Preparing for Renovations - Part 2

Here's the pile of carpet, underlay and other garbage - waiting for the dumpster to arrive!

Here are a few photos of the "last look" at the rooms before demolition started.

Preparing for Renovations

Last week in preparing for my house renovations I had to get back in the corner of the closet of the study. I "found" 2 Macs - both the original chimney style.  The one was from 1984 - the very first version of the Mac that came out. The other was a Mac SE that I bought the fall that I started my Ph.D. program in Minnesota in 1987.  Here's a picture of the original Apple products I had along with the Apple products that I have today. Oh and by the way, I really do like the MacBook Air. It had been several years since I had used a Mac on a regular basis so it took me a bit to get my mind switched from the PC to the Mac world - but not very long.  I keep saying "things on the Mac are just so intuitive." All of the stories I have been hearing these past few days, tributes to Steve Jobs, are saying just what I have been saying.

Baskets of Red Flowers

I received this wonderful wall hanging this past week from Vickie Bajtelsmit (in Colorado) for my birthday. This was a pattern that was in the McCall's magazine earlier this year - however the pattern was in pastels - and we think that red is much more dynamic. I love all of the hand appliqué baskets and flowers.  The sashing and borders are all half square triangles - a really nice effect. Thank you Vickie!

"ReUsing" on my Toronto Weekend

I'm spending the weekend in Toronto. Saturday was Lauren's 11th birthday party - what a great time.  I did some "reusing" with a pair of PJs that I had made for Lauren for Christmas in 2008.  That year I made her the PJs along with a quilt the they have been using on the sofa in the family room. The bottoms were way too short - so I cut them off and hemmed them - and voila she now has shorts (which she is already wearing so no picture).

Then I took the top and transformed it into a cushion cover that she can have on her bed.  Here it is along with the leftover pieces. The back of had the appliquéd logo for the Maple Leafs. I left the front buttons as the way to  open up the cover to take it off and on the cushion.  There is also a picture of the lap quilt is also here.  By the time I was taking the pictures and putting them up on this blog Lauren had gone off with her friend (wearing the shorts) so no picture of the shorts.

Basketball Anyone?

This duffel bag and matching case were Lauren's birthday present this year. Lauren found the great basketball fabric at Fabricland in Saskatoon this summer.  Together we planned out the duffel bag.

I used some Timtex (that I had left over in my cupboard) for the small case. I used Fusible Fleece which I ironed onto both the outside fabric and lining fabric for the duffel bag. I then quilted each of the sections before stitching the duffel bag together. The combination with the Fusible Fleece and lots of quilting should make the bag strong.

Nancy's Birthday

We had a wonderful Ladies Lunch Weekend in mid August.  I flew to Colorado and then we drove as a group to Steamboat Springs. The weather was gorgeous and we gave Nancy her quilt. She loved all of the detailed blocks.

And ... she did not disappoint us. She was very pleased with the back that contained the pictures of the theme blocks along wth explainations of the various activities of our Ladies Lunch group.

A Long Weekend of Wonderful Quilting

It is now Tuesday evening and it has been a great "long" weekend of quilting. As I type this Vickie is at the machine finishing off the binding on Nancy's quilt. Sunday early afternoon I picked Vickie up at the airport.  She came to Indiana as part of a trip to Washington DC to a meeting and then on to visit her sister and family.  The objective for her visit was to finish Nancy's 60th birthday quilt. I had many of the "theme"star blocks done (some were featured on a previous blog back in March) and she had the small star blocks done.  We finished the theme blocks and got the top put together, complete with the wonderful colored border.

We generated a description for each of the blocks which we put into a powerpoint file with one slide for each of the theme blocks. We then printed out each of the powerpoint slides on a one page per sheet size using my new Epson printer.  It worked great for printing on fabric. These printed fabric blocks were then pieced to make the back of the quilt. Needless to say, we were busy - but we were very pleased with our efforts. 

Then Tuesday morning we got up and loaded it on the long arm and got it quilted. Here it is "in progress."

However the weekend of quilting started on Saturday when I quilted this pink and purple quilt. It is for the crayon challenge at Common Threads Quilt Guild. We take our completed projects to the guild meeting tomorrow evening (Wednesday) and then it will be given to charity.  I used a pantograph with feathers and swirls and was very pleased with how the purple thread showed up on the pink flannel on the back of the quilt.

Sunday morning I quilted this baby quilt for Brent and Angela Gloy's baby boy - who was born in early June. This was made from a panel that I bought when the Ladies Lunch group was in the Gulf Shores last August for our annual get-away.