Happy Birthday To Me!

Monday was my birthday.  I have a fantastic birthday...7/11. 

 Free Slurpees on my birthday for everyone!!!

We went to Pink Castle and I bought some great fabric.

I ran into Brenda and she gave me a couple of charm packs of her new fabric,
One room Schoolhouse.
Isn't it pretty??

I had to work all day but I went out for dinner with my wonderful family.  

Three of my friends gave me some fabric for my birthday.

Judith gave me this Charm Pack.
It is the Spring Kaffe fabrics from 2016 and my friend Dianne sent the adorable cat FQ.

Robin  "shopped her stash"which is extensive, I must say!  

I made out pretty well from these friends!

Hubby and I went shopping on our way to GR and I picked up a few more things

The BIG birthday gift though was a new serger!!! 

 I have a couple of friends that have this machine.  

My thoughts were that if I got the same one I could ask for help should I need it.

I have her unboxed but have not had time to watch the CDs to see how it works.  

Wish me luck!

There was no cake for my birthday, but this was a pretty good gift!

~XOP~

WIPs With Friends

It's that time again.  Time to share the things you are working on with everyone!  

I have been madly sewing away on some little dresses. 

 I can't show you just yet as the baby shower is on Saturday, but soon! 

 I found the cutest pattern for some diaper covers and it just happened to be on sale too.

I'm thinking the dresses need matching diaper covers.

Isn't this the cutest?

Even though I can't share the dress I can share one of the fabrics. 

 Isn't this adorable? 

The fabric is called Wild Thyme.   

This dress is almost finished, just need to add the button holes and the buttons 

(I hate making buttonholes)  

Anyone out there know how to use the 3A foot on a Bernina 170 so it's automatic?  

Anyone?

I did manage to make some charity blocks and you can see them behind Autumn in this picture. 

 I get to turn them in at the guild meeting tonight.  

They are the red white and blue ones.

Last but not least, I saw this idea on Facebook. 

 It is an old sewing machine table turned into an entertainment table!  

GREAT idea right?

  Sometimes you find these old tables really cheap at the thrift shops.  

Often there are no machines, so...entertainment table!! 

 I am so going to be on the look out for one of these!
This one can be found on Angie's blog right here.
Go check it out and tell her Mama Spark sent you

Linking up to Let's Bee Social

OK now it's your turn to link up!

~XOP~

An InLinkz Link-up

WIPs With Friends

I have ventured into doing some garment making of late. 

 I have decided to try making a dress for an expected little girl. 

 I have a shower in a few weeks and since the grandma has already made EVERYTHING that baby will need, I decided to make a few dresses. 

 I found a great pattern on ETSY. 

 It's called the Hula Hoop Dress.  

If you want to make one too you can buy the pattern right here. 

(photo from the pattern pictures on ETSY)

My dress making skills are a little rusty, but I am going to try.  

The buttonhole will be the most difficult as 

I have never made these in all the time I have owned my Bernina! 

 Can you believe that??  

I am making a practice dress first. 

 I got it all cut out last night. 

Of course I had supervision, although she was laying down on the job!

 Peachy Pearl Bracelets for the skirt.

Pairs perfectly with some Fig Tree fabric for the top. 

 I have big plans for making at least a couple of these if this one turns out.

Now it is time for you to share with us what you are working on.  Please link up.
  I am linking up with Let's Bee Social

~XOP~

An InLinkz Link-up

Fourth of July Weekend

Our Fourth of July was pretty quiet and calm. 

 On Friday we celebrated with our friend Roy, his 95th birthday!  Quite an accomplishment.

On Saturday, we were invited to Austin lake to visit with my husband's family.  

His brother and his wife and their kids, live there and we usually get together over the holiday.  

This year, Andy, my husband's brother, called him and asked him if he would like to fly from Jackson to Kalamazoo with him in the airplane he had built. 

 My husband is a pilot and jumped at the chance to not only fly but fly with his little brother. 

 My husband is the oldest of the 7 kids and Andy is the youngest.  

This is the little plane that Andy built.

His sister Julie rode with us and she took a turn sitting in the cock pit, Hi Julie!

Here is my hubby in the white shirt and his brother in the pilot seat.

Here they are taking off!  I drove with Julie and my son the rest of the way to Kalamazoo.

 We made it to Austin lake and several of the brothers and sisters were there.  

We were missing 2 families.

We had such a lovely time!  My son set off some fireworks but Mother Nature had plans of her own!

I hope that if you are an American you celebrated our Independence day. 

 Freedom is especially dear, knowing so many gave their lives for us to have the freedoms we enjoy.

God Bless America!

~XOP~

WIPs With Friends

It seems it is Wednesday again and time to share our WIPs!  

I have been busy, busy, busy, working on Bee blocks and blocks to support 

the people affected by the tragic events in Orlando.

I managed to finish my June bee blocks.  I have never been so late getting these out!

I loved making this block and would consider making these again.  

So much fun!  

The block is a 12" finished one and the directions can be found over here at Sew Mama Sew if you want to make some too!  It is called an Autumn Chain block.  

