Sunday - Time Change

Well, did everyone change their clocks?  We did, but I do believe that for the first time in...ever...I took advantage of the extra hour of sleep, and then some.  Totally missed church.  Hubby needed hair cut, so I tagged along to pick up a few groceries.  We were there too early for the hair cut, so he said he would go back, he just needed to go to Home Depot to pick up some supplies for his building project.  After we got checked out and headed to the truck, he informs me that he isn't go to Home Depot, he is taking a day off.  As worn out as gets with anything lately, I am worried about his health, worried about how on earth he is going to manage to get through the rest of the house remodel jobs we have planned.

I on the other hand did a lot of work yesterday and this morning so am taking the afternoon and evening off.  Well, have to cook something for supper at some point, but other than that, I am just catching up on the computer, doing a little online shopping, and about to settle in with some project to work on.

I finally tackled my bedroom yesterday, took most of the day, but all the clothes are put up and the boxes are mostly gone.  Still have a box of glassware in there, but I am not about to put them in the storage building. Am hoping that after the first of the year when we redo the kitchen that I will have some storage space for them.  They were mom's and I just can't let go of them yet.  At least not until I can find some one that can tell me a little something about them, and if they are worth anything.  Mom called them her "Fostoria" glasses, but just not sure.  I did meet a lady that knows a lot about such things and am hoping to get her to the house one day soon to look them over.  At any rate, it is AMAZING how big my bedroom looks, and is, when all the stuff is gone.  I rearranged a few pieces of furniture and made room to put my mom's sewing machine cabinet in there.  I know have a card table set up to put my laptop on and to write on.  Was looking at buying a small desk, but am thinking I will just use the table a while and see what works and what doesn't before investing any more in furniture.  I have a recliner that is entirely too big for the space, but have to leave it as is until I get my living room arranged the way I want, the recliner may be going in there.  Our old PC is in the bed room, moving things around I am actually able to use it once again.  I hate typing on my laptop, keeping hitting something that moves the cursor all around.  Anyway, I bought a new mouse for my laptop and put the old one back on the PC.  Now have the printer right next to it and can sit down and still reach everything to do scanning.  The PC monitor is much larger as well, easier to see. I also went and uninstalled a whole bunch of stuff that never use to free up some space, loaded my new Quilt Design Wizard on it as well.  I created the drawing and directions of my first quilt yesterday morning.  It was fun and much easier than I had thought.  I know that EQ 7 would be really fun to work with, as you can scan your fabric in to it and see how it would look in a quilt.  But...at this point, I can keep playing with the Wizard which was so much cheaper.  Like is cost less than $15 and EQ 7 runs about $180.  I did find a place on line that had it about $30 cheaper, but still...at over a hundred dollars more I am content with what I have, which is much more than I had before.   An internet buddy told me that I would know when it was time to upgrade when I started wanting to do more with the design than I could do with the Wizard.  That I understand.

I also bit the dust and purchased PC Stitch 10.  It was less than $40, and have not bought from that site before so am praying that the transaction goes well.  I had a few bugs happen when trying to order, so am really praying that I didn't order three of them and didn't pay three times.  I also found a much cheaper brand of software, it was only $10, but it's capabilities were not really clear.  The PC Stitch describes being able to scan in a photo or image and turn it in to a chart.  Also has built in colors of all the major floss brands as well.  We will see what happens, I went with the more expensive one because I know people that have it and are using it and it stated that it could be used for beading, crocheting and quilting.

Eventually I am sure I will end up getting some type of software to do my own machine embroidery designs as well, but those programs are very expensive and I am just not ready for that yet.  After all, I did just purchase a new embroidery machine.  Granted it is not one of the top of the line fancy named machines, but for the type of work I do it will work perfectly and I am SOOO totally fine with the cost difference. I will see just how much I can do with what I have, how much I can't do that I wish I could, and then go from there.  I loose my head sometimes and start over supplying my needs for my various crafts.  Most people just do one type of craft, but not me.  Oh no, that would be too easy.  My problem is, so many of my crafts just overlap and run in to each other.

