Fat Quarter Shop – Chopin – A Passionate Quilter From Texas

December 20, 2021

Oh Happy Day!!!!!

Good Monday morning! The weather has been more like winter for the week-end, overcast, rain and cold. Now we will have summer again for a week or so. Looks like a cooler New Year’s Eve. We will be playing in the sun and warm weather for awhile soon. Looking forward to it. We have had only had approximately 6 days of sunshine since we arrived home last month from the coast. I am certainly looking forward to getting my nice tan back. It looks like it might be more cloudy than sun shine at home this winter and we are in a roller coaster ride as far as cool, cold, hot, and hotter. Oh well, maybe next year.

I reached a milestone and goal last night!!!! Of the 2 UFOs left over from previous years (Dresden Heaven and A Bountiful Life) I completed A Bountiful Life was last night. Thank goodness for football! Lesson learned the hard way. Because there was not a pattern for my border I got the brainy idea to put the border on, trace the vine, and then add the leaves and flowers. I do NOT recommend doing appliqued borders this way to anyone. But all I wanted was to get this one done, and it is. It would have gone much faster if I had just done the applique on 4 sections of the border, then joined the vines, etc. But I love to learn lessons the hard way! LOL. I started this project in 2015 or 2016, did not make the 20 blocks and very glad that I did not. I call it DONE!

I finished Dresden Plates a couple of months ago, but had another brainy idea to do buttons instead of the tiny circles – Lazy and another big mistake. The quilt is completed, but now in order to reach all the blocks to add the buttons it will require me taking a couple of rows apart to reach the blocks……DUH. One thing I hope for 2022 is that I lose the stupid ideas and really get back on track on working on my new projects. We shall see!

I am adding Counted Cross Stitch to my hobby list. I ordered all the supplies and patterns that I need to start. I signed up for the Fat Quarter Shop Cross Stitch Newsletter which led me to a free pattern and their YouTube classes on cross stitching. Great site! I find that the hand work is so relaxing for me at this time. I will be taking cross stitch, knitting, and sashiko projects to work on while we sit on the our balcony and listen to the water rush to shore. No need for books!

I will also take some time while we are enjoying the peacefulness of the area to really think about and decide on how I will divide my time working on my hobbies in 2022. I really have too many things I want to accomplish and I must prioritize them in a workable schedule (not binding of course) I want to establish ”wish goals” for my projects, no more hard and fast deadlines for the quilts I need to quilt either. I have been in touch with the longarm quilter who will take care of 8 or 9 of my quilt tops and that leaves me with the smaller projects that I know I can get completed. I just need to be in the mood. I have finished all my UFOs from previous years with the exception of getting the quilt tops quilted. So even though it took me longer to reach the goal I had set, I am happy that I stuck to my goal.

In January, I think I will go back and post all that I have accomplished this year – that always makes a quilter happy!

Again, I wish all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Be happy and hang in there only 3 more years of you know who!

Hugs to all,

Nanette

Linking To: My Quilt Infatuation; Confessions of a Fabric Addict; Finished or Not Friday ; Em’s Scrap Bag; BOM’s Away; Sew Fresh Quilts; Crazy Mom Quilts; Oh Scrap; Scrap Happy Saturday; Slow Sunday Stitching Quilt Fabrication Mid Week Makers; Peacock Party; Design Wall Monday, Scrap Happy Days, Quilting Patch Linky Party To-Do-Tuesdays;PHD in 2021;

October 9, 2021

The First Day of the Rest of Our Lives!

I love the week-ends! They are so peaceful and quiet here on our 5 acres! We are so blessed to live in the country rather than the City. I am beginning to get back in shape in my walking and this morning I am not dragging after walking. It has taken a month to recoup from thinking I was getting exercise on that indoor bike, but that is OK. My stress level is really going down and I am grateful for that!

The last 2 weeks were not the most pleasant and were rather difficult and then very I was busy rewriting our Wills and I pray to God that this is the last time we have to do this. For us we no longer have any living children as they are all in Heaven with God. So it is just Clay and I. We are so blessed to have been together 25 years and that we are still here working on 26. The last 7 years have been so difficult and hard to experience, but I truly believe that now life will begin to provide us laughter and peace each day.

