The Sewing Bee - Final Prep

Heather & Anita found a small flaw in one of the squares - probably from some of the unpicking we all did. So before we finish the quilt, we need to patch the flaw so it doesn't fray or tear. (I took the pictures using the "macro" feature that I just learned how to use - wahoo!)

Little Tear

Heather & Anita picked out some cute designs from one of the fabrics and cut them out. Then, Anita & I went shopping on Monday (yeah - holiday!) for fabric glue. We found a liquid kind and an iron on - so got them both to test.

Cute Patches

The first one down was done with the iron on stuff - since we didn't think it'd be good to iron on the glued down stuff.

Iron-on Flower Patch>

The second piece was done using a fabric glue - it needs to set or dry for 24 hours, but should be good as gold after that.

Glue-on Heart Patch

Now we're going to do a little bit of stitching around the patches, just to make sure they're secure. Then all that's left is the stitching in the ditch - for the 3rd & final quilt. I'm still amazed that in six sittings we will have completed 3 quilts. Way to go team!!

Macro Test

I found a cool feature on my camera - it takes "macro" pictures. You can put the camera right up on something (and sometimes zoom in from there) and take a picture. Nifty!!

Leaf & stem from a potted plant

My Eye

The Sewing Bee - Fifth Night

After a brief haitus, we're back at it and we're coming to the finish. One more night and all three baby quilts will be done. Absolutely amazing!! It's incredible to see the progress, and know that in only 5 sittings we have two quilts complete and we'll have the 3rd one done tomorrow (yeah holidays!). And Heather's quilt is coming right along too - all the borders are on, now it's time to figure out batting & backing. My girls worked hard again today. Anita was stitching in the ditch and finished two of the quilts (including washing & drying so we could see the final product), and Heather added three borders to her twin quilt.

Hard at Work

Heather finished all her borders just in time for dinner, and Anita finished the stitching for one of the baby quilts and almost half of a second one. After a lovely dinner of Chinese New Year's Chicken (thanks Todd!), Anita finished the last of the second quilt. One more to go. We have a tiny flaw in one of the squares, so tomorrow we're going to do some creative patching and then finish the quilt. Almost there!!

Done Before Dinner!

Anita & Kelly worked together on the first baby quilt - a present from auntie & grandma to a new family addition. Congrats!! And Kelly did most of the work piecing together the second quilt. All in all, I did very little sewing (maybe 10 minutes max), but made up for it by cutting, ironing, and directing.Way to go team!!

Lovely Presentations

The Sewing Bee - Fourth Night Continued

I was able to get a picture of Heather's work from our 4th night of sewing before she did more, so here 'tis! Such *fabulous* colors! And there's more to come, as she joined us again on the 5th night of sewing...

A Twin "Trip Around the World"

The Sewing Bee - Fourth Night

It's exciting to see all the progress we've made - wahoo!! Anita put together the last baby quilt top today - then sewed the borders on all three. Then we put the top, batting, & back fabric together, trimmed it & she sewed them together. What's left? We need to hand-stitch a small section, then stitch in the ditch (to sew the three layers together). Then they're done. Only four get-togethers and three baby quilts are almost done. Fabuloso!!

Side note:I had a malfunction when I downloaded the pix from my camera. The software said it downloaded 10, but there were only 9 - and everything's been deleted from the card. I'm bummed that I lost the picture of Heather's quilt. She put the whole top of her quilt together (excluding the borders). The colors are fantastic, and it's fun to see the pattern on a larger scale. I'll have to get a new shot to post...

Quilt-tops with Borders

Putting the layers together was relatively easy. We laid the batting out, then pinned the top to it. Trimmed everything to match. Then laid the backing face down to the top, pinned & trimmed again. (Basically, the quilt was inside out.) Then Anita sewed the three layers together, leaving a 8-10" opening, which we used to reverse the quilts so they are now right sides out - just need to hand sew closed the little opening. No need for binding, and the sewing took much less time...

