The Beast Conquered

This quilt was started in the summer of 2015 as my youngest son's college graduation quilt. It has appeared here on the blog many times, but progress was halted on more than one occasion due to shoulder problems, then surgery, and finally a long, slow recovery.

It feels so good to have finally taken the last stitches on this king-sized quilt, and completed the label. It may have been meant to be a graduation gift years ago, but this is going under the Christmas tree this year! 

Below is the glamor shot--at least as glamorous as a t-shirt quilt can get.

The twin to this quilt can be seen HERE. I made that one 9 years ago for my oldest son's graduation.

I have another near finish that I should be able to share at the end of the month, when I also hope to have a monthly mini ready, but here is a sneak peak.

This was Thursday when I was working very hard to get the quilting finished on my HQ Sweet 16. Friday afternoon I attached the binding and got half of it sewn down by hand on the back. Hope to get the other half finished today. To finish two quilts in one month that are large enough to keep someone warm is a very rare occurrence for me. I want to bask in the feeling for a minute. :)

I had a request from someone who wanted to see my tree that only has handcrafted ornaments this year. I have wanted to do this for several years, but I always hate to leave off the ones we have collected on family vacations, or the ceramic ones I painted, or the Matreshka doll ornaments that echo my doll collection. But since we won't be hosting any family gatherings, I figured no one would care if I left those ornaments off this year. You should be able to enlarge the photos to see the ornaments more clearly.

These photos get the tree from most angles. You can enlarge them to see the ornaments. The crocheted chain, large felt ornaments, and most of the counted cross-stitch were all made around 40 years ago, early in our marriage when buying ornaments wasn't an option. Many of them haven't been on the tree in decades. There are ornaments made by my mother and mother-in-law, my daughters, granddaughter, myself, neighbors, and some of you.

You may have noticed a little guy sitting on the window ledge. That is our "Gnome in a Dome." Many of you have an elf on a shelf, and some have a Nisse or two (or more). When hubby and I recently visited a Christmas display at a local garden center we couldn't help but notice that gnomes seemed to be the predominant theme. We decided we could use a gnome for our dome. He is a cute little guy.

We will be having Mom join us for a few days next week. It will be a privilege to have her with us for Christmas this year. There will be precious memories made. She wasn't supposed to live to see last Christmas, so it is a miracle she has made it this long. Though frail and struggling with short-term memory issues, she is still spunky and her dry wit keeps us laughing.

If you are celebrating Christmas, or Chanukah, or any other special traditions in your family, I hope you will cherish those with whom you are able to gather, virtually or physically. Make memories that will be remembered fondly. Choose to set aside differences, forgive past hurts, reach out to those who may be a bit harder to love. See if you can help someone feel valued. Choose to be part of the change the world can use right now.

Until next time,

Janet O.

 

Earlier this week I was walking to my car in a parking lot and was captivated by the view of this sun dog. It is brighter than any I have seen before (does this prove that I am a weather geek?). ;)

Mother's Flower Garden and my final swap of the year

I have told the story of this quilt before--most recently here. This is the halfway mark. I am now almost finished with the first block of row #4.

Since most of the fabrics I used came from my Mom's stash (I didn't have much of a stash in the 90s), and since my Mom and I started making the flowers at the same time, and since my Mom loved her flower gardens, I have decided to call this one "Mother's Flower Garden". Also, most of these blocks have been appliqued onto their backgrounds as I have sat with Mom following the many falls she has taken this year.

No action in the sewing room, other than the fact that I finally have lights back on the tree in the Christmas Corner. This tree has been bare most of this year, and there is a long story behind the lights on that tree and my iron. Suffice it to say that I am hoping my iron will play nicely with this new strand of low energy LED lights and they can have a long and happy life together.
Most of the ornaments on this little tree are handmade by myself, my daughters and a few blog friends. Pretty soon I am going to need a larger tree.
It stays up year round in my sewing room and gives a happy glow (when I actually have lights on it) to my happy place.

For the past few years I have enjoyed planning quarterly swaps with blog friends, but as my sewing time has continually decreased, I had decided that this would be my last year of regular swaps until I have a little more free time to spend sewing. So the final swap of this year was with my good blogging buddy Denise, at Count It All Joy blog. We did a little swap of mug rugs two years ago. We both have fall birthdays, and both love the season. It was really fun, so we decided to do it again this year. Denise likes making mug rugs, and I prefer making pincushions, so we decided to swap what we were most comfortable making.

This bundle of fun arrived at my house this week. Look at that beautiful mug rug! Denise is a master at embroidery and I feel honored to have a wonderful piece of her work. Her mug rugs are so pretty I prefer to hang them on my wall--the one she sent two years ago is on my kitchen wall right now.
There is also a little bag of the fun wool acorns she has been making. She recently posted a tutorial and you can find it here.
There are some bags of one of her favorite fall herbal teas (which is yummy), some fun fall stickers, a "tea" themed bookmark, and some notecards she made, some of them using photos from my blog. I love custom notecards.
I've put the acorns in with some fall bowl fillers. They are so cute!

This is what I sent to Denise--I went a bit astray from our agreement. I made the pincushion in another color scheme I know Denise likes, rather than the fall colors. I have had this idea playing in my mind and I thought it would be a good fit for her.
Thank you, Denise, for another happy swap. 

Every spare minute of the past three days has been spent making 15 batches of herbal soap for holiday gifting.

It seems like if I haven't been sitting with Mom, I have been making soap. But it feels so good to have that checked off the list!

Speaking of Mom, she has improved. She will have to get used to being inseparable from her walker now. But after another week in the skilled nursing facility where she is getting daily physical therapy, they think we should be able to bring her back to my brother's. We had to take her off hospice to get the MRI and have the sacroplasty and therapy. We will keep her off while she continues with therapy for a few weeks, and possibly has another CT scan or x-ray to see how rapidly her tumor is growing. But she is in good spirits and looking forward to being out of an institution--even though it is a very nice one.
Thanks again to everyone who has expressed their concern and/or included her in their prayers.

This is a wordy post. I'll close with a reference to my new header photo. It was taken from my daughter's home on Halloween evening. Those are the same mountains that I see from my sewing room window, but a little different perspective from her home. It was a glorious sunset for Halloween.

Until next time,
Janet O.