FOUND MORE GIVEAWAYS

stars from a star swap that are somewhere in a pile of ufo's....

 at one time they were on the design wall.

If you've already registered for my givaway then hop over to Nola at just ramlin' she has a great giveaway that ends July 31.  Lots and lots of CHARMS!!

I found another great giveaway at Sherri's A Quilting Life, beisdes the great giveaway, check out the new quilt she is working on made from fresh cottons....................soooo Great!!!

your opinion and giveaway

This one of my sock monkey patterns digitized and stitched out on a shirt by Peggy Johnston of SEW CREATIVE, Peoria Heights, IL and if anyone is interested, we were thinking she could have the digitized pattern available at her store, then eventually on my blog and hers if she gets it up and running.

  I want a shirt with the monkeys on it!! 

WOULD YOU LIKE TO BE ABLE TO PUT IT ON YOUR OWN SHIRT?

Several people over the years have asked me if I had ever digitized my designs for embroidery machines, but I did not have the ability nor know anyone who could/ or would do it for me.  As a hand embroiderer, machine embroidery did not hold all that much appeal to me, so I never pursued it but now Peggy Johnston of Sew Creative in Peoria Heights IL kind of posed that same question in a different form to me.  She had already digitized one of my designs for herself and sent me a picture of what she did and wanted to know if we could collaborate on digitizing my designs.........  Now I only do hand embroidery but a lot of people are really into machine embroidery..........Are you an embroidery machine owner and would you like to be able to buy my designs digitized for machine embroidery?  She has had a lot of people come through her store and have requested the design she put on this shirt.  So now she wants to know if we could sell them as a joint effort.  You can email either of us if you are interested too.

This is the cover for the pattern she started with

So what do you think?  Should I do it or not, ? .....just curious if you are interested, what embroidery format do YOU need or use??  Have any of you done that with your designs and what is fair for sharing the profits?? I am a fish out of water when it comes to machine embroidery.

DON"T FORGET TO GO TO ONE TO MY OLDER POSTS AND REGISTER FOR THE LAYER CAKE MONDAY MYSTERY GIVEAWAY!

Mystery Monday

Today's MYSTERY MONDAY PROJECT is about my lessons on coloring on fabric, gel pens, and pictures of the testing I did for our chicks meeting. 
Here's page I wrote about to pass out at a chicks meeting but for some goofy reason I saved it as a jpeg, so it may print fuzzy, so I turned the picture into a pdf don't know if it will help or not?  These are the things I know for sure ...........to keep the most amount of coloring on the fabric through a wash or two,  You need to test your fabrics first, so you understand how your fabric and your coloring techniques will look before and after washing, because they will fade to a soft watercolor look on some of the colors and fabrics and brighter on others.  That your fabric needs to be 100% cotton and pre-washed before coloring on then heat set after your finish coloring.  Do not color hard, it will just end up stiff with a waxy, greasy shadow on fabric, around item after you heat set it.  And just so you know.......white crayons just end up just being a greasy spot.

here's the pdf link to to the above notes on coloring on fabric

This is the unwashed version of fabric where I compared Crayola's, regular and washable crayons, and Roseart crayons( a little bit less expensive ones than Crayola, and they work just as well as Crayola for this project.  They even have a few different shades of crayons I might add) And various types of markers and gel pens as well, notice that I labeled things so I would know after washing

In the above picture the one on the left is before heat setting.......the one on the right has been heat set.  See how the color is blended into the fabric better.......less of the coloring strokes.  I tried coloring various ways, and made duplicates of each set and washing half of each set for comparison.  Just a note.................washable crayons are not completely washable on white prewashed fabric.........there is just the tiniest residue color left.  If washable crayons are heat set, they are permanent, and after washing look basically like the regular crayons maybe one shade lighter.  SORRY I thought I had pictures of the post-washed samples but I cannot find them.  Even  after the color has been heat set a lot of the color does still wash out but quite a bit remains.  If fabric is not pre-washed and cotton about 95% of the color washes out. 

see the pictures of the sock monkey book see the color levels I ended up with compared to the samples above..these books have been washed twice.  The first time I washed them in a warm/cold rinse load with a load of old t-shirts that I didn't care if any crayon transferred........I don't think any did, but I wouldn't put them in a load of good clothes just in case!  I wash most things warm/cold with regular tide.  So your laundy detergent may affect color level too.

twice washed sock monkey books

I found the best pens for the heaviest outline that doesn't bleed, run or fade are the Zebra g-8 pens from the office area at wally world or at an office supply store.................the pilot g-2 pens ran, just horrible when washed.  The new bleed proof sharpies look like they would work, I wrote on some fabric but I have not washed it yet.  Some gel pens do not wash well, heat set or not.  Some run, some fade.........run your own experiment on prewashed scraps of the fabric you intend to use.

here's a monster (click on on the word monster for a pdf link) for you to color so that you can

experiment with coloring on your own fabrics.............or if you want something more realistic below is a cornucopia, part of my basket collection.  is only a jpg, not a pdf.

