Giving up Diet Coke

Hey Readers,

During the Thanksgiving holidays I decided it was the perfect time to give up diet cokes.  I did pretty well over the holiday, but upon returning to work, it has been tough.  I am getting so little done during my planning period, and even if I get going in the afternoon, I feel as tho I am slugging through mud.  I am not trying to avoid caffeine, but am concerned with the artificial ingredients in our foods.  I have been moving toward eating more and more organic foods and fewer processed foods.  I have never been a big processed food eater, but as a single person more of those type products have crept into my diet.  It is just so easy for small amounts.

When Will, my son, came for my birthday, he brought a 6 pack of unsweet tea for my lunch box.  That has helped a bunch but I am still struggling.  I think I am past the worst of it…I even took the 16 or so diet cokes I had here over to the school to put in the faculty refrigerator, for whom ever wants them.

No change in weight or really how I feel, but I know it will be better for me.

It is a bad time of year to be short of energy.  But will continue to fight the good fight.

Thread Guide

Dear Readers,

Saturday we had our annual Possum Town Quilters Christmas Party.  It is always a really nice party with fellowship with my quilting sisters.  We do a pot luck, and play a couple of games and show any completed projects from that month.  

We exchange one small hand made object and one dirty santa gift.  I had covered another board, like I did for my ironing table for my dirty santa gift and made a thread guide for my handmade gift exchange.  

To make the thread guide, used to hold large thread cones or any other thread option that won't fit on the machine I looked on line and found some samples.  I came close to following this blogger's suggestion for making it.  I made a few adjustments.  I cut the board 4 x 4, just as she did.  I also used a skewer like she did for the spool holder.   I then spray painted it black.  It took about 3 coats.  The wood was a little rough on the bottom so I glued a piece of upholstery fabric to the bottom.   I drilled a second hole in the base for the coat hanger wire I was using to guide the thread.  I glued it in place and then twisted it just a little different front the blogger.  I put a loop right above the spool to make the thread come straight off the top and then a loop a couple of inches over that would be over the machine.  

Other than the time for the paint to dry between coats, it probably only takes about 20 minutes of work.

On my way home from Columbus, it was nearing sunset.  The sky reminded me of the of the skys in the mountains during Thanksgiving.  The picture doesn't do God's handiwork justice...but it made me think of the mountains, which made me think of my girl and her friends.  Good times.

Winona Quilt Show

Dear Readers,

This is about 3 weeks late, but I wanted to show you some photos of the Winona Quilt Show that was on November 9, 2013.  Lydia Chassinol, the state senator from Winona, wanted me to head up a quilt show in Winona as part of the heritage highway project.  She has been promoting Highway 82 as a heritage highway.  Cotesworth will be promoted as part of the heritage highway.

I gathered up a number of quilts from my friends in Columbus.  Special thanks to CC Coggins and Judy Stokes that were so generous with their quilts.  Lou Caffey of Winona also participated as several other Winona quilters and a few that showed antique family quilts.

The show was pulled together in about 2 weeks.  So there was not much time to promote it or get the word out.

I woke up in the middle of the night before the show, and thought, we don't even have a sign to put out front to let the public know we are having a show.

So I took the lower shelf off my planter table and covered it in white fabric and orphan quilt blocks and put it outside the church. Not great, but with short time frame, it will have to do.

 The quilt show was held at the Immanuel Episcopal Church on Summit Street in Winona.  It is a beautiful church that was built around 1901 and the windows came out of an older church.

 The plan was to hang the majority of the quilts on the pews and put a few on racks.

 The stained glassed windows in the church are really pretty.  They remind me of the stained glass in First Baptist Columbus.  The light coming through the glass was really pretty on the quilts.

 This is one of Judy Stokes quilts.  It was a leader- ender project to make spools.  She put her scrappy spools together in groups of 16 and sashed it.  Fabulous.

 These are some of Lou Caffey's quilts. The one in the background won second in the Pinebelt quilters Show.  Amazing work!!

Hope it helps Lydia get her dream of having highway 82 a heritage highway.

Live the day well.

New ironing table

Over the last couple of weekends I built an ironing table.

It all started at a PTQ guild meeting where they passed out directions for building an oversized ironing board cover.  I took the instructions down to the local hardware store, Homefront, here in Winona.  I asked them to cut the plywood into the sizes needed on the sheet 22 x 60 inches.  I have the tools to cut it myself, but I have trouble handling a full sheet of plywood on my own.

The plywood seemed rather rough, so I covered the back with contact paper and then covered the top with a layer of 100% cotton batting covered with silver ironing board fabric.  I staple gunned these down.

I did not put the pieces around the edge that would keep it from sliding off yet.  I wanted to see if I liked it before I put any more work into it.

I loved ironing out big pieces of fabric, but I thought that the space under the board was a complete waste, you could not even put storage containers under it as the ironing board legs were in the way.

