Blogiversary Winner!

And the winner is:

Joyce!

Congratulations, Joyce! I had The Husband choose a number between 1 and 9 (inclusive) to choose the winner and his number was 4. Here's a photo of your winnings. It is 4 fat quarters of blue & sparkly winter fabric.

Other news:

Quilting - I finished The Girl's quilt!!!! Well, it doesn't have a label but it is bound and ready for use. It's funny but I am busily thinking of tons of things I could sew for people for Christmas. It doesn't seem to phase me at all that Christmas is less than 20 days away. Ha!

Speaking of Christmas, you may remember last year I mentioned that when The Husband went to take down our outdoor Christmas lights we were missing just one net of lights. They were very distinctive - it was a rainbow net. The Husband actually didn't like them because he didn't think it seemed very Christmas-y to have a rainbow bush. But to get back to the story, they were missing. We didn't think much of it, a neighborhood kid pulling them off for his/her own contentment, etc., whatever. Like I said, he didn't like them much so we weren't too broken up about it. Well the other day I was pulling in to our drive, and I noticed something curious: the neighbors that we don't talk to very much had their lights up. And they had 1 bush with a rainbow net. Hmm. None of their other lights are rainbows. Coincidence? Hard to say...of course we won't be mentioning it. Even if I wanted to mention it I couldn't since we don't really talk to them. Not out of dislike or anything, they just seem to not want to speak to us. Maybe because of their rainbow net guilt. Unlike the previous occupants of that house they are very quiet so I am content to leave things the way they are.

The Big Read - I had about 400 pages to go in Les Miserables when the book wouldn't renew anymore. So I took it to the library and started finishing up the read online. Let me just say that it is very tedious to read a book online. But you can do it too at the Gutenberg website. Hurray for free stuff!

Congratulations to Joyce and thanks everyone for playing! Maybe this year I'll post a little more regularly. And add some photos.

Happy Blogiversary to me!

Today is my third blogiversary. In honor of this momentous occasion I am having a quiltie giveaway. Hurray for free stuff! My local quilt shop is having a sale tomorrow and I am jumping on that train to bring you a little quiltie prize of my random (but tasteful?) choosing . Leave me a comment on this post by midnight December 5th EST to enter. You don't have to leave your email address but I do need a way to contact you - if that is your blogger profile where your email can be found or a blog where I can comment for you that is fine. I'll try to post a picture of the gift tomorrow or Sunday. Wait, today is Friday right? Right.

Because of the prohibitive costs of shipping the winner must reside in the United States or Canada.

Good luck!

Family news -- I survived hosting thanksgiving for 17 people (it was supposed to be 22) at my house for the very first time. Whew. I had a little turkey trouble which I was not expecting because I've roasted up a gobbler before. But it all turned out all right and I haven't gotten any irate 'your crummy food made me sick!' phone calls so I'll take that as a good sign. Or maybe they are too busy barfing to call...

Also everyone seems to think I have permanently volunteered to have it at my house...urm, ok....what?

Fitness news...well I'm on a temporary pit stop. Besides the fact that I hate jogging in snow, rain, cold, and dark, I had a million things to do to prepare for the festivities at my house this week. I intend to start right back up next week. Really. I mean it.

Quilting news...I have 6 of the starburst hand pieced blocks done. I had a goal to get 8 done this year, but I don't think I'm going to make that. I am working on making myself a winter coat. And you know what? It's freakin' cold here in Ohio so I've got to get that done. Don't worry, I do have a stand-in coat in the meantime. I got the binding sewn onto the front of The Girl's quilt which is a big step. I also took a machine trampunto class through one of my guilds and that was lots of fun. It required some machine quilting and I did a not too terrible job at that. Oh and I joined a Round Robin with my guild and I'm really excited about that. I have a design worked out in my head for the center and we'll see how that turns out. I am thinking I might use the machine trapunto method for part of it.

Pay it Forward

Hey everybody! Some time ago, I agreed to participate in a Pay it Forward game on Debbie's blog and I'm finally getting around to posting about it. Here is how it works. If you would like me to send you a homemade little something, then you sign my comments saying you would like to participate. But here's the catch: you have to pay it forward to three other people. You snarf the pretty picture above and put it on your blog, and you ask for three people to sign on and participate, and you send three chosen commenters a little homemade giftie, and then they do the same, and etc. etc.

If I get more than three people asking to participate, I'll draw the lucky three. I'm going to hold this open until my birthday, April 12th. (Hey, I didn't mean for that to be a hint or anything. Ok maybe deep down I did. But it's a day I won't forget so it's a good mark for me.) I'll contact the participants shortly after that.

