Sunday Night and What Do I Have to Show for Myself?

Not too much in the way of crafty goodness. I did do some this week, but I can’t share it yet as it is for a swap and I know the recipient will see it. Here’s a peek, though… Naomi, don’t look! You said you like purple and lime green – I hope you weren’t kidding!

I caught a great sale on line at Stitching Bits and Bobs. They sell cross stitch charts, kits, fabric, and gadgets. I found these patterns for a dollar each!

 

I know these are probably not to the taste of many of my readers, but I thought they were fun. And if you are interested, Stitching Bits and Bobs has all sorts of patterns from prim to country to fantasy to realistic.

This is what we awoke to on Saturday.

 

Of course we had an appointment that morning, so we had to get to clearing to get the car out of the garage. Had to clear part of the street, too! Hubby took the snow blower and I took the shovel. I know we didn’t get near as much as some did, but it was enough! It is higher than the puppy. We have one dog who won’t touch it, but luckily another who was game. I cleared a small area of grass for them and then our daredevil has been making mole tracks through the back yard. She’s got to keep up her patrol of the property, you know!

This is what you see when you go outside and look up. Every now and then a big blob falls off to the ground. Believe me – I don’t want to be standing under it when it does!

By Saturday night, the road crews had the main streets pretty clear and it was a good thing, too, because we had tickets to the Cavs game in the 5th row behind the bench. See those two blurry people in the circle? That’s us! Great seats, huh!

Been Thinking About a Swap

Don’t get excited. I’m just thinking at this point. But I have lots of lovely friends in Australia and other countries besides the US and I would love to be able to do something that would be fun for everyone to enter without going broke on postage. I would love for folks to get to know one another better. This idea has been niggling me ever since my friend Khris from Australia asked people to send her postcards from where they live. I don’t know how many postcards she got in all, but the winner was number 64, so there were at least that many! The niggling has been kicked up a notch with my participation in the OWOH event. I have visited nearly 1000 blogs from all over. Some weren’t even in English (thank goodness for WordTranslator). And this haze of thoughts is beginning to solidify into a solid idea.

In the interest of keeping the cost of mailing down, swappers could create pieces about 6 inches square on a cloth base with unfinished edges that they could send to one another. The recipients could use them however they wish – as art quilt square centers, or on a bag or a tote, or turn them into an applique for a shirt or a jacket, etc. I am thinking no restrictions on materials so the maker could use needle and thread as in a stitchery, sewing machine, paint, iron on images, beads, whatever, as long as the base is cotton cloth so that the squares can be put together or mounted on something else. They could even be mounted in a scrap book, if the recipient wanted.

These would be fairly inexpensive to send, I think. As for theme, I’ve been pondering that, too. Often swaps have a set them or you are asked to visit the blog of your partners or exchange info via email. I love those swaps, too, but this time I think I would like to work it the opposite way. Instead of asking each person to make something he/she thinks the recipient would like, this would be more of a chance for each swapper to introduce him/herself to everyone. So I have a few ideas:

• Each recipient could pick his or her own theme. It could be simple as a color or it could be something like flowers or birds or whatever. Then each maker could interpret that theme in his/her own way. You could end up with squares with a prim bird, a goth bird, a fairy bird, an abstract bird, and a beaded bird, etc.
• Each swapper could send a square that represents him/her or where he/she lives. For example, I live in Ohio. Maybe I would send a square with our state bird on it, or a traffic light (they were first patented here, you know), or Devo (they are from the town I grew up in!).
• Or each swapper could just send pieces of their own design that represent them however they wish – where they live, what they like, who they love, where they work, whatever they are proud of about themselves.
• Each swapper could make them all the same, or all different.

Any ideas? I think I would like each swapper to send a short note explaining their square and a little about themselves.  I would prefer a long deadline for sending the squares and manageable group sizes. I would set up a Flickr site for us to upload pics of the squares we receive. But then I would set a second deadline for use of the squares. At that deadline we would all post what we have done with our squares to the Flickr site. What do you think? Is there any interest for something like this – not now maybe, but in a month or two, even? Don’t hesitate to give me suggestions!

First February Finish

Almost feels like a cheat because it was mostly done yesterday. Finished this tote up to match my jacket. Think I’ll wait for spring to break it out, though. Around here, this much bright just might be too much at this gray time of the year! I still have some “fabric” left from the patchwork flimsy, but for now I am going to tuck it away in my scrap bin.