So off to Lowes I go, I did not go to Homefront as I knew they did not have the wheels and the 2 x 2's that I wanted to use as legs and the ones I had them rip down from 2 x 4 were slightly different sizes and I just didn't want to try to accommodate that.   I bought 2 x 2's for the legs that I had decided to cut 33 inches long and wheels some with locks so if I want to rearrange I don't have to ask for help, 7/8 in by 48 in dowel rods to go between the legs on the ends to support the shelves and 1 x 4's to go around the top and and bottom to help keep every thing square and support the ironing table all the way around.  I bought the formica covered shelves for the storage.

While I was at the hardware store I ended up modifying my plan as the shelves did not come in 5 or 6 foot lengths.  I decided to make two carts, one 36 in long and one 22 inches long, so I cut 14 inches off of the small side shelves.  I also that that would give better support on the shelving so we would have less warping.  I also wanted more support for the table since you would put pressure in it when you are ironing.  So I added 2 x 2's between the  1 x 4's to support the table top.

lower end

I took the iron rack off of my ironing board and drilled holes in the side support boards to put it on  the end

upper end

The ironing board is not attached to the base.  I did screw two 2 x 2 boards to the base that fit in between the supports to keep it from shifting.  I wanted it removable to that when the ironing fabric needed to be replaced it could without having to remove screws.


I had some plywood left over so I went back to Lowes and bought two more 2 x 2 's, two more dowel rods,  more wheels and one more 1 x 4.  I put them together to be a potting bench for my workshop.

So no progress on the wall paper paste removal…sigh.  But happy about my new ironing table.

Covenant

Bogie inspecting before I sent to quilter.

Last summer I finished a quilt!!  I know it has been a while since I have seen a project through but in the moving process, I found a UFO that I had forgotten about.  It was a class I had taken with my friend Doris back when they were having the annual quilt show in Panama City around the second weekend in Florida.  We would sign up for classes and I would take a Friday off and drive down there and we would meet and take classes together.  Well I took this class and made 18 blocks and then got home and did not know which to eliminate from the quilt so I put it away and went to catching up from taking a day off of work.  I forgot about it and now have found it and finished it.  It is about 60 inches square.  I called it Covenant.  I had posted a picture of it on FB and had lots of suggestions about rainbows and bridges and it made me think of how God made a covenant not to destroy the earth with water and how His love can bring us together.  The quilter, a lady at the Bernenia store in Jackson, suggested a variegated thread.  I have not really cared for the effect of those in other projects but, it worked well in this.  I knew I wanted something with curves as the design was so angular.  I was really happy with the result.

Close up of quilting.

I chose a tape measure fabric with lots of the colors from the front, but I didn't have enough.  So I put red paw print fabric on the sides.

Back

Close up of back with footprints and tape measures.

I got it all done it time, but then didn't get my entry in on time for the Pinebelt quilter's biannual quilt show.  I will have to look for another one to enter it in.

Live the day well!

Post cards

Hey all,

I haven't posted in a year or so.  Spring of 2013 I decided to turn my somewhat orderly life upside down and move about 80 miles West.  I was feeling somewhat burned out at work and needed a change.  I applied for  a new job in a small town that my mother grew up in and the location of my grandmother's farm.  I got the job and started living a two city life.  I bought a house in my "new" hometown.  It is a really nice house, with a great floor plan and yard, but the former owners loved wall paper and it looked like I was going back in time to 1978.  Even with hiring a fair amount of help, it is very slow going.  I have one bedroom done the kitchen is almost done...but enough about that.  I still haven't sold my home in the other city, but praying it will sell soon.

In the quilt world, I have not done too much, but I will be putting up a few posts with my very limited progress.  I may write some posts about my renovation projects too...but we will see.

I did not get to go see my daughter this summer, and I was really missing her, so I made her some quilted postcards.  She is an art director and drew her logo out a few years ago, so I decided that would be a good subject.

This is the first one I did.  I had made a bunch of quilted cards for my IB students a few years ago and apparently have forgotten all the techniques!!  What is up with that?  Once I have quilted up the design I use a glue stick and it to a piece of heavy weight watercolor paper and then put the binding on.

I did not fuse the binding on and it looked ravelly.  (I know that is not a real word) But that is not the point.  It doesn't show in the photo, but  it just didn't look as good as I wanted.  I sent it anyway and then remembered how I used to do them.

So I did another one, taking the logo and changing the colors up and sending the logo to the football game in honor of the success of my daughter's alma mater.  If you follow college football, here in Mississippi the local universities are having the best season ever!!!

Anyway on this one I quilted the background, fused the binding on before sewing it down and I think it came out better.

Well, back to the boring sewing of making drapes for the bedroom.

As my friend Su says, "Live the day well."