Doing Some More Cleaning!

Sometimes I just get a bee in my bonnet and once I get going, I just can't stop! I've been doing some more cleaning. Moved all the furniture in my living room yesterday and vacuumed everything, even the corners! I just can't wait to rip that carpet out and replace it with hardwood floors! It's the only room we haven't put hardwood in yet. I really can't find enough negative words to describe how I feel about carpeting.

I started washing the windows in my kitchen on Friday but I can't reach the garden window without the ladder which I can't lift to get out of the garage so I'm at the mercy of my husband! I'm hoping he'll do it for me. I'm getting ready to go wash the windows in my car and Scott's car now. If he gets me an extention cord, I can vacuum the floors in the cars too!

Hopefully, I'll time to stitch later, while the Chicago White Sox win their trip to the World Series!

Christmas Block

Christmas Block
Originally uploaded by Kitty And Me.

One of the girls at my cross stitch chat board asked me what my next Crazy Quilt project will be. Well, as I mentioned yesterday, I sewed up 4 new blocks. So the first to be stitched will be this Christmas themed square. I'm thinking of a white poinsettia in the center. I don't know if I'll start on this today or not but it will be my next CQ project.

As you can see at the bottom right, I somehow backed myself into a corner. So I top stitched the green. Crazy Quilting is very forgiving. I'm sure I'll find a great way to hide that!

Kitty In Teapot

KittyInTeapot
Originally uploaded by Kitty And Me.

When I finished my All That Jazz block, I started stitching up this cute little Vogart kitty. I finished this last night and will eventually sew it into a doorknocker.

I usually sew up doorknockers when I have 3 or 4 of them do. I promised one of my readers that I'll take pictures and write up directions for finishing doorknockers and post it here. So stay tuned for that.

I've finished my design work for the week so today, I'll be pulling out my stash and sewing up several crazy quilt blocks. I have some neat ideas for new ones!

Crazy Quilt Eye Candy

First, I'd like to say thanks to everyone who commented on my "All That Jazz" block. I'm really pleased with how it came out despite my being so unsure of what to do in the beginning.

To refresh everyone's memory, the symbolism is as follows:

Fabric - Mardi Gras
Butterfly - Hope
Music buttons - Jazz
Floral applique - Magnolia Branch
Vine - Bougainvilla
Fan - Wrought Iron
Spider - Luck
Forgetmenot spray - for those who lost their lives due to the storm
Cat - My Signature

For some wonderful Crazy Quilt eye candy, be sure to visit Chloe's Place. Linda just received back some blocks that I believe were from a Round Robin.

Also, for more eye candy and a wonderful post on embellishing crazy quilts, visit Sharon's In A Minute Ago blog. I was delighted this morning to see such beauty first thing in the day and then to have a wonderful post to read at Sharon's was great!

All That Jazz Complete

All That Jazz Complete
Originally uploaded by Kitty And Me.

My All That Jazz block is now complete!

I added some more of the little music buttons to the top, I embellished the braid underneath the buttons with some Czech glass fire polished beads and some glass bugle beads.

The Victorians believed that it was good luck if they had a spider in their house and since the south needs alot of luck with clean up and rebuilding, I decided to add a spider to my block. The web is worked with gold Kreinik #4 braid, the spider body is made of 2 glass beads and I did the legs with DMC #5 Perle Cotton.

I'm going to look at this for a few days to make sure it doesn't need anything else and then I'll pack it off and ship it to Sharon in Australia.