and it’s awfully quiet…
and I’m a little lonely.
Jonas started out “eating” his new cousin a lot but by this morning, he was “eating” Uncle Nik and kissing his new cousin.
Progress, I’d say!
Instagram
I am making progress on my #onewordchallenge quilt for the @baltimoremqg. I have the word totally pieced at this point and I just have some embroidery to do to finish out the mini quilt. Feel free to continue to guess which word I have chosen but please don’t give up the answer if I’ve actually told you. 😉 These letters are from the #refrigeratormagnetpattern from @elizabethagh. And I for the record, don’t really love sewing letters although these weren’t too bad. If it wasn’t for me giving a demo about how to sew these back in January, I likely would not have even made this quilt. 🤣#salmonandsouvlakisews #baltimoremodernquiltguild #charmcitysewcialOne of my main goals for myself in 2020 (when it comes to my sewing life) is to finish up, give away (finished or not) or make progress on every work-in-progress (WIP) I have. My intention is to NOT start any new projects until I’m done with the ones that I have already begun. (I am reserving the right to change my mind of course but I’m really serious about this, honestly!) I’m also committed to evaluating every single item in my sewing room to decide if I need it or not. My goal is to significantly reduce the size of my stash and supplies, in the service of more simplicity in my life as well as knowing that in the not too distant future, we will likely be switching around bedrooms in our house and my sewing room will be significantly shrinking in size. . . ✂️🧷 As a way to quantify the work that I’m hoping to do (and because I like cold hard data 😉), I spent the last week or two, off and on, weighing everything in my sewing room (plus everything I collected from around the house) related to my sewing life. . . ✂️🧷My grand total? 244.75 pounds! I have some work cut out for me. My goal is to have much of this ready to head out to #destashbaltimore in March. It’s nice to have a deadline! #salmonandsouvlakisews #charmcitysewcial #baltimoremqg (and local maker friends, follow Renee @missceliespants for more info on #destashbaltimore 2020.)Presenting my first quilt finish of 2020! The center block sub-units were pieced by Debbie Kratovil (swipe to the end for the pattern specifics). She gave them to me (via her daughter) three years ago and at the end of December, I decided it was about time I put them into a quilt! She also gave me the extra purple fabric that I used for the outer border. So I just had to add the inner polkadot border and the backing. This measures about 42 inches square and is destined to be another quilt donated to Early Childhood Headstart via the @baltimoremqg. Debbie is a prolific quilter, teacher, and author but she doesn’t seem to have an Instagram account. If you Google her name, you will find her blog if you’d like to know more about her and her work. ♥️ . . . It’s been years since I used this particular quilting pattern, but I love how a tiny change in the angle at the top of the quilt results in such a big difference at the bottom of the quilt. You know that saying, “Small hinges move big doors”? Here’s a graphic representation of that! ♥️ (I love @healthymoving’s take on mindset and implementing small, incremental change if you are wanting any encouragement on that in the new year.) #salmonandsouvlakisews #baltimoremqg #charmcitysewcial #debbiekratovilI am working on samples for a demonstration that I am doing at the @baltimoremqg guild meeting on Sunday. I am demonstrating the freezer paper method for constructing words to be added to a quilt. This is the #refrigeratormagnetpattern from @elizabethagh. Our guild is doing a one word quilt challenge, as part of our yearlong 10-year anniversary celebration. Currently, I am working on the letters A, C, and T. There are four more letters to go. Can you guess which one word I’ve chosen for the year? 😀 #salmonandsouvlakisews #baltimoremqg #charmcitysewcialHere are my top nine posts and my year of color. Family, quilting, and lots of colors. Sounds about right! 😍 Happy New Year’s Eve!Handmade Christmas 2019: reusable teabags. That’s it. 😆 In years past, I sewed and sewed and gave handmade sewn presents to nearly everyone. But this year? It was a really rough fall that I hope I never have to repeat it again. And when I got to December, not much sewing happened (at least compared to my high output years). But I did make about 60 of these reusable teabags, made with 100% cotton organic unbleached muslin from @dharmatradingco. I gave them away along with dried peppermint from @mountainroseherbs. It seriously makes the best peppermint tea you’ve ever had. ♥️ In the picture, you can see that one of the teabags has also been used with black tea because it’s beautifully dyed. 😍 . . . How to use them? Fill with 1/2-1 tablespoon of loose tea (for herbal tea you need the larger amount), brew as usual, take the teabag out, allow to cool, turn inside out to remove the wet tea leaves, rinse, and dry to use again. It’s zero waste tea, especially if you compost the tea leaves! 