Spring....Summer

I live in a country where we can feel the seasons. This past weekend was so nice, sunny and warm! In a few days it felt as if we went from the cold weather of winter to the warm sunny days of summer! What happened to spring? It was a perfect weekend to spend on our boat.

My daughters picked the first flowers of spring. The flowers made me so happy.

It's always fun to play with a little boat behind ours....

Everywhere there were “pulletjes”..that's what we call little ducks...we could not stop looking at them!



For me, a special sign of summer are the freckles on my daughters faces, soooo cute!

Lucy

Another mini

As you know I love to make minis. It is a present for someone who reads my blog. I am sure the person is going to be so surprised to find this mini in her mailbox soon :-)
I like the simplicity of this quilt. It has the Little House of the Prairie feel I love so much.

Lucy

Machine pieced

Handquilted

Batting: 100% cotton

Size: 11.5 " x 10"

The winner is........ (drum roll)

Ohh my goodness, I am so flattered by the amount of women who joined my Give away of Little Faithy. I wish I could make a doll for everyone of you :-). One hundred and seven, yes 107, women all over the world want to give Faithy a new home. Thank you ladies. Over the next few days I will be visiting all of your blogs, that should keep me busy!

Well, Ta daaaahhh, here she is :-)

And here are all your names in a bowl....



My 13 year old daughters hand, she will draw the name!



Wait!!! I think I'm as excited as you are! Where is Little Faithy going too???

Ok, I'm ready, go on girl.



The winner is ......

Diane from Persnickety!

Congratulations Diane :-)

(Yes, typing a name can be difficult for me ;-)

Lucy

Thank you! (Give Away)

I have been blogging since 2005. I never thought it would be such fun (and addictive… and time consuming...) Before I had a computer I loved to read (auto)biographies about women in Dutch magazines. At that time I never thought that years later I would read so many different life stories from women all over the world while blogging! Blogging gives me the opportunity to be a part of this. I also enjoy your creativity. Boy, I never found so much inspiration as out here on the net...

This little dress is part of my GIVE AWAY, a thank you to my blog readers. I always love to hear from you, your nice comments, the number of touching (private) emails makes me smile, every time again. Thank you!

Today I aged a body for a new Little Faithy! She is looking forward to a new home. If you want to enter this drawing, leave a comment on this post. You can also send me an email. The drawing will be closed when Little Faithy is finished. The next few days I don’t have a lot of time to sew.This will give a you the chance to sign up for this give away :-)) Good luck.

Lucy

New room

Last week we cleaned and painted our living room. We avoided doing this for almost two years! Spring is coming and we decided we couldn’t put it off anymore!

I had an old pink chair that I loved, but it was sagging badly and it's too costly to restore it. Isn't it sad that it is cheaper to buy a new chair, probably made in a third world country rather than restoring an old chair from the 20's? I thought there might be another solution. I searched on Marktplaats (a kind of eBay) and I found this chair for 6 euros (about 10 USD)! It looks almost exactly like the chair I had, and it's in a good condition. It only needed a new cover and I can do that myself. This is the result!

I also painted my red bookcase the same off white as the woodwork. I tidied away a lot of books and papers that don't have a special meaning. That created a lot of room! I also like the fact that my toy sewing collection shows up a lot better with the white walls and bookcase.

Do you remember my brown quiltrack. My Dh made it white and aged it. I LOVE the result :-)



My new fresh white room needs a new wall hanging. A quilt Kathie started inspired me. You can find it in The Ultimate Quilting by McCormick Gordon. As pink is my favourite colour I came up with the idea of making a mini quilt with the same feel about it. I can't wait to quilt it (and yes I know some of you are thinking: "How is Pim's quilt coming along?").

Lastly let me show you a bag I made using Bonnies Maverick stars. It is a sample for the quilt shop . I will be teaching a class to make the bag.

That’s all! This was my update from my fresh new spring looking room.

Lucy

Fun :-)

My girls watched an episode of the Little House on the Prairie. It was about Founders Day in Walnut Grove and all the activities going on there. One of the games was a run with legs tied to each other. My girls had to give it a try. They had so much fun :-)

Lucy

Mini Tumbler

Last Sunday I opened my closet to grab fabrics for a project I had in my mind to sew. I ended up with fabrics for a completely other quilt from the one I had in mind. (That happens to me more often ;-).

