Friday Coffee Date

 

Welcome to Friday once again. This week has been crazy even though I only left my house once in the past 7 days, and that was to bring dinner to my husband in the field. It is time to link up with Diary of and Addict's Friday Coffee Date, and check in and see what is going on in my world.

 

Spring planting season has begun here in Wisconsin, even though preparation for it began a while ago. Crops are beginning to be planted, but are at a standstill for a few days, as we are getting a few days of rain. As much as I want my husband to get the crops in the ground, it is really nice to have his help getting ready for our move in two weeks.

 

Speaking of the move, we are almost there! In fact, we move in exactly two weeks. I am SO ready to just be in our new house and settled. I do not cope well with transition, or chaos. I tend to like my life scheduled and organized. The closer we get to the move, the more chaos there seems to be, and I am beginning to struggle with it. I just keep trying to keep my eye on the prize and know that God is not going to give me more than I can handle.

 

Because of all the moving and packing I haven't worked on any quilt projects in a while, and that tends to be my therapy.

 

 

This fabric is for the first project that I make once I get my sewing machine set up. I might just make myself work on this before ALL of the boxes are unpacked, just so I can have some time to relax! This will be for a quilt going on a little boy's bed. The colors are bright and the pattern is so fun. I tend to REALLY like polka-dots! I can't wait to get it all finished and get to have some time with my sewing machine once again.

 

I have spent a bit of time this week writing some new blog posts, I am just not quite ready to share them. I would like to get some pictures in them, and all of my pictures, like the rest of my life, is all packed up in boxes (mostly John Deere boxes!) I would really love to invest more time and energy into my blog and others, and I plan to do so once we get settled a bit. I have connected with some really amazing people through blogs, made some great friendships, and truly get a lot of great encouragement from other bloggers.

 

 

Well, that's about all for now. I will be spending my week packing, cleaning and having a garage sale to get rid of all of our unwanted or outgrown stuff. I anyone needs anything for a baby girl, I'm sure we have it!

 

I pray that you all have a great week.

 

 

Friday Coffe Date

 

Welcome to Friday once again. Happy Easter to you all!

 

 This week could not have gotten over soon enough. I think that lunar eclipse had something to do with a lot of the crazy behavior in our house this week. The kids were just something else! So I am very thankful that it's Friday and time to link up with Alissa at Diary of an Addict for the Friday Coffee Date.

 

 

This is about what my house looks like all over. Boxes, boxes and more boxes, and a bit of emptiness! It sounds like our moving date is going to move up, so we move in one month now. There are some days that I just don't know where to start. If anyone has any packing tips, or advice I would love to hear it. I want to get busy packing, but I don't know what all can be packed ahead of time. I really need to go through the girls' bedrooms and sort through for the garage sale that we are also having in the mean time, but that is very hard to do with a house full of little ones. They tend to take out twice as much as I pack up.

 

I thankfully have three of the four quilts finished that I have to make before we move, and will hopefully get a good start on the last one this weekend.

 

 

This is the one Caroline got for her birthday. She will be in a big girl bed once we are in the new house, so I wanted her to have her quilt all ready for her. I made a scrappy Dresden that my mom had cut out a lot of years ago. I added to it, made it bigger, and finished it for Caroline.

 

 

This last one is one that I actually pieced years ago, and quilted up to donate for a benefit for one of Neil's distant relatives that is quickly loosing her battle with cancer.

 

That is about it for this week. Have a blessed Easter and a wonderful week!

Friday Coffee Date

 

Happy Spring to you all! This has been once again a busy and challenging week in the Gustafson home. It may be spring, but we are still buried in snow here in northern Wisconsin, the temps have been warmer thankfully.

Once again it is time to link up to Rags to Stitches blog for the weekly Friday Coffee Date. 

 

 

I spent much of last week and the weekend at a quilt retreat just outside of Paynesville, MN, about 2 1/2 hours from home. I had a wonderful time, enjoyed some wonderful fellowship and caught up with some great friends. I finished only two of the three projects that I had prepared to do because I just ran out of time. My little baby bug wasn't feeling well, so I ended up coming home a day early.

 

The above quilt is one quilt that I did complete last weekend. It is a Mini Swoon quilt designed by Camille Roskelley of Thimble Blossoms. It was a fun project, and I can't wait to get it quilted and hanging in my dining room. It is just perfect for spring.

 

I also made this quilt, and I used Scrumptious fabric also from Camille Roskelley of Thimble Blossoms. The fabric is beautiful and again perfect for spring. I wrote my own pattern for this quilt and hope to get the finishing touches on that soon. I might just make some changes to this and add some cornerstones to break up all of the white. I just haven't decided for sure. The other thing that I can't decide on for this quilt is the name. Any suggestions out there?

 

And finally, this is what is next: a rag quilt for a client. I have never made a rag quilt so it is fun to try something new for someone else. It is going to bright and fun!

Well, that's all for now. I am hoping for a quiet week around here along with more quilting progress. I have so many quilts that I want to make, and not enough time to make them all. Once I get the few projects completed that I have going right now, I will have to get busy cleaning and packing as we have finally sold our house and plan on moving around Memorial Weekend. I also would like to have a garage sale in the end of April to get rid of lots of stuff!
I pray that you all have a wonderful week.

Friday Coffee Date

 

Once again it is Friday, and once again I am writing this post from a few hours away from home. Its time for my weekly link up with Rags to Stitches. I am quilting away at a retreat this weekend in Paynesville, MN at a resort called Bug Bee. This resort is so nice, I have even been able to relax in the pool and hot tub and sooth the back ache from bending over my machine. It has been several REALLY late nights, but I am almost done with a challenging quilt pattern. I can't wait until it is all done so I can show pictures of it. I am with the great friends, eating way too much delicious food, really relaxing and enjoying this getaway.

 It will sure be nice to get home on Sunday though, as I really miss all of my sweet loves at home, but this is a really nice break from life (not that I needed another break, as I have been gone a lot) and it feels really great to get something done. Well, that's it for now and I need to get back to sewing away, so you all have a wonderful week!

Quilts, Quilts...and more Quilts!

First of all, I hope you like all the new look to the blog, I was really ready for a change. It was in need of a new look, something bright, springy, and fun. The old barn wood just wasn't doing it for me anymore.

Speaking of spring, it is on its way, or at least I hope so. It is 50 degrees out right now, and I am sitting here writing with my windows open. It has been a really long winter here in northern Wisconsin. Although I am sure we will get one more big dump of a snow storm here, we always seem to get one in March, after we had a little glimmer of spring. Last year May seemed like our typical March. We got dumped with 17" of snow in May 17 and still had snow on Memorial weekend.

 

 

But enough about winter, I have two major things on my mind this week, and that is the amazingly warm temps, and quilts! I am leaving in less than two days for a quilt retreat, and am really excited. I have some really fun projects ready to work on. So since I have quilting on my brain, I thought I would post some more pictures of a few of the quilts that I have made over the years.

 

I love to venture out once or twice a year and use our farm as a fun background for my pictures. I love the old buildings, fences, rust and chippy paint. It makes for some beautiful scenery. So I load up the trusty old John Deere Gator with my quilts, and usually my husband too, and trek out across the farm to get pictures like these.

 

  Did you notice that not one picture has snow in it?

I don't know that last time that happened...

And they remind me that spring is almost here...

 

 

And the grass will be green...

 

 

And there won't be a cloud in the sky...

 

The corn will be knee high by the 4th of July...

 

And soon this grain bin will be filled to the brim from the fall harvest... or so we hope.