Easter is a time of.....

.....tulips.....

.....Easter bunnies.....

.....Easter eggs.....

.....baby chicks.....

.....and nests.....

I wish you a very Happy Easter and a color-filled and joyful spring!

Note: Please send your photos of any of the Primitive Pillow Ornaments to me before April 15th to be included in the next giveaway.

Afternoon tea anyone?

Today, I took my quilt group out to a beautiful old Dutch farm for an Afternoon Tea. We all had a really fun afternoon together. Here is a slideshow of a few of the happy moments from this afternoon...

Note: If you click on the picture itself on the slideshow, you can see the photos larger.

Coloring Easter eggs?

Remember the sneak peek photo in my last entry? I used the various fabrics in purple, yellow, green, pink and blue to make fabric Easter eggs.


On April 1st, Letty had an April Fool's Day surprise hidden on her werbsite. It was the pattern for these eggs. I love the old fashioned look to them with the stitched seams. I think it spoke to my love of 'crazy quilting'.


Placed with a simple twig wreath in my creamware dish and I have a sweet new Easter decoration. I just love it and want to thank Letty for sharing this pattern.

I also want to thank you all for your comments about my charm quilt. I enjoy linking history to the quilts I make and try to use a great deal of symbolism in them. I am so delighted that you too enjoy hearing these precious stories from the past too. And thank you for the sweet anniversary wishes too...

Note ~ Please be sure to email me photos of your Primitive Pillow ornaments as the latest ornament is coming up next week along with the drawing for the giveaway.

Old tales made new...

I am so glad I can start my weekend knowing that I have finished my charm quilt. This is the first of two I am making this year for my quilt group's theme. In case you are new to my blog or missed the entry about this...my quilt group is making charm quilts this year. We are swapping pieces to have enough to complete our projects. A charm quilt is made up of all different fabrics using a one-patch block. My quilt is made up of fabrics in shades of creams, beige's, browns, pinks, blues, greens, yellows and grays.


I decided I want to become better at machine quilting and will practice on a few of my quilts this being one of them. I am really pleased with the results this time.

At first, I debated about using blues in the quilt, but later as it came together, I found the blues added an exciting element to the whole quilt. I wanted this quilt to have an old fashioned look to it. There are 390 pieces of fabric in this charm quilt.

You can see the two directions that I quilted from the back. I quilted horizontally first and then went back and did the vertical zigzag lines of the hexagons.

Now why is this an old tale made new? I named this quilt 'Vintage Brain Training' because when you research charm quilts, you will discover that some woman made these quilts to use for their children when they became ill. They would repeat a fabric which would entertain a child who was sick in bed searching for the two pieces of like fabric print. I thought this was such a sweet story and could imagine a child searching along the patchwork for these matches. It was like the memory games or the modern day brain training computers. Why use a computer when you can sit and stare at a quilt instead? My quilt has 7 repeated fabrics and, believe me, they are not that simple to find. I love being able to tie stories of quilt history into my own quilts.

Here is a sneak peek at my weekend project. If you are curious to see what these fabrics become, stop by and visit me next week. We are off to Cranberry Cottage for the weekend. It is our 22nd wedding anniversary and we want to go out to eat at a favorite restaurant near the cottage. This will be my first stay since the New Year as my breathing problems were making it too difficult to stay there. I am looking forward to going again.

Whatever you do this weekend...enjoy it!

Something old, something new...

Something old, something new, something with pink to share with you...

Here is my French Abecedaire SAL part four is finished and I have started the new part. I am really enjoying this sampler and it seems to get prettier with each part that Claire shares with us. So this is my 'something old'...


...and for 'something new'...

I have started a new project. Last year, I gave my two lacemaking friends a box and half meter of fabric as a birthday gift. It was for us to make sewing boxes. We are first each designing our own French letter sampler. I will be stitching not only Hs on mine but also sewing items like the scissors I have started, my husbands initials and a cat to symbolize Dagi. I am having lots of fun adding letters to this but am very unsure about the lightest of the three pink shades. It does not show up well at all on the fabric although it matches my fabric choice perfectly. I am going to have to change this shade and rip out the small H I already stitched.


We will be lining the box in fabric and making a few accessories for in the sewing box. I will share progress as I go along and hope to show you the other two boxes also. This is going to be fun to do since they are going to become very personal to each of us.

