Whoa!

After unpacking all of my stuff from the cabin trip, I thought I would play with my machine a little bit and try some quilting. I've had the machine a year and have yet to get the single needle plate to work. It keeps getting caught on the bobbin somehow. I guess I'll have to take it back to the shop and sit down with somebody and see if it's the machine or Operator Error. :o) While switching out the needle plates, I decided to clean the machine. I don't use good thread. I buy the Coats & Clark at Joann's or at the local shops when they're on sale. I've cleaned this machine before but didn't realize the bobbin holder pops out. And look at what I got when it fell out when I pulled out the bobbin! Dang, if I was fishing, I would call this one the "Whopper"!! If I was a cat, that would be considered one heck of a fur ball!! lol

In case you need to do this to your machine, my sister gave me a hint a long time ago. Spray a little WD40 on your q-tips and all of this junk and fuzz, threads, etc. will stick to the q-tip for easy removal. If it's been a little while since you cleaned out your machine, maybe now would be a good time......go ahead, I'll wait. :o)

I pulled some more greens and creams from my stash so I could get a few more blocks made for my Jared quilt. I think when I get these done, I might have enough for the top.

Well, I better go get busy cuz I don't think they're going to sew themselves together!! Happy Monday!

Cabin Retreat

Me and two friends, Susan and Neena, went to Big Bear for a little quilting retreat. We were there Thursday to Sunday. It was COLD but we turned up the heater and had some roaring fires going and got nice and toasty warm. We rented this little cabin from one of Susan's friends. Isn't it cute?
I got lots of sewing done. I took my Juki machine and quilted this UFO. I sandwiched it at home so I only had to quilt it. I stitched in the ditch around the borders and around all the pinwheels. I forgot the binding so I still have to stitch that on before I can call this one finished but I'm almost there.
Here is a close up of the quilting I did on the borders. I didn't mark it. I just did it freehand and it shows! My loops and little curves aren't perfect but this quilt will be for my friend and she will love it anyway! :o)

Here I am sitting in front of the blazing fire, staying warm. A little too warm at some points of the weekend! I had the fireplace on one side of me and the wall heater on the other side. There were some points where that purple top came off and I was sewing in a tank top! lol The only other project I took to work on was my Jared Takes a Wife blocks from my class at Road to CA with Bonnie Hunter. This was a perfect project to take to the cabin. I chipped away at it for two days.

And this is the reward!! I finished 20 blocks. I would like to make a queen sized quilt so I am about half way done. I think I will need about 15 more blocks. We'll see.

Now that I'm home and unpacked, we will probably start making Save the Date cards for my daughter's wedding so I might only be sewing here and there. Hopefully, I'll have this quilt done before summer!

Whatta workshop!!!

All of these projects are from a Stampin' Up! workshop I went to on Superbowl Sunday with my daughter Stephanie. She signed up to be a Demonstrator a while back and wanted to do this workshop to learn how to make some projects for future classes. They allowed non-demonstrators to attend so I got to go. Woohooo, we had a blast. And look at all my treasures! :o)

Spinner box photo card....

Pictures are placed on all the empty squares. This would be cute filled with pictures of my grandkids, wouldn't it. LOL

Monogrammed candle box. I made this one for my sister. There were too many projects to make them all for me. :o)

These little candles were so easy to make and so fun. We stamped on tissue paper, colored, punched and then used a heat gun to melt the tissue on the candle. Soooo easy!

The Chocolate Box. I'm trying to diet for the wedding so no chocolate!!!! You can fill this with kisses, or any of your favorite treats. This box is super easy to do. It's the #2 box for the Big Shot from Stampin' Up! We cut two out, cut off two little tabs and glued the two boxes together. We used the oval punch to create a "handle" and tied the ribbon on. There was the stamping too but that part was easy and quick.

View of the two boxes glued together.

This is the photo album. I love this one. I made it for my friend who has lots of grandkids and loves Roses.

For the photo holders, we used card sleeves or clear envelopes from Stampin' Up!

That's enough for today. I've got sewin' to do and my machine is callllling meeeeee. :o)

Answer Forum

I was going to answer your questions in email but thought maybe others would want to know to. So here's for your inquiring minds. :o)

*Impera Magna - How long does it take to make one favor?
I used a die cutter called a Petal Cone. So you have to cut paper the right size and then roll them through The Big Shot machine. Because this favor needs to hold candy, you need to use "sticky" tape or red tape. That's probably what takes the longest. It would be much faster if we could use a tape runner. Once we decide what favor we'll make, we'll have an assembly party and it shouldn't be too many hours.

