Hi there,  Thank you all for visiting my blog. I know it has been forever since I posted but I am getting ready to start up again.  Am visiting with my cousin and she is helping me get restarted.  Seeing how many hits I have had despite not posting GREATLY encourages me.  I will be back very very soon.
Love to all Joanne.

Crocheting ..... and a life shared

In the past year there have been periods of time that I have been physically unable to sit at the machine and sew.  Rather than allow myself to get frustrated and depressed ... as is quite easy for me to do ...... I picked up an old past time of mine ... Crocheting.

At first it bothered my hands a lot but then I found these new ergonomic hooks.  There are a few different kinds, so I tried a few till I found one that worked best for me.... it is flat with a small cushioned area in just the right spot.  Now I crochet away.  There was also another problem .... because of some of the very strong medicine I was on; it was difficult for to fully concentrate to follow the directions.  My husband and I had many a good laugh over some of my strange creations.  But I happily crocheted odd shaped scarves and hats for friends and family.... who very politely thanked me for the "lovely" creation.

Then I found a charity that was looking for people to make 8 inch squares either knitted or crocheted.  A SQUARE !!!!!  I can do that !!!  Yippee!!! So I made about 100 squares for the orphanages in Rwanda and other places in Africa. No directions to follow and it was good strengthening exercise for  my fine motor skills.  It kept my wandering spaced out drugged mind occupied. AND the square was actually useful to someone in this world.  I was happy.

As time went by and the drugs lessened I was able to do more with the crocheting and made a Granny Square blanket.  A very basic design but a major accomplishment for me.  The picture below is my blanket:

I found a pretty throw made with hexagons in a granny-square-type pattern. I still had trouble following the instructions but when I could not figure it out, I just made up my own pattern.  It all worked except when I made 7 sided motifs instead of 6 ... :-).  Below is that blanket ....

Publish Post

The tedious part is weaving all the hanging strains back into the pattern.  You can see there are plenty to do via the next picture .....

On my last post I mentioned that we are eagerly awaiting the birth of my niece's (Jenica) second baby, a little girl named Aubrey.  It is a happy/sad time for all of us because in April my sister & Jenica's mother, Melinda died very unexpectedly and quickly.  

She was at Pilates and started feeling short of breath.  By the time the paramedics got her to the hospital she was comatose and expired the next day.  She had a massive brain hemorrhage.  A very tragic event for all of us but we are getting thru. It is hardest, of course, for my niece. She is an only child herself and her second child is her first little girl.

There were no goodbyes but my sister was a registered organ donor. About 3 weeks after her death we received a letter from the Life Sharing Group that her donation had help over 60 people with organs and tissue donation.  That meant a lot to all of us.

 Melinda  L. Moore

Melinda and her daughter, Jenica

Melinda and grandson, Brody

Thank you for stopping by and reading the blog. I would love to hear from you if you would like to leave a note.  Thank you and God Bless.     Joanne

PS I will post pictures when Aubrey arrives !!!!

Brody's Quilt

Hello again, have had a couple of  things occur to prevent me from blogging.  One being that I am having to relearn how to manage the pictures.  I continue to persevere.

• This posting is about Body's quilt.  Brody is my niece's  2.5 year old son who is a bundle of activity and brings us lots of joy.  The picture below is the bedding set that his Mom got for his crib and room when he was born.  Now Brody has a little sister on her way in just 6 weeks.  So his parents set up his crib to be a big-boy-bed.  Then my niece (Jenica) got the idea of turning the baby quilt  into a quilt big enough to fit the big-boy bed.   Obviously, the big rectangle in the photo is the baby quilt.

 I came up with a design and then we spent some time shopping for the perfect fabric.  Jenica lives at least 45 minutes away from me, so we decided to for me to spend Memorial weekend at her house sewing. That way we could work straight thru and not waste time with all the driving or gas money.

