One Year Ago Today

One year ago today the world lost an amazing man and I lost my dad. 

He was part daredevil.

He was fascinated by my daughter's peacock, Gizmo.  

It was one of his fondest dreams later in his life to get to visit her farm and see all her peacocks.

He got that wish.

He was petting the pet turkey, Jocelyn here.

He and Gizmo sharing a bonfire at the farm.

He love my children fiercely and unconditionally and they adored him.

This is one of the last outings we were able to go on together.  

We drove to Lansing to see his best friend and stopped in Mason for ice cream on the way home.

This is my favorite photo of me and my dad.  

It was taken on my wedding day almost 32 years ago now.

I miss my dad.  I think about him all the time. 

 I still want to pick up the phone and give him a call to tell him something that has happened or is happening in my life, but I know he knows.

If you still have your dad or grandpa in your life, take a minute and give him an extra hug today in memory of my dad.  Spend a few more minutes listening to that same old story once again.  Appreciate all the time you have left and take LOTS of pictures.  

RIP dad, you are loved and missed!

~XOP

Lizzy House Mini Quilt Swap

The WIP I want to talk about today is the Lizzy House Mini Quilt Swap quilt.
Linking up to WIP Wednesday over at Freshly Pieced.

 I finally got some time to work on it this past weekend. 

 I decided I needed to get it quilted so that's what I worked on this past Sunday. 

 I had to make the back.

I had one set of flying geese left over but that is not what I wanted to do.  

I picked it apart and made a pinwheel with it.  I decided to put that on the back. 

 Then I thought it would be neat to try to match the placement with the gray pinwheel on the front.  

A little tricky. 

 I sewed a back with the pinwheel in the same place on the back as the front.  

Then I layered it and used the crack in my table and a pin to try to line the pinwheels up 

as close as I could before I began to baste.

I then pin basted and drew the beginning circles using Perfect Circles templates as my guides.

I was able to use those lines to guide off for making the rest of the concentric circles for the quilting.  

I did make a few registration marks to know exactly where to begin the next set of circles, 

but that is all the marking I did for the quilting.  

I chose circular quilting to sort of build on the wind theme.  

Air coming off of the pinwheels.

This is how the quilting looked on the pinwheel on the back.  

Pretty close, just offset by a small bit, but I am happy with this.

Here is the quilt almost finished. 

 I chose some Pearl Bracelets for binding and it is just glued down.  

I still need to finish hand stitching it down and I need to make a label.   

I am very pleased with how it is turning out.  I hope my swap partner will love it as much as I do!

~XOP~

Improvising Traditions Quilt

I got together with some friends a couple of weekends ago to work on a quilt top for another friend.

Our homework was to each make a strip a la the quilt in Improvising Traditions. 

 Since the three of us work together we all brought our fabric and 

made selections for the sections each of us were going to sew.  

The three colors we chose were green, aqua and royal.  I got the green section.  

Here are some of my progress shots.  

Seems like my pieces got smaller as I went along.

Yay improv!

This is going to be a pretty large quilt and I could barely get a good photo of my strip!

This is all the strips laid out together.  So much prettier in person!  

With the three of us working all day we were able to get the gray background cut.  

Robin, a graphic artist, was in charge of figuring out how large we needed each element as we were enlarging the quilt to fit on a queen sized bed.  

She had cutting diagrams and everything!!  

We also got the entire top put together and the binding all made.  

We used the gray with a 2 inch "pop" of each color. 

 I went home and got the fabric together to make the back.  A strip of each color.

A finished top!!!

This is the same crew that worked on all those napkins!!!  

We all love how this came out and working together on a project.  

It was determined that we will do this quilt 3 more times with each of us making a strip for each quilt.  We will each end up with a quilt and will have strips made by our friends incorporated into it!!!  

We will all choose the colored strips we want too.

It was a fabulous day spent sewing with my friends.  

Robin's mom was able to join us too. 

 She is an artist and her work is fabulous.  She always enjoys spending time with us when we work.  Now that the work is over it's wine time!!!

Happy Quilting!