Weeks ago I saw this awesome mini tumbler on Lea's blog. I love it so much. She was inspired by Kathie, and so do I.

Well, when I opened my – still neat ;-) - closet for fabrics, my eye already moved to cut tumblers given by Dawn and Kathie.

Hé, that's easy. I only had to put them together, and I was distracted…

So on a pretty rainy Sunday I sewed them together, quilted and bound it. Before bedtime it was finished! Yeah maybe that's why I like minis so much.






-Finished size: 12,5 x 9,5 inch (32 x 24 cm.)
-Fabrics: 100% cotton
-Batting: 100% cotton. (I wish I know which one. It's a sample Bonnie sent me years ago. It is so thin and easy to quilt.)
-Machine pieced
-Hand quilted

Little Faithy 's pattern

Thank you so much for all your nice comments on Little Faithy. It was so much fun to make her that another Faithy will follow soon:-) You can find her pattern in this magazine: Create and Decorate, October 2007.

One little note: I enlarged the pattern 150% instead of 200%. I'm looking forward to see your Little Faithy :-)

Lucy

Little Faithy

In my last post I told you that I was sewing on something else besides my purple quilt. That was Faithy. I have been searching for a primitive prairie doll for a long time. I couldn't find it. I asked Libby, who has a beautiful primitive style of quilting, if she knew where I could buy a pattern or a doll. A few days later she told me that she found a pattern in a magazine and she was so generous enough to send it to me. Thank you so much Libby!

I was so happy; this is the doll I was looking for!!! As soon as Libby's package came I had to start with the creation of Faithy. After I read the poem that goes with the doll I couldn't stop.

The creation of Faithy gave me a lot of surprises. To age the body I had to use instant coffee and the oven!! I have never done this before. So I did exactly what the information on the pattern told me.

You should have seen my son's face when he came home from school and smelling the oven was, asked in surprise: "Mmm, mam, what are you baking???", me: "a doll".
Son (disapointed and wondering): a doll ???

After 15 minutes baking my doll turned out very,very, aged!! As if I had picked her up straight from a rubbish dump! No, this aging is too much.

So I started the whole process again with less instant coffee ......

Meanwhile my whole family had come home, and while we had dinner I was still aging a doll. Five persons were looking at me quizically: what's mom doing now??? I was acting as if it is normal to age a parts of a doll in the oven.

This time I was more satisfied. Still a bit too aged, but I learned a lot for next time. I aged everything with instant coffee, the dress, the bonnet and the skirt. When you start aging everything has to be aged :-)

Finally, Little Faithy is born. Here she is !

(...and her perfume is: Yes, instant coffee :-)

Lucy


The Story of Little Faithy

I was born Faithy Trumbull in Ohio,
Excatly where, I still don't know.
Sewn from scraps of cloth and thread,
I had no face upon my head.

We trudged along in our wagon train
As we made our way across the plain.
Each day, towards the setting sun,
We rode for hours 'til we were done.

Little four-year-old Sissy held me tight,
on her lap all day, on her pillow at night.
She'd look at me in a funny way,
She'd turn to her mother, and she would say:

Momma, my Faithy doesn't have a face
Don't worry, Sissy,that's no disgrace.
Those with faces are so plain
All their expressions are the same
When Faithy's mood has a swing
Your imagination can paint anything.

When Sissy got old she forgot about me,
I sat on her cupboard waiting patiently.
If I had eyes I would have cried
When they laid me by the new babe's side.

As Betsy grew older she really loved me,
We talked of love as we drank our tea.
And only to her did I belong,
Wherever she went I tagged along.

But I got dirty and I got worn,
It'd been a while since I was born.
And as Sissy fixed the dress I wore,
I heard the words I heard before:

Sissy, my Faithy doesn't have a face
Don't worry, Betsy, that's no disgrace.
Those with faces are so plain
All their expressions are the same
When you're with Faithy every day,
You can see her face in your own way.

Although Betsy was my best friend,
Every good thing must sometime end.
So they put me in a trunk to keep,
On soft blankets so I could sleep.

