Happy New Year

Wishing you and your family a wonderful, happy and healthy 2014. 

Progress

Despite being terribly busy with the holiday season,  I am managing to get some sewing time in here and there.    The house is starting to fill up and getting noisier, perfect.  Daughter is home from university,  hubby will be off until the New Year starting Friday and school ends for #3.  That means lots of chatter and laughter will be in the house.  

In my little sewing spurts I have managed to get Step 2 finished of Bonnie Hunter's Celtic Solstice mystery quilt.  

I am well on my way to finishing Step 3 as well

I had to interrupt mystery quilt sewing to make a few pouches.  These will go to the dance teachers along with a jar of my homemade salsa.

Are you working on any last minute gifts?

Happy Stitching

Lee

p.s. time for my morning work out so I can later nibble on a cookie or two

Linking up to TGIFF Thank Goodness its Finished Friday
and to
Crazy Mom Quilts Finish it up Friday

Finishes

I would like to post about some finishes, but I can't.

I made these

????
(can't show you yet silly, someone might be peaking at this blog)

And this 

This table runner is now gracing my mother's coffee table this holiday season.



I started Bonnie Hunter's new mystery quilt called Celtic Solstice.  The first step uses the Tri Rec rulers, which I had to go out and purchase.  

I was able to pull the fabric from my stash.   

base triangles cut

sewing process started

Sewing processed stopped.  I have come up against a very BIG, hard, brick wall.  My squares aren't coming out to 3.5" as required.  I am just about sick about it.  Some are fine, others are really not.  

I am not sure if I should recut fabric and resew.  Rip these apart and resew.  Wait to see what/how these go in the quilt and see if I might be about to fudge them in somehow.  

What would you do?

I've been spoiled

Thank's to my Secret Santa from Colorado Lady's Secret Santa Soiree, I have been spoiled with lots of goodies.   I know that my Secret Santa is from Canada and that's about it.  If she is reading this  I can tell her that I have stayed in her home town twice, both times to catch the Chi-Cheemaun ferry many years ago.  

Look at this wonderful box  of goodies. 

 Anticipation was killing me and I couldn't wait to open it

 oh exciting

 so many little packages

 I couldn't contain myself

 look at all these wonderful things; decorations, chocolate, note cards, magnets 

and vintage sewing supplies.

Thank you sew much Secret Santa your thoughtfulness and gifts are much appreciated.  Thank you Suzanne for once again organizing such a great exchange.

happy stitching 

Lee

Giving Thanks

Thank you to all of you that participated in the Blog Hop Party.  I was overwhelmed by how many of you stopped by my little piece of the blogging world.  

Thank you for your sweet comments about the Hug quilts.  I wish I could be a 'fly (yuck) on the wall' when those kids open their gifts.  I hope it brings them much joy.

I have been terribly busy sewing, decorating and shopping.  Trying to get ready for the holidays without being too overwhelmed.  (is that even possible)

Here is what I have been sewing lately:

14 placemats for a client:  

Impression of meandering left in the snow!  

From the scraps of those 14 placemats came this table runner:

From even more scraps or a bit of poor cutting on my part, came these pillows for me!

I have some more projects finished, but I won't be able to post about them until after the holidays (wink wink)

BTW the winner of my Blog Hop Party giveaway is:

"49 Jessica"

Here's her comment:

I am working on pj's for my sisters and quilted place mats for my mom. Thanks for the giveaway. That pouch is so cute and I love the fabric. 

She also liked me on Facebook and started following me on Instagram.  Jessica I'll be sending you an email (as soon as I finish this post)

For all of the my readers celebrating American Thanksgiving have a wonderful time with your family and friends.

Happy Hanukah to those celebrating around the world.

Happy stitching

Lee

P.s. Linking up to Crazy Mom Quilts Finish It Up Friday

1. 
   

Hugs completed

 Welcome if you have arrived from the Blogathon Canada or the Blog Hop Party from Quilting Gallery.  click on either to go to lots of blogs and giveaways



I hope you enjoy visiting my blog.  For last couple of days I have been blogging about the making of these two very special quilts. See more here and here







At last the two memory quilts are completed.  They have actually been delivered and will be given as Christmas gifts.  The mother couldn't have been more happy with the results. I could tell by the tears.  She knows the quilts will continue to bring herself and her children comfort in the coming years.

