quilty goodness

What a busy weekend it was. Saturday night we had our big Mexican dinner fundraiser for the ball next year. Since we are a little detachment here we "get" to do our own fundraising. Well, all the preparation was worth it. It was awesome. Veronica (one of the spectacular spouses here) really did awesome. I am pretty sure she doesn't read my blog (I do try to keep a low profile here in my real world) but if some day she does, I just want to launch my thanks and appreciation out to her in cyber-space. YOU ROCK Veronica! I got to work the deep fryer to cook the empanadas. I have never been at the helm of a deep fryer, but it was pretty fun, and go on last minute grocery store runs where I almost hit (with my truck) a small tribe of inebriated aborigines. I swear those guys have a death wish to get between me and 5 KG of ground beef.

Before the Mexican dinner we went to the Desert Mob to buy some Aboriginal art, that was pretty great too. So Saturday was pack jammed with activity. Sunday I took the day off and did some selfish sewing. I finished my friend's baby quilt, so that will be in the mail later today. And I made a quilt for me...or maybe for you. I am still undecided as to what to do with it. I do love it though.

They both washed and shrank up so wonderfully. Especially the Cathedral window one. If you are making one, stick with it and wash it! You will love it so much more. The bigger one is named "Sunday Morning Romance" since I made it on a Sunday morning and I LOVE all the fabric in it. It reminds me of a scrap book of all the little weekend trips my husband and I have taken over the years. Little maps and ticket stubs and strips of florals like watching wildflowers from the car window on lovely back roads. There is some BDU and DCU in it too.

This picture is not quite what I had in mind, but it is the best we could do with the batteries about to die.

These pictures are out of order and I don't know how to fix that. But here is the inside of E. Hughes Stu tote. I love it. I think this bag took me about 12 hours to make. The inside pockets are amazing and each bit of this bag is quilted. It is in the mail and on the way to it's new mama. Good luck with your adoption, E!

Here is another bag I finished yesterday. This one is pretty simple, but even so took about 6.5 hours to complete. It will be on it's way today.

See here is E. Hughes Stu inside out. I just dig it so much.

This is something I have never done before because I felt it was vain, but here is a note I got the other day from Claudia. I have sewn for her before and she was so great to work with. She wants another bag, which is fine with me. But this little note just warmed my little heart, so since I can't figure out how to make the "Testimonial" page on my website work this might suffice for a bit.

"This is unrelated to ordering, but I just have to tell you that I'm amazed by how many bags you've created! I've had so much fun looking through them all and picking out little details that I'd love to have in mine. To be honest, I've seen a lot of army bags here around Fort Hood and nothing compares to yours. I know that I'm a little biased, but in all honesty they just aren't as high quality, detailed or involved. I don't know how to explain it, but the ones I've seen for sale seem like they're just being sold as fast as possible, as many as possible. Which is fine, I understand that these ladies are trying to run a business which I completely admire them for, but a loved one's uniform is such a personal thing and I feel like you genuinely care about me and my bag. I know that you're trying to finish a million bags at any given time but somehow, it still seems like I get your undivided attention when you're working on my bag. I feel like you're putting a little bit of yourself into the bag I receive from you and each one is so unique and special that no one will ever have a bag exactly like mine. I don't mean to ramble and gush too much, but I just wanted to say thank you again, so much for everything that you do. I know that you're just one woman sewing her heart out, but I'm in awe of how many lives you touch, mine included! "

OK, now back to working on H. Perez's bag. It is going to be awesome too!

XO,

Tia

Desert Mob - Aboriginal Art

Here I am looking at Aboriginal art....this is not the best picture of me, but I don't ever look the way my mental image is. Do you? For some reason I think I am about 5'10" and strong and well, not so red faced. With that out of the way It is Desert Mob time again. Yay aboriginal art! This year I went hunting for landscapes with ghost gum trees. I found several.

Here is my loot. All the little ones were $10. What a great deal that was. See most are ghost gums. One of the bigger ones was $450 at the market and I paid $80, so that is not bad either.

Erica almost had to fight me for this one, but I was faster. Maybe she can have it for Christmas...or it can maybe have visitation with her. I love it though so you can't have it forever, Erica!

