Free Log Cabin Quilt Book- at end of post

At the January Anchorage Log Cabin Quilters meeting, I demonstrated my simple method of crazy quilting & piecing in one. The turn out was good in spite of a bad weather & road conditions day. I told them they must all be crazy!

On the weekend a couple of weeks ago we drove out to Chugiak, to Pamela's Cottage, to pick up the new lamps that I ordered from her. Our friend Ellis came along for the ride.

Here are the lamps, & Pam herself.

These are some of my favorites.

Last weekend I finished a simple crazy quilt & the bow tie for this bear who will be given away at the Teddy Bear Tea on Feb. 16th.

I also want to leave you all with a link to a free Log Cabin Quilt Book from Fons & Porter. It's a beautiful book & great for inspiration .

Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker

Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker by Jennifer Chiaverini just came out today. I was lucky enough to get an advanced copy. 

This is a beautiful book. Jennifer has researched & brought to life the story of the freed slave, Elizabeth Keckley, who was hired to make dresses for Mary Todd Lincoln during her husband's presidency. She was also a friend (Mary's only friend much of the time). 

This is not the Elm Creek Novels that we are used to from Jennifer Chiaverini. It's a story rich in history, & well worth the read. I think even my husband will enjoy this book.

Life is Full

December was a full month for us. The raven is the ornament I made this year for our annual ornament exchange. The moon is glow-in-the-dark fabric & the raven I did entirely with thread.

I taught Warren how to needle felt, & he did this bar of soap as is ornament.

Above are stockings I made for Michelle & the 2 Seans.

Above is the finished Airport quilt, hung in the conference room at the airport. Mary lee is the maker, (I quilted it for her). After they hung it, Mary's son Mike took Mary & me on a private tour of the airport. It was fun rinding the runway right next to a big plane taking off., & seeing things I never knew were there!

We had a great time at Calendar Girls at Betty's house too.

Right before Christmas Warren & I went to Edmonton, Alberta, Canada to spend the holiday with Brandon & Laura & the girls. Our first full day there, Laura & I took the girls to the Edmonton Mall to see Santa. We waited in line for about 4 hours for the girls to set on Santa's lap & have a picture.  They made some friends while waiting.

& Zoe took a nap too.

After Santa, we went to the Spagetti Factory for dinner. The girls did a little Melodrama for us using this metal gate as a prop. They were saying "Help me..."

We spent time just hanging out at the house.

Zoe tried to put some moves on little Simon the neighbor kid.

Laura made an 8 course dinner on Christmas eve, & had friends over.

Christmas morning was chaos & great fun.

Finger painting happened later in the day.

& bath time folloed.

We also had a day at the Science Center.

We finally had to say goodbye to the family & Edmonton. It was so good spending time with them.

This past week I worked & cleaned house. Put away Xmas. Yesterday we went to see "Les Miserables". I never have read the book & didn't know what the story was. I had expected to like it better, but can't say that it was any fault of the movie thta I didn't fully enjoy it. We had the misfortune of having a very drunk girl set down next to us, & she kept shouting out & making noises & rude comments. The 3 people directly in front of her got up & moved. When we & a few others asked her to be quiet she told us we should move too. I finally got fed up & went out & complained. The manager came in & very quietly asked her to leave. She didn't, but she did pass out so it was better for the rest of us. then suddenly the movie froze, the lights came up, & the manager apologized for the interruptions. 3 big policemen came in, woke the girl up & took her away.She was stumbling drunk, & all got a view of her backside, because her pants were falling off when she got up. The manager gave us each a free pass for another movie anytime we want to use it. I managed to get enough into the movie, that I shed a few tears at the end.

Today I hung the next quilt top to be quilted.Shot a few pictures & will do some drawing on them before I attempt to quilt it. It's a beautiful hand applique' done by my friend Jan Wills.

I also made this flower/pin to send to the RVQuilter who won my blog drawing a couple of months ago!

The Round Robin Finale

My camera & my computer stopped talking to each other. I finally took them into Best Buy & the Geek Squad fixed the problem. 

The last of the Round Robin quilts that I had to work on was Carol's. She had started with the purchased raven block screen print by local artist Cindy Shake. Sorry I don't have a picture of what it was like before I got it, but what I added was the upper & left side borders. I also added the little streaks of green & the centers in the leaves.

Here is Carol with her block.

Jackie..

Jan..

Mary Lee..

Betty B...

Rena..

Mary G. She got lucky...her's is finished quilted & bound!

Me with mine & my new hairdo from Sean in Seattle.

I took my piece home & tweaked it a bit. I moved the last applique' to a spot that pleased my eyes better, & I spritzed the top with a bit of green ink. I may do more...I can't leave anything alone.

We had the gang over for dinner a couple weeks ago.

& here is the latest quilt fresh off of Lily. Too big to take a decent photo. It's about 6 feet tall & 13 1/2 feet long. My pal Mary Lee made it for our airport.

She drew several designs about flight that I quilted on top.

I've decorated for Christmas & getting packages ready to ship.

Super Fast & simple Quilt Project for Longarm

For the latest addition to the family, I needed to make a fast, simple & fun quilt.

I layered the back, batting & solid piece of fabric on top, 

Then I cut skinny strips with a wavy rotary cutter & quilted them down as I went.

The result was fun & it has limitless possibilities. All kinds of designs could be made this way. Think of how many comfort quilts could be done!