A Peaceful Thursday in Portsmouth

Well I am still in Ohio; will be heading home on Saturday.  I was able to have dinner with my dad tonight at Bob Evans ... one of his favorites.  We had their farmhouse burgers (really good) and vanilla ice cream.

Worked on my crazy quilt project yesterday.  Will post pics of the new stuff this weekend.  For some odd reason, my iphone won't load my pics the last few days.

Stopped by Big Lots and got a letter P monogram rubber stamp ... the only one in the store, so it was meant for me, lol.  Got a scrapbook techniques book and a watercolor technique book.  Since art school isn't in the cards; I'm gonna try to learn something to improve my drawing this way.

Used the watercolor technique book and did a page in my art journal; except I used colored pencils instead of watercolors.  My sketchbook won't do watercolors and I only brought colored pencils and markers not the watercolors.  Again I will post a pic of the art journal page this weekend.

Helping my son's girlfriend to learn to quilt; so far we have finished two baby quilts this week; and are going shopping for the supplies for a third tomorrow.

Christmas Just Past

Well I can now tell about some of the Christmas presents I made this year.  Didn't want to ruin their surprises.

• Made my second son that is currently deployed to Iraq, a brown crocheted hat and scarf set.
• Made my dh a medium blue crocheted hat with a large black band on the bottom.
• Made my new step-granddaughter a yellow crocheted hat with a scalloped loop edging.
• Made my new step-grandson a heather crocheted hat.
• Made my oldest son a crocheted medium blue hat and a matching wide scarf.
• Made two OSU crocheted striped hats on commission.
• Made a navy blue crocheted hat on commission.
• Made my youngest son's girlfriend a crocheted purple hat with a ruffle.
• Made my youngest daughter a crocheted hat in her school colors of black and orange; the main body of the hat was black and the ruffle was orange.
• I made my oldest granddaughter a crocheted pink hat with a scalloped loop edging and a crocheted flower accent.
• I made my second granddaughter a crocheted peach hat with a scalloped loop edging and a crocheted flower accent.

I'll post pictures of these when I get back home, I am out of state right now, since my aunt passed away.

I have a denim cathedral windows quilt half done for my newest son-in-law, but got sick for almost two weeks and it isn't done yet.  He is a retired US Army Sergeant, so instead of denim for the background, I am using all his old camo uniforms, and for the inset centers, I am using a solid black and it is setting the camo off perfectly.

Second Crazy Quilt Wallhanging is Half Done

 

Just finished piecing the second block for this crazy quilt wallhanging.  I am liking how this is turning out.  It is in a similar color palette as the first one that I am embellishing.  

It has been too long since I did any handwork like embroidery or beading and I am enjoying it alot.

Monday's Crazy Quilt update.

Got some time to work on the Crazy Quilt last night and tonight, yippee! 

Here are some pics

I added a multiple length green blanket stitch to this seam and then added tiny white beads.

This is a way cool vintage button with neat patina from years of love ( it is slightly blurry in the pic for some reason).  Then the seam between it and the beaded spiderweb has a pink row of leaf stitched and then I went back and added a crossbar at the intersection of each stitch.

The white washed out a little from the flash in this pic.  The white lace medallion is really two pieces I cut out of a lace edging and rearranged into this design, I added a large pale lilac bead in the center and beaded tiny pearl beads around the edge and a small spray of them coming off the upper left and trailing down.

This shows the pink edge trim that I cut from a fancier design and then added the green pearlized beads on it.  The central motif starts with a huge vintage button and has a beaded loop hanging from its holes.  I gold metallic corner is tooked under the left side.  Two beaded green loops and a large lilac bead and a seashell are up top.  Further on the right is a groupings of mother of pearl and old off white vintage buttons, interspersed with a purple bead from a pair of favorite earrings that bit the dust.

This lovely lavender motif is a vintage piece I inherited from my Grandma Kuchenmeister that adopted me.

The flash messed with this a little.  The red teardrop jewel is surrounded by tiny white beads that trail off into a flourish of larger beads.

Finally this is the block (lower left in the piece) and how it is looking so far.  You can see the small string of pink pearls that I couched down along the long purple seam in the upper right.

Crazy Quilt progress

Been making some progress on my current crazy quilt project.

I am liking how this is coming along, I think it is going to turn out well.

Started on a New Quilt

Have started a new quilt, it is a crazy quilt, done in 12 inch blocks.  I have draw the design up in mostly greens with a little yellow and brown; to give it a feel for being like a walk in the forest on a sunny day.

This is the design drawing I made up; however, the lady that is getting this wanted purples thrown in as it is her favorite color.

I got 3.75 of the blocks pieced and am liking it so far.

Quilt Designs

Been drawing up some quilt designs for my next few projects, since I finished the US Navy Denim Cathedral Windows quilt. 

Got a Nature Crazy Quilt in the planning stage.

One I am calling Expanding Exploding Star Within a Star.

Then there is a Log Cabin Star quilt.

Then a Scrappy Star quilt.

There are two others I have drawn but not sure how to describe them and haven't named them yet; but they are nice.

That is nice and vague, isn't it?  LOL.  More details to follow.

Crazy Quilt Wallhanging

This is my first attempt at crazy quilting. I have been fascinated by crazy quilting for a long time.

So after several failed attempts at making a crazy quilt; that went in the trash. I came up with this one that I liked.

This was a birthday gift for my friend, Lidora.

It won a blue ribbon at the Scioto County, Ohio Fair.

The background is actually for crazy paper piecing blocks that I printed the papers for off line.

Then I embellished it with lots of beads and buttons.

I have quite a large button collection, thanks to being taught by my Grandmother Kuchenmeister to cut off and save all buttons from an piece of clothing that is going to be thrown out.

I tended to include lots of purple as it is both of our favorite colors and I threw in gold, because I love it and it goes so well with purple.

I also added in lots of lace and trims.

My friend really liked it.

I can not figure out how to get my pictures to be in any place but at the top of a post. Sorry blogger smushed them together.