Garden Bouquet Quilt: Month 19- The Lemon Lily

The tiger lily had proved such a favorite that Nancy declared she would design another lily for the flowers in the garden bouquet quilt. This time she chose the lemon lily, that pale yellow flower which is so fragrant and so enticing on a hot mid-summer’s night. This time she has designed the lily with its petals open to the breezes.

There are three parts to the flower, two leaves and a stem. The stem is made preferably from bias tape in the same shade of green as is used for the leaves.

The bias tape is safe to use since it is made from color fast material. It is easy to manipulate since it is cut on the bias. Then, too, since the edges are turned in ready for use it is more expeditiously put on.

The upper triangle of white which has been seamed onto the lower triangle of the pieced urn is ready for the lily and the two appliquéd birds.

The patterns for the urn and for birds were given early in the quilt series. If you do not have those or any of the back flower patterns send to your newspaper for them. A small notice is printed each week telling you how you may obtain the back copies.

Most quilt club members keep their patterns in the Nancy Page quilt scrap book. This is made from a pattern designed by Nancy and may be procured from your paper also.

The group held a discussion as to the advisability of using plain or figured material for the lily. Nancy voted in favor of plain. She wanted a pale yellow for the open part of the flower and a darker shade for the lower part.

She said that this flower always was a solid color which was one of the features which distinguished it from the cousin, the tiger lily.

By this time you are surely used to the best procedure for making the design. First, cut the picture along with its accompanying illustrations from the paper. Second, trace the flower, leaves and stem lightly on the white triangle. Third, trace the design onto lightweight cardboard. Cut out the various parts.

You will note the dotted lines going through some of the petals. These indicate the overlapping of material. It is best to allow as much cut too close to finished shape it is apt to pull out of position.

In cutting the cloth be sure to allow one-quarter inch for turning as is shown, for if the pattern is under on all sides. The raw edges are turned under, basted and pressed in place.

Then the pieces are pinned on the white triangle as indicated by the faint tracery. By using a slanting, invisible hemming stitch the [pieces are appliquéd in place.]

I haven’t been able to work on my block so I don’t have anything to show off. I will update this when I do get the chance!

Do you have any Garden Bouquet Quilt blocks to show off? Leave a link to your blog post about it in the comment section or email me a photo at heathers_custom_sewing{at}yahoo.com so I can share with everyone!

I hope you are enjoying this series!
~Heather

Quick Links to:

Month 1: Beginning Instructions, Urn, and Basket Instructions
Month 2, Part 1: The Tulip
Month 2, Part 2: The Saucy Bird
Month 2, Part 3: The Meek Bird
Month 3: The Cactus
Month 4: Lily of the Valley
Month 5: The Wild Rose
Month 6: The Trillium
Month 7: Canterbury Bells
Month 8: Nasturtium
Month 9: The Pansy
Month 10: The Tiger Lily
Month 11: The Primrose
Month 12: The Zinnia
Month 13: The Daffodil
Month 14: The Phlox
Month 15: The Poppy
Month 16: The Rose
Month 17: Balloon Flower
Month 18: Forget-Me-Not
~*~
Hand Appliqué
Machine Appliqué
Alternate Method of Appliqué Tutorial
Biased Binding Tutorial

New Windows! Update!

Last year we got new windows on the back half of our house.

Justin & I decided that waiting another 2 years to get the font half of our house finished just wasn't plausible. The windows are 60 year old single pane glass windows that were in serious need of some tender love and care. Every year we put plastic wrap on the mesh part to keep out as many drafts as possible. With the back half being done we didn't need to do that on them as we got some serious upgraded windows. They are double pain, UVB protected, energy efficient, just plain awesome windows!

Unfortunately the front half was still needing to be replaced & we were just sick of taking care of them. We also learned that we could still qualify for the stimulus package for the front half of the windows this year. So we decided to go ahead & go for it!

We went through Home Depot again & again received very professional results. The guys who installed the windows had all 4 (very large) windows done in less then 5 hours. They cleaned up after themselves & were over-all friendly.