The week of the 27th of September was difficult with the Memorial Service for Melissa and this week was just a lot of work with the Wills. We signed up for monthly donations to the Jones Academy a Choctaw boarding school for underprivileged children. They provide support from K through 12th grade for all Native American underprivileged children.

They have 4 wonderful programs to donate to and we picked the Choctaw Pony Project. This project has 8 horses that are direct descendants from the horses that traveled on the Trail of Tears in 1830. The other one is the Evening Enrichment Programing where they use the donations to take the kids to movies, County Fairs, and support their FHA projects. All in all they provide a loving environment, opportunities to learn social skills, and receive their education. The hold the future for all Native Americans, which Clay and I call ”the forgotten ones”.

Additionally, the Choctaw Nation matches all donations which is wonderful. We did 3 memorials for our children who have passed, to the Scholarship Fund. Jones will be the benefactor from our Estate when we pass.

Yesterday seemed to be a day of laughter and fun – even while working on the 2nd review and corrections of the Wills. Things just fell into place for us and that in itself has not happened in a VERY long time. I finished the Will work, we are set up for Fort Sam Cemetary to be our final resting place, and Clay will be receiving some benefits from the Choctaw Tribe that we were unaware of. All in all, by 6:30PM I was finished forever with my work.

Today is a day to just enjoy breathing! I will be working on the borders for A Bountiful Life – Yes I know, I have been saying that for months, but it will happen today. After I get the top and bottom borders on I will begin to cut out the leaves and flowers for applique. There has not bee a lot of button sewing for the Dresden quilt but I am seeing some starting tonight!

During the last couple of weeks I have been looking at Boos and Bats quilt pattern with The Fat Quarter Shop. I have to blame Laura for getting this one going (hopefully next week). I fell in love with it and the fabrics that they used. They used Sleepy Hollow by Andover and Holiday Collections – Halloween and I was the weak one on this and purchased a lot of each piece. I was surprised that Amazon carried the fabrics along with FQS. Here is a sample of the fabrics and they are so lucious. (I could not get the photo below to reduce – sorry)

Next I purchased some great embroider fabric from WebFabrics. It is a Michael Miller Cotton Coutour fabric.

Next temptation was an email from Quiltmania showcasing Dawn Heese. Around 2014, Jaydee sent me a picture of a quilt that she had made and I fell in love with it, but never got around to it. So when I saw the picture of the quilt with Dawn and the fact that she was had the pattern in her new book, I purchased it from Quiltmania. I absolutely love those bunnies!!!! The pattern is called In the Garden!!!

Here is a picture of Jaydee’s quilt before she had sewn it together. I need to get her to send me a picture of the finished quilt. She is quite the appliquer!

So as you can see, life begins anew today and I am want to get back on the Quilt Train and away from negative thoughts even though the world around us is falling apart, we are not going to participate.

One of the things I did when all the work was finished was to call and make reservations for the Choctaw Casino for next month. There are so many places to visit in the area so this trip will be a much needed getaway! We are ready to see new places and visit old places. ME – I am ready to turn off the world with Casino noise! Since I am limited to eggs and potatoes maybe I will lose a few pounds!

Have a blessed weekend and happy quilting!

Hugs, Nanette

February 3, 2018

Life Again! A 2018 Update!

Well, I must say my 2018 New Year did not start off well at all. I decided 1 Feb would be the beginning of my New Year. I am 3 days late in starting, but I do believe now that I am 100% back among the healthy and into the ‘sameness of routine’, as Gretchen calls it!

