Loreen's Schoolhouse

Progress at Last!

Check out my two new project albums.  I have one for the pillow cases I have just finished as gifts for Christmas for my family.  These pillow case were easy AND quick to do!  The hardest part was picking out fabrics from my stash.  I'm trying very hard this year to whiddle down the "stash".  I think of it as recycling!  I know, I know, I haven't made anything with these fabrics before but I've had some of them for so long that I've handled, ironed, folded and organized these fabrics so many times that it does feel like I'm recycling them.   I'm sure there are more than a few of you who know exactly what I'm talking about!  I have added little captions to each of the pictures to give you a little infomation.

When my oldest daughter got past her teen years and started taking an interest in my thimble collection, she decided she wanted to collect thimbles as well.  Problem was that she thought she could just pick through mine!  Wouldn't that be an easy way to collect thimbles...........cheaper too!!  Wherever we went, we would look for thimbles for her collection and somehow, I seemed to be the only person at the cash register at checkout time.  Then, because I'm a big tea drinker, I started collecting a few teapots here and there and low and behold, so did my daughter.  Imagine that!  The point to this story is that I've decided that since she is a pastry chef, I am going to make an apron for her of every panel apron that I find.  An apron collection of her very own!  Too bad I didn't think of this during my recent trips to St. Louis, Nashville and Houston but better late than never!  Check out my new photo album called "Aprons" to see the first one I completed the other day.  I lined it with a fabric from the same fabric collection as the apron panel and using the same lining fabric added some ruffles to the bottom and top and embroidered her name on with my new fancy, dancy sewing/embroidery machine.  I digitized her name in my digitizing software in no time at all and used a blendable thread.  Cute, isn't it!!

I hope you look forward to whatever new additions I make to the Apron album as I go in seach of new apron panels.  I have found another panel and hope to work on it next weekend.  I'm pleased that I got as much done this past weekend as I did.  I feel a great sense of accomplishment.  What a nice way to start out my week......did some sewing and made Christmas presents at the same time, mostly from fabric I already had.  Can't beat that combination!!

My friend Will brought me back some thimbles from jolly old England to add to my collection!  What a guy!!

Happy sewing,
loreen

More on Houston Quilt Festival/Market

I've posted a few more pictures from Houston along with those that were in some of my blogs.  Just go to the photo libraries and click on "Houston".  Hopefully, I will have a chance this week to fill in some captions to give you a better idea of what you are looking at.  I know some of you have been to the Houston Quilt Market/Festival and will be familiar with the pictures but alot of us (me until this year) have never been.  We are not allowed to post any pictures of quilts and displays so it's the best I could do for you.

Follow this link http://www.quilts.com/fqf09/enVivo/vidcasts.html to see the quilts that were on display from all over the world.  This video is on the actual Houston Quilt Market/Festival website so you will see some beautiful quilts that were being judged at Festival.  Be sure to watch both videos.

This link http://www.quilts.com/fqf09/enVivo/vidcasts.html will take you to a section where you can see still pictures of the goings on on the floor of Festival.  Lots of people, that's for sure!  The site promises that they will be adding more pictures and videos for you to see.  I hope you enjoy seeing these quilts as much as I did.  It took a long time to walk through these displays and it was great to see everything up so close I could see all the detailed stitching and embellishments.  It was spectacular!

Keep sewing,
loreen

While "grazing" the internet....

I went to the Viking Husqvarna website and found lots of free embroidery designs to download.  Here's a picture of one of the designs.

 Just click on the the link to go to the Viking website page for free designs.  There are lots to choose from along with free projects.  It doesn't matter what embroidery machine you have as long as you have software to convert the design to the format you need.  It's very generous of Viking to provide so many free designs! Most sewing machine companies have free designs on their websites.  Check out your favorite sewing machine company when you have a chance!

Happy embroidering!!
loreen

 

Back from Houston!!

What great fun Houston was!!  Here's a few pictures for you to see.  Hopefully, they will give you a feel for the area I visited or maybe some of you will remember this area and think back to when your last visit.  The weather went from very humid 90 degrees to very breezy 70 degrees then back again in a matter of days! 

There were all these little "earths" around the area of the convention center painted with different themes.  Since it started raining, I didn't get as many pictures as I would have liked to show you.

The first day I arrived I ate lunch at a little outdoor restaurant next to this fountain.  There was a live band playing the blues and the weather, while not perfect, was nice enough to enjoy after being in my car and hotels for several days.