This is the dotty one. I dig it too.

Yesterday I had to tidy my fabric closets and my studio was a disaster. I can't find stuff that I KNOW I have, it is quite making me into a looney. Some stuff is folded and arranged so nicely. Other stuff I am NEVER going to use. I need to purge it somehow. It is not bad fabric, but my addiction is quite getting out of hand. I ordered a bunch of Amy Butler's new line Daisy Chain and I don't know where to put it. Maybe I will have a give away.

Tonight we have a big Mexican dinner fund raiser for next years military ball, so I gotta go get ready to set up. Next blog will have some cool bags I have finished recently, I have so much to blog about, just no time to do it.

I did see a bit of the debate on Erica's AFN. So I feel like a real American again. In my opinion (in the first 8 minutes) neither did hot on the public speaking arena. I heard what a great speaker Obama was...all I heard was hemming and haaing I am still not impressed with him. Sorry Obama Mamas. OK, now I am off to serve empanadas.

XO,
Tia

Storm....

Yesterday we got some weather in the Outback. Normally (3/4 of the year) it is just HOT but every once in a while it will rain. Well, it rained yesterday. I watched the storm move in from the west through the windows in my sewing studio. It got pitch black, so we went outside to enjoy God's wrath. Immediately the kids stripped down to dance in the downpour. Normally I am fine with this. I did it as a kid in New Mexico, so why shouldn't mine do it here in Alice? I got kinda apprehensive when the big branches of 2 of the bigger trees in the park snapped off like they were toys and hail began to rain down big as my thumbs. The storm passed fairly quick (as they normally do here) and the power went out just as quick. No big thing. It was a big storm so I figured the power would fail.

I shut down my Bernina and turned off the computer, so I was ready. I was ready to jump in the truck and go see the storm damage! As I was loading up the kiddos I saw that I was not the only one with that idea. 2 friends pulled up in the drive with their kids. So we went off to survey the destruction.

Here are 2 of the 3 kids playing in the rain.

We went up to high ground to see everything. What we saw was a dust storm moving in from the south. That is MT Gillian (in case you are curious) in the distance. And that is Alice Springs with all it has to offer down below. I swear 2/3 of the town was out on the roads looking around. I have never seen so much traffic here! Power lines were down everywhere, trees were across the roads all the Australian emergency workers were out with their chainsaws clearing the way for fools like me to drive around and rubberneck. The 3 traffic lights in town were out (as was all the power), the shops were closed, and as I found out this morning all the chicken went bad. I know this is really NOTHING for those of you who live in the path of IKE or one of the other storms, but for us it was pretty exciting.

This is what I had to leave unfinished. It is all folded up and waiting for Thursday for me to work on it some more. I can't tell you how much I am loving those stars. They are so fun. I think I will only do stars from now on! Not really, but they sure are awesome in their strangeness.

Now for the most spectacular blog.....I go there everyday and I can't believe how awesome this lady is. She is a crafty goddess! Amanda jean of Crazy Mom Quilts. Holy Moly....I just love all her projects and she has the greatest tutorials. Makes me want to have some more tutorials....what would you like to learn? I can do another bag if you like....I have a little plan to make a wonky star wallet, that might be cool. Oh if only I had the time! Well, I guess all we have is time, and how fleet it is.

xo,

Tia

Happy Birthday!

My Daughter is 7. Hard to believe that that tiny baby I brought home just the other day is 7 and loosing her teeth and bossing everyone around and surprising me with her amazing insight. What a blessing she is to me.

She decided the cake was just not quite right so she added the dots and border. If you like Strawberries you need to try the icing. Very sweet, but wonderful. Mine was a bit runny, but I know what I did wrong.

Recipe for Strawberry icing

1 pint fresh strawberries

1 TBS granulated sugar

bag/box powdered sugar

1/4 cup soft butter

wash and slice fresh strawberries, then squish them up until they are really juicy. sprinkle them with about a TBS of granulated sugar to really get a syrup. let them sit for a bit, then drain some of the fluid into a bowl (reserve this, you may need it later). Put the squished strawberries into a mixer bowl add soft butter and powdered sugar and mix away until it is the consistency you desire. Mine was really runny because I didn't drain it at all. I did pop the iced cake into the refrigerator and it set up very nicely. Great pink color too.