I call it ‘Heaven’ because the last 7 months have been Hell! I started off fairly well with some goals for January, only to have back issues that were caused by the wrong tennis shoes and THEN on the day after my last post (21 Jan) I had finished my morning walk and upon stepping up on the 2nd step with my right leg I heard a lot pop and figured I had blown my knee out. That was the beginning of 2 weeks of pure pain! Long story short – I had a Bakers Cyst in the knee! Talk about depressing and hurting! Anyway, this week I had an MRI and it took about 15 seconds for the radiologists to drain the fluid and I am up and running. Well, not running, but the knee is fine, just sore from not realizing that I have probably had that stupid cyst for a while! SO, I am now back to normal and will resume my 1.5 mile walk starting Monday! I certainly hope that I can stay healthy for a L-O-N-G while! I am surprised I completed anything during January!

In my 17 Jan Aunt Bea’s post I discussed ordering a bolt of Kaufman Premium Kona Cotton from the Fat Quarter Shop in January because I had selected the wrong fabric for Aunt Bea’s Parlor (but did not realize it before I finished tracing all 20 blocks) and received it on the 21st of January. The next morning I was going to cut off 4 yards for Aunt Baa’s only to find that a dot of lovely red dye that was on the 3 roll off the bolt and it had bled through almost 4 yards. I returned the bad bolt and ordered 2 more bolts (they were checked by the store before shipping this time) This fabric is so nice and so wonderful for embroidery projects. If you purchase a bolt of any one fabric from them you will receive a 20% off the price – I thought $6.78 was a great deal!

So now here I am on 3 Feb and I have spent the morning on cleaning out emails and catching up on Blogging. The only day for sewing this week was Friday! I am going to be another few days before complete organization of 2018 projects will be completed, but so far things really have gone great for me since 1 Feb. I have a great new house cleaner to help me twice a month and she is a very good worker! I have all body parts working again and I have no other problems with my knees – they are in good shape! Clay ordered his birthday present Thursday evening and I ordered my Valentine present – 2 more new iPad’s! They will arrive today – Apple products are great! For Christmas I purchased the iPad Pro 12.5″ and love it and now I will have one for the Studio. What more could we want?

Have a great week-end, enjoy the Super Bowl (hoping the Eagles can beat the Patriots) and do some quilting!

January 17, 2018

Poor Aunt Bea’s Parlor and My Little Quilting Fairy

Welcome to the deep freeze in South Texas. I am enjoying this winter and so glad to be retired!!!! So far the month is going fairly well (as soon as I quit coughing) and the only unforeseen requirement that came up was a phone call from my house cleaner who quit for a full-time job! Yesterday Clay and I took care of this week’s work. Think I am going to continue to find a replacement! Wish I were 55 again!!!

My goal has been for the last two months was to have all of Aunt Bea’s Parlor blocks traced and ready to work on this month! Well, I have met that goal yesterday only to have to start over because AGAIN because I did not listen to that stupid Little Quilt Fairy in my head who was telling me that I had selected (again) the wrong background fabric for this quilt. So after finishing the tracing all 20 blocks yesterday I looked at them and had a sinking feeling that I should have listed to the Little Quilt Fairy! In order to prove her correct and me wrong, I took a piece of the background fabric, put the needle and thread test to it and knew immediately that I, AGAIN, have screwed up!

This is why I am NOT starting anything of importance until 1 February 2018! This is when my quilting New Year will begin. I attribute the last 7 months as a learning curve for anyone over the age of 70! Do not have hand surgery EVER if you are a quilter over that age, and DO NOT get the H3N2 Flu! You will become one extremely frustrated quilter!!!

Now to the fix. As I tracing each pattern, I realized that the blocks at 5″ were not going to be fun to embroidery and this project may die on the vine. So I spent the time to call Canon to seek advice on how to enlarge pattern through the software. (I was advised that the one I purchased last year is a cheap model – no wonder I miss my Canon 480 and 490 printers). The young man was very helpful and I learned a lot from him in a short time! Great support.

This afternoon I have scanned in all the blocks, resized them, printed out paper copies, and copies onto my pre-cut freezer paper. YEA! Ready to go, but wait which background fabric will I use (I asked myself) I had already purchased 7 yards of the “wrong” background fabric (it will be used in other projects) specifically for this project and I do not have a lot of plain ‘white’ background fabric – plenty of muslin – but I did not want to use that! So it was between ordering white Bella Solid, Kona Cotton White, or Kona Premium Cotton White. At this point in life I did not feel like taking the time to shop for the best price for the fabric so I called the Fat Quarter Shop and ordered a bolt of it! In the future, if I need a good plain white for background for my embroidery projects I have plenty of Beige, White, and Snow of Kona Cotton fabric! Heck, I am becoming a regular fabric store! LOL.