🌏 #salmonandsouvlakisews #reusableteabags #zerowaste #zerowastehome”Earthquake Consolation” is a series of six quilts that I made last summer (June/July 2019) as presents for my family and in response to the November 30, 2018 magnitude 7.1 earthquake in Anchorage, Alaska. With too many thoughts to be contained in one little Instagram post, I dusted off the blog and wrote a couple blog posts instead. See the link in profile if you want to read more and to see many more pictures. ♥️ . . . This was my most ambitious sewing project of the year by far! Quilt design inspired by a free tutorial from @emily_dennis_. Almost all the fabrics are #konacottonsolids from @robertkaufman, from my stash. Flannel backs from @joann_stores #salmonandsouvlakisews #charmcitysewcial #baltimoremqg #quiltersofinstagramI am really intent on finishing up all my outstanding projects in my sewing room (either finishing them or giving it away to someone else who might be interested in actually finishing it). So with that in mind, in late November, I made this baby quilt from blocks which I received from my bee mates in #beehiveswarmmerrilee in 2017. @driftedindrive was our leader for that year. Thanks Merrilee! After I assembled it, it didn’t feel quite fun enough for a kid so I added the little turtle appliqué. And then I had fun piecing together all my cute green fabrics for the back, including turtles, bugs in jars, frogs, and green beans! I donated this one to @baltimoremqg’s work with Early Head Start. . . . Block pattern: #treasurehuntblock from @blossomheartquilts #charmcitysewcial #blossomheartquilts #salmonandsouvlakisews #baltimoremqgThis year, I realized I was running a little late on three bird ornaments. In Ellie’s case, I was nine years late. 😂 For the two little boys, they are just 2.5 and 3 so I’m not doing too bad. I generally aim to make these in time for the first Christmas. But hey, better late than never right? 😊 . . . Little bird pattern is from @purlsoho. #salmonandsouvlakisews #charmcitysewcialFor the third year in a row, I sewed my mother-in-law pillow for her birthday (which is early in December). This year, I used a 150% enlarged #quatrefoilblock from @blossomheartquilts. It’s 20” square, sewn with fabrics from my stash. I just keep these particular fabrics together and reuse them every year (although I’m staring to run out ☹️). I love the rich red and green with gold combination. One of these years I should really sew some Christmas pillows for my own house. 😆 I made a Velcro closure for the back and sewed on the binding at half an inch to make it be a little more pronounced part of the design. In the last picture, you can see the binding as well as my very most favorite color of thread (used for the quilting in this project). 💛 In the picture with all three, you can also see my pillows begun in my @baltimoremqg classes with @victoriafindlaywolfe and @duringquiettime. I love seeing them all together! . . . #charmcitysewcial #baltimoremqg #salmonandsouvlakisews #quiltersofinstagramI am feeling like an accomplished grown-up today because I remembered to polish my silver the day before Thanksgiving. 😀 Also, “polish my silver” feels very grown-up to say. 😂 . . . I am blessed to have silver from both sides of my family. The set on the left is from my mom’s family. My Granny collected box tops for the set. The silver on the right comes from my dad’s family. The two little butter knives have the initials “M” for my paternal grandmother’s maiden name and “R”, for my paternal great-aunt‘s married name. She didn’t have any children and so my grandmother inherited her things when she died. My dad is an only child and so we ended up with a lot of silver. . . . This summer, while we were in Alaska for our family reunion, my dad asked us kids to each take silver with us. I am looking forward to using it on our Thanksgiving table tomorrow. 😍 (You can see some silver polishing process pictures in my stories right now. I just used my baking soda cleaning paste for polishing and it worked great.)Last Saturday night, I managed to whip together this little quilt (approx. 36” square). I already had the quilt top assembled so in under two hours, I was able to make the quilt sandwich, quilt it and sew the binding to the top. I did most of the hand sewing of the binding during our @baltimoremqg guild meeting last Sunday and, as was my goal, was able to hand it off to join the other baby quilts that our guild donates to a local charity. . . . Each of the blocks in the quilt top was sewn by a member of my guild. In 2017, I participated in the “quilt in a box” bee where I provided the fabric and each other bee member was free to sew whatever design she wanted to. Some of my most devoted readers may remember my posts from a couple years ago of blocks that I had sewn using other people’s fabric. 😍 . . And, if you swipe to the last picture, you will see the documentation of the other project I managed to get sewn over the past three months. There were six boy babies born in our church in 2019 (and no girls!). That combined with a couple other babies meant that I needed to sew eight boy flannel blankets. 🥰 . . . #salmonandsouvlakisews #charmcitysewcial #baltimoremqg #quiltinaboxCategories
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I feel that way when family leaves too. For the most part, I get used to being far away, but then having family here is SO good that when they leave there’s always a bit of an empty feeling around here. At least you get to see Priscilla/Mom again soon!
I totally agree Leah!