This makes a ton of icing, you will have some left over. I am making chocolate cupcakes later today and I will use the rest of the icing then....I can't wait!

I decided to have a little craft for the girls to do at the party (to work off a bit of the sugar) so we made wish pillows from my crazy bag of scraps. The girls did fabulous. I loved seeing the different combos they came up with. There are some very creative little girls up there.

Finally here is a peek at the latest Hero Quilt I am working on. This is for the son of the first widow I ever sewed for. I kept the scraps from his uniforms and am using the newest uniform she sent as well. I wanted the stars to look like they were twinkling. I asked my Flickr friend Krom_mama for some advice and she pointed me towards this tutorial on wonky stars. I made a couple changes....but it was very helpful.

I am trying to organize myself so I can be most productive. Monday, Wednesday and Fridays will be bag sewing days. Tuesdays and Thursdays will be quilt days and the weekend will be my own. That is my plan for now....we will see how I can stick to it.

OK, cheers ladies!

Feeling HOT HOT HOT

Spring lasted for about 3 days and now Alice is back to her Scorching Hot Summer self. Wow, sizzly. But in Springs wake the blossoms on the citrus trees and baby figs smell glorious.

This is my Tangelo tree. I hope all these flowers mean lots and lots of fruit! The first year we lived here this tree was laden with the most fabulously sweet and juicy seedless oranges. So, good. This year it had 3. My kids ended up picking them too early and we really didn't get to enjoy them. I have big hopes this year!

I sat outside on the back porch enjoying the perfume and sewing on buttons. It was such a nice way to enjoy my third cup of coffee. The heat did chase me inside and I am working on more bags now. Well, not NOW since I am blogging, but you know what I mean.

I want you to look at the middle of this bag. I removed the center button part and trimmed down the top quite a bit to make a smaller more trim bag. The extra fabric contrast is nice too, if I do say so myself. This is a great option for those of you whose mates are giants. Sometimes those XXLarge/XLong tops can make the most massive bags. I have nothing against the big boys, especially if you want space for lots and lots of gear, just keep this in mind while you are filling out your order forms.

OK, back to work. Have a great day!

HI, Target.

So, the middle of Australia now has a Target. I don't think it is the same as the one in the US, but it is a Target nevertheless. We went for the grand opening today. I think half the town was there shopping. The line to check out almost encircled the inside of the store. Dispite this everyone had big toothy smiles pasted on their faces. It was pretty funny actually how happy everyone seemed to be shopping at Target. I love Target (the US Target, I will hold off on forming an opinion on this one until I get to look around without the teeming masses breathing on one another), what I liked about Target (the one in Killeen, TX since that is the one I logged the most time) is how you can wonder around in relative peace looking at things letting your mind wonder. I would do that while the kids were at mother's day out and my husband was in Baghdad. I just wanted to share the joyous occasion with you all.


I am having some trouble re-assimilating back into life after our vacation. My sewing machine is acting up as is our Internet. If you have been emailing me and I have not returned your emails, I am not ignoring you, my stupid email and Internet have become really moody. I called the Internet provider today and actually lost my temper with him. For those of you who know me, I do not loose my temper very often, but when I do it is quite the thing to behold. Condescending poop. He deserved it. I wish I could have expressed myself a bit better. Oh well. My Bernina is taken apart beside me....It has been making funny sounds and going really fast, so I decided to trouble shoot.


Oh, and my wonderful little girl turned 7 on Sunday the 14th. She is going to have a Birthday party on Saturday so I am kinda getting ready for that too. I am trying not to go too crazy and just turn the little girls loose on my fabric scraps to make some wish pillows.

That is it for now. I do have some bags almost finished, so some pictures will be up soon.

xo,
Tia

wow...that went quick!

Some of you ladies are huntresses. Wow. I think I barely finished my Etsy listings and sent out the email letting the ladies on my wait list know they were active, and now all the slots are gone. I am so flattered! Thank you so much. Well, I have sent out my order form to those of you who have selected the custom slots, so check your SPAM folder if you don't see it in your inbox. I can't wait to sew for you!

Let's talk Quilts....

