more sewing lessons and fun mail

The junior high girls came to work on their quilts again today. We have so much fun when they are here....

 Two of the girls finished up their Line Dance quilt tops. The third one is almost finished too. We even got one quilt all pin basted and ready for me to quilt this week. The girls are anxious to be finished.

And I received some fun mail this week! More birthday mail from my sewing buddy, Annie. 2 pattern cards and some fat quarters. I didn't get a picture yet, but I already made one of the little wallets from the fat quarters and it's fabulous! More on that another day.

And lucky lucky me, I won a giveaway over at Prsd4tim2. Wendi had offered up the sweet Cherry on Top charm pack but when the package arrived all of these goodies were inside! Thanks Wendi! I will have fun with all of it!

Wow, what a great birthday week. I imagine the packages are done arriving now, darn!

crafty tuesday... the February version

There's nothing like throwing yourself a birthday party! I highly recommend it. And what could be more fun than crafting with friends all day? Not a thing. Melissa even brought balloons...

 There were so many of us we had to pull the kitchen table into the dining room. Cheryl spread her scrapbook stuff out and hogged the whole table for herself! I think she actually got some scrapping done this time....

 See poor Cheryl off in the distance in the next photo? Honestly she wasn't that far away! Kind of like the rear view mirror, items are closer than they appear! Trae was sorting embroidery floss and making it all neat and tidy. Melissa was scrapping too....

 Raquel came and joined us for the first time. No, she didn't sit and read magazines all day! She crocheted TWO of those cute ruffly scarves and learned some embroidery stitches! Joellen was english paper piecing and appliquéing.....

 I was working on english paper piecing too! Clamshells.... something new to me. I finished up the topper for my mini quilt....

While the girls were here, I opened up my package from Maria which had arrived from Australia last week (can you believe I waited???) Check out this amazing pillow cover (she would call it a cushion cover!). I am totally in love....

 This will be on the sofa in my sewing room so I can enjoy it every day. Wow! Thanks Maria! Look at the detail...

 She included these sweet goodies in the package too (as if that pillow cover wasn't enough!) A cute pattern and a lovely embroidered linen (I think I will use it as a dresser scarf. It matches my bedroom!)

 Some more goodies I received from friends (both friends here and friends far away.....

I am a lucky lucky girl. Such good friends.... I wouldn't trade them for anything!

gluten free baking...

 because seriously, if I don't bake myself a birthday cake, who will? This was my favorite cake growing up and even as an adult, it is what I would request for my birthday. A well loved recipe, can you tell? It even has high altitude adjustments written on it from when I lived in Colorado.

 Lemon Jello cake! Of course, since going gluten free more than 4 years ago I can no longer have a regular, box mix cake. I have been saying for a long time that I was going to try to make it gluten free and today I finally tried it! I have not been able to find a gluten free lemon cake mix so I bought this Pamela's vanilla cake instead. It makes a 9x13 cake, unlike most of the gluten free mixes which only make a small square cake.  I added some lemon juice to the mix instead of the vanilla they called for. Otherwise I made it exactly the way Mom's recipe said.

 And look at this! It looks fabulous..... and it smells so good. I'm having a really hard time not eating it right out of the pan for lunch.

I think we will taste test it after dinner tonight, before I spring it on my friends at crafty Tuesday tomorrow. You know, like the king's testers? Just to be sure noone dies....

And to make this day even sweeter, they had daffodils at the grocery store this morning! Maybe the groundhog was right after all. It does feel like spring here in Texas.

I'm so happy I get to share my birthday tomorrow with friends, sewing and crafting, just the way I like it! I'll let you know how the cake tastes.

ellyn's place stitchalong, February

Happy February! Have you stitched up your January mittens yet? I know some of you have, because I've seen them in our Flickr group. I'd love to see what everyone else has done. Please add your pictures to the group anytime!

It's time for February stitching. Our theme this month? You guessed it. Hearts! I played around with lots of Valentine's ideas, but in the end I thought to myself "what is the one thing we all love?" Stitching! So here it is.....

You can download the pattern here. Stitch your block in the middle of one of your 8 inch squares of fabric just like you did in January. Again, I used 2 strands of embroidery floss and mostly backstitch. I added a little bit of satin stitch for the thread on the spool, and some lazy daisy stitches for the flower petals. I'll bet some of you will have this done before today is over!

When you finish your block, press it well and trim it down to 4 1/2 inches square, just like you did with your mittens. Two blocks done! You guys are so good at this. Now upload a picture to the flickr group so we can all see! Nice job.

winner!

Thank you to everyone who entered my 500th post giveaway and welcome to new followers! You all and your sweet comments make blogging so much more fun. And now for the winner.....

True Random Number GeneratorMin: Max: Result:28

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Sarah_L_N said:  Congratulations on your 500th post!

I think I would use it to make a patchwork bag. I had a lovely little book for my birthday with lots of patchwork projects, it would be nice for these :)

Congratulations to you Sarah! I hope we all get to see what you make with your goodies. 

January finishes

I know, I know, there are still a couple of days left in January! But these are my major finishes for the month and I wanted to share them with you. You've already seen my scrappy trip along quilt, which I never planned on making at all! I'm so glad I did....

 I made a sweet mini quilt with some embroidered blocks which I can't really show you because it's a surprise for a friend. But here's a little sneak peak.....

And just today I finished up my line dance quilt. I used a charm pack of Mod Century, such an awesome, cheerful fabric line, and some of the "read solid" coordinates from the same line. Unfortunately it's a really rainy, stormy day so I can't take decent outdoor pictures for you but here it is...

 And my scrappy back (which I honestly love as much as the front!)...

I'm so proud of myself for quilting all of these on my own. I'm getting better at the straight line quilting. I think I'm off to a pretty good start for 2013!

Have you entered my giveaway yet? There are still a few more hours left.... you can find it in the next post down (for some strange reason blogger won't let me create a link today! Silly blogger.) Winner will be announced tomorrow morning... see you then!

500th post! let's celebrate!

 This has been a crazy week! I will have some fun stitchy posts to share with you next week (including our February stitchalong block. I can't believe it's almost February already). This week I have been busy getting ready for the retreat that our church ladies are having tomorrow. This is what my dining room table looks like right now....

No room for eating really. But tomorrow it will all be gone. Craft supplies for a mission project, journals for each of the ladies, devotion books..... whew! It's been fun getting it all ready but I'll be happy to have my table back!

Meanwhile, I am celebrating my 500th blog post today! Wow! If somebody had told me, almost 5 years ago now, that I'd still be doing this now I would have been shocked! But I love the blogging community and all of you are a part of that. So I decided we'd celebrate with a little giveaway! Are you in?

Up for grabs is a happy marmalade pin cushion filled with crushed walnut shells, a little moda candy pack of marmalade to make whatever you like and 2 pair of handmade buttons from ellyn's place. I imagine some other little treats will find their way into the box as well!

Here's how you win. Leave me a comment on this blogpost telling me what you might make with your candy pack if you win. Leave a second comment if you are a follower of my blog (or if you become one today!). Make sure I have a way to get in touch with you. I'd be so sad if a "no-reply blogger won) That's it. I'll leave the comments open until Tuesday night (January 29th) and announce a winner first thing Wednesday morning.

Have a wonderful weekend! And thank you all for coming along on this little journey with me.