Garden inspiration

I was looking on the internet one night for inspiration for a garden fountain. Instead of buying one we thought it would be fun to try to make one. I didn't find the perfect fountain project to make but I did find this really fun garden sculpture. I planted lobelia, impatients and some hearts and flowers, oh and a lemon thyme plant. This is going to look really cute when they start growing and start trailing down!

We finally got a new chair for our living room!

Mike finally has a LazyBOY.

He works really hard and he deserves to have a comfy chair!

I am trying out that quilt for the back wall. It is not quilted yet and I'm not completely sure it will find a home there, but it is auditioning for the part!

I've finished 2 quilts this last week, unfortunately the first one I forgot to take a picture of! So this sweet cat quilt is the second one I finished. I'm not a big fan of doing hand work (carpel tunnel surgery!) but I REALLY like this embroidered cat quilt! This would be a fun project to take along to just pull out and work on.

Here is a close-up of one of the kitties.

I quilted cats into the outside border of the quilt.

Well, I'm off to finish up some painting that I started yesterday.

I've got a really fun day planned tomorrow and I can't

hardly wait to take pictures and write about it!

Bridal Shower

Here I am with 3 of my favorite girls..........The little one on

my left is Brandy and the lovely girls on my right are BOTH
Jenny Baldi! Of course the BRIDE will soon be Jenny Hernandez

and the current Mrs. Jen Baldi will then be the ONLY Jen Baldi!

Jen was our lovely hostess and the organizer of the shower.

She (along with her mom and grandma) really know how to throw a party.

The two ladies at the end of this row are Lee and Darcy. They welcomed us in to thier home and helped Jen create alot of little special touches that really were wonderful.

This was the welcoming table where Jen had set up a place to put your address on a return envelope so that Jenny could write her thank-you notes with ease. There was also a basket for you to "help Jenny and Rafael write thier vows" by writing advice on a note card. (Using personalized "Jenny and Rafael" pencils of course!)

Ah, the dessert table! You can't really tell by this picture there there were dozens of tiny glass slippers with red candy in them for a favor. Lee found some disney characters on the computer and enlarged them and printed them out........Darcy made stands for them and they graced the table.

My next favorite table.......FOOD! We had homemade lasagne!

One of the activities that we did at the shower was to sign the quilt.

Here is Joanne and Kelly. Kelly and Jenny met at Walt Disney World, were roommates AND they both played the characters of Chip N Dale! Kelly drove up from Tucson to attend the shower!

Mary signs the quilt.

Cynthia seems to be checking the spelling and it looks like Jodie MAY be counting!

Tammy took over as my photographer at the shower. Thank goodness for her, because without her I might not have very many photos!

Doesn't this look like a fun group of friends?

Troublemakers

I have these two friends (Carole and Christina) who are REAL troublemakers! I met them many years ago while teaching quilting classes at a Viking sewing store. Carole and Christina are machine embroiderers and I have finally turned them into QUILTERS! They have been after me for YEARS to buy a sewing machine that does embroidery and I have RESISTED! I resisted it because I knew I would LOVE it and it would take away from the time I have to quilt! Well, they finally broke me down and have been helping me learn some of the tricks of the trade.


AND needless to say............I love it and am becoming more and more addicted!





Here are some pictures of some of the recent embroidery projects that I have completed:

The completed bridal quilt top. As you can see I decided on Setting A,
mainly because I asked Rafael and this is the one he liked. The very day that I
finished sewing these blocks together Jenny told me that she liked Setting B!

Here is a close-up of the embroidery I did on the center of the quilt! I gotta tell ya! I was pretty excited with how it turned out!

This is one of the sets of Hand&Fingertip towels I embroidred as a gift for Jenny and Rafael. I love the way they turned out as well! I think I might like this embroidery stuff!

These two pictures are of Carole the trouble maker and Christina the troublemaker! They are posing beside the Egg Money quilt that they completed! They sure look like QUILTERS to me! Wouldn't you agree?

I've had a really busy week. We finally ordered some chairs for the living room. We have worked really hard on the secret garden and got some plants for that area. Jenny's bridal shower was today and a huge success. My daughter-in-law Jen was the party planner and she really did an excellent job. She included so many little touches that really made the day extra special. I'll post some pictures of the shower next time.

Time in a Bottle

Has anyone been able to "put time in a bottle" yet? Now THAT would be a discovery! It would be FLYING off the shelves! and the creators would be rolling in dough!

