Playing on Etsy

I've been playing on Etsy and I finally, after quite a dry spell, got a Treasury last night! This is a screen shot of it, but you can go to see it in person here. The advantage of seeing it in person is that each of those items is a link to an Etsy store and that particular item ~ all are for sale (and as of this writing, still available)! You can't see my title with this picture (I'm not very adept at screenshots yet). I called it "Dots! And Fresh Lime". I thought everything looked fresh and Springy!

For those who don't know what a Treasury is, it's a little gallery of items put together by a curator (in this case, me), to showcase or promote favorite items. It's short lived, and will only be available online for two days, so jump over there and check it out soon! I've included some of my Quiltsy Team mates in this one, along with some other great sellers on Etsy, and my little Arcadia Crib quilt is in there too :)

Now I need to quit with the playing and get to some real work :)

Enjoy the day!
~ Dawn

Americana

I've been busy whipping up little flags this weekend, enough to make Besty Ross proud. I've pieced all of the little flags that are needed to complete the blocks of Folk Art America designed by Pat Sloan.

And I've finished a couple of the blocks for our Sloanies Club meeting at the shop on Wednesday morning.

I'm putting mine together using the fusible applique method, and I ran out of Heat n Bond Lite (my fusible of preference).

So I had to stop for now at three blocks done. I'll pick up some more fusible and see if I can get a few more whipped up next weekend :)

Enjoy the day!
~ Dawn

Happy Colors for the Babies

When I went in the shop to teach a class the other day, these beautiful happy colors were waiting for me on my shelf in the back room.

Char Werner made this lovely quilt to donate to the Mountain Baby Blankets cause, and had dropped it by the shop one day when I wasn't there. What a wonderful surprise that really brightened my day, and made me smile! Thank you Char!! I love the fresh colors, and the size is great for a larger child (which they also have a need for).

This is a quilt that I've made with my One Hour Crib Quilt pattern that uses a panel for the center, so it makes up super quick. I have more of this fabric, so some of these will go out in my next box being shipped to the Christian Appalachian Project.

My friend Mary Nielsen of Keep Me In Quilts did the adorable quilting on this one, and I finally got the binding finished.

Mary quilted in little hands all around the borders for such a nice touch! I'm afraid the next quilts I make won't be quilted quite as nicely ~ most likely will just be my signature all over stippling.

Since we are working on filling a new box to ship, I pulled this fabric out that's been in my stash a while, and will sneak in another little quilt as time permits ~ sometime it's nice to just do something quick and easy that makes you smile :)

Enjoy the day!
~ Dawn

Delving Into Some Good Books

Spending so much time at the nursing home and the hospital (Dad's currently back in the hospital with some kidney problems now), I've been killing the time with books and magazines as well as my knitting. These are my two newest quilt books that I've been loving from cover to cover. The first one, Quilting Designs from the Past I picked up on sale on my Valentine's Day outing with Heather. I got this one to help me with ideas on quilting up all my little Jo Morton quilt tops.

This next book, String Quilts by Elsie Campbell is not only filled with some beautiful string quilts of all different styles, it's really special to me because two of my best friends have quilts in this book! (I've also attended luncheons at Quilt Odyssey in Hershey where Elsie Campbell spoke. She gives a great lecture and seeing her quilts in person is a real treat!)

My good friend and co-worker Starlyn Baker has her quilt "Leftover Strings" in the Gallery of String Quilts section of the book. Starlyn has several beautiful string quilts and has taught how to make string quilts at our shop and led our Mountain Baby Blanket Sew Ins using strings :)

My close friend Mary Nielsen of Keep Me In Quilts has a quilt called "Diamond in the Rough" and it's pattern in the book. She has a picture of her and Elsie Campbell holding up her quilt at a class on this blog post. This quilt is also on exhibit this year at the People's Place Quilt Museum in Intercourse Pennsylvania!

Mary's special quilt even made the title page! You can purchase this book from our shop if you can't find it at your local quilt shop.

Enjoy the day ~ and a good quilt book!
~ Dawn

Maverick Scraps

First order of business is to give away these snipets...Random number generator chose number 15, Quilt Hollow. Email me with your address Mary and I'll send these little guys your way!

One great idea for using up scrap snipets are these little Maverick Stars made by Jo over at Jo's Country Junction. This post of hers explains a great way of how she multi-tasks to keep these little guys moving forward ~ I chuckled when I read how she manages to fit in quilting tasks around other daily functions because I'm always doing little things like this. From Jo's blog I found Bonnie Hunter of Quiltville. She has a great site for working with scraps, and I already had loved her books. Here is her tutorial on making the Maverick Stars. Enjoy playing with your scrap treasures :)

Enjoy the day!
~ Dawn

Some Snipets and a Smile

Wow! Because of the popularity of my little flying geese snipets, I've pulled them out of the waste basket and they have a place of honor in my sewing room, at least for the time being.

I've decided, since so many people cared to comment about them, I will take your suggestions and offer them up as a free giveaway ~ I may even throw in a fat quarter or two that has never been in the wastebasket :) So if you are interested in receiving my little triangle snipets (many of them Jo Morton fabrics, but not all), plus a little extra piece of fabric or two, just leave a comment on this post and I'll choose one random person by Thursday to pass them on to.

And I just had to share my little Day After Valentines Day present ~ a tradition that started back when we were first married and I was pinching our pennies pretty tightly. Instead of giving me chocolates on Valentines Day (Whitman Samplers are my very favorites, but was quite a splurge back in the old days), my husband would wait until the day after Valentines Day and go and buy one for me at half price. Now he continues the tradition, but gets me two for the price of one (isn't he cute) and he always knows how to make me smile :)

Enjoy the day!
~ Dawn

No Working Outside this February

Last year we had a weekend in February where the temperature was in the 60s so we enjoyed the day and went out and worked in the pavers in the garden. This picture of my husband working in the yard was from a post from February 2009.

This is my back yard now in February 2010. How different the weather can be from year to year!

So since working in the garden is out, (and I don't want to do housework), I'm chain piecing from the fabrics that I cut out the other day.

I'm making Flying Geese. Lots and lots of flying geese. This is one of the piles of geese for the exchange that I have going with some friends for our Buffalo Ridge quilts from the Nickel Quilts book.

And...wait, this is big...I've even given myself permission to throw away all of the leftover snipets (the potential half square triangles) from the corners that get cut off of the flying geese (for some reason I felt the need to save them at the beginning of this quilt). I'm working on that goal of Simplicity in 2010 and have come to the realization that even if I saved all of these, spent time figuring out how to store them, and was possibly able to find them in the future when I thought of them again...I will most likely not want to make anything with them anyway. Ahh, that felt good :)

Enjoy the day!
~ Dawn