Postcard sewing

 I have been sort of out of action on my blog lately , just life . I went to visit with my Mom for Mothers Day and found that visit very tough , it was so strange to enter the house and not see my Dad sitting in his favorite chair ,I miss him terribly . Anyway I did a little fun sewing yesterday to brighten my spirits , postcards are such fun to create . Want to see what I made ?

A little touch of spring with some flowers and a cute little butterfly . Still on the spring theme is this next card .

Colorful little flowers with a butterfly and a ladybug in the grass . Then there is the final one which resulted as I had a few more flowers left so what is a gal to do but use them up  right:-)

They were fun to do and the bright colors were great to work with  . 

I am working on my messenger bag today , with any luck I might get it finished soon . Off I go now to the machine since I haven't figured out a way to get it to sew on its own just yet . Enjoy your day and hope you come back soon .

 hugs Sheila 

A challenge completed :-)

Yeah , it is done and I love it , this was really a lot of fun and I will be doing this again .

Isn't it a fun bag , I even lined it to give it more body .Here is a photo of the interior .

Last evening we took a drive to the beach so I will share a couple of photos that I took , this is such a spectacular beach  but before I get to the beach just look at these cute little flowers that were blooming beside one of the cottages .

I had to check to see if they were real , they were so pretty in their pink little clumps , primroses I believe  and then there were these lovely daffodils.

I love that they are growing among the rocks that are covered with moss , and look what else was lurking in this garden .

A little garden gnome , how cute is that .

Such beautiful sand , and not a soul in sight but that will all change as the warmer weather arrives , well actually it was really quite warm the past few days . 

Love the beach grasses in the dunes .

 Thanks for stopping by and hope you have a sun shiny day . 

hugs Sheila

What I have been up to ....

It is Wednesday already , where is this week going ,I wouldn't mind but I have so many things I need to get done that are not getting done , oh well what can I say :-)
 Did I sew all weekend , no , I did not stitch one stitch of any kind , I was busy with paint brush in hand , yes it all started with a shelf I wanted to paint and the next thing I know I am painting a hutch as well as a potato bin . What color you might be asking , well I will show you when I am all finished. The painting is finally done but the doors need to be put back on and the contents need to be put back in place minus a few things I decided to purge. Let me tell you a hutch can hold a lot of STUFF ! I am really pleased with the new look though so hope to share it soon .
 I did mail off two postcards yesterday , one I can't show you the other I will as I am pretty sure this person is not aware I even have a blog ,

I guess I should have edited this photo , I took the picture at night so it is rather dark , the theme for this exchange was "you've got mail" , I think this little bird was the perfect way to send this message. Postcards are such fun to make .
Now today I did a little sewing , you see our guild is having yet another challenge, of course it is entirely up to me if I want to participate ,no one is twisting my arm but I love a challenge,I mean I really do so what is a gal to do  but participate right. The challenge was to go and buy a gift bag that we like , one that inspires us to recreate it in some form . It does not have to be exact just our interpretation of the bag so I went off to find a bag , no easy task to tell you the truth but with some persistence I came across this bag .

 I loved the bold colors and the freshness of the design , simple enough I thought so now to find the fabrics , luck would have it I did have fabrics in small amounts that were perfect for the design so do you want to see what I have done so far ?

Oh this has been such fun ,I am doing raw edge applique for two reasons , speed and also some of the parts are just to small to deal with any other way and since my plan is to make this into a tote I felt it would suffice to hold things in place . If you look closely you will see my little line drawings where I will stitch in the stems ,  I will give you an update later as I get more done .

