Yesterday was a fun day..... and thank you all....

Let me start first by saying thank you to everyone for all the sweet

condolences on the loss of our dog, Paisley. It's been a week now and
we're getting used to the fact that she's gone but it still feels weird
without her in our lives. It was so kind of you all to respond and offer your sympathies, I tried to thank you all personally but wasn't able
to for some of the anon or "no-reply" peeps.
Please just know that I appreciated every single one of them.

Now, to yesterday- the mail lady brought 2 packages to the house! One was a quilt book I had ordered thru Ebay, saving over $10, which I liked. It's "Greetings from Tucsadelphia" by Lizzie B. Cre8tive. It's got lots of fun applique patterns in it and even a recipe or 2. But the other box- well, let's just say "WOWEE WOW WOW", shall we? It came all the way from Buenos Aires, Argentina from a friend named Sandy. I didn't know it, but she had my name in a scrappy pincushion swap over at Flickr! I made and sent the turtle, remember? I thought that was cute. Sandy taught me all about CUTE with a capital C!

This is what I found when I opened the biggest package in the box- a little white cat in a pink bikini and a rainbow colored pincushion with a velcro dot in the middle. Interesting, yes? Wonder what that velcro is for?

OH! It's to attach it to the next largest piece in the box, turned out to be a tree trunk on a piece of sand!

Now, tell the truth- is this not the cutest thing EVER????? Sandy made me a little miniature Nosey Parker Goes to Florida pincushion set! It's a rainbow palm tree on a bit of beach! Un-freakin'-believable. She even has her own little towel which doubles as a needle case. Sandy made this up all on her own, she had no pattern and she had to work it out so that it was sturdy and would support the tree top and built it an underwire frame and everything. This was no easy feat! I am so totally impressed. And grateful!

She also sent me some fabulous Kaffe Fassett fabric, 3D rainbow stickers and a lovely handmade, custom card with a long hand-written note about how this came to fruition. You wouldn't believe how giddy and happy I was- I needed this morale boost- it showed me what a lovely friend Sandy is to me and what a kind and dear lady she must be, to go to all this trouble for me! AND- I got what has to be the best pincushion in the entire swap.

For size perspective, you can see the real NP checking out her newest competition. The little fabric NP is quite tiny and so dear! I just love this and keep pinching myself because it's so dreamy. I love things with pieces parts, I adore things that are rainbow colored and I love all things tropical. And of course, I love Nosey Parker to bits, so you tie them all together into one package and I damn near fainted!


I tried to stay busy last week, to distract myself and I ended up finishing 2 little quilts.

No bees, no honey..... No work, no money..... that's a saying from somewhere, don't know where, but I like it. :) It's also the name of this little quilt.

It measures about 12" square and is for me and the other one, below, is for the Doll Quilt Swap. It's about 24" x 16". It's called a spiderweb quilt.


The recipient's name is blocked out so she can't accidentally find out that it's for her before it arrives in her mailbox in about another month.


And what's a spiderweb quilt without a spider? :) Don't freak, it's rubber and squishy and fun to squeeze. This spider is my friend, he eats scary snakes!

I also finished up 9 more sewing caddies and they're all in my Etsy shop. And I made 9 cat collars, but that was no big deal. Murphy and Parker both lost one this week, those rotten kids.

So this week has been better than last week. Thank you all again, very much, for the kindness you've shown me.

Paisley.... we won the lottery when we got her...

For the last 14 years, we've been lucky enough to have a sweet collie girl named Paisley Maree. She came to us at the ripe old age of 3 months when her previous owners decided to have her put to sleep because she had a problem with fleas and mange and they didn't want to bother with her. Their loss was our gain. The vet was a friend of ours and was at our house when that call came in, to have her put down. She immediately offered her to us and we jumped at the chance. I mean, who doesn't love a collie, or the thought of having one? Turns out, collies are the NICEST dogs. And Paisley, who had every reason in the world to be miserable (infection raging, pustules flaring, sores weeping, and many flea bites, etc) was the happiest little puppy with the most tremendous spirit. She looked positively gruesome but we didn't care, we fell in love with this pup at our first meeting. All she wanted was to cuddle and play and scamper. So undemanding, she would take a nap where ever she was and that pink chair was a favorite spot, she would stick her head under there and snooze.

