Saturday, December 31, 2011

It's Almost 2012

Our New Year will be starting out on a sad note.  My father-in-law passed away yesterday, and we will be attending his funeral on Monday.  He was 94 years old and the last of our parents to pass, so I can't help having the feeling that we are now officially the older generation.


I wish you good health, happiness, and lots of sewing in the New Year! 

  I have really enjoyed getting to know so many of you this past year.  Thanks to all of you for stopping by and reading my blog.

Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Christmas Gifts

We had a wonderful Christmas.  Here are some of my presents. 
 
From my son and daughter-in-law I got the two Material Obsession books. I love the quilt on the cover of the first book.  The red polka dots really make that quilt sing.
 

This quilt is from the second book.  Each block has 72 pieces.  I think I'll put
this on my to do list.   Maybe I'll try just one block and make a pillow.


My daughter gave me this book of Crochet Borders.  There are some great ideas in this book, and I plan to use one of the borders in this book on the afghan I'm crocheting now. 



I also got this Jennifer Chiaverini book, too.  I plan to reread the rest of the Elm Creek series before I read this one. 


We didn't have a white Christmas, but we did have a little bit of snow today.  It had already melted some when I took this photo, but I always love the way our woods looks when it snows. 


I hope you all had a nice Christmas and that you are finding some time to do a bit of stitching.

Thanks for stopping by for a visit! 
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Saturday, December 24, 2011

Merry Christmas

I hope you are all enjoying your Christmas Eve celebrations.  I'm about ready to leave for church to sing in the Christmas Eve service.  My son is music director and he, my daughter and daughter-in-law will all be in the choir loft singing carols this evening, so it should be fun.

The thing I love most about Christmas is how the lights look after dark.  We leave them up as long as possible...They usually come down the day after New Year's Day.  Here are just a few of my favorite Christmas ornaments:

This is one I made from back in my cross stitch days.

This log basket is even older.  This is from my needlepoint phase.

My daughter knit this darling little Christmas stocking.



And here's another one she made.

This is our family room tree.  It isn't a beauty, but it is all full of happy memories from family and Christmases gone by.  I crocheted the tree skirt several years ago.

This is the blue tree in the dining room.  I put this one up pretty quickly and not all of the ornaments made it out of the box, but I love how it looks after dark when all of the blue lights show.  I crocheted this tree skirt from the same pattern as the other one.


I always think of my parents at this time of year and remember our holidays together.  My Mom loved to make these beaded ornaments from kits, and I have a lot of these to enjoy on our tree every year. 









 

This crocheted Santa was made by my husband's Grandmother.  I imagine this ornament is about 35 years old. 


A friend of my Mom's made these Wizard of Oz ornaments.  There is a lot of work on these.


This one came from a former neighbor that was a Lucy to my Ethel.  She got into some mail order clown sewing scheme and ended up having to pay her way out of the mess.  She bought this musical clown ornament as a reminder of the laughs we had over that.





I wish all of my followers and blog readers a very Merry Christmas.  I appreciate each and every one of you stopping by Loose Threads.

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M E R R Y   C H R I S T M A S!

Thursday, December 22, 2011

Christmas at My House

These are some of my favorite Christmas things ........


The candle ring in the photo came from a shop that I discovered while shopping in Shipshewana.  My daughter crocheted the doily underneath with the green trim.  I love these new Cottage magazines. They come out 4 times a year, and the Autumn and Christmas issues were just beautiful.





This lighted quilt shop came from friend Jackie V. from Washington. 


This beautiful garland of gingerbread men and hearts was made for me by Roswitha - Blauraute blog.  She had a contest on her blog, and I guessed closest to the correct number of spools of thread that she showed in a photograph.  I love this hung in the center of our mantel between our stockings. 



This wreath was made by a distant cousin. Underneath is a wire wreath form, and there are three layers of little fabric "pillows" that are stuffed with polyfil and then tied onto the form with a ribbon.  These are really easy to make and are a great use for your Christmas or red and green scraps. 

These are favorite Christmas quilts.  The top one is from back in my Thimbleberry phase.  I don't recall the name of the pattern, but it was easy to put together.  I hadn't had my Bernina very long, and I practiced couching some gold glittery trim around the ribbon. 

The second quilt is a combination.  The center was a feathered star block that I made as the center for a round robin that I was in, and I changed my mind and made a different center.  The blocks that surround it are from a Dear Jane Christmas swap that same year. 

The bottom quilt always makes me smile.  My friend, Gini, and I got together at her house and made a couple of huge stacks of large nine patches to put together for charity quilts.  It just happened that we piled some of the red and green nine patches together, and I remarked that they would make a great Christmas quilt.  In a few days Gini came to my door carrying the quilt on the bottom of the ladder.  I machine appliqued' the candy canes in the alternate squares and on the corners, quilted it, and put the binding on. 



I crocheted this Christmas afghan years ago from a pattern from a good friend from Michigan.  I love this shell pattern. 