~XOP~

Baby Pea Fowl

Yes it is that time of year again.  

We seem to have a million things hatching out over at Long Feather Acre.  

My daughter set some pea eggs in her incubator and most of them have hatched!  

I think they have all been sold already too.  

For the minute we have babies though and they are freaking adorable!

As you can see they are much larger then the chickens that hatched at a similar time.

This little one is only a few seconds after hatching.  Not quite as adorable!  LOL

My daughter bought a webcam and had it in with the chicks. 

 It was fun to watch them. 

 It is currently not operating (she turns it on when she is not using her computer).  

Here is the link for later though

 ustre.am/PhKx

I hope you are having a wonderful week!

~XOP~

WIP Wednesday

I have any number of these to talk about but I will choose just the one...for now.

I am in a swap using Lizzy House fabric for the mini quilt. 

 I have my top all finished but need to make the back and then quilt it.  

I originally put in a pair of red geese but opted for all low volume in the end.  

Just to show you how it changed how the quilt looked.  I really liked the second layout much better.

This left me with a pair of geese so I decided to unpick the sewing and 

sew them back together as a pinwheel.  

(Have you figured out where I'm going with this?)  You probably have, smarty pants!

I am going to put it on the back and *try* to get it close to where the pinwheel is on the front.  

My plan is to do concentric circles starting in the pinwheel to make it look like waves of wind.  

Wish me luck!

Linking up to Lee's WIP Wednesday

~XOP~

My Quilt Went To Market

I know some of you have been following the progress on my Pie Making Day quilt. 

 I am still going to do a tutorial/QAL if anyone is interested, I just need more hours in a day!

I did just get it finished in time to go to market and it was prominently displayed on the table in Brenda's booth at market.

This is Brenda and Jason in their Pie Making Day booth at quilt market.  

Their booth won first place for a single booth!!

You can see the quilt a little bit better here.

Brenda requested we use her fabric for the back too, so this is what I went with.  

Seriously, this fabric is so vibrant.  

The colors were just amazing!!!  I can't wait for the line to come out in July!!!

My little embroidery done with Aurifloss.  

That floss was so nice to work with also.  

It just glided right through the fabric!

I also made a few more Polaroid blocks.  

I'm not gonna lie, I'm actually kind of happy this is done now.  

I do love how they came out and participating in that swap.

I have also been embroidering some quilt labels for my friend, Robin. 

 I finished three of them. 

I like this one the best though.

Lots more to share.  Man I really need to catch up!!

~XOP~

Kara and Dan's Wedding Quilt

I am sorry I have been MIA, but I have had jury duty for the last 7 business days

 in downtown Detroit!  

It was a very serious case and we deliberated a long time but in the end the jury was hung.  

 It was interesting to get to see how things work.  

Even though no one wants to go it is important to serve.  

A truly awesome responsibility.  

Enough of that! 

 Now back to my regular life, so to speak.

I was finally able to gift that purple and gray wedding quilt!!  

I can now show you a photo of the entire quilt all finished!!!  

It was a BEAST of a quilt finishing at 102" X 102".

This first photo is of the top before it was quilted.  The background is really white.

My lawn was the only place large enough to lay it out for a photo!

Close up of the center.  My awesome quilter, quilted the center with hearts.

Of course it had to be inspected and the proper amount of cat fur deposited before gifting!

I used up my entire stash of Kona Ash for the back and 

it still needed a strip of fabric to make it long enough!

Label sewn into the back

Another close up.

I especially love the feathers and "pearls" in the borders!  Right next to the X and O borders!!

 Kara and Dan and the big reveal at Kara's parents home the day after the wedding.  

We were so fortunate to be able to be there when they opened it!

I think they are pretty happy with their new quilt! 

We stayed around while they opened all their gifts and when they were all finished I snapped this 

Collier Studios did their photos and these were two of my favorites!

My beautiful daughter is the first one on the left.

It was an amazing weekend and we were so blessed to be able to share in the celebration!

I have LOTS more to share about the things I have been doing so stay tuned.

~XOP~