In a Sewy Mood

I finished painting my sewing/laundry room yesterday afternoon. Today I'm doing about 2 weeks worth of laundry. I hate laundry. I don't mind the putting in the washer and then transferring it to the dryer, but I hate folding and putting it away.

Having not really sewn in about 6 weeks I'm itching to get back to it. We still need to put new linoleum down in there, but I can start putting fabric back in the cupboards and drawers and start setting things up.

Of course, I have about 10 quilts in progress and fabric to make ties for my boys when I figure out what I'm going to line them with. However, I also have fabric for a few quilts that I haven't started I'd like to get working on. Plus I've seen several quick projects recently I would like to do. One of them is this:

Petal Pillow Tutorial

Don't you love it! I want to make one for a chair I have in my entry.

I also bought this Amy Butler fabric at the top of the page. Blogger won't let me pull it down. I'm thinking it would be a super cute apron. I need some fabric for ruffles first though.

I also have a pillow pattern (but no fabric yet) for a super cute pillow for my daughter's room that has flowers made of ric rac + tons of ric rac trim. Can't wait to do that one!

Now.... to finish the final clean up of the laundry room so I can get started.

It's about TIME!!!!!!

It's about time I finished a quilt, don't you think? I made this one for my newest niece. I've had it quilted for about 6 weeks, then the laundry room situation happened and it didn't get bound. My niece was due on the 18th of this month, but surprised us by coming last Thursday. I hurried and bound it on my garage sale, $20 Bernina and took it up to the hospital.

I love the velvet ric rac. This is it after it's been washed once. No rolling!

I ran out of backing so I had to piece a little.

I think this is the last quilt I will be making as a gift, at least until my kids are older. I'll be working on other things, but with three little kids, one of them not quite 13 months I can't handle having deadlines to finish. It was a nice thought though!

Quilt Festival

I joined Amy's Creative Side's quilt festival. Here is my entry!

I don't know that I have a favorite quilt, but this is one I love. The is the first quilt I made for my baby girl one year ago. I love the bright fun colors of Bubblegum Basics. I had had the pattern for several years just hoping I'd have a baby girl to make it for someday. I always love to use ric rac. It's just a fun, happy quilt.

Don't forget to check out the other quilts in the quilt festival!

Garage Sale End Table

This table was another garage sale find I found last Friday. I think I paid $8 for it. I forgot to take before pictures until I had primed the legs. They were forest green before.

Here is a close up of the top.

I decided to paint it turquoise. Apparently I can't get enough lately.

Then I put a faux glaze on top.

And here it is in my house. Not sure what I'm going to put on top.... or if I'm just going to end up painting it black, but I do need to add more color to my room.

Framed Pear

One thing I'm always on the lookout for at yard sales is picture frames. I found these cute chunky frames and there were two of them! I didn't know what I'd use them for and then saw this. First I spray painted the frames. They were a flimy white color. Do you know the one I'm talking about? White washed or something? Anyway, they're black now. Then I got some scrapbook paper I liked and just glued it to the cardboard in the back.


I cute the pear in half. About 2/3 of the way through the knife wouldn't go any further. Yes, there was a huge "pit". A little cement disk to give it weight. I had to carefully peel one side of the pear off so that I could peel out the "pit". The I glued the good half of the pear down with E6000. No, this one is not centered. It was at one time and then I accident picked it up too soon. It left a small glue trail and I ended up positioning it slightly off to cover the glue. Oops. Then I didn't totally notice until it was very dry.

I think I like the red pear better. Never mind the recalled infant Tylenol on the counter and the phone cord in the background. My husband thinks the whole thing is somewhat strange. His question: "why would you have half a pear hanging out in a picture frame?" He didn't have any better ideas though..... I think he secretly likes it though!

Hidden TREASURE

My first sewing machine was a Bernina 830. When I was growing up my mom had a hateful White. She also hated to sew and this just aggravated it. It never worked the way it was suppose to and finally when I was 19 she decided it was time for a new one. She just wanted one to make mending not as frustrating. She called a neighbor of ours who was a home ec teacher at a high school and asked what she recommended. She swore by Bernina and also told my mom that the school she taught at was in the process of getting new machines. She said they were trading their machines back to Nuttalls but were able to sell the machines to people who wanted them for the cost Nuttalls would pay them. My mom decided to buy one and I did also. I bought my Bernina for $250.

I didn't sew at the time, but I had taken sewing classes when I was growing up. I had always liked to do crafts and decided in the future when I wasn't so busy with collage I might like to sew and it was a good opportunity buy a good sewing machine at a good price.

Fast forward 7 years. When I was 26 I was looking for a quilt for my then 1 year old's bed. What I really wanted was super expensive. I had always gone into quilt shops because I liked to do embroidery and make it into pillows of frame it with fabric in a picture frame. I decided I would try to make my little boy a quilt for his bed so I could make just what I was picturing in my head. I found I loved to sew. I think it was transforming beautiful fabric into something useful and loved and also providing heirlooms for my children.

Although I loved to sew, I didn't love my machine. It hadn't come with an owner's manual and I never felt like I knew how to really use it. Whenever I would go to Nuttalls for any sort of sewing machine pieces I would eye the other machines, thinking there was no way I could ever afford a computerized one. I knew that for some reason the Bernina 830 is in high demand and maybe I could sell it and use the money toward another machine, but I knew I was still really short for what I wanted. I did some Internet searches and found a Bernina Virtuosa 150 on ebay. I had checked a few local Bernina dealers and found that this machine was selling for about $1400-1500 used. I found it on ebay one night for $450. The auction was just closing. I showed it to my husband who got on another computer to look at it too. I put in a bid not knowing that he did as well. He outbid me and won it for $456.

To say that I didn't stalk the UPS guy for the next few days would not be true. It even arrived during nap time and I accidentally woke up my kids with shrieks of joy. True love. It was so smooth. There was no guessing about the settings. Everything worked perfectly. I sold my Bernina 830 on KSL.com for $454 about 4 hours after it was listed and have never looked back.

Over the last 3 years whenever I have mentioned I used to have a Bernina 830 and sold it people have questioned why I would ever do it. Honestly, I have never once missed it. Never.

This weekend my husband and I went to a garage sale. We went to one that we hadn't planned on going to, but was on the way. When I got there the first thing I saw was a Bernina 830. Guess what they were asking for it........$20. I'm totally serious. I asked the lady if it worked and she assured me it did. Of course I didn't need a sewing machine... I do have three already, but could I really pass this up?
I felt guilty. Did this lady know what she was practically giving away? Should I alert her? I decided to buy it. I am now the proud owner of another Bernina 830. I used it tonight. It runs like a dream. It is super smooth. It only has the basic foot, but it was definitely worth more than the $20 I paid for it by far. I don't know what I'll do with it....... but who says there is no such thing as hidden treasure!

Back to the Shutters

Here are my finished shutters. I'm thinking we are going to hang them up a few inches.

Sorry about the open entertainment center. My three year old would not have appreciated me pausing his Talking Word Factory show so I could close the doors. This picture is to show how much space we have between the top of the shutters and the ceiling.

I have two sets of these shorter shutters, bought at the same time. My husband thinks if I hang these above the others it will look like a portal though.

I also make this seed ball out of dried pinto beans and then spray painted it the same color as the shutters. This is the color I was thinking of painting the hutch, but I'm leaning toward not that color now. Not that I'm leaning toward any color right now.

I have a few more non sewing projects to show later. Hopefully I can get back in my sewing room soon......