A few quilting books

Good morning All,

Did you get some fun, quilty things for Christmas?  I did!

Not only did I get a bit of fabric to add to my stash :) But I also got a few quilt related books.

The first one I've been wanting for a little while now. My regular readers know I am trying to improve my free motion quilting, so any free motion quilting books I want to read and absorb.

My Sweetie got this one for me:

                                                          

                                                               

Molly seems to be a down to earth Gal. She says in her book " I would rather be fishing than shopping." My kind of gal :) Her book is rather like two books in one. You get some great tips and tricks, plus a few free motion quilting designs. And then you get projects.

She practices on small pieces, 12 x 15, 16 x 18 and such, and then turns those pieces into bags, runners, mats, etc.

A great book to add to your collection.

I enjoy reading stories about homesteading, opening up the West, prairie living, mountain living, etc. (As well as other genre's.)

This is the second book my sweetie got me:

 A book about her life on the prairie in the late 1800's.... she becomes a very proficient quilter :)
 Here's part of what it says on Amazon:

No Time on My Hands is a remarkable chronicle of the sod house era and of Grace Snyder’s married life on a ranch in Nebraska’s sandhills. From there she finally flies above the clouds to exhibits where her quilts contribute to a worldwide revival of quiltmaking. Mrs. Snyder lived twenty years after the publication of these memoirs in 1963, to the age of one hundred. Her daughter, Nellie Snyder Yost, who helped to write No Time on My Hands, has added an epilogue to this Bison edition.

So far, it's a nice read.

Hope you got some nice things too.

Have a great day!

The dino quilt

Hello All,

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas day.

A few days ago, I put the last stitches on my middle son's Dino quilt. Yah! It's finally done.

I pieced this quilt LAST year! and have just got around to quilting it up. Here's the back.

Thankfully, it's large enough that he can still use it ;)

When he was looking at it, the toddler decided it was his and he kept trying to take it from Carson. LOL, too funny. Isaiah  finally asked where his quilt was and he went to his room to get it.

So another one to check off the list!

I tried a variety of different fmqing designs. Practice, practice... one day I might be better at it. I like to practice on my quilts, instead of on little pieces of cloth. Although I got a wonderful book for Christmas, that uses those pieces of of practice work for bags and such. More on that in a few days.

Have a wonderful day!

 

Wishing you all a Very Merry Christmas and a wonderful New Year!

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/359302876495870257/

A bit of Christmas sewing

Hello, hello everyone!

Have you been getting any Christmas sewing done? I have done a little bit. Sewing just isn't something I am doing a lot of right now. But I had to make more of these sew together bags!

Earlier in the month, I posted some pictures of one I had already made and two more that were cut out.

Here are those two, done.

And all ready for gift giving :)

I've found that I really like these made with interfacing, instead of quilting the outer piece. It's a bit more stiff with interfacing, not so squishy.

We've been getting some much needed rain. Had a few days of clouds, and are going to get more rain this week. Looks like it will be a wet winter :) Which is a really good thing!! So, pictures are dark and dreary...sorry about that.

Other than that. I've been doing a bit of quilting on son #2's Dino quilt. I'm about 3/4 done, so might even get it finished in time for Christmas giving :)

Today I want to pull the decorations out and get some lights and such up.

What have you been up to?

Have a great day!

I'm linking up with Jennie at Porch Swing Quilts today. She is having a great sewing for Christmas linky party going on. Thanks Jennie!

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Happy Thanksgiving

Wishing you all.....

               Safe travels.....

                       Good food.....

                                 Good company.....

                       Happy Thanksgiving!

Thank you all, my readers, for stopping by and seeing what I'm up to. Thank you for your lovely comments and your friendship.

Tis the night before blog hop

Hello All,

Welcome to my part of blogging land. Thanks for dropping in to see what a lovely gift I received. And a bit of talk on easy gifts to make.

Thank you Samm for putting together this very fun blog hop! And to Marlene for being a great hostess.

My beautiful gift came from Margie at Threading my needles blog.

She said she couldn't decide which pincushion to give me, so she sent me both :)

Aren't they lovely?!

