A Peek and A Ta-Daaaa!

I am still finishing off swaps goodies this week.  I am not sure how I got involved in so many at one time.  Actually I say that and today I have signed up for MORE!!!  Slight addiction (maybe).  I just love making goodies for people and receiving their goodies :)

Here is a sneak peek of one of my placemats for the Placemat Quilt Swap.

I can only show a peek because I know that calamitykim follows my blog!  She and I agreed to do a pair for each other so our husbands could have one to use as well!  She does some pretty cool work, so go check out her blog.

Also, back in January there was a benefit concert, raffle and auction here in Abaco to raise money for Royal Potcake Rescue to do a spay and neuter clinic.  I offered to donate a quilt to the raffle.  At the time I couldn't sew because of some stitches I had, but the winner was very patient and the organizer of the event is in Abaco now and (I think) the quilt has been delivered to her.  So now I feel okay posting it on my blog.  Since the fundraiser was for the potcakes this is the original idea I had:

Since my drawings are not to scale they don't turn out exactly alike, but close.

I stitched "potcake" on the side of one of the dogs, and then along the bottom I stitched "the most colorful dog", which they are in SO MANY ways!

Here is what became of the drawing.......

And as always, when I am doing my little photo shoots, my own potcake helpers must be there to supervise and check things out.  PLUS they think the pool deck was built just for them, so I am not allowed out there alone, and that is where I take most of my pictures.

That is Karma giving it a close inspection and thinking "that dog has crooked ears just like me!"

Trooper is being distracted because Trixi is trying to chew his leg off!....never a dull moment around here.....that's why I love them so much :)

It helps to read the instructions!

I have been very inspired over the last few months with all the curvy pieced quilts, and for a while I have had the book by Jean Wells, "Intuitive Color and Design" which teaches how to do this curvy piecing.

BUT....being the artist that I am, I looked at the pages, the lovely pictures, tried to do it my way, and it failed.  

Then I got my swap quilt from mamacjt last week, and was totally inspired.

So here are my first successful attempts, after I read the instructions!

Then I had to try a piece with fabric other than scraps.......

Not sure what I will do with it, but I am pretty pleased with myself :)

Along with that the last few days have been filled with finishing off swap projects that have to be shipped out this week to meet the deadline.

Here are snippets of two of them.

Sneak peek at the coin mini quilt for Terrie.

And here is the Anything Goes Mini quilt for mamacjt......I sure hope she is as happy with this as I was with my goodies from her!

I couldn't have done all this the past few days without help from my kitty "Sunshine"

OH! and i almost forgot.....I also finished two blocks for an online quilt bee I am in called "Bee Liberated".  It is based on the book "Collaborative Quilting".  Each month one person picks a block out of this book, the rest of the group make one or two of the specified block and send them to the person who's month it is.  Then instantly you have enough blocks for a quilt top made by an online group.

Pretty neat hey?

These are my May blocks:

My month is June so I am trying to decide which block I am going to pick....tough decision because I love everything in that book!

Back into my sewing room for a few more hours to finish up three more swap projects for this month, then the next month it all starts over again for more swaps!

in His Grace: Favorites Party

in His Grace: Favorites Party

Go check out this cool blog by a great mosaic artist.  She is having a Favorite Friday post and you can see faves from lots of other bloggers!
Here are a *few* of my favorite things:

My Rescued Turtles.

Some of these guys (and gals) are bought at pet stores as small little creatures, and people don't realize they can grow to 14 inches long.  So i take them and put them in my ponds.

My dogs and my quilts are top of this list for sure!!!

Trooper wanted to be in the photo shoot also!

Great food with friends and family!

Actually, I love food so much that it is a fave even if I am alone! :)

My collection of Blythe Dolls.  So now some of you are pretty surprised!

Agility with my heart dog "Sailor"

Crochet, which at times is not a fave because it is a challenge for me :)  but keep on hooking!

How could i forget my cats?!?!! Especially the ones that are really impressed with their picture being taken, like Doodle below!

My garden (minus the million frogs that live in it!!)

And......my new adventures in jewelry creation, silversmithing and flame working!

Hope you enjoyed that!

Quilt for a School Fundraiser

This has been one of my projects this week.......to get this quilt top that my Mom pieced, quilted for the Angel's Academy fundraiser tomorrow night.  The fundraiser is at the Jib Room and this quilt along with a laptop and a framed pieced of artwork will be raffled.

Wonder what my chances are at winning it back?

This is made from vintage Bahama Handprint fabrics and a white tone on tone cotton fabric.

Most of these fabrics aren't available from Bahama Hand Prints anymore.

So if you are here in Marsh Harbour, come out and support Angel's Academy.  I've also heard there will be a few delicious desserts auctioned off!