. 

Try some coloring on fabric, experiment first, then go bold.  Try new things!!!!!!!  Like coloring on top of textures......sand paper, those textured plastic scrapbook sheets, leavesof trees and ferns, lightly blend colors.  If you want to control precisely where you color without lines, use contact paper and cut out desired shape, peel and stick, color, remove contact paper then heat set!!!    all kinds of fun........!!!   My previous post has pictures of our monsters that we colored for a quilt or two.
Don't forget to go register for my mystery monday giveaway from 2 mondays ago, drawing closes July 24 drawing held on July 25.

been froggin'

Now at my MIL's house, that means going around the all the ponds in season after dark, hunting bullfrogs for dinner the next day.....................They don't taste that bad, similar in taste and texture to shrimp, but I have trouble eating them because of the visual aspect!! And really hunting them for me amounted to my carrying the sack for of dead frogs', not my idea of a fun night............once was enough.

But for me, froggin' all  night meant rippin', rippin'. ripping, some of the monster blocks apart.  A couple of years ago, I did a demonstration, for our quilt group, on coloring on fabrics, and the various results of pre-washed versus not, and washable crayons versus not and different gel pens.  Then we all sat and colored some monster blocks that I had drawn of white quilt lining.  We had great time.  They were to take them home to square them to to a certain size and then add bright colored  borders.  But some of them didn't square up the blocks which were all different before they sewed on the borders and I could not make them work together they way they came back to me.  I haven't had time or the inclination to unsew until now.   I unsewed about 10 of them, am going to trim blocks and then re-add the borders back on. wasn't bad at all, should have done it along time ago. no stitches were teeny tiny. no back stitching or restitched line lines to rip out, was easy.  Several came back without any borders so I am doing those too.  So this is what I am going to work on now.  Here's picture of the piles of monster blocks and pieces parts  :)  Once the monser quilt is sewn together and quilted, it will end up at RACS (the rape and abuse crisis center or a hospital or something like that)

Don't forget to go to one of my previous posts about the mystery giveaway and leave a comment, which will close July 24, and then come back tomorrow for mystery monday?????

mystery monday project

Couldn't decide what to do for mystery monday so I thought I'd give you a family favorite recipe and something to stitch.  I have requests all the time for these, because two of those girls of mine who don't like to sew don't really like to bake either and love these, lol!  These are a spice bar chocked full of raisins!

Raisin Bars – 350 deg / 20 min

Pour 1 1/2 C hot water over 1 1/2 C raisins, let soak and COOL OFF while mixing other ingredients. In a bowl, mix 2 eggs, 1 1/2 C sugar, 1/4 C applesauce, and 1/4 C oil. Add just the water off the raisins and blend. Mix in1 tsp baking soda, 1/4 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp each of cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves. Blend in 1 3/4 C flour. Add the rest of the water/raisin mix and mix well. Batter is thin. Pour into greased and floured jelly roll pan. Bake till done 350 for 20 min, insert a toothpick to test for doneness. Let cool. Then dust with powdered sugar OR frost them the way we like them…………frost with: 2 C powdered sugar mixed with 3 T melted butter or margarine, 1 tsp vanilla, a pinch salt (yes) and enough strong coffee hot or cold doesn’t matter adding a little at a time, to make a good spreadable icing. (about 2T or 3T) Now I don’t drink coffee, so I buy those singles of instant coffee for this and put a little less water in the cup than usual.

Below here is another little something to stitch, maybe it could go in the corner of a tea towel???........................... ENJOY the raisin bars and the stitching. 
and don't forget to enter the mystery monday giveaway from last week!!
Cyndi

what to do for mystery monday

Can't decide what to do for mystery monday so while I think about it, I'm going to show what I did late last night and early this morning.......................Jenny Reynolds at Jenny from elefantz see the daisy do button on my side bar, she is having a 4 month BOM and being one to not always follow directions I decided to go an opposite direction as far as color, however I should have READ the directions because I just chopped off a chunk of fabric and traced the design on a light box with a white pencil from granddaughters set of colored pencils.........usually I use a white or light gel pen on dark fabric but the gel pens were at home. And now I think it's not 8.5" and so I may have to do a little tinkering to get it to fit in her design.  oh well..........that's what I get for not reading the materials required, makes life a challenge........who would want it too easy, lol!!!  Anyway, here is my version of Jenny's first block.................

I used dk cream, a taupe and dark brown floss on a brown/black tone on tone.

I was supposed to be sorting stuff but the needle called and I had to pick it up.