Putting Layers Together

...And the (mostly) Finished Product...

More Fun from 3rd Night of Sewing

More pix from 3rd night - sewing bliss! Look at all the hard worker-bees... They're doing such a *fantastic* job!! I even sewed a stitch or two... =) Thanks to Todd for providing fresh images of our fun!

Hard at Work - or Hardly Workin'?

The Sewing Bee - Late Class

After we cleaned up and took pictures (and Heather went home), Anita & Kelly decided they were game for more sewing. So we did. Had a minor bump in the road - 'Nita's machine needed some TLC, so Todd helped out by fixing and doing some test sewing. Now two of the baby quilt tops are done, except for the borders. If they get antsy before I show up tomorrow, the third top might be done as well. Got to stop by the fabric store tomorrow to get batting. Wow. We should finish putting them together tomorrow - that would leave just stitching in the ditch. Wonder if we'll have a complete one? Update tomorrow!!

Repairing the Tired Machine & Testing

Quilt-tops at the Ready - Wahoo!!

The Sewing Bee - Third Night

Things are cruising right along!! Anita & Kelly sewed the remaining strips together, so by the time I got there it was time to cut strips of squares. We had a new joiner to the club. Heather has already been working on a "Trip Around the World" - a twinner, 'stead of the baby size. She had a bunch done already, so by the time we quit we're all at the same spot - quarters are done. Now it's time to put the quarters together to make a whole piece. Then the border. Then putting together the front, back, & batting. Last piece is to secure the layers - I use the "stitch in the ditch" method...

Heather Joins the Bee

Anita Cuts Strips of Squares

The Rows Beyond A&B

Sewing Buddies

4 Quarters - Ready to Go

The Sewing Bee - Second Night

Once again, we accomplished quite a bit. We sewed the 'A' & 'B' rows together, cut the sewn strips in squares, then sewed the 'A' rows to the 'B' rows. For all three quilts. Kelly did indeed do her homework - lines are straight enough for government work... Everyone had to unpick at one point or another (including myself!), but our work is done... for tonight.

Next step is sewing more strips together... They're already in order, so Kelly & Anita might get a bug to do some sewing before the weekend - we're getting together for Night Three on Saturday or Sunday. More news then!!

Sewing Strips Together

Strips of Squares

The Sewing Bee - First Night

Three baby quilts... how long will it take? All the babies (girls) are due in February - and one is already here. Hope it doesn't take long!! We're using a pattern called "Trip Around the World". I've done this one several times - Anita & Kelly are novices... not only to the pattern, but to quilting. We got quite a bit accomplished tonight - ironing the fabrics & cutting strips for three quilts is no mean feat. Way to go Team!! Tomorrow's job? Sewing strips. Make sure you do your homework, Kelly!!

Ironing

Cutting

Machine Prep

Starting the New Year: Phase I

I took the day off on the 2nd - to hang with Jeannea a bit and take her to the airport. Then to do some shopping, miscellaneous errands, etc. I lost track of time (but Jeannea made her flight just fine), and ended up heading to the house around 5:30pm - thinking there was enough time to change, relax a bit, then head to wallyball, which starts at 7pm. Greg was on his way home from work, we'd hook up and go together. That was the plan.

I heard a strange buzzing when I got out of the car - wondered which neighbors had some kind of alarm going off... As I got closer to the front door, amazingly the noise got louder. And when I opened the door, I was met by a cacophony of noises and an odd smell - some alarm going off, and the cats frantic for reassurance and quiet. I determined that the loudest noise was coming from the garage. Called Greg to find out which kind of alarm was in the garage and if it would explode if I opened the door.I've seen too many movies...

