Here it Comes Again!

Would somebody jab me with a candy cane! Here is is the season of Joy and Goodwill, and I am not in the mood. Let's just say that I am having trouble finding the Christmas Spirit. What does this say about me, as a person? Now the guilt comes for not wanting to dive into all the frolicking. Sigh.

Here is the thing: I just want to stay in my sewing room all day and make quilts. Big quilts, little quilts, I don't care. The truth is I am full of Joy and Goodwill all year long! I love my family, I love my friends, and I love doing for others. What I don't love is shopping at any time of year. My husband will tell you that he has to beg me to go to the grocery store! Currently we only have two grandchildren small enough that we can buy them presents. The rest are teenagers (and Becky), and my holiday spirit goes like this, "Ho ho ho, Merry Christmas, here is your check!" I do love them all tho, and I think the check makes them happier than me trying to buy them clothes or just the right music CD. Perish the thought!

 Probably what this says about me is that I get excited about different things than I did in the past. For example, I made a little doll quilt and I love it so much that I want to fly through hoops in the sky! Does that sound a little extreme? Well, quilters, and other people who love their work, know just what I am feeling. Call it a "break-through", call it a "runner's high", call it the "Christmas Spirit"! Haha! We all know that different people enjoy different things.  This thing is definitely me!

Meet my newest doll quilt, Lil' Smokey. I take a bit of pride in the fact that I have never named a quilt after food. It is a challenge sometimes, but I have resisted! So no, this quilt is not named after little sausages! Rather, I tried to incorporate smokey colors. Of course some sparks had to be added as well. I like the contrast. I hope you do too! Something that I really enjoy about making scrap quilts is mixing new fabric with old, and combining fabric from different designers and manufactures. It is like cross pollinating! I love the result! Wouldn't it look fitting lying on a humble manger.

So Christmas comes and Christmas goes. It seems like it always comes sooner than I want it to, but once Christmas actually rolls around, and the REAL Spirit of Christmas engulfs our home, I hate to see it leave. We all know that the Grinch was right when he finally admitted that "Maybe Christmas doesn't come from a store". So maybe there is still time for Patchville to be touched by the magic of it all!

I BELIEVE

 

Recently I was sitting on the couch in our living room and my eyes darted past a pile of magazines scattered on the table. I did a quick double take as I focused on the one thing in the pile that had instantly brought peace to my soul. I love my quilting and other things that bring me happiness and satisfaction, but the flash of this image of our Savior had an effect that came so quickly and so quietly, and it was amazing to me. I am not even going to elaborate, but leave you to "ponder these things" as the shepherds of old in that faraway field were left to ponder.

 

Four year old Kathryn told her mother, my daughter, that she and her friend from school REALLY believe in Santa, because if you don't believe in Santa he won't bring you presents. My daughter replied that there are probably some children in her school who don't believe in Santa. "Yes", Kathryn said. "Claire doesn't believe in Santa".  "What does Claire believe?" my daughter asked. "Claire believes in kittens!" said Kathryn. 

 

Well of course! Who doesn't?! 

Along with kittens, here  is what I believe: I believe in the Spirit of Christmas! I believe in Peace on Earth Goodwill to Men! I believe in the Golden Rule of doing unto others as you would have them do unto you. I believe in many other things as well, but this is enough to get us through the Holiday Season no matter what religion we may be. In fact, this is a great way to go through life! At least that is what I Believe!

GIVE IT OR KEEP IT?

I began sewing little Saffiote blocks from 301 Country Christmas Quilt Blocks, a few months ago. They are very primitive and so cute! Paula at A Latte Quilts showed a project she just completed from the same book. Hers is really adorable! By the way, isn't that the cutest blog name?

I have yet to compile my blocks into a quilt. I still want to do that, but need to make more blocks. In the meantime, I made three of this block, because I thought it was so cute (pg. 71 if you have the book). It is one of Cheri's "create it" blocks, where she just puts in a picture of the block as she made it and then you make your own version. I have this flag fabric from years ago and I keep cutting out little American flags for various projects. I added the border and stitched the words, and with a minimum of quilting, it is now a gift to share at the LQS Christmas party tomorrow night. Or maybe I will keep it. I can't decide. VBG! What would you do? (Yeah, I'll probably give it. Sigh.)

AN ORPHAN FOR CHRISTMAS

Sounds like Little Orphan Annie, doesn't it? Actually, as you can see, I put a little pieced border around my Christmas orphans that I showed in an earlier post. (Enough with the Christmas orphans already).

