Rags N Quilts

Archive for May, 2008

I hope you all had a wonderful Memorial Day. We had a great day! It was even a little cooler ( 90) and a great breeze. We took the boat out for an incredible sail in the Gulf of Mexico. It was perfect! 15-20 kts of wind, 3-4 ft seas, and all the sunshine you could want! The water is such a beautiful blue-green, I never tire of it. And today we we treated by several pods of dolphins skimming along in our bow wave….3 with tiny babies!!! A perfect day!

And just so I have a picture…this is my family postcard for May. It is on it’s way to Mary. I used brown silk for the background, wool felt for the base flower,leaf, and stem; Angelina fibers, and beads for the center. The butterfly is sequins I picked up at MQS attached with a brad.
.Hope you had a great day too!

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For all who wanted to know the magnifier can be found here. It is a pretty great tool!
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Yesterday the UPS guy brought yet another of my MQS purchases….a bundle of 108″ wide marbled blenders that I bought from Marshall Dry Goods at the show. 52 yards in 9 beautiful colors! Yummy!! And they are so soft! These will be hard to sell to my clients for quilt backs….I’ll be struggling not to keep these for myself!!! OR…..maybe I will keep them!

I’m still waiting for my saddle stool…latest delivery info says next Wednesday.

And this is the latest postcard in the MQR swap from Margie…thanks! Mine were mailed yesterday. I’ll hunt up the picture later.

Hope you all have a fun and safe holiday!

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This is my latest new piece of equipment, thanks to Gina E. It is a great magnifier that clamps onto the handlebar of my machine. I have tried several, from the magna vision to JoAnn’s version of this one. This beats them all hands down!!! It fits the crossbar, has a long flexible arm, and the magnifying lens is large. There is NO vibration with the machine running, no nausea or motion sickness using it.
And I can see!

This background fill isn’t all that tiny, but I had to try it out. This will be a sight saver to be sure when doing micro fill!

And when you don’t need it, if easily moves out of the way and has it’s own sweet little cover to protect the lens. Goes on my list of best tools. And it was $39.99 with shipping! A bargain.

Now when my saddle stool arrives, not only will I be able to see, but I’ll be able to work comfortably too! Life is good!

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First of all, thank you all for the nice comments on my win at MQS. I think I’m finally caught up on my sleep. And now I’m beginning to try some of the new things I bought there.

These clamps are great. I float most all my quilts, and usually pin them along the belly bar. You put these along the belly bar instead of the pins. Works great, and is much easier than pinning.

I got them from Tomorrow’s Heirlooms. They came in a bag of 20 for $10.99. Well worth it!

And these are the bobbin genies…I have been meaning to try these for a long time but just never got around to it. So yesterday, I took out my anti-backlash spring and put in one of these. Works fine, good stitch quality, and sure easier to clean out the lint!

I also bought the new open toe hopping foot from Gammill, will put that on later in the week. And today I ordered the saddle stool. I tried it in the A-1 booth at the show, and I think it’ll be really nice for those long hours doing little background fill.

Have a great night!

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Well, after all the excitement of MQS, things are starting to get back to normal here. I loaded a quilt yesterday and have been working on that today. I am also working on both my MQR postcards, and my family postcards. I sent a bunch of stuff out in today’s mail to Mother, Mary, Ann, Maureen, and Nancy.

So first I need to catch up with pictures. This postcard Mary sent me and I received it the day before I left for MQS. It was an anticipation piece of our time together there. And we had a ball!

This beauty is from Gayle, part of our latest MQR exchange. The theme is “Recycle” and this is made from some really cool vintage bark cloth. Thanks, Gayle, I love the texture. This is from AnnMarie…I think she put the recycle issue “in your face!” just where it needs to be! Love everything about your card AnnMarie, from the stuff to the shape.

And this one is from my Aunt Nancy, part of our May family exchange. She said she saw these cats and thought of me. Thanks, Nancy, I love it!!! It definitely is me!

And then just 2 photos from MQS…the first was taken by Trayce Q…love ya sweetie! It is of Mary and me at the MQR get together…we had a great time meeting with all our MQR pals!
Do ya know who’s who???

And finally, for those of you who haven’t seen it, this is the quilt I won the 2nd place ribbon with. It is the raffle quilt for my guild this year. I designed all of the applique and pieced setting triangles. The 9 patch blocks and flying geese units were the ideas of 2 other guild members, Susan Slaton and Donna Vogel. I pulled it all together in EQ, and the guild members did the piecing and applique, and I did the quilting and all the embellishments.

And, I’m still tired, but had a great time. That’s it for tonight. Thank all of you who have taken the time to send congratulatory notes. I appreciate them all.

Later, gators!

Have a great night.

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Mary is not. Her flight was delayed in Virginia and we did not meet up in Atlanta this morning as planned. So, I flew on to Kansas alone. I just got a call from her and she finally made it to Atlanta. Now she’ll sit there till almost 6:30 when her new flight leaves for Kansas. She should be here a little after 8pm IF things start going the way they’re supposed to.

At any rate, I’m checked in to our room and have dropped off my little quilt for the auction, and picked up my class stuff. So now I’ll just rest up till Mary gets here. Then we’ll hit the bar for a drink and some dinner.

Fortunately, we don’t have a class until 1pm tomorrow, so we’ll be able to rest tonight and sleep in a little. My day started at 4am, but at least my flights were all on schedule. I feel for Mary.

Later, gators!

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