Can you tell I am a cheapskate.  Not an extreme one mind you, but if I can get the same item, same quality, some where for cheaper, than so much the better.  Especially since most of my projects are charity offerings.  How did I get started down this path you ask?  Let me tell you.  I first found that I have a passion for quilting.  A true God given talent and passion for it.  As I grew up, I learned the basics of sewing and crocheting.  I used those abilities from time to time as I became a wife and mom.  My oldest daughter as a toddler had a closet full of clothes, then for the boys too.  Hubby used to laugh at me when he would come home to find that I had been dumpster diving for sewing patterns.  Then, hubby's granny would take pity on me and help me advance my crochet abilities.  I also did a little embroidery from time to time as well.  Except for sewing, it just took me way to long to finish an item to suit me so I didn't stay with it long.  Every time I would get a craft area set up in the house, we either added to the family or moved.  I did ceramics for a while, miss it terribly, but the equipment alone takes up much too much space.  All those molds and a kiln.  When we moved to California, I found a church that had a quilt ministry.  I already knew how to sew, had always wanted to learn, and they had child care while we met. So joined in and found that I loved it.

Oh I jumped in that pond with both feet.  Got online and found some groups to join with, did swaps, round robins, even joined the local quilt guild.  They started me making small quilts, 32 x 32 inches called isolets.  They are used in the neonatal units to buffer the sounds and light for the premature and sick babies.  I met a friend, Cara.  In fact, we met online, noticed we were posting about the same speaker, she lived in the next town over but had joined the quilt guild as well.  Her two children were age wise on either side of my youngest.  We made a personal challenge of it, to see how many isolets we could get finished by the next meeting.  Then, she moved.  I really miss her.  In fact, she got me started in machine embroidery, then when I was kind of stale mated, she showed me the things to go with our machines to take it up a level.  Thanks to Cara I learned about free standing lace.

Then a lady asked me if I knew how to crochet. I told her just the very bare basics.  She wanted me to help make some hats to send to some soldiers.  She gave me a pattern, I bought some black yarn, and made a hat. Helmet liners they called them.  Okay...I bought a lot of black yarn...made 250 of those black buggers. Got tire of black so made a pair of slippers.  The soldier that I made them for said he had a bunk buddy that had really big feet, wondered if I could make him a pair.  So...I did, the guy wore like a size 15 boot.  That lead to some more request, they wanted colorful ones. You guessed it, I made like 200 pairs. Then my soldier (I had adopted this small unit, sent them all kinds of food, fun stuff, personal items) asked if I could maybe make a baby blanket and send it to his wife.  I made the crib size quilt, then decided to add a crocheted hat, sweater and booties along with it.  While waiting on my daughter at school one day, one of the teachers saw the baby set I was working on.  She hired me to make sets for her from time to time for shower gifts. That led to some charity sets that went to the army hospital for babies whose dad's were deployed.  A side track to that venture was rubber stamped announcements to be sent with them.  Then, I still don't quite know how it happened, I got lost in my second passion, crazy quilting.  I just fell in love with the embroidery embellishments that went along with it.

 That led me to do a lot of swapping of hearts.  This is one that I did and kept, but is nothing to compare with the ones that the other ladies were doing.  It was a true learning curve as I learned what embellishment were acceptable for cloth. What typed of products used in other crafts worked in this one.  I even bought a special rolling tote case so that I could pack up all my beads, threads, other decorations and take it all with me on a trip to Las Vegas with my hubby.  He went for work, so I had the whole day to myself in the room to work on this stuff.

You guessed it, I found a way to blend my machine embroidery with the crazy quilt blocks, the little car was done with my machine.

On any given block, you can have beads, sequins, ribbon, buttons, even jewelry pieces.

