What Are Quilters Blogging About Today?

You guys – we are close, so very close to being done with the house in California. We sign papers for the close next week and have a final walk through with the new owners and then we are heading up to Washington. It is just amazing! This has been the focus of life for so long. We are so excited to be nearing completion and so ready to move into the new house!

Much of the house looks like this! There is still a lot to be loaded into the last Pod and we have some movers coming to help ...

I am guessing this isn’t news to all quilters who happily participate in Hands 2 Help each year but the event is being coordinated by Mari of Academic Quilter this year. Sarah has a lot going on right now and rather than having to skip a year of making quilts for deserving people and organizations, Mari has stepped in and is hosting the whole event! We are all grateful to Mari for taking this on but most especially grateful are the staff and families at Mercy Hospital in Sacramento, California. To read the details about this year’s Hand ...

Since my shop closed, I have been working hard to take all of my sewing supplies out of the guest room and downstairs to the shop area. I want to have a ‘real’ guest room and since we have family coming for Thanksgiving, now is the time to finish this project. As it goes, I found lots of forgotten projects while cleaning out the guest/sewing room. One was a scrappy rag rug I knit back in 2016. I loved this little project but didn’t know what to do about the knots where I joined the strips when I ...

Hello all – I have not had much in the way of free time this week. So much so, I find it hard to believe it is Friday already! Here is a peek at the past week.

Last weekend was a special one because my youngest son, Ian, was here for a quick visit. He had signed up to participate in a run up in the Lake Tahoe area. That is approximately an hour drive from our home so he slept here and took off early in the morning for the run. I love all four of my kids and when ...

I write a post something along these lines annually. That is because out here in dry, dry California we have fire season every year now. This year it started terribly early, back in June. A few weeks ago, for the first time, we had a fire happen very close to our property and it was scary. Fortunately the River Fire was contained in time but my husband did have the car packed and ready to evacuate as we were in the group that would be called next, if the fire spread. That was far too close for comfort.

Just sitting here on a chilly, damp morning drinking that first cup of coffee. (Nothing better than that first cup, is there?) I am trying to wrap my head around the fact that my oldest child is celebrating his 36th birthday today and number two celebrated his 34th birthday two days ago. How did that even happen? Time just marches on. I love having adult children – watching them carve their path, raise children, and develop their careers. It is truly satisfying.

OK – moving on from blathering about my boys, let’s look at a fun project I worked on this ...

Post Update: Two things I wanted to update here. First of all, the winner of the giveaway on this post is Darci. Congrats Darci and I hope you enjoy the fabric. Second update: I talked about the Christmas Through the Decades later in this post and mistakenly said it was on Netflix. However it is really available on Amazon Prime’s streaming service. Sorry for the misinformation.

Hello everyone. If you are new to my blog, coming here from the Holiday Tales and Traditions Blog Hop, welcome. I have been blogging since 2014 (which seems crazy but it has been ...

Today you are all invited to play a little game. In recent months the news has been filled with problems, politics and pandemics. Enough with such seriousness. We need to lighten things up a bit. So I thought I would host a game called Guess Who!

I invited a number of quilt bloggers to send me a picture of themself as a child. There is quite the mix of bloggers participating. You are likely to be familiar with many of them, but some might be new to you. Here are the rules to this very challenging game. (Haha – really, this ...

Below is a letter I received from the Palliative Care team at Mercy Hospital in Sacramento, California. They are so grateful for all of the quilts you have made and donated to their program.

Dear Stitchers,

We are writing to thank you…words cannot explain how important these lovely Comfort Quilts are to the family of our dying patients.  When we deliver them, a look of relief and gratitude immediately takes the place of sadness and loss.  For our families to be able to take home something that their loved one has worn is amazing and unforgettable.

Thank you for ...

Today is my kind of day. It is National Just Because Day. Is this a real thing? I don’t know but I am choosing to believe it is, at least for today. Seems to me on Just Because day one can do pretty much as they like and not have to answer why. It is the one day when the reply to “Why?” is “Just because.”

So what is the plan? Eat ice cream in the middle of the day? Call a friend you haven’t spoken with in ages? Take a nap? Indulge in a long bath? Skip ...

Just popping in to share the sweet gowns being made for Amy and her amazing dolls at A Doll Like Me. Really, if you want a fun project these are so easy to make and take little in the way of fabric, time or skill!

Just to remind you, Amy makes dolls for children (and some adults) who have special needs or limb or other physical differences. She knows the need for physical representation and the ability to see oneself as beautiful. Her work is amazing and has really taken off over the past two or three years. If you ...

Popping in today to share a few things with all of you. Many of us are having a tough time trying to deal with all that has happened over the past couple of weeks in our country. Much unrest, anger, sadness and feelings of helplessness seem to have settled over much of our world. There are ways to help and to remain positive though. Lots of people are trying to provide support where they can, donate to various organizations, and be really vocal about the changes that need to be made.

To this end, there is an auction starting today ...

Today Julia and I needed something different to do so we decided to do a few errands and then go for a short hike. We are fortunate to live in an area with tons of gorgeous walking trails. Julia chose Hirschman Trail for today’s walk.

We have walked here several times before. It is an easy walk and there are some really pretty sites to see.

The highlight of this trail is a beautiful pond. It comes up quickly but I look forward to seeing it each time – once on the way in and again on the way back ...

I received something really special in the mail yesterday. The family of a patient who received a Mercyful Quilt wrote a note of thanks. We quilters have talked about this and agreed we do not need to hear the gratitude felt by recipients of the quilts we donate. As quilters, we donate because it might soothe someone during a really difficult time and it makes us feel we are helping in some small way when we make and give these quilts.

But this family was so taken by this handmade gift and they wanted to be sure we all knew ...

I recently had a conversation with the chairperson of our Community Service team within our local quilt guild. We were talking about the recipients of the quilts we make and the quantity of quilts she had available. The discussion came around to our local Children’s Protective Services team. This team includes officers of our Sherrif’s Department who have the very sad task of removing children from home’s where they are not in good, safe situations.

These officers like to carry blankets in the trunk of their cars so they can wrap up a child if needed when ...

Currently many quilters are making tree theme quilt blocks to donate to the Woolongong Modern Quilt Guild in Australia. This chapter of the MQG is making quilts for the families who lost their homes in the currently raging bushfires. As a native of California, I am too familiar with the devastation of wildfires and am happy to contribute a few blocks to the cause.

Here is some of the information as posted by the Woolongong MQG on their Facebook page. If you hop over to their Facebook page, there are some blocks shown for inspiration. You will likely see many ...