The obsession continues, and grows

So after finishing that mammoth King sized quilt I knew I wouldn't be making any more big quilts on my little sewing machine. My two youngest boys however had watched me making the quilt for their big brother and now decided they had to have their own quilts made by mom. Since they were only 3 & 4 years old at the time, I knew I could make smaller quilts and I thought I could manage those. I had been collecting Nascar fabrics for some time as the boys loved Nascar and I had made them several outfits from those fabrics - which they seldom got to wear because they were cotton and required ironing - I don't iron - so again I am not sure whatever possessed me but they sure were cute when they did get to wear them. Anyway, we collected all of the Nascar fabrics and started laying them out to see how they could be put together. Many of the pieces were pillow panels so we had a basic size square to work with, and I cut the other fabrics into squares the same size. I fussy cut the flame strips out of another fabric for the sashing and pieced the back with a picture panel piece bordered by checkered flag fabric. Once again the quilting leaves a lot to be desired, but the boys both love their Nascar quilts.

RED MARBLES

This story was posted to a Quilter's Club of America forum and I believe it deserves to be kept alive and re-posted as often as possible. Author unknown - setiment priceless

RED MARBLES
I was at the corner grocery store buying some early potatoes. I noticed a small boy, delicate of bone and feature, ragged but clean, hungrily appraising a basket of freshly picked green peas.

I paid for my potatoes but was also drawn to the display of fresh green peas. I am a pushover for creamed peas and new potatoes.

Pondering the peas, I couldn't help overhearing the conversation between Mr. Miller (the store owner) and the ragged boy next to me.

'Hello Barry, how are you today?'

'H'lo , Mr. Miller. Fine, thank ya. Jus' admirin' them peas. They sure look good.'

'They are good, Barry. How's your Ma?'

'Fine. Gittin' stronger alla' time.'

'Good. Anything I can help you with?'

'No, Sir. Jus' admirin' them peas.'

'Would you like to take some home?' asked Mr. Miller.

'No, Sir. Got nuthin' to pay for 'em with.'

'Well, what have you to trade me for some of those peas?'

'All I got's my prize marble here.'

'Is that right? Let me see it' said Miller..

'Here 'tis. She's a dandy.'

'I can see that. Hmmmmm, only thing is this one is blue and I sort of go for red. Do you have a red one like this at home?' the store owner asked.

'Not zackley but almost..'

'Tell you what. Take this sack of peas home with you and next trip this way let me look at that red marble'.. Mr. Miller told the boy.

'Sure will. Thanks Mr. Miller.'

Mrs. Miller, who had been standing nearby, came over to help me. With a smile she said, 'There are two other boys like him in our community, all three are in very poor circumstances. Jim just loves to bargain with them for peas, apples, tomatoes, or whatever. When they come back with their red marbles, and they always do, he decides he doesn't like red after all and he sends them home with a bag of produce for a green marble or an orange one, when they come on their next trip to the store.'

I left the store smiling to myself, impressed with this man. A short time later I moved to Colorado , but I never forgot the story of this man, the boys, and their bartering for marbles.

Several years went by, each more rapid than the previous one. Just recently I had occasion to visit some old friends in that Idaho community and while I was there learned that Mr.. Miller had died.


They were having his visitation that evening and knowing my friends wanted to go, I agreed to accompany them. Upon arrival at the mortuary we fell into line to meet the relatives of the deceased and to offer whatever words of comfort we could.

Ahead of us in line were three young men. One was in an army uniform and the other two wore nice haircuts, dark suits and white shirts...all very professional looking. They approached Mrs. Miller, standing composed and smiling by her husband's casket. Each of the young men hugged her, kissed her on the cheek, spoke briefly with her, and moved on to the casket.

Her misty light blue eyes followed them as, one by one; each young man stopped briefly and placed his own warm hand over the cold pale hand in the casket. Each left the mortuary awkwardly, wiping his eyes.

Our turn came to meet Mrs. Miller. I told her who I was and reminded her of the story from those many years ago and what she had told me about her husband's bartering for marbles. With her eyes glistening, she took my hand and led me to the casket.

