Mr. & Mrs.

This is one of the hot iron transfers I got at Knittn Kitten last week. It looks like it was a Workbasket insert and I may very well have it up in the sewing room in that bag of transfers I've been looking for since I started this project...

But these two are so perfect that I wasn't willing to take that risk. Now that I've got them stitched up, I'm convinced that I made the right decision.

Because Pretty Applique Needs a Pretty Setting...

Or because I can't leave well enough alone. Or something like that. 

I'm working on some applique blocks. My original plan was to use the same setting as I'd used for Pumpkin Carving. But I've made that quilt. And then I made it again a few more times, because Marilyn uses the same pieces in different colors and Full Blown Quilt Lust uses littler pieces.

While I didn't have time to make the applique blocks, I plotted the setting, and tweaked and tinkered with my ideas and came up with something I loved but didn't have the right fabric for and went shopping a couple of times before finding the right fabric.... Now I suppose it's time to finally cut those applique blocks, huh?

I'm linking up to Patchwork Times.

The Knittn' Kitten

The Knittn' Kitten has to be one of the neatest thrift shops I've found. I wish they were closer to home!

If you're shopping for thrift shop fabric, this is the way to do it. Everything is neatly arranged and easy to  find. I walked by the hot iron transfers twice, but that was a good thing -- when I asked, she brought out another tub from that back that hadn't been sorted or priced yet. I would've happily sorted through them all, but that would've been a little much to ask of the boys.

The vintage linens room looks like it's full of treasures, but I was too distacted by those transfers to go back for a second look.

I bought a little bit of fabric and a couple of sets of hot iron transfers and now I'm ready to spend some time happily cutting and stitching.

Weekly Stash Report 

Fabric Used this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Used year to Date: 17 1/2 yards
Added this Week: 4 yards
Added Year to Date: 57 3/4 yards
Net Added for 2014: 40 1/4 yards

Yarn Used this Week:  0 yards
Yarn Used year to Date: 5875 yards
Yarn Added this Week: 1200 yards
Yarn Added Year to Date: 4210 yards
Net Used for 2014: 1665 yards

I'm linking up to Patchwork Times.

Baking Day!

This is from the same day of the week set as the Market Day bird I stitched last week. Would you believe that I had the entire bird stitched before I remembered I'd meant to do her in black? 

This was my first try with a hot iron transfer pencil. At first, I didn't see the point. I've been tracing images with whatever pencil or ballpoint pen was handy and that's been working just fine.

After using the pencil, I definitely see what the point is. No improvised light box, no struggling to keep things from shifting, no stretching the fabric... I like this method much better!

Bathtime Buddies

I don't crochet. Not yet. It's on the loooong list of things I'm going to make time to learn, someday, when nothing else is exerting a stronger pull.

Bathtime Buddies: 20 Crocheted Animals from the Sea is one of those books that gives me a strong kick in that direction. The pieces are crocheted from cotton and stuffed with bits of sponge to make it easy to squeeze out the water after bath time is over. And they're adorable. 

I love the variety! In addition to the ususal ocean critters, there's an angler fish and a narwhale and a hammerhead shark....and the diver with his wonderful helmet! I love his expression. 

Disclosure - Martingale provided me with an electronic ARC

Let's Make Baby Quilts! {9/26/14}

I'm working on a couple new baby quilt this week. You can see one of them here.

Jo Kramer has a new baby quilt tutorial, A Star is Born. Just look at that pieced border! It uses bonus triangles and I know I've got a bag of those left over from something-or-other. Wonder if they're anywhere near the right size...

Let's Make Baby Quilts Linky Party Rules: 
Link directly to your post or specific Flickr photo. Your post can be about a baby quilt that's finished, or in progress, or you can be writing about what you have planned,  as long as it's about baby quilts. You're welcome to link to baby quilt posts that aren't brand new, but please don't submit the same post or picture more than once. I'd love it if you linked back to my site, either with a text link or the Let's Make Baby Quilts! button.

I've been meaning to go back to the furniture store where I took the pictures for my Nancy Drew quilt. They'll be putting up Christmas decorations soon, so it was either this week or wait until after the first of the year. They've added so much stuff. I can't believe I got the original pictures without any new furniture in the background.

There's the porch I used for the quilt photos...and the double-decker bus...

I don't remember this truck piled high with  junk. I'm almost sure it wasn't there before -- and now there are two of them. Teenage Son counted eighteen trucks in the building. And there are probably half a dozen airplanes.

Look at this little kitchen set. Doesn't that just make you want to play house?

Something about this arrangement makes me want to rescue these things, even though I know they're safe from harm and not really bound for the dump. Can you see the quilt just poking out from under the braided rug?

The Model T is in the middle of a pond with water gushing up out of the radiator.