Unlike last year, Justin was at home this time around. He ended up taking Ian out for awhile because he was very nosey & had to watch everything the installers did. He also asked about a million questions too. I think Ian is going to end up either in the military or building things for a living. Jameson could have cared less about what was going on. LOL

Anyways, here are our windows before…

Kitchen

Dining Room

Living Room

And here are our windows after…

Living Room

Dining Room

Kitchen

I just wanted to share because I am very excited about them. Home improvements are great! I think the next thing is to (finally) finish the half bath AKA 'the boys bathroom'. Then I think next year we'll get a new front door. Then… who knows what (we have a huge list, LOL)!


~Heather

Happy Anniversary!!!

Happy 5th Anniversary to my husband, Justin, and me today! I can't believe it's been 5 years already!

Here we are way back when on our wedding day...

And here we are now... I couldn't find a recent photo of us together. lol

This is my friend, Angel (on the left), and me (on the right) at my parents house. 5/22/10

And this is the most recent photo I have of Justin. He doesn't let me take photos of him very often. 5/24/10

A while ago I posted the story about how Justin & I met & you can read that here.

Thanks for stopping by!

~Heather

Garden Bouquet Quilt: Month 18- Forget-Me-Not

The members of the Nancy Page quilt club were already bemoaning the fact that there were only four more meetings of the club. But Nancy reminded them that they would meet to plan a border and a quilting pattern. So that there were really six meetings still to come, if you count the one today as coming. Today the group makes the first flower in the last row. It is appropriately enough a forget-me-not.

For members who thought the flower was too large to represent a forget-me-not Nancy said, “All right, call it an anemore if you want to. Or make it a blue flax. I don’t care. You see all those flowers are about the same shape. It’s just a matter of persona; preference.”

The forget-me-not may be made in pale blue or in pale blue and in pale pink. One of the flowers may be blue and two of them pink. In any case, though, Nancy advised that the deeper part of the flower, shown by the shaded portion, be of the same color as the upper part. It might be a darker shade. But she didn’t advise blue and pink combined in one flower.

The materials chosen are color fast and of a softness which will allow easy stitching. Gingham is good.

The tiny circle in the center of the wide open flower may be embroidered in color fast embroidery cotton. The larger circle may be worked in outline stitch, or it may be a small appliquéd circle of a deeper shade of cloth. The outline stitch is the easier to use.

After the pattern with its accompanying directions was cut from the paper a light tracing was made on the white triangle which is seamed to the lower triangle block. This lower triangle consists of the pieced urn.

After the tracing on the cloth has been made, a second tracing is made on the lightweight cardboard. This is cut out and used as patterns for cutting the materials which will soon appear as flower and leaves.

The patterns are laid on material and the pieces cut with one-quarter inch allowance on all sides. The raw edges are turned under this quarter inch and basted and pressed.
Then the pieces are laid in place on the traced outline and appliquéd in place. A slanting, invisible hemming stitch is used.

The stem, which is best made of bias tape, is continued up under the open flower as indicated by the dotted lines. The dotted lines in the flowers show where pieces overlap. It is wise to allow sufficient material for under laying, otherwise the pattern pulls out of shape.

The flowers may be done in outline stitch, although this is not advised. They, as well as the leaves and stem, may be colored with crayon which is set into material by pressing with a hot iron.

The pieces may be appliquéd by using a buttonhole stitch. When this is done it is not necessary to allow the quarter in for turning under edges since the buttonhole covers the raw edges.

The birds are appliquéd in place and the seventeenth block of the garden bouquet quilt is finished.

(Click in the image to enlarge, right click & save to your computer, when you print it make sure the square equals 1 inch.)

I haven’t been able to work on my block so I don’t have anything to show off. I will update this when I do get the chance!

Do you have any Garden Bouquet Quilt blocks to show off? Leave a link to your blog post about it in the comment section or email me a photo at heathers_custom_sewing{at}yahoo.com so I can share with everyone!

I hope you are enjoying this series!
~Heather

Quick Links to:

Month 1: Beginning Instructions, Urn, and Basket Instructions
Month 2, Part 1: The Tulip
Month 2, Part 2: The Saucy Bird
Month 2, Part 3: The Meek Bird
Month 3: The Cactus
Month 4: Lily of the Valley
Month 5: The Wild Rose
Month 6: The Trillium
Month 7: Canterbury Bells
Month 8: Nasturtium
Month 9: The Pansy
Month 10: The Tiger Lily
Month 11: The Primrose
Month 12: The Zinnia
Month 13: The Daffodil
Month 14: The Phlox
Month 15: The Poppy
Month 16: The Rose
Month 17: Balloon Flower

Hand Appliqué
Machine Appliqué
Alternate Method of Appliqué Tutorial
Biased Binding Tutorial

My Memorial Weekend Mishap

Memorial weekend started out great.

