she loved it

This weekend we were in Chicago for my mother in law's 60th birthday party.  Two nights and two parties later we are home and unpacked.  It's good to be home in a quiet house.  Hopefully this nap R is taking will help put him back on his schedule so that he's not too grouchy this evening.

In a few hours we'll be in yet another party with my friends coming over to watch the Oscars.  I'm looking forward to it but I'm also looking forward to working on Crymson Flower.  When things got quiet this afternoon I took out my notebook and made a giant to do list for the month of March.  I'm really excited about the things on this list.  It includes everything from buying a binder to keep my paperwork organized to what I want to make to add to the shop.  More wine charms, and flowers mostly....but different styles and colors.  Let's bring spring the to Crymson Flower!  at least that's what's in my head right now.  This coming week will bring more wine bottle pendants to the shop.  I have some awesome shamrocks to show you for St. Patrick's day that is right around the corner.

An amazing miracle happened this month.  Somehow between all the time I've spent on here and on etsy I also managed to finish the quilt for my mother in law's party.  I think she loved it.  There was a big smile on her face from what I saw.  Of course R had to go potty right at that moment and insisted I take him.  I had taken an personal day and turned the dining and living rooms into a quilting studio.  I am very proud of how this quilt turned out.  It was the best job I've done with both basting and quilting.  And it was kinda fun to quilt it.  I have made the final decision that I will not cross lines while quilting.  Bad things happen when I attempt that.  It was a small issue and I was able to easily fix it.  For as much as I really disliked sewing this quilt, I really love how it turned out.  And she does too.  I was proud to be able to give it as a good gift.  No more big quilts for me for a while.  At least nothing with a two month deadline. 

weekend work

I split this weekend up between working on some wine accessories for the shop and working on the quilt. 
First the shop.... I came up with an idea for a wine accessory line that I'm super excited about.  I'll have some small wine charms in the shop this week.  Those are already made.  These guys in the picture are totally new.  I'll have better pics of them soon.  I'm sort of addicted to making them and I might have two more finished that didn't make this quick snap shot.

The quilt is coming along.  I have the top all sewed together and squared up.  Unfortunately, I ended up losing about 15 inches because of fast sewing and not paying attention to seam size.  I went slightly bigger than quarter inch seams instead of smaller which really shrunk everything up.  Luckily I did it consistently and the pattern still looks good.  The next step is to find backing fabric and figure out my borders.  That means I get to go shopping this week.

switching gears again

I spent the holiday weekend up in Chicago with my parents and R.  We had a nice time, checked out a local museum and played lots of dragons.  When he slept I marathon sewed this quilt.  It's still in pieces, but at least they are big pieces.  The colors are a little off, in real life they are bright and glowing jewel tones.  It's really a very cool quilt but it's been a pill to sew.

I learned a lot about my quilting self this weekend.  First it's hard for me to switch gears from bead to quilt mode.  Each needs a different part of my brain and it takes a while for that part of my brain to wake up.  I also learned that fabrics are important to me when I sew.  This project is different in that the individual fabrics were kinda eh, so sewing each block was a bit laborious.  But when the blocks get put together the individual fabrics blend together to get this really amazing result.

This week it's back to beads for me.  It's cloudy outside so not a good photography day.  I'll be listing some new flowers in the shop today and creating some new items for the wine accessory line.