Carolina Blue Quilt Top

I completed the quilt top for my grandson who is attending UNC.  He had requested the colors of Carolina Blue and white.  I chose a variety of Carolina blues for the blocks and did the sashing in white with navy cornerstones.  The binding will also be navy.  I love
the way this quilt turned out and I know he will enjoy it also.  He is such a great young man!  It will go out to the longarm quilter in mid September.

 

 

Blue Fabrics

These are a few of the fabrics I will be using in grandsons quilt.  I need 54 blocks and I have 25 sewn as of now.  The push is on to get it completed ASAP.

Maybe Before Christmas

I have been asked to make a quilt for one of my wonderful grandsons who is headed off to college this fall.  He wants it Carolina Blue and White.  Yesterday I headed to Dahlonega for the beginning of
fabric purchases and found the background and a few Carolina blues.  Also I found the backing which is a medium blue with Carolina blue dots.  This quilt will be machine quilted by one of my friends who does long arm quilting.  Watch for pictures as the process begins.

My Georgia Quilt

I started hand quilting this quilt in mid February and completed the quilt June 10.  I love the colors in this quilt as it reminds me of our Georgia Bulldog Football team and the enjoyment our family receives from watching them play.  I may be a country girl from Mississippi, and I do love the Ole Miss Rebels, but having lived in Georgia over forty years I love, love the Bulldogs.

Bonus Room Cleaning

Today in Georgia we have hunkered down for rain and winds.  They are saying we could have up to 5 inches of rain over the next several days.  I have no appointments so I will be at home and have the opportunity to get caught up on some house cleaning and may a little sewing.

My upstairs bonus room use to be my sewing room and I loved having a designated space to call my own.  But the children became concerned with me having to climb the stairs and I converted one of the downstairs bedrooms into a “downstairs” sewing room.  The bonus room became the dump room after that move.  Everything that did not have a designated place to go was “dumped” upstairs.  Fabric was everywhere up there and I finally got tired of trying to fine what I wanted.  This week I cleaned up my fabrics that were not in bins or storage bins.  Absolutely amazing what I found that I had forgotten that I had purchased.  Now the fabrics are sorted by color or projects and the bonus room is looking so much better organized.  Not perfect, but better.

Today I hope to get started on a new quilt project.  Will keep you posted.

Domestic Machine Quilting Tutorial

Amanda Jean at crazymomquilts.blogspot.com is starting a tutorial on quilting with a  domestic machine.  She is a wonderful quilter and I am looking forward to learning her quilting techniques. 


Machine quilting is something I really want to learn and I know she will be a great teacher. 

Scrappy Quilt Time

I know I have to be the worst of bloggers.  Yet I love reading other blogs and gain so much information and knowledge from them.

 It is spring/summer time and the yard is demanding this time of the year and that is where I have spent lots of my time the past few weeks.  Leaves needed blowing to the back of the woods and weeds alway need my attention.  My major project this year was to plant new shrubs in front of my house and that has been done.  My next yard project is to thin out my daffodils and move most of them to another location in the yard.

I finished piecing a top and it will be quilted next.  It is the navy scrappy star pattern from a Crafty pattern.  Now I am working on another scrappy star quilt and making the 8 pointed star.  The scrapes were taking over my sewing room.

I hope you had an inspirational and happy Easter weekend and I wish you happy quilting.  And I will try to post to my blog more often.

Warmer Days

Today has been a beautiful day in Georgia.  After a very, very cold winter we are enjoying warmer weather and bright, warm sunshine.  High today was 70 degrees!

I went outside about 11:00 to get the mail and realized it had really warmed up quickly.  Yard work was needed along with other outside chores so I started doing what I wanted to get done before running out of energy.

First was to vacuum out the car and clean up an oil spill on the car floor.  Next I connect up one of the leaf blowers to the new 100 foot cord and blew out the garage.  Then it was time for lunch.

After a quick lunch of a bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwich I headed back out to the yard for heavy duty work.  I started by trimming four of the knock out roses that were in bad shape.  After trimming I realized that the roses were in worse shape than I realized and when I pulled rather hard on one of them it just came out of the ground.  I declared it dead.  Looking at the others I realized they also were on their last leg and pulled up another one and dug up the other two.  Knock out roses are really pretty for a few years but as they age they really start dying and I think it is better to just get rid of them and replant if you choose to do so.  These four are now gone and will not be replanted.

I proceeded to trim back a lantana that I planted last year.  I planted it on a hill in my side yard to see how I would like having lantana on this hill.  I liked it very much as it blooms all summer giving the yard some color.  Also, the deer do not like it so I consider it a deer resistant shrub and will be planting more on that hill this summer.

Next I cut back three knock out roses down by the mailbox that are still healthy.  While in this area of the yard I also trimmed back some ground cover plants that bloom in the fall. 

One of my neighbors stopped by and we chatted for a while and then I realized how tired I was and went in for the day.  It felt so good to be physically able to get back out in the yard and believe me there is much more to do in the coming warm days.

Thankful

Thankful

My blogging just has not happened this year for many reasons.  Today I was thinking about life, family and friends that have been close to my heart the past few years.  I have been truly blessed by many.

After my husband died in late 2012 my next door neighbor saw that I was having problems with my yard being mowed on schedule by my yard service.  It seemed my yard was the last yard to get mowed on their schedule every two weeks.  As often happens in the south the summer afternoon rains would come in and my yard would not get mowed.  So often it was over three weeks between mowing.   

 I cannot mow my front yard myself as it is on a hill.  I purchased  a self propelled mower and mowed my back yard once.  My wonderful next door neighbor saw me mowing and immediately came out and said “No” you are not mowing this yard.  He had all the equipment and a large riding lawn mower and has mowed my yard since that day.  I am so thankful to have such wonderful neighbors and friends.  Today I called his wife and told her that anytime her husband does not have time or energy to mow my yard to let me know and I will make arrangements to have it mowed.  She said “Oh we have that covered as I am going to run the mower this summer for both of our yards and my husband is going to run the weed eater”.  Oh how thankful I am for such loving friends and neighbors.

New Year 2014

There has been no blogging for over a month on my blog due to the holidays and illness.  Without going into too much detail I will simply say I was sick for the entire month of December with bronchitis and spent most of the month wrapped in quilts and blankets sitting in my recliner taking meds.Throw in Christmas events and a family wedding and before I knew it January 2014 was here.  I am much, much better and I know I am finally almost recovered.After the first of the year I pulled out scraps from an earlier quilt and started sewing blocks.  I would love to make 80 blocks with would result in a nice throw quilt.  Also I have managed to get the binding on another scrap quilt.  Lots of fabric remains upstairs and I really hope to get many quilts made this year.I wish all of you Happy Quilting in 2014.