Ian, my older son, went to spend the night at my parents house. He loves spending the night with them!

While he was gone my husband & I got to work on canning some strawberry jelly & making some strawberry wine. I took lots of pictures & plan to do a future 'how-to' post at a later date. Jameson was a very good baby while we worked in the kitchen. I think we started around 6pm and didn't finish until midnight. We did stop to eat dinner & put the baby to bed so we weren't in there for all those 6 hours!

Our first mishap, although minor, was that my strawberry jelly didn't set up. So, I'm calling it strawberry syrup! LOL It's very yummy & we've already had it on pancakes & ice cream. It's really no big deal & I'll be changing the recipe for the next batch. The strawberry wine is doing great & still fermenting away. We won't get to taste it for weeks to come.

The major mishap of the weekend began Sunday morning. My sewing room is in the basement because Jameson took over my old sewing room upstairs. I'm not complaining about that because I got a whole lot more square footage.

We've had a lot of heavy rain this spring. Combine that with our 2 large maple trees in the front yard which drop large amounts of helicopter seeds all over the yard & into the gutters. Justin had cleaned out the gutters twice already but it was enough that the water seeped in under our garage floor & into the crack in one wall of my basement sewing room. Along that wall I'd placed 4 book shelves. I happened to sit down next to one of the book shelves (to cut fabric) & glanced over at it & what did I see? Mold! I didn't even think about there being a crack in the wall when I put those book cases there.

I immediately pulled everything out of that one book case & this is what I found…


That's all water damage & there was only mold on the foot part. This book case has now been trashed! :( Luckily, I'd only stored sewing magazines & sewing books in there & the book case was an old cheap one. The books were a little damp but salvageable & not moldy at all. You can sort of see in the photo where some of the ink has discolored that backing too.

Here is where that book case stood against the wall…


This is the most damaged spot. I've scrubbed it up now & have a fan blowing constantly on the spot to hopefully dry out the carpet.

Here is where the book cases used to stand along that wall…


The good (expensive hard wood) book cases have moved next to an interior wall (next to the staircase) & the one good (cheap) book case is now on the only other interior wall. Here is moving in progress…



And here are the book cases filled back up…



The wall with the crack in it I decided to put my sewing table. I did this because it's open on the sides & bottom & much, much easier to pull away from the wall if I ever need to. I put it more towards the good corner where there was no water leakage…


And here is the rest of the room put back together…

The back wall with the wet spot on the left has been left empty. I'm not going to put anything there except a fan to blow it dry. My sewing table & ironing board are all set back up…


To the left of my sewing table I put a short book case that I stole from upstairs. I needed the extra storage space since I lost the big book case. And I have my vintage writing desk & an antique chest of drawers with more storage…


Further up the wall I moved my hope chest. Everything else to the left of it has stayed the same…


What a huge task! I spent all of Sunday & Monday moving, cleaning & reorganizing my sewing room. I had high hopes for the weekend… that I'd get my canning done (& redo the strawberry jelly), that I'd sew a few things, & enjoy the extra time with my husband before he leaves for 6 weeks of training. Well, I guess I should just stop making plans. But if I hadn't found that damage when I did that mold could have become dangerous & gotten me & the baby really sick since we spend the most time down there.

Overall we had a good weekend just with a few snags. I hope you all had a great Memorial Weekend! Here's hoping next year goes better… LOL

~Heather

Ian's Story

I admit, I'm having a tough time sitting down and writing this story about my older son, Ian. I briefly mentioned in my previous post about getting pregnant and about his birth-father. The beginning of my story isn't all that great but the ending has turned out much better then I could have hoped for!

I'll only be referring to Ian's biological father as his birth-father. We don't say his name nor talk about him in our house. The only good thing he ever did was provide the other half of the dna needed to create Ian.

When I was 17 I met Ian's birth-father in church, of all places. I was young & foolish & fell for his lies. He was older, by 6 years. (I'm not saying an age difference is a bad thing, as my husband is 5 years older than me, but in this case Ian's birth-father used our ages to take advantage of me.) He was a big talker & not long after my 18th birthday I got pregnant with Ian.