I also crocheted this Christmas ripple afghan...don't remember where the pattern for this one came from. 
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These bubble lights have been in my family for a lot of years.  They are always in the center of my mantel. 


I hope you are enjoying some of your favorite things this Christmas.

Thanks for stopping by for a visit

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Early Christmas Presents

In last weeks mail I received a surprise parcel from Roswitha from Blauraute blog for Christmas.  Roswitha and I have become friends through email and have exchanged parcels for awhile now, but this one came as a wonderful surprise. 

I really love this beautiful crochet doily that she made.  I'm not sure what this is called in German, but I call this filet crochet.  This is one type of crochet that I haven't tried, but I really like how it looks. 

This doily looks so pretty on my kitchen table underneath this Christmas cake stand that belonged to my Mom.


Roswitha also sent me this cute redwork snowman pillow.  Since he is a snowman and not just for Christmas, he will stay out so I can enjoy him through the winter months. 


Here is a view of the back.  The  pillow fastens with 3 heart shaped buttons.  I really enjoyed this package Roswitha.  Thank you so much for the lovely Christmas surprise.

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Then a few days later I got another surprise parcel from my friend, Val in Canada.  She made me this cute bag with kitten faces.  This little bag is just perfect for holding everything I need for a redwork project. 

Val also included these two balls of yarn.  She knows how much I like to knit and crochet, and I'll have some fun making something from this pretty yarn.  Val is really an awesome knitter, and you can see some of her projects here on Ravelry.  Thanks for the surprise, Val.


I hope that your Christmas is full of surprises, too. 

Thanks for stopping by for a visit! 

Saturday, December 17, 2011

Christmas Present Wall Hanging

 I just got back in town this evening from helping my daughter pack some of her things in preparation to move.  She has just finished her Masters Degree in Statistics from Purdue University and will be staying with us for awhile while she is job hunting. 

Before I left to go help her pack, I did a bit of Christmas decorating.  I finished machine quilting this Christmas Present wall hanging, and just finished sewing the hanging sleeve on before I left.  This is the Charming Christmas Present Wall Hanging that I showed and gave cutting instructions for in this post.  The link to the instructions is also listed in Tutorials and Patterns on my sidebar. 

The angel in the photo above was made by my Mom when she did ceramics.  I'm so glad to have these things to remember her by to display at Christmas.

I love this Flurry fabric by Kate Spain.

I quilted an all over paisley design on this wall hanging. 



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UPDATE:   Go over to Jeanne's blog, Luv2Stitch, and look at these three friends that I met years ago in Shipshewana.  They have each made their own Christmas Present Wall Hangings.  Wow!  They are all wonderful! 
Christmas Eve is a week from tonight, and there is still an awful lot to do.  I'm hoping to get a lot done this coming week. 

I'll write a tutorial for how to make a hanging sleeve and sew it onto the back of a wall hanging or quilt soon. 

Thanks for visiting. 

I hope you are prepared for Christmas and have time to do some stitching.

Saturday, December 10, 2011

Fabric Shopping

Here are some fabrics that I bought while I was at the retreat a few weeks ago.  I haven't had a lot of time for sewing lately, but if I did I think I would love to cut into some of these things that I bought. 

Both of the quilt shops that I frequent in Shipshewana (Lollys and Yoders), had big displays of black and white fabrics with both yellows and reds.  I kept coming back to the black and yellow combination, and here is what I brought home with me.  I don't really have a plan for these yet.  Any ideas?


Here are some red and white fabrics that I bought to go with some of my redwork projects.



I think they will look nice with my Norwegian Christmas Hearts project.  I finished the last two heart stitcheries at the retreat. 

This jelly roll of Kaffe Fassett is from fall 2011.  I have no plan for it yet.  It was just pretty.......

I have a little pattern that I want to do in bluework, and I think this will work for that.  I really do try to buy fabrics with a purpose in mind, but that doesn't always happen. 
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I hope you are spending some time this weekend in your sewing room.

Thanks for stopping by for a visit today! 

Monday, December 5, 2011

Design Wall Quilt Basting

 There hasn't been a lot of sewing done here this week, but I have done some quilt basting using 505 Basting Spray on my design wall.  This quilt is called Nine Patch and Hourglass from the book Quick and Easy Scrap Quilts by Leisure Arts. 

 

This fall tree is from several years ago.  The idea for this quilt came from an old  watercolor quilt book.

 

This is a two color applique' wall hanging from Pacific Rim Quilt Company called Sunflower Fields.  These quilts are really a lot of fun to applique'.



I drafted the pattern for this quilt from the HGTV show Sarah's House.  This is taken from the antique quilt that hung on the wall of her guest room at her summer house. 



I made this table runner to show different ways to use churn dash blocks. 



Be sure to visit Judy at www.patchworktimes.com to see what is on others design walls.

Thanks for stopping by for a visit today! 
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