AND I thought I'd introduce to our super helper/super monster, AKA Cami (Camryn).  She's granddaughter #2, and is age 3.  She wanted a Super Helper cape in red......................Now don't you just love fleece.............no raveling jsut sew and go.  I had lots of fleece but alas no red................what to do.................hmmmm Cami and I thought about it for awhile, her house is 40 miles from town so we couldn't just hop in the car and go to town, so we decided to make a super monster cape, but kind cute and not so scary, she thought it was a bit scary until I added the tongue, then she thought it was funny.  So now she zooms around the house in her super monster cape, being a super helper.  I didn't make it so it would tie around her neck................it has straps sewn onto it that she puts on like a coat or shirt.  They sit up at her shoulders so I wouldn't have to worry about her choking herself somehow.  She would only stand still today while we were cleaning for a few seconds so I had to be quick........she was too busy being a super helper for her mom and did not have time to have a picture or two taken

I should have gathered it more between her shoulders but she wears it as is and loves it.  It will grow with her.  It doesn't really show on my computer but the cape is black and the face parts are kind of a pale neon green.   The "hair was some scraps leftover from the face parts, it was all cut freehand and sewn on as is. 

Any way she is our little super monster, super helper.

Don'f forget about last meek's mystery..........am hosting a giveaway.  One layer cake ea for 2 different people.   Givaway ends at midnight my time CST.  Drawing will be sometime the 25th

LUCKY ME, lucky you

Have you seen this book?

  It was written ny Cherri House at Cherri House Quilts.

I get to see this book up close and personal.......................a  signed copy will be zooming my way any day now..........Jackie at Canton Village Quilt Works was having a giveaway and I won............I  won this book, and if that wasn't great enough, she got the artist to sign is, I AM SOOOOOOO EXCITED!  Go Visit Jackie's blog and see all the goodies there.  Then go to Cherri's blog and see all her goodies, such fun places.   Thank you Jackie for having such a great prize!!   Oh and if you would like this book Jackie says she is selling them in her store Canton Village Quilt Works. 

Speaking of prizes, Janet a new Canadian blogger, at  Caribou Crossing Chronicles of Quilts, the weather and other fun stuff, (go by and say hi!), won one of my giveaway prizes recently.  But what is better than that (as far as I'm concerned) is that she sent me my very first quilted postcard.   I have been dog-sitting at my one of daughters lately in another town, so I'm not sure when it came, I know it wasn't there by July 1, but the other day I had to take my son to an appointment and ran by the house for a few minutes and lo and behold............goodies for me, (including yucky ole bills) and a beautiful quilted FABRIC postcard from Janet.........so cool., lots of little pieces of Kaffe Fassett style florals.  Another cool thing is her post master/mistress was very careful when they postmarked it, it's a perfect postmark, you can see every detail about it.  Thank you Janet, I LOVE it  I always wanted to try one, now I know I will!!!!  If you're friends with your postal person tell tham thanks for being careful with the postmark.

Here's some pictures so you can see my surprise prize.  Sorry about the quality of my photos.

cool huh!!!!!!

If you want you can join in the MONDAY MYSTERY GIVEAWAY,  I have 2 layer cakes to give away to 2 lucky people.. one layer cake per winner...................Is one of them you?????????????

monday mystery giveaway

giveaway in this post!

Holey moley Batman!! , I lost a day or two somewhere.  I just sat down at the computer and realized I forgrot to post a fourth of July freebie, I attached a small version below, will try to scan it normal size and get it to you tomorrow evening, you could just blow it up to what ever size suits you.  AND I forgot about mystery monday.........................I am SO sorry, my brains must rolled out my head somewhere, if you find them send them back.    It's too late at night do something for monday mystery so let's have a mystery giveaway.   I have been sorting through things at daughter's house ran across 2 items that people may want to have.  I could get let it be a total surprise, but I think you should at least get an idea if what the mystery gift giveaway is.   I will say I have found two layer cakes.  So lets get two winners, more details on drawing date later, it'll be a week or two ,I've got to see what's going on next week or the week after............am bushed need sleep............will post tomorrow(oops just looked at clock will be later today, it's past midnight.

One thing I did accomplish this weekend was I got the red veriosn of snowball quilt all together and delivered it to Patches, Etc Sunday morning.  Would have posted a picture but I lost my camera(husband's camera) this weekend. Chris is supposed to be sending me one.  But you know what the blue one looks like, it's the same only red.

Anyway  leave a comment about something or email me and I'll pick a name from the list of comments, please include your email me an address if you have a no-reply return address.  NOTE: HAVE DECIDED TO END THE MONDAY MYSTERY GIVEAWAY AT MIDNIGHT JULY 24, and will draw 2 names sometime on sunday the 25th.