Around that time he began confusing his stories and trying to create more lies to cover up his mistakes. This is when we (meaning my parents & I) knew something just wasn't square about him. He became verbally abusive a week before my high school graduations. I remember locking myself in my room with him beating on the door yelling at me to let him in. My parents got home just in time & he left before they knew what was going on. That was when I knew I had to leave him & I asked him to not come to my graduations. He came anyway. With his whole family. I couldn't force them to leave, I was just too nice & I didn't want to cause a scene.

I will skip over a few details here but quickly mention that his family, especially his mother, are all just like him. Manipulative, controlling, pathological liars. I finally left him when I was almost 5 months pregnant.

I got emails.

I got phone calls.

I got letters.

I got threats.

He just wouldn't leave me alone.

In the mean time I began seeing an unwed pregnant mothers counselor through a great Christian organization & began planning a closed adoption. The families who wanted to adopt were put through a rigorous process to be eligible to adopt. They had additional requirements to go through the organization. They had scrap books about their families, beliefs, wishes, hopes, dreams that I was able to look through so I could pick the best family. In a closed adoption I would have no contact with my birth-child as apposed to an open or semi-open adoption where letters, pictures & such are exchanged.

I thought that choosing to give Ian up for adoption & doing a closed adoption would be the best & easiest thing for the both of us. The catch was that I had to get Ian's birth-father to agree & sign a legal document terminating his legal claims to Ian.

He refused. He said he wanted to take 'responsibility' for his actions. He said a lot of things. I knew better to take his word for anything.

After that I didn't him contact again & began planning for the birth of my son. I don't think anyone will ever understand how great my parents were in all this.

Ian Xavier was born December 2, 2002 from a planned c-section. He was 9lb 2oz and breech. My doctors tried to turn him several weeks before but he refused to budge. He came in to this world a happy healthy big baby, albeit a bit backwards.

I hated having the c-section. It was tough recovering. It was even tougher with the stress of Ian's birth-father. The hospital had strict orders to not admit him if he did show up. Luckily he didn't. He didn't even call to find out about him until December 24, 2002, Christmas Eve, during my families huge get together. My dad let him have a piece of his mind.

Things were quiet until Ian was 3 months old when his birth-father began demanding visitation rights. We'd already expected this & had been seeing a lawyer even before Ian was born. When visitations began we required them to be in my home where he would have strict supervision from me & my family. We didn't hover over him but we stayed in the other room so he could have a little privacy.

It wasn't long before he began demanding more & the lawyers were brought on board to mediate. Ian's birth father had to undergo a psychological evaluation & a deposition. The evaluation showed he wasn't unfit but that he 'missed the trees for the forest', whatever that means. And during the deposition we learned he refused to call Ian by his name but the name he had picked out. My lawyer ripped him a new one, if you know what I mean. He began calling him by 'Ian' then.

We eventually settled on a visitation schedule. It worked for awhile but his family came to every single visit. It wasn't long though before he began changing the schedule or the location of the meetings. There was even a time he didn't show up but his family did. They told me he was in the other room but I later learned he wasn't even there. I began requiring me to see him before I left Ian with him.

Visitation came to a screeching halt when Ian was 18 months old. His birth-father changed the visit location, yet again. I requested to go in & check things out & make sure it was safe to leave him there & he refused to let me in. Something about it didn't feel right & my mom & I refused to give Ian to them. We said we needed to contact our lawyers again & rework the visitations. He got in big trouble for that.

The last time visitations ever took place were at a highly supervised location. I can't remember the name of the place but a police officer was always on location. I would bring Ian in & sign him in then I'd go wait in the other room while he visited with his birth-father. He wasn't allowed to take Ian out of the visitation room, let alone the building. These supervised visits are set up for abusive parents. Only 2 visits took place there & then visits no longer took place.

Throughout this whole time I was supposed to be getting child support. I got it sporadically & when his wages were garnished he'd change jobs. I think I got about $2000 in child support, total. I was supposed to be getting over $500 a month, which was then lowered to around $375 a month. I won't even try to do the math. It's just not worth putting a dollar amount on my son. I didn't even care about the money but when I got it sure did help!

