Advice?

I found this plaid fabric in my "stash" last night and was wondering if you think I should use it on my pink elephan quilt.  The plaid is actually pinker than it looks in the picture and the pink isn't quite so bright, and the background for hte pink elephants is more cream than yellow.  The second picture is more accurate.

 

 My thoughts are
            1) to use the plaid instead of the pink or cream,
            2) to use the plaid for sashing, or
            3) to use the plaid as a small border (before the other elephant fabric I have)

So, what do you think?  I've decided to use it as the binding even if I use it in the quilt as well.

And More Wine Tasting

and now, back to wine tasting in Napa ...

Our third winery was Raymond. (Where do they come up with these names??) 

Raymond was an interesting place.  The bar area was fairly traditional but the rest of it was anything but.  I'm not sure what this area was -- we just looked around and then left.

 

These "angels" were up above. 

Outside there was a little walkway with a garden with lots of veggies and other things.  I thought it would be really dull, but it was quite interesting.  Either that or I had had a few too many sips.

 Weeds .. volunteer plants. hmmm.

 At the end there was a spot for picture taking ...

And then the last one.  It looked like a warehouse from the outside, but inside it was great! I think when it says "tasting cellar" that was the room we were in.  it was massive, smelled winey (in a good way).  It was perfect for our final stop.

 Behind the bar.

 The three of us ..

All in all, a good day with some very interesting wines and wineries.  Can't wait to do it again.

Birthday Weekend

My oldest and youngest sons celebrated their 33rd and 27th this weekend.  We had a lovely dinner on Sunday with both boys.  My cousin Steve was in town too, so he joined us.  I've pulled the pictures Steve took from fb.

 Getting dessert ready.

 The birthday boy (and his bride) -- her birthday was October 1.

The other birthday boy, and his bride (her birthday is tomorrow).

Of course, I didn't take any pictures of my cousin.  :(.  what's up with that?

Wine Tasting in Napa

So, we've lived in Northern California for 15 years now and this past weekend was the first time we've actually gone wine tasting.  On two earlier occasions, we attempted to do it, but didn't know what we were doing and it didn't actually count.  I think the first time we went to one winery in the Santa Cruz mountains and the second time we went to one winery in Sonoma.  This time we went to Napa with a friend of mine who showed us how it is done.

Our first stop (after McDonald's for breakfast), was Mumm.

Here we tasted champagne -- or rather sparkling wine.  We tried six different kinds.  At the table next to us, they sampled twelve different kinds -- or at least they had twelve glasses.  That makes for a very pretty table.

and here's our table.  Not nearly as impressive, but we needed to be able to walk away and even do some driving.

Outside the winery there were lots of these flowers.  I'm guessing that they are mums.

Our next stop was St. Supery.

Here we tasted 8 different wines - two tastings of four wines each.  I discovered that I like Sauvignon Blanc better than Chardonnay.   I was going to take another picture, but the bottles disappeared right after this.

 .

I'll post pictures of the other two tomorrow.

I think it's interesting how each winery has its own feel / character / atmosphere. 

Jelly Rolls and Pink Elephants

This has been a good sewing week.  On Sunday, while the boys were watching football and arguing all the fine points, I locked myself in my room and sewed.  I put the jelly roll quilt together and cut the blocks for the pink elephant quilt.  I've got three tops finished.  Now it's time to finish the quilts.

This was made using this pattern, but I totally copied this quilt here -- amazing that it looks as different as it does.

 

 

Next year ...

Image from here.

 Every year on labor  day there is a walk across the Mackinac Bridge.  Here's the recap from this year.  http://www.mightymac.org/bridgewalk.htm  I wanna be there in 2014.  This is going to be on my list next year.  Anyone care to join me?

15 Minute Challenge

Finally, a week worth talking about .. I posted pictures yesterday.

Tuesday - nothing
Wednesday - menagerie blocks (3)
Thursday - three more menagerie blocks
Friday - four more menagerie blocks
Saturday - made felt bags
Sunday - menagerie blocks (3)
Monday - finished the menagerie blocks!! yay!

A very good week for me.  I'm hoping to have more of these.

The theme this month was on learning something new every day.  I don't know that I learn something new every day, but it happens quite a bit, but it's not usually big things.  Just little things here and there, whether sewing or real life.

To see how others did this week, check out the 15 Minute Challenge at  Life In Pieces -- or better yet, link up and let everyone know how your week went.

Pink Elephants in the Post

As usual, I am at a loss for a name for my blog post.  I love the 15 minute challenge on Tuesday, because, like a uniform, I already know what the name is going to be.  No decisions on my part.  It's not that I don't like cute/clever names, but they take work and it's too much for me.

I ordered some fabric on line last week, to make a couple of girl quilts.  I was hoping that one would come today and it did.  It is, in fact, pink elephants -- the pink version of the blue elephants from my blue elephant quilt (another creative name).

 

 Here is the blue elephant quilt, which I love.  I plan to make something similar with the pink.  Something simple. 

Next, my dear friend Amanda made a quilt for her little boy.  Here's a picture of the finished top. Isn't it great!!  She is one of the people who helped me get started with quilting -- she has a great eye for colors and patterns! Hopefully she'll forgive me for stealing the picture from facebook.

Anyway, she gave me her leftovers from this quilt.  I didn't take a picture of all the scraps but I can't wait to figure out what to do with them.

The other fabric I ordered online was a jelly roll of Simply Style by V and Co.  I had seen this jelly roll quilt and I had to have it.  I am going to be totally unoriginal and make one like it.  When I looked today to see when it was going to be delivered, the shop I bought it from was on vacation.  Boo hoo.  I was upset that it would be a while before it would come.  I resigned myself to waiting.  However, when I came home today, this is what I found!! So very exciting.

I finished making the blocks for my rainbow menagerie or whatever it will be called.  Now I need to sew the blocks together.  Here's the first layout I tried. I'll try some other layouts later this week and decide which way to go.

I just love the reverse blocks. 

All in all, a pretty good sewing/fabric kind of day.

Another Project

So, here are some pics of my current project. 

I didn't fussy cut the animals, but I think that's okay, though on some of the blocks you only see the back end of some of the animals (like the top left corner of the yellow block).  I would think that somewhere there would be a bunch of blocks with just heads, but it doesn't seem to work that way.

 

Here are the four colors together.  I think it's looking pretty good.  There are four reverse blocks as well; one in each color.  I'm excited to see how it will look when the blocks are all done.  Makes me wish I had a design wall.  Some day I will.  For now, I'll have to be content with a design floor.

I was just thinking that what happens with me is that I get started on a project and I get all gung-ho* and work to finish it, and then there's nothing to do so I stop sewing for a bit ..  The solution is to have multiple projects, all the time.

*such an odd phrase.  wonder where it came from?

15 Minute Challenge

Well, even though I'm not having a stellar week, I thought I would jump back in.  Here's how it looked.

Tues - nothing
Weds - nada
Thurs - zip
Fri - decided on next quilt pattern
Sat - zilch
Sun - cut fabric for new baby quilt using menagerie fabric
Mon - made two blocks

This is the pattern I'm using for this fabric.

To see how others have done this week, check out Kate's 15-minute challenge.

Remembering 9/11