Oh, and btw. Some time ago...ok, in NOVEMBER...I gave away a little prize to two people to celebrate my second blogiversary. I saw Freeblady, so I just delivered hers in person. Poor Joyce has been patiently waiting for me to get off my bum and get to the post office for months! What's really pathetic about it is I've had the little giftie since January. I'm so sorry Joyce! I did jokingly say that it would take me awhile to get the gifts out but I didn't mean for it to drag out so long. Hopefully I will have it out to you soon.

In other news...Freeblady and I went to a really fun event yesterday. The Original Sewing & Quilt Expo! It was so much fun. We had a free-motion quilting class with Sheila Finklestein, and a binding class with Connie Spurlock. I got to try out a pretty fancy (for me) Viking machine in the free motion class. I signed up for the binding class because I was hoping they would have some advice about binding an inside curve on a quilt. The Girl's quilt has about a jillion inside corners to bind. Of course the instructor did not really know, and her basic advice was, "don't do it." Oh. Um. Huh. Well, then...

And I almost forgot to mention: Freeblady won a prize! Unfortunately not a sewing machine, but a prize is a prize! Woohoo!

Happy Second Blogiversary!

Ok, so I'm one day late. I spent the day yesterday at the spa courtesy of birthday gift certificates so I think you can forgive me. Or maybe hate me. Anyways. It is an annual pilgrimage with the mil and sil. We don't always go the same time of year, but we usually go. This year it landed on the blogiversary, and somehow the day slipped by me. The picture is me celebrating. Ok, ok. I was at a wedding. But that's celebratory too, right? This was at Chalicat's sister's wedding a few weeks back, which was very lovely, btw.

To celebrate, I am going to mail two lucky commenters a little goodie. Hopefully I'll send it sometime before the next blogiversary. he. But leave me a little comment if you are interested in a little giftie. I'm not sure what it will be, but something quilty.

We stopped at a shop that had all sorts of signs up saying 'visit the third floor for fabric!' and I was so jazzed. I ventured up on my own since I was the only one interested...and it was just upholstery samples. Lovely but I'm not in the market for that. sigh.

So happy blogiversary! Leave a comment before 12/15 if you want to be in the drawing. Of course it is pretty likely that I'll only have one or two comments anyway, but if there's more I'll do a drawing.

Something other than the Secret Project

Today I joined the Quilt Studio blog ring. For awhile there I wasn't posting much, and I feel joining a ring may help me to restart the habit. Plus I'm all geeky about this stuff, you know me. I've seen these little links on people's blogs forever and I never thought, 'hey, I should join one of those' for some reason. But today I did. And the blogiversary is coming up, so maybe I'll be on the list by then.

Also in blog updates, I added a link to Quilt Otaku on my sidebar under cool quilting blogs. I discovered her site from listening to Annie Smith's podcast, which we both happen to be big fans of. Anyways. I've been reading her blog for a month or two now, so I figured it was time to add it. I even went back and read some of her archives (err, I hope that doesn't creep her out if she happens to read this.) Plus, you know how I'm always saying I'm a quilting nerd or that I'm geeked out over some quilting thing...Otaku actually means "nerd"! How funny is that? Her blog (unlike mine) seems to have a photo every post. Maybe it is time to resurrect my photo-every-other post goal, since it is way more interesting to read with pictures.

Yeah. That sounds like I am 8 instead of er, not yet in my mid-thirties-something. I meant that crafty stuff is more interesting with pictures. Show and tell at the guild would be pretty boring if people just stood around describing quilts.

And since I know that you just have to know...I did successfully create my binding and pinned it partially to the quilt. However we were watching 'Mutiny on the Bounty' (with Clark Gable, isn't he dreamy) last night so I didn't get to retreat back to the sewing machine to sew it on.

Happy Blogiversary!

Hello! It's been a few weeks since I've posted seriously because I've been planning the Big Post, well, since the 22nd. Below is my gift to the world to celebrate my very first Blogiversary. I was calling it my Blirthday but The Husband thought Blogiversary had more snazz.

The free pattern below is pretty rough as it is my first attempt at writing up instructions for something I designed. Take the pictures with a grain of salt, they are not to scale or exact. I mean, come on. How exact can you get drawing with the Paint program? Feedback is of course welcome as I'd like to improve my skill at writing instructions. Is it clear? What needs more or less explanation? Do the pictures add anything for you?

And you have my permission to use the pattern for personal use, which excludes use as a teaching tool or any form of publication. Even if you are teaching how not to write a pattern.

Oh, and not that I haven't received any gifts myself today. My boss informed me this afternoon that I am the lucky (though not undeserving) recipient of a promotion. Woohoo! And just this morning I was pondering some recent costs we've inflicted on our household budget and wondering how on earth we'll manage to pay for it without going in to debt, and wham! A promotion, complete with raise. So I've been blessed today, on this special day, my blogiversary. Thanks for reading, and many blessings to you as well.