're popping in from the Festival - welcome to the end of the dirt road where quilting and ranching are mixed in with a bit of homemade goodness from the oven.

Our college girl chose this pattern that was originally published in the  February 2012 issue of American Patchwork and Quilting. It is a pattern by Bill Kerr and Weeks Ringle. I think I wore out my iron pressing all of those seams open, and I was never so happy to unplug that thing when the last seam was pressed. However, now that I see the finished quilt, it makes me want to make another one...or perhaps I ought to just keep this one! No worries kiddo! It was just a fleeting thought although don't even try to con me into giving this to you early! Under the Christmas Tree it goes!

I love the stained glass look and am smitten with the backing. In an earlier post, I came to the conclusion that I was channeling my inner Jimmy Buffet when I crossed paths with this fabric. And I suppose Jimmy Buffet is a Gypsy in an island kind of way. I sure did listen to a lot of his music while I worked on these blocks. This became known as the gypsy quilt when I began to look at all of the fabrics I had gathered together. There are bits of Terrain, Curio, Gypsy Caravan, Organic Soul, London, Grand Bazaar, Road to Marrakesh, Rhapsodia, Mimosa, Summersault and who knows what else! Its an eclectic mix and some of the names of the fabric lines just made me think of exotic and far away lands and thus gypsy came to mind. College is  a journey so I'm thinking it is an appropriate name, but no matter where she roams, she will always be a dirt road girl. 

Quilt Measurements: 100 x 100
Special Techniques: None, just lots of pressing open of seams. :)
Quilted By: Jackie Williams using this great swirly design called Happy Days

Best Category: Bed Quilt - Scrap Quilt 
So here's my contribution for this year's festival:

Thank you so much for stopping in! I know that Amy is hosting another grand quilt festival and that there are umpteen blogs to visit and oodles of inspiration. Thank you Amy! I'm fairly certain we will all be adding to our lists of 'must make' quilts! 

HST Progess Report

I'm having so much fun watching this project come together and stitching with Staci! I love how blogging has allowed me to meet so many amazingly, talented people and where else can you stitch with someone who lives in another state? 

Her 16 patches are gorgeous and once we both  stitched those little squares  into place, we both tackled the stack of hst's...the never ending stack of hst's and after what seemed like forever, they were conquered:

I think we wore ourselves out over these little rascals. Hop over and take a peek at  Staci's progress. She's making me covet that Vintage Modern Line. Next up: corner units although don't expect them tomorrow! That thing called 'life' is going to keep me from whipping those out for just a bit, but I need a break from the iron and rotary cutter. After all of that pressing and trimming, I was feeling my age. :)

So, how many of y'all are itching to make some Scrap Star Jar's along with us? Amber has made it easy for us. She has a tutorial for this super fun block here. 

Edit: I neglected to fess up to the fact that I had to press these twice. I was still partially sleeping when I wrote this this morning. Reading Staci's post, I was reminded. I must have really, really wanted to forget that part! See why I should never stitch alone? I need constant supervision! So thanks Staci! And she thinks SHE'S confused. I think she needs a Super Hero cape!

Caution: Reindeer Ahead (Blog Hop Giveaway!)

This giveaway is now closed. Thanks so much!




Yay! It's time! It's time! I'm so excited!  There are an awful lot of fun bloggers showing up at this party on the 10th and every one of them is giving something away. There will be over 250 blogs to hop to so get your hoppin' boots on! The first day this Blog Hop Giveaway was announced, I jumped in and signed up. Then I began to contemplate. Hmmm...
What should I give away? So I sorted...and stitched...and strung...and pulled...and dug...and glued. I wanted to give away all sorts of things. Then I needed a bigger box. LOL.

So, I settled on this:

I hope you'll like him. I've been making these for 14 years now. At least a dozen grace my buffet for giving every year.



I keep thinking I've given these to everyone I know and then each year, new people pop up. :)
Yikes! That's a lot of reindeer... and a lot of reindeer droppings.

 Yep. This little guy is not house trained, but I hope you'll welcome him anyway. LOL. He will arrive in this little gift bag which is the brainchild of Jeni .

accompanied by this little snowman who is covering up a giant Hershey Bar:

I'm thinking the fact that a candy bar will be hanging around here for an entire week without being devoured is some kind of record. He's the creation of Laurie Furnell and I am smitten with them.

Do I have any takers?
No rules. You don't even have to be a follower although I would love it if you were. Just leave me a comment and tell me what is your favorite Christmas baked good? If you haven't blogged about it, maybe you will and then I could hop over and add a scrumptious new recipe to my cookbook. :)

 My list is long and I would be hard pressed to choose just one, but the Birthday Cake for Jesus and the gingerbread cowboys probably get top billing.

 One year we moved between Christmas and New Years. We never have movers although one time we splurged and rented a Uhaul. Horse trailers are generally our mode of transporation. (Insert Beverly Hillbillies here.)  It was 5 hours one way and we made the trip 4 times that week with 20" of snow on the ground. We moved into a house where the heat didn't work and the water heater left us 3 minutes of hot water, but that's a rabbit trail for another day.

Needless to say, it didn't leave much time for baking and we were sad. My inlaws met us when we drove through town and my dear MIL loaded us up with Christmas candy and cookies. It was 3 pm, we hadn't eaten, and we proceeded to make ourselves sick in the parking lot of Paul's Vet Supply while the men visited and we raided the Cool Whip containers. LOL.

This giveaway will remain open until Saturday, December 17th and I'll announce the winner on the 18th.

Thanks so much for dropping by and y'all come back now, ya' hear?

