Stocking

It's official.  My Long-arm is sick.  I received the cable Saturday.  I had hoped that it would fix the problem.  Sadly, No.  She is all boxed up and loaded into my truck. Sniff.  Soon she will be on her way to Utah.  Hopefully she will be restored to her former glory and return home soon. sniff. sniff.

Meanwhile I have been busily working on another project.  Christmas Stockings. Remember when I said that I had found a new plan for my Hexagons?  Well this is it.

Cute!

Don't give me all of the credit.  I had a little help in the form of inspiration from Amanda Murphy's Modern Holiday.  She has four different and equally striking stocking ideas in her book.  But I saw the hexagons and just new I had to make it for my nephew.  I didn't follow Amanda's pattern, basically because I am lazy.  The pattern in the book called for enlarging the templet 300%.  My printer/copier doesn't enlarge.  And I just didn't feel like driving to the print store.  See?  Lazy.  

I simply made up my own by tracing a generic red and white felt stocking I had on hand.  I had to  modify the hexagons I had already sewn up by adding a row to the bottom and a couple to the side to accommodate the heel.

I embroidered my nephew's name by hand.  It finished up quickly, seriously it only took one Dr.'s Appointment to finish it up. I checked out TaDa! Creations for her quick embroidery tutorial and she just happened to have a stocking tutorial too!  Her embroidery is far superior to mine but her tutorials are awesome.  I even added the ruffle from her stocking tutorial!

I backed the stocking with Santa fabric.  In hindsight, red would have been a better choice, but for a 2 year-old I just couldn't resist Santa.

Now for the really fun part.....Filling it!

This is not good...

I had the sewing machine repair man out to set the timing on my Longarm.  Sadly he found other more complicated problems.  Now my machine sits and waits for a new cable.  Hopefully that will have me up and running soon.

A Bean Bag...Baby

The Little Boy Blue {Toddler Bean Bag} from Vanessa Goertzen of lellaboutique.com is on it's way to a special little one.  I finished it up towards the end of last week.  It is so cute.  I mean it!  SO CUTE! 

It has been tested and approved by all of my, not so, little ones.  If I could have only snapped a shot of my 16 y.o. trying to sit in it!  

The pattern went together so quick!  The worst part was those darn beans!  They get everywhere, and FAST.  Emma and I resorted to stabbing them with pins to try to keep those pesky little static cling beans from rolling everywhere.  We had all these little shish-kabobed beans stabbed into the carpet all over the sewing room.  It was quite funny.  Kinda had to be there.    The pattern calls for a separate interior bag to hold all of those little beans.  That way the exterior can be washed and rewashed.

Now I still have 1/2 a bag of beans left.  Guess I'll have to sew up another.  darn.

He loves me? He loves me, not?

It's official, He loves me!  Yep, it only took nearly 30 years but he has proven himself.  This weekend my husband bought me sewing/quilting supplies (and they are things I can actually use.) All by himself.

This summer my DH has caught the garage sale bug.  He spends several Saturday mornings a year driving around looking for "things,"  tools mostly, or occasionally yard equipment.  This Saturday I was the beneficiary of his garage sale finds.

Here is a little of what he brought me.

An Extra Jumbo cutting mat, mini quilting iron, pinking shears,

A tracing kit and THE BUTTONEER 2 (not to be confused with the original Buttoneer)

Not one but two pairs of "New" electric scissors.  Cuts everything, (says so right on the box)

S-P-A-C-E  T-A-P-E

I have no idea on this one.

And the entire contents of this cabinet.  Which includes but is not limited to pins, needles, hooks and eyes, zippers, a hot glue gun with glue sticks, a chisel, 5 measuring tapes and much, much more!  All this for $15.  Yep, he loves me.

canning

Ah...Fall.  It is finally upon us.  The days are getting cooler, even down here in the south.  Today we are only going to reach a high of 80 degrees.  Seriously, with out the humidity 80 seems cool( in the shade. )  We have been enjoying the cool nights by keeping the windows wide open.  Even the kids have commented on how wonderfully they are sleeping.

With the cooler temperatures the garden is slowly dying.  I think I pulled off our last green pepper just yesterday.  Emma and Jack have been anxiously awaiting the fall of the leaves.  Nothing says fall like a big pile of crunchy brown, gold and orange leaves.

Jack and I have been busily baking up apple pies.  We have made 2 in the last 2 weeks.  Sadly I think we will have to make another this weekend. ;)  bummer.

With the arrival of fall canning the last of the seasons veggies and fruits seem to be on a lot of people's minds.  Pinterist.com is flurry of Mason Jar ideas and crafts.  This past week I too have been canning.  Although, I have not been canning veggies or fruits.  I have been canning quilting and sewing supplies, of course!

I posted a blog last week surrounding the numerous projects I have floating around my house.  Well we can cross one off the that list!  I finished my mason jar labels and let me tell you they are cute!  Just sayin'.  There was no real pattern involved.  I kinda winged it.  I took fabric for the front (expertly embroidered), batting and another strip of fabric for the back, sandwiched them together stitched around the edge, leaving an opening for turning along the short side.  Turned the sleeve inside out and top-stitched around the outside and installed a closure. YAHOO!  Give it up for  my new mason jar holders.

1.   for Velcro... (please hold your applause until the end.) hehe.

Closed with...

you guessed it Velcro.

2.   for Elastic...

and for the closure... yep. Elastic.

  Here I made small casings and sewed the ends into both sides of the sandwich.

3. for Rickrack..

A little bit of rickrack to spruce it up.  And for the closure.. 

You guessed it Ribbon. (had you for a minute, didn't I?)

(insert loud boisterous applause.)  Thank you. Thank you. You are too kind.  

a campaign based on facial hair and lights

This fall my middle child (and middle school child) decided to run for Class President.  The fact that he was unopposed didn't dampen his enthusiasm one bit.  After days and days of agonizing over what his campaign posters and speech should be about he decided on "The Mustache.'  I know I din't understand it either, but it made for some cute posters.  Thought I would share these.

I mustache for your vote..Jack Hoog 8th grade president

And this one ...

Obey the 'stache' vote Jack Hoog

When Jack decided to run for 8th grade President his father said,"the best way to get votes was to give away free stuff and to have flashing lights."  Since they are not allowed to give things away, he had to settle for flashing lights.   It's a bit hard to tell but around the perimeter of this poster we put lights.  (if you look closely you can see small black dots ...that's where the lights were threaded through the poster.)  Emma and I ran across poster lights at Jo-ann fabric and new we had to get them for Jack's campaign.  The funny thing is... It totally worked.  The day Jack hung the sign with lights he had one person after another come up and tell him they would vote for him!  Many had no idea what he was running for, which Jack found hilarious! Everyday Jack would go into school in the morning and turn on his poster. And everyday one more person would pat him on the back and assure him he had their vote.  Jack said it was a shame he was running unopposed it would have made for an interesting experiment. (obviously he was not running with the popularity ticket)

mustache gracias

Well, since Jack was unopposed he won.  Amazing I know. 

 Now if you will excuse me I really Mustache...:)