Wednesday, June 26, 2013

A New Toy for the Sewing Room

 

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While I was absent from the blog, I certainly was not absent from my sewing room!  Although I did work for almost 2 months quilting Vintage Tin, I did break the monotony of that project with a few small, but cute projects …. you know, to keep me from burning out on sewing altogether.  This was one of those projects. 

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I had purchased this pattern over a year ago from Crabapple Hill designs and had really wanted to make it right off the bat, but I had a difficult time finding a galvanized pail in the correct size to fit the pattern, so the project kind of sat on the shelf waiting for me to come across the pail.  The pattern calls for a 10 quart galvanized pail.  None at Lowes.  None at WalMart.  None at Feeder’s Supply or Orscheln’s.  They had some really cute pails at the Dollar Store, but none in the right size for this.  Ummmmm I finally looked on Amazon.com and there it was.  Purchased this and a couple of books and got free shipping!  Could have saved all the gas I wasted in my search!

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This lovely little bucket is lined with 2 tiers of pockets inside.  You can see some ink pens peeking out of the first tier and the large gaping pocket is in the second tier.  Additionally, there is the center of the interior free for large or bulky items ….. that’s where you see the tape measure.

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The outside pockets will accommodate magazines and large envelopes.  There is a magazine in the outer pocket on the picture up top. 

I love my new toy.  I can carry it anywhere I want to work …. out on the patio, the porch swing, on sewing retreats and to friends’ homes.  And it will carry anything I need to take!  And it only took an afternoon to make.  Call me a happy camper!

 

Enjoy,  Merry Gay

    

Goodbye Google Reader …. Hello Bloglovin’!

<a href="http://www.bloglovin.com/blog/5198763/?claim=6kzvhgddrwb">Follow my blog with Bloglovin</a>


It’s a sad day.  I’ve used Google Reader for as long as I can remember ……. even before I had a blog!  So, to see it go is kind of upsetting because I’m so used to things as they have always been.  BUT ….. as of next Monday, Google Reader will be gone.  Poof!  Up in smoke.  GONE.  So I have decided to try out Bloglovin’.  So many of my friends in blogland have already done this.  It must be painless.  We. Shall. See.

Enjoy,  Merry Gay

Thursday, June 20, 2013

I’m Back Again ……. And with a finish!

I want to thank all my friends for sticking with me and my blog during my long absence.  For those of you who do not know, my dear, dear husband who had been sick for such a long time, passed away last month.  It has been a very hard adjustment for me and I thank you for your patience.  I am trying to get my life back in some kind of order and get back to doing the things I love, blogging among those things.  And on that note, I want to present to you my version of Vintage Tin …….

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This post is going to be picture heavy …… I have lots of photos of the individual blocks since that is the only way the embroidery shows up. 

2013-06-20 11.42.05               2013-06-20 11.37.16

Vintage Tin is a pattern which was designed by Meg Hawkey for Crabapple Hill Designs.  If you are comparing the two, you can see that I have changed the arrangement considerably.  My quilt did not use all of the embroidery panels that Meg designed for the quilt, but I have them embroidered out sitting there on my sewing table.  I may at some later time use them to make pillows or something else.

2013-06-20 11.37.05         2013-06-20 11.37.27

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The quilt measures 96 1/2“ long and is 89” wide.  I used about 15 skeins of DMC black embroidery thread for the embroidery and over 4000 yards of Superior Rainbows thread in the quilting.  I began work on this quilt last August and it was completed the end of May of this year.

2013-06-20 11.38.29  2013-06-20 11.38.45

2013-06-20 11.38.38  2013-06-20 11.38.53

2013-06-20 11.39.02  2013-06-20 11.39.07

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Thanks for sticking with this post through all of the photos!  I am back to sewing, so I hope to be posting to my blog more often. 

