June Update, July Goals and Sewing Space #2

Where did June go?  I missed the mark on my June Finish Goal for A Lovely Year of Finshes.  My week long trip to Washington State sure did take a bite out of my creative time. It didn't help that I came home full of nasty things I inhaled on the plane, my son passed around an even nastier tummy bug and I totally forgot that I would have catch-up work at the office.  

Here's some things that I did get done or started:

From top left traveling clockwise...Red Bird from Heather Bailey's Birds and Branches, June's ALYOF quilt top (I added the boarder on 6/30 but no photo), border cuts and my Yellow Bird, iPad pouch attempt #2, 5 pouches for my WA trip, Sis and me on the way home from WA. Not pictured...my mending jag; Hubbies cycling jersey, Son #2's Chubbies shorts, my robe, and trimmed and serged some useless micro-fibre wash-clothes to fit my Swifter.

I also celebrated a birthday. I was born in 1960. I think my Sweetie may have shorted me 50 SmallCakes. I'll give him until the end of 2014 to make it up to me.

A Quilting first for me in June...I finally won something! Must have been the magic of my birthday month. Thank you so much Hema. I'm giving a sneak peek here but I will give it a full share a little later. 

My Prize!

Now for my July 2014 List of potential project:

1.   Experimental Bar Mops for a top secret project. If it works I will share. If it doesn't work...I'll probably share the failure anyway.

2.   Finish my ALYOF goal for last month. The top is complete with borders. I am still in the process of scribbling the back on graph paper. I haven't settled on a design yet.

3.   Start on that Wedding Quilt I have mentioned before. I have had another design change of heart. My goal is to at least have the fabric purchased by the end of July. I am giving myself a November 1st deadline since that is the original wedding date. Coincidentally, it is also my anniversary.

4. Start and finish a project using my newly won quilting bounty.

My July Goal is once again to finish completely the goal I set for June.  That would be project #2 in blue from above.

 Another Sewing Space share:

When I set up my sewing space after Master's 2013 I moved to the Rec/Bonus Room. Sorry, no photos of the setup.

I set up in that corner between the Dart Board and the Carom Board. The pool table was a great layout area until the guys wanted to play. The wool felt like to hang on to all the little bits of thread and fluff.

Then red leather chair and Ikea "Dave" was nice for handwork in front of the TV. How many "Daves" do you see in the above photo? Well, that's less than half of the number we own. We love those things. They are still available but they changed name. Too many name infringement lawsuits? They will always be "Dave" to us.

I stored my fabric and tools in that little black cabinet. But not everything. I still had things in the guest room. It's a long haul between these two spaces. More and more tools migrated over. It go pretty crowded.

I broke the area down for the stream of November and December visitors over the Holidays. I didn't set it up again. The next space has a bit of a sordid history. It started ugly, real ugly...

Linking up with Freshly Pieced WIP Wednesday.

Linking up with Lily's Quilts Small Blog Hop.

My Sewing Space-Try One

Alternate title:     My Sewing Space-Or Lack There Of

I do not live in a palatial palace but my home is pretty spacious. Especially for a family of four with one out of the house. 

My home of the past two years is about 3400sf. It is the Salisbury plan by William Poole. I really need to whip up some Aunt Bea dresses so I can feel more at home. (See the description blurb on the W.E.P website to clarify)

http://www.williampoole.com/plans/Salisbury

http://www.williampoole.com/plans/Salisbury

http://www.williampoole.com/plans/Salisbury

The "Future Rec Room" is finished in my house.

My house is nestled among a collection of newer homes in a tiny sidewalk lined neighborhood with alleys and an abundance of rocking chair front porches. It is supposed to bring your mind back to gentler days before AC made us all shut-ins. We have little to no front yards to speak of. It works fairly, we do interact with our neighbors more than in any other place we have lived, but it is a bit like living in a fishbowl or maybe Disney Land. We are close, somewhat fake and there is a steady stream of tourists prowling the neighborhood taking in all the cuteness.

I love this house, it is adorable but it isn't really my style. I would prefer something more streamlined and industrial but lets face it, I live in the South and my style would not go over well. The flow of the house is pretty wonderful too.

Now to my dilemma:

(For more clarification see my Sew post for my sewing history.)

It's a curse and a blessing. We live in close proximity to the Augusta National, home of the famed Master's Tournament. Like many other large events, our area does not have the hotel accommodations to support its signature event and the there is a huge demand for locals to rent their homes. 

