Doggie world

I was going to show a pic of the bits and pieces I have put together for the BOM, but the quality was no good. Confession time though - I did place a "small" order with Fat Quarter Shop last nigh with bits I think will fit in :-9

So instead this:

Quilty as charged :-o OK Mom, I know that I'm old enough (10 yrs coming October) to know better, but making your bed is sooooo much fun. Or rather - unmaking it.......sorry, couldn't help myself there.

True to our origin, we do love to bask in the sun. Somehow we know that these warm, sunny days are soon over, so we take every chance we get to bask. And if there isn't enough sun on both beds, we love to snuggle up on one ;-)

Auditioning

This afternoon I finally mustered up the courage to open the first bag containing the instructions for the first Butterfly Garden BOM. What was I afraid of? I understood it all :-) After reading it through I just had to start auditioning fabrics and I started with the big floral that is going to be the focal point and color setter for the entire quilt.

Even before I go the BOM pattern I had a vision of what colors I wanted to use - ruby red, mossy green and some yellow thrown in. Going through my piles of fabrics I realized that I own very, very few big floral prints. Started with the reds-burgundy-pinks:

Coming this far it struck me - Wolfie these are your so you colors and honestly - a bit of a bore!
Working my way down the stacks without anything screaming "pick me", I decided to have a look at the    lighter greens and found this:

and this one practically yelled at me ;-) The colors in the pic doesn't do justice to the actual fabric. I felt this little twirp of happiness, talk about going outside the box/comfort zone. Next to that fabric was these:

Once again - the colors in the pics are a bit of...sigh. But they match the chrysanthemums perfectly!

Delving into the FQ box rendered this collection:

Went through the box of charm packs and found a few bits. I started to go through the scrap bags, but when I finished the yellow and was into the red, I heard some ominous sounds from above and right - these danged dogs of mine had played in our bed and thin mattresses and covers has all on the floor - grrrrrr! The beasts has sought sanctuary in Sam's room, otherwise I think I would have shut them in the boiler room :-O Nahh, would never do that, but put them outside maybe?

Anyhow, I now have a little collection to start of with, but if I know me - I will probably make some online purchases for more supporting actresses LOL. I absolutely need some more fabrics (FQs will do) for the hearts, strange that I don't own just the color that sing with the chrysanthemum fabric ;-) But I absolutely need a hoop and embroidery floss if I will be able to make the first block. Gawd, this is soooo exiting!! 

Yet one more

All done free hand (without any wine), which shows LOL. Decided to do some butterflies but only one look so-and-so, the rest looks like ???? Well, next time I draw these little buggers first;-)

Happy yayy

At the same minute I parked my car outside our gate, a postal van drove up alongside and a guy asked if I was living "there" and yeah, I am. So I got me a package and not any old package, but the one from Aztek Rose in Holland containing these goodies:

Issue No 3 and 4 of Vignette Magazine, the full set of Butterfly Garden by Leanne Beasley, one piece of Kona solid fabric and one piece of ironing on muslin (there must be a reason why I did order that.....), two package of embroidery needles (my mistake - I wanted one package of each embroidery and applique needles and one bottle of Roxanne's baste glue.

I have browsed through the magazines and looked at the needles, remembering that I have a package of small appliqués needles in my toolbox. But I have not yet opened up the BOM package.....I want to be of somewhat crisp mind when I do so - bear in mind that I have never done anything like this, so I want to be able to understand the instructions for the first BOM ;-)  Right now I'm not there at all.

I got an email from the sweet Karen at Aztek Rose this morning, telling about an exiting new project that is a joint venture between Australian and European designers called Quilt Aid - check it out, it looks great! Don't you just love the colors of these Moda fabrics? :-)

Persistently I continue with my FMQ samplers and yesterday I used an old leftover block:

It looks a bit better than the others and I find it somewhat interesting that the white parts that on the un quilted block lays flat along with the other bits, but when quilted this way, the look like they have risen above the rest ???

Once upon a time

I have my own website and a blog in Wordpress. I created all the graphics myself in PSE (PhotoShop Elements) and some was quite good -
like this:

Or this:

Kind of dark and sinister both of them - huh?

And then my logo:

The logo isn't the sharpest you have seen, but heck if I can find the good version on our LAN disc where all my stuff is backed up :-(

So why are I showing you this? Well.... the above graphics are made in PSE for Windows (I thought myself everything) and now I'm using PSE 8 for Apple and to cut it short - we are not on friendly terms. Far from it.

I have a wast collection of brushes, fonts and layer styles from the Window time and they do work in this fruity version too. But it's been some time since I played around and now when I was struck by the urge of creating my very own header for this blog, I just can't find these danged layer styles. They don't show up on the screen at all. There is probably some button to push, but heck if I can find it.....Honestly, I'm on the verge of highjacking The DHs gaming 'puter and install my good ol' Win PSE for and copy all them xtra goodies that are stored on the LAN disc. Ohm, of course I have them copied to the fruity version of PSE :-) I just can't access the layer styles....brushes and custom shapes shows up though.

Well I have no clue on what to cook for dinner, so I have some more time to "play" around. If this PSE was a living creature I would for sure strangle it's scrawny neck ROFLMA.

Scrappy clean up

Back when I had a website for my Botanical Perfumery, I taught myself not only to design and create a website, but how to change things within a WordPress blogg theme. I have tried in wain to do the same with a Blogger template - anyone who knows how to work the HTML editor to import your own header and sidebars and change the colors, please give me a holler. I am utterly frustrated :-(

So - while looking for some left over jelly roll strips to make some FMQ sandwiches of, I realized that my (rather small) collection of scraps was in an unholy mess and decided to do something about it. I mean - I'm not a Virgo for nothing am I? Said and done; sorting everything by color, throwing away bits way too small to use for anything, putting them all into ziplock bags (which is not as easy as you would imagine to get hold of larger over here), pressing out the surplus air before putting them in a spar box.

In that large paper shopping bag I also found a whole bunch of left over blocks from my niece's America quilt, some spare melon wedges from my MILs Double Wedding Ring quilt and some blocks that I only had one of. So why not use these single ones as FMQ test pads?? They are now spray basted and just wait for me to decide on how to do it. I probably need to do as yesterday, have a nice glass of wine while I do it.

Oven rosted chicken (stuffed with ginger, lemon and hot chili) and gratin aux potatoes for dinner. Standard for every second Sunday dinner around here :-)

Feathers and mushrooms

Yesterday The DH came home from another mushroom hunt with 5kg :-o  (round 10lbs I think) Autumn chanterelles:

Uncleaned

Cleaned

We sat down on the patio and spent round 2 hrs cleaning it all and got a nice dose of fall sunshine too :-)

After spending round 1hr to parboiling and packaging, I sat down at my Horizon with a glass of wine within easy reach (suggested by quilting people who really know their stuff ;-) and played some more with FMQ and this time I am kind of pleased with the outcome:

because I am in fact, a total noob at this .

Well first put a load in the washer machine, then sewing some unwanted jelly strips (that is strips I will never use cause I simply don't fancy the) together for more  FMQ test sandwiches.

Oh - almost forget to tell the best news of all (well from a quilting perspective that is) - my package with Butterfly Garden and basic stuff for embroidery and the two latest issues of Vignette magazine is on it's way from the shop with the best customer care I have ever encountered - Aztek-Rose in Holland. How exiting is that? :-D Wonder how fast/slow it will take for it to make the journey from Holland to Sweden??

Have a lovely Sunday.