Liebster Award!

Heidi at Red Letter Quilts has very kindly nominated me for the Liebster Award! Thank you so much, Heidi!

The Liebster Award is for blogs with less than 200 followers or that are less than 6 months old. Each nominee must do the following:

 

1. List 11 random things about yourself.
2. Answer 11 questions posed by the nominator.
3. Choose 11 blogs to pass the award on to and link them to your post. 
4. Create 11 questions for those 11 people to answer.

So, here we go!

11 random things about myself:

1. I read, on average, about 5 books a week. More if I have to spend a long time on a bus. Getting my first e-reader made my life SO much easier.
2. Why do I spend a long time on buses? Because I coach my school's math team! We travel to about 10 competitions a year throughout the state and nation, which results in a lot of time on a bus. Fortunately, we pay for the good buses.
3. I have been dancing for almost nineteen years--on and off since I was three! I've done ballet, jazz, and lyrical (contemporary) mostly, but have also dabbled in gymnastics and tap. 
4. I love watching college football and am almost completely uninterested in all other sports. Go Noles!
5. I have a massive collection of t-shirts. I counted a couple of months ago and I think it was somewhere in the neighborhood of 60 or so.
6. I spent the fall semester of my junior year of college in Hong Kong studying abroad. It was AMAZING. I also got to spend that semester with my then boyfriend, now husband, which made it even better!
7. My husband and I have two dogs, Izzy and Peanut, both of whom came from our local animal shelters. They are on the larger side, both about 60 lbs. We baby them and treat them like our kids. :)
8. Other than the semester I spent in Hong Kong, I have never lived outside the state of Florida, which means that my current location (Tallahassee) is the farthest north I have EVER lived! 
9. I have been a Mac user for my whole entire life--I have NEVER owned a PC (though my husband owns several, and I'm forced to use one for work--our IT guy refers to Macs as "fruit"). My whole family is the same way--my parents bought their first Mac around the time I was born. Two Christmases ago, my mom bought us all t-shirts that say "I was a Mac user when Apple was doomed."
10. My favorite color is pink, and my friends in my knitting group make fun of me because I pretty much exclusively buy pink yarn.
11. I hate cooking but I LOVE to bake! I spend most of December baking Christmas cookies.

And here are the answers to the questions that Heidi asked her nominees:

1. Cats or Dogs?

DEFINITELY dogs!

2. AM or PM person?

PM. I hate waking up early!
3. Sand or Snow?

I'm a Florida girl, so definitely sand!
4. Floral or Plaid?

Floral
5. Warm or Cool colors?

Cool colors
6. Favorite Flower?

Pink roses
7. Who would you like to have lunch with if you could?

Hmmm… not sure. Maybe Hillary Clinton?

8. Hotel or tent?

DEFINITELY hotel. I am not a camping person.
9. Your first quilt pattern?

The first quilt pattern I followed? Sunkissed Squares, from the Moda Bake Shop.
10. How many UFO's do you have stashed?

Ummm… too many to count… around 12 or so?
11. What is missing in your fabric stash?

Neutrals and text prints. 

I'm nominating the following bloggers:

http://fairlymerry.blogspot.com/, one of my buddies from the Cochineal group of the Simply Solids bee this year

http://www.squawkthat.com/, another buddy from the Cochineal group

http://www.nitadances.com/, who has been buzzing along with me in We Bee Learning for the past year

http://throwawenchintheworks.blogspot.com/, who I've followed for a while and is a fellow teacher

http://archiethewonderdog.blogspot.com/, who is absolutely hilarious!

http://recipeforsanity.blogspot.com/, a real-life friend who does not blog about quilting, but instead about recipes and her path towards her masters in counseling and eating disorder recovery

http://busybeingfancy.com/, another real-life friend whose blogs about her and her husband's efforts to renovate their 85-year-old house (which is amazing!)

http://www.knottedcotton.com/, whose blog I've just discovered, but I'm a new follower as a result of reading her Slow Blog Manifesto (one could look up "slow blog" in the dictionary and find my picture)

http://fosterreviewsit.blogspot.com/, who I discovered in the Let's Get Acquainted! blog hop

http://sewquiltexplore.blogspot.com/, also from Let's Get Acquainted

http://spoolhardygirl.blogspot.com/, also from Let's Get Acquainted

And the questions for them:

1. What made you start your blog?

2. What is your favorite dessert or sweet treat?

3. What is your favorite beverage?

4. What are your favorite and least favorite things about blogging?

5. If you could be an expert in one area, what would it be? Be as general or specific as you'd like!

6. If you could have lunch with anyone, who would it be?

7. Who do you look up to?

8. Who is your favorite author and/or what is your favorite book?

9. Where do you do your crafting?

10. How long have you been a crafter (quilter, knitter, etc)?

11. What is your favorite color?

Finish-Along 1st Quarter 2013

We will see how many of these get done. 

1. Red bubble quilt

This is basically a whole cloth quilt (with a pieced border) with appliquéd circles. The circles were attached with basting spray and then I'm free-motion quilting over them to stitch them down permanently (inspired by this quilt at from the blue chair). I have to say, I'm not enjoying it super-much. This is destined for a child in foster care. It's about halfway through the quilting process, and could get finished in a day or two if I had enough room on my sewing table to manipulate it...

