So Much Going On

I feel like I have a lot to catch you all up on. 

Over the next few days I will do that.  

Last week Monday we were invited out with a group of other folks with the investment firm we use to go out on a yacht, have dinner and watch the fireworks in Detroit. 

 What an amazing night!  

We had so much fun living it up like the rich and famous!  (of which we are neither).  

The yacht was called the Ovation and it was HUGE

We were handed a glass of champagne upon boarding the boat. 

 I only had a sip then switched to Diet Coke.

Not the most flattering photo of me but whatever!  It was super windy and so there it is.    

The fire works were amazing.  We cruised from Lake St Clair down the Detroit river.  

You can see the Detroit sky line in this photo and Canada was on the other side of the river.

Pictures don't really do it justice and I only had my phone, but you get the idea.

We had delicious food and there was a live band.  

Not much dancing but that would have been fun too.  

It was a little chilly (in the low 50's with wind).  

We rode a tour bus there and home. 

 I think we made it home around 1am!  

That is too late for this old bird!  

I have to get up at 5am for work.  

All in all a great way to celebrate America's independence!  

This weekend we will be heading to my BIL's house on the lake 

to celebrate the 4th of July with my husband's family.  Let the partying continue!

Tonight we will be heading over to the home my dad lived in until he passed away.  

There was a couple that lived there when my dad did, Maggie and Roy. 

 Their only son passed away, and their grands live in NV.  

His brother comes to visit but they don't have many regular visitors.  

We used to visit with them while visiting my dad.  

They panicked when he died, that we would stop coming to visit.  

We decided that we could not do that. 

 I was next to Maggie in the few hours before she passed away so now there is just Roy. 

 He celebrates his 94th birthday tomorrow so we are going over tonight, 

along with his brother and SIL to celebrate with dinner and (his and my favorite) Cherry pie!

The house has moved now and is around 45 minutes away so we don't get there as much as we did when they were just minutes away.  

We were just there last week and my daughter brought her baby peacock, Beep.  

Roy loves it when we bring the birds!

Happy Birthday Roy!!  

~XOP~

That Cat and A Giveaway

"I am so incredibly excited to announce that 

one of my quilts has been published in McCalls Quick Quilts magazine!  

The issue will be for sale soon, with subscribers already receiving this issue. 

 It is the August/September issue.  Here is the link to the issue.

That's my quilt down in the left hand corner!

GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED

I participated in a guild challenge using a crayon color. 

 We drew a crayon out of a paper bag and then could add 

black, white or gray along with the crayon color.  I picked red-violet. 

 I had seen the amazing work of Donna Mibus and 

thought it would be fun to translate one of her paintings into a quilt.  

So I contacted her and asked her permission to do so. 

 She was great to work with and was excited for me to make her art into a quilt.

  Then I asked her if I could submit it for publication and once again she was so gracious and agreed.

So without further ado here is "That Cat".

You can find the issue here

If you do Facebook you can find a neat video showing the projects in the issue here too.

I hope you will run right out and purchase your very own copy of this magazine!

Just in case you want a chance to win your very own I have two to giveaway.

Leave me a comment, tell me what kind of things you like to see on blogs, or what you think of my latest project.

Please make sure I have a way to contact you!

If you are unsure, leave your email address in your comment.

I will choose another person if I can't contact you,

For another chance leave a comment on the McCalls site here, then come back here and let me know that you left a comment.

The place to comment is on the bottom of that page. You have to really look for it. 

I will choose a winner sometime on Monday.

Good Luck!

Winners have been chosen.  Numbers 3 and 43!
Congratulations ladies.  
Please send me your mailing address!!

~XOP~

Father's Day Weekend

This Father's Day was a little bittersweet.  

I have the best husband and father to my kids ever, but I am missing my own dad...a lot! 

 We did a lot of things this weekend so we kept pretty busy though.

Hubby and I went out and helped on the farm a little bit.  

The peafowl pens are coming right along.  

There is still a LOT more to do though!  

Here is Blu.  He sure is a beauty isn't he?

  Have you seen Jurassic World?  *SPOILER*

The heroine in the story is a Raptor named Blu too!!

This is looking at the pen structure for putting up the fencing.  

