Whats Black and White and Red All Over?

When I think of that question my first thoughts are grade school and the first thing that comes to mind is a Skunk in a blender.  But my wife does not approve of that one so I guess a News Paper will work for a more safe answer.  When I asked Jared the same thing he came running into the room with this item on the left.  So today's teaser is my newest rag quilt.  It will be another giveaway choice.  So now 2 of our giveaway quilts are finished and 2 of them are on the home stretch.  After making this post and making a post on Julia's blog (oh did I mention the cute little one has her own blog?)  Tanya had a baby shower and with in an half hour of this post, I should have a baby shower post up there.  There are some cute posts from my kids to their yet to be born sister.  For those that will later want to see pictures of Julia I will put some here but most of the pictures will go there.  So you may want to book mark it.

My newest rag quilt (name not quite decided, but close) will have our red paisleys.  As I hinted yesterday while at Joann's I finally found more of that fabric and I bought every inch they had, which was just shy of 2 yards.  They also had flannel on sale and bought some red for one of the other projects still sitting on hold.  Its the Case Equipment quilt, but before I got home from work had the bright idea to combine the paisleys and the red as a sandwich and then random light's and dark's from my Man Quilt stash (figure we can spruce up them a little) after all Paisley Parade was a popular quilt.

While writing this post my sons cat Chubby Wubby decided to knock something off the dresser and that just deserved a picture.

At the baby shower one of the many things Tanya got were these 2 burp cloths.  Not that my wife's were not wonderful but these are amazing.  I am not a hand sewer or crocheter but these are just fantastic.

These are the back's and front's of both of them.

Both are frogs and both are very cute cant believe I cant wait for them to be thrown up on.  The joys of parenthood.

One last reminder http://juliadawnhealey.blogspot.com/ is Julia's blog and I will post the pile of gifts and a couple pictures of my wife over there in just a bit.






Linking Too

Giveaway Quilt Top Finished

The original plan was to make 3 granny quilts and 1 5 X 5 quilt for myself.  In my zeal to make blocks, I well did not think far enough ahead and/or calculate the size of the blocks versus the size of the quilt.  My wife, Tanya and I sat down the other night and went though the huge pile of blocks and realized that I was 2 colors short of making 1 5 X 5 block quilt for me.  We then sorted though the Granny Blocks and realized if I did 2 blocks of each color group (20 blocks in quilt so 2 of each of 10 different colors)  that I was 4 reds short, and 1 purple and 1 green of making my 2 Grandmothers their quilts.  Then I realized I was 17 blocks shy of making my give away quilt

 At about this time, Tanya pointed out the huge pile of extra 5 X 5 blocks.  Making 2 more red blocks would give me my 12 color for my quilt. The 12th leftover block and enough blocks for 2 instead of 1 quilts. Since I have now totally lost the Granny love (To complete the 4 quilts that will be 1000 2 1/2 inch blocks for the Granny's and 600 2 1/2 inch blocks I sewed for the 5X5).  The 1600 blocks that I have sewed  is enough, I am done.

 Granny's are out of my system.  I have 2 blocks left to make, the green and purple that I was short and I am done. Now that the end is in sight, its time to start sewing these things all together.  Tanya and I went shopping today and bought 2 types of white fabric for the borders and the back.  Then I bought, some while I'm going to keep it a secret for now, binding fabric to bind my 4 quilts.  The plan is Saturday to quilt and maybe bind the quilt top here, for one of the 4 quilts in the Giveaway for Julia's B-Day and Birth Weight.  That will leave 1 quilt to do.

   Not to be out done, my wife has been sewing up blocks for rag quilts that took a creative turn today when I found something in Joann's. The Man Quilt with a huge twist, for the 4th quilt will also get done this weekend.  All four of the giveaway quilts should be ready before the baby gets here.  Tanya has been counting down the days, 20 days from now (OK 19 by the time most of you read this) until her official due date.

For any one who has not yet put your guess in, please go now and put your guess in to win one of these 4 wonderful quilts.

Oh and here is the red set of blocks and 4 more extra granny's that I completed. I will have I think 8 spare granny blocks when all is said and done. I may have to do a give away or something to get some one to take this obsession away from me, because I am done with it for this month.

Link A Finish Friday #7

The Goal for me this year is 52 Finishes in 52 weeks help keep me honest and show off your own finishes at the same time its a Link A Finish Friday!!

This week I am proud to show off my wife's 2 finishes on my link a finish Friday.  She can not believe I am so excited about this but I am she made them with out me prodding or prompting her at all this quilting stuff is my passion and it seems to be tempting her some to do which is fun.

This week the most popular link was to Sherbet Pips Quillow which Is a fold up quilt/pillow what a cute idea.

What have you finished this week link it up

So for the rules.

1) Who likes rules. Toss them out.
2) Add a link to your finish blog or where ever you show off your finishes (Not limited to quilts but I like them the most).
3) Visit a few of the finishes and comment or encourage them on.

Not Required but fun to do

1) Follow my blog.
2) Follow the blog of all those that link.
3) Link back to my blog.
4) No finish, go quilt and stop reading the web.

I am in Bliss

My wife had to laugh at me today I got a pink package in the mail.  You would think after her dealing with the fact my favorite color is purple that pink packages would not be a issue.  And better yet inside of the pink package was the wonderful charm pack domestic bliss.  My wife already could tell you which ones I would like  before it even showed up (she goggled it when I first won). 

Thanks goes to Vroomans Quilts if you have not been too her site I highly recommend it.   One of the things I find neat on her site is she is keeping track of the Traveling Stash boxes and keeps you up to date on who is currently holding giveaways to win this if you have not been to her site go check it out.

To Hexy or Not To Hexy That is the question

I won some Hexagons from the Leap Day blog hop.  I find these giveaways so much fun.  Each and every one that I have won and those that I have given give me a chance to try something new.  I have not been quilting all that long so every thing is new and exciting to me.  Polka Dot Classic is where I won this most recent Item.  It is a set of 88 1 inch Mylar Hexagons.  My wife started researching this when she found out I won and even then was some what confused.  I was so happy to find that Marta made me one flower as an example.  My daughter Rebecca also loved these and want to give them a try.  I don't think I could make a full size quilt out of these but I love applique and these would be fun to make and applique onto a quilt top.  So look forward to these showing up some time in the future in my work.

It was funny about 5 minutes after I wrote my last post on the Burp Cloth Tanya made she came in and dropped this one on my desk.  I can tell she is getting baby hungry.  She did this one rag style so we had to wash it once before taking the first picture.  The borders around and though the middle are created with one of the many decorative stitches that we have on our sewing machine.  It turned out amazing.  The stitch looks like a diamond it goes out and in and then back out to the next diamond.  She sewed it with a multi colored thread that is changing colors.  Any way congrats to Tanya.  She made me promise not to link this post to any sites I was suppose to promise the same thing on the last one but got busted linking it to Such A Sew in Sew on her monthly finish drawing.  Oops.  Better to ask forgiveness then... oh wait I was told before hand not to link it so um that does not work.  So here is my public apology for it.  Please post and tell her how wonderful they look she thinks they did not turn out wonderful and I am so happy with them.

Love You Tanya your the best and I am proud of every thing you do. And every thing you do for me.