Busy February

Hi everyone! I've been MIA for a while here on my blog! So sorry about that, but February has turned out to be busy for me! As an update, I did manage to clear out the apartment for my January goals. It felt soooo good to get things organized, but it's been a challenge to keep things that way. I feel like there are always things to pick up or put away, so it just never ends!

This month my husband and I started planning our summer vacation. We're going on a very long road trip all the way out to Seattle to go to the Sasquatch Music Festival and then driving all the way back. We'll be stopping multiple places on each way, so it's going to be a great trip! Plus I'll get to see Mumford & Sons and Cake live! (And a million other bands...)

With the goal of getting healthier and more fit, we also joined a gym this month. So, we've been spending an hour or two there each day after I'm done with work. It eats up a lot of time, but it makes us feel much better. So far I've lost about 10 pounds, which is great. Here I'll be honest with you - I started off weighing 175! That's not at all where I want to be. I've gained about 20 pounds since we got married in 2009 and I want to get that all back off and more. If I get into the 140s, I'll weigh what I did in high school, and I hope that I can get down that far. Our gym is really fantastic and so far we've really enjoyed going there. :) So - here's a LARGE goal, to get down to at least 155 by May when we leave for our vacation. I really hope I'll be able to revise that number as we go along. So far, so good!

I filled in at another office over the weekend, so I didn't have a Saturday to do any crafting. I'm also hosting a couple friends this weekend and throwing a bridal shower for my great friend Heidi. She's getting married in May (another reason to work out!!!) and I've been busy getting ready for that too. The shower is on Sunday this weekend and Saturday will be dedicated to running lots and lots of needed wedding errands since the bride now lives in Florida and this is the last time she'll be up in Wisconsin before the big day. It's going to be a lot of fun.

Despite all of that, I have managed to do a couple little things with the few minutes I have at night before I collapse in bed.

I started knitting a scarf for my other friend coming up for the weekend. I hope, hope, hope I can get it done! And, now I'm not sure it's going to be very cold any more for her to need it. But, she was joking about how she wasn't going to be able to handle the cold Wisconsin weather and I joked that I'd make her a scarf, and then actually did it. Now I just need to finish it!! It kind of reminds me of the flying geese quilt block pattern since it has a pyramid shape in the knitting pattern. It goes pretty quick, so I'm going to knit, knit, knit tonight and hope I can get close to finishing!

I also played around with some embroidery. I've never really done it before, and I made an awful first attempt. I made this flower embroidery. I used pencil to draw on the pattern. That was my first mistake since I couldn't get rid of the marks and then had to adjust the pattern as I went to cover them up. I hate the shape of the petals and I hate that I filled in the petals, but I had to cover up those stupid pencil marks! Ick! I kept this only because it was so bad I needed to see where I started and hopefully I'll improve from here!

I don't mind the stem and the leaves, but oh my gosh the whole flower should just be ripped out or thrown away. I think I'll hang it over my sewing machine space so I can have the motivation to get better. :)

The next attempt went much better. I made an owl sitting on a tree. I really like the wood grain that I did and I like that I gave it a circular border around the whole design. I also like these cute little leaves on it. So, hopefully my next attempt will be even better. I need to learn some more stitches so I can be a little more creative!

So - that's what I've been up to so far. As far as other February goals, I'd really like to finish my Over the Rainbow quilt this month. It's still sitting on my sewing desk, all pinned and ready to be quilted, so I'm so close to finishing! I think that will be the only other thing I plan to do in February. Hopefully March will be more crafty! Happy crafting everyone!

Guest Bedroom Cleanup

Well, change of plans. I didn't clean up and reorganize the bathrooms today, but the great purge of 2013 continued. Instead, I tackled the guest bedroom! :) Which is also my craft room and our storage room and for me was the most daunting room of all. So - there was a lot of stuff to go through. I doubled the amount of things I'm giving away and I threw away 3 large garbage bags of junk! It feels so good to purge! (My husband said we look like hoarders with all of the stuff we've thrown out and the boxes piled up in the hallway to donate!)

So, here are some photos of before and after. I started around 11:30am and had one break for dinner and one break to take the Christmas tree to the curb and finished at 8:30pm. It was a long day!

Before: View from the doorway

During: It looks really bad now! I pulled everything out of the closets...

After: View from the doorway. :)

After: View from my sewing desk (closets are to the right and fill the entire wall!)

