I have not sewed a stitch in DAYS!!  I've been trying to clean my messy, messy house as I have a group of ladies coming on Monday for game day.  WOW, it is SLOW going!!  AND I'm thinking I really need to start organizing and packing stuff up in anticipation of a move I hope to make before too long.  UGH, it makes me shudder just thinking about it.

So since nothing quilty has been going on around here, I just had to share the cutest photo

Aren't they CUTE?!!!  My niece found a nest with these 5 babies a couple of weeks ago.  Being the animal whisperer that she is, she couldn't just leave them.  She called a few rescue organizations but only one would take baby birds and it was a LONG drive so she decided to take care of them.  I figured they all succumb pretty quickly but look--they're almost ready to fly on their own.  She goes to Pet Smart and gets live (GROSS) meal worms and crickets and feeds them to the babies.  They are little PIGS!  It's unreal how much one little baby bird can eat!!  But aren't they cute?  Little swallows.

My intention was not to be so long in posting but it's all JoAnne's fault.  SHE remembered to take a picture with our friend, Dot, from England when she was here and I did NOT.  :-(  So I thought she'd post on her blog but then she didn't and---well, you know. 

I laid the blocks that I currently have completed on the floor so you could see how I'm coming along.  GEEZ I've had to do a lot of unpicking on this one.  Seems I always get ONE row sewn on wrong and don't get the diagonal colors that make the quilt pattern.  ARGH, that is frustrating.  Doing this along with an occasional block for the colorful X quilt and some Home of the Brave blocks in civil war repros,  red/white/blue and fall colorways for donation quilts means I don't have a lot of finishes to show but I AM getting stuff done.  In fact, I sewed one of the repro quilt centers together at church today and JoAnne took it home to get a back on it.  Should've taken a pix but didn't..oh well.

Scrappy Trips

I started another scrappy trips after seeing some brighter examples lately.  Now I realize this is just BARELY a start but I'm thinking I want to make this queen size so I can replace my present fall-colored batik quilt that now resides on my bed.

I'm also very excited that I found a border for my "Easy Streets" quilt and will, hopefully very soon, get those on and get her off to the longarmer.  I LOVE that quilt and get ooo's and ahh's everywhere I take it. 

After church quilt group last week, I brought home yet more homework.  UGH!  But it's stuff I love to do..got another rag quilt finished up and have a couple more of those to work on.  But I still haven't finished the curtains for my nephews so I WILL get those done this week.  Also have a project to do with them for their mom's Mother's Day present.

RAGGGGGS

Got a second rag quilt done..I still really enjoy making these, they're so 'freeing'!  LOL  Our group leader at the church quilt group has a goal of making 100 quilts for the 'Quilts Beyond Borders' organization.  I was looking at their blog the other day and noticed several of the boys wanted to trade in their quilt for a 'soccer' quilt.  So when I was in JoAnn's, I noticed some soccer fabric and bought the remainder of the bolt (which was just over a couple of yards).  I cut it into something like 24x21 in. pieces and am just going to put 12.5" borders around the center piece to bring it up to their size requirements, which are like 45x48 because they said it fits on the kids' beds better.

Now I NEED to get busy making curtains for my two little nephews' bedroom.  That is like one of my LEAST favorite things to do but I will do it for them!!  HA  Nothing fancy--I'd just rather be doing something/anything quilty!

I was this close to finishing my bright, colorful + and x quilt but then I went off in a different direction.  UGH!  I'm SO easily distracted.  However, I was distracted by a few donation quilts I need to get done.  I went to quilting up at my church last week and our fearless leader always tries to sedt us home with homework.  I already had some stuff here but did bring home another rag quilt kit to add to the one here.  I also had a QOV that I planned on putting together. 

 The last time I contacted the state coordinator for HOB quilts, she asked that the quilts I was ready to send be the last as the program was winding down.  Now, that is a VERY good thing..so glad the need is no longer there.  However, we still have lots of civil war repro fabric in our closet and had lots of blocks cut.  SO I decided to set them 4X5 with a border to make them large enough for QOV.  This is the first of three I'll be putting together and will wait til next church group to cut and attach a border.  We have a great longarmer that graciously quilts all of our donation quilts--isn't that AWESOME?!!

This is the first of two rag quilts I'm working on.  The stitching is completed on this one but of course needs to be clipped.  It's cold and rainy today so will try to get that all done this evening.  Then hopefully in the next few days I'll get back to my + and x quilt (although I DO think I found a couple of 'mushy' blocks--OH NO!).  Including replacements for the 'mushys', I'll have 6 more blocks to finish up then put the rows together into a flimsy.

Still growing

Still growing and I still love it!!  Have about 8 additional blocks in progress and parts cut for several more.  May wind up at 6X8 (or even bigger..we'll see!).  Wanda even looked at it and said she didn't see any mushiness.  LOL

This Easter

With Easter tomorrow, it's bringing back a lot of memories of what I was doing and what we were facing last Easter.  We did not get to attend Easter services last year as our flight to LA prior to Frank's second brain surgery was on Easter Sunday.  SO many firsts still occurring since Frank left me to be with his heavenly Father.  I still miss him so....

I attended Secret Church last night at The Hills Church of Christ.  If you've never attended a Secret Church simulcast, you have definitely missed out on a blessing.  Frank and I attended one at our own church last year but he was having a very difficult time following and David Platt (the pastor) goes at a rapid-fire pace.  The topic last night was "Heaven, Hell and The End of the World".  While I have been doing a LOT of soul searching over the past year, this reaffirmed (to me anyway) that I have not been doing what God has called each of his children to do.   There are so many out there who believe in God and think they are destined for heaven.  In order to be certain, we must 'study to show ourselves approved' and then 'go, tell'.   The focus on last night's simulcast was the Chinese Muslims and, in particular, the Hui people.  It just STRUCK me how we are SO blessed to live in a country that allows us to worship as we please without fear of reprisal (usually) and without being rejected by friends and family.  These people are SO Muslim, it's part of their being and IF they convert to Christianity, they are rebuffed by everyone, forced out of their homes and communities and wind up alone.  And one last interesting tidbit--the country of Maldives is the ONLY country in the world that REQUIRES it's citizens to be Muslim.  WOW!