November Free Motion Quilting Challenge

It has been a good week. I got a lot accomplished which I will share later. Thanksgiving was a very good day. My #2 son and daughter-in-law hosted Thanksgiving at their home this year. We brought the turkey, sweet potato casserole, and a pumpkin cheesecake. My daughter-in-law's parents were there too which made it extra special. It was the first holiday we all spent together since my son got married. 

One thing I accomplished this week was my free motion quilting practice. This design is really neat and would be great to use for sashing or borders. Sarah Vedeler shared this tutorial on the SewCalGal blog this month. Sarah is a very talented quilter. Check out this post to read more about her.

 For this spiral design I printed out this pdf which Sarah shared with us. It had the guide lines to make small and large swirls. Sarah shows the steps to make these swirls which was very helpful. Again I practiced on paper first. This is one thing I will do every time now before I start any free motion quilting.

 For some reason I was having some problems on beginning the next swirl. You can see the arrows on the paper. I did get better but it took some practice on the paper.

 Onto the fabric piece which was fun to do. I think that I will use this design on a quilt one day. One more month of tutorials. I wonder what December will bring.

With Passion,
Carrie P.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I wish all my American friends a Beautiful Thanksgiving Day!

Give Thanks to the Lord, for He is good; His love endures forever. Psalm 107:1

With Passion,

Carrie P.

Guild Meeting and Winner

This past Monday Karen Combs came to speak to our guild. You might not know her face but I am sure you know her quilts.

 She is the master of illusion when it comes to designing quilts. She has also designed some gradated fabric to use in quilts like these. It is called Serendipity. She has included a free pattern so that you can try your own quilt of illusion. You can also check out her blog to see what she is up to. She has a block in the new 100 Blocks magazine by Quiltmaker that I really like. It also uses her Serendipity line. It was really great to see all her quilts.

Some of you might remember that my applique bee helped me make the blocks for the lady who was our president last year. She brought the quilt back to show us that she had gotten it all quilted and bound. It looks great, doesn't it?

And now to winner of my Hop To It book...
It is Teresa from A Quilt and a Prayer! Here is what she wrote.
I would call it "Afternoon in Wonderland" because of  the soft muted colors, like the soft afternoon light, and the white bunny in the center. It's beautiful, no matter what you decide to name it:*)

So "Afternoon in Wonderland" it is! Congrats Teresa. I am sending you an email!

 I appreciate all your suggestions. So many great ideas and I read every one of them. Thank you for all ideas. You all are so creative and made my job of naming my quilt much easier because I am horrible at it. Most times I ask my daughter to name a quilt for me.

With Passion,
Carrie P.

Apples and Pumpkins...

these two things definitely let us know fall is here. I finished my apple row from Bee In My Bonnet row along. Now to get busy on the coffee cup row. This is only a portion of the row.

 Yesterday I was busy cooking a pumpkin that we got at our farmer's market. I didn't get as much as I had hoped for but enough for 4 recipes. I made Pumpkin custard yesterday. Today I made Pumpkin Cranberry muffins. I put pumpkin puree in the freezer for a pie and for a Pumpkin Cheesecake from Our Best Bites for Thanksgiving. I am not a big fan of cheesecake but this is one recipe I do like a lot. The crust is to die for.

 I also roasted the pumpkin seeds.

 I have a giveaway going on yesterday's post if you are interested.

With Passion,
Carrie P.

G & G

Are you wondering what G & G stands for? It stands for Garden update and Giveaway. I thought I would show you the last of the flowers and vegetables in the garden. The white one is from my pea vines. The orange are nasturtiums and cosmos. But the orange flowers are all dead because of frosts that we have had.

 I have cabbage, bok choy, and green and yellow bell peppers growing. The bell peppers get covered with a hoop house so the frost hasn't hurt them yet and they are still producing. I also have onions and kale growing.

 Here are the pea vines which are still producing peas. I pulled all the big carrots but I have some more carrot plants growing. In the back is one onion and some Bibb lettuce that I keep covered with row covers. The frost hasn't gotten them either. I have a vole in my garden which ate some of the carrots. I really do not like those critters.

 I planted black beans and pinto beans during the late summer. I let the pods dry on the vines until I heard frost was coming. Then I brought them in to finish drying. I got a whole quart jar of black beans. I have already cooked the pinto beans which weren't as many as the black beans.

 I also have Cilantro and other herbs growing. The Cilantro was growing so well I decided to dry some. Here you can see bunches hanging. Such a pretty green until they dry out.

  Okay we are getting close to the giveaway. I have to share a giveaway that I won a couple weeks ago but forgot to share. I won these fat quarters from This-N-That Fabrics. Perfect for fall.

 Okay, now for my giveaway. You can win my Hop To It book and three green batik fabrics you can use for leaves. (approx. 8"x12" pieces) One thing I should tell you is that the blocks in the book are twelve inch square. When I made the blocks in my quilt I had enlarged patterns which made my blocks fifteen inches square which made my quilt queen size. Also, if you don't hand applique don't worry you could make this quilt with machine applique with great directions in the book.

Okay, so what do you have to do to enter this giveaway? Just help me name my quilt. I don't want to call it Hop To It anymore because that is really the name of the book.
Leave a name for my quilt and you will be entered into the giveaway. If you haven't seen my quilt yet you can see it here.
I will pick a winner next Wednesday.
I will probably not reply to all the comments just because I don't want to aggravate the tendonitis in my elbow. I hope you understand.
I do appreciate all your very nice comments on my quilt and the quilting Mary did for me. Thank you! I am slowly replying to all of those comments.

With Passion,
Carrie P.