Before: Left side of the closets

After: Left side of the closets

Before: Right side of the closets

After: Right side of the closets

I know this is not perfect and we still have a lot of stuff in these closets, but this is pretty much all of the storage that we have. The closets in our master bedroom we use for clothes! :) Plus, this is a guest room and a craft room and I have lots of crafting supplies. I bet if I didn't craft at all we would have a very clean apartment.

Speaking of crafting, did you see the quilt on my bed in the 4th picture? My great-grandmother made that for me in 1987. I was just one year old (or maybe less...)! I love it and it's super warm.

During this clean up I went through boxes and boxes of junk - things we had probably moved around with us since we left our parents' houses. I also had a ton of old mail (even junk mail) that was just stashed away in the closet. So, lots of things were thrown away and lots of things went into cleaned out boxes to be donated. My front hallway is almost impassable now because of all of the boxes to donate. We're taking a trip to Goodwill tomorrow after I get done with work. I hope it all fits in the car!

I came across a couple projects while cleaning that I want/need to do:

1) I saved some of the old T-shirts to cut into strips and knit into a couple rugs. I want to make at least 2 rugs, but I bet I have enough T-shirts for way more.

2) I had saved all of our wedding cards and I want to make a book out of them. I saw one that a good friend of ours had made by gluing them together into a spine of sorts. I think I may use some glue, but I'd like to sew them together with needle and thread like I did my upcycled journals.

3) I have some old quilt blocks that need to get made into a small lap-quilt or picnic quilt. That project shouldn't take more than an afternoon to finish up.

4) We need shoe racks to go along with our underwear drawer dividers. I wish I had a work space to make some things out of lumber, but I'll figure something out. Maybe Goodwill has something I can use... ;)

So - rooms left to clean out and organize:

• Master Bathroom
• Guest Bathroom
• Kitchen
• Dining Room
• Living Room

We'll save those for another day though. :) I hope you all are doing something much more fun! Happy crafting to you all!

Master Bedroom Cleanup

Well, I couldn't wait to get started on my mission to get organized this month. So I started with our master bedroom. It was atrocious!

 

We had laundry everywhere! It was all clean laundry, (except for the stuff in and on top of the hamper) but I didn't have anywhere to put it because our drawers were stuffed full and our closets were a huge mess.

Try not to cringe too much! :)

I'm glad my cats were having fun in there because I was not! My method of cleaning isn't the most organized I'd have to say. My husband wasn't very happy with me when he walked in and saw all of our clothes piled on the bed, heaps of clothes to give away stacked on the floor and everything from the closets in mounds to go through and organize. I think I pulled everything out of everywhere all at once and then commenced going through it all and putting it all back away.

It took about 6 hours of time to get this into a clean, organized space and it was well worth the time. Not only did I put away all of the clean laundry we had, but I washed and dried everything that was dirty and then put all of that away too. The best part about that was we had exactly the right amount of shirt hangers for everything we kept. That never happens!

We do have quite a bit to donate. Here's a picture of my front hallway with 2 garbage bags, a box, a large duffel bag and a large piece of luggage filled with clothing and a few other miscellaneous things to donate. My grandmother gave me that huge piece of luggage at least a decade ago, but it's starting to wear out on the bottom edges. Maybe someone at Goodwill will be able to fix it and give it a good home for a cheap price. Otherwise, it has wheels so it will help me get the donation to the store much easier!

My cat Sasha was very worried when I started bringing all of that stuff out to the hallway. I bet she thinks we're going on vacation and leaving them here for a while. She'll be relieved when we come home from church tomorrow and don't leave. :)

So - here are the after pictures of all of my hard work. I should have taken a before shot of the closets, but just imagine them brimming full with hanging clothes, no space on any of the shelves, and shoes, clothes, papers, books, etc all over the floors so you can just barely close the doors...

View from the doorway

View from my side of the bed

View from the bathroom doorway

Small closet for our dress clothes

His side

Her side

This is the closet for our every day clothes, pieces of luggage and my shoes. :) We just have pants hangers left (and extra space on the shelf!). My husband came in after I was done and was speechless. He was very happy with what I had done. I even organized our dresser drawers so now he can find everything he needs.

We just need a couple things to make it completely done. We both want to make dividers for our top drawer to separate out our socks and underwear. I also want to make a better holder for his ties. I know I could just buy a tie hanger, but I saw something fun on Pinterest that I want to try if I can swing it. We'll save that for another day after I have some more of this clutter taken care of.

