A beautiful Monday morning

Monday morning!!! Doesn't mean much theses days as I'm still off work.   I am getting a lot of sewing and knitting and rug hooking done.  I love my crafts, every day I get to work on something I love doing.  I found out that I can get the feed dogs on my Singer 15-91 to drop, which means I can do free motion quilting on it. 

Up till now I have either had do hand quilt my machines or I could do parallel line quilting on one of my older machines.  But now I can free motion quilt so to see if I liked it I pulled out my first quilt top I made.  I made this quilt top about 2 years ago when I first started quilting, back then I just wanted to learn to sew.  One summer I cut out all the pieces with scissors pen and ruler and sewed them together.  I learned a lot that summer about using machines and needles and thread.  The top then sat in a drawer for years, I never wanted to take the time to hand quilt it, so when I found out that the 15-91 could do free motion quilting I pulled it out and though well instead of throwing it out might as well try free motion quilting on it.   Here it is...

 

I used a sheet that I had bought at Value Village for the backing.

 

 

 

I like how it turned out and so does hubby and the 2 little dogs seem to like it too.

 

 

 

The final test, my Buddy wouldn't even wait for me to finish taking pictures to test it out.  It has his stamp of approval.  So I guess this means I can do some more free motion quilting and finish some of the quilts I have sitting around

 

 

some times

Some times I think I should of been born at least 60 years before I was.  I love old houses old cars and the idea of living on a farm.  I love the idea of recycling things.  I think most of all I love the life my grandmother lead.  She  use to be a mid wife for a doctor in her younger days, she ran a boarding house, was a foster mother, and raised a family, and taught me to love knitting, crocheting quilting she never could get me to love cooking though.  I am lucky, I live in the house my father built about 8 years before I was born, and I mean he built, wasn't a contractor involved like now.  This house had 8 of us living in it when I was young 3, brothers, my mother father and my grandmother and grandfather.  There is only my hubby and I now living here, 3 floor, with 3 bedrooms.  Now you would think that there is plenty of room, but there really isn't it contains "stuff" from over 60 years.  Some of it is priceless to me.  Here is a picture my grandmother painted when I was just a child.

 

I remember watching my grandmother paint when I was around 5, but not after that.  I do remember her making this peteitepoint for my parents,  it has hung on the living room wall for over 20 years.

 

It doesn't look that big here but it is.  She worked on it for years, on this large frame.

My 2 male dogs, they certainly don't keep the couch neat, ok we blame it on the dog, but it's really hubby that leaves it like this.



September the best month of the year

I love September!!!  cool evenings and warm days.  The second week in September is a busy week.  All  the vegetables are in and it's time to close up the trailer.  The problem with closing the trailer is that it all has to be done in one weekend, so everything has to be put away and the pipes blown out electricity turned off and closed up till next year.  So we go from

to this....



Then home  to  freeze vegetables 20 lbs of carrots 15 of turnips 4 bags of beans and a dozen corn.



 Do I need to do this amount anymore, as there is just me and hubby?   It's like I have no choice, my dad and I did this all the time when he was alive.  He was a farmer at heart that moved to the big city when he married my mother in 1946.  Growing up there was 8 of us in the house me, 4 brothers (6,7,8 years older than me) and my mother's parents.  We had 2 huge freezers in the basement and a pantry always stocked.  I am my father's daughter, I have been able to cut down to 2 small freezers.

On Vacation

Went to the doctor last week and the oxygen level was through the toilette.  77 is not good for an oxygen level when normal people's level is 100, but my normal level is 90.  Needles to say the doctor has put me off work at 100%, so I'm looking at having an extended vacation.  Relaxing, and  dieting but no exercise. 

I was looking at kijij in my area yesterday and was reading an add for a 301, in the add it said that you could drop the feed dogs on the machine which allowed you to do embroidery or free hand quilting.  Looked up on the net and found that my 15-91 can also drop its feed dogs.  A quick call to the local Singer store and they sell the embroidery foot for 19.99.  