We didn't see or hear anything from Ian's birth-father after Ian was 18 months old. We were worried he was up to something but hopeful he had moved on.

When Justin & I married, when Ian was 2 1/2, we still hadn't heard from him.

After another year had gone by we began researching step-parent adoption. Justin had already been raising him physically but now it was time to make him Ian's legal father. We learned that if the biological parent 'willingly & knowingly abandon's' their child for a full 6 months then the adoption will be able to take place. We'd fulfilled the time requirement so we began the process.

We did all the required paperwork. We had a social worker come inspect our home and our refrigerator. She wanted to make sure I wasn't starving him or something. How awful! And Ian even had his own lawyer, a court-appointed guardian ad litum, who was fully unbiased, and who recommended the adoption to take place. He ended up being on our side in the end.

Ian's birth-father was notified & the court date was set. We were all required to show up but he never did. He had been really angry when he found out & talked big about contesting the adoption. The judge set a second date for which he again didn't show up. When he didn't show up for the 3rd court date the judge had had enough & legally severed all his rights to Ian. Papers were signed that very day!

Justin is now Ian's dad in name & in the eyes of the law! It was finally over a few months after Ian's 4th birthday! We couldn't have asked for a better outcome.

Ian is now a happy, healthy 7 1/2 year old (albeit ornery) boy.

I will be truthful with you though, this put a huge financial strain on us but we still somehow managed for me to stay home (even though there was a short time when I bounced back & forth between staying home & working- mostly working for my mom as the secretary in her accounting firm).We relied on & are grateful for many, many family members during this whole ordeal too. We couldn't have managed without you!

Also, Ian is non-the-wiser to what has gone one in the above story. As far as he knows Justin is & always has been his dad. He has no concept of who or what his birth-father is. One day, when he's old enough to understand, we'll talk to him about it. But for now, ignorance is bliss.

And that is Ian's Story...

~Heather

How My Husband and I Met

With our anniversary right around the corner, I thought I'd share our story.

2002 was a hard year for me. I got pregnant with my first-born not long after my 18th birthday. I was attending a private Christian school & was near the end of my senior year. The policy for the school is immediate dismissal for pregnant students. They had a zero tolerance for un-wed pregnant mothers. Needless to say, my pregnancy was kept hush-hush for those last 3 months of school. I did graduate although not with the best memories. Not long after that I left my sons birth-father. He was not physically abusive but he was psychologically abusive and a pathological liar but that is an entirely different story and not what I want to talk about!

In early 2002, Justin had just returned from an active duty Army deployment in Kosovo. He had finished his active duty term and joined the Guard, part time, when he got back. He has since joined the Guard full time and is actually considered active duty. But before that he worked at a laser engraving and polishing company. When he wasn't working he was online or out working on a car.

During the last months of my pregnancy I also spent a great deal of time online. I had nothing else to do but try to pass the time. Justin and I crossed paths in a local chart room often and we eventually exchanged messenger emails. We began talking online frequently. He wanted to meet up with me even though he knew I was pregnant. I told him there was no way until after the baby was born and I was able to wear some decent fitting clothes again. I was pretty insecure about my body and frankly I just didn't see how a guy would date me with my baggage.

Ian was born December 2nd, 2002 from a planned c-section due to him being breeched. It was very hard adjusting and I don't think I could have done it without my mom.

Just after Christmas, when Ian was almost a month old, Justin and I finally planned to meet each other. We agreed to meet at the mall where it was busy and we had lots of people around. That day I remember walking around the upper floor looking down at our meeting spot waiting to see if he would actually showed up & he did! I was so nervous that I almost left! I finally found the courage and Ian and I went down to meet him.

I am so glad I took that leap to meet someone off the internet! We both like each other a lot and by the end of the day I just knew that Justin was 'the one'! I think he knew too but he just won't admit it. lol

We dated for a year and the next Christmas Justin proposed to me in front of my family. During the gift exchange he gave me a camera and a camera case but inside the case was a hidden box with my ring in it! It was a huge deal and several of us cried.

We were engaged for a year and a half after that. We decided to wait so we could properly plan the wedding. We had a beautiful wedding June 11, 2005. Ian was our ring bearer at 2 1/2 years old. He was so cute in his little white tux!

And that is how Justin & I met! Hope you enjoyed my little story!

~Heather