Turtles and Swans

Another hobby I have is rescuing turtles. This time of year there are a lot of turtles who find themselves on a busy road and sometimes they get hit by a car. If I see a turtle I always turn around and pick 'em up. I bring them to our property and offer them a new home far away from a busy road. Today's turtle at his new home...

I always thought that our community was165 acres, come to find out it is 265 acres. There are about 12 other lots besides our own. Each lot is about 15-20 acres. There is a lot of public space for picnics, etc. No HOA fees. We are the only ones to have built a home so far, besides the developer. 

There are 4 springs and an 8 acre spring fed pond/lake. Bill and I have 4 swans on the pond/lake.

 The white Mute pair are Milly and Milo 2. 

The Australian black pair are Bruno and Bella.

 The silver box is a solar fish feeder, there are three of them around the pond/lake. There are bass and catfish in the pond/lake.

Bella and Bruno are such fun as they come up to me and actually look me in the eye and carry on a conversation with me. Love their red bills and eyes.

I do feed them waterfowl kibble twice a day. It is so relaxing to hang out with them. There won't be any babies for 2-3 years.

Vet Quilt Presentation

Today my small group of quilters presented a quilt to Ellis Butler. He served on a destroyer during WWII. He was born in 1925 and enlisted when he was 17 years old. He was award the Bronze Star and a couple more that I can't remember.

He lives in an assisted living complex in Waynesboro, TN. It was such an honor to shake his hand and thank him for his service to our country.

That is Anne in the red shirt, she owns the Fabric Emporium. 

Another WWII Vet has moved into the same complex. He isn't originally from Wayne County and some people think we should only be giving to the Vets who were originally from Wayne County. My thought is that any Vet living in Wayne County should get a quilt. Their reasoning is that the long time residents will get mad. I just don't believe that at all. Anne and I aren't from Wayne County and we don't mind giving quilts to each and every Vet here.

The quilts we make are simple and go together easily. As most, 90%, of the quilters in our group are beginners so we can't do anything complicated. This quilt is a simple 9 patch and 1/2 square triangle quilt. His grandson threatened to take it if it wasn't taken care of!

It was a very touching celebration of Mr Butler's life and so glad that I was able to be a part of it.

My Wonderful Friend Karen! Vet Quilt

I consider Karen a very dear friend. If it weren't for the Internet our paths would never have crossed. She lives in Ohio and I am in Tennessee. I am so very blessed.

Last year (when I wasn't blogging) she sent me a beautiful quilt for my birthday. 

I love the floating stars, how the light stars on the dark background almost shimmer.  It was such a surprise. As a quilter I never expect to recieve a quilt as a gift. Bill and I both love it. Thanks Karen.

And the back - cute bird cages.

Karen has also made a couple of quilts for the Wayne County Vet project. Here is a picture the one she just sent.

It is the perfect size. The quilt is hanging at an odd angle. 

I am so grateful for Karen's friendship and her willingness to help with the Vet quilts.

Quilts For Vets of Wayne County, TN - part 2

I was able to quilt and machine bind 3 quilts this week. It really doesn't take that long to do a simple meander. They have all been washed and dried.

One of our group of quilters brought in a quilt pattern and wanted to make it into a Vet quilt. She picked the colors and went to work. Turned out pretty good! We are aiming for quilts to be 60x70 and this one is 70x80, a bit larger than usual.

We are trying not to duplicate patterns when making these quilts. This next quilt is a duplicate. We gave the first one to a critically ill Vet. We wanted to make another one so we can have it in our quilt show in September. We have a bunch of extra 1/2 sq triangles left over from these quilts, enough to create another quilt!

This quilt's stars were made from the string blocks our beginners made a few months ago. The stars measure 15 inches with the star center at at 5.5 inches and the points cut at 3.5 in sq. The red row strips are cut at 10.5 x 2.5.

We are working hard to get these quilts finished by the end of July.

Quilts That Are Not Vet Quilts

I've come to the conclusion that I have missed having my blog to refer back to. I miss keeping track of the quilts, yardage, who got which quilt.

Even though I've been busy with the Vet quilts for Wayne Co, I have finished 3 other quilts. These pictures were taken from the pictures in my quilt albums...