This place is just as much fun as an antique store -- with no temptation to buy anything! I guess I'm supposed to be tempted by the new furniture, but who has eyes for that with so much neat stuff to take in.

This post is linked to Vintage Thingie Thursday, Thriftasaurus, Share Your Cup, Ivy and Elephants, We Call it Olde, Savvy Southern Style, Thrifter Maker Fixer, Coastal Charm, Thrifty Life Thursday

{Yarn Along} The Squid is Growing

I'm used to lying things next to a quarter or rotary cutter to show how small the pieces are, but for the squid I had to drag out a yard stick. The legs are all joined and I'm about a quarter of the way through the head. This thing is heavy! But the end is in sight.



Embellished to Death by Christina Freeburn is a fast paced mystery that starts with the death of a scrapbooker in the parking lot of a retreat and doesn't slow down a bit after that. Knowing that there's an identity thief lurking among the croppers, Faith isn't going to stop searching for the bad guys until she's sure that they won't be able to use her customers' memories and personal information against them. I've been enjoying this series and happily read through this book in one sitting, but I don't think I'd recommend jumping in with this one. There's not a lot of backstory to explain who's who and what the relationships are.  You'll have more fun if you start with the first or second book.



Revelation Dyer and her husband Jeremy both come from families with long histories of magic. His ancestors built their wealth and fame by creating elaborate stage illusions. Her side of the family is more complicated than that. After Rev fatally shoots her husband while they're performing the bullet catch trick on a Las Vegas stage, she fears that whoever altered her pistol will come for her and her daughters next and she flees to Hawley Five Corners. The home of her ancestors, the town was mysteriously abandoned in the 1920s and has been sitting all this time, waiting for her and her girls.

I loved The Hawley Book of the Dead. It's full of atmosphere and magic and mysteries.

For more pretty knitting projects to drool over, check out On the Needles at Patchwork Times and Work in Progress Wednesdays at Tami's Amis.


Disclosure -- the publishers provided me with review copies. 

It's Market Day!

Not for me -- it's market day for this little bird.

I've left the words off of most of the day of the week patterns I'm using, but I love the idea that she does her marketing by filling a basket with worms. Just look at how tightly that little guy is hanging on to that blade of grass!

Say Cheese!

Forgive the sun-dappling. If I take the pictures outside, the prints in the fabric show better -- but the trees don't cooperate.

The pattern is Click! from the August 2013 issue of American Patchwork & Quilting. Instead of making the light and dark cameras that the pattern calls for, I'm making all of mine dark and adjusting the blocks a bit to do white sashing instead.

This post is linked to Design Wall Monday at Patchwork Times.

A Little Bit of Carefully Considered Shopping

I bought fabric this week. Craft Warehouse was having a truckload sale and I was able to find the medium pink I need for a baby quilt tutorial I've got planned...actually two different choices for the pink. The one I don't use for the front may wind up as the back. I also found the perfect blue for another quilt, if there's enough of it.  I've got my fingers tightly crossed, but I'm pretty sure I'm deluding myself. I was sure there was a little over a yard. At the cutting counter, it measured as 3/4 yard. By my ruler at home, it measures thirty inches.

Oh, and there's sock yarn. I've finished a dozen socks so far this year, all from stash. So I don't feel at all guilty about picking up a color way that I've been drawn to for months, in a brand that I know I love knitting with. (it also doesn't hurt that I had coupons!)

Weekly Stash Report 

Fabric Used this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Used year to Date: 17 1/2 yards
Added this Week: 5 3/4 yards
Added Year to Date: 53 3/4 yards
Net Added for 2014: 36 1/4 yards

Yarn Used this Week:  400 yards
Yarn Used year to Date: 5875 yards
Yarn Added this Week: 400 yards
Yarn Added Year to Date: 3010 yards
Net Used for 2014: 2865 yards

I'm linking up to Patchwork Times.

This Little Gal has a Butter Churn

And doesn't she look happy to show it off?

I'm guessing this is a Workbasket transfer, but I can't find any confirmation online.

Anyone know what the letter A and backwards 3 are? A mistake in the printing? They're part of the hot iron transfer. If I'd noticed before I was halfway through stitching the piece, I'd have cut them off or traced the image.

Let's Make Baby Quilts! {9/19/14}

I'm absolutely swooning over the copy of Animal Parade: Adorable Applique Quilt Patterns for Babies that the nice folks at Martingale sent me.  These quilts are such a gorgeous combination of applique and piecing.

Just look at those stars! You could make the quilt without the owls...I'm not sure why you'd want to do that, but it would still be gorgeous.

And the foxes!

You can see all ten quilts at the book's detail page on the Martingale website. These would be such wonderful heirloom projects. and with the variety of colors and critters, I think this book would be a great one to have on hand if you've got lots of babies to make quilts for.

Of course, I plan on making a bunch just for the fun of it!

