Friday Finish is a Friday Start

No finishes this week as I have been taking in new quilt tops to quilt.

Yesterday I cut batting to fit the quilts I had taken in.  I just love this new batting I am carrying, Legacy 80/20.  Its so soft and beautiful drape. (Don't know why my camera is showing this in sepia tones.)

 

I have a quilt loaded and one row is quilted.  WooHoo!(I took pictures but they won't transfer off my phone.  Time for a new smart phone this one seems to be dumb today.)

 

Now I am off to work.  This is a big weekend for us with the roll out of the rest of our fall products.  I have 47.5 hours between now and Tuesday.  Wednesday is my day off, hope I can sleep in and soak in the tub.

 

Have a safe Labor Day weekend.

 

Yours in quilting,

Terry

 

Work in Progress Wednesday -- Madison Bus Trip

The Covered Bridge Quilt Guild is taking a bus to the Quilt Expo in Madison, WI, on Saturday, Sept. 6th.  They will be leaving Princeton, IL at 7:30am.  Please Carolyn Schmitt at 815-875-3161 or 875-878-4810 if you are interested in this bus trip.  Cost is $39 per person and includes your ticket for the show.  (Note this trip was originally planned for Fri., Sept. 5th)

We need to fill the bus by Sept. 4th or the trip will be cancelled.  Please call Carolyn ASAP.  Let's pack the bus.

Yours in quilting,
Terry

Preparedness Tuesday

Since my family is work such crazy hours, I am cooking ahead so that we have "heat and eat" meals in the refrigerator.  Last night I started with 4.5 lbs of ground chuck and 4 lbs of chicken breasts.
I first made Sweet Chili Lime Chicken with Frank's Sweet Chili Sauce.  I serve this over rice.  I put the cooked chicken in one container and made a big batch of rice in another container.  This is the guys favorite grab-n-eat meal. Then I moved on to making Grandma Pat's Casserole which is like a mock chop suey, with 1.5 lbs of hamburger, also served over rice. I put the casserole in the oven to bake for forty minutes. 

Next I browned about 1 lb. of hamburger and mixed in Hunt's Spagetti Sauce.  The guys cook noodles for themselves and they will have a quick meal.

Today I used the last 2 lbs of hamburger and made Sandy Roseberg's recipe for meatloaf with Sweet Baby Ray's BBQ sauce.  I also mixed up brownies from www.hersheyskitchens.com and baked those at the end with the meatloaf.  I baked the brownies for 24 minutes instead of 30 and they are fudging, yummy good.

TaDah!!!  We have "heat and eat"  food for the week.  We are like ships passing in the night with all our crazy work schedules.

Time to go to work.  I can post the recipes later if you need some easy ones.

Yours in quilting,
Terry

Its Monday!

It was a busy weekend here.  It was fair week here and we usually go to the fair on Wednesday with our friends for our annual "oil change".  In other words, one night a year we eat all the fried food at the fair along with a lemon shake-up.

 

This year because of my new job, we weren't able to join our friend for this annual event.  I had to work each day so Saturday night Rod offered to take me to the fair for our "oil change".

We each had a corn dog and shared a large lemon shake-up.  Rod bought his annual box of Malone's State Fair taffy.  We walked through the barns, especially the hog barn, so Rod could talk to the pigs.

You can't take the farm out of the boy.  We headed home with all that heavy food in our tummies.

 

I just had to laugh, we were in bed asleep by 9pm.  We both had worked so hard this week at our jobs that we were all in, all done.

 

I haven't really come out and talked about it but its probably time to fill you in.  I am working full time at Bath and Body Works in the Peru Mall.  I started there last fall as a holiday worker just to get a little socialization.  Quilting in the basement was getting lonely.  Then they kept me on after the holiday but I only worked a few hours here and there.  About a month ago, we had 6 people leave and I was asked to step up to a sales lead position for the fall and Christmas seasons.  We also had one person  who had her baby a week ago.  We have been working with a skeleton crew and are slowly getting positions filled.  We have a new manager on board completing her training.

 

Yesterday we had our annual inventory.  It is so much work getting prepared for the inventory crew to come in.  I am happy to say all the hard work paid off and the inventory went smoothly yesterday.  I left at 7pm last night and they were about 2/3 done already. 

 

I am continuing to work on quilts at home and working full time at BBW.  We are hoping to do some remodeling on our home this fall and the extra money will help pay for some of the new items for the house.  We met with a contractor Saturday morning at 7am to try to finish the planning for the remodel.  Next we will have to live through having the house torn up.

 

Have a great Monday!  I am off to work to open the store.  I am ready for a sewing day with friends.

 

Yours in quilting,

Terry

 

 

 

 

 

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Friday Finishes

Hello everyone!  I am glad the road to heaven is paved with good intentions.  I would love to post everyday like I had previously, but my job at the mall is up to 40 hours a week.  So, I have to pick and choose how to use the rest of my time.  I will post as much as I can until this temporary job ends in January. 

 

So here are my latest finishes.

This quilt was made by Kara A. who is a beginning quilter.  She did a fabulous job considering she stated, "I didn't know what I was doing".  Keep on quilting Kara, you did just fine. :)

 

I used Ocean Froth by AnneBright.com as the quilting pattern and soft white thread by Omini. 

From longarm to finish....

 

This wedding quilt is ready for the binding and its trip to the wedding.

This quilt will be a signature quilt at the wedding.  Guests will be asked to sign in the white areas.  I asked Kara to send me a picture of the quilt with the happy couple to post later.

 

Isn't this  a happy quilt for a guy?  I just love all the different fabrics.

I quilted waves all over the quilt.  You can see the rest of Gloria's quilts in my previous post HERE.