2. Giant granny square quilt

These granny squares are all made from charm squares from an I Spy Spoonflower swap. I still have tons of these charms and I'm not sure what I'm going to do with the rest of them… This quilt is basted, but I haven't started quilting yet.

3. Chevron quilt

This is becoming a REALLY long process! For this quilt, I sewed 2.5" strips of Connecting Threads Urban Odyssey with 2.5" strips of Kona white. Then I cut each strip into 4.5" squares and then arranged them in a chevron pattern. At their longest, these rows are 20 squares long! And I have a VERY small living room. I'd love to get this top finished this quarter. I don't even remember when I started this. FYI: I started doing this with a pack of 2.5" strips. That was not nearly enough fabric. Once I realized that, of course they were out of 2.5" strip packs, so I had to buy quarter yards of every fabric I wanted to use (about 16 of them, I think). I ended up using 2 strips total for each fabric.

4. Sew.Happy.Quilt quiltalong

 

I think I might have finished one more block for this one that's not shown.

5. Garden Squares quilt

I need to start making some more of these.

6. Bow tie quilt

I'm swapping some more bow ties this month or next, but I'm getting close to the number I need!

7. Granny square quilt(s)

Need to trim and sew these together. I ended up with 45 or so in total.

8. We Bee Learning 2012 quilt top

My month for We Bee Learning was December, and my bee-mates made me this block with any 4 bright solids they chose for the boxes. I'm still waiting for a few of them, and I need to make mine.

Linking up to:

Happy New Year!

I have neglected this little blog sorely over the past few months! I've been crafting (not necessarily sewing) a lot, but not taking pictures or writing anything. So I'm going to post my 2012 accomplishments and 2013 New Year's resolutions here (both crafty and non) and show you a bit of what I've been up to.

1. I finished three quilts this year!

Supernova quilt

Skill Builder Sampler Christmas quilt

Across the Sea quilt

I would have liked to finish more, of course, but I have a baby quilt mid-quilting, a baby quilt basted, and a long-time WIP that I've finally made some significant progress on, so I'm pretty pleased with these three finishes.

2. I participated in my first quilting bee!

 

 There are only 9 pictures for two reasons--I forgot to take a picture of one, and I am a TERRIBLE bee-person and haven't made my last two blocks. Admittedly, one of the blocks I haven't made is for me. So that makes it ever so slightly better, but still bad.

I will be continuing to participate in We Bee Learning for 2013, as well as participating in Simply Solids-a modern {bee}. I loved getting out of my comfort zone for these, and I'm happy I'm continuing to participate.

3. I got, and learned how to use, a Silhouette Cameo!

I have the best mom and dad in the whole entire world, and they bought me a Silhouette for my birthday in August. I immediately jumped into learning how to use it, focusing mostly on vinyl projects. I've made a bunch of stuff, including Christmas ornaments, wedding presents, tumblers with vinyl, and onesies with heat transfer vinyl. I have plans for oh so much more, and I will try to post stuff as I make it for those of you who might be interested. 

4. I made a billion wreaths

And by a billion, I actually mean about 6, which somehow I have NO pictures of. But I have wreaths for winter, spring, football season, and Christmas of course! And I just keep making more… on the list is a burlap bubble wreath and a Valentine's day ribbon wreath. 

5. I got more comfortable with free-motion quilting

Though I didn't follow the challenges I'd planned to do, you can look at the Skill-Builder Sampler quilt to see my most extensive free-motion quilting endeavor to date. I feel much more confident now, after taking a class at my LQS and completing that quilt, and I'm planning to continue using FMQ for my quilting projects.

And now for some goals/resolutions… .

1. Quilts for charity

After making two quilts for charity in 2011, I didn't complete any in 2012. I have two in progress that will be part of my finish-along list for this quarter, so I plan to get two done early in 2013. I want to contribute to Newborns in Need again, as well as passing these two along to a friend who works with children in foster care. 

2. A bed-sized quilt

This one is well in the works. My goal is for it to be a twin-sized quilt for our guest room/office. Eventually I may get started on a king-sized quilt for my bed, but probably not soon.

3. Learn to paper-piece

I'm participating in the Lucky Stars Block of the Month Club. I'm excited about these blocks, and want to get started (although first I have to find a way to print out the templates… maybe a goal for this year should be to buy a new printer?)

4. Open my Etsy shop

I'm hoping to open it soon! It will include Christmas ornaments, onesies, canvas signs, etched glasses, tumblers, and other items that I'm making using the Silhouette. I had really hoped for it to happen before Christmas, but I just had too much going on with work. 

5. Blog every once in a while 

Because really, I have so much fun making all this stuff, the least I can do is document it for myself and share it with others!

2013 may have a bunch of changes in store for me and my family--I'm hoping so, at least, but we shall see as the year progresses. Happy New Year to all of you! I wish you a wonderful 2013! I'm going to enjoy watching some football (go Noles!) and perhaps work on organizing my closet. :)

Linking up to: