Feeling Gratitude & Grounded Beauty Nice Long Weekend

There is a true magic and beauty found in the quietness and re-connection with the land and nature. Spent the  long weekend  playing in the woods at my camp. There is a magic up at camp and part of that magic is that no technology works up there. no cell phones nothing unless it works on propane and the lower amp electrical plugs I have up there. what a beautiful grounded balanced feeling my spirit has after the time spent up here.

I spent the weekend hunting the wooded land around for dead trees and lugging them back and cutting them up for the weekend warmth it was a bit of cold yet beautiful weekend.

 The extra magic was the power of sanctification just being in the moment. no needs for anything extra and no extras where had either. Just a beautiful weekend shared by us that where there together.  

Cold Wet Spring Morning & Some Recycling.

I am not sure what silly non chicken people around are thinking but these 3 girls are a part of my family and yes that comes with extra loving care. I watch them like a mother hen and worry about the elements and such around them. This morning it dropped to a very wet damp 35 degrees outside after being over 80 degrees that last couple days. I got up and rushed before work to make them some warm oatmeal before I went off to work and I am hopping they liked it.They seemed all happy and cheery this morning. No sign the colder weather bugged them at all. I think it is just me and the new mother syndrome. My friends think I am just crazy nuts and that my girls are just chickens. I guess they just do not get it.

On a another note I have been saving up some pallets and collecting them to strip them out for the free wood value and recycle them into many different things. just last night I stripped this small pile here.  I was rewarded with a whole can full of scraps to burn at my camp site and a nice haul of lumber to be used for the projects I want to make and complete.  Below is the lumber stack.

Got The First Wall Up

Coop Progress is Slower Than I Would Of Liked Progress Made Though.

My girl looks over at me and says WOW your building that mansion for us! I will post a few progress pics below for you all to give me pointers, encouragement, or otherwise thoughts in the comments. 

Frame started 

Roof idea window and egg laying box is all rough idea in place 

I got the roof started. being a 1 womyn coop carpenter with no carpenter skill set I am learning as I go. I lost a fram wall and had to fix that and now everything seem really tightened up with the roof wood on. I am impressed I got this far and its really looking like a coop. I just thought it would be all enclosed and ready by now. I will get there soon enough. 

Water Mellon Loving & A Little Progress Has Been Made

Well everything I have read all over the net says that chickens love water melon and this is a big truth with my girls  too. here they enjoy some watermelon while I got  a bit more progress made on the new coop on wheels. The floor base is on and it seems to work great and and still tow around nicely. 

I am looking very forward to getting this nicely finished and the girls will have some more room and then I can tow them around to different grass spaces in a longer nicer run. while I am sitting on the deck sewing away and enjoy the great fun of watching them. 

Chicken Tractor/ Coop Engineering Changes & New Build

Angels lays with her new loved hens as I work on moving the heavy coop they are in now. 

Well I built my hitch axle and attached a new set of wheels. this much was a plus. I tested it on the coop they have now so I could move that and it was an epic fail. I did learn a lot and will be armed for the new engineering ideas.  Here is the failed attempt pic I am still impressed I did this all and got this far. Its truly a fun learning adventure with a lot of creativity.

I have the base with hitch finished on the new coup and I tested it towed it around the yard and it works like a charm. Fingers crossed it works that good with the coop built on it. I believe my sewing has helped my a lot in the shop as now I seem more patient and this is just a time like seam ripping I guess. 

Hildigar was very happy to have her coup back on the ground for sure. 

Upgrading A chicken Coup Plus Turning it Mobile & A Fast Wedding Quilt

Well now there has not been a lot of sewing as I am trying to make the Coup all ready to be nice and Mobile and make a new nice run to add as well. This will help in so many ways for maintenance cleaning and giving them the whole yard as I move them around.  So the first this I did was tile the floor and than hang the water bucket up.  a lot nicer look and easier to keep and to clean up. Here is an inside pic.

To keep my hens happy as well as myself I am so impressed at how I have recycled reclaimed and made a mobile  base that works and  I added new tires and new bearings for it too.  The hens needed to get to bed last night  so I will try and make it attached and working today after work.  Here is the test drive to see that it  hooks up to the mower and is working. 

I will work on the frame and getting the coup mounted to night. 

I can not post with out any sewing pics. here is another wedding quilt I I made last summer. After the chickens are all settled and made comfy I will be very happy to sew on the deck and watch the girls out in the yard. 

Mothers Day Sewing and A Few Chickens

I managed to get in some sewing time during this busy week with new things going on around the house. I am making up a small wall hanging for my mom for mothers day. I really am enjoying this applique thing lots lately  nothing recycled in this project but I am still working on all that too.

Well as always with my silliness I got this idea that a couple chickens would be fun to have and we could enjoy  some farm fresh eggs too.  So I went to look at a small chicken coop for sale and than we got to talking and he also sold me 3 Hens so wow in like a few hrs flat a became a chicken farmer LOL ok well at least an owner of 3 laying hens.  Here is my new Girls so far 2 have names Hildigar and Zelda the 3rd is still waiting for her name. Day 3 we figured out how to tell them all apart too.

Since we have a lot of red tail hawks over head along with many other predators I  built this  up fast so they be out and safe while we are around.  Below I will so my small coop they seem to love too. I am working on building them a mobile chicken coop or Chicken tractor for them to enjoy and it will be secure enough to have them be able to enjoy the outside safely and securely all day.  For right now this is my set up. 

I would love for them to be totally free range however I am guessing that I would not have my fun hens for very long with all the hawks,  fox, coyotes, coons, and many others roaming around that would just just to eat up my hens. 

Recycled or Re-purposing Fabrics & Some Stash Busting Bag Fun

Sometimes being creative means to let go of the hype surrounding the commercialism part of the craft and bust out the old fashion way with whats laying around. 

The above is a design from a Lunchbox embroidery set I got. this was the first block of many to come that involve almost all recycling of fabrics. I love new beautiful fabrics and all however I love sewing  and experimenting  so much that using less expensive or free sources of fabrics is the way to go for somethings too.  The Denim background is from old jeans and the black body of the applique is from an old tee shirt and the pink skull dress is a very inexpensive fussy cut fun remnant piece.  I am planing more stuff like this too. 

Also there is a time that stash busting is a good thing too and I wanted to try some raw edge improvisational applique so I looked around and found a viking shopping bag cut the seams out and made it lay flat  (another recycle) ready  to use as my foundation and busted into an already opened  jelly roll and just went to town.  See Pic

I now have the top finished and the skull yellow fabric is something I have laying around in my stash that  I will be using for the liner. I maybe adding some embroiderer to this too and redoing the handles.  I will keep you all updated as it takes more form and shape. 

A Beautiful Evening After Work Sewing On The Deck.

I love when the weather breaks and get a chance to take everything outside. This allows the magic of nature to caress my spirit will I feed my soul by creating anything and everything. 

I am looking into alternative power sources to add to outdoor sewing. Right at the moment I have a 2nd battery hooked to my pick up truck so I can sew off my tail gate. I want to try and take it to the next level and be able to sew any where my truck can not go too. Please share any ideas along the way you have.

Sorry For My Mix Mp In Comments. & A New Guild To Me.

Sorry for missed non replied comments

I seem to of been extremely ignorant in how the comments work and I will try and catch up on my mistake. If I have this figured out now some comments are replied through email and those are the ones I have missed and others are replied to under the posts here in my blog. I will be careful to try and not that and reply back via email when they are not here under the post. I thought I was going crazy.  I just figured this out on my own today so please give me some time to catch up and Please keep comments coming.

I believe I am going to join a Guild

Thanks to my Rocking friend Nadine I just went to her guild meeting last night with my sewing partner in crime; we had a great time met some great people too. the show and tell was super great and listening to some of the up coming plans they have coming to. I will be updating on this as it evolves.  Lots of great fun. Here is a link of an old newspaper article I found that has the guild info in it.  

newspaper article with guild info

I am always in need of posting a pic 

Here is some silly thread art play for a little bit as I still get use to the new long arm and my partner in crime has played some to. Its amazing how fast one looses time so fast driving around the machine in fun play.

Duck Top Finished & Some Crazy Long Arm Driving

I am excited there are some mistakes this was a bit harder than I thought to try and line up all the rows. I did some seam ripping and all however I am proud and THANKS TO URBAN THREADS for the great ducks  that I embroidered for this quilt top to be born.  Now to think about the next steps in making it happen into a finished quilt for my friend.

On another note here is some of my practice on my new long arm  setup. As you can see from the pics it will surely be awhile before I put a quilt top on to finish. However I am having a blast practicing and playing. I have about 26 yards and lots of different threads to play with so I am all happy. 

  

The Ducks Are Progressing & Sharing My 2nd Passion When Not Sewing

It is really getting close to that time of year when the weather breaks into nice warmer sun filled days and that's when my focus begins to really change into my 2nd passion.  I love Riding Motorcycles. Dirtbikes being my first love however after donating my kidney a few years ago I gave that up and now I just ride street bikes.  I took sometime to get out for a brief moment and catch some weather I really need to get her into the shop and all ran through to get ready for a great beautiful season of riding many miles into the sun and under the stars this summer.

Me & My Favorite Bike 

After some ride time it was back to work on the Ducks. SMILES!  I am not using a pattern and just doing my thing after I stitched out all the ducks from Urban Threads I am  learning as I go and seam ripping and redoing to get my blocks to line up as good as they will and here is the progression of them thus far. I am pleased and excited for more to come. 

I HAVE ALL MY DUCKS IN A ROW!

The sun came out and the ducks where all finished after about 25 hrs of machine stitching. 

I packed up my ducks a sheet and grabbed my top rate partner in crime shown in the below photo

and we set up for crafting out in the sun at the lake. Smiles How fun is it sun  and quilting together, Cat also worked on a new afghan too. 

Here I am  getting the perfect Fussy cut fit for the ducks. 

 WOW HOW COOL ALL THE DUCKS IN A ROW!

This is just beginning  now the ducks are finished and they are cut and ready to have some sashing added to each block and than put all together. I must say I am getting excited watching it transform .

Quilting Gifts Received In Mail & a New Quilt Started.

What a great awesomeness to add to any day to find something sewing/quilting related in the mail awaiting my arrival home after a long day. I received my wonderful beautiful Mug Rugs with some great extra goodies too;  from my swap partner last night. Here they are.

I also did some shopping at UrbanThreads.com and got the coolest rubber duck files 21 in all I think I will do 18 to 20 of them for a baby quilt I will be slowly carefully working on to get it just perfect for my buddy that will soon have his 1st baby sometime late summer.  The first Duck took me 2.5 plus hrs to stitch out and 32,988 stitches total. 

I will keep this updated as I get more done here and there. I am so excited about this soon be rocking quilt. I was agonizing over the pattern ideas and what to do. A special thanks to Roz and Rochelle for all the help to make sure I had the knowledge to not screw this up! SMILES!

I Am Here All Is Well. Here Is Some Highlights Of Some Of the Good Stuff.

Sorry it has been so long to post things have been insanely busy with this that and the in-between. All is well and there have been some amazing great things in my sewing world although not much sewing.  Let me share some of it with you here.

Long over due is telling you all about the last weeks where I went to the Quilt Show in Ohio that was amazing! Also they sent me the pics of how the community days went while we where gone and the bears we made ahead of time now have a lots of friends. Nothing feels better than making a difference with the help of my fav people Roz and Rochelle at Blasdell Viking Sewing Gallery...   

This shows a Business that cares and that is where I like to spend my money.

The big grand thing is I scored a deal on an imperial grace frame @ EdenSewingCenter I am almost ready to begin to play with it after a lot of craziness to get it together. All I am in need of is some Tracks as the ones with it where 5’ and I have it set up for 10’.  I am Very Excited. Oh yes also might have a deal on a machine coming too. Fingers Crossed it all happens sooner than I think.

My awesome great sewing friend Nadine alerted me to a longarrm class that was @ CreeksideFabrics Saturday  presented by Wenda Coburn. (I highly recommend her if she is in your area) 

What a great time we had and how cool it was to enjoy hanging out and talking quilting all day. 

SMILES!

I also have just been playing around with this and that here in the sewing room.  I will update the many more going on's to come this week. There is some other really great things happening in my sewing world. I can not wait to share with you. 

An Eventful and Productive Wonderfully Beautiful Weekend

Well now in the preparation of the weekend to come I spent all day Saturday Busting out some Bears for Community Days next Saturday March 23rd @ Blasdell Viking Sewing Gallery  since I will be @ the Pittsburgh Quilt Show that day and can not make it. I still wanted to make a contribution. I changed the engineering and added a heart  from the 1st 2 posted in another blog. I was the embroiderer, pattern cutter and stuffer. Sherry sewed them all up and Cat did the major surgery job of Hand sewing all the legs together.  What a great family team work project we all had fun sharing in.  Staying up way past our bed times.