You can see the existing coop and their pen.

Digging down to put the fencing in around the bottom of the pen.

Lots of digging!

Soooooooo much digging!

This was Blu and O2 showing off for the ladies.  "How you doin'?"

 The star of the weekend, by far was Beep.  Isn't he just the cutest little peacock?

The neighbors had a party on Saturday night so all of Saturday was a wash.  

Their son has a band so we even had live music!

Then for Father's day we took my hubby to the local airport for their annual pancake breakfast.  

They have a small fly in so lots of planes for him to drool over.  

The two kids that are local came with us.

Son looks a little rough.  too much celebrating the night before!

Then our daughter took us to see Jurassic World, which was awesome.  

One of the folks in the movie reminded me soooo much of my son (Chris Pratt).  

Love it!

I have more to share but am out of time and this is a lot to look at all at once!

How was your weekend?

~XOP~

Lizzy House Mini Quilt Swap

I finally got my Lizzy House mini quilt all finished!  I quilted it myself and I am so happy how it turned out!!

Here is the back side too.  

I didn't use any fabric that was not Lizzy House in making this quilt!  

I don't think my partner reads my blog so I think it is fair to show the name on the label.

The tracking says it has arrived but she has not posted anything up on Instagram yet so I hope it has.

I also made this pin cushion to send along as a little extra.  

It is not made out of all Lizzy House fabric.

But the back is.

I cut a full set of all of the Pearl Bracelet fabrics and sent a charm of each along 

with some Quilty looking chocolate from IKEA.  Here is what my little package looked like.

I sure hope she posts about it soon or I just may die of it!

Have a wonderful weekend!!

Linking up to Crazy Mom Quilt's Finish It Up Friday post.

~XOP~

Emerge.Do.Good.Stitches

I am part of a new charity bee online called Emerge.Do.Good.Stitches. 

 I am happy to be a part of this bee and making blocks for charity every month.

  We only need to make 2 blocks each month and we use our own stash, which is great!

This month Amanda Jean of Crazy Mom Quilts fame, allowed us to use her pattern 

Birch Trees as our block for the charity quilt. 

 You can find the pattern here.

The head of our bee this month asked us to make the backgrounds in 

"manly" colors and to use brights for the "trees".  

I used Kona Indigo for the background on both blocks.  For the first one I did a variety of brights.

The second one I used varieties of greens and blues and I LOVE this one!!

This would be a fabulous way to use up your scraps. 

 If you have not checked out this pattern you should.  

It was super easy to make and I used it as a leader ender while I was doing some paper piecing!

I hope you are all enjoying your week.  We are trying to stay dry over here. 

 It has rained almost every day so far this week!!

~XOP~

Canning and Life

Sometimes life gets so busy doesn't it? 

 We had to go to a funeral of a friend's mom on Friday. 

 It was so great to reconnect with our friends!  

They live out of state but the entire family was there so it was nice to reconnect.  

Then we decided we needed to go pick strawberries (and peas). 

 So we went out to the farm and picked up our daughter and "BEEP" (her new baby peacock). 

 I got to hold Beep in the truck on the way to the berry patch.  

Beep will now have the honor of being the new house peacock.  

Fingers crossed he fares better than the last one.  (RIP Gizmo)  

Beep was the first of 5 to hatch out.  You can watch the  chicks live right here.

Here is a pic of hubby picking.  He kind of looks like a giant picking the tops of trees but whatever!

Here is one box of berries

We picked around 20 pounds of berries!!

 They were so good!!

Also some sugar snap peas

On Saturday we had a graduation party to attend. 

 Our babysitter had three girls and her oldest was graduating from High School.  

(No that does NOT make me old, thank you very much).  

When we got home we decided (and by we I mean me) 

that the berries were not going to keep for very long so we had to make jam.  

So I began cleaning berries and started the jam making process.  

So many hours and 23 jars of jam later we (I) was finished.  

We had a couple of packages for the freezer of just berries too. 

 You can see the 3 jars of peas we did as well.  

Actually I won't even pretend I did those, although I did shell most of the peas!

What did you do this weekend?

~XOP~

Tula Pink Mini Quilt

You may remember that I was part of a Tula Pink Mini Quilt Swap a few months ago. 