First of all, thank you so much for all the wonderfully supportive emails about this magazine feature. Heck after I answer the questions and send in the pics, they may decide I am the most dull human in the world and want nothing to do with me. Who knows? It could happen. But thank you ladies so much!

OK, the flood gates are not even open yet and already my email is crazy....I wonder how I am going to do this bag slot thing? I have been looking through my orders and the traffic by ladies on my wait list, most of you are return customers....I would say about 1/3 of you are return customers. Seems I send you your order and you are already back in line for more. I love it! Thank you so much for your support! I am "mind wrestling" the bag slot issue, it will be all set tomorrow, my wait list invite will go out and then on Saturday I will have them ready to have. I think I will do it through www.etsy.com this time. SO have your profiles all set and ready. Last time I opened My slots were gone in about 6 minutes. I am not bragging, I am just preparing you.



Onto a different topic, let's talk quilts. I think I will open for 4 quilts this Christmas. The prices will not be what is on my website. Those prices are for VERY SIMPLE WHOLE CLOTH quilts. I just can't get into the Admin site to edit that. So if you want a more complicated quilt for your mother in law for Christmas or a gift to you and your mate tack about $200 onto the base price on the website. I can't do things the simple way, everything I touch has to be complicated and detailed, but that is the way I like it, I guess. I have been doing it that way for 30 years. I really didn't do that much before I turned 4, so we won't count those years.

Let's discuss what makes a great heirloom quilt. Now this is just my humble opinion. I am not the boss of the world, so there are lots of other people who like cheap and easy, I am not in charge of those guys. I like lasting quality. I use Quilter's Dream Cotton batting for the middle layer of the quilt. That is the big roll of white stuff in the picture above. It is ALL 100% wonderful soft cotton. Not a bit of polyester in it. Who wants to snuggle up with a plastic blanket? NOT ME. And I am going to assume that you don't want to either. SO I use that for the middle.... It costs more, but you are worth it.

For the top, I use fabric....duh. But the fabric I use is pretty great too. You can send me bits of your children's clothes to use in some of the blocks, let me know what colors you like and we will design a pallet just for you, utilizing my hand picked...ripe and ready prints and solids here in my studio.

What "pattern" would I use...well I am not a big pattern girl. I do however love to be inspired by 2 different quilt designers Denyse Schmidt and Fun quilts. Look at their sites so you can get your bearings and we (you and I) will design something just for your unique desires.

I quilt each quilt freehand with my Bernina sewing machine. Basically I draw with thread (100% long staple cotton thread) all over the quilt. I can do numerous styles: lines, swirls, zig zags, scales, waves....heck I have "drawn" pictures on quilts....the sky and your imagination are the limits.


Now the Back of the quilt I want to be just as interesting as the front. So, Hey, you get to have a 2 for 1. What a deal!

Also 40% of my quilt commissions (just like my Camp Follower Bags) goes back into the pot for my Hero Bag and Hero Quilt Cause.

So there you go...our quilt talk. I have been hiding long enough in here by the computer, now out to settle things down a bit with the bags.

Big doings in the works

See, I got all dressed up to tell you all! OK, and this may not even pan out, but I need to give you a warning anyway and I just wanted to show that I really am an American married to another American. Well, I guess America really does not have one specific type of person to look like...but this is me in some of my red blooded glory (I don't think I have any pictures of me in ALL of my red blooded glory, and you probably wouldn't want to see those anyway).
What is all this about anyway, you may be asking yourself? Well, I was contacted by a magazine to do a thingy on me and my sewing gig. And they want pictures of me and my bags and quilts. Well I don't have any bags finished and ready to take pictures of at the moment, but I will have quite a few ready soon, so if your name is over there on the list it will probably be your bags and Hero Quilts that are going to be in the magazine. If for some reason you do not want your bags or quilt featured in a major American magazine please let me know and I will move it out of the frame. So anyway...that is what is up. Oh and I spoke with another magazine (Australian patchwork and quilting) last month and they weren't interested in me anymore after they found out that I was a "yank". Which I am so NOT a "Yankee". My people are from the south, thank you very much. Not that Yankees are bad people...I just am not from the North, it is too cold up there for me, but The Australians like to call Americans "Yanks".

