I'm joining up since I really need this!

I went to Carla's blog and saw this cute little button, yeah I know, I'm always the last one on board, lol. She is finishing an item a week for Christmas and showing pics...if you haven't been to her house, ya gotta run over and check out her mother in law's Christmas present! Very cool stuff. This is so what I need so I am not typically running full blast on the 23rd of December trying to finish 6 gifts in time...you KNOW what I am talking about! So I am jumping in. With all the grandchildren, and great grands (this is so weird...how can I be a great grandmother?) I need all the challenge I can get!          

This crib size quilt is for one of my new grand daughters. It's a d9p, using 5" charm squares, gleaned from various scrap packs of mostly Christmas fabrics, that I bought from my fellow etsy sellers. I added a 1.5" border and 3" outer border of fadey (is this a word?) red and white stripe. I used green #8 perle cotton and a big stitch, to outline stitch a string of Christmas bulbs on the stripe fabric. It reallyt didn't turn out as I had hoped, the big stitch, so no close ups on this baby! The baby will love it, so I do to! I have another cut out and ready to sew, almost the same, except I am using a fadey (non-word again!) green stripe on the outside border. This little quilt was done @ 2 weeks ago, but I procrastinate! Oops, almost forgot, I did straight line stitch of 3 rows, by machine, on the white inner border and a nearly stitch in the ditch for the rest of the inner quilt. The next one, I promise to show a close up!

The Red, White and Blue quilt top that I made in my oh my God, this was horrid tutorial little quilt along, is going to be pinned and quilted and sent off to wrap a wee one in, either in the Gulf  or to a Mountain baby. I will show a pic next week, after I quilt it. (There are so many people devestated in our Gulf, that will never recover....I'll save THAT for another post.)

The Christmas present I finished this week is my version of the Lucy Tote!  It actually started it's life as a possible diaper bag, but the recipient said it was way to big for a diaper bag...so now, it's just a tote. The new recipient will love it, but I can't say who it's for since she might read my blog! I machine quilted this one too. It is huge, lol. 15" high x 19" wide x 5" depth....and that's not including the handles. I used 100% cotton batt and a piece of Timtex in the bottom to retain it's shape. No pattern, I winged it! Aren't ya proud of me Ms.Lottie?  I guess this just goes to show ya I quilt like my grandma cooked...just a bit much!

 It has 2 pockets on each side, lined with the red and white polka dots in the inside and quilted in a grid pattern.

I found a "new" pattern on The Quilt Forum, like I NEED a new pattern? Maybe for next week? Check it out...have you seen this before? I love it...the disappearing 4 patch!

 Back to my sewing, Elaine

                                                                                         

One top nearly done

Quite a while back, I won a fantabulous giveaway from Meredith. I won a Glace layer cake and some groovy yardage, again, yummy glace! I looked at it for a good while, petted it, stroked it and fell in love with it. I finally decided it wasn't going anywhere...except my bed. Meet my new Christmas quilt, just for me! I haven't measured it, but it just fits on my queen mattress top, as is.

If you use a layer cake for the disappearing 9 patch, you need to add 12 extra squares for a bigger top. Mine is 2 squares wide and 3 squares down. I had to fold them in half to cut them, lol, big suckers! Then my friends, the Quilter Sisters, recommended I put a "stop" point on before the border. Great idea! Thanks Sisters!  I had another top in mind for quite a while. It didn't turn out at all what I had hoped for. Fine, it's really ugly! I'm going to have to think about it before I can post a pic of it....like I said, it's really ugly!!                               

Who's busy now?

Do you ever wonder where the time goes...just sewing along and then you take note of the time....oops, dinner is going to be late again! My poor husband just doesn't cook, doesn't like it at all. I don't mind, I actually love it, and the trade off is priceless.

He washes the dishes and cleans up after me...everytime!

No, he is not for rent, even if you whine.

I did make him a nice dinner, quick and easy. I took 3 medium size potatoes, scrubbed them and cut into lengthwise pieces, drizzled olive oil on, garlic salt, pepper and fresh rosemary. Popped em in the oven (425) for about 30 mins. While they were cooking, I took some pre-tenderized beef and cut into "finger" chunks, dipped into flour, salt, pepper and dropped into pre-heated veggie oil (medium high) and let them cook until light brown, turn and continue until 2nd side is light brown, done! I also grabbed a bag of frozen broccoli tops out of the freezer, microwaved them and slathered the butter on.

One of the things I couldn't get used to in Texas (please forgive me all y'all Texans) is chicken fried steak. Just can't eat it more then 1-2 times a year, lol. My poor husband was raised here and he doesn't care for it either. We do like steak fingers...kind of a mini version of chicken fried steak!

I better get moving on my latest project...the disappearing 9 patch. I found one on someone elses blog and thought it was way cool! Hope so, will let y'all know, lol!

Don't forget to head over to: http://faithfulquilter.blogspot.com/ for a giveaway of Civil War fabrics, yummy! Her name is Elaine too, coincidence...you decide, lol!