Then...I got stupid and decided I needed to take a full time job outside the home.  Thinking that I would be able to keep doing my crafts, I would cart the plunder back and forth.  It was about this time that I felt sorry for hubby having to listen to the whir of the sewing and embroidery machines all hours of the night and thought that scrapbooking would be the way to go, much quieter, didn't need as much room.  I was wrong, it is way more spread out.  Then there are all different types.  Scrapbook pages, card making, art journal, and so many techniques.  Stamping, ink embossing, texture embossing, ink, pen, markers, embellishments, on and on. Even went so far as try my hand at being a demonstrator for a home based rubber stamp company.  Yes...I was my biggest customer.

Oh, I could go on and on, but you get the picture.  So, I have been down sizing the supplies so to speak in order to put all my efforts in to only a few crafts.  That being quilting and crocheting.  I have a box of my mom's more special clothes, that have embroidery or cut work on them. Also a sack of my dad's ties. Have been saving odd fabrics for over twenty years and will use them with the clothes to make some crazy quilts.  Small one, lap size, for my brother, and then will maybe divide what is left in to four small throws so that each of my children will get one.  A memory thing, but I intend to work in some old photos of family members as well.  Will probably do this with the computer, photo print on fabric, but there may be some other ways as well.  I just ordered some software that will turn any photo or image into a cross stitch design. Much cheaper than the digitize version for machine embroidery and no learning curve either.

Of course, after doing so much hard work yesterday, and since I am still waiting on my AccuQuilt Go cutter to get here, I did do a bit of shopping.  Oh alright, a lot of shopping.  I am going broke getting updated supplies and new ideas.  Still have a couple of "carts" waiting on me to finish checking out.  So...now that I have had a really long break, I need to get back to work so I can spend the evening working on something...anything...just some of the many UFO's I have.  I have a huge stack of paper work and magazines to go through and purge down and then find a home for.

Will post photos of my progress so check back often.  Thanks for stopping in.

Got the bug!

It's official, I have the bug.  The quilting craft bug that is.

This was the last project I did.  My youngest grand son, Mr. M, was born 7 weeks early, weighing in at around 3.5 pounds.  I made this small quilt to cover his isolet in the hospital.  He is now over a year old.

Ain't he a cute thing?  I have fun with him, since I am daycare for him.  My oldest two grandsons live in Texas and I only see them about once a year.  That is hard, but that is how it has to be.

Before that, I made these.

The quilt set was a baby gift, although as I look at it am pretty sure that the sweater did not fit.  It seemed a little small when I made it, but I went with it any way.  The casserole carrier was a wedding gift.  I made the little pot holders out of the fabric that was cut out to make the handles area.

Now however, I am so ready to get working on some projects from my UFO list.

If you have been  following my blog, you already know that I have been on a long break from any crafting.  I used to have a corner of our bedroom for sewing. Then I was foolish and took a job outside the home, worked there for three years before resigning due to health issues.  Sadly, I don't qualify for any type of disability yet cannot go back to work.  I only went to work in the first place to earn work credits so I could draw my social security. Seems that even though I put in a fair amount of money over the years I worked before kids, I cannot draw any of it because I am lacking in the work credits.  Now I will never be able to get it.  Yes, I can draw on my husband, but darn it I paid that money in and should be able to get it.  At any rate, thought I would be working longer so packed up most of my quilting supplies since I didn't have time to work on anything.  Of course, when my dad passed away in 2003, I just kind of lost interest in any of it any way.  He was my biggest fan and with out him it just wasn't the same.  At any rate, I thought that I might like to start up scrapbooking.  So, I would take my check and buy all kinds of gizmos and gadgets for scrapbooking and lots of supplies in general for paper crafts.  Thinking I was preparing for my eventual retirement and would then have it all to work with when I no longer worked.  Only problem, I don't really like scrapbooking and it would seem that I am allergic to paper, well wood or wood products actually, and break out when ever I work with the papers.  I do however love to make cards, so guess the investment wasn't for nothing, except for a ton of rubber stamps I will never use.