*Conni - How big is it?
It measures about 2 3/4" x 4 3/4". That might be why we either modify this favor or use a different one. It's a little big, especially if we're filling it up with chocolate. We saw a way to trim the bottom off and it looks a little like a small Chinese take out container. We'll keep playing until we get it right. Oh darn. :o)

*Isabel - How did you add the edging?
If you look at the link above for the Petal Cone, you can see the die shape and there is also a half scallop and a banner. You have to cut the cone twice so you have both sides (for a 4 sided cone) and if you put an accent color on the half scallop, you get the accent color piece. It sounds like more work than it is.

I went to a workshop with my daughter Stephanie today. We made 8 projects and they were cute! I'm going to go sit behind the sewing machine for a little while and then take pictures of the goodies we made. I hope to post them tomorrow.

A gift for me, a prototype for the wedding

My crafting buddy (and all around best buddy) Neena brought me a birthday present last night. It's a trivet, wall decor, cute as can be red tea pot. She said when she saw it, it said "Liz". :o) Don't you love friends who know you so well? Thank you Neena. I LOVE it!

And after much catching up and gabbing last night, we played with our Big Shots and our Cone Shaped Die and worked up some favor samples for Dave and Ashley's wedding. This is just one. There are so many cute things you can do with that die shape, it's amazing. Maybe Neena will post some on her blog. (She's due for an update.) :o)

The other thing I worked on last night was finger folding my four patch/nine patch units for my Jared Takes a Wife quilt. I didn't want to haul out my machine and all the paraphernalia that goes with it since I knew we would be having a gab-fest last night. It had been a while since we had gotten together. I was right. It's a miracle we can still talk after all that yakkin'! TGIF!!!!!

We interupt this craft blog.....

......for a photo shoot. Although I guess photography is a craft, just not "my" photography. My photography lacks a little to be desired and cannot really be considered a 'craft'. :o)

My girls, their significant others and my significant other (aka, hubby) got me a Nikon Coolpix camera for my birthday. I took some pictures with it when I first got it but wanted to look over the manual to make sure I was getting all the settings right. The book is over a hundred pages so it might take me a while to get through it. If I was to sit and read all of it, I think I would fall asleep, it's that exciting! LOL

Anyway, here are some pictures I took to try out the different settings. A nickel on my couch using the macro setting.....

Pretty good considering I don't have very steady hands. Speaking of hands, let's try a close up of my hand. Look at those wrinkly old things. LOL

*****Dang, I clicked on the picture to see how it looked. Ewww, my fingers are hairy. LOLOL Isn't that a nice thing about growing older. Your eyes go bad so you can't really see the little things, like hair or wrinkles!!!!!

And since I will mostly be using my camera for quilting and family shots, I tried one of a quilt that is hanging in the dark entry way. Hmmm, I don't know about this. It might be the blog post so I'll have to publish this post and then click on the photo to make it larger and see how the detail is. Let's see how it works with a group shot.....

Well, that's one kind of group. HA!

Here's a better bunch. Shhhh, don't tell but these are the baby makers. lol

Okay, I better read that book some more. In between the other nine million things I am juggling right now. :o)

To all my buddies in the cold, cold Midwest and east coast, I hope your heaters are working, that you got a snow day (or three) and that your pantry is fully stocked!

We're booked and official!!!

After calling, emailing and driving all over Southern California, we found the location for Dave and Ashley's wedding!!! There is pretty golf course/club in La Habra called Westridge and they were right in the range of everyone else. When I laid down on the ground and cried to PLEASE be cheaper than everyone so we can stop looking, the man took pity on us and gave us a discount. LOL Here is Ashley on Sunday afternoon, after that big rainstorm we had. The wind was blowing and it was cold......but she's happy! :o) This is the garden/gazebo area where the ceremony will take place.

It's even pretty on a cold and wet day! There was a wedding on Saturday so there are still pink rose petals on the ground and the chairs were still up.

This is the hall where the reception will be. It's very pretty and those lovely golf carts will be routed another direction so we won't be dealing with that the day of the wedding. lol

This is the view from the parking lot, looking out across the street. It's so pretty up here.

Now we're getting excited. (Like we weren't already!! LOL)