Tomorrow I will take the time to work on my 2018 projects and UFO’s from 2017 and try to become more organized (if my body will cooperate). I hope my brain will be up to all that hard work! I have joined a few QALs – Squared Away BOM, a new one Stars Over Baltimore , to assist me in attaining some of my goals for 2018 I am using One Monthly Goal and 6 & 6 in 2018, and the APQ 2018 UFO Challenge! Good luck to me huh?

I am still going to try to meet January goals of ‘looking’ at Mountmellick (do not trust myself to start this one yet), finishing the 42 Mini Dresden’s, complete tracing for Aunt Bea’s Parlor, and Regatta. I have a neat idea going for the Regatta, but the way things are going it may not turn out but worth the time to play with it, after all I have 2 full weeks – 14 days to finish SOMETHING!

Have a wonderful evening and enjoy stitching!

September 9, 2016

Rowdy Flats Library Quilt and Betsy’s Basket Fabric

Happy Friday! We are still enjoying the lovely hot and humid weather. But no complaints because we have received 30″ of rain on our hill this summer and the majority of it was in August. Our planned trip to Choctaw Casino has now been delayed until October! Life’s unforeseen requirements have gotten in the way – darn it! But there is always a reason for everything good or bad, so we just go on. At least it will be cooler in October (fingers crossed).

Last week I was searching for toille fabric for the Rowdy Flat Library Quilt. I had found a very nice piece on Etsy, but waited too long to make the purchase. One of the Blogs I follow was talking about some fabric from Robert Kaufman called Betsy’s Basket by Darlene Zimmerman.

This fabric has a very nice toille in red, navy, and blue denim. I found a fat quarter bundle on Etsy, some of the darker blues at the Fat Quarter Shop, and the shirting and red toille at Hancocks of Paducah. Thought you might like to see the nice colorways. I think that with this stash and what I already have on hand it will make a nice Rowdy Flats Quilt. This will be a 2017 project.

It has been a “no quilting/sewing” week for me. It is going to be a “slow quilting/sewing” week-end. Have a great week-end and happy stitching and quilting!

November 22, 2015

Farmer’s Wife 1930 Sampler and Me

In October I posted the story about me doing a “dum-dum” by not realizing that there was a new Farmer’s Wife Book! I joined a Quilt a Long with Marti Michell, Fat Quarter Shop and Gnomeangel Blogger for the Farmers Wife 1930’s Sampler (not the 1920). Marti provides conversion charts for the blocks that will be rotary cut and Fat Quarter shop provides a kit (fabrics). Since then, I have changed to Very Kerry Berry Farmers Wife Quilt Along. Kerry is starting from Block One in the Book rather than skipping around. I am providing both sites in case someone would like to start this project. Both provide 2 blocks each week. Of course by now I am behind 20 blocks, and by tomorrow 22! (LOL). The blocks provide challenges to all quilters. I am going to do a mix – rotary cutting and paper-piecing (see how long this lasts).

Today I am determined to start this project. Any bets? I wanted to show my fabric selection for this project. I purchased some fat eighths from Westwood Acres Fabric and all the fat quarters from Calico Annies. The background fabrics are Bella Solids from Hancocks of Paducah . I am not going to spend the time in trying to wash them so keep your fingers crossed – it is the first time I will make a quilt without washing the fabric.

1930 Fabric Background Fabrics — Background Fabric

I would like to end this short Blog wishing each and all a wonderful Thanksgiving Day. Please keep the families of the victims of France and Russia Terrorist attacks in your prayers. We all have many things to be thankful for but the main one is our Freedom. My prayer is that our great Nation CAN and WILL somehow remain safe from further attacks until 20 January 2017!!! HAPPY THANKSGIVING DAY TO ALL.