A Winner and some ramblings

I bet y'all are wondering WHO WON THE GIVEAWAY??????
I won't keep ya guessing! Congrats goes to.......

who said: Courtneysews said...

There are some cute girls skirt tutorials at sewingtutorialslibrary.com/category/sewing-tutorials-kids/girls-clothing/

Congrats again Courtney! I will be emailing you in just a sec!

Thanks everyone for all the b-day wishes! I really do appreciate it!

Now, back to a little of what I've been doing!

I made these pretty pillows! I followed Vanessa's tutorial over at V&Co to make it! You all should go check it out! I would link to it except for the fact that my computer is on the fritz and I'm really lucky to even be making this post at all! Hopefully I"ll get all that worked out soon enough though!

 

I made this little pretty following Jeni's tutorial over at In Color Order! She is VERY TALENTED! And the tutorial is SOOOO easy to follow! I visit that blog VERY often! :)

This is my first dissapearing 9 patch quilt. Of course, Welcome to Bear Country by Moda is my fabric choice! This is for my best friend's baby, good thing she doesn't get online, (cuz it's a secret!)

And you see that design wall?????? Yep, I MADE IT! :) It wasn't hard at all! I'm not completely sure about the layout of the quilt top yet though, I like it, I just don't know if I love it! I'm trying to decide if I should do a border on it or not, what do y'all think? I need someone's opinion besides the same ol' "I dunno babe" from my hubs.

I'm still working on my skill builder sampler QAL and the beginners QAL, just can't show you that stuff yet! Soon though, I promise!

I'm trying to get involved with as much stuff as I can, and make as many blogging/quilting friends as I can. With that being said, I'm really really liking the looks of this....

the Hexy MF quilt a long over at the Fat Quarterly's blog! It looks like loads of fun. I am definately going to give it a go. I just found out about it yesterday, so I still have the funnest part to do! PICK OUT FABRICS!!!!! AAAAAAND, with that being said, look at what I found!

Yep, 50% sale! WAHOO!!!! I can't wait to go back and get my fabrics! This is Hancock though, and my Hancock doesn't sale designer fabric *tear* so I can only do my shopping for that online! Which I like and all, but I'd rather be able to see it all up close and personal! I don't have a LQS close by! It sucks!!!!! But, oh well, Hancock does sell some pretty fabric!

Wellllll, I'm off to bed, I'm on a 4 day stretch (booooo!) and need to rest up!

~Hope y'all are having a great day~

                                                                             

Look what I made

Look at what I figured out how to do!!! I made my own signature! Pretty huh? If you want to make one click here. It's really easy I promise! If I can do it so can you! I will be making a regular post later this week to give you all updates of what I'm doing! I've got lots of pretties to show you!
~Hope y'all are having a great day~

My birthday! And a Giveaway for you too!

I got some PRETTIES in the mail recently!!!! I have heard sooooo much rave about Zipit that I just had to go check it out! You should too!!! Prices are AMAZING and product is TOP notch!!!!

This is my first order, which I recieved super fast! All wrapped up suuuuuper cute too! I've already made a 2nd purchase! :)
I've been "comissioned" to do a quilt for a co-worker and I recieved that order as well! Which I am T-Totally in-love with this line!!!

Nightshade by Tula Pink!!! It was bought from the Intrepid Thread. The shop owner, Julie, is amazing! Customer Service there is beyond great! I will definately do much business with her again! (No, I am not in any way, shape, or form, asked to say this, nor am I getting anything in return for saying anything about either shop! It is just my 100% honest opinion!!!) I don't know if I will want to give this quilt up when I'm finished with it or not! I'm still trying to figure out exactly what I want to do, my co-worker has given me free creative reign, (I dunno if that's a good thing or bad, I guess we will see!!!)



Onto other things!!! It is officially MY BIRTHDAY! Wahoo!!! We celebrated it last night, along with Father's Day! (Happy be-lated Father's Day to all you Dad's!!!) My hubby cooked steaks on his brand new grill that I got him for Father's Day.

This is one of my b-day gifts from my Momma, which was filled with my FAVORTIE dish that she only cooks for me on my b-day! (Broccoli Rice and Cheese, her own recipe, and lemme tell ya, it was AH-MAAZZZING!!!)
She also got me:

This awesome Wok! (Sorry about the flash, I couldn't NOT get it in the pic! Very frustrating!!!)

A new mat and some rulers (she says so I'll give her hers back!)