Even though I took along a project to work on, of course, I didn't get alot done.  Did most of the cutting and that was about it.  I was too busy looking at all the displays of wonderful fabrics and projects.  As usual, I wanted to do everything I saw that suited my fancy.  Don't we all!  I brought a few projects back with me but you'll just have to wait to see what they are when I start working on them!!  Isn't that just plain mean of me!  Ok, ok, I'll see what I can post in the meantime!!

Here's a cool picture looking down from the floor above to the Houston Quilt Market/Festival. It's through a bubble window.  The large people in the picture are the reflections of those standing next to or around me.  They are not giant posters hanging from the rafters!

I will post more pictures over the coming days for you to see and put all of them in an album to browse through.  Just wanted to get a few pictures up in the meantime!

It's time to get back to the projects at hand but first I need to clean my sewing room.  I've just dumped stuff everywhere it seems.  Don't we all need to stop every now and again (probably more often than that) and just clean, sort and put away??  I think I'll take a few pictures of my sewing room before I clean it up so you can see we are all in the same boat together!  I've decided it would probably be a good idea to make a list of the projects I need to complete for Christmas presents so I can get those done.  I'm trying very hard to keep this projects as simple as possible.  Instead of quilts, I'm sewing table runners, placemats........things that are not so time consuming.  It will feel nice to be able to cross a few things off the list during the course of a week.

I must check in with Donna to see if she has her Bunny Hill BOM's completed.  How about the rest of you??

Happy sewing,
loreen

Trip to Houston

Ok, off again I go!  This time to Houston, Texas.  My travels, though plenty, have always been up and down the east coast of the United States and a couple of trips to Tennessee over the last year to visit my son's school.  This was a pretty easy drive since I stayed on Interstate 10 most of the way.  Changed to Interstate 12 for awhile then back to I10.  No big cities like Atlanta, Washington, DC, New York City or Boston so this was a breeze!  I am at the Houston Quilt Market and staying close by.  Here's a couple of pictures I took before I was rained out.

I may have more pictures later if I can take any inside the event.  For the most part, pictures aren't allowed except for your own use and not to be put on the internet.  I will just have to tell you all about it and, hopefully, show you some of my projects if I pick up some good ones! 

I brought a sewing project with me...found a quilt in a magazine that uses alot of scraps so I thought it would be a good time to use up all those fat quarters I bought when my eyes were closed.  You know the ones I mean......  I bet you have a few of those too!!

Trip to St. Louis

In August, I took my son to school in Tennessee. I'm not sure if "took my son" would be correct since he was following me in his own car but you get the idea.  After spending some time with my son and getting his school stuff squared away, I traveled up the highway (24, I think) heading for St. Louis. I had to make a gas stop along the way.  Since I had been through more than a few states to get where I was, my credit card company decided at that moment to stop any further transactions on my credit card.  Here I am in the middle of nowhere and I do mean nowhere and my credit card gives me trouble.  So being the all-American than I am, I whipped out another credit card and starting pumping gas into my thirsty vehicle.  While pumping gas, I happened to turn around trying to find something to look at and what do you suppose I saw??  On the other side of the street, also in the middle of nowhere, was a big sign for Hancocks of Paducah!!  Imagine that!  I was in Paducah, Kentucky, home of the annual giant quilt festival.  Isn't it amazing what you can see if you just look around while filling your gas tank. Of course, it wasn't the right time of year and, of course, I didn't have time to go investigate the fabrics at Hancocks at right then but I did stop there on my way back from St. Louis.  Can't say that I was all that impressed once inside.  It was nice with plenty of fabric to look at/buy but I was on a mission to get some good red fabrics and only found one.  At least I can now say I've been to Hancocks of Paducah!

Here's a picture from my St. Louis trip.  I made sure to get the arch as proof I was there.  It's very pretty at night when it is all lit up.

After leaving St. Louis and stopping at Hancock's of Paducah, I headed back to Tennessee, spent a couple of days with my son and then headed home.

Happy sewing,
loreen

Where have I been??

Ok, ok.  I apologize for being gone so long from blogging.  I've been traveling, getting Mom moved, taking care of my aunt's house and time just got away from me. 

I've started back sewing, having bought a new sewing machine so I'll have a few projects to post when I get back from the trip I'm on now.  Working on a Christmas table runner that looks like packages with bows on it.  Really cute!  Also finishing up my pumpkin quilt that is already posted in my projects album.  I'm trying very hard to get some of these things all finished which can be a bit boring but always feels like an accomplishment when the last stitches in the binding are sewn.