'Those three young men who just left were the boys I told you about. They just told me how they appreciated the things Jim 'traded' them. Now, at last, when Jim could not change his mind about color or size.....they came to pay their debt.'

'We've never had a great deal of the wealth of this world,' she confided, 'but right now, Jim would consider himself the richest man in Idaho.'

With loving gentleness she lifted the lifeless fingers of her deceased husband. Resting underneath were three exquisitely shined red marbles.

The Moral: We will not be remembered by our words, but by our kind deeds. Life is not measured by the breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath....

Today I wish you a day of ordinary miracles ~ A fresh pot of coffee you didn't make yourself...An unexpected phone call from an old friend...Green stoplights on your way to work...The fastest line at the grocery store...A good sing-along song on the radio...Your keys found right where you left them.

Send this to the people you'll never forget. I just Did....

If you don't send it to anyone, it means you are in way too much of a hurry to even notice the ordinary miracles when they occur.
IT'S NOT WHAT YOU GATHER, BUT WHAT YOU SCATTER THAT TELLS WHAT KIND OF LIFE YOU HAVE LIVED

The beginning of a new obsession

This is where the obsession started. My very first quilt. Growing up I spent a week or two with my Grandparents every summer. I remember watching Grandma hand piecing her beautiful creations as she sat in front of the television each night. Everyone loved Grandma's quilts. Each of the Grandchildren received at least one and everyone wanted more. My oldest son had a quilt that my Grandmother had made, it was made as more of utility quilt, my parents had used it in their camper for years and after they sold the camper I had confiscated it and had also used it for years, then my oldest son at some point ended up with it on his bed. It was well over 20 years old and had been washed probably hundreds of times. It was worn out! Stains had turned the white fabric a dull yellow and the fabric was disintegrating. I tried to buy him a new quilt at the store, but he refused. There was no way he was giving up that quilt unless he could have another home-made one like it. Grandma was no longer with us, and there was no one else so I ended up volunteering for the job.

First I had to design a quilt that was similar to the original, but with no "girly" fabrics. At this point I really didn't know anything about quilting, I had been sewing for 20 years but the closest I had come to a quilt was some pot-holders I had made for Christmas one year. I didn't know you could buy quilt patterns, or where to look for them. I just took out a piece of graph paper and started drawing. Once I had a basic idea of what we were going to do I had to start collecting fabric, I had a large stash of cotton fabric, but most of it was flowery "girly" fabrics. After collecting the fabric and cutting out all those 3 1/2" squares our life was suddenly and dramatically turned upside down and the quilt pieces were put away before I could sew a single stitch. A few months later we had moved into a much smaller house (almost a third the size of the house we left), most of my stash was listed on eBay and sold I had started selling my machine embroidery designs and life was starting to calm down again. I found the plastic baggies with all of those little squares and decided that sewing them together might help me deal with all the emotional upheaval. I found I really loved sewing the patches together. If my seams didn't line up perfectly I didn't really know enough to care. When I made mistakes of which fabric went next in the row, I didn't really think anyone else would notice, so I didn't really care. I was enjoying myself and that was really all that mattered.

When I finished putting the top together I had to quilt it. The original quilt was a queen-size, but this one turned out to be a large King-sized. I bought the batting and fabric for the backing. I had a basic idea of how I was supposed to put it together, but I did not have an open space anywhere that was that large (this was before I figured out the driveways are an awesome placed to pin quilts). So I laid out the layers on my queen-sized bed. Now this in itself would probably not have been that bad, but our bed is not like a normal queen-sized bed, the top of the mattress is over three feet off the ground (I have to use stairs to get into the bed)! So here I am on top of an unstable step stool trying to get the whole thing laid out straight on a bed that is considerable smaller than the quilt. After several hours I finally had all the layers pinned together, now I had to figure out how to actually quilt this monster. I had a little cheap Brother sewing machine with a throat space of about 4 1/2" maybe 5". I knew I was supposed to start in the center of the quilt and go out towards the edges, but how in the heck do you get to the center of the quilt? I ended up rolling up the sides and fighting, stuffing, shoving until I had the whole thing quilted. If you turn it over and look at the back it is a mess! Puckers and pleats everywhere! But it was done and I was never going to make another big quilt like that again, that was for sure! My neck and shoulders hurt like crazy for days afterward!