A rainbow of fat quarters, and some other pretty fabric in yardage! She gave me some cash to go get whatever I wanted too!!!!
My husband (the wonderful man that he is) got me the absolute BEST gift EVER!!!!!!!! (at least I think so!)

A brand new sewing machine!!!!!! Just happens to be the one I've been telling him I want FOREVER! I love it! It's not top of the line by ANY means, but for me it's my TOP of the line for now at least, with my skill level and all!

It does basic monogramming which I dunno if I will use or not.

And has 99 built in stitches, and came with an extendable quilting table, and a bunch of different accessories! The only thing I'm lacking for it is a FMQ foot! (Which can fit on this machine! YAY!)
Then at 4 a.m. he brought me....

\These pretties!!!! God, I love that man!
The last few days we have spent at a close-by amusement park to which we have season passes! Dollywood!!!!!!!

You ever heard of it??? It is an awesome place for the WHOLE family! (and I have a big one, so it's hard to find a place for all of us, that we all enjoy, but this place HAS IT ALL!) If you've never been here you should definately check it out! It's got EVERYTHING!!!!!!
And if you have read this far then, you really do care!!!!!!! LOL!!!! And I have something for one of you too!!!!!!! I couldn't just keep getting things, and not GIVE anything in return! I'm just not that type of girl! So yes you guess it, A BIRTHDAY GIVEAWAY!!!!!!!
Edited to add: This giveaway is now CLOSED! Thank you to all who entered!

You will get one charm pack, Collections for a Cause: Traditions by Howard Marcus for Moda! Really beautiful line!
All you have to do to enter this giveaway is:
#1 You must be a follower of this blog
#2 Give me a suggestion on what you think would be a good place for me to look into making some cute skirts for my girls, if you know of any good tutorials, leave a link!
That's it, not bad huh?
Open to US residents ONLY! (sorry to everyone else!)
I'm almost at 50 posts too!!! Wonder what we'll do for that????? Hmmmm......
Good luck!!!!!!!!! I will leave this giveaway open for one week! So that means it will close Monday June 25th, at Midnight EST!!!!
Until next time
~Hope y'all are having a GREAT day!!!!!~
~Kelie~

Summer Sewing Contest

I can NOT believe I actually got this done! I've been dreaming the concept of this up for a while now, just never actually sat down to it! This Summer Sewing Contest by Ellison Lane Quilts is just what I needed to get the job DONE!
So without further ado?!?!?!?!? (I'm trying to sound smart so bear with me on that one! I dunno if I got it right or not)
Here is my entry into the

I did a table runner and 2 pillows for my patio furniture! I chose Pezzy Print by American Jane because to me it is just plain SUMMERY!!! I LOVE IT! I used the "Tumbler" tool by Missouri Star Quilt Co. (I love that place!)

Here are my pillows hanging out in the bushes basking in the sunlight!!!!!

And here they are on one of my patio chairs, don't they just look so pretty there? I think so!
I did quilt both of them, one is done in a sort-of-straight line quilting, and the other is just COMPLETELY RANDOM (like me!!!)
No, I didn't take any close up of the quilting on the pillows (sorry, I forgot!)

My lil' ol' table runner wanted its turn basking as well, so I (very quickly) snapped a pic of it on this fence. (Honestly, I'm surprised it stayed up there long enough to snap one!)

Here it is on the table of which it will call home over the next few weeks at least! It covers the entire circle table! (I was going to do a circular one, but ummmm.....yeah, I'm no good at sewing curves yet! Maybe next time!) This baby is quilted in wavy lines. Yes, I did take a close up of the quilting on this, but it turned out blury!

See what I mean? Not the best pic in the world, but it works huh?

I backed it in a solid white quilters cotton. Hey, I just noticed, this shows the quilting detail perty darn good! (don't laugh at my quilting "skills" please!)

I really liked how this pic turned out! Shows the crinklyness of it! (Yes, I have been playing with a photo editor!!! YAY ME!)

And one last pic to top it all off!!! I really hope you guys like it! I worked really hard on it!
You all should really go check out the rest of the entries in the summer sewing contest by clicking here and you still have some time to enter if you want! The linky closes on June 17th! There are all kinds of great prizes so definately go check it out!!!!
Thanks for visiting me!
~Hope y'all are having a great day!!!!!~
~Kelie~

A few finishes

Guess what? Yesterday officially started my VACATION!!! *jumps for joy* I'm off for NINE DAYS! NINE!!!! I can't believe it! I'm so excited, no work, which means time to clean house!!! LOL! But most of all TIME TO SEW!!!!!!!!!! Don't have too much I can share right at this SECOND but....soon...very soon, you will see what I was working on yesterday, and finishing up today

I finished the baby quilt for my friend, it measures 32" x 32".