This quilt I totally stole the idea (with permission) from Life In Piece's Kate. I even used the same math fabric. I made this for our granddaughter's graduation (to fit her dorm bed) as she wants to teach  math at the college level. It is upside down...or not.

This quilt for for Seth. I have made this quilt numerous times and I am sure I have enough of the big print for two or three more.

Our niece married a guy who has a young son and this was the quilt I sent to him. I also include a letter telling him how happy we are to have him as part of our family. He loved it.

I need to get busy as I have a stack of tops waiting to be quilted and bound for RMH. A few I made and a few were sent to me from a cousin and from Karen. Plus have to get some kits put together for our next Vet quilt sew day.

I used 90.34 yards so far this year.

Quilts for Vets in Wayne County, TN - part 1

My friend, Anne, owns a quilt shop - The FABRIK Emporium- in Waynesboro, TN. We are about two hours southwest of Nashville.

She knew that I made QOVs. She made the suggestion instead of giving the quilts to QOV that I might think about giving them to the Vets in our county.   I thought that was a great idea. Last year on Veteran's Day there was a celebration and we were able to give out 18 quilts to Vets who served in WWII, Veterans that were POWs, Veterans who were critically ill. Each Vet was thrilled and grateful to receive a quilt. It was a great feeling to give them locally. 

This year we are making 50 quilts to give to the Korean Veterans and any Vet that becomes ill. Anne opened her shop for our quilting group. We meet twice a month and have between 4-6 women come. Some of these women have never used a sewing machine. Some have made clothes. None were able to sew a 1/4 inch sew when they started. They are getting better. 

We have 16,913 people in our county. We are the second largest county in the state - square miles.

We were given donations after last years celebration and we were able to buy 75 yards of fabric and two rolls of batting! 

Besides our group of quilters I have had Karen help make quilts. Her help has been greatly appreciated.

We have 30 tops made, 15 have been quilted so far. I actually think we are going to make our goal.

Next year we will start making quilts for the Vietnam Veterans. There are a lot of them in our county so we will be spreading their quilts over 3 years, they will be given alphabetically and as needed for the critically ill.

I have been making kits for the group. We started out making string blocks. Then simply pieced blocks. I did have to undo a lot of blocks because of the seams.  After the blocks are made a couple of us sew them into tops and then we quilt and bind them. 

It has been a fun way to met new people and to teach them about quilting. Two have even bought their own sewing machines and quilting tools! 

January 2016 End of Month Report

LOOK WHAT I FOUND!

A BRAND NEW JANOME TREADLE SEWING MACHINE!

Apparently they have been around for many years. No, I haven't bought one, yet. I do have a old treadle machine. I thought this one was just neat. It has good reviews on amazon. I first saw this at a quilt store about 90 minutes from me and they wanted almost $600 for it. Online you can get one for $290.

For the first finish in 2016 I used the scraps from the backing of this quilt.  I cut as many squares as I could then went looking for a pattern to make this a extra large lap quilt. Finished size is about 72x84.

The teal and the reddish orange match the snowmen's hats and scarfs almost perfectly.

I love making quilts for Seth. He is 24 and has Autism. His favorite color is red, same as mine. Every time I send him a new quilt his mom tries to buy it from him. She even offered him a new video game he wanted and he said no! Gotta love a guy who loves your quilts so much. He is 6'2", so it had to be extra big for him to be able to wrap up in while he is on the couch.

Next is a quilt for Ronald McDonald's House. 

The big blocks are 15 inches. Here is the fabric I used for the big blocks...so life like. The pattern is the "Big E-Z". And E-Z it is!

And zebra print for the backing...

I needed a baby quilt in a hurry and made these two in about three hours each.

This one has the sweetest butterflies.

Close up of the fabric used - more butterflies

Here is a QOV-

 I was given some QOV type fat quarters. I cut them into charms and made this quilt.I chose to just sew blocks together and if two of the same fabric were next to each other it was okay. I wanted it to be totally scrappy. Karen is the one who showed me a picture of this quilt.


So far so good!

Linking to JudyL  and Michelle's baby quilts - A Quilter Reader's Garden

 
Fabric usage  2016 ~

fabric in YTD ~ 

fabric out YTD ~ 38.77

used YTD ~ 38.77

Quilts Finished ~ 5 ~ each quilt will only be counted in one category

QOV ~ 1

RMH ~ 1

UFO ~ 

New ~ 3