Late Friday Finish

 I have not felt very productive lately, but I certainly got in the groove today. I think it is so much easier to get into the sewing zone when you sew with friends! My AWESOME (we both use the word awesome a bunch!) friend, Lindsey, and I got together this afternoon and worked on the same project together. We made these thread catchers.

 I actually used some of my precious Bonnie and Camille fabric for mine. We added a little scissors holder at Lindsey's suggestion, so they are always at your fingertips.

Here is Lindsey's.  Although, my pictures make it look red, the main fabric is a really pretty coral.

 Here is the pin cushion with the bird showing nicely!

Before I went over to Lindsey's at noon, I finished appliquéing my orange peels. Now, I will just need to play with my rainbow layout for the baby quilt.

 Since I have been cross stitching Little Miss Shabby's "Quilty Stitches," it made me go dig through what was left of my cross stitching supplies from 20 years ago. Look what I found!  This is from Better Homes and Gardens Cross Stitch & Country Crafts 1992 magazine and I made the Country Champion Cow right around when I got married.

Same with the Champion Pig...I was making them in preparation for our moving to Colorado back in 1994-1995. We did not move here then, but we did in 2005. 

I already have the aida cloth to make the Champion Sheep and most of the floss, so I will work on this when my "Quilty Stitches" project is done. I think the three framed and displayed together will be  fun in my country home. These animals will not escape and run through my neighborhood! (We have loose livestock every now and then and recently had a funny encounter with some pigs!)

Look what arrived in today's mail! This is the market bag from American Made Brand, the cotton solids from Clothworks where the cotton is grown and manufactured into quilting cotton here in the U.S.A. I won it from Patty at http://ncweekendquilter.blogspot.com, she designed the North Carolina license plate. I had won a bundle of fat quarters from the American Made Brand blog hop earlier this summer. Lucky me! 

I usually read a lot more than I have this summer, but I have not read or finished nearly as many books. I have been kind of disappointed with some of my selections this summer. They are either not that interesting or just light like candy where I can neglect them. I finally read this one yesterday. Heather Gudenkauf is one of my favorite authors, so I had requested to borrow it from the library electronically on my iPad. I got the email at noon that it was available and I was done with by 11:30pm. It was very timely dealing with a baby that is left in a hot car and the consequences that arise. I don't want to give away too much, but I finished it in less than half a day and am dying to talk about it. I hope my book club wants to read it next month! 

This weekend I need to quilt my Woodland ABC quilt, make an eyeglass case (I need readers for cross stitching), figure out the layout of my orange peels, keep working on my "Quilty Stitches" project, and find a new book to read! What do you have on your agenda?