Kicking off December or "I Can't Share That Yet"

December 1st brought us our first storm of the season and snow is forecasted for tomorrow. That's good news after the scorching, dry year we had. Moisture of any kind will be welcomed with open arms and the cold air will be greeted with a cup of hot cider and a cozy quilt. Hoping the wind that they are forecasting does not materialize though. 60-70 mph means the dirt will be flying. Oops! Too late!

More good news. The 1st round of the National Finals Rodeo is on tonight. 10 days of good horses and great competition. I'm ready. This year's NFR will find me stitching the binding on Christmas presents that you won't get to see until after they are delivered, but I spent part of the morning pulling fabrics for one of them:

I'm stitching up something  extra to send to my seam-ripper-giveaway-winner, but I can't show you that yet either.

I made some 4-patches and got them in the mail for Regina's 4Patches4Hope project:



I'm working on another giveaway too. They are so much fun! Can't share that yet either, but I'll announce it on the 10th and I'm joining in on the fun over here:

I want to share something , but everything's under lock and key this time of year.

My Scrappy Western Many Trips blocks are on the back burner until after the first of the year. Half of them are complete. I'm hoping it'll be my first finish of the new year.

I'm eager to get back to my abandoned Granny Squares quilt too so today I did dust that off and sew up a few blocks just so it wouldn't think I had forgotten it. I can share that!

My ongoing-longterm-hexagon project is...ongoing:

I opened the box the other day to add a few more stitched pieces and was surprised to see how many there were:

I'm planning on making Bonnie Hunter's Hexagon Medallion Quilt in blues and browns and I laid some out a while ago just to get a feel for it:

I hope I still like blue and brown when I finish. Right now it makes me grin.

I hope that y'all are enjoying the "Most Wonderful Time of the Year" and finding peace amidst the hustle and bustle. I know that your lists are long and that time is short, but I hope that you will make time to "Be still and know." It's so easy to get caught up in the busy-ness of this world and then we miss the most amazing everyday moments that God truly wants to bless us with. I'll be repeating that daily as a reminder to myself.

Gotta run. The NFR is calling!

Sew Not Ready for Christmas

 I like Christmas as much as the next person, in fact, I love it, but I'm in the 'no Christmas until the day after Thanksgiving' camp. It just makes me shake my head to see Christmas trees and ornaments hanging in store aisles in August. The first week in November I do not want to be inundated with Christmas Carols when I walk into the grocery store. Makes me sound like a grinch, but really, I'm not. The day after Thanksgiving I am decking the halls and belting out Amy Grant's "Christmas Can't be Very Far Away" while I'm slinging omelettes. But don't jingle those sleigh bells in my face until I have put away the leftover turkey.

However, I'm a crafter. I sew and quilt and like to make things as gifts and waiting until after Thanksgiving to start making said gifts just doesn't cut it. I thought I had it handled, but y'all keep posting cute projects and tutorials and making me add things to my list. I've already repeated the 'Next year I'm going to start on Christmas gifts in January'...multiple times. You know y'all have said that too. I'm trying to avoid the stress of getting it all done. I suppose its unavoidable. Some people thrive on it. I am not one of those people. I'm a list maker and it works pretty well for me...until I start adding things to the list...in November.

So I've been furiously making pot holders...and table runners...and gift bags...and gathering supplies for a herd of reindeer. And the only thing I can share with you are these 2 drawstring bags I made for the 2 darling children I made the pillowcases for in my last post because they are not for Christmas:

Aren't they the cutest things?! The little boy likes Curious George and his sister loves dance class. I couldn't resist these monkeys:


The dancer fabric has glitter on it and it just made me smile and think of sweet Katy. It wouldn't make a very good pillowcase, but it makes the perfect gift bag! The first photo is a better representation of the color. Don't know why this one is so wonky:

Jeni posted this wonderful tutorial on her blog, Color Order, and I had to make a couple. Then I REALLY fell in love with them after making them and went a little wild. I cut out 8 more and started sewing them. Thank you for sharing this Jeni! I'm hooking up with the Sew Darn Crafty Party over at Sew Many Ways. So hop on over there this week and see what everyone else is up to, but don't blame me if you end up adding something else to your list! ;)

So for the time being, my Western Many Trips quilt and my wool quilt are sitting on the back burner while I'm sewing up a storm in an attempt to get ready for Christmas...before Thanksgiving.

Sneaking off to Sew When I Should Be in the Kitchen

I've been cooking for a crew these past few weeks. That means that the majority of my time is spent elbow deep in bread dough, slinging hash, scrubbing dishes in a sinkful of bleachy bubbles,and baking umpteen desserts.  Not to mention filling the sugar bowl before every meal because I don't care how sweet I make the tea for the sweet tea drinkers on the crew, they will empty my sugar bowl at every meal. I spent a boatload of money on groceries:


And this is only a portion of it. I have 25# of flour and all the meat in the deep freeze and the most of the produce is already put up.



I also put up a bushel of green chile:



I have to run back and get another bushel to last us through the year. 6 of these are already gone.

However, in order to keep my sanity during my kitchen incarceration, I sneak away once in a while and indulge in something sewing related. A minute here while the bread rises and 5 minutes there before I have to fill the tea glasses. I feel a tad guilty, but all is well as long as I don't let the rolls burn.

Last week I made this pillowcase for our son.

I just found out that he may get in trouble for it. Apparently they are only allowed to have issued white pillowcases. Oops. I told him that when he opened the box to say, "Sir, yes, Sir. My Mama made this for you, Sir. "  LOL.

I also made this monkey one for our daughter. I KNOW she won't get in trouble. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if she phoned and asked me to make pillowcases for the dorm. LOL.

I have been cutting strips for my newest project. Lots of strips.

What's that? Don't I have unfinished projects languishing in various forms of completion that are desperately waiting to be finished?  Hush now. I know not of what you speak and  I'll just pretend you didn't say that.