I did different quilting for all 4 blocks, some straight lines, some diagonal and some wavy! Overall, I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out! She loves it, which is all that really matters!!!!

I also finished up this cute little tote for another friend at work, and she ADORES it!!! So job well done on my part for once! YAY!
Guess what's coming up in a week????? Can you guess?????
MY BIRTHDAY! WAHOO! Wonder what that'll mean for you guys?????? ;) Guess you will have to hang around to find out!

I also finished the first block for the Beginner's Quilt Along that I told you guys about! If you haven't checked it out yet, go ahead and click on the button on my sidebar!!!!
Welp, that's all I've got for you right now, back to sewing!!!!
~Hope y'all are having a great day!!!~
~Kelie~

My Sewing Corner

I know the other day I had said I had another post for you....but it didn't come!!!! Well, I got busy doing the mommy thing, then the sewing thing! So I wanted to say SORRY!!!!!
I was looking through my fabrics the other day and thinking of what I could do a blog post on, then it slapped me (kinda hurt too!!!) in the face! Let me show you a little of my sewing corner! (yes corner, because that's all I have!)
I have been REALLY addicted to fabric here lately! ALL KINDS OF IT! Want to see?????
Well, even if you don't I'm going to show you!

This is my top drawer of my fabric dresser, it has mainly polka dots, mostly 1/2 yd cuts, some fq's too!

You see all those pretty Kona solids in there? YUM!!!! There is also a few Bella solids as well!

Bad pic, I know! But this is from the Papillon line by 3 sisters! I LOVE IT!

A bundle of Curious Nature! (for my hubby, only he doesn't know it!)

This is my 2nd drawer, mainly boyish fabrics.

This is of course for my football star! (My 12 y/o step-son) It's going to be for his b-day if I could ever figure out a pattern to use for it!

This is my 3rd drawer. Holds a lot of girly fabrics along w/ a couple of my WIP, just some stuff I'm playing with.

On the left is my stack of "practice" fabric I got from my Mother in law, then there is my flannel and of course some FELT!

A tote full of batting!

This is the top of my fabric dresser, it holds my quilt rack w/ my blocks I'm doing for the Skill Builder.

AAAAAnd, this is where I sew! Those 2 totes beside the desk also hold fabric, but it's a mess in there!!!! I do have more but until I find the place for it all, I'm keeping it under wraps! That's all I've got today! Hope you enjoyed the peek into my sewing corner!
One last thing before you leave, I've been playing around trying to make a blog button and here is my first go at it.....

What do you guys think? Should I use it, or keep playing around? Please let me know what you think! AND be honest!!!!
~Hope your having a great day!!!~
~Kelie~

I finally figure it out

Well, I decided to try my hand at zippers. This is the result I got:

CROOKED!!!!!!!

SOOOOO I pulled out my hand dandy:

STITCH RIPPER!!! And decided to redo it all! Good thing I didn't loose faith and just give up cuz I got this result next:

(parden my flash) YAY! I DID IT!

Oh how I love this fabric!!!!!!

Sorry I'm bragging...but I'm so proud of me!!!

I made the tote first, then the matching pouch! I'm so proud of myself for actually doing it! Aint they pretty?
Okay, so I decided to try something else, without good results. Please don't laugh too hard at me!!! But this blog is about my journey teaching myself to sew, all kinds of things.....right? Right!!! Well, I tried my hand at applique and it didn't turn out so good. I want to make my babies some alphabet bean bags, since my son is starting kindergarden I figured it would help him recognize the letters better if he could interact with them. Good idea huh?

BAAAAAAAAAAAAAAD RESULT!!!!!!!!!
But my friends over at my local Hancock gave me some pointers. USE HEAT AND BOND! (They even gave me a little bit so I could try it out!) I love them!
Now that I've bragged and embarrased myself I'm going to jet! Gotta go get working on my skill builder!!!!! I have another post for you guys but I may wait to do that one later today....I dunno! But before I go let me tell you ONE MORE THING! 2 of the lovely ladies I work with have more or less "comissioned" me to make them each a quilt! It excites me!!!!! Both of them are wanting out of the same line. I have an idea for one of theirs, but if I could just make it happen....that's the question! Anyone have any suggestions on how I could figure out how much fabric I need to get to make a twin size pieced quilt top? I'm not sure about the block size yet, so yeah....any suggestion are much appreciated!!!!! Until next time.......
~Hope y'all are having a great day!!!~
~Kelie~