But as the days passed I thought about all I had been through to make that quilt and I was happy I had done it. I really enjoyed the piecing, and maybe the quilting part wouldn't be that bad if the quilt was smaller. Within a couple of weeks I was drawing up a new design and planning out the next quilt.

Color Ka-Boom!

This quilt started out with a pattern called "Carpenter's Color Wheel". I liked the pattern, but it was for a wall-hanging and I wanted a lap quilt. So with the help of the "Electric Quilt" software, and my husband's amazing ability to find my mistakes I enlarged the original design and altered it just enough to make it work for my purposes. The finished quilt is about 80 inches square and backed with flannel to make it a very warm lap quilt for next winter. It is quilted with monofilament thread on top and cotton thread underneath, so the quilting would not distract from the colors and design of the top, but the back would still be comfortable and not "pokey". The top was pieced in February and quilted in June (note to self - do NOT quilt a flannel quilt again in June!).

When I went to pin the layers of this quilt together it was a fairly nice day, partly cloudy and not too terribly hot. So I went out in the front driveway (the only flat place I have that is big enough to lay out quilts) and laid out the backing and taped it down to the driveway. Then I spread out the batting got it centered and straight and taped it down on top. Finally I spread out the top over the other layers, centered and straightened it and realized that the backing was about 18 inches short on one side! Now I had measured both the top and the backing twice and thought I should have had at least a couple of inches extra all the way around, not optimal, but I figured I could work with it. Once I realized I had apparently mis-measured I already had the backing and the batting taped down and really didn't want to start over from scratch. So I figured out how to make it work for me. If I moved the top so that two sides had two-to-three inches of backing beyond the edge of the top there would be an extra 22 inches along one end, so after quilting the rest of the quilt I could cut that extra off and attach it to the side that was short, then complete the quilting along that side. So I lined it up and began pinning the layers together with safety pins. After about the 5th pin it started raining! Thinking that this would be a light, short lived Spring shower I just kept pinning as fast as I could. Of course it starts raining harder! By the time I had a dozen or so pins left to go it finally stopped. The sun came out and dried it enough by the time I was done so I was able to bring it in and start quilting without having to hang it up to dry.

As I was removing the tape that held the layers in place My 7-year-old came outside and said that the quilt looked like an explosion of color. This is how the "Color Ka-Boom!" name was born.

MY STORY

BRINGING YOU THE BEST DEALS ON MACHINE EMBROIDERY DESIGNS AND COUNTED CROSS STITCH PATTERNS.

MY STORY:

I have been creating embroidery art for over thirty years. Having taught myself to embroider by watching the generations of creative seamstresses that came before me, I eventually felt the need to try my hand at new and more challenging ways to express myself. When I was pregnant with my first child I started working with counted cross stitch but found that the patterns available were not always what I wanted or were so overpriced as to make them unattainable at the time. So I began creating my own patterns, one stitch at a time by hand.

After my son was born I began creating custom children's toys and clothing for him, and for many of my friend's and neighbor's children. Including personalized embroidery and applique work on my custom designs enabled me to create unique one-of-a-kind creations that the children loved as much as their parents.

When I was expecting my fifth child my husband bought me an embroidery machine. I had wanted one for years and I was so excited to put it to work for me. The only problem I found was that the designs were so expensive and the selection was limited. I knew there had to be a better way.

When I started creating my own designs I found that others were constantly asking where I had found them and how could they get them. Thus I started putting together a collection of all of the designs I had created and went to work creating more. I wanted to enable other people to enjoy all the possibilities available without the enormous expense.

The major embroidery design companies want you to believe that anyone who sells designs for less than they do have stolen their designs or are offering inferior quality designs. This is not the case! I have sold hundreds of my design sets and have never had a dissatisfied customer. Every design, whether for machine embroidery or counted cross stitch patterns, is my own creation. I have put in countless hours ensuring that I only offer the finest quality to my customers as I would expect myself.