I'm So Excited!!!

I'm so excited!!! I just made my reservations at the Westin for Long Beach Quilt Festival...the debut!! We can be charter members or something right??? Who's going?? Let's have a PARTY!!

So I quilted my first quilt for a friend...not really a "customer quilt" cuz I did it for free, but it still kinda freaked me out cuz I was quilting for someone ELSE!!!

I also jumped on the "Sharon Red Geranium Cottage" bandwagon of making a little 30's strip quilt cuz I have decided I want to be her when I grow up LOL!! So glad you are back posting Sharon...missed you sweetie :)

Oh and I realized when I got home from retreat after reading your comments and e-mails that maybe some of you thought I was going on a quilting retreat :) no such luck----my church has a youth retreat every year..and they invite us parents to come along :) So instead of posting pictures of that which you (unknowingly requested LOL) Iwill post a more fun picture of my shopping that was inspired by Sharon and Beth and ... I can't remember... I have also been very inspired by Deb lately to make my own Annie and I may attempt that soon...thanks for all the tips Deb :) I will share one picture cuz my precious niece's were working at the campground we were staying at...are they cute or what..actually 3 of those cuties are my own babies :) o.k you twisted my arm two pictures

Look who came to live with me!

Thursday as I was packing my car for retreat I noticed a box behind a planter by my front door. I guess the postman was making sure it didn't get wet if the rain came, but it was not where my packages are usually left so I'm glad I noticed it! Look who was inside:An Annie of my very own! Yes she is legitimately mine, not stolen or kidnapped but legally adopted from Nicole at Raggedy Old Annies. Thanks Nicole-- she's adorable! I think I now understand why some people have so many of these cuties. As soon as I had put her up I immediately wanted to go order her a few friends-- she looks lonely don't you think? In fact my neighbor went and ordered twins after she saw mine LOL!

Done with Step 6!

I finally finished step 6 of the Carolina Crossroads a couple of days ago. I've been using the step 7 rail blocks as leader enders for some other things I've been working on, so it may take me a while to complete this last step.

Janine paid me a surprise visit this morning and brought me these:

aren't they cute?!It's been fun seeing what everyone has been doing after being so inspired at Sharon's the other night: here and here. After seeing her cute heart quilt in person (from here) I made this:

Well I've got to go run errands and start packing--We are heading up to Pine Valley tomorrow for a retreat--- It's gonna be COLD!!! Be back Sunday...have a great weekend!

Who's the guilty party?

Is it: (Beth)

or: Nancy no blog
Or (Deb):

maybe even:

Go over to Sharon's and vote and rumor has it there is a drawing involved--and you just know that it's gonna be good cuz she loves her Annie's. If you guys can figure it out then her whereabouts shall be revealed...I didn't put my picture up there cuz you know I'm an innocent bystander...right?

It's 5 O'Clock Do you know where all your Annies are?

Oh and how could I forget her? Isn't she cute? She was naughty though and wouldn't sit still for the picture--Bad Annie! So one of the girls had to punish her and put her in a time out! I'm not sayin' who. She's probably ready to come out though. So Sharon if you haven't missed her yet (poor little Annie) you might want to visit Deb or Beth's blog for a clue to where she's being held.
Actually it may have been Nancy no blog...I just took the picture :) LOL

Road to California and the After Party

So yesterday I headed up to Ontario for Road to California. I went with my quilting buddy (also known as my Chauffeur and Sherpa :) just in case she's reading this) Janine. It was the first time attending for both of us and we had a blast! Although if you judge fun by the amount of purchases you make I had way more fun lol! Janine is pretty good at behaving herself...well when it comes to fabric purchases that is :) I'm afraid most of my pictures of the quilts came out blurry, but here's a few.

We thought we were doing pretty well time wise, it was 4:30 and we had just about finished the room...oh what's that over there? WHAT the ??? Another room!!! Yup we had missed the second room completely!!! You should have seen us racing through that room, I am sure we did not do it justice. I may have to see if I can drag someone up there with me again tomorrow. Here's my loot...from the way my shoulder feels from carting this around it seems like there should be more. Although Janine did help with it for a while, she wouldn't carry it the whole time --she has this weird notion that if I buy it I should carry it too...what's up with that? LOL

After the show we headed over to Sharon's and can you say CUTE??? She's cute ---her house is cute, cute , cute and her quilts well there just aren't any words. I'm afraid she may not be able to blog for awhile cuz she's gonna be busy with her mop cleaning up all the drool we left behind lol.
I swear I would have saved my camera battery for her house instead of the quilt show if I had any idea!! It was so fun meeting Sharon and Carol and Deb and Beth and Nancy NO BLOG (get a blog girl) they were all great.
From the back left is Sharon, Beth, Deb, Janine, Carol, and me and Nancy in the front.
Nancy no blog gave an impromptu quilting class.

