How was my Thanksgiving?

 Thanksgiving, doesn’t that already seem like so long ago? Well, let me tell you about my Thanksgiving, mostly so I don’t forget that this was the year that the oven went wacko. I was so stressed out last year, I guess, with my job that I don’t even remember last Thanksgiving (2008). My parents, Grma and Great Aunt were here and apparently we had a very nice day…I thought that was 3 or 4 years ago. Then I found the pictures, yup they were here, last year.

So Thanksgiving 2009, I’m laid off, so no work related stress to deal with and the turkey is doing it’s happy little turkey thing in my oven. It’s been in there going on 5 hours and I’m thinking it should have only been 4/12 hours (barely a 15 pound bird), finally the little popper on his butt ‘pops’. But, I know not to trust these. So I also check him with my own thermometer—twice. He's done. Fast forward about ½ an hour, Meghan has the gravy about done and everything is on the table. We start the carving and my new electric knife I got at Kohl’s and blogged about a couple weeks ago…was worth the money. Unfortunately, it didn’t help the undone thighs. Oh the top of the turkey was done, but the bottom, no. So what did I do? Well, after sharing a 2 second look with my husband (OH MY GOD THE STUPID #@#$%# TURKEY ISN’T DONE!!!) I calmly advised my family of the situation. My dad’s aunt said, “Well, we’re not going to starve, just put it back in the oven for a while.” - Oh the wisdom. So, I put it in another roasting pan and cranked the heat up. We put everything in the fridge that needed to. I did some dishes, discussed at length with my mom, grandma and aunt what could have possibly been the problem and about an hour later we ate. It was done. It was delicious. (Friday I went out and bought an oven thermometer, and that's the problem it's off, way off. Paul will fix or I'll be getting a new oven for Christmas.)
Now, if that isn’t enough of a story to make this the thanksgiving that we all remember…**November 2014****: “Remember the time mom’s oven sensor/thermometer went bad and the turkey wasn’t done….hahahahha”. Well we can also say, “OH yeah! That was the same year, Grand pap (my dad) went peasant hunting in the morning and when he got home, Jake bit him, and it got infected and after we finally ate, he had to go to the ER and have intravenous antibiotics because it started hurting so bad…..” I am not making this up.

(Jake is my dad’s 12+ year old English setter. He’s never bit anyone, he doesn’t even growl. They’re just not that kind of dog breed. We have a Gordon setter, same deal.) So we don’t know what triggered it. He’s an old dog and they don’t go hunting very often anymore. Did he just want to stay in his dog crate nice and warm in the back of my dad’s truck? Is he losing his hearing, eye sight, getting doggy dementia and my dad startled him? He was fine and acted like nothing happened 10 seconds later. My dad called him out of his crate and said he jumped right out and came over to my dad wagging his tail. He’s been fine since. Sadly, my dad had to go back to hospital for a 2nd round of intravenous antibiotics on Saturday, (they wanted to admit him at that point but he refused-yup, if the infection doesn’t do him in, my mom might.) He went back in on Sunday and it's finally responding to the antibiotics and the blood work came back that his blood isn’t infected so that was a relief.  But he had to stay home from hunting camp. It’s the 1st day of buck here in PA and “the men in the family” go to the mountains. As I’ve said before, all the deer are here in suburbia, but there’s no messing with tradition.
Is it ok if I wish for a really quiet Christmas, like “shhhh...Nobody talk, breathe, move.” Let’s just watch the tree, wrapped in a warm quilt, or maybe bubble wrap- it’s safer. Is everybody up to date on their booster shots, flu shots? Rabies vaccination anyone?

Monday already?

Well, there goes November!  I have nothing new on my design wall, but yesterday I finally had time to start on the Spring Journey Sampler quilt that I loaded on HQ a week ago! 

I'm doing a feather design in the outer border, so I got the top border done and then started working my way down the quilt, doing SID just to stabilize layers.  Since this quilt is set on point and the setting triangles are so large, I pre-marked the feather spines in the triangles. I am stitching them and doing the SID around each block and sashing first and then I will go back and finish the feathers and quilt.....I don't know what yet in each block...it will tell me what to do when I get there I think (hope-*wink*).  But as I was finishing stitching the spine in one of the triangles I was just "itching" to do some feathers....just to see how it would look.  It's not the best picture, should have turned lights on the machine off, maybe.  It probably wouldn't have helped; I'm a crappy photographer! 