Enjoy,  Merry Gay

Wednesday, April 17, 2013

April Showers Mug Rug Blog Hop


Welcome to the last day of the April Showers Blog Hop and welcome to my blog!  Hasn’t this blog hop been amazing? ….. So inspiring!  A big thank you to Madame Samm at Sew We Quilt and to our cheerleader, Erin, at Sew at Home Mummy 
The theme for the April Showers Mug Rug Blog Hop is anything you find inspiring for the month of April.  what do I think of when I think of April?  Rain. Rain. and even more Rain!  And Easter.  And flowers.  And warm weather – NO MORE COATS!!!!!  I always think of those cute little vintagey Easter chicks and ducks when I think of Easter.  So, I put on on my mug rug!
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I thought and thought long and hard about how to fashion my mug rug.  I looked at embroidery designs and vintage illustrations …… all kinds of things.  And I came up with absolutely NOTHING.  So, I turned to my stash of orphan quilting blocks and my scrap bin in hopes of cobbling something together.  I found the little 16 patch block in my baggie of orphan blocks and it looked promising …… blue, which I always think of April as being a ‘blue’ month.  And then the white fabric had little blue droplets on it ….. just like rain.  So I grabbed it up and decided to use it for one side of the mug rug.  All I needed to do was look for a little embroidery to go with it.  I found the little drawing of the chick, downsized it on my printer to the perfect size, and then spent a couple of hours with needle and thread embroidering it.  I added in some raindrops to make it more April like (at least in my mind it’s more April like).  A little border from the scrap bin, some rick rack edging for the ‘cute factor’, and there you have it.  My mug rug.  I hope you like it as much as I do!
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Thanks for stopping by my blog!  I hope you will come back and see me.  AND  don’t forget to visit the other bloggers on the April Showers Mug Rug Blog Hop!  Here’s a list of links :
Thursday April 18
Merry Gay @ Merry Gay in Stitches
Mary @ Sew Maybe I Can
Joanne @ Everyone Deserves a Quilt
Linda @ Buzzing and Bumbling
Mary @ NeedledMom
Sherry @ Peanuts Patchwork
Fredrika @ Feltfree på Åsly
Shauna @ Welcome to Shauna's World
Sharon @ Dancing thru Threads
Madame Samm @ !Sew WE Quilt!
Happy Hopping Everyone!
Merry Gay








Wednesday, March 27, 2013

Too many projects .....

I have so many projects on the go right now that I can't make sense of them all on my workspace! I'm trying to get them finished as fast as I can. I'll post pictures as I get them done.  Stand by .....

Enjoy, Merry Gay

Sunday, March 24, 2013

Finally! A new post!

I didn't realize that I haven't blogged on a whole month! Surely I can do better than that. My life has been such a roller coaster lately that I've lost track of just about everything. But I promise to try to do better.

I haven't sat at the sewing machine much, but I did manage to finish the Vintage Tin quilt top and have ordered the backing and batting so that it can be sandwiched and quilted. Yay! I am so happy to have one close to finished! If you only knew how many tops I have stacked up ready to be quilted!

I am still slogging away on this embroidery project ... The embroidered borders for Bluebirds. Pictures will be found down below. If there is a way to embed the pictures into the paragraph using Blogger app for android, I haven't figured it out yet! I used to think I knew about technology... "used to" being the operative phrase here. One of these days my son will come home and teach me! Anyway, the Bluebirds quilt embroidery COULD BE finished by Easter if I really threw myself into it, but with my life being so topsy turvy right now, I'm thinking it will be more like 2 weeks. ;-)

In the mean time ....

Enjoy, Merry Gay

Sunday, February 24, 2013

Eye Candy Gram - The Neverending Border

I haven't had a lot to show the past week or so. I've been plugging away on the neverending quilt border for The Bluebird Quilt. I figure that I'm about half way finished with the embroidery. I am also working towards finishing up a quilt top this week and it is one that I haven't shared with you yet. So I will have a big surprise to unveil! So stay tuned!

Enjoy!  Merry Gay