Having all these supplies was a storage problem as you can well relate.  So...when youngest son moved in with a friend of his, I promptly repainted his room, moved my youngest daughter in to his room and then repainted her room and took it over.  Hubby calls it "the cave", I have tried to figure out a name for it.  Craft Cave, Sewing Studio, Diva Den, and so forth, but when I am talking to the family it just always comes out as "my room".  Sounds like I don't sleep with my husband, so don't like that part of it, so now it has just become the "spare room".  At any rate, I settled in and was actually doing quite a bit of work in there.

This is one of the ATC (Artist Trading Card) that I did with paper.  They are the size of a business card.

And of  course, I did some with fabric.  These are crazy quilt style.

I made card for various occasions, various techniques.

Then, I just got bored with all of it.  I did find that I really love the embossing part of the paper craft hobby.  Both texture embossing and ink embossing with heat.  The positive side, I know what I like to do.  The negative side, I have way too many supplies.  The really neat thing about it, most of my supplies can cross over so to speak.  In other words, a lot of my embellishments and ribbons for paper crafts can be used for crazy quilting and embroidery.  Some of the paper cutting equipment, the Cricut and Sizzix (die cutter) and be used for cutting quilting shapes.  And of course, I have bought more gizmos lately, for quilting my first love.

Back to the point, I had just really gotten settled in good when my mom become ill.  Soon as we found out she was terminal I packed it all up, put it in storage and turned it in to a bedroom for her to live here with us. I had a huge, I mean HUGE desk that I got spoiled to, that I got rid of when we did the change over.  I am so missing it, but there just wasn't any where to put it.  When mom passed away, we put in new carpet and I moved my supplies all back in, but I have kept some of her furniture from her little apartment.  Also bought a new sewing cabinet that has a built in cutting grid.  SO COOL!

If you want to take a peek, go to this post.  It shows the room how it is now. There are still a few changes I am going to make.  We are actually in the process of doing some remodel work on the house.  It has to go in a certain order, to make storing furniture easier, but the recliner was my mom's, I don't really like it and it is too big for this room, so am moving it in to the living room when I change out the furniture in there.  Long story for another time. I will be moving my mom's sewing machine cabinet (Kenmore model 90 machine inside it) in to our bedroom.  I should get rid of it, even though it sews wonderfully I know I will never use it. I do have loving sentimental attachments to it though.  However, this space where it is, I really need to move a small desk in here so that I have a place to write, go over bills, write out the menu plans and such so I need to get the PC and printer in here so I can easily scan and print from this room.  I also want to purchase a smaller chair and ottoman that has a pouch on each side to hold magazines, remotes and such, for in here when I move the recliner out.

So, here we are.  I am so ready to start working on projects once again.  That was a really long story to just say that when I was unpacking my supplies and stash, which I still haven't gotten all of it unpacked, just the part my hubby knows about. LOL  Any way, I found many unfinished projects, all in various stages.  Quilting, sewing garments, machine embroidery, crocheting and of course some paper crafts.  I have a good year or more worth of work, so can't possibly start anything new.  Except for some Christmas gifts.  Maybe a swap or two...okay, I will wait until after Christmas to get involved in any of that.  Maybe.

Well, thank you for stopping by.  Feel free to leave a comment, it is always nice to know some one is reading this.  Come back for a visit to see how I am doing with my crafting and what I am working on.

Hooking Again.

I have been doing a little hooking lately.  Steel hooks and yarn. LOL  I have been crocheting.  I have on and off over the years crocheted a lot of things.  Basic things, as I am mostly self taught and consider myself a beginner.  When I was little, it was necklace's.  Teen years it was granny square afghan's and baby blankets.  When I married, it was baby blankets a few lace collars and attempts at Barbie clothing.  Then it all go packed away and I didn't touch the stuff for many years.  Like about 15 years or so.  Then, I was asked to help make some hats for a couple of soldiers.  Will have to see if I can find those photos.  At any rate, I dug out my hook, bought some black yarn and started hooking again.