Sunday we all got up early to spend the morning with my beautiful mom and shared her morning together as her youngest daughter turned another year older. ( THAT WOULD BE ME! ) We shared a great morning with lots of wonderful sewing surprise gifts that Rocking Great Roz set my sister up with for me. Sherry and Mom went off on a different adventure and Cat and I went off to our first Block of the month at Blasdell Viking Sewing Gallery. Rochelle did a great job showing and sharing the ways to make this great fun block. & than Roz showed up with some really yummy great cupcakes from a new place in East Aurora to add to the magic of the day.  I did not finish my Blocks as my brain was so tired and sleeping away I think plus we had a few seam ripping moments. I must say I am become a pro at seam ripping for sure. Below you will see a picture of one of Cat's finished blocks how awesome this block will look all finished in a quilt to come later. 

Than it was time to come home and before I crashed out early to catch up before Mondays soon to come work day I had to do one more thing just for me.  While getting things ready in the morning for the class I  ran into this funky deep red leaped print fabric in the wild bartered stash area fabric. I had to redo the non matching ugly leafy sheet table cover with the cool new stash find.  Now there is a very warm cool funky great look that brings that area all together warmly.  I am so really loving how this sewing area is coming together now.

Learning To Sew Bears Can Turn Into Scare Bears

Ok here is the background that will flow into more story to come within the week to come ahead.

There is 3 events going on next week on Saturday the 23rd  that I am really wanting to enjoy. Here is the List.

#1 Community Days ( Making Comfort Teddy Bears to give to first responders.  Roz & Rochelle are such amazing people that have gotten me sewing ) This is at the  Blasdell Viking Sewing Gallery here in NY

#2 There is a great looking Quilt Show in Cleveland, OH

#3 There Is a cool Quilt Show in Pittsburgh, PA ( plus friends we all want to see )

So this is the plan
Take Friday off go to Cleveland Quilt Show

Saturday go to Pittsburgh Quilt Show it ends at 2 and than hang out with friends

Cat and I will make the bears before hand and make sure they get To Blasdell Viking Before next Friday. No way can I see myself missing that great event. Roz and Rochelle work hard and harder  to keep us going sewing and for such good causes.  That is why I buy my millions of sewing machines the service we get there.

So below here you will find my first prototype of the bears using my 5D Pro to play with the Face size and than sewing them together they looked great inside out. However looking at the finished product I am Scared. hahahaha I am guessing I did something wrong with seam allowance. 

I am not done and I am not throwing in the towel. I am thinking I having some engineering issues in the first steps of entering the world of stuffed teddy bears.  I will be working hard tonight to try again and see I can get a better closer bear rendering.  I will be Trying a new method like I did my Stockings and see how that works out for better shape.  Any Help You Want To Offer I would Love to hear from you all.

The Magic of Sewing Just Fills My Spirit

I got to spend some just plain good  me time last night in my newly configured sewing room. I loved every minute of it.  I learned some a few important things too.  Most Important I had a great night.

Here Is a great instant gratification Pillow I made with some thicker cotton and it worked out great.

Here is a great wolf  pillow I made from an almost Batik like feeling cotton.

I did not use any batting and I really learned that in a fabric that is this light you really need to stabilize with some quilting or something to make it more formed for construction.

I Am So Happy! My Sewing Room Flows Perfect.

No matter what I do in the small space I can not seem to get a good angle or picture. after several takes this was the best I could come up with.  There is a flow in the room and since there is sometimes more than one sewing at a time in here that was to be considered too. It is very nice now and all machines have a home and where tested.

I am so excited I forgot to take a picture of the quilt top I finished and is ready to be sandwiched and quilted.
I also cut some fabric for a new project. I am thrilled that my cutting table feels right. I was having such a hard time with it facing the other way.  All and all I am ready and excited. The feel and flow of the room seems just right now. Took a lot of  different tries and now I really think its perfect.

Sherry even came up and sewed some That says a lot. 

Sherry is not addicted like the rest of us she sews out of need 

she is short and always needs to hem pants up.

She did say she likes the room set up like this the best so far.

Thanks To Everyone Sewing More Beauty Into My Daily Life

I have no sewing pictures right now to post. Just some cool sharing’s of the long week that had no sewing.  Sometimes life just gets moving a bit fast and it is hard to find that moment of me time to do anything.  No complaints as I have some really great things to share in the sewing world around me from the week. 