One Last January Finish

I worked on a bag to go with my patchwork jacket but I didn’t get it finished today. That’s OK. It can be my first February finish. A couple of other things preoccupied me this weekend. The first was this little art quilt. It is a new pattern in development by the marvelous quilter Aniko Feher. Check out her website to see her amazing work. She is an incredible artist and is creating patterns for sale. I was lucky enough to be chosen to be a pattern tester for her and this is the lovely pattern she sent! She also has developed patterns for a kitty and a young girl and all three will be available on her website once all of the testers have done their thing. Though I said I wanted to use fabric from my stash this year, I did buy small pieces of tan and gray for this pattern as I felt it was important to have the right colors. It looks really cute in my craft room hanging on the wall over my sewing area. Aside from being a very cute pattern, I really liked the instructions she gave for the borderless finish you see here. What you don’t see are the two really neat pocket corners on the back for hanging.

Then I took time out this afternoon to make homemade lasagna. We are supposed to be on a diet, but I won this amazing Emerilware Enamel Cast Iron Deep Dish Baker / Lasagna Pan in a web giveaway by Jerusalem Greer. How could I not use it? I did use Hodgson Mill Organic Whole Wheat Lasagna with Milled Flaxseed instead of regular lasagna noodles. And I ground my own chicken breast instead of using hamburger or sausage and used fat free ricota cheese. Then I added grated carrot, diced onion and green pepper, sliced mushrooms and fresh spinach, too. I finished it off with fat free organic sauce (I should have made my own – I like it better) and fat free grated mozzarella. Add a fresh salad and this pan made enough for hubby and I for 6 meals.

Maybe There is Hope for Mankind Yet!

I figured with the OWOH event going on right now this was the perfect time to share this video. It brings tears of happiness to my eyes!

Link to access video at youTube in case this video isn't working; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nh7D2g5v-Sg.

One World One Heart

I almost didn’t get a ticket! It isn’t as if I didn’t know the tour was coming up, but I am usually such a home body. And here in the past few days I have been to over 700 blogs and I don’t know how many countries! If you don’t know what I am talking about, click on the image below to be whisked off to the bog of A Whimsical Bohemian for details.

Basically, Lisa created this event and has hosted it yearly since 2007. Each participating blog owner offers to his/her visitors a giveaway in return for the visitor’s leaving a comment. That’s it! In Lisa’s words, “This is more than wanting to win something.......that is only the means.......in the end it's about finding kindred spirits. Someone who may be fairly new to blogging, not sure how to navigate, find others and have others find them....Some are long time bloggers and in some cases well known in the blogging community. Whatever the case it brings all of them together. This is an INTERNATIONAL event that has and had participants from the US, Canada, France, Sweden, Germany, Finland, Malaysia, Brazil, The Netherlands, Australia, New Zealand, Scotland, Ireland, England,Wales, Slovenia and more. It transcends geographical location, socio economics, political affiliation, religious beliefs......it's a coming together like the giant community we are on this planet. If only it took a simple giveaway to create PEACE everywhere, in the mean time here we give from our hearts. We are not solving the worlds problems nor are we curing anything nor are we changing the world. We are merely generating a closer community between humans through blogging.” Cool, huh?

Now I couldn’t travel all over blog land and enter my name into dozens of giveaways without  offering one myself. But as I said, I wasn’t prepared. So I thought about it and came up with an idea…..

This year’s theme is the Magic Carpet. As I said, I have ridden it all over blogland the last few days and seen sewers and painters and writers and photographers and jewelry makers and collectors and more! It got me to thinking. If you had a real Magic Carpet, where would it take you? Now remember, it’s magic! If you want to go to a real place, that’s fine, but you don’t have to. You can go ANYWHERE you want.

Would you like to go to Africa?

Or maybe the ocean?

You could go back in time to the Victorian Era….

Or visit a Gypsy in Romania!

Maybe you’re all about fantasy and want to play in Fairyland,

or challenge a wizard,

or step into a fairytale.

You decide! To get there you only need to leave me a comment telling me where you would go. Please make sure you leave a way for me to contact you if you’re chosen by the random number generator when I ask it for a winner on February 15! On that date, I will begin preparing for your journey and at some point in the not too distant future I will send you in the mail my interpretation of where you would like to go. It will not be a duplicate of something I’ve made before and will be smaller than my creations on my blog or in my etsy shop in light of possible international shipping.

Will you visit

the Forest,

the Moon,

Alaska,

China,

a Carousel,

a Wedding,

a Formal Tea,

or a Field full of Butterflies and Flowers…. ?

Surprise me and let me surprise you!

Drum Roll, Please!

My jacket is finished! OK, it is far from perfect, but I am very happy! I had the most awful visions of bird’s nests of thread and big wads of excess fabric all clumped up and that didn’t happen. I realize that my stitching needs work, but practice will hopefully help. At least now I know I can do it! Next time I think I will choose a longer sweatshirt. In fact, I might just make the next one from a pattern, who knows? I have plenty of fabric left and now I am going to make a purse or tote to go with this jacket. I had hoped to do it today, but putting this back together while chasing a puppy took more time than I figured it would!