We were to make one orange and one pink.

They were easy to make and they look really cool!

On top of that a woman in our Bee group asked us if we wanted to contribute some large HST blocks to make this quilt to go to the people in Orlando affected by the shooting. 

 It is called Big Love.  

I sure do love it!  

Wouldn't it be great done in blues and greens too??  

The blocks we made were 9.5" HST blocks and here were mine.

I belong to another group run by the fabulous Diane Bohn of From Blank Pages fame.  

She designed a ginormous heart made up of hearts and set in an interesting way.  

They were paper pieced and she designed them to be a rainbow.  

There were 86 I think.  I signed up to make 3 teal ones.  

You can find the pattern (free) here, if you want to make one too.

These were my three hearts

I won the first two fabrics in a giveaway that Pile O Fabric had so put them to good use.

I had this one in my stash.  Aren't those cats adorable.

So these are the things I have been working on.  I have a couple of finishes to share soon.

I also am going to be working on an epic Hallowedding quilt in the very near future.  

If you have not see the epic Halloween quilt over at Flying Parrots blog, go check it out.  

She is running it as a QAL.  

Most of the patterns are free, some you have to buy if you want to duplicate her quilt.  I

 will be adding to mine to make it larger and I am using some different fabrics, so stay tuned!

Now it is time for you to click the Inlinkz button and add your WIPs!

~XOP~

An InLinkz Link-up

WIPs With Friends

It's time again to link up any of those WIPs you have been working on!  

I have been sewing like a mad woman but I am trying not to share until I can gift. 

 Instead I will show you pictures of the beautiful flowers waiting for me to plant them. 

 (kind of a WIP, right?)

Last Friday after work hubby picked me up and we picked strawberries.  

I made 24 jars of strawberry jam!

It is always nice to have these in the winter!

One of my WIP's that I will show is how I quilted this piece that I used in something else. 

 I put down tape over the line of faces and quilted on both sides of the tape.  

Then I lifted it up and put it over the next line of faces and did the same thing!

This is how the quilting looks as I was going along.  

I have had several finishes but can't show them just yet.

Of course Autumn was overseeing all this progress.

Until she got bored.  

She is such a sweet soul.  

She is really getting thin and I am worried that I will lose her shortly too.  

(lost her siblings in October and March).  

Now it's your turn to link up your WIPs.

Also linking up with Let's Bee Social.

~XOP

An InLinkz Link-up

There Once Was A Little Birdie Quilt

My daughter met her very best friend when they were 5 years old.  

They lived down the street from us and they did everything together for many years. 

 Near the end of high school they drifted apart.  

Her friend and her familyexperienced some very difficult times and 

her friend moved away for a short time.  

I had also become good friends with her parents. 

 This time was tough for everyone involved. 

 Over time and with a lot of prayer, things evolved and changed.  

We never stopped thinking of this young woman as part of our family.  

I think growing up, she spent almost as much time at our house as at her own. 

 We have watched her mature and grow into the most spectacular young woman and soon to be mom.  We have always loved her and we always will.  

I was on the fence about making her a baby quilt.  E

ven though we love her we are not really part of her life in a real way any more. 

 I was invited to her baby shower and made her a chenille blanket.

I decided that I wanted to make a quilt for her new about to be born daughter.

The nursery colors are lavender and yellow.  

I have never worked with those colors and let me tell you, they are adorable together!

I had a pattern that I have been dying to make for someone and this proved the perfect one.

I did not realize the birds on it were quite so large.  

I had to adapt this to a baby quilt.

I figured out how to place the stars and then pulled fabrics.

You realize how much you lack when you pull colors you don't often use. 

I had to reach FAR back into my stash for this one!

Everything was made from my stash except the binding.

I give you 

~Little Birdie~

The Quilt pattern is called Feathers and it is by Lydia Nelson

You can buy a copy here

I altered the pattern to make only 4 birds.  

This meant I had to figure out how to make all the stars whole.

I also added Prairie Points.

The quilt design in the center is called Marmalade and you may purchase it at Digi-Tech Designs

Showing you the individual birds.  

The background is actually a white on white with little birds 

(a Moda Muslin Mate)

The quilt was quilted by Kathy Koch of Threadbear Quilting.  

She did a feather in the outer border.

Kathy is one of those quilters that can up your game by the amazing job she does.  

If you want Kathy to quilt  your quilts too you can find her right here. 

I promise you that you will NOT be disappointed!

I used up some of the 5" squares I had cut for the prairie points on the back since I didn't have enough of the  all purple background, even with the yellow.  

I made a yellow star as the label and wrote on it, all but the date. 

 (Still waiting for baby to make her appearance!)

 I love, love, love this baby quilt.  I hope little mama loves it as much as I do!  

I can't wait to meet the new little one and gift this quilt. 

 Soon!

I think mama is more than ready.

I am calling this a finish and will link up with Crazy Mom Quilts Finish It Friday.

Have a safe, fun and productive weekend!

~XOP~