Teaspoon as Quilting Tool

If you pin-baste your small quilt projects using the bent safety pins, here's an easy way to latch those pins without disturbing your quilt sandwich or killing your fingers. If you hold the spoon as shown, it's easy to push down on the pin to get it latched. This is one of 14 wall hangings I'm making for Christmas presents. 7 are finished, 7 need to be quilted and bound. Another is all cut out, but it's for me, so it can wait awhile.

China Blue Patchwork Puzzle Balls

I've been having fun making these patchwork puzzle balls. I've made several, but these are just the ones I made with fat quarters of one china blue fabric and one more solid fabric. I've got 2 more of these fat quarters and lots of other blue fabrics, so I'm going to make a few more to put in this bowl on my dining room table. But I'm so tickled with these three, that I just had to share right now! I collect blue and white china, on display in my china cabinet, and the runner at the top of my blog is usually on that table, though I think I'll make a hexagon mat to put under this bowl and put the runner on the sideboard.

Bluebird Pool Party

I took this little movie about a month ago. I believe the younger of these birds were raised in our houses by the older birds. The group is very possessive of our backyard and will chase off the mockingbirds and the doves, though they tolerate somewhat the house finches and chipping sparrows. There are actually a few more, but it's been hard to count them. There were at least 2 broods, one of which fledged while we were gone this summer. The older fledglings help their parents feed the next brood when they hatch, and they seem to stay together through the winter, splitting up and finding their own mates and homes in the spring. Some days, we'll see as many as 7 or 8 different species of bird coming to the bird bath for a drink and a bath.

Mute the sound. DH was watching Glen Beck, and I hadn't figured out how to keep it from recording.