Last Weekend's Show and My Surprise Package

A few posts ago I told you I was busy getting ready for a show.  Abaco had its first Agri-Expo and it was a great success!!  That's me in my tent with my quilts hanging up.  I had little art quilts, jewelry and ceramics on the table, and had great upright stands for them but the wind was brutal and everything kept blowing down.  I did well, sold quite a bit of jewelry, ceramics and got an order for a quilt!

There were lots of vendors with organic produce, farmers brought their goats, pigs, sheep and chickens out, and there were many other arts and crafts tents.  There were also fantastic food vendors including a vendor that had vegan foods for sale......YUMMY!

So this week I have been trying to gather my self together again, work on orders, work on swap quilts, quilt a quilt for a fundraiser this weekend, and stay inspired.  I still feel like my imagination is overflowing and I am enjoying that, just wish I had more time to play with these ideas.

Yesterday I got a nice surprise in the mail.......my "Anything Goes Mini Quilt Swap"

Here is one of the quilts I received:

It is 8"x 8" square with embroidery stitches and button embellishments!!!  I LOVE it!!!  Looks like the water and bubbles.  It is hanging next to a flower that is painted on my studio wall and matches perfectly.

My sweet swap partner wasn't sure I would like that quilt.  Thought it may have been too pastel-y, after seeing my work, so she sent me another on!!!!!! Can you believe it?

This one is called "Here Comes Summer" and I am infatuated with this one as well!!!  I can't believe I was so lucky to receive TWO and from such a great quilter!!!  Her work is perfect and precise and I feel honored to be her partner.  I have been admiring her work for a while now, so I hope we get to be partners again!!!

Check out her blog and look at her awesome work.

I have quite a collection of swap quilts now, and am involved in 4 more right now, so that means I have 4 more on the way to me!!

This is the wall in my studio that I started to hang my collection.

Well, I need to get back to work and finish those swap projects!!!  Today I was making clay buttons to add to one of those projects, so I thought I'd do a post while I was waiting on those to dry.

I'll be back the end of the week to show you the large quilt I am quilting for the fundraiser.

Have a great week :)

A Fellow Jewelry Artist

This morning I wanted to tell you about a jewelry artist who's work I am totally in love with.

I met this artist thru the blogging, flickr and facebook, and we are thinking about doing a collaborative piece of jewelry together.

Here is one of Lorelei's pieces that is in my *small* collection!

She is having a giveaway on her blog today, so head over there and check it out.

She is great at taking components from many different artists and putting them together to make one piece of jewelry.  Each piece is such a work of art.

She also makes some of her own components, and has started to do some resin pieces with her own artwork in the bezels.

Above is another piece that belongs to me!

Go check out her blog, enter the giveaway, and you may win some awesome pendants that she made.

From her blog you can go to her flickr and her etsy shop and see even more wonderful pieces of jewelry.

I promise you wont be disappointed!!!

I'm Still Here....Somewhere

Been really busy since the last post, so just thought I'd drop a quick line to tell you what is going on.

I am getting ready for a show this weekend, and so I am running around finishing this and that.

I was supposed to take pictures today, since the sun came out, but got busy working and didn't feel like breaking that cycle.

Above is a peek at one thing I have been working on.  Got lots more to show you....just need to get those pictures taken!!!

When everything is done I will take some more pictures to post.

Back to work for now...........

Happy! Happy! Happy!

Just like that little quilt top says, thats what I am!

A few months ago I got involved in several swap groups on flickr.  The first one was a Spring Fling Mini Quilt.  Had to be a mini quilt with a spring theme and between 6"-12"....easy enough!!! This is the idea that popped into my head (below) that I sent to my partner.  In this swap we were told who our partners were.  We could find out preferences, get to know each other and have fun!

So yesterday I received my quilt from my partner.  I was totally blown away!  It is the cutest little mini quilt ever made!  And to make it even more awesome, it is backed in vintage fabric!!!  I LOVE vintage fabrics!

Praire points, embroidery, buttons, pieced letters......WOW!!!

A couple weeks ago I was checking out some blogs of other quilters and came across this tutorial for these pieced letters that I had seen on so many quilts.  It is a lot of free cutting and piecing and I am pretty impressed at how small my partner can do these letters!  ALL of her letters are almost as big as one of mine!  I just thought it was pretty neat that I was trying to make these letters and I receive a quilt with them in it!  The piece I made was the "happy" piece at the top.

Here is the link to the tutorial if you would like to give it a try.

I also made that little flower from a tutorial which you can find here on the House of Krom blog.

Not sure how I am going to put the two together but that is for later.

My very first quilt swap from last fall, from the Quilting Gallery website.

This is the fall inspired quilt that I received in that swap.

Love this quilt also, and it hangs in my studio near my sewing machine.  Batiks, cotton solids, half square triangles, beads, fall leaves.....awesome fall quilt!!  This came from Sew It Up Baby.  It will always be so special because it is my very first swap quilt.

