Hope everyone had a nice Easter! We went to my youngest son's for dinner and all 3 of my kids were there. They are all in their 30's now but we did have 7 of my 16 grandkids there. The older 3 grandkids had to work so they didn't get to come. We still had 17 of the 26 us for dinner. Lots of good food and fun getting to sit and visit with my sons and dd as I don't get to see them as much as I'd like. Everyone always leads a busy life nowadays.

On the sewing front I host 3 swaps on the  Quilting Board forum and host the Scrap Club on there. It is a busy thread most of the time. It has been really popular!
  http://www.quiltingboard.com/member-swaps-round-row-robins-f11/quilting-boards-first-scrap-club-t207686.html

I also host a Quilt Bingo game on the Quilting Haven forum if you are interested in checking out that forum. It is an active forum every day and we have lots of fun chatting and supporting one another.
  http://www.quiltinghaven.com/index.php?topic=9351.msg280653#msg280653

I made my first mugrug recently and I think I am hooked on making them! I love the size of them and will be making lots more to sell soon.

 Here is my first attempt:

    
   

I had made a doll quilt using this 3 D technique and I loved it so I used it here for the blue flower again.
The blue flower is not flat against the backing. It is sewn a that bottom only. The petals are sewn with two sides so they can stand free.


Hope you enjoyed seeing my mugrug!

Wishing you Sunshine and Laughter!! 

so is everyone getting any sewing time in lately? I have been working on a mugrug for a swap on the Quilting Haven. I am almost done with it. I thought it would be a quick and easy project but of course I have to make it more complicated! LOL  I think it will be cute when I get it done tho. I'll post a picture when it is done.

I'm not sure what I will work on next. I have some dresden kaleidoscopes in progress that I need to finish and get onto my store but I also want to work on some stock for my store too. I usually use 1 1/2" squares and make small gift items. I really need to get some done up ahead. 

So hopefully I will have some pictures to share soon!

wishing you all a Sunshiny day filled with laughter and good cheer!!  

Gluten Free

Last Sept we decided to go wheat/gluten free and to also cut out corn anything including corn syrup from out diet.  I wanted to lose weight and I had seen it said it helped someone with there skin problems.  So as I have hand eczema I wanted to try it for at least 2 mos and see if it helped.

well after 2 weeks I discovered it helped my breathing problems tremendously. we improved our over all well being and I no longer have days where I feel like i am walking in water. My hand eczema is 85% improved and is receding more every day.

so this is a life style for us now. I have decided I have had this intolerance or allergy to wheat for along time and just didn't know it. I have struggled with breathing problems for over 15 yrs and now that is all gone! Praise the Lord!

But if I am tempted which I have only done twice - I ate 4 bites of garlic toast last week and it came back to bite! I struggled with my breathing all day the following Sat. so no more giving in to temptation! LOL

We have gone back to basics no prepackaged or canned goods from the store. I have found a few gluten fre products we can use but I dont' want to add too many carbs back into our diet so I use them sparingly. there are some really good pasta alternatives out there. Mostly the ones I've used have been made from brown rice. but they taste just the same as wheat pasta.

the one thing I have discovered is we eat alot more lettuce salads now. so I had to find dressings that are gluten free CORN SYRUP free!  Cutting out the corn syrup is much harder than cutting out the wheat.
but I found Hidden Valley makes a Hickory Bacon that is a thousand island  dressing and we really like that one. Ranch is the only one I have found so far that I can get in restaurants. It's not my favorite but it is okay.

It has been an interesting journey this last few months and as I discover more things I will talk about them here.  I hope to come up with my own bread recipe using a gluten free all purpose flour.

I've been working on dresden kaleidoscopes lately. They fascinate me! To make a dresden kaleidoscope you need fabric with enough repeats so you can fussy cut 10 exactly alike blades. then you sew them together and get a dresden plate with a kaleidoscope look.  they are so much fun because you really don't know what they will look like til they are sewn together.

I wrote an ebook on this subject and if it interests you you can find it here for $10.60.
I show how to pick out the right kind of fabric and show some troubleshooting ideas. there are 6 project directions you can use. Plus more info on how to make great dresden kaleidoscopes!
 http://store.payloadz.com/details/1012850-ebooks-arts-and-crafts-dresden-kaleidoscope-ebook.html

so back to the fun stuff now!  here is a wall hanging I just completed for a wall hanging swap I host on the Quilting Board forum   - www.quiltingboard.com

These are some of the dresden kaleidoscopes I have been making. some are already on my etsy site and some will be on there soon.