Well my pieces in the show are up - my very first show in 19 years (been a bit of a lull!!). This one is the first of many in a grafitti series, I basically like the way it turned out...the top of the "I" (it says "quilt" if you're still having a hard time reading it) is heavily beaded and the weeds were glued on, but I also used silk ribbon embroidery to tack it all down.

This one was a last minute thought! I woke up and thought "I'll make a doll, so about 5 hours later, here she is....not happy with her legs, but it's an amature show and it's kind of fun to experiment.

This one was featured on the back of our Rocky Mountain Crazy Quilters Calendar and was based on a piece I did (combo digital photo and photoshop) called "crowded" (it's the picture in the middle.

As I was looking for solutions to hang my grafitti quilt, I found this (no time to order, but a cool idea for the future:
Quilt hanging solutions: The Hang-Ups Company.
Well it is again 90 degrees today here and we're all sick of it (the heat, etc). However, I got up and did a whirlwind clean of the house, so at least feel better for that. Stumble It!

Nope, not my design, but I had to have it. This is from Tack-O-Rama (which I have also bought her clip art CD and it rocks!) from her CafePress store, I have literally waited months to have $20 "spare" dollars so I could buy this. When I showed this to a friend of mine today she was determined to get a tattoo with this design.
I got this little item at the thrift store for $1 last week:
However, I have no idea what it is or even what country it's from. I was thinking from Mexico (bright colors, fun figures) but someone suggested Sweden. Anyway, it looks cool in our living room. It's fabric with embroidery and the animals are sewn together. Any ideas?

I was working on my pieces for the art show (photos coming soon)and here was what the kids were up to (I think it's supposed to be a sort of a picnic, but I love the scene, I had to take it out the upstairs window, so thus the bad exposure):
So (stupid me) I set a "no TV" rule for this week (which was good in some ways - the literally sing jingles to every product they see at the grocery store) but of course my nanny didn't show up today, so here I was, with kids to entertain and no TV (my rule). Worked out ok tho, we had music class this afternoon and then went to Old Chicago's for dinner. Cracked me up when Missy C. was singing along with the Alabama song "Whiskey Bar", but all in all a fun evening (especially since kids eat free there and it was happy hour!). I broke my own rule and they're watching "Madagascar" for their nighttime story. I guess what's life without breaking a few rules, eh? Stumble It!

I think when you get into general fiber arts (beading, embroidery, sewing, patterns, my own patterns, cotton, silk, velvet....on and on), the worst part is keeping it all in some order so you can accomplish something. I'm trying to put together a purse (picture to be posted today in process) for the fiber art show. It's a new idea, so I hope it doesn't totally go bust. I hate the frame I got for my on piece...I'm going too try painting it today and see if it helps, but I think it upstages the piece.
Anyway, I spent all of Saturday digging my studio out - these are the beads all redistrubuted and pretty much sorted by color:
Here's my little corner of stuff. The floral box is hankies...the drawers are full of lace and believe it or not, the sewing box is FULL of needles - all sorts (oh and pins, but that qualifies, eh?).
Here's how I "sort" my embroidery thread....you can see a few areas where they are still tangled, but one is muted colors and one is brights. They are simple fishing tackle sorters - I belive about $2 each.

In doing all my sorting the good news is that I found this. it's an uncut (so rectangle) Keebler animal crackers box. I have no idea what to do with it, but I adore the drawings. I originally thought I might copy them onto the kids bedroom walls, but they're a bit old for that. Any ideas?

Stumble It!

I have not been doing any stitching (especially bad since my show pieces are due in a week...eek!) but it's just been way too hot! However, a gal who collects hankies found this picture (above) that I'd posted months ago for Stash Sunday and in finding her I found this group: Flickr: Vintage Hankies. I thought there might be a lot of you 50's fans and crazy quilters who would be interested in the group. I still have more hankies to post, so maybe I'll do that soon. Stumble It!

It's almost 100 degrees - 93 by my Weatherbug on my computer, and the kids are running buck naked through the hose in the back yard (don't worry, we have high fences! :-)) - I won't post those photos for fear of weirdos on the net, but believe me it's actually funny!

What a better way to wish Happy Birthday to my blog (actually it's tomorrow, but close enough!)! Can you believe it's been two years? Just in case you don't go back and read 342 posts ago (can you believe I've written that much?), here's my first post, with an explanation of why my blog has the name it does. Cheryl Wheeler is one of my favorite folk artists and the interesting twist to the name of my blog is that APPARENTLY there are more than a few people in my family who think the title actually fits me. Ok, with some deliberation, I guess it does....a BIT!

For my birthday post, I'll pass along a cute idea that's actually my husband's (I can't take credit for this). He needed a way to put up his black and white photos (he has a dark room in our basement) and he was taping them to the wall in our hallway to the basement. However, with some pleading (I hated the tape), he worked out this solution - it's just a few lengths of chain attached to a piece of wood (we painted black) at the top with some screws. Then down the chain he attached some binder clips.


Here's a close up of the clips on the chain. Oh, and the cat loves to play with the bottom of the chain! :-)

It's also flipping hot here as you can see by the cat (leave it to a cat to find the coolest position imaginable). Today's another 100 degree day, so maybe we'll spend the afternoon in the basement. Or maybe a trip to the fabric store! :-)


By the way, the deadline for our show got pushed back a teeny bit (another week) so I should be able to finish my 3 projects soon! So, cool time in the basement should be good! Stumble It!

I actually posted the post from the 5th today. UGH! I'm so behind! I'm working on my quilt tho...which is good since it has to be done on the 18th. I have the great idea to make my other piece into a bag, but of course, I've only made a few bags, so that requires skill, etc. Be interesting, eh? Anyway, here's how my grafitti quilt is coming along (for those who can't read it, especially since it's cut off, it says "quilt"):

Here's a little detail piece. I used the feather stitch for a crack in the wall. You can almost see my button hole stitch around each of the letters. It's creating a bit of dimension, but I'm afraid it's a bit too subtle. However, there's LOTS more detail to come, so I'm not afraid of the piece being subtle, so I guess that's ok.

And finally, here's a picture of the kids (grandkids/niece/nephew...for that audience!) on the 4th. Good heavens, I need to find some way to keep the two from growing! They're already outgrowing their summer clothes!

Ok, now on to some "Widget" website work. Oh, and don't even get me started on "World of Warcraft", it's evil and my husband is MORE evil for introducing it! Stumble It!

My incredibly creative friend, Claudia who's responsible for setting up our craft group here, made this fantastic silk tie ipod holder. Our craft group is great! On Fridays we pitch in for a sitter and work on our projects together in a local church basement. Fun social time and good designated "work" time.

Claudia has also set up a new Flickr group called, Sew Me Your Machine. She's trying to pick out a sewing machine and she has photos up of her fabulous old machine but she's trying to pick out a new one, so please give her all the input you can (maybe posting favorite and least favorite machines would help her make a choice). I'm going to join and post mine (for what it's worth....you all know how I sew! :-)) but please join....seems like a fun group!

Speaking of sewing, I rethreaded the serger (hooray! I was freaked when two of the threads broke a week ago) and got 3 floor pillows for the living room done and edged one towel. I'll probably edge the other two frayed towels today (and I might...eek!...attempt to change thread color!). I'm also working on playing with a tshirt I'm modifying (pics to come later), oh and I used my serger to sew up the sides of my grafitti quilt.

I took a bunch of fun hand projects to our friend's 4th of July fest to sew on, but the HUGE compliment of super soakers led me to leave all of that in the car. I'm hoping today is gardening/sewing day. Stumble It!