Tomorrow's mission: bathrooms! :) Happy cleaning!

December Finishes and January 2013 Goals

Welcome to 2013 everyone. How did it get to be January 5th already!? I'll try to keep this post short and sweet so you can all get back to your New Year's Resolutions (I didn't make any because I don't want to break any!). 

On my plate for December I was supposed to:

1) Quilt up the Christmas quilt for my dad - done! He loved it, and even though it's not a queen-size quilt (it finished up at 6 feet x 6 feet) it is proudly displayed on his bed at home. :)

2) Put together a triangle quilt for my brother-in-law and his wife - done! They also loved it and this time it was a queen-size quilt so they could put it on their bed. They had just made a headboard with matching fabric, so I'm really happy it all worked out. 

3) Finish my Over the Rainbow quilt - not done. There just wasn't enough time in the month. :(

4 and 5) Get the rest of the Christmas shopping done and presents assembled/wrapped - done! And get our Christmas cards made, messages written and sent out in the mail - done! Plus, people got them before Christmas eve, so I got those done earlier than last year. :)

So - 4 out of 5 is a solid 80% which was still in the B range when I went to school. I'll say I bump up to an A for December with finishing the triangle quilt all in a week (I'm so generous with my grading!). :)

So, what's on the docket for January? Nothing. No crafting - no sewing - no baking. :( I might be cranky come January 31st. 

This month I need to focus on cleaning and organizing my apartment. We have laundry everywhere (clean) because our drawers are full of things that are outdated or don't fit. We need to put away the Christmas decorations. Clean out the closets. Reorganize the cupboards. And... I need to really revamp my craft storage. So - I'll be a busy little maid this month (and maybe, just maybe I'll have to create some things to get us organized so my crafting mind will be kept content). 

There is one commitment that I will have to get done this month which is my Bee block for January. That should only take part of one day, so I'm going to save it for when the vacuum cleaner breaks down or I'm waiting for laundry to dry, etc. 

I'll have a few humbling pictures up here I'm sure with the before shots, but hopefully the after pictures will make up for it. So, without further ado - commence Mission Organization!

Triangle Quilt Finished!

Merry Christmas everyone (and wow, this is my 100th post)! I didn't have time to post yesterday, but I actually got the gray and yellow triangle quilt finished up in time to give away yesterday afternoon. It was a big hit, and means I finished another December goal! :)

All Pinned and Ready to be Quilted

Here it is all pinned and ready to be quilted. I had to move my living room furniture around in order to get it on a flat, non-carpeted surface. I decided to just do straight line quilting on this one in a diamond pattern. Here's what my timeline looked like:

• Monday, December 17th: cut out all of the pieces after work
• Tuesday, December 18th: divided out the triangles into rows and started sewing the rows together after work
• Wednesday, December 19th: more row sewing after work
• Thursday, December 20th: we had a snow day, so I was able to finish putting all of the rows together!
• Friday, December 21st: started sewing the rows into the top and completed the first 1/2 of the top after work
• Saturday, December 22nd: after practicing for our church Christmas program and finishing up some last minute shopping, I sewed together the rest of the top
• Sunday, December 23rd: ironed the top, sewed up the back (all one gray printed fabric), pinned everything together and quilted the top (that was a looooong night!)
• Monday, December 24th: cut, sewed and ironed the binding before working for a half-day, then came home at 1:00pm and sewed on the binding before heading to my Dad's house for Christmas eve celebrations. I took my needle and thread along and hand stitched on one side of the binding while I was there
• Tuesday, December 25th: finished hand stitching on the binding, threw the quilt in the washer and then the dryer and pulled it out at 1:30 which is when we needed to leave for Christmas at my husband's grandmother's house. No time for wrapping, so I tied it up with a piece of yarn. Gave it away at 6:30pm that night. 

Finished Quilt Laid Out on Our Bed - Queen Size

What a quilting whirlwind!!! Now I don't have anything on my plate that really needs to get done in the next few days. Unfortunately I've come down with a Christmas cold, so I'll spend the next couple of days recuperating and drinking tea. Hope you all had a very merry Christmas and that you enter the new year with lots of joy! Happy crafting everyone!!!

A Very Productive Snow Day

Hello everyone! I don't know about where you're at, but we had some crazy weather here in Wisconsin today. I live in Madison and we got about 18 inches of snow today! That's right... eighteen inches!! They even shut down the university - and this is finals week. That just doesn't happen.

