Where oh where is the time flying off to?

I have emerged! Oh, that's true, you all did not notice that I was stuck under a pile of stuff! I really am, I need to take a week off and just clean... Thing is that I'll just end up in front of my sewing machine (Smiling face) sewing up a storm, instead of cleaning!

I want to give a shout out to A, who just gave birth to a beautiful little girl named Emma. Congratulations to A & J! Yes, I am trying to finish the baby quilt for Emma... I am a tad behind in my projects... and BOM's...

So I found one project that I think I need to make about a 1/2 dozen of in the next two or three weeks...

This is from Nancy's Couture blog for this card wallet

 5.3.11 |  Posted by Nancy Brumfield

I know y'all need one of these!!!  They are quite handy.  They can hold store cards, credit cards, business cards, and any other little card you might have. So grab your supplies and let's get to work!

Supplies Needed:

• 4 Scraps of Fabric at least 8" x 8"
• Medium Weight Fusible Interfacing
• Ruler
• Scissors
• Thread
• Sew On Snap
• Sewing Machine

For the outside & lining:

Cut your outside and lining fabrics into 8"x 8" squares. 

Also cut 2 squares of interfacing 8" x 8".

Iron the interfacing onto the squares following the manufacturers directions.

For the pocket pieces:

From the other 2 fabric cut rectangles 4" x  8".

I cut 3 of each.

Fold each rectangle in half, WRONG sides together, so it is now 2" x 8" and iron.

To assemble the wallet:

Grab you lining piece. Starting at the bottom draw a line 1" up from the bottom. Draw 4 more lines each 1" above the previous line.

Starting at the line closest to the bottom lay a pocket piece with raw edge  facing AWAY from you on the line.

Sew it in place using a 1/8" seam.

Continue doing this until you have sewn a pocket piece on each of the 5 lines.

Don't panic! You should have 1 extra pocket piece.  We will add that in just a minute.

Starting at the top fold the pocket pieces up and iron in place.

Now grab that extra pocket piece and pin it to the bottom.

 This time the raw edge will be pointing towards you.

Baste it in place.

Draw a line down the middle (4") and then sew. 

TIP: ***  Sew from the bottom up to prevent folds or buckles in the pockets. ***

Now lay other square on top of the pocket square. Make sure right sides are together.

Sew using a 1/2"seam allowance.  Make sure to leave an opening to turn it right side out.

Clip the corners.

 Turn right side out and iron.  Whip stitch the opening closed.

Fold it in half and iron.

Sew on a snap as pictured above.

Fill it with cards.

Hope you get a chance to try this pattern out. It is rather straight forward and easy :) Just my kind of pattern these days!

Thanks for stopping by! Ciao for now :)

J :)

Great Idea!

Have you ever had a moment when you thought ... "where did I see that post?" and you really want to make it, but you do not have the time? Ah, yes, I am right there with you. I found this wonderful tutorial for a bag to bring to the beach. It would be a great bag to make for my nieces... for Christmas/Chanukkah that they would be able to use for the beach, for laundry, for stuffing clothing into for a sleep over, I could go on and on...

Anyway, I saw this over at iCandy Handmade and had to capture it here so I can make a few... I only have 12 nieces... but I think that this would only work for the ones under 20 years old, so that would bring it down to 5 nieces.

So here is iCandy Handmade's posting July 20th and her part of the series 'What do we do in the summertime?'

I'm excited to be a part of Kierste's series this summer called 'What do we do in the summertime?'

at iCandy, we spend most of our days lounging in our beach chairs, drinking diet cokes and watching our kids play for hours at the beach!  So, my summertime craft for you is just a quick something that is making my life a little easier, and my car a little less sandy!

 I just needed a bag that would successfully store all of my sand buckets, shovels, rakes, and other sand accouterments, would be easy to carry, would allow sand to filter out, and still allow the wet sand to dry out. 

check, check, check and check... 

All I used was a cheap, mesh laundry bag from Target, and a clearance-d cut of utility fabric (you know, the kind they use to make re-usable grocery bags?) and I'm loving the results.  

This just might be genius!  :)

Want to make one yourself?

what I used:

1 Heavy Duty Mesh Laundry Bag (from Target)

1 yard (I have left-overs) Utility fabric ($2/yd clearance at JoAnn's)

serger (not required)

scissors, pins, sewing machine, yada yada

 Cut:

-8" x length of the fabric strip (for the bottom)

-6 1/2" x length of the fabric strip (for the top)

-8" x 35" strip (for the strap)

 (I serged the top and bottom of each strip except the strap strip (that one doesn't matter)

You don't have to serge them, this fabric doesn't fray, but I liked the finished edge that it gives.  You can choose to zig-zag stitch the top and bottom to finish it, or just leave it plain!

