Fabric Postcards

The first postcard swap I did was a very large group of 25, so I had to make 24 postcards. And I forgot to take pictures of them before I mailed them off! But a few of the recipients have been kind enough to send me pictures. So here are a few of the ones I made for my first swap:









I had originally thought that I would make them all the same, but after making about 8, I got bored. LOL! So then I started changing them up. I don't even have a picture of the first ones, but they were crazy quilt style. All of them were done on my embroidery machine, but I have been doing other techniques, too. It has become my latest obsession! LOL!!!

Japanese Spring Wall Hanging

I finished this yesterday. I love how it turned out! And here is a detail of it:





Now I just have 2 more seasons to go.

Intelligence Quiz

I found this fun quiz on Katy the Scrapbook Lady's blog - I don't know that it's very accurate for me, but it's fun anyway:

Your Dominant Intelligence is Linguistic Intelligence

You are excellent with words and language. You explain yourself well. An elegant speaker, you can converse well with anyone on the fly. You are also good at remembering information and convicing someone of your point of view. A master of creative phrasing and unique words, you enjoy expanding your vocabulary. You would make a fantastic poet, journalist, writer, teacher, lawyer, politician, or translator.

What Kind of Intelligence Do You Have?

Books

Ange posted a fun survey about reading on Sweet Shoppe Blog - she got it from Creative Musings by Melissa. And since Ange did it for the From Our Blog To Yours feature, I decided to play along:

Hardback or trade paperback or mass market paperback? Any and all. If I'm buying a book and it is available in several formats, I will usually buy the least expensive one (unless the print size is too small).
Amazon or brick and mortar? Both.
Barnes & Noble or Borders? Barnes and Noble.
Bookmark or dog ear? Bookmark.
Alphabetize by author or alphabetize by title or random? Random.
Keep, throw away, or sell? I keep a lot. Others I give to our library for their used book sale.
Keep dust jacket or toss it? Keep.
Read with dust jacket or remove it? Usually remove it.
Short story or novel? Novel.
Collection (short stories by same author) or anthology (short stories by different authors)? I rarely read short stories.
Harry Potter or Lemony Snicket? Neither - I read the first two Harry Potter books, and unlike most of the rest of the world, I didn't like them much. I've never read Lemony Snicket.
Stop reading when tired or at chapter breaks? I try to get to chapter breaks (or some other natural break) but sometimes I stop if I'm too tired.
"It was a dark and stormy night" or "Once upon a time"? Both.
Buy or Borrow? Both.
New or used? Both.
Buying choice: book reviews, recommendation or browse? All.
Tidy ending or cliffhanger? Either.
Morning reading, afternoon reading or nighttime reading? I read when I eat my breakfast and lunch, and also before bed.
Stand-alone or series? Both.
Favorite series? Outlander by Diana Gabaldon.
Favorite children's book? The Little Prince.
Favorite book of which nobody else has heard? I don't know what other people have heard of, but one I read recently that I hadn't heard of until my son recommended it to me was The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood.
Favorite books read last year? All of the Outlander books.
Favorite books of all time? The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley and four books by Mary Stewart - The Crystal Cave, The Hollow Hills, The Last Enchantment, and The Wicked Day.
Least favorite book you finished last year? A Conspiracy of Paper by David Liss. It was just barely good enough to keep reading.
What are you reading right now? Plainsong by Kent Haruf.
What are you reading next? Haven't decided yet.

Laurel Burch Postcard Swap

I finished up some more postcards yesterday. These are for a Laurel Burch swap. Laurel Burch is an artist who creates fabrics, so these postcards had to have at least one of her fabrics in them. Mine use only her fabrics. I cut out the cats and appliqued them to the background fabric, and did some free motion quilting on the background. I then satin stitched the edges. Hope the other swappers like them!

Brian and Jessica's Wedding Quilt

Journaling reads: "I made this quilt for Brian and Jessica as a wedding gift. Lucky loves quilts, so I often find him on my sewing table while I'm working on a quilt. This day, I was putting the binding on, which is the last step. Then I put it on our bed in order to get a good photo of it. This quilt was really made with love."

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Credits: Daydream kit by Eve Recinella of Sweet Shoppe Designs and Jomi Van Bekkum of The DigiChick

Stitched frame by Christine Nash of A Cherry On Top

White edge on small squares by Scrappers Guide

Scraplift of Big Dogs layout by mrs2a50 (Julie)

Fonts - Cheryl, AL Sandra, Artistamp Medium

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This layout was also featured on the Rectangle Scrappin' Gallery yesterday - I was really excited about that!