The vet convinced us that her face would eventually grow hair (they later admitted that they didn't really know that for sure but were hopeful) and we treated her mange with a daily dose of Interceptor, a once-a-month heartworm pill. It was sort of an expensive experimental treatment, not one recommended by the AVMA, or whatever it's called, but it darn sure worked. About 60 pills later, she was clean of mange mites.

She grew up to be just like she was as a pup, happy, fun and calm, but quirky. She would go for a walk (before we had a fence) and always come home toting something, either she'd find an old bottle in the woods or tree branch, a long deer or cow bone, something, it was a riot.

Paisley and I were really close, she wouldn't leave my side when I was sick in bed for a week, many years ago, and she continued to show that same kind of devotion for her whole life.

She and the other dogs had a game of stealing Daddy's hats. She didn't much like to wear them, though. :) Camo was not her color.

She was a real beauty, in our eyes.

Paisley had a few other problems, but nothing we couldn't deal with. She never lost her appetite, meals were a favorite time of day for her.

Monday, July 19, 2010 she had to be put to sleep. Her sweet heart was failing her and she couldn't get enough oxygen in her blood, she was constantly panting hard and no matter what we tried, it was getting worse. She was exhausted, she had given all she had to stay with us and it about killed us to make that final trip to the vet's office. We had her for just over 14 years and it was not enough. I miss my sweet girl but I'm glad she's not suffering anymore. The house feels so quiet and empty and I just hate this. My husband is so good to me, with the extra hugs and pats and kisses. He misses her too, he was the best daddy that girl could have wished for.

We'll miss you forever, Sweet Pea.

It's been a busy week, lots of sewing projects finished!

I've been sewing a lot this week. I was in a pincushion swap and I decided to sweeten the pot a bit by making a few extra shells for the turtle. I particularly like the Carmen Miranda/fruity one! It's on its way to somewhere, I think my partner will like her.

I finished the mermaids and all the pineapple drinks, too and got them all mailed out for beach/underwater July/Aug 3.5" mini block swap. Sorry about the blurry photo, but you get the drift, right?

I got all the blocks done for the DQS9 doll quilt, I still have to put them together and then quilt it, but the hardest part is done, I think.

And I made 4 little eyeglass purses for a friend, she keeps her reading glasses in them and hangs them around her neck. She needed one black one for dressy occasions and then some fun bright ones to wear to work. I got those done today.

And, for another swap, a "flat pet" that can be taken out and about and photographed in fun places.... I made a flamingo (no!) and have it ready to mail off to parts unknown (to you, I know where she's going). I have one other swap to fulfill and then I'm done for a while, phew!




The feet are made from over-sized, enormous chenille stems, aren't they wild?! She looked pretty cute on our verandah, it's going to be hard to send her away!

That's what I've been up to! What about you?

Fair warning- removing a tutorial....

In about 3 days, I'm going to delete my tutorial for the sewing organizer/travel caddy. I've had shops asking for a pattern and I feel like if I'm going to be selling them, I should take away the free one in order to avoid possible confrontations in the future.

So if you haven't gotten to it yet, you might want to get all the info and measurements now, because by about Wednesday, the 7th, it's going to disappear. Sorry for any inconvenience, but I don't see any real way around this.

Thanks for understanding!