Donna has been busy keeping up with the BOM from Bunny Hill Designs and I'm waiting for her pictures to post for you to see.  They are really cute!!

My son's gone to Tennessee to start school at Middle Tennessee in Murfreesboro.  He's a junior and having a great time because he gets to take all his music related classes (majoring in sound engineering and music production).  That was one of my trips.....helping him get his stuff (guitars, amps and all) up there and getting settled in.

I've got to get new pictures of my sewing buddy, grandson Caspian, on his album as well.  Geez, didn't realize how far behind I am!!

Keep sewing,
loreen

Boondoggle Rulers!

Just finishing a couple of table runners made with rulers that I picked up at a quilt show a few months ago called Boondoggle rulers (at least I hope that was it!).  I received a pattern with the rulers, thank goodness.  Otherwise I'd have had no idea where to begin.  The projects really went pretty fast once my friend and I got the hang of just how everything was cut out.  Most of the cutting was pretty simple until we got to the edges and had to use the side of the ruler.  We weren't sure at first whether to use the regular ruler or the "baby boondoggle".  After a couple of bad attempts, we got it right.  I think I'll cut a paper template on that half triangle cut and keep it with my rulers because I know my brain will never remember it later so why not make it easy on myself!  The sewing went quickly but you really need to lay out the pieces to get the angles right.  It's all straight seams.  Not a "Y" seam anywhere! Check out the table runners in the projects library.  One is done with vegetable fabrics and the other with Christmas fabrics.  Of course, I have to finish them up, quilting and binding so I'll post the finished products soon.  This is a project that can easily be done in a day start to finish.  Let's just see how long it takes ME to finish!!

from the Schoolhouse,
loreen

Slowly Getting It Done!

I had a chance to get the borders on the pumpkin wallhanging today.  It really looks much better with two borders.  I love the fall fabric on the outside border.  I'm not sure it shows as its best in the picture. 

Spent some of my time today drawing up a new pattern for a table runner.  There's been some new fabrics out that have fruits and vegetables on them.  Not a mixture like that old "Veg-All".  Anyone besides me remember Veg-All?  Do they still make it? Just the thought of that stuff makes me gag still!  I think it was the lima beans.  Anyway, this fabric mostly has just one fruit or vegetable on it.  I used some of it on the table runners I have just posted in my Projects album.  I have been trying to come up with an idea of how to put this fabric in its best light and it finally occurred to me today what to do.  Something for you to look forward to in the near future.  Of course it would be a table runner so that part was easy though you could make a wallhanging using the same pattern, just enlarging it to suit your fancy.  It's sort of a table on your table!!

Keep an eye out for the new pattern at the schoolhouse,
loreen

Pumpkin Wallhanging

So it's been some time since I last blogged.  I have been diligently working on a Fall project -- a big pumpkin wallhanging.  It was all done with my embroidery machine in the hoop.  A total of 25, yes 25, blocks!!  The design is a new one from Anita Goodesign and is really cute.  I've added some pictures of my progress in my projects album for all to see.  Even though their sample had one brown border, I thought it needed more so I'll be adding a small brown border and a fall colors border.  There won't be alot of quilting as this was similar to a crazy patch quilt so there's lots of fancy stitching in each square.  Can't quilt in those sections but I'll have to use some sort of tacking stitch to attach the front, batting and back of this wallhanging together. I'm going to look through my embroidery designs to see if I might have some small pumpkins or vines to quilt into the borders.

I've just sent out everyone's block #8 for the Bunny Hill Designs block of the month that we have all been attempting to work on.  Of course Donna has sent along a picture of her finished block #7 and I am, sadly, still on block #4!!  Be sure to check out Donna's latest block in the BOM album.

Added some new things to my website for all to see. www.therightspot.com  Found a terrific website from Australia that has the best embroidery designs and many are FREE!  There were lots of cute alphabets.  I especially liked the different ones for Halloweenie!!  I purchased the Nutcracker designs.........very nice!  Be sure to check it out soon!

Also, I've posted a new free foundation block at my website www.therightspot.com so be sure to go ahead and download that for your block "stash".  It's in pdf form to just print out and sew.

I'm working on a new set of projects and hope to be done soon so stay tuned for more project pictures and info.

from the Schoolhouse,
loreen