Red Hat Lady & Velvet Pansies

Digging around in my stash, I found some white cotton velvet that mom had given me not too long ago. Well, you know what you can do with cotton velvet? You can dye it! And that's just what I did:



They don't look like much now. I still have to Blanket Stitch around the outside and then add the do-dads to the centers. I'll work on those today. I want to make some leaves too.

I then worked on the Red Hat Lady pouch:



This is ready for some beads! I'll work it again later this afternoon. If I complete it today, I'll do the finishing tomorrow.

I must say, I love the way red and purple looks together!

Speaking Of Dragonflies......

Isn't this a gorgeous little creature?



Scott took this photo yesterday evening when he got home from work. We were sitting on the front porch watching this guy bounce around in the garden.

We have many varieties of dragonflies here, but this one is one of my favorites.

Cellphone Pouches

Yesterday, my goal was to do the finishing on the Dragonfly Cellphone pouch as well as do the foundation piecing on the Red Hat Society Lady Cellphone pouch which is a custom order.

Here's the completed Dragonfly Pouch:



OK, so my hot pink cellphone doesn't quite work with the colors in this pouch! It's only there for size reference!

Here's the pieced Red Hat Lady pouch:



I'll begin the stitching & embellishing process on this later today.

On to Maxine's quilt, I'm happy to say that I now have all the deteriorated patches replaced as well as the stitching. Now, I can start the embellishing!

Because this quilt is quite large, I want to put some larger embellishments on it first. I'll start by making some velvet pansies. Do you know how hard it is to find velvet or velvet-like fabrics in anything other than black, red and green? Geez! In this day & age!

Anyway, I'll also be making some sunflowers using yellow sparkle organza and brown velvet for the centers. Ok, wish me luck on this one because at the moment, it's only an idea in my mind. I'm hoping I can execute it the way I see it!

Stop by tomorrow for another update on my current projects.

Buttons

Well, my Flea Market finds yesterday were quite minimal! The market was huge but I just didn't find anything all that exciting. In fact, I only spent $5.00!

I found some pretty little vintage buttons and some little appliqués, all from the same dealer:



Usually, I find some nice lace and other odds & ends but not this time. Very disappointing! And I haven't seen a vintage iron-on transfer in months! Actually, I haven't seen any since last Summer! What's up with that? Now, it's not like I don't have any. Actually, I have a huge rubbermaid container filled with vintage transfers. I can barely lift it to get it off the shelf but it's one of my obsessions! I love them and I won't apologize for it!

Back to the buttons, it occurred to me that my plastic button collection would be more accessible if I separated them by color. At the moment, I store them in this huge 5 pound antique coffee jar:



They look really great in the jar but I when I want to use some, I have to dump them all out into a big cake pan just so I can find what I want! So what to do? I have a bunch of old blue mason jars that I could use. Yes, I love old stuff! Methinks I'll contemplate this a bit more!

For today, I'll be sewing up the Dragonfly Cellphone pouch. I'll also do the foundation piecing for my custom order, a Red Hat Lady cellphone pouch.

I worked on Maxine's quilt for a few hours yesterday. I have 3 more patches to replace the stitching on and then I can start embellishing it. Yes, I found 2 more deteriorated patches the other day so I replaced them. I'll have another update on that project for you soon.

A Gift From Gina

I don't know what it is about opening my mailbox and seeing a surprise package in there from one of my online friends. It's just so exciting to know that someone thought of me!

Yesterday, I received a package from Gina. Oooh, there's really something neat about about a package arriving all the way from Australia! Probably because I know that Australia is so far away! (No, I don't get out much!)

Anyway, Gina sent me a goody pack filled with gorgeous laces and buttons:



Are these amazing or what? Such lovely things to embellish crazy quilts with. I just can't wait to work them into new projects. Gina, thank you so very much for your gift! I love everything!

BTW - did you know that you can take the binding off of gathered lace? I just use a seam ripper or my embroidery scissors and clip the stitches. Once the binding is off, you can press it with your iron and you then have flat lace!

My mom also gave me a goody bag with all sorts of new fabrics and trims but the battery in my camera was about to run out so I'll save that photo for another day.

For now, I'm thrilled to tell you that my design work is complete! I did 28 designs in 3 days! They were mini designs but that's still a lot of work and I really pushed myself to get them done. I'm certainly happy for having the work but my true love is the hands-on stitching so now I'll be getting back to working on Maxine's quilt, my antique quilt and several other projects.

Coming later this week will be the completed Dragonfly Cellphone Pouch. That one is spoken for so I plan to get that assembled and ready to ship to it's new owner.

Also this week, I have a custom order for a Red Hat Society Lady Cellphone Pouch so I'll be piecing that block and stitching on that.

Be sure to stop by tomorrow for a new complimentary charted design. It's a pretty little design, perfect for a small gift or as a focal point on a crazy quilt!