A Good Start

Thus far, I feel as if I have made a good start into 2020. I have done some goal setting, some organizing and cleaning, and have more planned. I am writing everything down to try to stay on track. I even bought myself a nice yearly organizer.....now to just be organized enough to keep up with it...lol. We all know about good intentions.o

On the rug hooking front, I truly want to finish my TEN UFOs. I also have three rugs in the binding queue...my favorite job....ugh.  The Reader is moving forward...

The rug and book are done and I’ve resumed hooking the background. Pretty soon I will be forced to work on Roxie. I need to find the photo that I was working from.

The 4 Mary Brown blocks are joined with the vines ready to appliqué. Plan to work on that today.

I also got the pieces cut out for the next two blocks.

My Leaders and Enders project for this year continues to be Square Deal by Primitive Gatherings. This one may take forever. This is the goal....(quilt on right)...

Here are a couple of my 2 1/2” finished babies...

If you aren’t familiar with the Leaders and Enders method, go here for a  great explanation.

I really wanted....certainly not needed....to start a fresh quilting project for the NY. Because I have a mountain of stuff I need to work on, I decided to at least set some guidelines for what I chose to start. I wanted it to come entirely from my stash, to be simple to pullout and work on a bit at a time, to be fun, relatively easy and appealing, and to ultimately free up some storage space. This is what made the cut...

This is the box holding the binding, borders and backing. The individual blocks for each month are stored in a small storage bin. This will check off freeing up some storage space when I am done as well as from stash and easy to pull out.

This was the Designer Mystery 2018 BOM from FQS. The designer of this cheery fabric is Fig Tree Designs, and creator Joanna Figueroa designed this first block. Check off appealing.

About halfway in, I realized there was a problem, and it was too late to consult with the group since the BOM was 2 years old. The instructions said to cut the square to make the final flying geese segment at 3”, but if you look at the top block, you can see that it just doesn’t work. After a bit of fiddling, I determined that the block needed to be cut at 3 1/4”. Thank goodness there was adequate fabric to recut those four blocks...thank you FQS for your generous fabric cuts! The bottom block above is the correct piecing. Forget easy. I spent way too long figuring out this little glitch.

And this is the finished block...a perfect 12 1/2”! Next.....

This is month four of Happy Hexies.....

And my favorite block from this group alongside the stack of finishes...all 48 of them.


I will report on the NY in cross stitch next time.

 

I cooked birthday dinner for dear friend Regina and served up her favorite frosted brownies in lieu of a birthday cake. We have known each other since HS, and worked together as nurses over the years.

Forget the projects from way back to the 1980s....LOL.

Take Care,

Jennie

December OMG

I almost met my OMG for December.  I completed the needed block.....

I love sunflowers, so I love this block. I did take the liberty to make fewer pointy petals on the flowers. Made the appliqué easier and I think they look fine. Learned this tip from fellow group members... thanks ladies!!

These are the two upper corners. 

The rest of my OMG was to trim and join the 4 right hand corner blocks and add stems. The stems are already made, so I hope to get this done in the next couple of days.

Go here to see how others came in on their December OMG. 

These sections look pretty large already, but there are two more rows of 4 - 10” blocks between these corners!

My

January OMG will be to complete two of those blocks.

Visit these blogs to see what the other Mary Brown participants are working on:

Karen – Log Cabin Quilter(Lead)

Cathy – Biglakequilter

Julie K –  Juliekquilts

Robin –   solsticestudio

Nanette – Doitrightquilter

Jan – Nanette will show her progress on her blog

 

This month’s Happy Hexies are stitched together.

Now to press, remove papers and appliqué to the background blocks.

So proud of Macy. Her coaches selected her as Most Valuable on her NHS JV cheer squad!!

Does this sound familiar to anyone out there...lol. 

Take Care,

Jennie

Some December Progress

Despite the holiday busyness, a few things have been accomplished on the hooking and stitching front.  So, here’s a little show and tell.

First Snowflake is stitched and ready for me to fully finish. Picked up a nice frame at Hobby Lobby yesterday. Hope I can do it justice. It is a birthday gift for a dear friend who collects deer. No pun intended.

My progress on Mary Oakley. Started this one Christmas night. The floss and pattern were a gift from Ashley. I am stitching one over two on 40 ct Wren linen with called for overdyes. I started it on 36 ct, but wasn’t happy with the coverage. 

I am moving right along on The Reader. Note that I have totally avoided hooking anything on Roxie. I pulled out the book page three times before I was satisfied with it.....not my norm.

Couldn’t resist ordering the Uffindell Sisters by Hands Across the Seas Samplers. To read about these amazing samplers, go here and 

here.

Ms Debi made this adorable snow guy and stuffed him with goodies, including the super cute scissors!

Poor Daisy is all tuckered out from the holiday doings...sweet girl.

I think that I recognize myself here....

Take Care, 

Jennie 

It Was Christmas

Hard to believe that Christmas has come and gone, and I never stopped to blog. So you are going to get it all in one fell swoop.

The Sunday before Christmas with the Horne and  Estes families ...

Christmas Eve with the Cates and Adcock families...

2019 Christmas card.....


And some of our decor......

Hope that your holidays were as blessed as ours.

Take Care,

Jennie

What’s Going On

I have been busy...shopping, stitching, but not decorating. I know, but the tree goes up tomorrow. And the rest. In my defense, I do have a wreath on the door and mailbox decoration up.

So, stitching update....

Month 10 of Liberty Periodical. Only two months to go!!

Month 3 of Happy Hexies, 

And all 3 months together. I am making half with two different prints and half with the same color. Just decided that the variation made it more fun. I really like these happy colors.

Center medallion of English Frame Quilt after month two completed. I am loving this one!!

Another little Prairie Schooler Santa.

and a third in the works.


A little pillow from a Notforgotten Farm kit that had been in my stash for more than just a little while.

And a Blackbird Designs start...Bringing Good Cheer...purchased as a kit from Country Sampler In Spring Green. It’s really hard to tell from this photo, but the linen is an amazing antique color.  Getting the foundation border on this one was more than challenging. Like rip more than once and order an extra skein of floss challenging.

This cute rug is another UFO...started many years ago as a second class rug with Anita White at Caraway. It is Readers by Sharon Smith. I love it, but was intimidated by changing the dog to one of my late schnauzers, Roxie, so I packed it away. When I pulled it out I had trouble feeling oriented with the plan. The dog and little boy were hooked to this point, but that was all. I had the wall fabric ( I am not doing the little airplanes), but hadn’t started it. So I thought that was a good place to restart and try to get a feel for the rug. This is what I’ve done thus far.

Took these three Christmas shopping...not only did we accomplish a lot, we had so much fun!

Take Care, 

Jennie

Dogwood ATHA Christmas Luncheon

Last week the Dogwood ATHA Guild celebrated the Christmas season with a wonderful luncheon held at the Atlanta Country Club. 

Perhaps the best part was the Kim Nixon presentation. Two of her friends and students spoke of Kim’s legacy and brought rugs by both Kim and themselves, most of which were her patterns or were taught by her. In addition, several guild members brought rugs and footstools hooked in classes with Kim.

I have photos of many of them, but regret to say that I am not sure which belonged to whom. 

I do recall that these were hooked by Kim.

These two photos were of a footstool hooked to represent a church. Note the pennies around the skirt of the stool in the first photo.




These two pics were a stool hooked to look like a camper. There was even a little trailer hitch.


Other footstools....









Other rugs.....










And some beautiful braided rugs by one of the presenters....

Hope you enjoyed the show....I know that I did!

Couldn’t be truer!

Take Care,

Jennie