We rent ours. Queen to King beds are expected in all the bedrooms. All my rooms are set up with queens. Unfortunately, I have to keep mine set up year round because I do not have walk-out storage that would accommodate a queen mattress and it will not fit up my attic stairs ether.

My first attempt at a sewing space was in Bedroom 4, our designated Guest Room.

I wasn't crazy about all the sewing paraphernalia decorating my hutch in the guest room.

This is the only shot I took so you'll have to use your imagination. At the machine location you see above I would roll back to hit the closet and my foot pedal would often disappear under the bed. I moved to the window table which was great for FMQ since I put my second table in front of the closet and had an L-shape of wall to contain the quilt volume. My problem was the table blocked my closet storage area and my chair was even closer to the bed than it had been to the closet. Bump-bump-bump, it drove me bonkers. I lasted about nine months.

When I broke down for our first Master's rental I reset my sewing space up in the Rec Room, or as we call it, the Bonus Room. Was it a better location?

Trip home post 2:

See my first post here.

I had a great time on my trip to Kennewick, WA, with my Big Sis. The sun comes up about an hour earlier in the Tri-Cities and our bedroom window faced east so I had no problem maintaining a pretty eastern rise time. 

I was happy to see that the community gardens at the library down the street were thriving. They were in their infancy on my last visit. So many times efforts like this fizzle but not this time. It was beautiful and showed all the signs of being well cared for and utilized by the community.

Sis on our first morning walk

It was one big nostalgia fest driving around where we grew up in the 60's and 70's. So much has changed and there are some surprising things that made me feel 10 again. David's Shoes on Kennewick Ave. was unchanged down to the strong smell of leather. It was surrounded by the expected collection of antique stores, bars, empty store fronts and offices you expect to see on a neglected main street. It was good to see that there has been a surge in urban renewal efforts directed downtown the past few years. It looked like its days of decline were over and it was on its way back to its former glory.  Here is a section of photos from our day of getting reacquainted with our old community: A cute little bird house I spotted in one of the Kennewick Ave. antique shops.

Classic sign from our high school You can see forever here. In GA we can barely see across the street. Crossing the cable bridge over the Columbia River.  Mural painted in the refurbished Kennewick Library by some high school friends. More trip updates to come...

Thanks for visiting my blog!

Graduation and a Gift

What a great weekend. We celebrated the graduation of our oldest son from the Brock School of Business at Samford University. It was so special to see all the young people crossing that stage and receiving their diplomas. Samford is oh-so-beautiful year round but especially in the Spring.

It was a bit sad walking the campus knowing that this chapter has come to a close for our son.  The bright spot is that Drew will continue working with the campus population next year. There will be another group of Launchers to mentor and the pancake parties will go on.

We helped him move out of his dorm and into his new apartment in Bham. He will be home for a few days next week and then back to his new home for good. It feels good to have him successfully leave the nest but we are sad to have him five hours away. At least he is not on the opposite coast (like me) or other side of the world. Though that day will come.

Now for some crafty updates...

I finished my first project with Heather Bailey's Birds and Branches. I did the cover since it had the photo I could follow for color placement. I have never done a needlework project that did not have a legend to follow and I am finding it a bit intimidating making those choices myself. I have jumped in on bird number two. I am sure I will embrace having color choice freedom in short order.

My plan is to complete three of the birds and incorporate them into some scrappy minis to hang in my future studio. Why don't I have a studio now? I'll save that for a future post. It is a slightly interesting topic in itself.

But, I will tell you why I have chosen Birds and Branches for this project. My husband has always come up with interesting nicknames for our pets, me and our boys. It started with our first fur-baby, a miniature dachshund named Wee Woodman Editsto or Woody for short. He called him Woody-Gator because of his big mouth. It did not stop there, the silly nickname list was quite long.

Now for the birds...Shortly after we brought our first son home from the hospital he started calling me Mommie Bird. The nickname lives on more than twenty years later and has made me love all things birdie. You would think my home would be full of birds but it isn't. I am not much of collector. I prefer less clutter. But this is a "wall" project so it is okay.

On a related note...

When I came home from Alabama this weekend I found a little box in the mail. Look what was in it! An adorable blue bird figurine. It is from some dear friends who live overseas.

My New Blue Birds

Bird on the shelf with a broom from India, family figurine from Kenya, egg from Romania, original painting of our surname initial with the Chinese symbol for "Family" decorating the "F",  and Three Wise Men from Puerto Rico. All special international gifts we have received.

I have a big finish that I am dying to share but will wait until the end of the month since it is my A Lovely Year of Finishes project for this month. Plus, I still need sunny day photos with the real camera.