Rearranging Furniture

I know there must be many, many of you who like me, move things around every so often.  My good friend, who has an eye for simple, uncluttered design is helping me to make my living room look better. Here is a before picture...

And now, after....

The red chair has been replaced by my grandmother's trunk and stacked quilts.  The recliner is moved and the rug has been turned.  I also scored a great frame at the Goodwill store for $6.99 and JoAnns cut  and mounted the wedding print on a mat for only $3.00. Think it needs to be hung a little higher.  I removed the sconces and lowered the mirror a bit.  The room seems much more cozy now.  I still think I'll replace the rug with something more neutral and make some new pillows and quilt in some teal/greens/blues. The antique print in the first picture is my inspiration for colors, even though I've now moved it to our bedroom.  I hung my new Smokey Mountain print in its place

Not big differences, but to me, it seems better.

My favorite change is the addition of the trunk and quilts.

Grey Baby Quilt

I think this turned out really cute. And after I washed it, it was so very soft. I was surprised for all the quilting.

I did some freehand quilting. Of course the picture would show the worse place in all my border ferns....oops.

I did a machine binding. I thought using a grey thread on the solid color would blend right in. Not exactly. I think I've learned that for a machine binding to disappear you need a thread that matches and a busy print.

I pieced the backing with a little strip of green.

Anyhoo......I like it!

 

Charging Station

I saw this idea on one of my favorite blogs, Organizing Made Fun. I thought it was a great way to hide the cords while charging electronics.  So, this idea, got on my list of projects to do this week.

I bought a circular bit to fit the hub's drill and drilled this hole in the bottom of the back of my night stand.  Then the cord is fed through it up to the top drawer.

Then you just have to corral the cords to keep them orderly. Connect to the power cord, close the drawer and your electronics are charging but kept out of view.  A great idea!

Hard work

I've spent the day doing some hard work, but I love it. The hubby left this morning for his annual northern fishing trip and I have a few days off to do my favorite things.......clean, organize, sew, projects. Today, while my kitchen backsplash was being finished (pictures to follow) I washed four bed quilts, two sets of sheets, a mattress cover, all my throw rugs (7), freshened up two mattresses using baking soda and a few drops of lavender, and cleaned up the big dusty mess from the tile job.....

Love this white subway tile!

He has to come back and caulk the bottom and top edges. It wasn't bad before, but the white brightened it up and just has that old-timey look that I like.

Before

After

Before

And now after...

In the after pictures I didn't turn the under cabinet lights on because it made such a glare. but without those lights on the old tile, it was very,very dark. Our handyman also replaced three light fixtures today. Yay! Now we can see in the garage and the laundry room. The old fluorescent fixtures went kaput.

There will also be some sewing and quilting this week. I put this little one on the machine and am doing some custom quilting on it.

 

Option #2

 

I kind of like this one better.

I started a "barter" quilt today. Love those! The guy who is replacing my kitchen tile backsplash bartered with me to make him a quilt, for his mom, out of his granddad's shirts. Isn't that sweet? I think both of us are getting a good deal!

The pattern is Bricks and Stepping Stones, one of my favorites for a remembrance quilt. Free on Quiltville website.

 

Words or no words??

Need advice here.....should I do the words across the center or just try to do some fancy quilting on the solid gray???

 

 

Bright Boy Quilt

I finally started working on this one. It is called "Oh Baby" from Heather Mulder Peterson's latest baby quilt book, Little Quilts 4 Little Kids. The charm pack was an old one I had in my stash. I love the gray back ground. The center piece (green) is designed to use with the child's name appliquéd to it, but since I don't have a specific recipient in mind, I may try to find some other words for it. Any suggestions?

I've still got a bit more sewing to do to finish up the top.

 

Quilt Class

It has been a long time since I quilted using my little machine, but I wanted to do it because that is how I am teaching the quilting part of the class. I did straight lines in the ditch and about 1/4" on either side of the seams. I like the look. About 90% of the binding is sewn on. I didn't do it all so there would still be a little left to show them. I also started the hand stitching of the binding so they can see how that is done. I think I've done enough so I am ready for the next class. Yay!

 

Purse Organizer

One of the ladies at the quilt class last night showed us a purse organizer she had made. I loved it. I went to the recommended website (google Jen Wesner purse organizer to find it) and it didn't take long at all to make this...

I made two.

She recommended some heavy fabric for the outside. I had the red ticking and it did fine but just wasn't very pretty. So I made another with regular fabric, cut it down a few inches, and put interfacing on both pieces of fabric.

Your wallet and planner, if you are like me and carry one, fit in the middle. You other things such as phone, keys, lipstick, ink pens, check book, chewing gum, hand sanitizer, etc., fit in the little pockets. It secures to itself with Velcro and forms a little circle.

So when you want to carry one of those "black hole" type purses, you just put your things in this little organizer and you'll be able to find everything in the purse and you can move the contents from purse to purse when you want to carry a different one.

What do you think? Let me know if you make one!

 

What to do with overripe bananas?

The hubby likes a banana in his cereal so like a good wife, I buy them for him. However he doesn't always eat them before they start to go bad. I hate to waste, so when it looks like they are getting too ripe I freeze them. Sometimes I make banana bread with them. Today I made a banana milkshake. Oh my! Delicious!

I used Mayfields homemade vanilla ice cream, a little vanilla, a little sugar, and some defrosted frozen banana pieces. Blended it together. Delicious!