Santa Must Get a Pretty Good Accuquilt Discount

As the month draws to a close, so does my December pincushion giveaway. Every comment left by a follower gives you a chance to win the cupcake pincushion pictured above. I know we're all busy playing with all the quilty goodies Santa left us, so I thought I'd post a gentle reminder.

Speaking of playing with quilty goodies. Santa been berry, berry good to me this Christmas.

There is going to be some serious Accuquilt GO! cutting going on in 2011. I found the 1-1/2" strip cutter, the Dresden Plate, Hexagon and Rose of Sharon dies under the tree Christmas morning. (It didn't hurt that I had set up a global wish list over at Amazon so the hubs....er, Santa....knew exactly which dies I wanted most.)

I also got a hefty stack of books....all the Gwen and Freddy Collaborative/Liberated series, Elly's new one, a couple Kaffe (my favorite books in all the world--the photography and locations are spectacular), Ricky Tims, and  Irish, New Zealand, Intl. Quilt Festival, and 100 Quilt Blocks magazines (The Hubs: "I went into Borders to grab some magazines for your stocking and it cost me $40! What's up with that?!".)  I've leafed through most, read one Kaffe, found my next project in the New Zealand mag, decided the Irish mags are a waste of money, and am trying to figure out what needs to come off the bookshelf to make room for the new books.

This nifty scissor sitter was one of my favorite stocking items. It's made by Puffin and Company (http://www.puffinco.com/). The perfect docking station for my new zebra print Ginghers.

My sister found the cutest pincushion. It's loaded up with the fork pins the hubs remembered I was looking at in a shop in Florida (where I choked on the price and didn't get them). He put two boxes of them in my stocking. He is most definitely the man.

Back to my sister's taste in pincushions....these are two others she has gifted me. I love my sister's taste in pincushions...actually in everything.

(Yes, those are pre-war Japan Shiny Brite pinecone elves....there's a bunch of them that are vacationing in my studio this winter. They're all so happy to be out of the cold, snowy Bavarian forest.)

 

While I finished my friend's gift (it was a cool retro smock apron from the pattern My Neighbors Apron (http://www.myneighborsapron.com/), I think she was disappointed. I thought the pattern was cute when I saw it in Vegas...no ties, no bib slippage, pockets. I just thought aprons were all the rage right now. Maybe aprons are a younger thing (especially the ones that are made to look like Daisy Dukes), though at my age, I can still appreciate an apron. I've got two more to make, and now I'm wondering if I should even bother with them. (sigh) This is daughter modeling the gift:

I'm off work until next Tuesday. The plan is to spend a little time each day on EQ7 lessons and embroidery mastery. I also got a thread sketching DVD I'd like to take for a spin, so it's going to be a fun week spent in the studio. Grab a project and create with me. Maybe we'll run into each other at the New Years' Eve Twitter Party. :)

Go make beautiful things!