Sharon had all these cute (there's that word again) valentine's dishes and as we were leaving she gave us each our plate and glass and this cute little bag full of girlie stuff. Thank you Sharon for a wonderful evening :)

A little bit of fabric heaven

was delivered to my door just now. Don't you just love the UPS man? Him and Mr. Fed Ex are two of my favorite guys in the world :)

What's inside?

I absolutely love all of it!

But this...ahhhh yes...a bundle of near perfection :)And to top it off my favorite hand lotion.

Tomorrow it's off to Road to California. I'm so excited! I know it's going to be a fun day and night, but more about that when I'm back :)

Cute Quilting Student

My friend Janine says I'm the world's best dog sitter, and no wonder-- how many dog sitters do you know who teach your dog to quilt over the weekend? None, right? Well now you do and here's the proof LOL!

I love this little dog, luckily for me Janine likes to travel so we get to have this little sweetie over a lot.

It's gets a little confusing sometimes since I have a Sophie too. Big Sophie and little Sophie. It's so funny to see them together a little toy cockapoo who weighs about 10 pounds bossing around my 120 pound Newfie LOL.

Freshly Cut Freshcut

Last spring I fell in love with Heather Bailey's line of fabric by Free Spirit-- Freshcut-- and I have been picking up pieces here and there ever since. Even though I love it so much, or maybe because I love it so much, I have had a hard time deciding what to do with it. I mean I knew I was going to make a quilt with it, but which one? I finally decided on this one here that Amanda made (isn't it pretty?) and went to my LQS to pick up the 3 yards of white I would need. Right before I started to cut (actually I had cut 2 white strips) I thought maybe I would try to find just a few more pieces online. So I off I went to my favorite fabric search engine and YES I found a new source online that carried some pieces I hadn't been able to find locally. Before I hit the order button I decided that maybe I should inventory what I had...good idea. I had almost 20 yards--what the ? How did that happen? Well when I saw how much I had managed to uh...collect, I decided to find a different pattern, one that would make a slightly bigger dent in the pile :) Now at the same time that I am agonizing over what to make with my freshcut, I am also trying to decide what fabric to use for a pattern-Tag Sale from this book
-that I have been wanting to use since I saw it made up at The Country Loft. They had used Shangri-la and Roman Holiday by Moda, and it was beautiful. Problem was I had already made a quilt using Roman Holiday and didn't want to use it again. I had started buying a few different lines to use in it but just recently decided to use a different pattern for them (from this book that I got for Christmas).Tuesday afternoon, exhausted from all the obsessing, I went to my room for a little nap--right as I was about to drift off I had an epiphany :) I could use my freshcut for Tag Sale. Brilliant huh?
Use the fabric you love with the pattern you love, what a concept lol. Some of us just take a little longer to process I guess :) Here it is so far

and now to make about 70 more blocks :) One more picture before I go--aren't these guys adorable?

I saw them on this blog and had to have them. They need to go on a shelf above my door. A shelf that hasn't been put up yet. A shelf that shouldn't go up until after I paint. So needless to say, they may be homeless for a while, very sad :(
O.k. I'm off to go make dinner.

Lunch with the San Diego mystery quilters!

So a group of us from San Diego who met online through Bonnie Hunter's mystery quilt met up today for some shopping at Rosie's and then on to Marietta's for some Mexican food and margarita's, well some of us had margarita's, I'm not saying who :) It was fun to see all the projects in person...they all looked great! Terry was so sweet she brought a bag full of fat quarters and we all got to choose two! I think it's safe to say a fun time was had by all!
Here we are from front left to right is Karen, Janine, me(Tammy), Kathy, Terry and Carmen.

My kiddo's are all up in Big Bear for a weekend of snowboarding. Well that's what they thought they were there for. The "big storm" that was supposed to dump down snow ended up dumping down rain instead and they closed the slopes today for lack of snow and high winds. Then it started snowing and they were all excited, but it stopped at less than an inch! Very sad :(
Hopefully it will snow tonight.

O.k I'm off to work on Step 5!