Let's Make Baby Quilts Linky Party Rules: 
Link directly to your post or specific Flickr photo. Your post can be about a baby quilt that's finished, or in progress, or you can be writing about what you have planned,  as long as it's about baby quilts. You're welcome to link to baby quilt posts that aren't brand new, but please don't submit the same post or picture more than once. I'd love it if you linked back to my site, either with a text link or the Let's Make Baby Quilts! button.

The Estate Sale at the Old Schoolhouse

We've been to a lot of neat estate sales over the years, but never one where there was an old schoolhouse in their back yard. Do you see that iron crib in the foreground? I would have loved to have brought that home, but it wasn't in the budget and I wouldn't have a place for it if it was. 

They also had the ends from half a dozen wooden cribs for a dollar each. Those would have made great props for photographing baby quilts, but I didn't think there was room in the SUV. (And after Hubby's purchase, there wasn't!)

They had a wishing well planter. When I was growing up, Mom had one of these in her kitchen and I thought it was the ugliest thing ever. We'd see them at every antique store and flea market, with high prices. I didn't even notice this one until Leif dragged me over to show me the neat wishing well. (Mom, you can leave yours to him instead of me -- he loved the thing!)

My father's mother had grapes like these in the middle of her kitchen table.  What is it about those things that makes you need to click the glass balls together?

I resisted the temptation of the old schoolbooks, since I've already got a decent stash to use in craft projects.

What I don't have is a picture of the writing desk that Hubby bought. It has a fold down writing surface. And pigeonholes! I've always wanted a desk with pigeonholes. According to the seller, it's the original teacher's desk from the old schoolhouse. Which makes me wonder -- if you had the desk and the schoolhouse, wouldn't you keep the desk in the schoolhouse? I sure would!

I should have taken pictures of it standing in the barn instead of upside down and sideways in the back of the SUV, but buying it was a sudden decision ("Will you take $50 if we measure and it fits?) and I didn't get a chance.

Just look at those pigeon holes!  

This post is linked to Vintage Thingie Thursday, Thriftasaurus, Share Your Cup, Ivy and Elephants, We Call it Olde, Savvy Southern Style, Thrifter Maker Fixer.

{Yarn Along} Shrimp Socks

I'm still knitting socks. Every time I say I'm going to take a break from it, I pick up another skein and cast on. This time it's Tofutsies, the sock yarn with shrimp and crab shells in it. I bought this skein years ago, when the yarn was new and everyone on knitlist was talking about it and whether or not  it was dangerous for people with allergies. No idea what colorway this is -- the ball band is long gone.

It stripes. It plunks big patches of pink in the middle of those stripes, but it's pretty pink and it's keeping my hands busy, so I don't mind too much. If I was knitting something that wasn't going to be hidden in shoes, I'd probably be fussier.

My biggest complaint about this yarn is that it's so splitty. That makes me slow down and watch what I'm doing and if I'm knitting self-striping socks while watching TV with the love of my life, I don't want to watch my stitches.   But the socks themselves are nice and squooshy.




Just What Kind of Mother Are You? by Paula Daly is a thriller about a missing teenager. According to the cover copy, working mother Lisa Calisto "takes her eye off the ball for just a moment," an action which results in the disappearance of her daughter's best friend. (Really, it means that her disappearance isn't noticed until later than it could have been.) I had a hard time with Lisa. She's super critical of the other mothers around her, especially the ones "without proper jobs," and she comes across as whiny when it  comes to her own life. But my biggest problem with the book was Lisa's terrible lapse in parenting, the one that makes her responsible for Lucinda's disappearance. It just wasn't that terrible.



I'm beyond excited about What If?: Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions
by Randall Munroe. Teenage Daughter told me about this one after she heard an online interview with the author. My youngest son loves to ask impossible to answer questions, exactly the kind that this book answers.  Like -- "What would happen if the Earth and all terrestrial objects suddenly stopped spinning but the atmosphere retained its velocity?" That's the first question in the book. So far I've only read the free Kindle preview, but I can't wait to get my hands on the rest. The explanations are way too complex for my eight-year-old (or he might surprise me!), but I'm fascinated by it. And I'm usually not that excited about science. While I decide whether I'm going to order the paperback so that the boys can read it someday, or sign up for Kindle Unlimited so I can read it right this second, I'm keeping myself happy with the author''s website. Expensive Shoebox is probably my favorite of the posts I've read so far, along with Cannibalism and Vanishing Water.  I think I might submit some of Leif's questions!

For more pretty knitting projects to drool over, check out On the Needles at Patchwork Times and Work in Progress Wednesdays at Tami's Amis. For more finishes, check out Sew Much Ado, Finish it Up Friday, Can I get a Whoop Whoop?,  and Freedom Fridays, Wonderful at Home, and Inspired Friday.