OK onto business. I uploaded a bunch of my new fabric onto my Flickr Fabric Gallery. Please double check to make sure you do not see something you LOVE more than what I already have down for you. I am quite eager to cut into some of that loveliness, so just give me the word!

Also, I am updating my list over there. So if I have already taken your order, or you have already sent me your uniform and do NOT see your name let me know and I will remedy that. Also I am gearing up to take more orders. This will probably be the only time I am "OPEN for All Orders" until after Christmas. So be thinking about what I can make for you in my role as Santa's special sewing elf. I am going to be overwhelmed pretty quick, so have your bags and quilt desires in mind.

I will be sending out my invitation email to ladies already on my wait list this week too, so check your spam folder. I think I may be using my campfollowerbagslady@yahoo.com email for this, because my other email does not like to deliver or receive my mail and I am too stupid to figure out why this is.

And just so you know it is Spring in the lovely Australian bush. What a lovely time to be here. My fig tree has tiny buds on it and the citrus trees are getting ready to flower. The weather is perfect and there is not a cloud in the sky. Happy day.

XO,
Tia

Home again Home again Jiggity Jog

Our little clan is home again safe and sound. What a great trip, and how wonderful the kids were. We only lost one thing during our 16 different flights and it was towards the end....Sam's car seat, which we would check each time with the baggage. No biggie really, it was lost right at the second to last flight, and covered in Sheep poo anyway (the kids harassed a flock of sheep in an old Scottish ruin and where there are sheep there is poo). It is probably quarantined and not lost at all. It was a great trip, I got to see both my wonderful sisters who I miss so much and I got to hold my only nephew. What a dream boat he is. My arms have ached to have him. We did miss seeing my parents, but maybe they will come down here? We had fun visiting my Mother-in-law in North Carolina, the mountains are so lovely.

This was a walk I wanted to go on. Now I did not research it very well...If I would have we would have dressed differently. Over the hill and through the woods is an ancient set of standing stones. We drove all the way to the Isle of Skye (I really just wanted to go there, I love the name) to go exploring the stones. When we found the parking area we saw that the walk was about 5 miles. It was drizzling wonderful rain, and so delightfully muddy. It was also a bit chilly, with a good breeze, so I opted for just this picture instead of 3 wet kids covered in mud and various types of poo.
This is Emma with our Scottish Inn Keeper, Romey. Romey was getting ready to castrate her piglets and Emma was ready to help out. As I would have at that age. I remember holding dead quail after my dad went hunting. It was so amazing to hold their little corpses in my hands, petting them, then I got to hold the organs...a little morbid now, but then it was quite the field lesson. I am sure if we would have stayed longer Emma would have tried to squirrel some pig balls into her backpack.

Scotland was covered with B&Bs. Seems to be quite the institution. We really enjoyed this one. Her breakfasts were great. She had some sort of organic farming project going on with some professors from Cambridge, so the company was eclectic. I only intended to stay 2 nights, but my husband loved it so much we stayed 4. It was a great base of operations to explore the Highlands and look for Nessie.

If only travel would have been so quick as in the Harry Potter novels! I am writing this blog at about 0345. I just can't sleep.
So one last rainy look at Edinburgh....ahhh. No pictures from Singapore or Perth. Singapore was the most secure airport I have ever been to. They have it designed to herd the passengers into one central area, but it was sparkling clean with family bathrooms and a big play area. I didn't get to see much of Perth, we got in at 0300 and were so jet lagged we slept until 1700, got up and ate and went back to bed only to fly out again in the morning. The road from the airport to the hotel on the bay was very nice...

I got a new laptop while I was back in the States....it has Windows Vista on it and we are running into some problems with programs not being compatible. I have to rewrite my Camp Follower Bag order form (I have been meaning to for some time, but now that I deleted it I have to) and I wonder if you all will be able to download it as an attachment unless you have Vista as well?

Speaking of business I will be taking some more orders later this week. For those of you on my waiting list you will have first go at the slots. Last time I opened for 10 orders I got overwhelmed for about 8 months. I will try to control it better this time. I am open to suggestions!

OK, I need to go unpack still and make a grocery list. Thank you so much for all your wonderful comments and kind support. You make my day!

XO,

Tia