Happy late Fourth.  The Fouth of July basket is from the first set of patterns I ever drew for someone else.  Hope everyone had a good weekend. Cyndi

another happy ending quilt mishap

My daughter #2 loves purple not to the point of being a "must have everything purple fanatic", but she is geared towards purple.  Anyway in high school she picked out the kaleidescope pattern as the quilt that she wanted.  I started collecting and gathering fabrics buyimg purples in every quilt/fabric store I visited.  This went on for a couple of years I think.  Then  I started cutting, until that point I hadn't really thought about the red purples, pinky purpls and blue purples of which I had LOTS.   And I cut and I cut, then cut some more.  I started assembling a few blocks.  We threw them up on the diesgn wall and she decided for the most part we should stick with mostly the bluer purples and less of the red violet shades. So I sewd and sewed pieces together.  When I quit I had more than enough for one quilt, and still had LOTS of pieces left, I have since then made a second one (it was machine quilted) and have enough pieces for a third and maybe a fourth..(got a little carried away cutting)

anyway that part is not the mishap.........................................

This is the front of her quilt keep reading.............

Bethie's quilt above is the first and last big quilt that I tried to quilt by hand.  I had done baby quilts before that and since then with any major screw ups................. but because this quilt was special, of course things would get weird..    I do not have a reglar quilting frame so I used a very large oval floor hoop off of the stand, in my lap. I had basted it with very large basting stitches, removing them as I went along,  I sarted in the center and then worked around the center moving out going around in a bigger circle each time.   Somwhere about 1/4 of the way from the outside edge on one of the rounds when I was coming up to join where the circle started, all off of a sudden I realized that at one point or another I had pulled the fabric underneath waaaaayyy more than the top.  I was HORRIFED............................I had way more top than I had backing.  Now I don't even :"unsew" if I can help it, I was NOT going to unquilt it,,,,,nor would I have even known where to start unquilting  I put it aside and just looked at it for days, weeks, months...............WHAT was I going to do, I knew what had to be done.................but would I do it.......................one day I decided to quilt everything else but that area about 10" x 20".  when I got done with the rest of the quilting, I did the only thing I knew to do.........................

flipped it over, picked up my scissors, just the backing layer of fabric and sliced it open.  I laid it out flat, rebasted and then quilted it as if there was backing fabric there, the batting stretched enough it was okay. Now I had this large gap on the back going from nothing to almost 3 inches wide.   Now I could have sewn a piece of fabric over the gap but at the time I was enjoying needleturn applique and decided to applique flowers over the gap, and because of the unusual place decided to sprinkle lots of flowers all over the quilt.  swooping here and there..........hiding the fact that there was a problem on the back, lol!    The hole if you really want to know where it is is underpart of the swoop at the left in the middle.  (I think anyway......it's been awhile.) 

A happy ending quilt mishap................She now has a 2 sided quilt, which makes it even more special than the original idea because she has a funny story to go with it,  Only bad thing was she was excited because she thought her quilt was about done..............took me another year more to finish it.  It was a bad time too my son had been in a near fatal car accident.  He suffered a TBI(traumatic brain injury) was in a  coma for 22 days and had to relearn everyrhing.  He'll never be the same but he is who he is and can do most things.  He and his dad just don't get the fact that he can't drive anymore and a few other things but is okay.  According to the label I began her quilt(began collecting fabrics a couple of yearsbefire that) in 2001 and finished it in 2003.  Here are some shots of the backside............sorry about the quality of the photos, best I could find.

up next. a Fourth of July freebie...........check back later. cyndi

too too fun (tutu fun)

This is Kylie, (she is my youngest grandchild) when she was about 6-7 month's, in a purple tutu.  She belongs to DD#2(DD#2  goes by Bethie, her real name is Elizabeth).  One of DD#3's friends (DD#3 is Sarah) (DD#2's twin), named Rebecca Rademan who has begun to work as a professional photographer(she works at Pro Photo, JC MO and for Jefferson City Magazine).  While Becky was working as an intern, she took these fun tutu photos of Kylie.  Some of them are so funny and cute, thought I would share.

the beads were interesting

 

red haired beauty in purple!

just soooo funny!

ignore my arms and legs, she's making a face at Mommy

Well I'm going to resist the urge to say "the end" and stop my post here, which I thought would be really, funny and corny.  But I thought I'd show you a more current picture of her.  She turned 2 in March.

 

She's changed a bit and her hair is not red any more.

If you haven't noticed yet, her mom likes purple (puhpohl) and dresses her in it whenever she can.

Which reminds me of another happy ending quilt mishap.................The purple quilt I made for Bethie...............come back tomorrow for the story................I need to go find the pictures of her quilt.  Because you have to be able to see what I did!!!!