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Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Shopping with My Sister

Had a great day yesterday going to the quilt shops in Johnson City, TN. It's only about 50 miles from here, and is a beautiful ride over the mountains.

We ate at Bob Evans  first to make sure we had enough energy to shop. Love their sausage gravy and biscuits, YUM!! The  we went to a store that is closing and moving to, of all places, Millersburg, Ohio!! Like they don't have enough quilt shops already. It's called Somewhere Sewing .  Everything was 30% off, and the Aurifil thread was $6.00 a spool. I bought 8 spools, lol. Can never have too much Aurifil thread, it's my favorite, and I use it for everything. I also bought a small piece of a pretty background fabric, and a goodie for a scavenger hunt I'm in. What was the other thing I purchased??? Oh yeah, it was a pantograph called bamboo.

Then we headed to Jonesborough TN. There are 2 quilt shops there. We first stopped at the Sewing Bee. It is a smallish shop, but the folks are friendly and I always find something that I want. I bought some pearl topped straight pins and 2 patterns, one for a child's apron, and another for a child's dress.  (I can't take pictures cause Dave has my camera with him for his road trip, lol.) They don't have a web site to send you.

The last store was Tennessee Quilts, one of my favorites!! I bought a kit for a child's quilt there.


It is so cute and the fabrics sweet. I always find something there too. Really neat store.

Fun Fun Fun. That's what Dave gets for leaving me home for 5 whole days, lol. So today I hope to sew quite a bit, I think my sister Roma is coming over for a while to sew also.

update: MIL has been pretty good so far. Kinda makes me feel guilty for complaining, KINDA.

Later,
WilmaNC

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Making labels

How do you make your labels? Do you label everything you make? Or just the large quilts? I used to only label the large quilts with labels I designed with Paint Shop Pro and printed out on pretreated fabric. But I decided I wanted to put little tags on pretty much everything I make. So this is what I came up with.

First, I went to the Avery label place online, designed a business card the way I would want my tag to look, then printed it out on pretreated fabric. Oh, I purchase my pretreated fabric by the yard from the CJenkins Co. I have used their product after the first time I did the whole procedure with the Bubble Jet set stuff. Too much work, lol. (And I just noticed that they sell scraps of the pretreated fabric now for 1.99 a pound, they would be perfect for the tags I make. )

I like the Avery Method because I can make them in color. But anything on pretreated fabric tends to fade a bit with time and washing. This picture is of a sheet I printed. (The ones on the left are messed up cause my printer didn't do what I wanted, but I didn't want to waste the sheet so I printed over it...)




I cut them apart, fold them up, and sew down the sides. I sew these down with the bindings. I only printed the 20 so I could add the year with a pigma pen.



The second way I make my little tags are with rubber stamps. I have used 2 companies now and they are both very good, and very prompt. I like the rubber stamps because I can use them on any fabric, and it doesn't doesn't have to be pretreated. But, unless you are willing to do all the work of using multiple colors, the labels are black (or whatevever color you choose) only. Here is a stamp I received in the mail only yesterday. They ask what you want on it, and that's what you get. This one I got from Simon Stamps. It came in about 3 days and the total cost was $19 and change, which included shipping. I use the archival stamp pad which I bought at a craft store. I love the stamps because they are fast, and they do not wash out no matter what!!! No fading at all, ever.





My picutures are very light for some reason....but here's a tag made with that stamp. This one isn't sewn up the sides yet.




I have another stamp purchased from Sweet Papery. They do good work, just not as many choices.

Here's the one from them sewn on under the binding. (Dang camera too light again.) 



I love these little tags. I can even put them on place mats I make for gifts. Oh, and I used this one once for a signature block exchange I was in. There were over a hundred blocks to sign, so I used my stamp.

Today I am going to rest up and try to completely recover from this shitty head cold that went to a sinus infection. One thing I like about quilting, you can even do it when you're sick, lol. 

Later,
WilmaNC

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Feeling Fallish

I have been under the weather for the past week. Somehow I got a nice case of bronchitis and it kicked my butt. I'm feeling better now, and actually did some sewing yesterday. Up until then all I could handle was a little handwork.

I wanted to make a couple of Halloween wallhangings for my grandsons. Quite some time ago, one of my friends from the Quilting Bee forum (then Quilting Passion) sent me a whole stack of Halloween 9 patches. They have been laying around for a few years and when discovered again, I decided to use them for the wall hangings. The first one I decided to do as a cut up 9 patch. The quilting pattern I used was a spider web pantograph. Looked really easy, NOT!! It was very hard to have the lines intersect where they should, but I think after I wash it, it will be less noticible.



The next one I am not cutting apart, just making a 9 patch wall hanging. I will quilt it the same, but it should look better since I have had some practice with the panto. The kids will like them anyway. 




I also saw a table runner on this site, Pleasant Home, and just had to try it. It is soo cute. No pattern, so mine is somewhat different, but basically the same. Hopefully I will get it layered and quilted this week. I plan to do straight line quilting only. (It looks crooked, but it's not, lol. I didn't get it smoothed out totally.)


And, finally, this has nothing to do with fall, here are some thimbles I got in a thimble swap. They are so cute. Not sure what I will do with them yet.



OH!!! Had to show you just one more picture. Looks fallish, and Halloweenish to me. It was taken on a hike at the Biltmore Estate. I thought it was the most beautiful dead thing I have ever seen, lol.


The weather is so nice and crisp today. Makes me feel happy. I think we will walk at the arboretum then go to the Western NC fair just to look around.

Later,
WilmaNC

Monday, September 6, 2010

TA!! DA!!!

The Basket Weave quilt is done!!! And is hanging on the wall. I really do love this quilt.


And here's the pieced back and a close up of the quilting.


Now on to the next project.

WilmaNC