About Me

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New Jersey, United States
I am the wife of a wonderful husband and the mom of three super adult kids and their spouses. I also proudly have five adorable grandsons. I happily taught preschool for 25 years. When I'm not with my grandsons I spend much of my time indulging in my "Quilty Pleasures."

Monday, March 30, 2015

Make-A-List Monday March/April

The month of March has been so busy!
We continued to have lots and lots of SNOW.
Our poor little fishpond boy was begging to come inside :)

We had a flood and a leak in our basement.  They were not connected, but the leak did some damage to at least two of my hanging quilt tops waiting to be quilted.. 




I decided to quilt them anyway.  The quilting does seem to hide some of the water stains.

I obtained a new Singer featherweight
sewing machine this month.




I named her Doris after my precious grandmother who passed away in 2000.

She joins my other three featherweights, Abigail, Bonnie and Caroline.

I treated myself to a new 
Kitchenaid Artisan Design mixer 
after my ancient hand mixer died.


 Here she is making mashed potatoes!


I was able to celebrate St. Patrick's Day with my two favorite Leprechauns.



Ryder and Logan and their mommy and daddy suffered a terrible stomach virus but I was able to avoid it by arming myself this way:





Don't laugh...
it worked and I did not get sick.

We celebrated my DBIL's birthday.

And just today, I got to spend time with my friend's triplets.  

Here are the three quilts I made for them.


Noah, Grace and Zoe are gorgeous and such good babies.  Their parents, Alison and Evan, are doing an amazing job.  I hope to be able to help them out more in the future.  I know from spending time with my own grand babies, an extra set of hands can make a big difference.





So many exciting things are happening with our family.  I hope to have a big announcement next month on
 Quilty Pleasures...That is only if I can wait an entire month.  This announcement might just deserve its own separate post.  



With all these things happening this month, I did not make much of a dent in my list, but I was able to get a few things accomplished...


March
(in review)

1.  Spend quality time with my wonderful grandsons.  

Okay...this list item is just an excuse to post ridiculously cute pictures of my little munchkins.  What can I say...I am head over heals in love with them!


Ryder pretended to be Mrs. Quackenbush...a local librarian, as he "reads" to Logan.




We played I Spy at another library with their collection of DVD's.


Logan after a bath...scrumptious!


Logan loves to look at himself in the mirror at the gym.




Finger Food!!!




Ryder loved the sharks at the Camden Aquarium.




We have so much fun making up stories about the props in Coco's Story Box.




Logan loves to help with the laundry.




St. Patrick's Day crafts at Mimi's house.




Ryder received his first sewing lesson on one of my Featherweights.




Brody loves his belly rubs from Ryder.  We received Brody as a puppy just days before Ryder was born so these two little boys have grown up together.




Ryder loves to play in the rice box...a Christmas gift from Mimi and Granddad.




Logan wishes the snow will go away so he can play outside.




Ryder and his daddy...Kyle.




Those eyes..... :)




Ryder and Logan met their newest cousin, KARA.




Delicious!




Ryder, Logan and I went on a scavenger hunt at our local mall on a day too cold to play outside.  We had to find 20 different things.  In these pictures you can see us finding a mannequin, a hat, Disney things, a fire extinguisher and pink shoes.  We had so much fun this day.




Logan can't wait for baseball season to start.  He is too young to realize that baseball season takes his daddy away for soooo many hours :(



<3




Ryder and his mommy planted flower seeds.







First Steps!




I'm not sure if this video will work.  I am still learning how to upload videos to my blog.  Here is another attempt:


Logan's First Steps :)



Tag





2.  Attend the Quilts for Kids workshop at Pennington Quilt Works.




This is the quilt I made this month.

3.  Attend Saturday Sampler workshop at Pennington Quilt Works.



4.  Attend Strip Club at The Village Quilter.

This is strip club from February:



This is Strip Club from March:





5.  Attend Quiltfest in Somerset, NJ.

This show seems to get smaller and smaller each year.  Still there were definitely some beautiful quilts to see:



6.  Attend two quilt shows in Lancaster, PA:

The Lancaster Quilt Show at The Continental Inn
I enjoy this show each year...not for the quilts since there really aren't very many to view.  My favorite featherweight vendor attends this show and the Hershey show in July.  I have purchased two featherweights and a hand crank from Richard and Betty Neff of Pennsylvania Quilter and I respect their knowledge of all things vintage sewing.  

The AQS Quilt Show at the Lancaster Convention Center

The AQS show totally makes up for the lack of quilts at The Lancaster Quilt Show.



There were so many to view and they were all amazing.




7.  Celebrate my DFIL's 80th birthday.

My Dear Father-in-Law turned 80 this month and we were able to get our family together to celebrate.




 Four generations of Hutchinson men.  
The birthday boy is in the top row, right side.


My little Rybear and Me!

8.  Garden Stroll inspired commission quilt.

This is the center of the quilt.


It will have a pieced border. This is one of the border blocks.

Here are three of the border blocks together.  

My next step is to determine the size of my coping strip and then I can begin to attach the borders to this quilt top.

9.  Katie and Brian's Memory quilt.

I purchased fabric for this quilt in Lancaster.

I am going to stick to the pink and brown color scheme of the nursery.  This will probably to the last picture of this quilt that I will post before the quilt is presented because Katie is an avid reader of this blog and I want her to be surprised.

10.  Make a few little zipper pouches for future gifts. 

No progress

11.  Quilt for Wyatt.

Hand stitching the binding was the last step for this quilt.

After the binding was complete I washed the quilt so it would be all ready for Shea to present to little Wyatt.


Here is the almost 1 year old with his new turtle quilt.


