A gift!

Chocolate Cream Pie

I had entered a drawing at LeeAnna's blog in December. She was making these cute pie shaped pin cushions! I had commented on how chocolate cream pie is my favorite and she drew my name! She made a special pie pin cushion just for me! With the Holidays and all, I forgot to blog about it until now. Check out her blog, she has a lot of wonderful ideas!

The only thing on my design wall is something that I cannot show publicly. So this is my design wall post for this week.

A new Beginning

I took a bit of a break from blogging over the Holidays. We had a great time with the kids and grands! I forgot to post the results of my Sew Mama Sew giveaway! Oops! The prize went to Linda, she had offered up her favorite Holiday treat recipe:

Linda has left a new comment on your post "Giveaway day!": 

Hi, Thanks for the Recipe-I'm saving it!
My favorite is: STRAWBERRY LEMON BARS 

Crust: Makes 12 bars
1 1/2 c flour
1/2 cup of powdered sugar
1/2 t salt
12 T butter, cut into 1/4″ cubes (1 1/2 sticks)

Filling:
1 c sliced strawberries+1/4 c sugar
4 eggs 
1 c sugar
3 T flour
2/3 c lemon juice

Powdered sugar for dusting

Line a 9″ x 13″ pan with parchment paper up 1″ on all sides.
Mix the flour, powdered sugar, salt and vanilla in butter.
Press dough evenly over the parchment lined sheet using your fingers to press the dough into a uniform sheet of dough that goes about 1/2″ up all the sides.Put it in the freezer for 30". 
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
In a small bowl, combine the strawberries and 1/4 cup of sugar 
To prepare the filling, whisk together the eggs, sugar, flour. Add the lemon juice and whisk to combine.
Remove crust from the freezer+ put in oven+bake for around 25 min. When the crust is done, immediately scatter the strawberries around the crust, pour any accumulated juices into the lemon mixture and whisk to combine. Pour the lemon mixture over the strawberries.
Lower oven to 325.
Bake 15-20 minutes, or until the center of the lemon bars doesn’t jiggle.
Remove from the oven and allow them to cool completely. 
Slice, then dust with powdered sugar and serve.

Over the New Year weekend, Sweetie and I went down to Kanab. We took a drive down to Page, AZ and on the way back we stopped at the Glen Canyon Dam. Wow! What a sight! They had an unusual snowstorm a few days before.

Glen Canyon Dam

So I am getting my stuff prepped for a trip to CA. I am teaching at a retreat and also I am teaching a class at the Cloth Carousel shop in Winters. I have a tub of projects and class materials. I just toss stuff in there to stage things until it is time to pack. I wanted to use a zippered project bag that has something in it, and I found something that I was looking for!

Surprise!

I knew that I had a spool of copper colored metallic thread! I had been looking for that for the last couple of weeks! It was the project bag that I had my weekly journal quilts in. I had joined a group online to do this project. It started in August 2011. I was going pretty good until December. My brother died and I lost all interest in doing any art. I did manage to do 2 more journal quilts. So I have 14 out of 52. I had the start of one more, note the fabrics under the thread. I will blog about the 14 journal quilts in the upcoming weeks. I am enthused about finishing to 52! On the 29th of December was the 3rd Anniversary of my brother's death. I decided that it is time to let him go and move on.

Perfect!

The project that I wanted the copper thread for is my Capitol Reef quilt for the National Park project. I cannot show the piece until the book comes out later this year. I need to get it finished and in the mail before I leave on my trip.

Sneaky guy

In this post I talked about how I lost a triangle off the design wall. Well guess who showed up yesterday? I swear that I had looked in that pile of quilting samples! Sneaky guy.

This is my off the wall post for this week.

Half over

Border blocks

I got my border blocks sewn for my Wales Sampler quilt. Wednesday is the meeting, so I need to sew the border on and write up the instructions. I will have a photo of the completed top next week.

Emerald Pools

I am getting down to the nitty gritty of my leader project on the wall. And in the bottom corner I just noticed that a triangle is missing! It could easily have been knocked down, and since that corner of the design was sloppily slapped onto the wall, I didn't notice it was missing until I tidied it up. Luckily I had more of that fabric, several of the black and whites were used up when I cut for this quilt. I hope to have this guy finished and off the wall this week.

More bowls for the shop!

I worked the shop on Friday and Saturday. While it was slow between customers, I was able to wrap more cord for bowls. I just need to trim some threads and then photograph them to list in my Etsy shop. I have so much fun making these! The little ones are perfect to put next to your machine as thread catchers.

