Chillaxin'

This past weekend I finished piecing my latest quilt. I have started the long tedious process of hand quilting. (Pictures to come this weekend.)

Every night this week has been spent relaxing on the couch watching TV and stitching.

Last night Erwin got in on the action.

Nothing like lounging on the couch, your feet up, and a cold brewski in hand after a long day of terrorizing the dog and taking naps.

What I did last night

Did you have a good weekend?

Mr. B and I went into the big city for date night on Saturday. Then Sunday we headed up for family dinner at my parents. The kids brought over their Wii and everyone took a turn at Dance, Dance Revolution. It was rather amusing watching everyone trying to dance along with the TV, Wii remotes in hand.

We are experiencing the 'polar vortex' yet again. I wore my long underware to work, it's that cold! This time I've been leaving the cupboard doors open in hopes the pipes won't freeze again. The geese have been moved to the basement for a few days so their toes don't freeze. I gave them a talking to last night to remind them to use their inside voices. So far so good. The weather looks like it will improve soon and they will be back outside tomorrow.

Last night I made us a bunch of breakfast sandwiches. They are tucked away in the fridge and will be breakfast for the week. One minute in the microwave when we get to work, and BAM delicious balanced breakfast. So much better than the bag of Cheetos and snickers bar I had last week.

Magic Register

Erwin sits by the bathroom door every morning waiting for me to hurry up and do my morning thing so I can feed him. Incidentally there is a register right there. He has learned to associated the sound of the furnace with warmth from the magic registers.

This is the routine every morning.

Stretch, warming up my toes.

 

Ohh feel the warmth, it's so toasty-oasty.

Now for some warm air on my belly.

Mom this is great, you know you should feed me soon, maybe move my bowl right here by the warmth..

Magic Register, how I love you.

The Sunshine Quilt

If you can remember back a year ago, I showed you this photo. I was just starting the process of hand quilting the Sunshine Quilt. It was going to be the very first quilt I started with every intention to keep for myself.

Well It's finally finished!! The picture really doesn't to it justice. You have to see this one in person to appreciate the quilting. I'm really proud of the way this one turned out. I stepped outside of my normal quilting of following the seam and block patterns. Every large square has four petal flower, similar to a dog-wood flower. The rectangles and borders have loopy designs, if you look closely at the picture above you can kinda see it.  

 From the amount of snow in the picture, or lack there of, you can tell it's been done for a while. A good thing to, it's been so very cold and dreary outside. It's nice to have a warm quilt that reminds me of spring to snuggle under.

Freezing Rain

Several weeks ago we had some freezing rain. These are three of my favorite shots that I snapped the following morning. Check out the way the iceicles formed on the fence.

Saturday Night In

If you know anything about Mr. B and I we have a whirlwind of a social life. It seems we are out most of the weekend, with just enough time to ketch our breath, do a few loads of laundry, and head back to work Monday morning.

Um yeah, not really. 

Home bodies through and through. 

This Saturday night was no exception. We were struggling with what movie to watch. Were we going to have to leave the house and go to Redbox? The horror, leaving the house on a Saturday night! I had my comfies on since waking up from my afternoon nap, like I said pressing social schedule, I didn't want to go nowhere. 

Then I remember this:

  

We got it a few years ago for a gift exchange.

Mr. B helped me set it up on the dining room table and we played for hours. If you are new to our party here check out this post about the ginormous table Mr B. built me. It's not as wide as a ping-pong table but it's close enough. 

At fist I annihilated him in every match. By the end of the evenings the score was close, real nail bitters.

The Juki

As I mentioned earlier this week I took the plunge and got a new sewing machine. Since moving into my crafty space downstairs, I've been sewing more. And while my litter Singer is great, it was starting to become obvious that I was eventually going to need to take a step up.  

Last month I quilted a lap size quilt on it. Man was that a challenge wrangling all that fabric and batting! And poor Betty, that was a bit much to ask of her. If you look closely at the stitching you will notice that even though I used a walking foot she had some issues keeping her stitch length even. Overall the finished product was amazing. I loved the look, texture, and drape of it. Not to mention it only took me two evenings of stitching to complete. It was rather therapeutic, like mowing the law. Back and forth making my strait lines, following the seams. I know I'm weird, but something about the monotony of mowing the lawn or in this case quilting I find relaxing.

After my first large project of machine quilting, I was hooked, already dream of my next 50,000 projects. I was going to need a work horse, something that could handle the demands of quilting. Enter the Juki TL-98Q.

I did my research and the Juki seemed to me like it would be the best fit. I didn't want a fancy-pants computerized machine; I needed something simple, solid, and would handle any task I put to it. Preferably something that you can drop the feed dogs, the little teeth that pull your fabric through the machine on the bottom. One of my goals is to give free-motion-quilting a try. For my non sewing readers, that's where you are in control of pushing and pulling your fabric, this enables you to do all sorts of nifty loopy patterns. The only down side of a machine of this caliber is the price tag. Yikes!! I was lucky enough to find a lightly used one, you guessed it, on Craigslist. Still an investment, but so far worth every penny. 

I've had her for almost a week, and I'm completely smitten. She just purrs. I'd have to say that one of my favorite bonuses is the automatic thread cutter. So convenient! Press a button with our foot and presto, threads are cut! I've yet to try the knee lift but I think it will come in handy while machine quilting. Of course I will let you know in a few more weeks how she's treating me, along with some details on my latest project!

 

Pink Cupcakes

Guess who had frosting for dinner tonight!

I 

While I Was Out

It's rather obvious that I took a long break from the blog. One of my resolutions for 2014 is to post no less that twice a week. I'm thinking there is someone out there who will hold me to that, you know who you are.

 Since January is half way through I better get going! Let's get caught up on some of the major things that happened these past three months. I think the best way to do this would be using bullet points. I heart bullet points, don't you? They make a list look so nice and neat and organized. That said I like lists too, especially checking things off the list as I get them done. That reminds me I need to get the list of house goals for this year typed up. Mr. B works so much better when he knows what needs to get done, even more so if I prioritize them. As usual I'm rambling again. Let's get to that list. 

The high-lights for November - January are as follows:

• We celebrated three holidays and two birthdays, all of which there were homemade gifts involved. Gus, Gaggle, Girly might have it's first ever guest post involving one!
• We went to a Packer game. It snowed the whole time, a magical day at Lambeau Field. 
• Mr. B said that the house this year was the most Christmas-y house he has ever lived in. We were going to host Christmas Eve this year, and I wanted the house festive!
• My grand plans for a prime rib dinner fell through this year, but we still were able to spend the holiday with family. There might be an excuse for one next month, I know someone with a birthday coming up.
• I completed four quilts. Two that I was commissioned to make. Not to mention a cupcake gig, and another one on the docket for this weekend. 
• Gus and Mr Erwin have become good friends and snuggle buddies.
• It got cold last week, really cold. Like Mr. B agreed to keep the geese in the basement cold. Like kitchen pipes froze cold. One burst, that was not a fun evening. 
• I got a new sewing machine!