Sizzlin!!!

I'm sitting in my air conditioned bedroom at 7:30 at night ... it's 78 in here and it feels blessedly cool!  It was 102 degrees in the east part of San Diego today and the rest of my non-airconditioned house is still at least 85 degrees it feels like.  We have a whole house fan in the upstairs that is blowing on high to cool down the rest of the house, but I may keep my air on all night ... I never do that!  It always cools down in San Diego in the evening, so on the rare occasions when I run my air, it always goes off by dark.  I am ready for fall ... the last couple weeks here have been really hot for us.

I had high plans of quilting today ... I went to the Country Loft and bought some fabric to do the borders on my halloween quilt.  I decided instead of doing a scrappy border, it was just going to overpower the whole quilt.  But I never got as far as cutting it out because it was so hot ... I also had planned to put another quilt on my Innova, but that didn't get done either!  The dogs and I sat in the bedroom all day watching t.v., reading, and being cool!  I did run errands this morning for about 2 or 3 hours ... I had a blast shopping and spending money I probably shouldn't have ... ha, ha!

Here are the pillowcases I made for JJ last week ... I never saw him open the gifts, so I hope he likes them ... I almost kept them since they were so cute!!

Look how cute this fabric is up close.  And it was flannel so it was soft and fuzzy.  Why don't we all have cute pillowcases?  This is the absolute simplest thing to do ... you can make one in about 30 min.  I have plans to go back and buy some cute fabric for my daughter and make her a couple so she can rotate her pillowcases at college ... but shhh, don't tell her!  Hopefully she's too busy with her college life to read my ramblings!

I did a couple of quilts this week ... had Jason from Let's Quilt out last Friday to give my machine a once over.  He was in the area so I just wanted him to take a look at my machine and make sure I was taking care of it properly.  There also was a shudder in a part on the frame, and I suspected it was a leveling issue, but hadn't been able to get it to stop.  He showed me how to loosen the frame and let it all relax and tighten it back up if I have problems again.  If you are interested in an Innova Quilting Machine, I would highly, highly recommend Let's Quilt in St. George, Utah.  My dealers Teryl and John are just the best!  I have had my machine for a year now and I can't say enough about them ... the entire process from buying it, to taking classes, to maintaining the machine has been a breeze.  Their customer service is excellent.

I forgot to take a picture of a small quilt I quilted earlier in the week ... It had been a small block of the month (I think), and really was screaming for some custom quilting ... ruler work, etc.  So I started ... by the time I realized I did not really enjoy what I was doing, I was too far to turn back.  I am not comfortable with ruler work, and usually when I do custom, I don't use a ruler, but just free motion the movement.  In the end I think it looked really cute and matched the design ... I'm pretty sure I am overly critical of myself ... oh wait, I KNOW I am overly critical ... ha, ha, ha!

Here's a fun quilt I did for a customer ...

I used an Omni navy blue in the top and Glide in the bobbin, and just did a free motion stipple.  I did travel straight down and across the center line of the stars because I thought it needed some anchoring in that area.  It is a fringy star quilt, so when it's washed, the edges of the stars will fray.  I didn't want the whole star to be too puffy.

She used all fabric she had in her stash on this quilt ... that is an awesome feeling!

I also decided this week that I needed some bright orange thread for my halloween quilt; I was low on a couple of favorite colors, so a Glide order was needed!  Look what came ...

I know some of these colors look the same, but they're not!  I ordered a forest green, kind of thinking of Christmas, a pretty color called Penny which is a gold with a little copper in it, Sand, and my all-time favorite that I use the most of Vegas Gold.  I also ordered some prewound bobbins in Vegas Gold and Leather, which is a brown, another good color that I use a lot of.

I think my two favorite colors in the order were these in the front ... the orange I hope will go terrific in my quilt (and if it doesn't, I'll just have to find several fabrics that I can use this thread with!).  This other color is a rich rust, I can't remember the name of it, but I thought it looked like a beautiful fall color.  I think my thread stash is getting a little out of control as it won't fit in the big box I have all my thread in ... why shouldn't I have as much thread as I do fabric ... !!