12.  Aiming for Accuracy II by Mishka's Playground.

This is the batik fabric I will use for this quilt.


The first two blocks complete.


13.  Nine 6" Economy blocks for the McCall's 
Make It Your Way quilt-along.

No progress.



14.  Complete piecing, quilting , binding and labeling a 
Quilts for Kids quilt.


My quilt is pictured above.

15. Prepare backings and bindings for Aurifil,  two Tell It to the Stars, and Wishes.

I was only able to prepare the backing and binding for my blue version of Tell It to the Stars.


16.  Prepare a label for Victory and Orca Bay.



Victory has been labeled.
Look for this quilt in a future Show & Tell Tuesday post.


17.  January, February and March blocks for the Arcadia Avenue Quilt Along sponsored by Sassafras Lane Designs.

Here are the January and February blocks completed.

These blocks are paper pieced so I was only able to finish two of them.  
I LOVE the way they turned out.


No progress was made on the following list items:

18.  January, February and March Mini-Quilts by the Aurifil Thread Designer of the Month.

19.  January, February and March blocks for the Friendship Star Sisters 
2015 Block of the Month.

20.  January, February and March blocks for Quiltmaker Magazine 
2015 New Year's Mystery:

21.  January, February and March blocks for Pat Sloan's 2015 Mystery Quilt:  Vacation Time.

22. January, February and March blocks for Calypso Kaleidoscope by 

23. January, February and March blocks for Scrapitude: Scrap-in-a-Box 
mystery quilt.

24. January, February and March blocks for the RSC15 Sampler by So Scrappy.

25. January, February and March Blocks for the 

26.  Complete quilting the top currently loaded on Annie:  
 Aiming for Accuracy I and any other quilts currently on my

I was able to finish quilting Aiming for Accuracy I and the September 2011 Stash Club - Nine Patch quilt.




No progress was made on the following list items:

27.  Bind/label 5 table runners, Watermelon Mania and other quilts I complete this month.

28.  Black & White Sampler blocks

29.  Crazy Quilt using Shar Jorgenson templates by Omnigrid.

30.  Fit for a Hero, a quilt by Judy Laquidara.

31.  Grandma Mary's 9-Patch, a strip club quilt by The Village Quilter.

32.  Country Threads Sampler blocks.

33.  Candy Striper by Anita Grossman Solomon.

34.  Julie Herman's Toes in the Sand quilt.

35.  Uncle Sam's Quilt, a strip club quilt by The Village Quilter.


36.  Dear Jane triangles.

37.  Work on the following BRODY Projects:

*Civil War Tribute
James River Blues
Daisy Dazzle
Glory Box Table Runner
Cool Breeze

Just a little progress on Civil War Tribute.




April

1.  Spend quality time with my wonderful grandsons.  

2.  Attend the Quilts for Kids workshop at Pennington Quilt Works.

3.  Attend Saturday Sampler workshop at Pennington Quilt Works.

4.  Celebrate my two DS's birthdays.

5.  Celebrate Easter with my family.

6.  Attend a "Paint Party" hosted by my DA Kathy.

7.  Attend the 2015 New Jersey Shop Hop.

8.  Make a first birthday shirt for little Logan.

9.  Garden Stroll inspired commission quilt.

10.  Katie and Brian's Memory quilt.

11.  Make a few little zipper pouches for future gifts. 

12.  Aiming for Accuracy II by Mishka's Playground.

13.  Nine 6" Economy blocks for the McCall's 
Make It Your Way quilt-along.

14.  Complete piecing, quilting , binding and labeling a 
Quilts for Kids quilt.

15. Prepare backings and bindings for Aurifil,  Tell It to the Stars, and Wishes.

16.  Prepare a label for Orca Bay.

17.   March and April blocks for the Arcadia Avenue Quilt Along sponsored by Sassafras Lane Designs.


18.  January, February, March and April Mini-Quilts by the Aurifil Thread Designer of the Month.


19.  January, February, March and April blocks for the Friendship Star Sisters 

2015 Block of the Month.

20.  January, February, March and April blocks for Quiltmaker Magazine 

2015 New Year's Mystery:
Auld Lang Stitches.

21.  January, February, March and April blocks for Pat Sloan's 2015 Mystery Quilt:  Vacation Time.


22. January, February, March and April blocks for Calypso Kaleidoscope by 

Quilt Addicts Anonymous.

23. January, February, March and April blocks for Scrapitude: Scrap-in-a-Box 

mystery quilt.

24. January, February, March and April  blocks for the RSC15 Sampler by So Scrappy.

25. January, February, March and April Blocks for the 

26.  Complete quilting the top currently loaded on Annie:  
 Mexican Cross and any other quilts currently on my

27.  Bind/label 5 table runners, Watermelon Mania, Aiming for Accuracy 1, September 2011 Stash Club - 9 Patch, and other quilts I complete this month.

28.  Black & White Sampler blocks

29.  Crazy Quilt using Shar Jorgenson templates by Omnigrid.

30.  Fit for a Hero, a quilt by Judy Laquidara.

31.  Grandma Mary's 9-Patcha strip club quilt by The Village Quilter.

32.  Country Threads Sampler blocks.

33.  Candy Striper by Anita Grossman Solomon.

34.  Julie Herman's Toes in the Sand quilt.

35.  Uncle Sam's Quilta strip club quilt by The Village Quilter.


36.  Dear Jane triangles.

37.  Work on the following BRODY Projects:

Civil War Tribute
James River Blues
Daisy Dazzle
Glory Box Table Runner
Cool Breeze


Until Next Time.....Happy Stitching!!!

Sharyn