Friday Finish!

 Christmas is coming and as usual, faster than we would like. I have done my shopping and the house is decorated and packages and cards are all done. Now I can relax a bit and plan our meal, we eat at our house on Christmas Eve with the kids and give them some presents, then on Christmas we go to their house and I save some presents to open then. 

I am working on finishing up my cheater quilt and after going through some of my old books, I decided to make a small piece from a Whimsical quilts book. It was fun to do and I still have plenty of wool to use up, so I grabbed most of it from my scrap drawers. I added the snowflake buttons for fun.

Last week after shopping, we drove around the beach areas. We saw a boat coming in.

And one going out. 

And as we drove by the town beach in Narragansett, we just missed seeing Santa, as he rode by.

With Bill working days, he gets up early and falls asleep early, so hard to get out at night to see the lights around town. He does have a long week off for the holiday, so hopefully we can get out more to see them before they are gone.

I hope you are all enjoying the holidays and can enjoy some time for yourself and Christmas around your area.

Friday Finish!

This week I wanted to make another fall piece and I got the idea of using my star pattern from Buttermilk Basin with another of her appliqués from another pattern. I reduced the size of the pattern to fit the star. The fabric for the star was some old cotton that I over dyed with grungy browns but it doesn't show up too well in the photo.

It is a fun piece to make and you can see more of Stacy's designs at Buttermilk Basin, she has patterns with Christmas and fall, as well as, wool appliqué and stitchery types on stars. She also has a new free pattern on her Blog.

The American Made Contest is still running and I would love to see Stacy raise her votes. I hope everyone has a nice weekend. Bill has the long weekend off, so we will be doing some exploring, so we shall see where we end up;)

This was a fun piece to make, and great for a shelf sitter. The star looks light but it is actually a grungy brown.

Wool Flower Mat!

First a reminder, the giveaway for a Shabby Apple dress is still going on until friday, so if you have not commented, visit the blog post and leave a comment there. If the dress is not for you, maybe something you could give to your daughter or a friend?

I started a new piece, a wool mat for my table, or maybe a gift, haven't decided yet. It was raining all afternoon so I had to take a flash photo, bad idea with wool pieces, but you can see my progress so far. I am not following the pattern, I could not figure it out and i know my pieces are off, but it is a nice project to work on while I watch tv and relax. I do the basic stitching first, then I will add the stems and details later.

We had a lot of rain and then a lot of humidity, perfect for my flowers outside. I grew Cosmos to attract butterflies. This is the first time I have grown flowers from seeds and they have grown so tall and beautifully.

It was so hot this weekend, that I got sick from paddling, too much hot sun. We paddled to the beach and I jumped in the water. Most of the time I sat in the water or under the umbrella and waited for a breeze to kick in so I could paddle back without killing myself. This weekend will be nice and cooler, so hopefully I can get  some good paddling in.

Winners and Gourdy's Gang!

Today I finished my Gourdy's Gang. I won the pattern from Brenda of Pumpkin Patch Primitives. I won it a few years ago and I finally made it and so glad I did. It was fun and it made me smile as I worked on it.

Of course I made a few changes, such as the top pumpkin was a one eyed pumpkin and I gave it two. I also used yarn for his stem, by making a twisted cord with Boucle yarn and then stitching it onto the piece. I used a loose weave wool for the background and that enabled me to use pearl cotton for the webs and yarn for the spiders legs. When I finished the piece, I used a heavy weight fusible, then put the backing on and fused it all together, then cut both peices at once to get even edges. The fusible made it easier to cut the back with the front and held the pieces together while I did the blanket stitch on the edge. The edge was done with an over dyed pearl cotton.

I lightened the photo, so you could see the details better, so the colors are a bit brighter than they actually are.

And now onto the winners! The first right answer came from Fiona, who said it was Bill and she was right. We both laughed at your answers, some were funny when you think about it, calling Bill a whale, especially, lol. For the second winner, #20 who was Dawn. Congratulations ladies, pick any epattern that you would like and email me with your choice. For those who asked and wondered about my mermaid dog, I did not make that, it was sitting like that on the beach, well maybe not with glasses;)