For your viewing pleasure...

...and the continuation of my documenting my quilts.
 This little wall quilt I made in 1995, it's hand appliqued and the bow was attached after the quilt was finished. This is the 2nd one I made.  The first one my SIL made such a fuss over-I was compelled to give it to her.  This is one of those quilts that never seem to lose its appeal for me. I just love seeing it every fall.

This is an oven mitt.  I never use is, just hang it on a cabinet knob every October and put it away when the Christmas decorations come out. It was a project from a LQS in 2003, called The 3rd Saturday of the Month Club. You paid a small fee in January and got your first little project. Then as long as you brought the completed project into the shop the 3rd Saturday of the following month; you got the next month's pattern free.

This is the quilt on my bed right now, made in 1997.  It's all flannels even the backing.  The pillow panel at top is cottons.  I machine appliqued those using a loose zig zag stitch. This was before I had a machine with the blanket-stitch. There was no way I was doing all that by hand. It's one of the few quilts I've tied. 

This is a lap size 'raggy seams' quilt I made in 2004.  The front is all homespun's, the back is mostly denim from the kids' worn out jeans. It was amazing how little usable denim is left from kids jeans after removing seams and holes in the knees etc.  I had to go to a thrift store and buy some large men's jeans to make up the difference.

This is a Little Quilt (literally and patterningly as well). It is only 13" x 17". I hand quilted it.

I just love this little guy too. As I've started to document these quilts.  I'm finding some of them haven't been labeled... GASP!  Bad, Diane, bad. 

And in this process am seeing first hand why it's so important.  --It's a pain in the butt to go through 4" ringbinders of patterns and notes to try to find the date that I took a class (that quilts further down) or in this little quilts case looking back through my quilting photo albums.

Much easier to just flip the bottom up and read the label. 

This is another Little Quilt, scrappy 9-patch made January 2004.

This little winter door hanger I made in 2005.  The pattern was in Amer. Patchwork Mag. in 2004. 

 He hangs on our door almost all year.  Annie will use her nose to ring his little jingle bell to get our attention when she needs to go out.  Our 1st westie, Haley, taught her that, but Haley rang the sleigh bells  on the hinge side of the front door.  It, too, was a holiday decoration, that stays up year-round.  

Annie will hit the big ones first, but if we don't jump up within 30-40 seconds.....she'll start flipping the snowman.  Sometimes we just watch her do it, cracks us up. 

And finally, my no diamonds Lone Star. It's made with HST.  I think 5/2005 is when I made it.  It doesn't have a label, and the class notes just have 4/29 on the top of one of the pages (in my hand writing).  I don't remember and didn't have a picture of it in my photo album.  Wow, I really dropped the  archival ball on this one.

The "design wall"

This is my design wall the little maple leaf quilt is ready for quilting, I will probably just do it quick on my 4.0, I've never tried the built-in stipple stitch. I got this little kit on my quilt bus tour and am glad another project I bought is getting done. 

The 3 embroidery blocks are up there only because I found them in a drawer a few weeks ago.  I made a bunch of these while oldest son was in Iraq, I think the 1st time.  I had more of them (all with different little sayings) but used them for gifts, pillows etc.  These are what's left.  They'll probably get taken down and put away again, until inspiration strikes.  

The other 2 blocks are orphans. 

On Saturday I finally loaded my Spring Journey sampler quilt on HQ but have yet to start. I figure I can work on it a little, while waiting for the dang turkey to thaw. haha.   I've marked the huge setting triangles with the spines for feathers and will probably quilt the blocks and sashing "as the quilting spirit" moves me as I go along.  I know once I start on this, I won't want to stop.  (Its an illness, I know.....)

It's finished!

And I'm really happy with it.  I did an all over micro stipple but in the center block area I quilted a feathered circle....really was a waste of time 'cuz you really can't see the feathers.  But I like to do feathers and micro stippling is sorta boring...so it's all good! 