Those soldiers wanted more hats for their buddies, I made them up and sent them, 250 of them.  Then I tried my hand at some slippers, sent them.  Received an email from my soldier explaining that one of the guys had really big feet, could I make some for him.  So I did, and for a few of their friends, about 100 pairs when said and done.  Then I made some baby sets, which I sold as a gift set with a hand made quilt.  Then I put the hooking away, with all my quilting supplies, when I took a full time job for a few years.  Now that I am no longer working, some things have a way of working their way back out in the open.  I had intended to take up scrapbooking, card making, stamping and such, along with beading.  I have a room now over flowing with all these supplies.  As I was making the decision, and more importantly acting on that decision, to start paring down the supplies, the allure of hooking, and quilting, and sewing, called to me once again.

This time, it started with a cryptic email from my oldest daughter, the teacher.  She sent me a photo of a crocheted scarf.  Nothing telling me that she wanted it, nothing asking if I could make one, nothing even asking for one.  I did a little research, found out that it is called Queen Anne's Lace. So, I tried it out.

And I made one, gray, just like the photo.  Now, the photo was of one that a woman made and sold on Etsy. That of course put the seed of an idea that maybe I could do the same thing.  I think it looks nice.

Now, while all of this is taking place, our church put a little notice in the bulletin announcing that they are taking donations through January for cold weather items (scarves, hats, gloves, socks, etc.) for the Rescue Mission (a local homeless shelter)  My brain, which gets me in to more trouble than I care to admit, popped in to gear and told me to start hooking again.  So...I spent last week working on some sets in the evenings.

And there you go.  Two sets to take to church, along with some that I bought at the dollar store (that are thin fleece) so feel that I have participated enough.  I have also created/designed my own pattern for a scarf.  It is pretty simple, but I am well pleased with the look of it.  Although, it is taking me way longer than I like to get very far along with it, so have put it up for a few days while I work on something else. However, that little seed of an idea, about Etsy, just kept growing and I took the plunge, I opened an account and will start listing some things there.  You can list hand made goods, vintage items and supplies. I have some one in the family that would love to get some American Girl outfits, feel pretty sure that they would sell well too. I will be spending some time (okay, a lot of time) photographing some vintage shoes, patterns, figures and such to put in my store. Listing some supplies as well that I have found while cleaning.  There will be more I am sure when I hit this Diva Den aka sewing/craft room for a mad cleaning and organizing session.  Also going to move things around a bit to see if I can make a little more working room.

Did I mention that when I head in to a hobby I head in head first with both feet?  I have found a couple of PIGS (projects in grocery sacks) I am going to finish up and then see if I can either sell them or donate them.  And, as if I really have enough time for that kind of thing (taking care of a baby again) I have jumped in and joined some crochet swaps once again.  However, this time I am at least attempting to be more organized about it.  Before I signed up for the swaps I completed my offerings for the swaps then created a detailed spread sheet for swapping.  Oh go ahead and laugh, but when I use to swap, I would mail out 10-12 packets every month.  I also know myself well enough that it won't be long before I am up to that point again.  There are crochet swaps, embroidery swaps, quilt swaps and more.  When I was doing paper crafts, I was mailing off at least that many per month, but I am not letting myself getting back in to the paper crafting on that big of scale.  Only to make a few private cards or lay outs.

On the menu plan front, I have planned out a few weeks worth, for the most part I have been following it.  Not exactly, but close.  My oven is still out and so I am working on trying to make the same dish either in the microwave, on the stove top or in the crock pot.

Well, I have pretty much wasted the day away, just not feeling well and the wind is blowing in a winter storm along with a ton of dust.  Makes my head hurt.  So, I am off to do a little hooking before I have to start our dinner.  Not part of the menu plan, but when hubby offers (with a lot of prodding) to grill steaks, I don't complain, just accept it.  Thanks for stopping by, come and visit again soon.  Feel free to leave a comment.