Where I Call Home

The Sweet Shoppe Blog has a challenge this week to tell about the place where we live and how we came to live there. I have lived in Stillwater, Oklahoma, for almost 30 years (aackk!). I grew up in Omaha, Nebraska. I was going to school at the University of Nebraska at Omaha when I met my husband, who had just finished his master's degree at Oklahoma State University. We met on New Year's Eve, 1976, through mutual friends (a long story for another post).

Anyway, we hit it off immediately, and he started visiting me for long weekends about every 2-3 weeks. It didn't take long to decide that a long distance relationship wasn't what we wanted, so I moved to Stillwater in May, 1977, and we got married in August.

When I first moved here, the idea was that I would finish college (I had 2 years left) and then we would move. But when I finished my accounting degree, my husband had been looking for jobs (his degree was in biology and he wanted to work in fisheries). Jobs in his field weren't easy to find. He had been working as a technician at OSU in the department where he'd gotten his masters, and a few months after I graduated, I got a job in the accounting department at OSU and he got a more permanent job at Langston University (about 20 miles from Stillwater). We thought that we would stay a couple more years (so our resumes would look better) and then move.

When we decided to have a child, we decided that Stillwater would be a pretty good place to raise him. And we thought that when we retired we might move. Well, I haven't worked outside the home since 1992, and my DH retired in 2002, and we're still here. I'm not sure we'll ever leave now. We bought our first home in 1981, and then bought land and built our second home (where we still live) in 1989.

Here is a layout of our home:

Credits: Morning Bloom Kit by Lauren Grier, available at Sweet Shoppe Designs

Fonts: Times New Roman and Artistamp Medium

Misc: Circle by Dianne Rigdon from Art Inspiration Collection Kit, available at ScrapArtist

Sketch by Rachael Giallongo (InLoveWithDOTS) at The Digichick

Needle Punch Postcards

I have recently gotten into making fabric postcards. They are such fun to make, and there are a number of internet groups that do swaps of them. I made my latest creation with my Bernina needle punch accessory - which is another fun thing. I took yarn and wool roving and "punched" it into wool felt. The needles in the accessory are barbed and you don't use thread - the barbed needles make the yarn a part of the base fabric. Anyway - here are my postcards:





After making the flowers, I used my Viking to embroider the bees and the satin stitched edging.

Birthday Party Layouts

I actually finished 2 layouts today! I did most of the first one (a 2-page layout) yesterday, and finished it up this morning. Both layouts are from Jessica's birthday party Monday night (my future daughter-in-law).





Credits:
Papers from Techno Flirty, Quintessential, and Cosmic Space
It’s a Third Date
Simple Sayings
Say Here Journal Bits
All above from Eve's Digi Extras

Ricrac from Marmelade (recolored)
Jelly, J, and J background from Fancy Pants
Both kits by Eve

Stitching by Jennifer Layden
String ties by Christine Smith
Paint - brushes by Nancie Rowe Janitz
Fonts - 2 peas scrapbook, AL Sandra
Template by Teresa Ferguson from a layout by Jenny Jorgensen (here) and (here)



Jessica's nephew (Parker) and her mother (Parker's grandmother) at her birthday party.

Credits:
BoyzWorld Kit
Cardboard from Enjoy Life
Staples from Regality
Ricrac from Marmelade
All of above by Eve Recinella of Eve Recinella Designs

Freestyle Flower template by Christine Smith of The DigiChick
Buttons from Fudge Dream Supreme by Robin Carlton and Lauren Grier of Sweet Shoppe Designs
Corner and heart from A Mother’s Love - Unconditional
Charm and charm holder from A Mother’s Love - Forever
Above by Amanda Rockwell of Sweet Shoppe Designs

Scraplift of Kate Hadfield's 4th Anniversary layout (here)

Quilting

I just got home last night from a 3-day quilting workshop in Paducah, Kentucky. It was held at the Museum of the American Quilters Society. Just think - there is a National Quilt Museum, and it is a wonderful museum. The workshop was the very best workshop I've ever taken. The teacher was Diane Gaudynski. If you are a quilter and want to learn to improve your quilting - take this workshop!! She is a wonderful teacher, and SO talented. It was expensive, but worth every penny.

But of course, I'm behind on everything now - time to play catch up.