Thank you so much Margie. You do such lovely work.

~~~~~~~~

One of my favorite things to make is bags. Purses, tote bags, hand bags, lots of different shapes and sizes. They can be short and quick, or take 3 or 4 hrs.

Mostly I make up my own pattern. But this year, when I saw the Sew Together bag by Sew Demented (click on the link to buy the pattern), I knew it would make the perfect gifts for some of my quilting friends. And it was the perfect excuse to buy a pattern ;)

I've made 2 so far, and really enjoy making them. I have 2 more  cut and ready to make, they are addicting. lol (You'll see the first one I made tomorrow, on Cindy's blog.)

They can be soft and sweet.

Bright and colorful.

Or just plain fun.

You can quilt the outer piece or use interfacing, use a variety of colors, or all the same. What a great pattern.

I hope you are enjoying the other blogs in this hop. You can find the full schedule over at Marlene's. This is who I hopped with today.


Just Let Me Quilt
Bumbleberry Cottage
A Reformed Heath’n
Coeur D’Alene
Sew Incredibly Crazy
Threading My Needles
Ridge Top Quilts (you are here)

Black Cat crossing winner

Hello All,

A quick note to say thank you one and all for the lovely comments on my Black cat crossing blog hop.

And to announce the winner of my bag. I used Random generator, the lucky number is 96, which belongs to...









Congratulations to Theresa of Bumble berry cottage, she is my winner!! An email has been sent Theresa.

My Day, Black Cat Crossing blog hop

Hello Everyone!

Welcome to my blog. And my day on the hop. Thank you Samm, Wendy and  Maywood Fabrics for a fun theme for our hop.

We are not big Halloween people, the kids and I. When my third child was just a little guy, we took them all trick or treating, this being Carson's first time. Carson is quite the shy boy and he was not able to go up to the houses and knock on the door. I think he managed a few houses that day, but that was it.

So, from then on we started just having fun and games at home. My big kids are teens now, and they still enjoy playing games, eating carmel apples and getting some candy treats.

Which all means, that I don't decorate for Halloween. Except for a few paper crafts the kids enjoy doing.

But, I just love Maywood fabrics and knew I wanted to play around with these cute ones. I picked the panel and a few of the prints.

This is Blackjack, hanging out in the trees, admiring the Fall foliage.

Blackjack is unique,

 his tail comes off!

What?! why does his tail come off....

Well, to play pin the tail on the kitty of course :) One of our favorite Halloween games (actually, we usually make a very simple drawing of a witches head and a removable hat and play pin the hat on the witch. LOL.)

If you look closely, you can see I fmqed a face on Blackjack :)

But this is so much nicer! We have a bit of Halloween decor as well as a fun game to play.

Blackjack wishes you all a fun Halloween!

Another project I made, this trick or treat bag that one of you could win. (side one)

Yup, my VERY FIRST giveaway here on the blog! It makes the perfect trick or treat bag, or if you want to keep it for yourself, it will hold a few books from the library, or any other little thing you want to use it for. (here's side 2)

Pumpkin Spice, the kitty (really, that's her name), was checking it out, making sure everything was good do go :)

Just make a comment, and make sure if you are a no-reply blogger, that I have your email address so I can contact you if you are the winner. International's welcome :) I will draw a winner on Thursday, Oct 30th. Yes, too late to use this year, but you can keep it around for next year.

Thank you so much for stopping by! Make sure you visit these other lovely Ladies to see what they have made.

                                 Monday, October 27                                     

Ridge Top Quilts (you are here)

Dancing Moon

Kwilt Krazy

Lydsfire Sewing

Grandmama's Stories

You can find the full schedule on Wendy's blog.

 all rights reserved, mtnmommy2.blogspot.com 2014

WIP Wednesday

Hello All!

Have you been following the blog hop over at Sew We Quilt? There is some cute Halloween/Fall projects going on over there.

Mine is all ready (I post on Oct 27th).

And so is my project for the Twas the Night blog hop happening in Nov. I can't show you that though, as it's a gift. What a fun blog hop this is going to be. The project we made is going to the person on the list below us (on the blog hop)! So you will see my project on someone's blog. I hope she likes it. And I'll post about the sweet gift I received.

Which means I can get back to my projects that I left hanging.

Starting with the Sept mystery quilt from Jess at the Quilt and Needle. I was a tester... and I'm still not done :( I just have a few more rounds to go, then I can put all these together.

I'm still working on Carson's dino quilt too.

And Rachael's quilt has taken a back burner... hope to get to it soon.

Hope you all are enjoying some quilting and creating!

Linking up with Freshly Pieced.

 all rights reserved, mtnmommy2.blogspot.com 2014

A blog hop sneak peek

Hello Everyone,

I got in some good sewing over the weekend :) My Black Cat Crossing project just needs some quilting on it.

Here's a sneak peek. You can see the finished project on Oct 27th. 

We start hopping on the 20th.