 Fold the Strap strip (the 8" x 35") directly in half (the long way) and use a ruler to crease along the edge the entire length of the strip to make an obvious line.

 When you open it up, you want to be able to see that line!

 Next, fold each side into the middle of that line and pin.

 like so:

 And then again, fold it in half along that crease that you made before.  This creates a quadruple thick strap to make it more sturdy, while simultaneously finishing the edges.

 Sew around the perimeter of the strap. 

 Next pin your completed strap onto the drawstring side of your mesh bag, near the top.  You just want to make sure that you leave enough room for the drawstring to do it's job, so a good 3 inches from the top (ish) is great...

 Take your top strip of fabric (the one measuring 61/2 x the length of the fabric) and pin it over the strap, running parallel with the top of the bag.

 To sew the top strip around the bag, I began at the end of the strip that ran along the strap, and began sewing up, toward the drawstring, and along the strap, then made a right-hand turn to begin sewing around the bag.  (I hope that makes sense.)  The picture below shows where I started.  Sew up the strap/end of the top strip, and then turn the corner to begin sewing parallel to the drawstring.  I pinned the strip in place as I went around the bag, measuring periodically to make sure I was equidistant from the top.

 As you approach the beginning, fold the end of your strip under to finish it nicely.  (you may need to trim your strip a little bit depending on the size of your mesh bag.)

 Sew a rectangle over the top strip, where the strap and top strip layer to reinforce the strap.

 Next, lay the fabric flat, and sew, again, around the perimeter of the bag, at the bottom of your strip.  This step was a little tricky to get the fabric to lay flat, but if I can do it, so can you!

 Here's what the top strip should look like when completed.  Now onto the bottom!

 Trim off the bottom seam of the mesh bag.

 Again, line the strap up with the bottom of the existing bag, and layer the bottom strip over the top of it to reinforce it.

 Sew around the top edge of that strip exactly the same as you did the top strip edges, and fold the edge under when you circle around to the beginning of your stitch lines.

 To finish off the bottom with a square edge, turn the bag inside out, and serge straight across the bottom (not a necessary step)

 And then re-stitched along my serge, and again about a 1/4 of an inch up from the bottom, just to reinforce my stitches.  (you never know how heavy those sand buckets will get!)

 Next, turn the bag sideways, and press the side-seams and the bottom seams together to create a right triangle at the corner (see picture below)

 You can use a ruler, but my Mother-in-law taught me to grab one of the little cards that bias tape comes wrapped around, and cut a little triangular notch out of it about 2/3 down from the top, and use that as your marker...put the top of the card at the top of your triangle, make a little mark where your line is...

 and then turn your card sideways, and use it as your straight-edge to draw your stitching line...

 Stitch along this line, twice...serge if you'd like, and trim off that little triangle on the edge.  Repeat with the other bottom-corner, and you have a square-bottomed bag.

Voila!

I hope this comes in handy for you this summer, and if you can get a chance, stop by and look what else we've got going this summer over at iCandy!

Thank you for stopping by! Hope your having a wonderful day!

Ciao for now :)

J ;)

Dawn Jahn Moses ~ An amazing women

Hello All, I need to share this obituary of a very wonderful women who has left us much too soon. This obituary is from the Boston Globe and ran on July 10, 2012 by Bryan Marquard 

Dawn Jahn Moses, 46, advocate for homeless children

Few constituencies have less political clout than homeless children, whose lot in life Dawn Jahn Moses tirelessly tried to improve over the past 17 years.

Recognizing the prejudice many harbor toward people who lose jobs and homes, she helped turn the focus from adults to children with “America’s Youngest Outcasts: State Report Card on Child Homelessness,” which the National Center on Family Homelessness first issued a few years ago and updated last year.

“It was Dawn’s foresight and vision to say: ‘How do we bring this to people’s attention? We have to package this around the kids,’ ” said Dr. Ellen Bassuk, founder and president of the center, based in Needham, where Ms. Jahn Moses had been a vice president. “Dawn was a warm, compassionate, very smart, politically savvy, personable human being who had just tremendous commitment to social justice issues.”