These little blocks all paired up so cute together. Isn't it amazing what you can do with stuff that has just been kicking around for ages. Finn mentioned a couple of quilts that the ladies at Country Threads did several years ago. They were fabulous. They had lots of orphan blocks and created full size beauties. I have been looking for my book, but it is buried somewhere.

If you haven't been to Finn's Orphan Train Blog, you must check it out. She was kind enough to feature a couple of my quilts in her recent post. Go see what other bloggers, including Finn, have come up with. As for me, I gonna keep digging---I know I have more orphan blocks that need a home.

BLOGS AND BLOCKS

My husband has been gone on a business trip this week and I thought I would get so much done! Where does the time go? I can't catch up on the projects that I posted about before I left for Minnesota. I have been home for two weeks and I feel like I am spinning my wheels. I need some time to spend finishing some stuff. I haven't even read all the blogs on my bloglines. I feel bad about that. When I got home my bloglines said I had over 600 entries to catch up. Now it says 400.

It would help if Kim at http://kimsbigquiltingadventure.blogspot.com/ didn't write every day. But she just can't shut up! And I want to read all her funny stories.

Then there is Mary at http://maryquilts.blogspot.com/ who not only blogs every day, but also completes an amazing amount of fabulous quilts, and now is providing instructions for them!

Darlene at http://quiltingdaze.blogspot.com/ and May Britt at http://abyquilt.blogspot.com/ always have darling projects, big and small, and I want to dive into each one of them!

Oh yes, there are many, many more of you who keep me at the computer much longer than I should be. How can I get anything done when there are so many voices waiting to be heard? And new people keep showing up! I am going to have to draw the line somewhere. But not quite yet.





OK, that reminds me of my little Plumpkin. She mimics everything she hears, of course, and her mom has gotten into the habit of saying, "Not quite yet," to her when she asks for things. Plumpkin, of course, now uses that expression constantly. In fact, she will answer her own questions and say, "Can I have a cookie, not quite yet"? Or "Can we go to the park, not quite yet"? This is a picture of her this month - June - when she decided that the only outfit she would be willing to wear was a witch costume that she spotted in her closet. She actually prefers no clothes. Her mom decided that witch clothes were just fine.





Just so you know I haven't been totally non-productive, I have been making some of those Cheri Saffiote blocks, (see http://patchalotmore.blogspot.com/2007/05/primitive-christmas-blocks.html )and I wanted to see what orphan blocks I had that might work with them. I actually found a few that sized up very nicely together. The cardinal is a Debbie Mumm design, the Santa is from Country Threads, The tree from Little Quilts, and the quilt block is a reject from a block exchange. The color was good for this. The little ornament block is one of the Saffiote blocks I made. Patti at http://quiltingisstillmypassion.blogspot.com/ has been combining her orphan blocks into an enormous quilt that is awesome. I can tell you it is hard work figuring how to fit it all together. I am thrilled with my little project and I am going to border it and call it done! Sadly, it only contains one of the Saffiote blocks, so I will still have to decide what to do with all the rest. I am in no hurry, but I would like to see SOMETHING completed!
Dang, my Bloglines is now reading 485!

PRIMITIVE CHRISTMAS BLOCKS

Have you seen Cheri Saffiote's new Christmas book? It has tons of the cutest little primitive folkart blocks! (Notice all the bookmarks). I decided I wanted to prepare a bunch to take with me to Minnesota next week so I have some hand work to play with. So I started preparing the blocks, then in the evening I sat down and stitched them, totally defeating the purpose, but I couldn't stop myself! I don't have any idea how I am going to arrange them in a quilt. At this point I am just making a few of them for fun and I can figure the rest out later. There are so many patterns in this book that in order to print them all, they are printed small and you have to enlarge them 200% on a copy machine. I did that to a few, and some I decided to make smaller, so enlarged them at 175%. Some are so simple that you can just sketch them out in the size you want. They are all odd ball sizes, so they will need strips, etc. to pull it all together. But for now, I just laid them all on the floor for a photo. I have to tell you, the directions in this book puzzle me. It isn't very clear what the finished size of the blocks are supposed to be. When I add up the measurements for the pieced blocks they don't compute. I finally decided I would just determine the cutting sizes on my own so I was sure of what I would get. It would be really confusing for a beginner, but I am used to winging it, so it is OK. That funny little tree in the picture will have buttons sewn on, but not until after the quilting is done. Wow, do we know how to have fun or what?