Home for the Holidays... At Home with Quilts

Home for the holidays ... well at least with my heart in this 2010 holiday season!  Last July I went home to Nebraska for a family reunion and had the pleasure of meeting the Crazy Quilt Guild, lead by Linda Clements and Janet Prior, owner of Prior's Fabrics.  They organized an evening of show & tell and I gave a SCHMETZ needle presentation.  The evening worked out beautifully despite a tornado warning.  The ladies, young & young in spirit, brought quilts that they lovingly made.  And some of the girls even brought their 4-H projects soon to go on to competition at the Chase County Fair.  Take a look at these wonderful quilts from the great plains of Nebraska. . . .




Thank you ladies for the warm welcome and sharing your quilts.  Seeing your quilts and hearing your quilt stories made my heart swell with enthusiasm for the love of our hobby.

I'll be back next year with more stories from my travels, some of my misadventures with sewing and a few new products you will want to try.  So hurry up and finish your 2010 projects, so you can make a fresh start on your 2011 sewing projects!
Happy New Year!
Sew SCHMETZ!
Rhonda

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A World of Good Wishes

If you sew chances are good that you also dabble in a few other hobbies.  I am not a scrapbooker, but for nearly 15 years my dabbling has been close by being the custodian of family contacts - keeping track of aunts, uncles and cousins on my Mom's side of the family.  Don't use fabric or thread here, but a few sewing tools and stash items sure are imperative.  Here's what I do...

Choose a beautiful Christmas or holiday card.  I combine birthdays and anniversaries in a running list, then dedicate one page per family with mailing addresses and other contact information.  Most of the time I need to trim standard 8/5" x 11" paper to fit the card, so I use the Roll The Gold Titanium Blades.  These blades cut slick... on paper and fabric! 

Roll The Gold
45mm Titanium Rotary Replacement Blades

I fold the family info sheets and secure them in the card with ribbon from my stash.  Plus this year I found cute little 3D poinsettias to further embellish the sheets.

Ribbon From The Stash

Yesterday I combined 18 Christmas cards with the family address book.  Since all the supplies were handy, this project took about 4 hours - printing the address sheets took the longest chunk of time.  Christmas cards are in the mail and will hopefully make their destinations in time for Christmas. 



SCHMETZ Needles,
Iris Pins, Roll The Gold

On behalf of http://www.schmetzneedles.com/ I wish you a very merry holiday season. . . . .  And during the hustle and bustle when you are in need of a little "quiet" time, sit down at your sewing machine and remember SCHMETZ needles make your sewing projects sooooo much better!

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Let It Snow . . .

Last weekend Chicago land - which is where I live - was blanketed with a beautiful white and fluffy snow.  I just could not stop myself . . .  Since becoming a photo bug I bundled up to take pictures of the glistening wonderland before the wind had a chance to change the winter scape.  Take a look...

Snow Covered Berries

I adore the red berries on this tree.  Some of the berries are nearly translucent from the freezing temperature.  When I looked at the whole tree against the snow background my first thought was translating it into embroidery.  Wouldn't this pic make a beautiful embroidered block?  Wouldn't this be spectacular on a white Ultrasuede, which I recently found  in my stash.  Something to ponder.....

Limelight Hydrangea

This summer I planted 8 Limelight Hydrangea.  To say they were magnificent is an understatement.  For new plantings the blooms were impressive - robust and full.  . . . .  I'm imagining next year's growth . . .  but to get back on track I love the way snow created domes on the blooms.  Now I'm wondering how I can translate these regal snow globes into embroidery.  Any ideas?  I better start collecting white, silver and iridescent threads.

Dogwoods

With the dogwoods I love the snow resting gracefully on the red branches.  Hey, I think this could be a very cool 10" embroidery block.  Well it looks like I have the beginning of an Ultrasuede quilt or at least an embroidery series, but first...

. . . . I better finish another project I started during Thanksgiving. During last weekend's snow storm I squared up my embroidered blocks using the Roll The Gold blades. Have you tried them yet? Smooth as butter, these blades cut effortlessly. With the Titanium coating they last a long time, but I like that I can cut faster and more accurately. The 45 mm blades - they are sold in 2 and 10 packs - work with all the rotary cutters found in my drawer - Olfa, Clover, Dritz, etc.

 

I'm taking a few days off for the holiday.  Hopefully I can finish a couple projects and start some new ones.  You know how it is... always creating in my mind and hopefully . .  with my hands.

 

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