g'Ma's hankies

I finished my mothers birthday present, a pillow made from my grandmothers hankies.
all 3 of them, though the lions share were g'ma Lorie's , hence the big yellow "L"














I sent it off to Chicago and she loves it!

so it's now safe to show everyone.

Unfortunately, in my infinite wisdom, (NOT!) didn't take a picture of the whole thing done and ready to go.
that's what I get for leaving things to the last minute!

had a hard time coming up with things to fill this out, these hankies were my gran's but the present was for my Mom, who's images do I do?
I decided that G'Ma's hankies were enough of a reminder so I used mom's favorite things to cover the corners that were left, some of those hankies were busy!












there are reminders of pets past, we had 42 bunnies at one time in a 3rd floor Chicago apartment! I bought a little bunny, then I bought another bunnie, don't one and one make two??


I had to put MR.Chuckles on there, he was Mom's horse back when Chicago had stables on clark and fullerton he is also a reminder of the Chicago Armoury Polo Club, mom was a groom and trainer and I was a gole tender and hot walker

When she was younger she used to race bikes on short track and I remember waiting for the herd to fly by so I could run to the center and watch her from the grassy spot in the middle.
when I was really little I rode in the bike seat on the back and we would do errands and such,
later we would ride on the lakefront

She gets to travel now, with her husband. they have been all over the place Europe, Malaysia, China Russia, India and so on. Her favorite place is Pariss though, she has photo albums full of odd little corners of Paris. someday I think she wants to retire there if she can convince poppabear to go!
Then I would have an excuse to go to Paris, explore and fill my own photo album!

update on the SRE class

Ok so here is even more of an update on the SRE class
I'm not terribly pleased with the wisteria as it looks like grapes but it's not awful so i'll leave it.
for some reason the actual grapes won't load so I'll do that later.

I have made a wreath that I was going to use for strawberries but though better of it and now don't quite know what to do with. flowers of some sort I suppose!


the butterfly is finished and I'm working on the strawberries now

SRE class

Here is how my SRE class is going.

so far I'm quite pleased!

I'm using a combination of RJR and Gloriana silk ribbon.

the RJR is wonderful for good solid colors and gloriana has wonderful vibrant variegation's in it for blending and realism!

pay it forward

Have you all heard of the "Pay It Forward" phenomena that has made it's weaving way through blogland? Well, I am not the recipient of it from any blog but I want to play. I am going to start the Pay It Forward myself well...because....I do what I want, and I wanna play!

Here are the rules...

* I will make a little handmade something for the first 3 people (and maybe more...again MY rules I make them up) who comment on this post who would like to play along.

* I have a year (365 days) to complete my mission and send off the goodies! That should be enough time.

* There is no telling what those things might be, or when they will show up in the post, it's a mystery.

Details, or the fine print;

Since this is ‘Pay It Forward’. You, my dears, must do as I have done and post a similar blog entry yourself, hence Paying the bloggy goodness Forward and keeping the meme, and the fun, going. Remember you are only obligated to make out to 3 people!

Would you like to join in? Of course you do. You have an entire year to make whatever you want, it can be something small or tall or short and stout, even something round. And you will receive something made by me! Ooh, the possibilities!

Now, go on and do it!

(text swiped from Princess of all things(and them some!)
whom I shamelessly plug here http://princessandthebeads.blogspot.com/

my Christmas stocking

I finished my DBF's stocking before christmas and as you can see, I am making progress on my stocking too



I will probably mess with it some more next year but for now I am satisfied with it








the Key is a play on my maiden name of Noelke
Noel-key, get it;)

the cryllic letters stand for my name in Russian

and the two Birds are "nesting'
the erring is one that my mother made for me, the other one broke and I used the bugle beads in the DBF's stocking as organ pipes.

the asiatic scene is one that used to be a pendant and the buttons were some that I found at my gramothers

Queen of the yard!

let me tell you why I am ""queen of the yard". yesterday I conquered the chainsaw!
Pishaw and small potatoes you say!
well, hey, I'm a big city Girl, i've never realy been close to a chainsaw, let alone ever have to use one!

last sept I was horrified when the DBF took out his chainsaw and proceeded to carry it up a tree to cut down branches, not just by the noise it made (damned things are really loud!) but by the prospect of sewing back severed limbs should he fall or misjudge a cut..
I did what any other sensible City dweller would do, I did the "girlie thing" and went inside to bake bread so I wouldn't have to watch the possible carnage.
after all, what do I know from Chainsaws?

though the DBF did point out that, trying to make it out here in the wilds of the great northwest with him, three stray cats and twenty million trees on our 3/4s of an acre I'd have to learn to use one, one of these days.

well, yesterday morning I had a dream (no really!) that I was cutting down the big dead tree by the front door, with the chainsaw in my own lilly white hands!
so upon waking having a good strong cup of coffee, kissing my DBF off to work and putting my "Big girl panties" on. I decided to go have a talk with the chainsaw a see what the fuss was all about.
Turns out he's just another tool, who likes to be oiled and gassed up from time to time like all the other ones hanging around various parts of the garage.

