full grown woman

A project awaits…

Ever since I saw this picture in the May/June issue of the McCall’s Quilting Magazine, I have wanted to make it:

Paradigm Shift, by Janelle Cedusky

But, I also love Elizabeth Hartman’s Paintbox Quilt.

So, I thought I might do a little combining of the two ideas. I will still do the black and white fabrics, but how about assorted rainbow colors in place of the lime green in the original?

Now I just have to bust booty on a couple of other projects so I can get to work on this one!

Flying Geese-Bee Block #4

I loved this fabric! It was so nice to look at the bright and cheery fabrics while constructing this block. It was a little challenging because my machine is still misbehaving, even after being serviced. Boo.

A little roundup.

I have been so busy during the day and exhausted at night that my blog life is suffering a bit.  So I thought I’d sum up the past couple of weeks.

I managed to swim even farther, 1/3 of a mile, last Monday and am hoping to make it to the half mile mark next week. It still feels nothing short of miraculous.

I have a flying geese block to work on this weekend for the bee, and hopefully, I’ll be able to share pics very soon. I took my machine in for servicing recently, so I’m a little gun shy to work on someone else’s project without testing it out on something first.

I went to Colorado Springs last weekend to quilt with some ladies at Petersen AFB to make a quilt top for Quilts of Valor. That was such a nice experience except that I learned that my machine was desperate for servicing after breaking four needles, and I also learned to not travel ever again without my driver’s license. Heh. They won’t allow you on base without ID, but luckily one of the ladies in the group was allowed to pick me up at the gate. Sigh.

Other than that, summer is in full swing and we’ve been busy visiting the pool at our gym and going to the Denver Zoo and a multitude of other summery activities.

Joy is:

A little fun on the North Carolina shore!

1/4

It seems like just a little bit. A quarter. Not much really. 25 cents. 4 tablespoons in a 1/4 cup. And really, if someone told you you had to walk a quarter mile, you probably wouldn’t sweat it. 1/4 inch seams are small and neat, essential for being a good quilter.

But, on Monday, 1/4 was incredibly important. Life changing.

On Monday, I swam a quarter mile. I SWAM A QUARTER FREAKING MILE!!!! It has been a year since the surgery, and 2 and a half years since I was told I would never swim again. I felt an incredible sense of relief and elation and praised God for this wonderful milestone in my recovery.

I now, for the first time, have renewed hope that I can do another triathlon, but also that I can live my life without the fear of dislocation.

My new beach bag!!!

I finished!!! I’m so proud of this!

I love these happy little pinwheels. I stitched in the ditch on the diagonal lines and think it turned out really nice.

Lily is….

naughty. We have a saying on my private cloth diapering board that if the child does something naughty, it is best to take a picture to allow yourself time to recover and you can’t do any harm to them whilst taking the picture.

The other day I was folding laundry and I thought Lily was happily playing in her room and reading books.

Instead, she was up on her stool in the bathroom and applying mass amounts of concealer to her face.

Uh oh...I'm in big trouble!!

What do you mean this isn't my color!?!?!?

I assure you, she didn’t get beaten. She just got a stern, “we don’t play in mommy’s makeup” and then she got to take a fun bath with toys.

Pretty Pinwheels

We’re going on vacation to the North Carolina shore, and I desperately wanted a new beach bag. I have made a couple of bags in the past but wanted this to be bright and fun, and what a better representation of summer in a quilt square than pin wheels. Here is a preview:

Here are all the green HST’s (half-square triangles) waiting to be pieced:

I can’t wait until I have my finished bag!

I have a new button!

I was recently accepted into the Quilting Bloggers index and now have a new snazzy button over there to the right to commemorate it. You can click on it and go to an awesome directory of international quilty blogs and they also have a pretty extensive list of online quilting supply vendors!

Quilting Bee Block #3

This is my block! I can’t wait to see what all of my fellow bee’ers send me! I sent out the fabric last week to the other 11 participants.

I made the block myself first in order to make sure that I could understand the directions and that they were clear enough for the other participants. Here it is:

It is an autograph block! All of the participants have been instructed to sign and put their city and state on the center rectangle.

I will update with a post with all of the squares when they come in!