This picture is from the morning snow. By the end of the night it reached the top of the arm of the chair! And to think - we didn't have any snow accumulation on our little balcony before today! We're definitely having a white Christmas this year.

So... I was gifted an extra sewing day that I hadn't planned on, and I so desperately needed it! As of last night I had 12 out of 30 strips for the gray and yellow triangle quilt put together.

Today, I finished sewing up all of the strips, ironed them all, and laid them out to see what it will look like. I had to do the layout in 2 groupings since the quilt is so big. :)

So, here's my timeline for the rest of the quilt, and I sure hope I can stick to this!


Friday night after work: sew all of the rows together into the quilt top. Possibly start basting if I'm not completely drained.

Saturday afternoon after church practice: Start/finish basting. Start quilting - I am going to do straight lines mirroring the triangles on probably every other triangle. I have no idea how long that will take with such a large quilt, but it means I won't have to move the fabric as much as when I'm doing a swirly FMQ pattern.

Sunday afternoon after our church Christmas services (and lunch with Mom): Finish quilting everything. Make the binding and sew that onto the front. Trim off excess backing/batting.

Monday afternoon (I have to work until 12pm): start hand stitching the binding onto the back of the quilt. We are celebrating at my dad's house on Monday night and the quilt will be given away on Tuesday night. So, if I need to I can finish it up on Tuesday morning.

Tuesday: Wash, dry, wrap and give it away!

Phew! This looks tiresome, but I hope I can get it done. The end is definitely in sight!!! Happy holidays and happy crafting everybody!

December Goals Update

Hello everyone! It's been far too long since my last post, but I've been really busy. I have 2 of my December goals solidly done, one in progress and one more basically done. So, here's what I've been working on:

1) I finished the Christmas quilt for my dad!

I really like how it turned out. All in all it's 72"x72". Long enough for it to cover his toes, but small enough to be manageable to quilt! :)

Here's a close up of the back fabric and stitching. I think I might love the back and it's all-over print more than I like the front. I also think my FMQ stitching is improving - not too shabby for a novice! My dad won't notice the mistakes anyway... :)

2) I've finished all of my Christmas cards! Not only are they put together, but they are  signed, stamped and out in the mail to be delivered!

I put my scrapbooking skills to work with these. I made some out of red, green and blue card stock, but the design for them was all the same. I made 27 cards total and probably could have made a couple more if I had really wanted to. I bought the music from Good Will for $1.99. It came in a large booklet of choral music and I used one sheet (cut to size) for each card - basically half for the front and half for the inside. The snow flakes were from a package of Christmas paper I bought several years ago. I just cut them out one by one and glued them on. I really liked the look of music pages for the cards and I'll probably use that element again.

3) I have just about all of my presents done/bought/wrapped. I have to buy just 2 more things which I'll be getting this weekend. But - the big project is getting the next quilt done by the 25th! Otherwise, my cats are very much enjoying playing with the ribbon on the wrapped gifts under the tree (At least it's saving the ornaments from being swiped off the tree!).

4) I have started the quilt for my brother-in-law and his wife. It will be out of all gray and yellow materials and I have all of the triangles cut.

I'm assuming that cutting was the longest part of this project, but I guess I'm about to find out. I've never done a quilt out of triangles before and now I'm going to attempt to make it a queen sized project! I might be a little crazy - just a little.

If you don't hear from me for the next 10 days, now you know why! :) Happy crafting everyone!

November Finishes and December Goals

Hello everyone! I hope you all had a nice November and are gearing up (or maybe you're completely ready) for the December crunch! I had a pretty busy November, but still managed to neglect some things on my goal list. As a recap, here's what I had planned to finish up in November:

1) Sew together half of my leaf quilt blocks. Not Done... Sadly this project is still right where it was. I haven't done any more sewing on it at all (and it's not going to make the list for December projects either). This one might end up as a long term WiP or on my New Year's Resolution list. :)

2) Finish the birthday gift for my sister. Done! And it was a huge success. Want to know what it was? I knit her a case for her brand new kindle - which was inside when I gave it to her. She was stoked. (My husband thinks it looks like a cute little monster face.)