Hello Lily

(Notice the difference in landscape in just a couple of weeks.)  

If you are visiting from the Quilting Gallery Blog Hop, I hope you are enjoying hopping around, all over the world, checking out amazing blogs, getting tons of inspiration and entering giveaways!

My winner will receive this cute little zippered pouch and these great Moda marble bright charms!

To Enter:

1. Just leave me a comment here about what sewing project you are currently working on.

2. For a second chance like me on my Facebook Page

3. For a third chance follow me on Instagram User name: lalaslovelys

This giveaway is open until November 26th and I will ship internationally

Enjoy your hopping!

P.s. I am also linking this post to Crazy Mom Quilts Finish it Up Friday

Giveaway is now closed

Hugs almost completed

Hello,
If you are visiting me from Blogathon Canada, Welcome to my blog and I hope you enjoy your visit.

Are you wondering why I have titled these posts "Hugs".  Well, my hope is that these 'memory quilts' that I have made for the children of the father who passed away too soon can bring them a hug when they need it.

I also wanted the mother/wife to have something from this project.  So I made her a pillow with left over shirt squares and a golf shirt. Now she has something to hug too. 

Now on to the basting and quilting of these two quilts.

First up thread choices

The daughter's quilt got the Aurifil grey with wavy lines running diagonal thru the body and feathers along the border all done on my domestic machine.

On the son's quilt I did some straight line quilting again on the diagonal varying the width between lines.  I learned from the fist quilt that the walking foot would sometimes snag going over the ties.  This time I used some quilting tissue over the ties and had no snagging.  (Always learning)

Of course binding had to be made.  I choose a solid black.  Wish I hadn't because I find it hard to see to hand stitch, but I managed to get through it. 

Almost finished showing you all about these quilts.

Tomorrow (Thursday Nov 21st) is the start of the Quilting Gallery's Blog Hop.  Hope you'll check out what my giveaway will be.  

Check back on Friday to see the final quilts revealed. 

Happy Stitching

Lee

Hugs continued

Over the course of September and October I worked diligently making these two 'Memory Quilts'.  My vision was coming together. ( See yesterday post)

After all the piecing was done this is what was leftover from the ties:

And from the shirts:

I even had enough strips for piano key borders. 

I mentioned in the first post about these quilts, there was also golf/polo shirts to use as well.  I kept those to use on the back.

One quilt would be going to her son and one to her daughter.    The daughter loved her father's yellow golf shirt the most so I paired it and others with this delicate daisy fabric.  

Her brother's choice of go beige and black golf shirts was paired with a more masculine fabric.

Getting closer to the final quilt

Final layout

Once again I hope I haven't bored you with all these photos of these quilts.  Stay tuned, tomorrow I will show you the final quilts.  

Lee

P.S.  the Quilting Gallery Blog Hop starts on Thursday... Giveaways galore will be happening..

Hugs

Back in June or July I was contacted by a lovely lady (my physio's assistant) to see if I could make her two quilts for Christmas presents.  

Now these two quilts were going to be extra special quilts.  She lost her husband (53yrs old) three years ago and she wanted quilts made for her grown children using his shirts and ties she still had.  

I had to think about this.  I didn't want to screw up someone' s cherished clothing.  Could I work with these items knowing whom they belonged to?  (kids thought it was creepy).  After much consideration  I decided to go for it.  

She brought over a tub of golf shirts, ties and dress shirts.  And there they sat until Sept.  (too many things were happening during the sumer to get started)  The pattern and layout were up to me, she didn't care.  I came up with the idea to include a family picture on the quilt.  (something I have never done before).  

Out came the pattern books and magazines to look for inspiration.   I consulted Bonnie K Hunter's book Scraps and Shirttails.  

I viewed her shirt deconstruction video

And then got down to the task at hand.  Making two quilts using 6 golf shirts, 4 dress shirts and about 10 ties.  

the following pictures take you through their journey. 

ties unstitched

Shirt cutting begins

2.5" strips ready to go; lots to work with

test run of block

3 blocks done, many to go

tie strips; very slippery; used muslin underneath

Tie string block

many tie string blocks

I had to keep reminding myself through this process that these are not my colours.  These are being used for sentimental reasons.  

Whew I think that is enough photos for one post.  Drop back tomorrow for more progress on these quilts. 

Happy stitching

Lee