So I gassed him up and we had a good time cutting down that dead tree in the frond yard, I now have my sights on the rampant rhodi jungle by the northeast side of the front yard.
look out here I come!

but maybe after a couple of days and a nice cup of ginger tea, it seems the flesh is weak and muscle soreness is a bitch!

new sketchbook entries

something I haven't done a lot of lately is share my sketchbook idea's with you all.

here are some of the recent projects you may recognize,
the cinderella quilt the DBF's christmas stocking
the witchi-poo hat


and some newish ones

like my christmas stocking which I know you've seen before

and the beauty and the beast quilt furthering my attempt to
CQ all my favorite fairy tails,

and the SRE class quilt which may or mat not be made into a purse, i haven't decided just what to do with that yet.

and then there are tthe hankies, my mothers birthday is in march and I decided it was about time to do something for her again and I have grandma Lories hankies hanging about doing nothing so...

Idea rampage

I need to slow down the project mayhem!

I have a lot of things going at once and am in need of pile management!

Again!


see that pile on the couch? that is the extent of my overflow of imagination.
I can't seem to slow it down the ideas keep coming and I am a slave to all of them.
and its growing!

a pot of tea first, I think, then what to show you next?

Merry Christmas!

I want to wish every one out there in bloggerland a very merry Christmas and a Happy new year,Wish me luck,
this Holiday season I am flying into Chicago tomorrow, christmas day, to see my kiddies and Just to remind everyone it could be worse! this is Niagara falls in 1911, frozen completely over!

I hope the new year brings you every joy.

Mundane quilt rescue

well here is the new project, my DS childhood quilt,
he has had it since he was 6 or 7, I took it away from him, when I discovered him walking around with it serape style and gave him another quilt until I could fix it.
that is now just as dead, deader even.






I have had it in the to-do pile for far to long and finally decided it would be a fitting christmas surprise to get it back to him this year.
Especially since he keeps bugging me to have it back.
the problem is how to fix the great honkin' hole in the quilt top,







so first I closed the hole in the front, It being the smaller of the two,


replacing the three inch squares was as easy as they come!


why I did not do this sooner is anyone's guess.

probably a misguided attempt to teach him to take better care of the things he loves.

I should have taken a closer look at his childhood stuffed cat, carelessly tossed strategically close to his pillow every morning.



the front was not as damaged as i originally thought, here is the top, hole-less.










now for the back,





made just a little more difficult due to the lack of batting as well
but with a little help from the cotton batting extras I have in a box and a little straightening of the edges

  that was relatively painless too!






Now I am extremely embarrassed at not doing this sooner, as easy as it has been so far,


of course just saying that grantees me trouble in the future.


the basting is all done now all I need to do is sew the big patches down


 fix the small patches on the front and quilt the darned thing all over again!







Not bad for a weekend project! I hope to have it done before new years!)

My new space

I have a new work space, in my new home, in my new town of Bothell Washington!

I know some people out there get a little "hinky" about showing their workspace to the world. I have no such compunctions, I am a mess, get used to it!) It's not so bad really I know where most everything is (unless someone messes with my piles) and I have a place for almost everything.
Now If I could only get it there!

I have a lovely picture window looking out on the backyard and the lovely draping tree, whose name
I know not, and southern exposure!



this picture doesn't do it justice but it's raining (again) and Foggy (again) and the window really needs a good wash!



you see in the big northwest, southern
exposure doesn't necessarily mean lots of sun light. It does, however, mean lots of good bright light.

I also, still have a lot of tidying up to do and it doesn't help that I keep getting lost in the small stuff. ie, open a box of fabric, lace, beads,etc. and organize it, instead of actually putting away the mess.


and as my space is right out in the open, I have to do more in the way of reining in the usual insanity that is my work space.

so far I have gotten the pile management down fairly well and it helps that my Dear BF does pile management too;) as long as our piles don't get too mixed up we should be fine!




I like being out where i can be a part of everything going on in the house rather than shut away upstairs in the attic!










I also caught sight of a visitor today. so far as I can tell "Grey kitty" is a boy, very shy and a mouser extraordinaire. We have been encouraging him to stick around by leaving offerings, as you can see he has accepted our latest, by licking the plate clean!

playing with my organ

I thought that might get your attention, naughty girls!)
I have finished my BF's christmas stocking!

Gold ribbon went a long way to making the organs keyboard pop, what the picture doesn't show is that the bugle beads are a shimmery purple over black.

I made little christms trees of green glass leaf red stars, to brighten up that piece of lace at the top of the piece.


I also added black and purple beads to the corner seam treatment, a silver bugle charm to the wreath, my BF's name and gold beads to the poinsettia round out the upper half of the stocking.

the final bit of beading was to the green lace motif where i used lots of white and MOP beads of birds stars and hearts.

everything on the stocking represents something he loves or is dear to him. i want to point out the robin patch his mothers name is robin and the little face at the corner represents a sun, to mean Son of Robin. a little play on symbolism there.

I also want to thank you all for your kind words of encouragement and praise it was a lovely surprise to see how many of you look into my humble bog. Thank you:)

Happy Halloween!

As promised, Me in all mt witchy goodness!

The Organ concert was wonderful the studants played a tag team on the obligatory Toccata and Fugue, they also played the march of the marionettes, better known as the theme music for Alfred Hitchcock presents" and so many others. lots of fun!