From Deborah

in my Heartstrings Group! (http://heartstringsquiltproject.blogspot.com)

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She sent these two lovely quilts - with the backing. I really like the way the coins look. I have started my moms group and a few ladies in my guild on the String blocks - this may be the next thing I show them! Won't these be a great addition to our Quilts of Valor?

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They look like a great way to use up scraps as well as smaller pieces that I have here!

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Today the storms didn't come in like we thought - although there was thunder and black clouds - maybe tonite some rain will come.

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Back to getting a back ready for another Quilt!! Have a great evening!

Happenings at the house

You know - rumor has it that school starts here in about 2 weeks. This is a shame... a horrible horrible thing to have happen to my kids... so we are packing everything else that we didn't get done into the last 2 weeks... and most of that takes my effort (smile).

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And of course they are doing construction on the highway, and my drive goes to the highway, so we are becoming real familiar with the flaggers, steamroller drivers, and construction dudes.
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So, we went fishing. My husband got this boat way back in college and his dad had it up in their barn. It is now at our house and the boys fixed it up and painted it some. So we had to go test it at the lake. It was a blast. Only 3 can ride in a time, so we took a little tent and two of us fished from shore while the other 3 went in the boat. Surprisingly no one fell in the water. They came close, but got lucky. No fish - but lots of fun.

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We have been riding all over the place. Of course I forgot my camera for that. But it was fun. We really don't have trail riding horses, yet we went trail riding (somewhat) anyways. We planted some trees over on the East side, and we went to check on them. 4 of them are really growing. And two fences need mending. So we did that too.

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We managed to get to the Fresno Zoo when we went out for my uncles wedding. My mom, brother , nephew , my three boys and myself, went. We had a good time. My three are hugging the elephant. Then all of them got to try to touch stingrays. The barbs on the stingers had been removed, and the water smelled pretty salty ( ugh). I have a timer on my camera so tried to get a timed shot of all of us, and a zoo visitor ( bless his heart) asked if we would like him to take it. Good thing he did - all my timed ones have really pretty leaved in front on someone EACH time! Go figure!

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And then of course was the wedding. My uncle and his new wife said I Do. And then they danced the night away to Elvis, Fats Domino, Chubby Checkers, and more . My sons stole the camera and they got some of the best pictures of people. Kind of Candid ones too... I may have to delete a few of them.

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And last but not least - my oldest has no more braces. He is So excited... and smiles all the time now. Of course I think it makes him look way too old! But the good news is they are off!

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Have a good one! It is a little cooler here so far - supposed to me in the double digits rather than triple - so a good time to go work in the garden!

Sunday Is Audry Day!

This is Ms Audry. She is one of the ladies that sew with my moms group. And man is she on a roll. These are Three quilts that she finished between the first sew day and the second. I know there are more - because I hung out with her today!
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Today we had a booth at the Larimer Co Fair. We had three ladies sewing, Two cutting, Kids ironing - and I bound a quilt... Drum roll please!
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Audry told me that she has a new calling in life - and that is to be a quilter! She is just loveing it, and she is so proud to be helping out the soldiers. We all talked to many people today about QOV and she was sewing and talking! It was great!
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Ms Vicki W - do you recognize any of the fabrics in the top right quilt??


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Today was also the day to pick up your entries from the Weld Co Fair - so after being at one, we drove over to the other , picked up one of my quilts, and now we are home and about ready to put our feet up. It was a great day , very quilty, and I have used all my words for the day talking up QOV!
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Hope you all had a great one - I will see ya soon!

Its Cathy E day!

These Beauties came in from Cathy E in KY. The curved one looks like it was a challenge. I have never good with curved seams so I am impressed!
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The borders on the red quilt had the coolest feathers in them so I took a picture from the backside so you can see the quilting better.
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These quilts are really neat! They are soft and cuddly and are very eye catching! You know - even after seeing all sorts of Red White Blue and Creams - I am still amazed that I haven't seen them all. This Red quilt had quite a few fabrics that I had never seen. Maybe this means I should get out more!
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On another note - if anyone will be at the Larimer Co Fair on Sunday.. from 3 to 7 pm we will be in the First Interstate Bank Bldg on the East side promoting Quilts of Valor. I will be binding a couple of quilts too. I say this so you are not shocked when you see me attempting to BIND something. This is probably my least favorite part of quilting... yet apparently it MUST be done (grin)
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Have a quilty Day - Enjoy the sunshine!

Our Quilt of Valor Project - No Soldier Forgotten

I have been asked some questions about the Quilt of Valor project and I thought I would try to answer them all today.
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First of all, our school QOV project started 4 years ago now with my sons 5th grade class. They were learning about veterans and my son told the teachers about the QOV quilt project that I was involved in. So one of them contacted me and asked if I could address the class. They gave me 20 minutes - I took an hour. Well Not really me - the kids had the most awesome questions and they wanted to get involved. One innocent kid asked if the class could make a quilt ... and the thing just took off from there.
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The class that year made 8 quilts. Another child and his mom made a quilt and I had one. We were invited by the chaplain to present the quilts to him. It was cool. Jump to this last year. The chaplain now serves a unit of 400 soldiers that have been wounded. Our delivery to him this year consisted of 48 quilts. I sort of lost count - but I think our kids made 15-20 quilts.. there was a quilt from each group of kids, and quite a few scrappy quilts. The others came from very generous quilters across the US.
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As we left this year the Chaplain asked if maybe we could bring 100 quilts next year, and I thought - why not? As we were driving back I started thinking of ways to get my quilt guild, friends, more students, etc involved. I spoke to quite a few people and started getting people excited. Then a friend ( and yes - I still call her that) from a Quilting list challenged the whole list to help out. If there were 400 soldiers there why couldn't we try to cover them all. Why should Chaplain choose only 100 soldiers to recieve a quilt...

And Voila - a challenge was born!
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Now many many of you are involved with QOV and I DO NOT want to take any quilts from your own projects. I know there are soldiers ALL over the country that need a quilt. I KNOW that many of them could use a quilt now - however our goal is to get these quilts to the Chaplain in May 2009 and have enough for every soldier in his unit at one time.
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The way we are doing this is :

1. I dragged my mom - not so kicking and screaming - into the project. She organized a group of ladies to sew.

2. My own quilt guild is having monthly sew days to work on QOV's

3. We will be setting up a booth at the Larmier Co Fair to entice people to join.

4. We will be sewing in the school again. Not only in the 5th grade, but the CFS teacher at the high school has joined in - she is a force unto herself ( I Love her!) We do have to let them go to school and get the regular education - so our sewing goes around their schedules. We do need the Whole year to make our quilts. I do the quilting... but rumor has it the CFS teacher got a machine to help out too ( hint hint Mrs. W )

5. Anyone who reads this who wants to contribute - but will not take away from another project - is wonderfully and wholeheartedly accepted.

We need quilts from sizes 50x 60 to 72x 90. I don't want to discourage anyone - but No smaller than 50 x 60 please.
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I also drew up a fairly easy quilt pattern that you are welcome to use. http://www.quiltygirl.com/QuiltPatterns/not%20so%20top%20secret.pdf
Many have asked for it in Pdf form and a very sweet blogger did it for me...Thanks Liz ( http://lizquiltz.blogspot.com/)
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If you want more info about quilts of valor there is a website. http://www.qovf.org/ it has lots of info, if you have specific questions about this project - you can email me too - I may be slow but I will answer them.
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Another quilter (Lisa) suggested that we needed a motto - "No Soldier Forgotten" I like that and it applies - we will not forget one soldier and for us - defineatly not the soldiers in this unit.
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I hope that answers some of your questions.. keep em coming! - When something is so close to your own heart and you have been involved in it - you ( okay me) sometimes forget that not everyone can read your mind... which might be a very good thing somedays. My mind wanders and I hope it doesn't get lost LOL
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Have a quilty day!
Alycia

I have been asked for my address - but alas can not reply to the comment...
It is
Alycia Quilts
31544 U.S. Hwy 34
Kersey CO 80644

If it won't work in the label thingy sometimes you have to spell out Highway - but UPS does know where we are ;-)

Its Jackie Day!!

This incredible lady is really involved in Quilts of Valor. And Lucky me - I got to meet her and MQX in 2007. It is cool to put a face with a name - and actually make a contact! ~

Her name is Jackie and she is from New York. These quilts were made by her group according to the labels - which are wonderful!

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All of the quilts are so cool - and patriotic. The backs are really neat too. And of course I have the ruler to make the quilt on the bottom Right hand side - I have just never seen one made... Isn't it gorgeous!!

