Paris

Sorry you haven't heard from me lately. 

I was at the Arc de Triomphe

Notre Dame

Eiffel Tower

The Seine

The catacombs under Paris

The Louvre

Whew! Now I need time to recoup!

Short attention span

Hello Friends,
    I've been very unfocused lately and have been prone to jumping from one unfinished project to another. Soooo...nothing complete to show you.  How about some UFO's today...

Wavy Wiper made from Messy Karen's pattern

Almost finished bookmark

A scarf to donate to a veteran through the WWII museum's Knit your bit program.

My daughter's quilt

Embroidery project from Jenny of Elefantz

More bibs waiting to be cut out.

I have a few other projects in the works too!  Better get busy!

Vietnam Wall

There is a striking wall in Washington DC honoring those in the US military who gave their lives while serving their country during the Vietnam war.  I was fortunate enough to see this memorial wall when I visited DC several years ago.  It is very difficult to view this wall without welling up with emotion.  So many names, so many grieving families. 
There is not a single name on the wall that I recognize.  The war ended a year or two before any of my friends and classmates were old enough to be eligible for service. And yet, unexpectedly, tears came.

A much smaller "traveling memorial wall" has been touring the country.  It is in my town for 5 days. I went to see it this afternoon.

Again, the tears fell.  This time, it was not unexpected.

Bibbies

Made some baby bibs for Touching Little Lives.  They still need snaps at the neck.  We have some volunteers that come to our monthly workshops that we affectionately call "Snappy Ladies" who man the snap attaching machines.  They will snap these lickety split.

Can you guess which ones are my favorites?

Yup! The froggy ones.

Thanks Stephanie for  dropping off a bunch of cute flannel fabrics for me to use for my charity sewing.  I have enough left over for many, many more bibs!  I try to sew a bib here and there between my other projects. 

Talk at you later! Rumi

Lazy Girl purse revisited

Hello Friends,
   Awhile back I made myself a purse using this Lazy Girl pattern.  Read post here.

   Well, I like it but felt it needed a couple of changes so I had to tinker a bit with it.

I decided the optional curved bottom was indeed nicer.

The pattern has just an open pocket in the back.  I hardly put anything in there since it doesn't seem too secure--I can picture things falling out when I lay the bag down.  I decided a zippered pocket was in order.

OK, changed up the inside.  Pattern had you sewing elastic directly to the top of the pocket.  I decided that making a casing looks much nicer.  Pattern has you attaching the strap by sandwiching it between the bag and front flap.  As you can see, some of the raw edges didn't get caught up inside the topstitching. In my new bag, I attached the strap early in the process and inclosed the raw edges within the bag--no chance of raw edges hanging out.  Again, I turned the flap at a seam and did not cut a turning hole in the flap as the pattern said--who wants a whipstitched slash in the flap anyways!

Inside.

This bag is a Christmas gift for a friend.  Hope she likes it.

Monkey Cake

Hello Friends,
    Whew! October sure was a busy month for me.  Our son got married on the 23rd and there was so much to do before and after.  We had several out of town relatives that came out  for the wedding and boy, it sure was great to spend time with them and catch up on family news.
    Now that the wedding is over, I can breathe a bit before I'm off and running again getting ready for Thanksgiving and Christmas!

Haven't done any sewing but I did bake the most adorable cake to take to a Halloween Party.  I figured that even the dessert should be in costume!

One boxed cake mix made 2 of these cuties.  The monkey "fur" is chocolate rice cereal (in this case Cocoa Pebbles) and I used upside down Rolo candies for the eyes.

Would you like to make your own Monkey cake?  Watch the video on the Better Homes and Gardens site

One word of warning though.  Make this cake the day you want to serve it.  The cereal gets soft and loses it crunch if you make it too far in advance.

Talk at you later!  Rumi