  Oh, and you may be wondering "diane, why would you make a turkey blue?" Well..... I made this to go on my table for

Thanksgiving, the new tablecloth I got for it is blue, my dishes are these:

Pfaltzgraff "America" there are 4 different quilt blocks in the set.   So I think it will really look nice together,

Oh I am liking this little Turkey

After my morning post I got dressed (he-he, I do a lot of my best work in my jammies) and headed to the sewing room to work on this Turkey block. Oh my gosh I am in love with him.  I took a picture of the pattern sheet, you may have to enlarge to see it though.  I wasn't able to use the special ruler to make the long tail on my turkey because I'm using scrap pieces of batiks and the directions call for cutting 10 inch and 7 inch squares....my pieces aren't big enough. We are really scaping the bottom of the scrap barrel--which is a good thing too. But just took me longer to figure out how to piece this one.

Oh and here's a new little cabinet I got last week while I was out searching for a new fall front door wreath.  I didn't find a wreath but I spied this little cabinet and thought it would be so cute to hold spools of thread.  When I got it home though, I decided it would look great on the walll next to my china closet.  It would never have held all my spools anyway so I didn't feel bad about that.

I'm busy

  I've been busy...planning my menu, grocery shopping, shopping at Kohl's (do you love Kohl's?-I do)  I got an electric knife   Then I got a food processor, that was a luxury buy I will admit.  I have a small version, but it takes a long time to chop up large quantities.  I've been mulling around getting one for so long...I'm doing a little happy dance about it! 

And my most important purchase-a new heavy duty turkey roasting pan of my own!  Can you believe married as long as I have been and I'm still using the old one my mom gave me years ago, when she bought herself a new one because our family got so big her's wouldn't hold a 22 pound + turkey.  

 So now I have one with a very sturdy roasting rack, with handles  I'm so excited to use all my new stuff. It feels like Christmas came early for me.  

I've been sewing too, but not a lot of progress.  I finally got the binding hand sewed to the back of the Black, White and Red Circles quilt I posted about last time.  I was reading a blog (Ponderings)  about Faux paper towels and fabric napkins.  So I bought some fabric at Joanne's that I thought would go nicely with my dishes and made some.

The yellow ones are hemmed, the fall leaves ones I cut on the bias, no hem.  I didn't know if you cut something on the true bias it wouldn't fray.  I was skeptical, but dang it's really true!  .

Today I want to make a turkey block using an Eleanor Burns pattern that I can't remember the name of right now.  It's actually a maple leaf block that you add applique head, waddle and legs to to turn it into a turkey.  You have to use her special rulers, so this will be new for me and will take a little un-interupted time, which I think I may be able to squeeze in today
. 

This morning I went into my sewing room, on the way back upstairs from starting a load of laundry, and I spied my Santa Hooked Rug project...

This is a project UFO that I honestly don't know when I started it or bought it.  This is what my notebook says....

-I got this kit years and years ago, probably in the early 90's! I was afraid I was going to screw it up, so I just put it away.  A few years ago, (3-4?) I got it out and did a small area of it, but after Christmas was over, I lost interest...

11/04--I got it out again and did a good bit more on it. I would like to finish this in 05...

I didn't finish in 05 so I'll try again for 06. :)...

It's 7/2006-I haven't looked at it yet... 

It's 10/06-I moved the project bag it's in but haven't added one stitch.

(no further entries)

Yes this is my most procrastinated project ever.  I brought the bag upstairs with me.  Maybe this is the year.  LOL.  I used to have a 14" quilting hoop that I used for it....I can't find it anywhere.
I'm not going to hope for a finish this year, let's just say 'significant progress' which at this point would be anything, haha.  It's really cute and after all these years I still really like it. So it's definately something I want to finish.  I also remember that this kit was terribly expensive and that was part of the reason I just put it away,  I would have bee Here's a picture from the pattern, finished....  

And here are my efforts so far. Pathetic, I know. 

Today I quilted the Black,white & Red quilt. I need to give it a name. I did an all over what I call "water ripples" using black thread. Here's a close up picture, I hope you can see the quilting. I really liked how it turned out. The colors are not true, the whites are pure white-not off white or cream as they appear here.

 

Tonight was my book club meeting.  A couple of us went to dinner first and then to Panera's for the meeting. The book this time was Tallgrass by Sandra Dallas.  It was a good book, nothing earth shattering, but I liked it.  We had a really good discussion which was nice.  Sometimes it's not a good discussion and I think I should have just stayed home. (I get cranky like that occasionally!) *wink*.  

After I got home from the meeting, I finished the B,W and Red quilt and unloaded it. Then  I loaded a baby quilt that another friend dropped off today, she's run out of time to quilt it herself and wants to have it done before Thanksgiving to take to her daughter who is pregnant with their first grandchild, so I told her of course I could do it. I was just going to load it for tomorrow, but I'm up anyway so I quilted that too.  It's done.  She'll be surprised when I call her tomorrow.  

I finished the Winter Welcome runner this weekend and just love it-hated to put it away until Christmas decorating time. 
Today it was nice out, cloudy but warm-I didn't even need a jacket- so I got out in the flower beds and pulled out and cut off all the dead stuff, it looks much better and I feel much better being able to get that off 'the list'. 

Yesterday and today I sat out on my empty deck (had to drag a chair out) and cut out the logos on all the t-shirts.....a much more managable pile to work with now.  And it takes up much less room.  There are about 50 t-shirts!  Just getting this much done makes me breathe a little easier, now that I've started I'm getting a little excited about the process. I've never made a t-shirt quilt before and probably never would if my sister-in-law hadn't asked.  I'm only going to work on one quilt at a time and am hoping to have the pieces fused  and a layout started by this time next week.  hmmmm, crossing fingers, legs and eyes that I can do this.  I bought 9 yards of woven interfacing. I don't think that will be enough, but it will be a start. 

My other goal for this week is to load and quilt my Black, White and Red Circles quilt that I pieced a few months ago.  I have the backing ready and waiting....

Today I finished the little trivet that was our gift from visiting Calico Gals quilt shop on the bus tour last week. In back of it is a bag I made today as well, I'm going to keep my GPS in it in my car....disguised as a cosmetic bag...in-genius!

Oh, one more picture.  My friend Libby asked me to quilt a baby quilt for her.  It's an adorable Mother Goose quilt.  My photography skills are crappola so my apologies.  I just had a ball quilting it.
A good friend of hers hand appliqued the center and then Libby assembled it.  I only did a little quilting on the appliques, most of it was background stuff to help set off the design. She was very happy with it, so that makes me happy too.

The table runner

The table runner Winter Welcome is getting there.  I hope to have it sewn together today and maybe quilted.  I haven't done any embroidery for a  l-o-n-g time, in fact when I was ready to do this one, I couldn't find a little hoop to put it in...I looked everywhere. Well, everywhere I thought they might be....  Before quilting,  I cross stitched. I know I have several of those hoops, but where?  I had to run to the local craft store and pick one up (I got 2 just in case). 

 The 2 t-shirt quilts are starting to nag at the back of my mind.  For the past two weeks I've said to myself, "ok, next week we start...get 'em cut out, interfacing fused...one quilt at a time.." And the week ends and the boxes, full to the brim, sit and mock me from the corner of my sewing room. Just getting them cut out will probably cut the boxes in half (there are 2 for each girl!)  So that should be enough reason to get me going. My room is not big. I could be piling lots of other junk  important stuff in that corner!  Ok next week I start...

I'm back

Well, I've been home since Sunday afternoon. But 'whew' shopping for 3 days really takes it out of you! *wink*.  The Spooktakular Bus Tour was spectacular but by the 3rd day I was ready to head for home.

I was a bad blogger.  I had my camera, weighing my purse down the entire trip but didn't take pictures at the first 2 shops.  The first shop was the The Quiltmakers Cottage in Hershey, PA. Our fearless tour leader Ruth, divided the bus by sides and half of us ate lunch first while the other half shopped and then we switched.  The lunch was great and the shop just lovely.  The employees were helpful (as they were at every place we went-made us feel at home, and not only helped with fabric selections as you would expect, but chatted with us about where we were from our families blah, blah, blah.  It was just like being at your local quilt shop. 
I must say our bus driver, John, was also fearless--he had never taken a tour group of quilters. At every shop we taught him something about quilting,  by the end of the trip he had purchased a 'fat quarter' of a bright bali batik with peace signs on it, which he tied around his neck.  He would get on the bus after each shop visit and tell us what he learned.  He was a hoot.

Then we were off to Quilting Possibilities in New Jersey.  WOW-a Quilt Sampler Magazine shop! This is a huge shop, one of those that you walk in and literally your jaw drops (well mine did) and you don't know where to look first. 
The large fabric in the back is 6 yards worth for a One Block Wonder quilt.  

   We were 1/2 mile from the Atlantic Ocean but cautioned  not to take the bus for a peek.  The roads are narrow and Friday night it would be crowded---we'd never get turned around to get out.  I would have loved to have been able to just listen to the surf for 5-10 minutes. 

Saturday morning we were up and on the bus before 7am. (groan). Charlotte got on last and in her halloween attire, handed out treats for all of us. A little bag of chocolate goodness to help us through the day. 

 Our next stop was Endless Mountain Quiltworks. This is also a Quilt Sampler Magazine shop from 2007. 

Two kits, a wool pincushion, 2 wooden plaques for my sewing room and a bundle of fabrics. The 6 fat quarters bottom right of the picture. I won those too!  I guessed closest without going over the amount of $$ our bus spent on day 2! I will not put the amount of my winning guess.  What happened on the bus tour....stays on the bus tour. 

Oh I just looked out my window (the sun finally came up) and there is frost on the ground, I did a double take--thought we had a dusting of snow.  It's in the forecast for later this week.  I can't wait. 

I almost bought the kit for this quilt as well. In addition to our bus tour they were having a shop hop and this quilt was their "shop hop quilt". I stood for many minutes holding that kit and discussing with myself whether or not I should.....and didn't and now that I'm home I wish I would have. 

Then back on the bus and on to Syracuse, NY to Calico Gals.  They had just moved to a new space and the bus tour was their first customers.  Again a Quilt Sampler shop from 2005!

 If you spent $25. you got the insulated lunch bag as a gift in celebration of their grand reopening. (I picked pink, they also had lime green).  A bundle of 8 wool pieces; for that table runner I mentioned earlier, a charm pack, couple fat quarters and a kit of 12 mini Christmas quilts with a yard of homespun fabric included.  The clothes line and glue stick was a free gift from the shop.  Janet, the owner demonstrated how to and the kit has enough for a coaster or trivet.  Libby and I worked on ours that night in the hotel while watching You, Me and Dupree. 

I may get mine finished today or tomorrow. It was a short trip to the Hampton Inn where we stayed that night and then Sunday morning we got a little reprieve--didn't have to be on the bus until 7:30am!  Millcreek Sewing & Fabric Center in Erie, PA.  Judy Fenton, the owner, got on the bus to welcome us.  She's one of those people who as soon as you meet her, you feel like you've known her forever.  She also was a Westie owner, a huge plus in my book! 

Ok, I'll admit by this time I was ready for home...and feeling a little like "what else could we see".  And then we walked into the shop. Jaw dropping again (I must get that checked by a doctor, it's embarrassing).  I did take pictures but they fail to do justice to the size of the store the amazing array of samples, fabric, kits and decor. Here's one wall, no it's not even half of the one wall.....just their "fall quilt section".  Of course I didn't take a picture of the quilt that I purchased a kit for.  It's a pinapple wall quilt.  Libby snatched up the last pattern so I just have the fabric bundle to show. 

  

We returned to our home shop The Quilt Company (also a Quilt Sampler Magazine shop) at 4:15 in the afternoon, a little ahead of schedule.  Many of the ladies went in and shopped as it was a new shop to them.  Libby got something and then we loaded the car and went home, to dinner, a shower, jammies, a quiet evening of TV and a good night sleep in my own bed. (Heaven.)