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Today in our neck of the woods it is 105deg - a little warm for us... and very very dry. There have been 2 grass fires around us and the smoke stinks. So I am keeping my fingers crossed for a little rain.

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Hope you all are having a quilty day!

Its Tracye Q Day

These Patriotic quilts came in from Tracye Q in ... Colorado!! She is a neighbor to the south ( way south) of me. How cool is that? The one on the left just really jumped out at me .. and one of my boys wants to make one like it!
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The one on the far left has really cool spiral quilting on it, so I tool a picture of that too - it looks awesome!
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This morning it smells really smoky here, it started last night and woke me up - so I went and checked all around to make sure nothing was on fire, and I couldn't see anything. So this morning I did it again - just to make sure and there is nothing at my place , but it is smoky all in front of the mountains, so something must be burning. Maybe I should watch the news sometime - but well - there is just

no time for that... I have quilts to quilt and quilts to oogle
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Have a great day.. quilt a lot and be happy!

Its April and Carolyn Day!

April and her friend Carolyn in Ames IA sent these lovely quilts to me! That is Carolyn with the horse. That horse looks very friendly! We used to have a horse very similar to the one in the picture. His name was Will, and we loved him.

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If I have the story straight - Carolyn is a fairly new quilter and made this quilt to the left. April W. then did the Long Arm quilting on it. They make a great team don't they?

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The other three quilts were made and quilted by April. April's LA business is called the Quilting Den in Ames IA.

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Back in my Pre quilting days I worked for a company and traveled all over - I spent a lot of time in Iowa and think I even went thru Ames.

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Anyways - Back to Quilts. I hang the quilts up in my living room to take pictures and it is so fun to get to look at them for a while. My Hubby came in while the stack n whack style ones were hanging and he had such fun trying to figure out how they turn out like that.

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Truly - they are all stunning and wonderfully pieced and quilted! They will make 4 soldiers very very happy!

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Thanks ladies for contributing, and thank you for your photos too!

Have a great day!!

Its Naomi Day

I recieved a wonderful box from Naomi and the Magic Valley Quilters. The Virtual MQX quilt I already posted was in it and then there were 4 More!!! It was great fun hanging them up on the curtain rod and taking pictures. The second one looks very string like.

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Each one of them has a cute little crocheted bookmark made by one of the ladies in the group. All of the quilts are so comfy , patriotic and soft. A couple of them came in tote bags that were really neat too.

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Today it is pretty warm here and I can see the Thunderstorms building.

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We had swim practice in the morning and there was an empty lane. Another mom and I swam in it... we tried to beat the kids.. didn't happen ;-) Well she might have beat them once or twice - but I sure didn't. Oh to be in shape again (giggle)

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Then it was off to sports physicals - I have one Swimming and One playing Football this fall.

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Today is also my parents anniversary - 41 years and they still like each other ;-) We called them as they were going to town for an anniversary lunch... or maybe it was the early bird special (tee hee)

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Have a great one!!

Sunday is Catch up Day

And oh boy have we been working! Last week I recieved 10 pillowcases from Nann H in IL and 15 pillowcases from Jan B. So today I got all the unpillowcased Quilts of Valor pillowcased. They look so nice. I have been printing the pics of the quilt and pinning them on the outside. If they are female quilts they also get a pink ribbon. And... I used ALL of the pillowcases - isn't that awesome!

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These first two pics are the cases that came from Jan. I think I need a bigger couch!

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The next pics are the cases from Nann and some yardage that she found for me to use. I have the perfect quilt top for it too...

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It was made by Jan K right here in Colorado. Now - Jan was a 4-H leader and taught sewing. She was a great teacher and her daughters are great seamstresses to. But they hadn't made quilts. So of course NOW they are hooked. Jan also made a cool pillowcase to go with her quilt.

We decided to do a rail fence for the first quilt with this group, and they were much better than they let on, and defineatly could have handled a harder quilt! So next month... tee hee ... they are in for it... I am going to show them 1/2 squares! It will open a whole new world in quilting!

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Okay - back to catching up. I already did a load of laundry, folded it, ironed enough clothes for my hubby to wear next week, did the dishes, finshed quilting a quilt, loaded the next one, got my cutting table all cleaned off... Now I think I might need to vacuum - but then again - no one is coming over for a day or two.... hmmmm my Carolina Crossroads is still next to the machine....

Later ;-)