How many years I softly slumbered,
How many dreams, sweet unencumbered.
But somebody finally remembered me,
And opended the lid and set me free.

There was Betsey's wrinkled face,
And another woman I couldn't place.
And a sweet girl of five or four,
And I heard those words before:

Momma, that dolly doesn't have a face
Don't worry, Carrie, that's no disgrace,

Those with faces are so plain
All their expressions are the same
She's had many faces on which to boast,
You can choose the one that you love most

Written by Larry Franz

Lynn's daughter Eve is visiting Holland for two weeks. She is staying with friends of the family in Groningen. Because I have children about the same age as Eve, Lynn and I thought it would be nice for her to spend a few days with us. She went with my son to Amsterdam, we showed her a bit of Haarlem, and we had a very good time with her. Right now she is in Groningen, but she will come back at Easter. It was so nice to have her over.

Lucy

PS. I hope to show you more of my purple quilt soon. I had a busy week without much sewing, and what I sewed wasn't my purple quilt.

Purple quilt I

These are my first blocks for my purple quilt! Do they make you curious?? :-)

Lucy

Goat farm

Patti was wondering what we were doing at the goat farm. Our 13 year old loves animals and they love her back. It is so special to see her with the animals, she lights up and is so happy. Being a special needs child when she is happy we are happy.
Unfortunately for her we live in a city. Going to the farm lets us escape the city and enjoy a bit of the country for a few hours. Luckily for her we have a dog, Joseph. They are Joseph are so special to each other. We also have two guinea pigs. Our 13 year old is the one to take care of them and I think nobody in the world can do that better than she does.

Since we can't run a farm at our place (something she would love), we visit the goat farm once in a while. The children can feed the goats for a little fee.







They also can feed little goats a bottle of milk. Or what our 13 year old did, feed a big pig a bottle!!



A perfect day for our 13 year old and the goats! (and for her mom who enjoy this trip as much as she does )




Lucy

At the goat farm. Isn't she cute :-)

Lucy

Painter

A few days ago I started my new purple quilt. I LOVE how it is coming along. For a beautiful quilt you need beautiful fabrics. I can't search in this mess for beautiful fabrics anymore. Time for a real makeover!


For a moment I almost regretted I started it. My Darling (read: featherweight) was calling me all the time, even in this mess. I knew that ordering my fabrics in this closet would take more time than I wanted.

Finally, after hours, a night sleep and more hours it looks like this :-)


Wow, what a difference! That gives a satisfying feeling. Pfff.. Time to relax..



What’s that! No!! I left this golden box filled with darning wool on my stove. It came out of the mess and it needs a place back in the closet. Hmm, maybe I can organize the wool from the golden box into a smaller box, then I will find a place.




I'm ready to sew :-)

Lucy


Ps... Maybe you wondered why this post is called painter. Maybe you are wondering how I can turn this closet into such a mess,

Well when I'm sewing I feel just like a painter, instead of throwing with paint I throw my fabrics all around me, sorry I can't help it. I enjoy the sewing part so much that I can´t think about folding the used fabrics....
I don't have a sewing room. I sew in my living room (actually my living room is my sewing room) I need the table for sewing and for our dinners. So what to do a few minutes before I have to serve dinner? Yes I grab all the fabrics and squeeze them into the closet!
My intention is to keep this closet tidy for a while, but I can't promise ;-)

Too many ideas...

Do you know the problem: too many ideas...



I have a great idea with this purple fabric! I bought it a few years ago. It is patiently waiting for when I'm ready for it :-) Today, tomorrow??



Kathie showed me her 'March quilting plan'. So beautiful, I made blocks of this pattern years ago. They never made it into a quilt. Shall I join her? It is a lot of fun to sew together, and these blocks will end in a top :-)



LaDonna showed me a quilt her mother bought years ago. The quilt is very special to her. I love it! I have wanted to make this pattern ever since I have been quilting. So I thought it should be fun to make this quilt together. I will use these fabrics for the first block. First I have to buy a solid which goes with the flowers!




In the meantime I haven’t forgotten Pim's quilt! I promised him (and Tracey inspired me) this quilt would be finished in April!

Too many ideas... believe me these are just a few; I have a lot more :-)
I love to dream about every single idea I have.

Lucy