Spins A Good Yarn

This has been one of the most beautiful Springs that I can remember. The flowers have been lovely and long-lasting and the trees are just beautiful. I love the Spring with all the green everywhere. So much better that Winter’s constant favorite color of gray! My friend, Joyce, has a lovely spot in the village where she lives. It is like being in the country while living in the city. Her pink dogwood was so pretty that I had to take a picture of it when I went to her house for a visit. Gorgeous, huh?!?!

I have a flowering crab in front of the window in my living room. I planted it there many years ago to block the sun from shining in all morning long and heating up the house. It has grown quite large and it has created quite a nice spot for some lovely ferns, ivy and vinca vine beneath it and a happy place for birds to gather in its branches.

Speaking of flowers: My daughter, Meagan, is a quilt artist and she made me a beautiful, flowered book to keep my artist trading cards in. She put a picture of Tiffany on both the back and front of it. There are quilted flowers in the background and appliqued ones on the background fabric. I love it!!!!! She made it for me for Mother’s Day. Thanks again, Meagan!!!!!

Here’s the front.

And here’s the back!

And here’s the original picture that she used for the book. Meagan’s husband had been playing with Tiffany with a silky blanket and when he took the blanket off of her this is how she looked!

It is one of my very favorite pictures!

I received some wonderful presents this year and thought I would share some of them with you. My daughter, Meagan, made me a beautiful scarf from the book 101 One-Skein Wonders.

She used a mohair-linen blend by Louet in my favorite color green and I LOVE it!!!

She also made me a soft, cuddley and “oh so warm” fleece and flannel throw! Isn’t the doggie flannel just the cutest thing?!?!?!?

My mom and dad gave me a Cobra GPS navigation system so I can get around without getting lost and I am so thankful for them! My mom also gave me these way-cool knitting notion bags! (Okay, they are really cosmetic bags, but they will be PERFECT for knitting notions and knitting projects and knitting….)

I bought myself a super-cool present! Meagan and I LOVE watching the “Gilmore Girls” and were sad when the last season was over. I saw that a 7-Season Set had been produced that had the entire seven seasons and was supposed to look like a “Barbie Doll Case”. I was innocently looking around at the mall, when what jumped right into my hands but this little case! I HAD to get it and here it is!

The cover opens up and has all the seven seasons in individual “booklets” on the right-hand side. The DVD’s are all pink and there are pictures of the characters on each booklet.

There are two booklets in the set. One has an episode index with lots and lots of pictures and the other is a “Gilmorism” dictionary of sorts!

It is SOOOOOOOOO fun!!!!!!!!

I received lots of other wonderful presents and am so thankful to everyone for thinking of me this Christmas season!

I used to quilt! A lot. For years. I even worked at the Calico Cat quilt shop and taught quilting. I did bed quilts, lap quilts, baby quilts, miniature quilts and wall quilts. I did piecing, paper piecing and needle-turned applique (I really liked the applique). Then I started knitting. And knitting and knitting and knitting and spinning. Did I mention the knitting?!?!? I tend to become slightly compulsive with my hobbies in case you were wondering.

Anyway, I have a wonderful Bernina Virtuosa 155 sewing machine that makes quilting like play. It is a great machine and is so reliable. I have two friends who I still do machine quilting for. I am their own personal quilter! They have grandsons who are the same age and they like to make identical projects and then I get to quilt them.

Here are some of the quilts I’ve done for them recently.

This one is a baby quilt for Nancy. I did a medium stipple over the whole quilt. It is so cute!

Both Bev and Nancy made a wall hanging out of this cute panel with borders. I stitched all the borders around the blocks and then did the outer borders. After Christmas, I think they are going to have me embellish them with beads, buttons and cute little hearts and bells, etc.

This is a lovely throw that Bev made. It’s also quilted with a medium stipple.

Bev made this beautiful quilt using panels and piecing around them. Notice the little “helper”! Here’s the front:

And the back!

Bev made this wallhanging with many, many little tiny pieces!

And last but not least, Nancy made up this baby quilt with panels and strips.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this little trip into my “quilting” life!

Now, back to the knitting!!!