This gal does some amazing quilts and quilted projects so check out her blog and be inspired.

So after I opened the quilt swap envelope, which I had to restrain from doing in the car WHILE driving home, I had a few other boxes to open that were online orders.  One was a box with my new running shoes in it.

woohoo!!! Yellow and Lime green!!!!

I see this envelope in that box (sometimes my shipper does that so small packages don't get lost), and I realized it was probably my potholders from the potholder swap I was in!!!!  In this swap our partners were secret.  We gave a hint of what we liked in our sign up email and from there our partners had to check out our blogs and flickr pages to get a feel for what we liked.

I think my partner did a pretty good job!

How cute are they????  Blue and green - 2 of my favorite colors; a log cabin - love those; and a BIRD!!!!  I think these will be hung as decoration, not used on hot pans that are dripping with food to stain them!!  And my partner sent a cute little fabric card with a sweet note inside.

As if those two swap packages weren't enough goodness for one day I also got my new mini kiln, so I don't have to make lots and lots of beads and ceramics before I can actually fire, and my Spring Fling swap partner sent me some quilting tools as extra goodies.

A magnetic pin case, a seam ripper with a hidden compartment and a fancy little sewing box with notions.

The day ended with doggie school with agility and fun with great people and some awesome dogs :)

Doesn't get much better!

Etsy & Swirls!!!! I finally did it!

I finally did it!!!!

Several months ago I created an etsy account, with the intention of opening an etsy store, as another way to market and sell my work.  After opening the account I just kept putting off actually posting goodies to the store and making the store public.

Right now I only have 2 items there....for several reasons......

1. Every picture has to be re-sized and that for some reason is taking me FOREVER!!!

2. I have quite a bit of jewelry to post, which I need to sell, but I want to keep it all........not sure what to do about that problem.

So stay tuned and keep checking out my etsy store, and I WILL get new stuff in there.

Another accomplishment I made this week was making a swirl on a glass bead!!!

I was over the moon!   Just because I made a few doesn't mean I am a pro at them now either......gotta find that *perfect* part of the flame for every, single one and sometimes I mess that up.

It's pieces of jewelry like the above photo that I can't let go of.

I stamped "Keep Calm" on the front.  There is also a row of silver chain, czech beads, a blue glass bead of mine, a hanging fuchsia crystal and a silver toggle on the rest of the bracelet.

The inside of the bracelet says "and carry on".

That is one of my favorite sayings, ("keep calm and carry on") and I have to remind my self of this often...like when I am trying to put delicate swirls on glass beads!

flower beads

Just thought I do a quick post about my new flower beads.

These are three of the best ones.....some were just complete disasters.

Not easy to find that part of the flame where you can work with the molten glass without everything turning into *mush*.

Also, had an idea for a pendant using my glass beads, discs and a silver pendant that I also made.

Well, that's all for now........itching to get back behind that torch!

Easter Earrings

Happy Easter everyone!!

A few weeks back I ordered some of Jangles new beads called the "Woodland Collection".

Ever since I got then I have been trying to figure out what to do with them.  They are sooooo amazingly cute that it has to be the perfect project.

So I was looking at the whole set today, trying to figure out what to do and the little lilac birds were just screaming "EASTER" to me, and I paired them with some white and yellow feathered glass beads I had made.

I have more ideas for the rest of the beads just need to wrap my head around the assembly part of it.

Go and check out the Jangles website and Jennifer's blog.  She is one amazing ceramic and jewelry artist.

A Beading Journey

For about two years now I have been "playing" with flame working.

It is something I had wanted to do for YEARS.  I got a kit for Christmas one year and was terrified to start the torch. Finally got the opportunity to go to Florida and take a class, then my husband announces that the Miami Boat Show is the same weekend.

We do dog rescue and traveling together can be complicated, so I told him if he wanted to go to the boat show he would have to go and take my flame working class, and come back and show me how to do it!

Being the wonderful husband that he is....he did it :)

Since then I haven't played with it consistently until the last few months when I have gotten more involved in doing jewelry.  One thing I have realized is that mistakes make me better in flame working and it is all practice, practice, practice!!  Seems like those lessons could apply to a lot of things in life.

These pink, black and white ones are some of my faves.

I love doing dots and making feathers.

A lot of what I have learned (besides for what my husband taught me)  has come from reading books and watching dvds, but I sure could use a REAL class sometime soon to do some fancy stuff.

The disks have given me a run for my money, but I love the look of them so much that I keep trying.

I have been putting together some pendants which I will post in a few days.....need to take more pictures.

Here is a container full of a few days of playing.  Some are total disasters, and some are pretty good.  I hang onto the disasters so I can see my mistakes and my improvement.

My head is also filling with ideas for jewelry and adding some of these to mini art quilts.

The possibilities are endless :)