This was the second knitting-in-the-round that I've done, and it was a lot easier than I expected it to be. I finished the project in one afternoon which really surprised me! I made a practice one for my dad (it didn't have cables) just to see how it would go before I spent the time on something more complicated. He also liked his case. :)

It was my sister's 30th birthday and her golden birthday on the 30th, so I also made her a special dessert. It was a caramel cream pumpkin pie with meringue topping. This was one of the most complicated desserts I've ever made, but it was worth it. It tasted so good! My mom even brought her creme brule torch so I could toast the meringue at the end. The meringue was really creamy which I did not expect. It was so good that we used the left over meringue for stuffed french toast the next morning at brunch. (Don't worry, the recipe called for cooked meringue, so no humans were poisoned in the making of the pie or brunch.)

3) Finish the Irish Hiking Scarf. Done! It turned out lovely, and seems to be a favorite thing for my cat Sasha to steal out of the closet. I've had to hide it multiple times from her, but she's the sneakiest little thing at getting in there! Luckily she hasn't destroyed it or really done any damage to it each time she's stolen it. One of my previous scarfs she completely shredded, so this one must be more durable. It's made out of Caron Simply Soft Yarn in Sage Green. The picture looks a little funky with the colors, but it's a nice hunter green or Christmasy-green color and I think its future owner will like it.

4) Plan and cut out the pieces for the Christmas quilt for my dad. Done and done! And I've even gone a couple steps farther by piecing the entire top and basting all 3 layers together. It's sitting on my sewing desk waiting for me to have time to quilt it up. :)

My dad really loves the Peanuts gang. He owns pretty much every cartoon movie they ever made with Charlie Brown and Snoopy. He also really loves Christmas. He gets so excited to put up the tree and have hot chocolate and make cookies - it's cute. So I know he's going to love this. The top roughly measures 60"by 60". I used 12 inch blocks in either a 9 patch or 4 patch pattern. I had gone back and forth with how to quilt it when my husband had a great idea. He said, "Why don't you quilt it so it looks like the wind is blowing over it." Great idea! The back is one fabric print of the Peanuts characters on ice skates and some of Snoopy's cousin Spike with his Christmas cactus, so the swirly wind motif will fit in with the back and the front. Not to mention that should quilt pretty quickly as a big swirly pattern.

5) Put together and send out the 2 Color Bee Shocked bee blocks for November and December. Done and done! I got the fabric for the December block early, so I sent them both out earlier this month. November was an inset circle block (the theme was we could put together any 12 inch block we wanted as long as it had circles incorporated). December was a couple Flying Geese blocks that I really liked. That one went together really quickly, the circle one I was nervous about, but it turned out.

So, besides all of that, I've done a few other things as well. I put together another Christmas table runner. This time it was for my mother-in-law. Someone told me my tutorial for it was a little confusing, so I'm planning on posting more pictures and hopefully clearer instructions for that in the coming days.

I also put together a "Kare-Package" for one of our really good friends, Sven. He's in med school with a very demanding clinical schedule and hasn't had time to cook much (or sleep for that matter). So, my husband and I put together some freezable servings of chili and I also made mini-lasagnas for him to heat up as he chooses. All in all he got 4 big bowls of chili and 6 bread loaf-sized lasagna pans to take home. He has since tried both and gave me a thumbs up on each one. The lasagna took about 35 minutes to bake, so the smaller size cut off about 1/2 of the baking time of a full-sized lasagna pan.

  I have also decorated my apartment for Christmas! We went out and cut down a tree. I celebrated a lot when it was finally cut because we had a really, really dull saw and the tree was pretty sappy. It was a small, but important victory. We have the tree all decorated now with ornaments we've collected from some of our travels and ones from our childhood. I have a couple on there that I've made as well, including the tree topper which is a star I made out of an old copy of "The Hobbit" which was falling apart. Plus, check out the beautiful tree skirt my mother gave us! It's gorgeous and was the first thing we put on the tree. :) Thanks mom!!

Lastly, I made us a little Noel sign for our living room wall. Most of the living room is adorned with pictures from our travels, but there was a weird bare spot above one of the bookshelves that I have now filled. I bout the wood cutouts at JoAnn Fabrics, painted them red with a sponge brush and added "snow" with a 1 inch bristle brush. Super easy. Then I hot glued it all together and glued on a nail hanger on the top left of the N and the bottom of the E to keep it straight and sturdy. I really like it - now if only I had something to cover up the ceiling fan switch... :) By the way, that carved thing is a nativity set we got from Portugal - we think the baby Jesus looks like a weird squid, but it was unique - and the tall candle is the unity candle from our wedding.