Ms. Jahn Moses, who was a policy adviser to Tipper Gore during the federal health care overhaul attempt in the 1990s, died June 6 in her Arlington home of cancer that had metastasized by the time she was ­diagnosed four years ago. She was 46.

“Dawn’s passion and determination to eliminate homelessness inspired and impacted so many,” Gore said in an e-mail. “In each of her public leadership roles, she was masterful at understanding the issues, inspir­ing people with her passion, and driving towards change.”

Ms. Jahn Moses had a sure grasp of how federal policies get made and was a go-to adviser in the nation’s capital and in Greater Boston as she advocated for those whose voices often go unheard.

As she worked with Gore and others during the health care debate of the 1990s, Ms. Jahn Moses made sure everyone remembered that each dry statistic represented a vulnerable person.

“Dawn loved policy, but she loved people more,” said Skila Harris, who formerly was ­Tipper Gore’s chief of staff and special assistant to Vice President Al Gore.

“Throughout that period when we were working on health care reform, the thing that sticks in my mind about Dawn is that she always brought us back to who would be served by the mental health and substance abuse coverage that we were crafting. She had a very true moral compass in that she never let us forget who this was for.”

Ms. Jahn Moses also paid close attention to those with whom she worked at government agencies and at the ­National Center on Family Homelessness.

“She was thorough and was an incredible strategic thinker and had such a commitment to homeless people,” said Katie Volk, who considered Ms. Jahn Moses a mentor at the center, and now works for the Center for Social ­Innovation. “Beyond that, she wanted to get to know you as a person. Even when she was so ill, she knew exactly what was going on in my family and the different people in my life, and she knew that about everybody.”

The youngest of four children, Dawn Anne Jahn was born in Princeton, N.J., where her father was an aerospace science professor and dean at Princeton University and her mother taught at the University League Nursery School.

She graduated from Princeton High School and went to Princeton University, from which she graduated in 1988 as a history major, with a certificate in women’s studies.

In a freshman Spanish class she met James Moses, whom she had first encountered in nursery school, though neither recalled those early months ­together. “She had taken four years of Spanish and by all rights should have placed into a higher level,” he said. “I think she stayed up a little too late the night before her placement. We might not have met if not for that little twist of fate because we traveled in different circles. We got lucky.”

They began dating the following year and married in 1994.

Meanwhile, after graduating from college, Ms. Jahn Moses took a job at the National Institute of Mental Health, working on programs for the homeless mentally ill.

She went to the University of Texas, graduating with a master’s in public affairs, and ­returned to federal government. Along with advising Gore, she worked with the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Service Administration.

Ms. Jahn Moses, who moved with her husband to Massachusetts in 1995, took great satisfaction in working on policies designed to help the homeless, the mentally ill, and substance abusers.

“She never articulated it, but I think she felt a calling,” her husband said. “She could have done anything. She could have been a great lawyer, she could have been a great banker, but that wasn’t her. She needed to do this work.”

Said Volk: “She doesn’t take credit for things, but in her quiet way, she had a big impact on our field of family homelessness.”

Just as involved with her own family, Ms. Jahn Moses set aside illness to attend the many activities in which her 13-year-old daughter, Georgia, and 9-year-old son, Henry, participated. Despite her diagnosis, Ms. Jahn Moses was so spirited that “I thought to myself: ‘This illness has no idea who it’s met,’ ” Volk said. “She was just so tenacious.”

In addition to her husband, daughter, and son, Ms. Jahn Moses leaves her father, Robert Jahn of Princeton; a brother, Eric Jahn of Princeton; and two sisters, Jill Jahn of Princeton and Nina Gustin of Greenwich, Conn.

Family and friends will gather to celebrate Ms. Moses’ life at 2 p.m. Saturday in Town Hall in Arlington.

“She was an incredibly thoughtful and loving mother and wife,” her husband said. “Georgia and Henry were her pride and joy.”

Though the illness was ­advanced by the time she was diagnosed, Ms. Jahn Moses “defied all the odds, all the statistics in terms of survival,” he said. “I think she was able to do it because she wanted to be around as long as she could for the kids.”

The gathering this past Saturday was a wonderful outpouring of Dawn's life, she touched so many people. The stories, antidotes, smiles, chuckles, and many tears brought so many different corners of her life together.   Dawn loved color and asked that all the ladies wear hats to her memorial and we did. 

Thank you for stopping by today, Ciao for now 

J :/

On the road again...