This fabric is really nice. I love Maywood fabrics, they have such a nice feel to them. And they are thick, so you know they are going to last. This is Black Cat Crossing fabrics, of course ;)

Linking up with Freshly Pieced.

See you soon.

 All rights reserved mtnmommy2.blogspot.com

A little progress

Hello All,

Wow, Sept is really flying! I can't believe it's the end of the month already. And I haven't posted since the beginning of the month.

But not a lot of things have been going on here. I am slowly working on Jess's newest mystery quilt. And THAT'S IT! There are lots of these in the mystery quilt...lots!

I have to get my project for Black Cat Crossing done, I post on Oct 27th, so I need to get my butt in gear.

This little cutie keeps me, and his Dad, pretty busy. If he's not outside 'working', he is inside getting scrubbed with the wash cloth ;) 

 In this picture, Daddy is teaching him something about one of our generators. This kid loves mechanical things, anything with an engine.

So not much going on in my quilty world, just wanted to pop in and say HI.

My corner of bloggy land

Hello Everyone,

Welcome to my blog. I am participating in the 'Around the world' blog hop that's going around bloggy land. My good friend Pat 'tagged' me.

Pat has a lovely blog. She has some beautiful kitties that help her out, some great projects and beautiful fabrics. I love her 'quilty muse', and the ideas she come up with. Thank you Ms Pat, for tagging me :)

I started quilting way back in 1993, when I was pregnant with my first baby. I had to make him a baby quilt. And oh boy, is it funny to look at now! I then started making quilts for some family members. But I really started taking off in quilting 7 yrs ago when Jess Smith starter her forum, the Quilt and Needle. I've really grown and learned a lot in the past 7 yrs quilting. I started out a hand quilter, and now I am foraging into the free motion quilting world.

On to the questions.

1. What are you working on right now?
 
I put the next three projects on hold over the weekend so I could do some mystery testing for Jess!  I haven't tested for her in awhile, and really felt the need to have some fun doing it again. These are the fabrics I'm working with.

I have been cutting and piecing on my project for the Black Cat Crossing blog hop coming up in late October. These colors are a bit out of the norm for me. But I love Maywood fabrics.

My girls quilt and my middle son's quilt are both put on the back burner till the previous two are done.

2. How does my work differ from others of it's genre?

Hmm. I consider myself having a foot in both worlds,the traditional one and the modern one. I love mostly traditional blocks, but I use modern fabrics and always put my own spin on a pattern. Rarely do I use an already made pattern.

This is one of my original patterns. It's called Train stop, I made it for my eldest son.

 I enjoy mixing and matching blocks as well as fabrics. Rarely using just one line in  a pattern. Although I love testing patterns, so most of the quilt tops I have, are tops that I tested for Jess. I just love her mystery patterns.

And I sew on vintage machines. This is my White treadle from the late 1800s.  My first sewing machine. I love it.


                                


And this is my Singer 201-2, I do all my free motion quilting with it. I love it too.

 
                   


3. Why do I write/create what I do?

Over the past 20 odd years, I've dabbled in many different creative pursuits. I have always loved photography. I enjoy writing. I enjoy drawing. And cooking/baking is one of my favorite things to do. I'm not the best at any of these, but I enjoy them all.

Quilting factors in 3 of those pursuits. It's fun to take my projects outside and find just the right spot for a picture session.

These are some of my original patterns, you can find them scrolling thru the archives.

 Pre-baby, I did a lot of tutorial writing. I love teaching a new quilter something, or writing tips to make a certain block easier.

My two most viewed posts are the one on making a Lone Star quilt, and it's companion, set in seams.

 And quilting is just 'drawing with thread', as so many quilters say. So my enjoyment of many creative endeavors are all rolled in one with quilting. And I end up with something warm and comforting to use or giveaway.

4. How does my writing/creative process work?

When I'm looking at fabric, I always buy the ones that I just love. Not only the color, but the design of the fabric too. Or if I am making something for a loved one, I pick fabrics out that I know they will enjoy. Then I start thinking of how these fabrics would look together. What kind of pattern do they want to become? I use pencil and paper, then I move on to EQ when I have an idea down.

This is my girls quilt.

I mix and match blocks, creating the settings that I want and that speak to me. Using EQ is fun, it's so much easier to change the fabrics and turn blocks around/etc.

So that's my creativeness in a nut shell. I hope you enjoyed this stop.

I haven't been able to find any bloggers to continue this blog hopping. If any of you out there wants to do an around the world blog post, please leave me a comment and I'll update this post with links to your blogs. I am supposed to tag 3 of you. You would be posting next Monday.