Roz and Rochelle from Blasdell Viking Sewing did a great job Saturday as we sewed our hats and had a blast. Anything frustrating that went on was all ok as me laughed and made it through together enjoying the day shared. I loved it and everyone else did too.   I was so much in awe of the day I had a couple of very cool strangers (how could not be cool with a pink streak of hair. )  I met in the Joann’s store deliver a small just fun thank you from us all.  Dodging and hiding out to make it a full surprise without being seen was just covertly extra bonus fun.

The week progressed and I decided I do not like the new sewing room design at all and it must be changed so I have it all drawn out and was all ready to get home Thursday night and rip apart and redo it yet again to get me motivated and the sun downers lazy bones feelings knocked out of me and get my motivation back and running.  Well I stopped over to Eden Sewing Center to say hello to all the womyn at the open sew and also sign up for a fun looking class on Tuesday.  Well much to my surprise a great womyn there found an amazing skull cup with black zig zags and it was just perfect to make my night glow and shine.  She then made it even better by saying how just saw it and thought of me and my sewing portfolio bag and it fit.  While Carolyn and I spook and shared something’s too and these 2 events fit so well into the book I wrote. I rushed out to the truck and found a couple copies and gifted them off too.  I must say it was a super great night at the open sew even if I did not sew and needless to say who am I kidding to think I would leave early enough to get any of my room done before the need for bed time. All worth it and a great time was had.

The Long and short of this post is that a couple years ago a decided to clean up my emotional home inside me and give my spirit something new to grow with and learn.  Somehow in this time I made the quilt for my mom and this whole sewing fabric and quilting addiction hit hard and fell right into place with my new life changing growth spurt.  This said sewing has not only brightened up my creative world it has also brightened up my whole world great people and great learning.  My gratitude and honor to all that are sharing in this new part of my journey in life as I am nothing special I am only a reflection of all that is around me. This all is what makes me love life so much. 

THANK YOU TO ALL THE SEWING WORLD FOR ADDING MORE BEAUTY TO MY LIFE!

My Book Is Found Here At Amazon

Blasdell,NY Viking Sewing; Charity Day. Hats for Roswell Cancer Patients

Saturday was a great fun day. Ok it was really a blast.  Rochelle and Roz rocked out the day dealing and supporting with us crazy wild sewing people. Yes they sure have adopted us. Poor them to be stuck with us and all our excitement and all the questions and wild enthusiasm that goes a long with us both as individuals and than as a group. WOW they have their hands full with us. SMILES!  We are more than Lucky to have them as a part of our sewing  family. They made the day work and added a great amount of fun  and  learning to the process. Guess we all are the Lucky ones to have them for sure.!

We manged to crank out some different hats a lot of different patterns to work from and a the group as a whole did a good fair amount too.   SMILES!

I would love to some things like this in the future. Funny now my head is spinning with some free form new hat ideas. I am not sure how much I really like to sew 4 layers of really think fleece with my serger however I took the challenge and did not back down made some very funky in my style fun bright hats.

For the event I added some of my own fun and gave my hair a makeover just for fun and to add to some good bright energy for a good cause. Pic posted below.  I encourage you all if this comes up in your area to jump in and have a great time.

Do not ask I have no clue whats up with me and all my crazy facial expressions lately. I was in shock I had my eyes still working good without my safety glasses on for this project. 

After a Few Attempts & Some Seam Ripping THE MUG RUGS

I have not been sewing that long and I am really a newbie at it all. This said I have the addiction like the pros and I am more than willing to try anything new and learn everything I can. I joined the Mug Rug swap.

I have not ever done Applique nor worked with such small pieces. This was probably the hardest still fun though sewing item I have done yet. I am excited with all I learned and I also messed up my iron badly with some excess steam a seam 2. Learned to not leave any over the edges. This was learning and it was very fun to watch it all come together piece by piece.  I will be looking for more applique in the future. 

These are made and packaged and sent off to my secret partner as of today! 

A Baby Quilt I Did Awhile Back With Baby

A very beautiful old time friend asked me to my honor to make her new coming son a baby quilt since I had just started quilting. I believe if memory serves correctly this is my 3rd finished quilt. I was late and baby Conner arrived a couple weeks before I had it finished and mailed out to Hawaii. As you all can see in the photo it was received and much enjoyed. This is also my own design and I had fun making it come to life.

This was a great honor for me to do and even be asked to do for such a beautiful loving friend.