Cute little guy!

I also made this little guy! My sweetie loved it so much that I told him I wanted him to have it. He put it on his dresser for a loose change catcher. And today is his birthday! So I will be baking his favorite Rum cake as a special treat.

This is my Design Wall Monday post.

Oh, and BTW, I drew a name for my giveaway. I will announce the name after I hear back from her. Thanks to everyone who entered! It was fun to hear all about your favorite treats!

Really? The 12th of December?

My week started it off with some unnecessary expenses. I broke my coffee roaster. I was trying to move it, and the chamber and chaff catcher went flying to the floor and shattered. The unit is top heavy and I am usually careful about moving it and this time wasn't. Good thing is that replacement parts are available. 

English Nut Bars

I did some Holiday baking. My daughter-in-law was told by her husband (my son) that she was required to get the favorite family cookie bar recipe. So we baked them. She then went home and tried again, forgetting to separate the egg white from the yolk. They were fluffier, but still good. The recipe is here.

Pink scrap bowl

Black scrap bowl

Purple bowl

I got three bowls finished this week. I will be making a few more this weekend. I love how the scrappy ones turned out!  They are available for purchase at my Etsy shop. The purple one isn't up yet, I had trouble photographing and getting the color right. Message me if you are interested.

I am participating in the Sew Mama Sew giveaway. There is still time to enter, my drawing will close tomorrow afternoon (I forgot that I am working the shop tomorrow) Check out this post.

This is my off the wall Friday post.

Monday Morning

Wales quilt

I have one more section to sew on and my Wales block of the month quilt will be sashed! I have the border designed, but just need to select what fabric I want to use. And also to write up the final instructions.

Emerald Pools

I am getting close to finishing my Emerald Pools leader project. I really love how the colors glow!

I am participating in Sew Mama Sew's giveaway day! Check out this post to enter.

This is my design wall Monday post for this week.

Giveaway day!

I am excited to participate in Sew Mama Sew's biannual giveaway day! It is so much fun to check out all the wonderful sewing and quilting blogs! This round I have a yard of Blank Quilting Jet Black solid fabric and a fat quarter of a hand dyed fabric. The base fabric was a black on white holly print. I over dyed it using procion fiber reactive dyes. It has been washed in synthropol to set the dyes. But I do recommend using a dye catcher when washing items made from hand dyes, just in case.

To enter my giveaway, please comment on this post (make sure that if you are set to noreply that I have a way to reach you) answering this question, what is your favorite cookie or treat to celebrate your family's Holiday season? One entry per person please. Since I will be working at the quilt shop on Friday, I will draw a name first thing Saturday the 13th.

My family's favorite cookie is English nut bars! While my Son and Daughter-in-law were here for Thanksgiving, she said she was "required" to get the recipe from me.  I was thrilled to know that my son had remembered those cookies and wanted his wife to learn how to make them. I will be posting it to my family recipe blog later this morning.

Thanks for stopping by my blog, I hope you take a minute to look around!

December?

I hope you all had a nice Thanksgiving! We had a wonderful time. The kids and grands were down for the weekend. They left yesterday afternoon. Sweetie and I did a bit of clean up and then plopped down in our chairs, exhausted! I did not get into the sewing room at all. But after I get some chores done today I plan on getting back in there.

Sashing

First up is to finish the sashing for the block of the month that I designed for one of my local groups. I would also like to get the border on the top before the next meeting.

Wales Sampler blocks

I used all star block patterns for the 12 blocks and then used a star sashing design to continue in the same theme. The border also has stars.

Emerald Pools

I am still hammering away at this class sample as my leader project. It is slow, but steady progress. I hope to get it off the wall this week.

I also booked a class at a shop in California for January. I am going to be out there for a quilting retreat that my friends put on and so called the shop where I used to work and teach to see if the new owner would be interested in a class that week. She accepted! I miss that place! It will be fun to be back in the shop teaching. I will add it to my schedule after the owner gets a chance to announce it at her monthly Block of the Month event.

This is my Design wall Monday post for this week!

Since this is cyber Monday, I would love it if you are shopping at any of the sites that I have a banner for that you click on the link from my blog. I try not to be very pushy with promoting the ads and so I make very little from the ads. I greatly appreciate any clicks and purchases! I know that there are a lot of deals today and the next couple of weeks. Happy Shopping!