Jersey Boys

This was my early Chanukah gift from my husband. 

We went into Philadelphia to a really nice restaurant and then went to see Jersey Boys.   If you remember any of the songs by Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons, you have to go see this show.  There was a smile plastered on my face the whole time.  I so wanted to sing along, but I controlled myself.  Do you remember any of these songs:  Walk like A Man, Big Girls Don't Cry, Rag Doll, I've Got You Under My Skin?  The list goes on and on.

You Have To Be In It To Win It!

The BLOG HOP PARTY begins on Saturday, Dec 10th. It is going to be huge with lots of give-aways.   I am posting this today to make sure that my blog makes the cut and is included in the tour.

Welcome to everyone that is visiting my blog for the first time as you participate in the  biggest Blog Hop Give-away that I can remember.  My blog focuses on quilting.  I share techniques, inspiration and lots of photos.  My work is eclectic and ranges from traditional to pictorial to modern to artsy.  It runs the gamut. I love sharing what I have learned over the years.  As I am writing this you have the opportunity to win something from over 250 blogs.  That is huge. 

And to all of my regular readers, I hope you take some time to visit some cool new blogs and win something. (Just remember, I want a finders fee.  LOL) You need to visit the Quilting Gallery for the links to all the blogs.

To celebrate the opening of my etsy shop, Sewing With Silk, I will be giving away a trio of silk dupioni fat quarters.  The trio includes my tips for working with silk as well as fusible stabilizer to "tame" the silk.

To be eligible to win the silk  give away you must:
1.  Become a Follower or be a Follower
2.  Visit my etsy shop and choose your favorite dupioni trio colorway
3.  Leave a comment, making sure you include your trio color choice and an e-mail address where I can contact you if you win.

A random winner will be chosen on Saturday, Dec 17th.

Join the fun and visit lots of blogs.  Maybe you'll win something.  Good luck.

Fabric Flags

My son is getting married next June at our lake house on our dock in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania.  His fiancee is a wonderful girl whose creativity knows no bounds. 

She has lots of ideas for the wedding decor -tons of ideas.

I have walked with 2 wonderful women every morning for many, many years.  They have schooled me about being a mother-in-law.  They have tried to teach me how to mind my own business and the fact that the first call a daughter makes is always to her mother.  I have 2 sons.  (Hrmph.) 

But sometimes I can't help myself and I  have to try and help, which they may think is interfering. IOne son is already married.)    Honestly, I am only trying to help. (Do you hear that girls? I know they read my blog.)

So Loren, my future DIL, mentioned she would was thinking about stringing fabric flags throughout the deck and the yard up at the lake for decoration.  She has already bought fabric.  I had some immediate ideas about how to do this in a quick and easy manner.  So what follows is my way of not interfering as a future MIL, but just doing a little experiment!!

 

I made a template from a 4" x 5 1/2" piece of paper.

After folding it in half, I cut diagonally to form a triangular flag.

 Then I prepared the fabric.  I chose an assortment of orange and turquoise. 

 (You know who likes those colors.)

Rectangles were cut from each fabric that were about 9" x 6".

 Fold it in half and press a crease line.

Then I ironed a rectangle of fusible web to half of the wrong side of the fabric.

 Remove the paper and press the 2 halves together.

The next step was cutting the flags using the paper template.

I stictched around the 2 sides of the flag.  I used this very cool trim to connect the flags.  It was from one of my quilt guild's members who moved away. (Thank you Josephine.)

Look at the price! Can you tell how old it is?

Then, I inserted the flags into the fold of the trim and stitched.

So it looked like this:

My friend Kelly thought they would look good pinked:

And it did.

So I took them out in the yard.

And look who was looking at me, wondering what the heck I was doing!

 

The Auction Begins

The newest auction for the Alzheimer's Art Quilt Initiative has started. It ends Dec 10th.

 My quilt (#8397), "Give Peace A Chance" from our quilt guild's challenge is up for bid along with Lorna Milano's (#8394) - another guild member. 

Hurry up and take a look at all the quilts. 

They would make great holiday gifts,as well as benefiting Alzheimer research.

http://www.benefitbidding.com/listings/categories/index.cfm?category=965774286

Friends With Benefits

Yesterday was a get together with a group of my quilting friends. We were all excited to hear about Terry's trip to India. She went to an Indian wedding and had teased us with some photos in her e-mails. I couldn't wait to hear about the rest of the trip. She started with Show & Tell with all the beautiful silk shawls and a real pashmina scarf. Then she showed us the Indian clothing that the wedding couple had custom made for them to wear. (I wish I had thought to take photos, but I was too dazzled by it all.)
The photos that followed were just amazing, including one of Terry and her husband on a painted elephant. We had the added delight that Sujata of The Root Connection is one of our gang.  Being from India, she definitely added some commentary and explanations that were so enlightening.

Our group has a tradition of gift giving during a  nice holiday lunch after our guild meeting in December. If time allows, we try to make a handmade gift -sometimes edible. Terry had dropped some hints that her holiday gift this year was from India. I thought she brought us back a bit of silk or some type of Indian fabric. I was speechless when she gave each of us in our favorite colors (of course mine was blue), this:

And here are some close-ups:

Here are a couple more. Each of them are made from bits and pieces of saris. Can you see the yokes?

The embroidery is gorgeous. Every time you looked, there was another wonderful design.

I Just Had To Share

The love of my life

No Shopping For Me

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving.  Here on the east coast of Pennsylvania, the weather has been just beautiful and unseasonably warm.  So it has been easy to walk off that dinner.  I have been busy in the Studio working on some holiday gifts and will share my projects soon.

I am so thrilled that my etsy shop,  Sewing With Silk, has been featured by Sew Cal Gal on her blog in the Fun Friday category.  You can still go visit and have the opportunity to win some free silk!