 

Gloria B. is the maker of this quilt and one of her lucky guys gets this quilt for Christmas. 

Thank you Aaron, for holding the quilt for pictures! 

 

I used my new batting in the swim trunk quilt, Legacy 80/20 and love the results.  It has a wonderful drape to it and is cuddly soft.  Plus, I had no lint in my bobbin area of my longarm. 

 

Today I am linking up with ..... Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Link a Finish Friday, Freedom Fridays, and Crazy Mom Quilts. 

 

Have a great weekend and stay cool!  Its steamy hot here in Illinois.

 

Yours in quilting,

Terry

 

Vintage Thingie Thursday

A while back I had an adventure with my friend, Barb.  We went to a home that was filled with treadle machines and a few feather weights.  Oh my, oh my, where do we begin!

This was their reading lamp.  This was super cute.

 

Every where we turned there were more machines.

 

This is a Wheeling & Wilson.

 

So I came home with a Feather Weight table.

 

Grandma Esther's feather weight now has its own table!  Its so cool!

 

I will be going back as I left my name on a beautiful oak treadle machine.

I had to leave before I was tempted to buy more.  I don't have endless room to store these things.

 

Have a great Thursday!

Yours in quilting,

Terry

 

 

 

Monday, Monday....on my longarm instead of Design Wall

This weekend we had a little get away.  The whole family went to my dad's in Iowa and we went to the Iowa State Fair.

Couldn't loose our guys with the bright colored shirts!

(Left to right:  my husband, Rod; my son, Aaron; my step-mother, Pat; my dad, Joel.)

 

As we entered the Fairgrounds, the Big Green Egg welcomed us.  Our neighbors have served us many great meals from their Big Green Egg smoker.

 

Of course, the guys wanted to check out the horse power.

 

Photo Opportunity!!

 

Yes, I felt like Edith Ann in this big chair.

 

I got home yesterday afternoon and rested a while.  Then headed to the basement to load and quilt this black and white quilt.  I completed 2 of the 7.5 rows before going to bed.  Started on it again this morning and finished it about 10am. 

 

Today I am linking up with Judy at Patchwork Times.

 

Yours in quilting,

Terry

 

 

 

 

Work in Progress Wednesday

Today I got up and went straight to work quilting on the swimming trunk or boxer quilt.

It is now fully quilted.  Full view will be shown on Friday Finishes.

 

I met with the kitchen planner yesterday afternoon and we have our kitchen planned.  I came home and went over the planning with Rod and we are in agreement.  That's a good feeling. 

 

Tonight I get some free time to attend the Gems of the Prairie meeting in Peoria. 

 

I am leaving my son home to do laundry. Hahaha!

 

Yours in quilting,

Terry

Block of the Month Links

Many of my quilting friends are following along with me on several Block of the Month quilts.

 

Quilt Doodle Designs 2014 BOM:  This month's blocks look like peppermint hard candies.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-UGYD12TSr-WWF5am5wTzhVQTg/edit?usp=sharing

 

Country Threads 2014 BOM (scrappy): This month's block makes a chevron row.

http://www.countrythreads.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/August-BOM2.pdf

 

The third Block of the Month is with Quilter's Garden Quilt Shop in Princeton, IL.  It is a Barn Quilt that they have designed.  I have my July blocks finished and will be getting August's pattern next week.  If you are interested in their barn quilt you may contact them thru their website at www.quiltersgardenonline.com.

 

Late this morning I did some cooking for the week.  I baked bacon for Bacon, Lettuce and Tomato sandwiches tomorrow night.  Tonight we had BBQ chicken on the grill.  Sorry it disappeared before I could take a picture.  The menu is planned for the rest of the week.  I have to work a few nights at my mall job so I am preparing meals the family can heat-n-eat without me.

 

I also had a large zucchini given to me.  The blog, Chef-in-Training, had posted 50 recipes to use with zucchini.  I made Zucchini Cookies.  Melt in your mouth good and super moist. You are suppose to frost them but they are so good they never got frosted.

 

All in all it was a productive day.  Today I have linked with Connie at Freemotion on the River.

 

Yours in quilting,

Terry

 

Friday Finishes - 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 is started!

Woo Boy, this has been quite a week.  I have been little quiet in the blogging area.  I have been busy at finishing my Sales Lead Team training at my mall job.  For the next five months I will a SLT, or similar to an assistant to the managers.  I am happy to say I have completed 50 hours of training.  Next the on-the-job training that comes along with doing all the daily activities.  So that is finish #1.

 

Finish #2 is Kansas Troubles quilt.

I used Magnifico thread for the quilting and the quilting pattern is falling leaves b2b.

 

#3 is cool winter scene and I used Off White Magnifico thread and snowflake e2e.

 

 

 

Finish #4 is this beautiful teal, brown and cream butterfly quilt.

I used Coffee Glide thread and the flutterby pattern by Handi Quilter.  This one I delivered in person as my friend, Stephanie, had her right knee replaced last week.  I sewed the binding on at her house and she is finishing the hand work on the binding while recuperating.

 

Last, but not the least, #5 the biggest quilt of the week is still on the machine.

I am quilting waves over all these very cool swim trunks or boxers.

 

I will share with you that I am not super woman and my body is paying the price for all the hours I have put in day and night for the last two weeks.  This morning I arrived at the vet with our horse at 8 a.m. 35 miles away and then took him back to the pasture as well as cleaned the barn.  This afternoon, Rascal, my Yorkie and I curled up for a long nap.  I went into work at the mall at 6:30pm.

Hopefully, I will get a good night's rest tonight and will feel a little more human tomorrow.

 

Today I am linking up with ..... Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Link a Finish Friday, Freedom Fridays, and Crazy Mom Quilts. 

 

Yours in quilting,

Terry