I sat down yesterday and made lists of what needs to be done in the next month and kinda started feeling panicky! Luckily my good friend Lyn called at about that time and saved me from throwing up my hands and going to the bar! Naw! I wouldn't do that..........but I thought about it!

I've been working on this quilt. It's a really pretty fall colored quilt........so appropriate for the weather we are starting to have. Kinda got me ready for fall. However, I was almost finished with this quilt, one long border to go, and suddenly my thread breaks on me! Upon further investigation I find that I HAD RUN OUT OF THREAD! No big deal right? Except that I buy my thread in California or at longarm quilt shows and most of our local quilt shops do not carry longarm thread! I quickly got on the phone and started calling the shops. I was delighted when I was told that 35th Ave Sew n Vac had EXACTLY the thread and color I needed! So I rushed over there, bought the thread and came home to finish up the quilt, only to find that it seemed to be a different "consistency or weight" from the thread I had been using. I usually buy the big professional cones of thread and the one I got at the local shop was the smaller spool. I tried everything I could think of to get this thread to work..............with absolutely NO LUCK! So I walked away for a day and somehow, miraculously this morning it worked! YIPPY! So the quilt is finally finished, except for some clean-up work (I check the quilt over for any areas I may have missed and clip threads and such). I'll post a picture of it next time.

My dear husband spent the weekend working on the secret garden. I wanted to have some raised beds so I could plant some tomatoes and such. He installed water and electricity all around the edge of the fence and they built lovely curved raised beds out of those nifty blocks that you can get. It looks really GREAT!

Water and electricity!

Building the beds.

Tomatoes planted!

Decisions, Decisions...........

Well, I got busy today, jumped in and finally decided what pattern I was going to use for the signature quilt for Jenny's bridal shower. It is not a traditional quilt pattern used for signatures and set in some ways would not, in my opinion, be appropriate for a bridal quilt. However I wanted to do something a little different.





Below you will see the squares that I made today set in two different ways. I'm trying to decide which would be the best one to use. Please leave me a comment and give me your opinion.


Jenny..........if you are reading this and still want to be surprised than I'd suggest that you don't scroll down any more! OR you can put in your 2cents worth.

Setting A Setting B

Both of these setting end up being the same size

One just looks bigger because of how I took the picture!

On the Home Front:

We got new carpet today!

Hurray!

It's about time!

Old grubby looking Carpet

Out with the OLD! and In with the NEW!

Earth, Wind and Fire!

Last night I attended a concert by Earth, Wind and Fire. To be really honest I was not really excited about going. We went out to dinner at a place called Fez....a little urban downtown restaurant where we had some appetizers and a martini. Okay......that was pretty cool and different. The "warm-up" band , Michael McDonald, was pretty good, but I just kinda sat thru it, waiting to get pumped up or for it to be over. When Earth, Wind and Fire started it was ELECTRIC! I truly didn't want them to stop! They were exciting, energetic, dynamic and very talented. This is one of the best concerts I've ever attended! I would definetely see Earth Wind and Fire again!





There are 3 members from the original band still in the group and from what I could see still "HAVE IT". One of the members with the last name of Bailey has a range on his voice that was amazing. He was singing and hitting VERY high notes......to the point were I looked closer thinking that perhaps this was a woman singing............then he started belting out baritone! Amazing!


Here is a link to a Youtube video of one of thier performances:


http://noolmusic.com/blogs/YouTube_Music_Videos_80s_90s_Rock_Pop_-_Earth_Wind_and_Fire_-_Reasons.shtml





On the Quilting front............here is a picture of another quilt I have worked on recently:











I had quilted this one awhile back, but felt that it really needed a little more quilting, so I added a little more. This is a pattern called "Yikes" by Maple Island. I've really been wanting to make this quilt myself..........it's on my list of quilts to make!





This past Saturday I was finally able to give my children thier quilts that I have been working on. First I gave Jenny and Rafael thier engagement quilt. I think they liked it!








Brian and Jen will really enjoy looking over the signature quilt from the bridal shower. It is full of good wishes.





My next project is to make up at least the squares for a signature quilt for Jenny's bridal shower.
It is only 1 1/2 weeks away! I'm not even sure what pattern I want to use. Perhaps I should start working on that! I think that may be one of my projects for today!

This and That

Progress is coming slowly to my house! I've still got so much to do! I've been working out front in my flower beds and they are starting to look fairly decent.












This is my herb garden that I am working on just outside my front door.









Mike has been working in my side yard area, putting me in some new flower beds that I hope to plant some tomatoes in soon!





And this is a picture of the latest quilt I have finished quilting.