 

Such a little thing but what a world it opens up.  My problem with quilting has always been quilting the quilt as I have always done it by hand, which takes months to do. After getting home I pulled out a miniature quilt that I had made last year but never quilted,  and sat down with my 15-91 and had some fun.   I love this machine it is so reliable and everything just always seems to go so smoothly with it.    I used black thread on the piece as I wanted to see the quilting.

 

I love the way it turned out, now I need to bind it, and then I want to finish the very first quilt top I made quilting it on the machine.

 

 

Won't probably get a lot done today, as hubby and I have to do groceries, and then I want to check out the other singer machines I have sitting on the front gallery, as today is garbage day.

not one of those projects...

Sometime I wonder what I got myself into, ok most of the time I wonder that.  There are some projects that I wonder why I ever decided to start.   There are 2 projects I'm working on right now that will take me ages and ages to finish, but I refuse to give up on, one is a cross stitch Christmas tablecloth Dash Away Santa, and of course I had to buy the largest one they had which was 60 X 104.  This table cloth takes ages to do, I am working on it for at least 2 hours a night and hope I can get it finished for this Christmas. I've finished the napkins to go with it.

The other project I'm working on is a latch hook rug, I want this one to go beside the bed and resemble a patch work quilt. 

I'd like to bring the double bed up from the basement into the spare room upstairs and set the room up to be a bedroom again.  Right now it is being used as a  storage room, and hubby is such a pain when it comes to changing anything around, that I will probably have a fight on my hands to do it.

the year was 1935...

The year was 1935 and everyone was excited looking forward to a new year at Ohio State University.  This year would be the start of an exciting 2 years for Ohio State as a young  man would become a student there.  A young man that could run like the wind and would set 3 world records and tie another all within 45 minutes.  At the 1936 Summer Olympics he would win 4 gold medals for the United States.  Probably one of the greatest athletes that the world has known.  Jesse Owens would go down in history books, but he was never given a scholarship, he couldn't travel with the team, nor could he eat in the same restaurant as the rest of the team, nor could he live on campus, because he was a black man. 

The year was 2014 and John Abbott College for a few days was transformed into Ohio State University to film the story of Jesse Owens.  One of the best things about working for the college is that during the summer the campus is sometimes used to film new movies.  This year we got lucky and it was a film from 1935 and they brought in all the old vehicles from that year.  For just a few days we were able to imagine what it would be like back in the 30's.

 

I changed the photos to b/w as I  thought that it was more appropriate.

 

 

has it been that long

I can't believe it, 7 months since I've posted!  So much for new years resolutions.  I really did want to post at least 3 times a week this year, but it has been a bad year for health problems.  I was born with 3 heart defects, and the problems they cause are getting worse as I get older.  I'm back at work now at 3 days a week, and the doctors don't think I will ever return full time. 
I now have an empty nest.  My son who is 23 has moved out and is now living with his girlfriend(Michele) and her 3 year old son(Theo).   You watch your children grow and are there to help them and guide them along their way.  By the time they are in their late teen years and early 20's there is not much left to do other  than to watch them struggle through the Mom knows nothing and why even talk to her stage.  You try to stay patient and you hope that you gave them enough of a solid upbringing that they will be able to become a good adult.  My son(William) seemed to become a man over night, he brought a girlfriend home to meet us. Introduced us to Michele and her 3 year old son Theo.  So in March my son started transforming into a man, and I really like the man he has become.  I see him with Theo and am proud of the father I see him becoming.  I wasn't sad when he move out in July, for me it was just the natural progression of things. 
For the last 7 months I have been resting, sewing, crocheting, knitting and doing cross stitch.  This winter seemed to be a long and hard one, it just never seemed to end, but spring finally did happen.  We opened the trailer again, and I was able to spend long weekends  there plating or sitting out side.  I like hand made things of every kind, and I love to see things that people would normally throw away used for something.  A friend was throwing out some pallets, or was going to burn them, well as soon as I saw them I had this vision. a fence with flower shelves.  Here they are, and I do like how the turned out and best of all they cost nothing.