I finally got off my duff.....

and made up some patterns for a couple of my sewing organizers and caddies. What prompted this was a phone call from a woman with an English accent named Jennifer, who lives not too far away and has run her own business for many years, a pattern and sewing accessory business, selling patterns and items all over the country and she was picked up by Butterick for some of her things. She is the nicest lady and was very generous in her praise and admiration of my work. I've known about her for a long time, I would see her things in local craft malls and at some local shows. I didn't realize she was so nice, though. :)

At the end of our conversation, she commented one more time on my work and said "you know, your work is so good, you could almost be British." lol That really cracked me up, because as some of you know, I'm what some of my friends refer to as a "Half-Brit". My mum was born and raised in London. So, Jennifer and I had a good laugh about that. It was a very enjoyable phone call.

Anyway, she wanted to order some patterns and some finished product, so I finished writing the pattern and had some printed up the other day. Ordered some zip locks and stuffed them this morning and now they are for sale in my Etsy shop. *shameless self-promotion* For now, the sewing tutorial is still available here on the blog for the travel caddy, but I may be taking it down soon as I can probably make some much needed income from selling the pattern. I'm not looking forward to an unhappy email from someone who bought the pattern and then found out she could have made up her own with a little extra trouble and effort and saved the $9. If any of you have any thoughts about that, I'd appreciate hearing them.

And Nosey Parker was SO helpful this morning as I was folding patterns up. She wanted in on the action and had a wash right where I could supervise her supervising of me.

She's so stinkin' cute, we can't hardly stand it. :)

Doll Quilt Possibilities....

After a lot of sleuthing and snooping and prowling around, I think this is my plan for a small quilt for my partner. It's called a Spiderweb quilt and I've never made one before. I have great expectations, though and hopefully will be able to start it soon. I have until the end of August to get it done, so it shouldn't be a problem.

These are the fabrics I'm planning to use, along with some solid white.

Hopefully she'll like it! I think it'll end up being about 24" long and 16" wide. I feel a little better for having a plan, I must say. And it was a tough decision but I can't tell you why just yet, in case she's peeking in. :)

And this is what I did this week while Jim was in CO, along with some sewing and making tiny 3.5" quilt blocks for a swap.

This is a before shot- and it was crammed even more full than this photo shows- I've done a little too much fabric shopping this year. *gulp* I was having to move entire stacks to get to the color stacked behind it and it was very inconvenient. So I refolded everything....

And this is what it looks like today!

I think this will be easier for me to deal with. I don't like the look quite as much, but function is very important and it's easier to slide a certain fabric out without disturbing the rest of the pile.

I'm in a beach swap where we all make a dozen or so little 3.5" blocks and mail them off. This month's theme is beach/underwater. I made these little pineapple drinks and also some mermaids, which I'll show you later. I love how these came out!

No Nosey Parker photos today, sorry! Please don't hurt me! :)

A couple of cool cats....

First, we had a bit of company last week, our friend Patrick drove up on his way to Colorado and spent the night. We put him to work dicing onions to go into the buffalo burgers and he said he wouldn't mind wearing my pinnie. Looks pretty good on him, too, wouldn't you say? He's a fun guy and keeps us laughing most of the time.

The next day, he and Jim drove off into the sunrise together but in separate trucks, to head the rest of way to CO, talking to each on hand-helds. After helping Patrick unload a truck full of furniture, Jim intended to catch a mess of big trout. So he's having a fishing vacation and getting to spend time with his buddy, so he's happy.

The next night, as I was lying in bed reading, I saw something just horrible- Beeswax's neck was bright reddish-pink and it just freaked me out, I was sure it was blood. Then I remembered he was wearing a hot pink collar and had gotten caught in a severe rainstorm earlier! Phew! His collar was bleeding, not him! My boy was OK. Scared me, though!

Nosey Parker evidently really misses her Daddy because she has been glued to me all night, every night. Sleeping curled up in my arms, on my stomach, cooking me until I'm sure I'm going to explode, making bread on my wrists and palms until they're a prickled mess, gosh, I just love it! My baby..... she's so stinking sweet when she's asleep!


Up on the fabric hutch, which is usually covered with a white towel....