 I ran the swap too.  It was so much fun. 

 Tula actually put together a mosaic video of many of the quilts.  I realized, looking back, that I never shared the finished quilt with you!

I tried to make a rainbow (of sorts) with Tula Pink fabric.  I used some of my most precious fabrics.

That full Moon Forest Owl is a favorite, but super difficult to come by!

I felt so good being able to share it with someone else too!!

I chose concentric circle quilting for this one too.  I sure do love the effect!

I love this little froggy too!

 This is one of my favorite prints for binding.  Cut on the bias makes it look so neat!

So this is my entry into Finish it up Friday.  

Have a great weekend everyone!

~XOP~

A Little Birdie Told Me

I realize, looking back at some photos that I have not posted some of the 

things I have finished working on! 

 Remember when I was going over to work on the Improv quilt top with my two friends?

 I made a little pin cushion for my friend that hosted the get together.

Her name is Robin, so when I saw this sweet pattern I could not resist making it for her.

  It was called something else but all I could think of when I saw the pattern was a robin.

See that fat little Robin fabric?  

That's what I put on the back of the pin cushion. 

 I want to make some coasters for her in the near future using this pattern also.

  Isn't it so adorable? 

 It came as part of the Block of the Day program. 

 If you subscribe to the Quilt Pro Block of the Day program (free)

 they send you a different block every day.  

I think you have 3 days to save it and then it is gone. 

 If you are interested, you can check it out here.  

I have received several really great block patterns!

Have a wonderful day!

~XOP~

Fold and Sew Square in a Square Block Tutorial

A friend of mine showed me how to make this neat little block using

 a layer cake square (10" square) and a charm square (5" square).  

Apparently there is a whole host of "fold and sew" quilt blocks out there.  

 Who knew?  

I am thinking that Handicrafts by Peg may be the originator of this technique?

If not she certainly had a LOT of cool fold and sew blocks!

Go and check her site out!!

I don't know about you but I am always looking for quick and easy donation quilts to make up. 

 When my friend showed me this block, BINGO, quick and easy donation quilt! 

 Then I started thinking about it and it is also an excellent way to make a quick lap quilt. 

 I have this fish fabric hanging around that both my husband and my daughter would like. 

 I need a new lap quilt for him and she is always wanting whatever quilts I make. 

 I have not had much time to work on it but I did get a block or two made. 

Once these wedding/grad quilts are finished I hope to have time for some selfish sewing

Let's get started.  For each block you will need one 10" square and one 5" square.  

Place your 10" square face up and your 5" square also face up on top of your 10" square. 

 I like to vary the placement of each charm as then I don't have to match up seams 

when I sew the blocks together. 

 Just don't place it too close to the edge.

Next you will fold in the two sides.  

They will NOT meet in the center.  

I used a Hera marker and my ruler to make a crease to fold on.  

I placed my ruler on top of the charm and lined up the right edge of my ruler with the right edge of the charm making sure the charm was straight 

by checking the ruler markings on the top and bottom edges of the 10" square.  

(I forgot to take a photo, but if you need one tell me and 

I will take one on another square and edit this).  

I ran the Hera marker along the edge of the ruler from the bottom of the 10" square to the top.  

This makes a great creased line to fold on!

I used the marker as the fold line needs to be butted up to the 5" square.  

Using the marker to make a crease made sure it was exact.  

Once you have creased and folded both sides, press the folds.

Take your folded piece to your sewing machine and sew 1/4" from your folded edge. 

Press the sewn edges open. 

Turn your square and fold in the other two sides the same way you did the first two and 

stitch along the folded edge.  

Just like you did for the first 2 folds.

You can see all the edges are sewn in this photo.

 This is what it will look like on the back of your block when it is all pressed open.

As you can see all your seams are enclosed!  

Trim your block to 8.5"

Ta-Da, here is your finished block!  How easy was that?

I hope you enjoyed learning this technique.  I know that I sure did. 

Thanks Pauline for showing me how to do this!!  

I can't wait to make some more fishy blocks for my quilts!!

Please let me know if you make some of these blocks and if you have any questions.

Have a wonderful day!

~XOP~