Christmas Dinners

Last week was busy with three Christmas dinners to attend. Last Tuesday was the AQG Christmas Dinner. We had lots of good food. I took my usual deviled eggs. We had a tote bag exchange and I received a very cute tote.

On Thursday the Paradise Piecers had their dinner at the Fruit Jar Cafe. It was the first time I had eaten there. The food was pretty good, except I didn't care for their cat fish breaded with corn meal. The breading over powered the fish. I had the sampler meal with cat fish, steak strips, and chicken strips. The stake strips were good. I didn't get to try the chicken. I brought a doggy bag home and my daughter ate the leftovers when she got home from work. Guess she liked them, but she didn't care for the coating on the cat fish either.

We drew names and exchanged five fat quarters as our gifts. Sandy drew my name and gave me six very pretty fat quarters.

Here is a picture of our group. We also passed the crown to the new Queen Bee for 2009. That will be me. We all are taking turns being Queen Bee.

Friday, the Needle Turners went out to lunch. We had planned to go to Uncle Gus Dinner, but when we got there their power was out to the kitchen half of the restaurant. The strip mall they are in was having problems and every other unit was without power. We decided to go to Back Street Barbecue instead. It was good, but then I like barbecue and very seldom get to eat it, because Paul doesn't care for barbecue.

We exchanged gifts. I gave everyone an utility apron that I made. The girls seemed pleased with them. I got some cute gifts from them.

MaryBeth gave every one a batik FQ that she got on her trip to Alaska and some hand lotion.

Sandra made heart Christmas ornaments for every one.

Dot made everyone a cute little bag and put a FQ in it.

I think I made our very well this Christmas. I still have one more dinner. The EVQG is having a catered dinner tomorrow evening. I still have to get the seedless grapes to go with my gift. I've got the 1/2 yard of food fabric and the recipe for Waldorf Salad ready, just need the grapes to go with it.

I finished the X's and O's top. It turned out cute. I haven't taken a picture of it yet. I've got to make some curtains for Dora. She wants them lined. I've never lined any before, plus a valance too, all on a single rod. She has figured out how she wants me to do it. I'm just not in the mood. But it is her Christmas gift to her boyfriend. Curtains for his room. The curtains are a sheer black fabric with bats and the valance is a sheer black fabric with spider webs ad spiders. I don't do sheer fabrics very well. They are a pain it the ass to sew. I found that out many years ago when I used to make Dora's Halloween costumes.

Progress Made

Finally the T-shirt quilt is at the quilters. I'm so happy the top is put together.

I did take the star fabric out of the center block and use a smaller star print instead. I can't wait to get it back from the quilter so I can get the binding on and get it to my client. Hope she will like it.

I decided to play around with the letter blocks and have them on the design wall.

I did substitute the blue/floral set of four patch blocks in the 2nd row with a set of yellow/red print ones. The blue was too dark and now all the four patch blocks have yellow in them. When I noticed that, I had to rethink my sashing fabric. Originally I was going to use the yellow print in the picture for the sashing with green corner stones. Now that will be reversed and the yellow will also be the outer border. Hope I can start sewing this top together today.

Dreary in Georgia

This has been a cold dreary day with some sleet. It started raining Friday night and has been cold and rainy ever since. I'll be glad when winter is over.

I've managed to stay busy since the quilt show. Except while I took time out to be sick! I was making X's and O's blocks and LOVE blocks for a baby quilt when I decided to get sick.

These are 4" blocks. I still have some heart blocks to make. I found some hearts on the guild free table that I'm going use. I just need to frame around them to make them 4". Then I plan to throw in some left over four patch blocks and some crumb blocks and see what I come up with. Hope it turns out cute, I'm needing a baby quilt for a little girl.

November 10-14 EVQG had quilt camp all week at the civic center. I was just getting over being sick and was still really congested and short of breath. I managed to drag myself and all my stuff down there. As usual everyone had a good time. I didn't think to take my camera with me, so didn't get any pictures. I worked on a kit I bought last year at the East Cobb quilt show. The quilt is made from Kaffe Fassett's fabrics. I love his wild fabrics, but just don't know what to do with them. So decided a kit was safest.

This is Moonflowers from his Kaleidoscope of Quilts book. It was included in the kit. There was even enough fabric to do a pieced back. It is quilted, but I haven't had time to get the sleeve and binding on.

Sandra bought an older used Gammill long arm. She is having fun quilting on it. Of course it doesn't like me. She had me go over one day and quilt a community service quilt that I made. We both quilted on it and our quilting styles aren't the same. I've been afraid to look at. Needless to say it still needs the binding put on. Her long arm didn't do anything but give us trouble that day. Now that I'm not around, its been behaving beautifully for her.

I'm trying to make a T-shirt quilt for a customer. I've worried myself sick over it. It is a different lay out than any I've done before. Guess I have a preconceived notion of what a T-shirt quilt should look like and this one definitely doesn't look like it. Guess I've done so many of them that were nice and orderly 14" blocks with 2" sashing and corner stones, that I think all T-shirt quilts are supposed to look like that.

Well I do have 13x14 inch blocks, but in most of the blocks, I had to use two shirts. Than I had to fill in around them to get them to be 13x14. Instead of nice sashing with corner stones, I decided to frame around them log cabin style. I think it will look all right, except for the very middle block. I'm seriously thinking about taking the blue star fabric out and replacing it with a smaller star fabric. That fabric really stands out and three blocks in a row is just too much for me.