OK, so that's what November held for me. I'd say that gives me an A. The "extra credit" I did on my Dad's Christmas quilt can counteract the standstill on my Leaf Quilt. And with that being over, here's what's on my to-do list for December:

1) Quilt up the Christmas quilt for my dad.

2) Put together a triangle quilt for my brother-in-law and his wife. Their wedding colors were gray and yellow and they have lots of matching decor in those colors in their apartment. I have planned to put together a quilt for them and have 1/2 of the fabric cut out. I just need to buy more, cut it out, sew it together, baste it and quilt it by Christmas... Doable? We'll see!

3) Finish up my Over the Rainbow quilt. It needs a black border yet (which I have the fabric for!!), sandwiching and basting and quilting. I've decided to do an all over stippling with rainbow thread on the front and white thread on the back. The back fabric is a black and white geometric pattern that I love. I think I'll bind it up in black as well.

4) Get the rest of my Christmas presents put together. I think I have a couple knit scarves on my list and then some items that need to be purchased. I went to Target yesterday and it was crazy! I think I'm going to do all of my shopping online and have it delivered to avoid the hustle and bustle of the stores.

5) Make and send out all of our Christmas cards. I have 1/2 of them 1/2 put together already. I'm making them with old Christmas music and card stock. I'm going to keep them pretty basic, but I think they'll look nice in the end. Now I just need to get all of the addresses I need...

So, 3 quilts in December? I think I might be a little (or a lot) nuts... What are you working on this month? Happy crafting!

My Longest WiP (and other projects)

Hello everyone,

I've got a special project to share today. It's still in the works, but I can feel the completion date getting closer and closer. I've been working on this quilt since I was either in High School or 8th grade. I'm thinking 8th grade since I know I was "too cool" to quilt in High School. (Wow, I can't believe that was 12-13 years ago!!)

It's a quick and easy 9-patch quilt called "Over the Rainbow" that I fell in love with many, many years ago. I've always loved Amish quilts with vibrant colors and black backgrounds, so my mom and I started planning this quilt. I was lucky enough to find one patterned fabric in all of the colors - purple, pink, red, orange, yellow, green and 2 shades of blue.

I've been carting the fabric around from apartment to apartment through college and after, knowing that some day I would eventually finish it. Earlier this year it finally earned a spot in one of my 3 WiP drawers. That means I need to finish it before I can start another project because I'm not letting myself store in-progress projects anywhere but those 3 drawers. (Unfortunately, all of my current projects are large quilts, so this was the next one to finish up.)

My 8th grade self had already done most of the leg-work. The fabric was cut into 2.5 inch strips and sewn together for quick piecing. I just needed to cut apart the strips to make the pieces for each 9 patch block.

Ta da! I've got everything all cut and ready to go for the blocks. (My 8th grade self had even pieced together the light blue blocks, so I'm one more step ahead of the game.) I'll have to put a close up of the fabric I'm using in the next post. I can't decide if it looks like puzzle pieces or germs (maybe a combination of the two??), but I still think it's amazing that it came in all of those bright colors! I'm pretty sure we bought it at Wal-Mart - back when they still had a decent fabric section - but it could have been JoAnn Fabrics as well. Either way, I doubt I'll be able to find anymore if I happen to run out...

On another note, I finished the second Color Bee Shocked block (the one for November) and sent everything off in the mail today. Here's what I came up with:

It looks a little wonky to me, but hopefully not too bad. This was the first time I'd really worked with set-in circular seams, so I practiced a couple times first. I made the fugly Americana pot holder in my previous post and also made the below block. I plan to make it into another pot holder/trivet for my sister. (She said she needed a lot...)

This one I like way better than the Americana one I made. It almost looks like a little house - maybe a gnome home? :) My sister is coming to see me on Sunday, so I've got to get this little guy finished up by that time. So, with the circle bee block completed, I've finished one of my November goals of finishing up both Color Bee Shocked blocks. I also finished the knitted birthday present for my sister as another goal. I won't be showing that off until November 30th or December 1st.

With those two projects done, I the last goals I have for November are to sew together half of the Leaf Quilt blocks and plan/cut out the fabric for the Christmas quilt for my dad. I'm not sure the Leaf Quilt blocks will get done this month, but I've already planned out the pattern for the Christmas quilt and have the fabric for it. Hopefully I can finish the Over the Rainbow quilt top and get the Christmas quilt fabric cut and ready to go.

Anyway, this post is way too long, and I have some blocks to sew! So, happy crafting everyone!! :)