At first I thought I could just build the larger size quilt around the smaller one. But I quickly realized that that was a poor plan.  Brody's Mom and I took his little quilt apart and began the process of "building" the new one. 

First came the striped fabric and getting the "perfect" mitered corners in place.  Then a wider navy perimeter was added to the quilt and then another round of stripes ...... (By the way, did you know how hard it is to match navy blue?  I really did not realize how many shades of navy blue there are in this universe  Egads! That was a pain to accomplish!) .......  The quilt was looking pretty good at this point.  Brody was enjoying watching his quilt grow and would often jump up and down on it to show his enthusiastic  approval.    Similar to the kitty-help I have at home !!

Another round of stripes and navy and we were ready for the best part of the design (IMHO) ..... adding all the stars around the edge that will drop down on the side of the bed

And more stars .......

While I was sewing my niece, Jenica , started working on her own project .... making hair-bows for her daughter, Aubrey who is due to arrive July 6 via C-section.  (Jenica calls her C-section date Aubrey's   "eviction notice".)  Jenica loves the baby bows that are so popular right now so she bought a few.  But after a thorough inspection she realized she could make her own.  So she has been hard at work creating her own hair adornments for her daughter.  She came up with some real pretty ideas and each bow was better than the one before.  Jenica's bow work space and mess ! I had the other end of the table to mess up!

Here are some of her initial creations.  Aubrey will be "styling" from the day she is born!!!!  A bow to match each onesie outfit !

Finally the new flimsy (quilt top) is on the bed and it fits just great!  







We finished the 3 day weekend by making the quilt sandwich.  I have it at my house now and it is slowly being finished.


I hope this posts with all the pictures clear.  For some reason I am still struggling with using the new blog program with IPhoto.  I know it is just me .... with each tutoring session I learn and retain a little more.  


Thanks for stopping by.   God bless you all!

Butterfly Garden

Butterfly Garden

My last attempt to load the photos obviously failed, but my DD from D.C. has been visiting and while here she is trying to teach me how to upload the photos .... after she first figures it out for herself.  So here I go again ......

Back to the Butterfly Garden project that I have been slowly working on.  My cousin, Cathy, and I both fell in love with this design and decided to do it together.  I chose it ... well, first because it is gorgeous .... and at then, because I was looking for a project I could pick up and work on by hand on days that I am unable to sit at the machine for very long.

After piecing   the individual nine blocks together I had 9 small blocks to make EACH Big Block (BB) square ....  81 small blocks  = 9 BB ....  just sound of that number makes me tired.  I did not realize until I wrote this truly how much prep work went into the start of the quilt. 

This is one BB.  Another reason I chose this quilt was to practice my appliqué technique.  I used to make a lot of appliqué quilts but have not done so in many years.  I stuffed the flower centers and butterfly body for a tarpunto effect.  Here is some detail on it ....

This next clip is a close up on the embroidery.  I love how there is such variety of handwork to do on this 

quilt.  I began to get even more creative on this block and added some beads to the butterfly wings.

Big Block #3 is almost finished .... so I almost have 3 out 9 BBs completed.  

If you look closely below, in the small light blue square you will see buttons instead of the original design's embroidered flowers.  They don't show up too well in the pix ..... it would help if I cropped the pix better ..... but, oh well, that is another lesson.

 My cousin is doing her BG Quilt in 30s fabrics and it too looks very pretty but also very different.    I have  seen many other color combos with this design on the internet.  All of them are gorgeous!   It is inspiring to see how each individual interprets the same design.  The variety of  color combos everyone has is amazing.  It is part of what I love about quilting ... such individuality and all so pretty.

One day this will hang on my living room wall behind the couch.  I have a lot of  
dark  brown in that room so this will set it off nicely.  Brown and aqua is just one
of my favorite color combinations ..... as is purple and green or yellow ... oh, and
I love red and aqua also.  Do you have fav color combos that you repeatedly
lean towards in your creative process?


Would love to hear from you ...... Love and hugs with happy stitches.