A tale of UFOs

This is a tale of some UFOs. Just some mind you as I could never even admit to how many I have. That is what happens when you used to teach patchwork and lead a quilt group. You have to keep coming up with new things meaning the 'old things' never get finished. But I am going to share a few tht I have been concentrating on this month of March.


This is the first of my two charm quilts that I am making this year. Each year, I create a theme for our quilt group to work on. In January, we started on charm quilt. These are quilts using a one-patch block and in which all the fabrics are different. This type of quilt became popular in the Victorian period while women saved a scrap of fabric to use for making this quilt. You can read more it about it here.

We are swapping our scraps to help each other get as many fabrics as possible. My top is now ready to be sandwiched and quilted. I have made this charm quilt with a twist in its tale but I will reveal that when I show you the finished quilt next week. Did I say next week? Yes, I really want to get this quilt finished before my next quilt evening on the first Wednesday of April. Crunch time for the deadline!

I will keep the tale of this second quilt (sorry for the wrinkles) a secret until I am farther along with it. I am again making this quilt with a historic connection in mind. Are you intrigued? I hope so and I will tell you the tale soon...

Finally, this applique block has a tale. I have never been a lover of needle applique so I decided to start this Bunny Hill BOM to make myself practice the technique more. I am very behind as this is the January block and I have yet to start on February or March. I will start the next one after I get the quilting done on my charm quilt.

Next post, I will share my stitching projects. I just started a new project which is going to be a very fun one to work on!

Birthday party for a blogger!

Today is a friend of mine's birthday. This very blog brought her into my life. She commented one day saying "Hello from another 40-something woman from Amersfoort". I commented back to her through my blog. We not only were the same age but from the same city. Later she started her own blog and we met for real.

She is a warm and caring person and I am so glad that this blog brought me her friendship. It is her birthday today and she is very busy now working so does not have time to blog as she used to. So I thought it would be fun to hold a birthday party for her here on my blog. Please help me to wish Carolien the most wonderful day today!

Happy birthday to you my dear friend! Time to get together soon so I can give you a little birthday gift...

A thread box

So often I see something in a shop and instantly imagine what it will become when I start working on it. This happened one afternoon when I went to a little discount shop to buy my shampoo I use. I saw this box and opened it.


When I saw the inside, an idea I had was confirmed and I knew I had to buy it to start on a gift for a friend.

So I measured out the raised space on the top of the box and worked on a design that would fit just right. When finished, I mounted the stitched piece.

I then attached it to the wooden box to create a thread box for Diane. I finished off the edge with a piece of trim. This sweet little box has a removable tray and little places to hold special threads. I enjoyed trying to turn this box into something just that little bit special.

Monogram fun

I just love stitching these French monogram letters. They are just instant beauty and who doesn't love a gift with their own letters on it?


These are a birthday gift for a friend of mine. She loved the ones I made for our bedroom at Cranberry Cottage. I have been wanting to make her a set.


I stitched the letters S and T for her and her husband's first name and L for their last name.


The frames where ones I found a couple of years ago in IKEA. I fell in love with them right away. I often see a frame and immediately get an idea of how to use it. The funny thing is the this same friend has seen these frames and is always telling me that she wants to buy them from me. How can she when I meant to use them for her own gifts. *grins*

She does not do any kind of crafts herself but loves things like this and I cannot wait until I see her next week to give them to her.

Primitive ornaments SAL - Noel

The 15th of this month came very quickly with being at the hospital most of this week. I am sorry to be so late in the day but here is the third ornament of the SAL. This month, we are doing a universal Christmas word - Noel.


Once again, you can click on my chart photo to enlarge it and print it out. This ornament uses beads under each of the three bells.


Here is a slideshow of all the photos I have received so far. I am thrilled to see the various results and have really enjoyed seeing how everyone is finishing their own ornaments. Another idea for finishing is to complete each ornament and save it until all the ornaments are stitched at which time you can sew them together into a little quilt.

I have also decided to hold a giveaway each month from the photos entries received. Jos has just drawn the name of the first winner. Susan will be receiving a little gift in the mail very soon. I will look forward to next month's ornament and giveaway. I can't wait to see your results.