Blast from the Past April 2014

I’m doing a little series of posts that feature old blog posts.  I have been going back and looking at them.  It’s been fun.  I started blogging in June 2009…WOW.  Over fourteen years. Today I’m still playing catch up. I’m so glad I’ve kept the blog as a diary of sorts…today I’m telling you about things I was working on in April of 2014.

April was a busy month. Kelli, my daughter, and I were cranking out quilts. We were writing our book Country Girl Modern and making all the quilts. Kelli took on the pattern writing and I was at the long arm and binding quilts as quickly as I could. All of this was done in secret. We weren’t allowed to tell anyone we were working on a book.

This is a pile of the quilts I shared with you all. I finished the longarming and binding of these five quilts. All were destine to be in our book.

This quilt returned home. It’s a design by Kelli and I.

It was made from our block that was featured in Quiltmaker’s 100 block issue. This was returned to us after it was featured in the Fall issue. 100 blocks was a previous publication that they later discontinued.

You can read more about that quilt HERE.

That was from the fall issue and this was our block that was featured in the Spring issue that came out in April.

Kelli was busy sewing and make this table topper quilt. You can read about Kelli’s quilt HERE.

This was another table topper from Kelli. You can find the link for the table topper HERE. The free pattern link is there too!!

In writing this post, I realized I didn’t have this listed as a free pattern. I added the link to the right-hand column of free patterns on the blog, so you will have access to it anytime.

I did the quilting and binding on both of them for her.

Bonnie Hunter’s latest book was out. In it was a quilt called Spoolin Around. Previous to the publication the blocks were part of her quilt challenge for the year.

I had made 309 blocks previous to seeing the published quilt. When the book came, I immediately wanted to use my sewn blocks in this design. I quickly flipped to the directions at a glance.  Oh my?!?!  I am not even close.  I have 309….I need 648!!  I am not even half way there.

I later made and finished this quilt. It is one of my favorites.

We were cover girls. That’s our quilt on the cover of American Patchwork and Quilting. You can read more about the quilt HERE.

I was doing some foster care for some pups. In the middle with Kelli is my foster dog Buster. Puppycat Kelli’s dog in on the left and Ruby on the right. Both of our beagles have passed away.

Kalissa and Craig joined us beagle owners with their purchase of Betsy. Sadly Betsy recently passed away too.

The house remodel was taking a TON of our time. This is the side of the house before it was fixed. I am facing south. We were getting ready to remove the right 1/3 of the house.

This was a temporary wall that was constructed. It is not opening between my kitchen and dining room.

We were on the hunt for cabinets. We bought this for $110. Craig and I later stripped it. The cupboard serves as my pantry in this house. You can read about the cupboard HERE.

Kramer and I Were trying to come up with an idea for our kitchen island. I think the cabinet maker wanted something like $5000 for a kitchen island. We were on a budget and loved antiques so we came up with our own idea. I had seen a picture of the cabinet to the left on Pinterest. I asked Kramer if he could make one from an old Baker’s cabinet. He said YES. Then he had the idea to butt it and a big butcher block table that I bought on an auction for $100 together with the Baker’s Cabinet and that would be our island.

I LOVED the idea. We got right on the idea. Here is the start of his replication. I was painting it.It was what were doing in April of 2014.

The two piece are still in my house to this day…they still serve as my kitchen island…and I still very much love them.

In the kitchen, was making Lemon bars. They are the easiest bars ever. Just combine a can of lemon pie filling and an angel food cake mix. You can get the full recipe HERE.

This was a short Blast from the past as there wasn’t a lot of quilting that we could show you. It was mostly secret sewing and a lot of work on the house.

Check back soon as I’ll have a Blast from the Past for May.