Almost Done!!

I am almost done! I started working on Bunny Hill's Postcard Cuties for Spring Back in January. 7 months later and 25 appliqued blocks later. I am 10 more blocks away from completion of the main part of the quilt. I of course have the borders, corners, and piecing left; but I feel like I am almost done. Here is a picture of her finished quilt:

 I love her quilt but you wouldn't believe how tiny it is when its all finished (we're talking smaller than a baby blanket). So in mine I might not cut the squares down as small, or I might put sashing in-between the rows. Here is a picture of mine that I took: 

As you can see I have two rows that are still blank. I am hoping that I can get the applique pieces for those rows cut out, starched, and glued on before I have to leave for vacation on Friday. We are going to Park City, Utah and I am anticipating a fair amount of sitting around which means a fair amount of sewing time.

On another note I have a new link on my page for Alpaca Direct. I used to work for the owner and he told me that anyone who puts a link to his page on their blog can get 20 % off of their purchases. So, see it, love it, use it as much as you like. He has great deals on yarn and other crafty type stuff, as well as some non-crafty but comfy stuff.

Stay tuned for some crafty adventures (and non-crafty adventures) in Park City, Utah. 

Canning with my peep

So as the title suggests I have been doing a lot of canning lately, with my peep. I would say peeps but there is only one. The canning season started back in April, at least it did out here in sunny California. We started with Cherries and have progressed to Apricots and early peaches. 

This is my peep's trusty truck Eleanor. She claims that it is her sons truck but i've only seen him drive it once. I think she might have a truck crush or truck envy. Anyways we use Eleanor to transport our boxes of Apricots, Peaches, or plums because she has lots of space in the back for our rather large boxes of fruit. As shown in the next picture.

We canned about five or six boxes of Apricots like the ones in the picture.  We used the Dry pack method with the oven, so that we could pack the jars pretty tightly.  Here are some pictures of the jars. Aren't they absolutely gorgeous!

 We were totally ecstatic that they turned out so well. My peep sent me these pictures like a week ago and I procrastinated posting but now seeing these up just makes me want to can more. Which means coming up soon you'll get to see my plum jam that I have been working on lately. I'll write again soon. TTFN

Busy, Busy

So yeah as my title implies I have been busy lately. That and my daughter hates it when I am on my computer and not paying attention to her. So when I do post its late at night but most of the time thats not always possible. I never realized how much of your day as a mom you spend sitting around and playing because your child won't let you do much else. At least with first children I think thats true.

My crafty peep just started her blog and that is what has inspired me to try to keep up on mine. She thinks that if I can blog regularly then I might be able to sell more stuff on my Etsy page. Not that there is much on there anyways.

On a side note though I have been thinking about retiring my grubby t-shirts. My husband refuses to let me wear them out in public (which is probably for the best). So instead of throwing them away I am going to turn them into a quilt. I'm going to batik/tie-dye them so they are colorful. I found this lady's blog: http://fabricdyeing101.blogspot.com/2006/11/how-to-make-bati-like-fabrics-with.html
I am not 100% sure that it will work on t-shirt material but i'm going to give it a try. I am thinking of making it a rag quilt but it might just end up as a 5x5 block quilt. I'll try to post pictures as soon as I get started (my camera has finally stopped acting up).

The Hungry Caterpillar quilt

So as an aspiring pattern writer I figured you have to start somewhere so here I am starting with

 the very hungry caterpillar. Which also happens to be one of my favorite stories, and so far my daughters favorite also. I started with the panels and then sat down and started doodling thinking now this goes here and that goes there. Realizing that I had large gaps that I would have to fill so here is a glimpse of what I filled it with....

As you can see my daughter is helping me the very best way she knows how, by holding it down with her bottom. Its amazing how much you can get done in one nap time. The plan is to have this finished in a few more days and then send it off to the quilter and write the pattern while they have it. I hope to be able to offer it in pdf and printed form which you could buy on this site, or possibly even in a store. I have to go my daughter is terrorizing my husbands desk.