Turns out that we have a CO detector in the garage. Carbon Monoxide is a toxic gas that's odorless (we still don't know what the strange smell was, but I'm not crazy - Greg smelled it too!) and colorless. It generally comes from appliances that use gas: boilers, kerosene or gas space heaters, leaking chimneys & furnaces, generators, and automobile exhaust (this is a good site for more information:http://www.epa.gov/iaq/co.html). I waited for Greg outside the house with the door cracked just a bit so the cats could get fresh air. The garage did not explode when he opened the door (whew!) and when he reset the alarm, it stopped going off. He repositioned it and turned it on again - still no alarm. Which was a relief, but also confusing.

So we cancelled wallyball and figured out what to do when you've had a CO detector alarm go off. Call the gas company. Or the fire department. Or 911. We called the gas company. Even though it was after hours, their emergency line took our information, then transferred us to the fire department. We were told to wait outside, so we took the cats out to the car and sat in the running car, trying to stay warm for a bit. The fire department came in no time at all, then Greg left to see to them and the cats & I stayed in the car. After testing and wandering in & out of the house, turns out they found a CO leak coming from our furnace. Great. Weather forcast for the next week (starting the very next day) is severe cold - hovering around zero during the day, colder at night.

Some good friends put all four of us up over night, and Greg stayed home from work to let furnace repair people into the house. The first one that came said our heat exchange was cracked in about 3 places, and the current furnace was 27 years old. Time to replace. So Greg spent the rest of the day hunting up heaters (electric) and calling for bids on getting a replacement furnace. The only place to actually make it to the bid appointment also happened to be available to install the very next day. We're in!

We just spent a boatload of money on something, and I was feeling a bit robbed. I mean, I can't drive it around, can't show it off (it's in the crawl space), it doesn't do tricks, and no one will ever even see it... so I sent Greg down to get some pictures to post.My lesson that I'm passing on: if you don't have a CO detector, get one - it could save your life. If you have one, test it to make sure it's working properly. And if you have one going off, the door won't explode if you open it.

Crawl space beyond the furnace

The New Furnace

Merry Christmas!

So I still haven't sent out the Christmas Letter. It's written. We have the list of people to send to and most of the addresses. It's just a matter of printing the letters & envelopes, then sending them. But somehow there just hasn't been enough time. We were up until after 1am last night, just wrapping presents. The time crunch must have something to do with my habit of procrastination. It's probably why I didn't get the last of my shopping done until yesterday (the 23rd, although Greg remembered one last gift and had to go out today - it was *crazy*!). Oh well. I think we're ready for Christmas - but the letters will be late. Hopefully we'll get them out this week.

The day before Christmas Eve (the 23rd) we had a *huge* snowstorm. This is the third storm in the past week - according to the news - all dropping loads of snow, but this was the most. Lots of big, fluffy flakes that came down for a long, long time. Greg had to shovel the driveway, deck, & stairs since we had company for Christmas Eve. This pic is only from the last snow dump - we'd already cleared away the snow from the previous ones. Fortunately the snow was light since the snowblower isn't working.

Huge snowfall - but light & fluffy

So tonight (Chrismas Eve) we had friends over, ate food, visited, set up luminarias, visited more, had a gift exchange, and then visited some. Very nice. I was reminded once again of what great friends we have. We are truly blessed.

This is the 4th year we've done luminarias. We saw them in New Mexico years ago (has it been that long?!?) when we went down for Christmas. Dad sent back supplies for us, and the next year we set them up. They're beautiful. And (funny enough) this is the first year we've done it at our own house - previous years we've spent Christmas Eve with friends or family and shared the fun with them.

Luminarias - closeup

Luminarias lining the deck railing

Cool shot of the luminarias - didn't hold still for the long exposure

We hope that your day tomorrow (today) is filled with happiness. Merry Christmas!!

Winter Solstice

Starting tomorrow, days are getting longer - wahoo!! It's one of the things I look forward to in December. I know that it's the "official" start of winter, but to me it means that we're on the downhill slide... From an article in the Anchorage Daily News:

"The sun rises today at 10:14 a.m. and sets at 3:41 p.m. for five hours and 27 minutes of daylight. But after today, the daylight outlook gets brighter."