The fat lady has locked herself in her dressing room...

...who knows if she'll ever come out and sing! Extremely SHORT post.
Arms are all better, back to sewing!!

That's what I'd like to write...It would be HALF right. My left arm is totally better. However I can't say I haven't cheated here and there..I answered a few emails....posted a few comments and read some blogs...all left handed....but still not better for the right arm. My dominant arm is so hard to keep still and not use. I am overwhelmed with the lovely thoughts and good wishes from you guys.

I have one more week to go before my doctor appt. and all I can do it try extra hard to be super good for this week and HOPE that the right arm calms down and gets better. I'm taking my Aleve, drinking my Certo and Pomegranate juice concoction (I hate grape juice), and taking a huge Fish Oil tablet everyday. I'll try anything, but I'm seriously tired of looking longingly at my fabrics and projects. I just can't risk this staying permanent. It has to go away or back down to at least a dull ache.So you have something to look at.... Look what happened last week! 75 degrees and MARBLE sized hail rained down for about 5 minutes! Freaked the heck out of the cats!

Offical break...

Well I've been taking a break on and off for a little while, but just posting less and trying to write less. My arms were revolting and I needed the rest. Unfortunately, I have done a very bad job of it so far. So after finally giving in and seeing our orthopaedist this morning...

I am OFFICIALLY banned from any hand work for 2 weeks. No typing, no sewing, no rotary cutting, no using the hands. WHAT? the heck am I going to do for 2 weeks? Anybody?

I really have to do this because I planned to sew until the day I croak, and I can not afford to make this worse. I'm gonna need my hands for that. Along with developing "Trigger Finger" in my mouse clicking finger; my arms are swollen, inflamed and squeezing/crushing everything that run into my hands.

So have fun sewing ladies! Sew a bunch for me! I'll be reading books for a while I guess. See you in a few weeks.

***Cindy B. you asked for the list/plan for the blocks. If you email me from my profile I will send you the block picks so far. I would have already but you are listed as Noreply****

Civil War...

So I keep working very slowly and with these blocks it works out to about one per day getting done. Why couldn't I have finger/joint issues when I had the quilting slump? I did get some work done and a decision made...

Here are the blocks I got done over the last week.




Thousands of Diamonds D Pg. 91 and Victuals D Pg.53


March To Winter Quarters LL Pg. 33

On thing I decided on was the sashing for my quilts. At least one of them anyway. I found a lovely color called Civil War Natural to use. I'm still deciding on the corner stones and the border, but see what you think?

If I had used this for all the background and light sections, it may have looked a bit dull and dark, but I'm using much lighter creme and shirting, so the blocks still pop against the darker sashing...or so I think.

H1 Peek-A-Boo...another Dear Jane block. Very simple one and easy to do with lots of color pop! If you want to see how easy it was to construct, follow the Flickr mosaic to the Dear Jane Misc. group and follow the instructions. It really wasn't hard at all and easy to assemble on your own.

Piddling along...

I've slowly worked up to being able to sew a tiny bit of hand work and finally got the one basted, waiting block done tonight. I can say I have complained before to hubby about aches and pains but I had no idea how good I really felt until it all went south and totally relapsed. I doubt I will be as easy to whine about feeling bad now and a very long while again before I complain.

Machine sewing has been easier, but Freezer Paper Piecing still requires a bit too much hand manipulation and so I haven't gotten to work on the CW blocks as much this week. But not to fear, I had some other blocks ready to go and got them over the last few days.

Above: B7 Hot Cross Buns...Done with Wendy's 3 Piece Freezer Paper Template technique, which worked wonderfully and will be used many times over!

Above... B7 World Series. Done with Anina's directions using reverse and regular applique.

Above....K2 Grandpa's Chickens...using regular strip piecing.

Above...G11 Decisions, Decisions; Again using the same 3 piece Diamond in a Rectangle piecing from Wendy.

I absolutely have another block to show and CW blocks but they will just have to wait for the next post since I am falling asleep at the keyboard.

Short and sweet...

Since my hand sewing is stopped for the moment, I thought I'd work on Civil War blocks. They don't contain any hand sewing...but wow, are they getting complicated and labor intensive.

Here are the few from yesterday and today...I'm going lighter in fabric choices, although the pictures don't show them as light as they are in real life.

Top Row; left to right...
LL Pg. 163 Nothing Like an Affectionate Wife
D Pg. 69 Lincoln's Telegraph
D Pg. 61 Merchantable Goods

Bottom Row; left to right...
D Pg. 133 Small Pox
D Pg. 135 Surrender of Vicksburg
D Pg.63 Bad Box

**before I get emails....I don't know where you can find any Abe's, sorry. If not for a very sweet friend who shared a couple with me I wouldn't have any either. I will say you can make a copy of the best Abe picture from the book and print it onto the photo paper...which was my option. We are allowed to copy the book for personal use only, so it should be fine to do so.

Dear Jane...

Yes, I like lots and lots of projects at the same time. Yes, I get so excited when looking at others projects that I sometimes start them too. More than sometimes. Can't help it.

So, I decided to show off the new project that I started with my new spring colors. I have drooled and swooned over seeing these Dear Jane blocks and couldn't stand it any longer. I watch the Dear Jane blog all the time, commenting and drooling over the quilt that I bought background fabric for almost 4 years ago! I've planned this quilt a hundred times over the years. Then after looking at Anina's sample blocks on the blog and finding Wendy's blocks from the list of participants, I was too far gone to stop. These are the blocks I've done in the past week or more.

I'm not making the whole quilt...far from it! I'm stopping at 25 blocks. I'm really concentrating on small 50" square quilts at the moment and doing lots of planning for new quilts in that size as well as all the other larger ones.

I also started the July 4th patriotic quilt kit that I bought when Libby and I headed out to Primitives of the Midwest last summer. These are the "flowers" nifty huh? No, the circles aren't meant to be perfect circles. I've got the rest ready to sew but unfortunately I'm having to parcel out my hand sewing for the moment and do it only when I can. I'm having a bad flare up at the moment of my muscular condition and I have no clue why. I pulled out my hips reaching up really high on my design wall and the treatment caused other issues in my muscles. Now for some reason my knuckles want to swell and ache and I need to nip this in the bud before it gets any further. I plan to sew for years to come. You don't realize how good you felt until it comes back with a vengeance. So the many projects keep me doing what I can at the moment...hand, applique, or machine.