Ah yes, middle of the week holidays throw one off from the normal routine... Or at least it did to me. Just one week later and I am all ready behind.

Well I am just stopping by as I am off to visit my sister and her family in the Catskills of NY.

I hope I have pictures to share on Sunday :) Till then have a great weekend.

Thanks for stopping by, Ciao for now :)

J :)

More than half way...

Is it me? Or does it seem that time is flying by? I am looking at the calendar and it is saying June 27th!!! The month has flown by! I have so many projects that I need to finish that I will be missing once again... I am aiming to post at the very least once a week... or on Wednesday to catch up... :)


So last weekend hubby and I spent some time in NJ visiting my aunt. She has a show at the local library of photographs she took during her time in China, as a volunteer English teacher, some twenty five years ago or more. The photos she took where amazing. I think that the fact that some visitors to the show where from the very province that my aunt had taken the pictures, was even more amazing. They where very interested in the fact that my aunt took some pictures of places that most visitors have no knowledge whatsoever about. There was a picture of a building that was the dorms for those who are not going on to further education. Pictures of the Terracotta Army (the army was discovered in the spring of 1974 to the east of Xi'an in Shaanxi province). In addition to the warriors, an entire man-made necropolis for the Emperor has also been found around the first Emperor's tomb mound. So seeing a picture similar to this one, done by my aunt was very interesting to think how close she was to viewing these.  

There where more pictures that showed people and places that the young men who spoke to my aunt, said that they are no longer there. I am glad that we got a chance to see the show. I remember the book that she had put together after she came back from this trip. So seeing them hung up was wonderful. 

The other place we went to in NJ was a park called Luna Parc.To quote the web page:

 "Luna Parc is situated on 5 acres in the lush northwestern woods of New Jersey, Luna Parc is a perpetual work-in-progress. Since 1989 the house and grounds have become an environmental sculpture park by artist, designer and King-o-Luna, Ricky Boscarino." 

It was a lot of fun... I took a few pictures that I am still sorting out. Go check out Luna Parc and you will be amazed at the collection of art and what Ricky Boscarino has done to the place... there are pictures of what it looked like before the add-on's, changes of windows, and sculptures where all added.  

I want to thank you for stopping by :) Hope you have had a great day! Ciao for now :)

J

Yes, I am still among you all...

My Finish-Up-Friday Ladies have been making fun of me of late... They are saying that I have forgotten my Blog... Sad to say that Life is really getting in the way of writing...

Today I grabbed sometime to stop by and say hi :)  I am still temping... but now I am also looking outside to find a permanent position, as the temp position is dragging their collective feet.

I am also teaching a private class ... to make a simple wall hanging... need to find good time to get together and start.

I have a wedding quilt that I'm also working on, a baby (due July 1st or so) quilt, two graduation T-shirt quilts, and my aunt's quilt. I need to check in with my aunt next weekend to find out if this is going to Texas or staying in New Jersey.

So, while I have been away, I have not forgotten you all :)  Nor have my friends forgotten me... did you see the new button to the right? Yea, it is another quilt-along, this time for a Mario Brother's quilt. That would be perfect for the oldest grandson for Hanukkah. I would need to make a Princess Mario Brother's quilt for our granddaughter... That would work... now to think of something for the baby and their parents for Hanukkah. We only give one gift for each, not one for each night. I don't need to encourage them with more stuff that they all will not use.

In the meantime, I also have a signature quilt that I need to whip up in the next four weeks... I will post how that is going... thinking how I am going to incorporate the colors for the wedding into the quilt. It will be over two hundred signatures... I'm nuts!

Thanks for stopping by :) Ciao for now!

J :)

Monday...

It really seems like time is flying... I have already been a temp for 12 weeks!

I am still hearing interesting stories from the people I work with regarding the women who's position I am filling in for... The latest is that she was out shopping with her husband and just about ran into my manager... I say just about, because when he saw her, I gather he went off in another direction. He left his wife to pay the bill and say hello to the women.

I did say I am still hearing stories... I think if I was in her position I would have been looking elsewhere for work while being paid for sick leave.

 In the meantime I have gotten a quilt done! Yea!!!
This is the front...

This is the back...

Back in February I found out a friend was moving to Florida and giving away a very nice crib. I have the crib here for our grandson. This quilt is the thank you quilt I mentioned on Facebook, and is for the little girl who is now into a big girls bed.

The quilt will be on it's way tomorrow!!! Sweet

Thank you for stopping by, Ciao for now :)

J :)