 I suppose you are wondering if I ever finished the teapot challenge , why yes I did finish it but did not take a photo of it yet so will share that later as well . I must apologize I know I have been a little slack at visiting blogs of late but seriously I have been too busy with the painting to do much else other than sleep which I needed lots of after that ordeal , so I will try to get around to visit real soon . Thanks for stopping by today and be sure to do some fun stitching today it is so good for the soul  :-)  Oh I am linking up to the Needle and Threadnetwork for WIP Wednesday so be sure to hop on over and see what others have been busy with this week.

 hugs Sheila

Looks like I made it :-)

 First off I want to share my mystery quilt update , yeah I completed April round just before Darlene shared the May round . I did make some slight changes , partly due to time and partly because I do love piano keys so I left out the HST'S and I am pleased with how this looks.

This will  likely be  the last time I will be sharing this from the design wall it is pretty much filling it now .
 Next on the agenda is my May goals for UFo's with Carrie ,just making it under the wire to post so here goes . Unfortunately there are some repeats like this quilt.

However if you look closely these houses are different , I am more than half way through the quilt now and my motivation to complete this is really good . Wish me luck as I am really hoping to have this finished in time for our quilt show on June 8th ,yikes that is pressure isn't it ;-)
Another UFO that has been around for quite some time that really should be completed is a messenger bag that I did a demo on at our guild many years ago , I finished one but this one was in pieces to explain the process and I just never got around to sewing it up so this is the month .

Never even took the time to iron this , sad isn't it . Too bad this isn't spring colors I would have a nice new bag to use but hey I will be ready for fall early :-)
 Finally for this month I really want to finish the hand quilting on the little quilt I shared last month , with all that took place in April my goals were sadly not met .

There is not a lot left to do so a few evenings should take care of this if I push myself.  So there you have it my goals for May , hopefully I can make progress and actually finish a few things.

Now to change the subject my hubby and I were at the beach the other evening and I just had to stop and take this photo as the sun was going down , wouldn't this make a great landscape quilt.

I love the look of the fence , the sky was actually prettier than this photo shows , but it is still pretty . Thanks for taking the time to stop by today and hope your day is a great one.
 hugs Sheila

What's happening in my world

I am trying to resume my regular sewing schedule, not always working but at least I am trying . So I do have a finish to show you ,I had given you sneak peaks a way back when and now you will get the reveal.

This little project is for our quilt guild watering can challenge , ok I will admit when this challenge was first announced I didn't think I would find any inspiration for a project but Pinterest to the rescue , love Pinterest ! This was a free stitchery pattern which I found here  and because I love color I did color my watering can with my trusty crayons , what would I do without them ;-) I also embellished on the flowers a bit  to make them stand out better and I love this little mini  and will be a  great one for my table top stand for summer. This will be on display at our quilt show in June , why not stop by and see it in person  ;-)
 I have another little project in the works for the show too , you see we are serving tea and a treat just in case you get hungry from all that viewing so.... it was decided we needed to spruce up our lunch room with some tea related quilts etc. and yesterday it came to me just what I wanted to do so here is a sneak peak as it is still very much in progress .

Actually that is a pretty good peak isn't it . Oh well to see the rest you may need to come to the show.
 As you know if you have been reading my blog , this has been a bit of a tough month for me and my sewing mojo is way down and therefore my progress in my UFO'S is suffering too but I did make progress even though it was small so I want to share that with you today.
 Here is my cottage quilt and it may be hard to see that I have actually made progress but I have made a few turns and am so close to another maybe later today if all goes well .

 Next on my list was this mini quilt which I planned on hand quilting as well , dumb idea to have two hand quilting projects going at the same time but I did make a start and once I get going this really should not take long .

Then the final item for this month was my Autumn table topper that I planned on machine quilting myself , ok I opted out of that too but it has been sent on to a machine quilter and may very well be done , I am sure it would only take her a few minutes where it would have taken my hours of frustration so I will be reporting on that once it arrives back home . I am linking up today to Carrie and to see how others faired this month be sure to hop on over and visit Carrie , she always has lovely work to see .
 Thanks for the visit on this lovely sunny Sunday ,hope all is going well in your world.
Hugs Sheila