Hi everyone! I hope your weekend was fun. It was beautiful weather wise here. Sunshine and not too breezy :)  I went downstairs to continue on my art quilt with the Earth Wind and Fire horses from BigFork Bay! It is really coming along now. I have to add batting, backing fabric and then I will be able to start free motion stitching. It am loving how it looks so far and hope my stitching does it justice! We will see! This will be a wall hanging. It will take me a while to finish, but I am excited about the progress. Enjoy the rest of your Sunday and hoping your week goes well!

Hi all! I have been quietly working on my horse quilt from Bigfork Bay every moment I get. I have all three horses completed. And they have come together on the ironing sheet. I am showing you the green horse and then all of them together! I completed the red horse before (see post below) and then the green horse and then the orange horse and now they can all overlap each other! Next I must work on the fabric portion and then these horses will get ironed onto the background. Once that is done, I can start free motion stitching! Phew!!!!!!! The horses are beautiful! This pattern is amazing! :)
Hope you are enjoying seeing it come together! Have a lovely week!

I got a bit farther on my left side horse. :)
It is completed for the moment. I will begin on the horse on the left next! Then after completing that one, I will move to the middle. Eventually all three will come together and it will be wonderful! I am excited to see that!
So far now, here is the result. I am enjoying this process! The post below tells about the class and the process!

Have a happy day!

Hello all,
I wanted to share with you that I took a class this past weekend with Laura Krasinski. Laura teaches the patterns from BigFork Bay! Here is a link to their site and Laura is on the home page with one of her gorgeous quilts.
http://www.bigforkbaycottonco.com/
Laura's quilt is on the right side named Autumn Lady. Wonderful!
Anyways, the class was marvelous and I chose a difficult pattern, but Laura encouraged me that I could do it! :) She has great faith and has always told me that I could do anything! Hehehe! GOOD friend!

I am going slowly at this, but it coming along and I want to share it with you. These patterns are intricut and detailed and quite beautiful. You can look at the pictures closesly and see that we traced the pieces onto the proper fabric onto fusable web that is ironed on, cut them out and then sort of put this together like a big jigsaw puzzle. The patterns are glorious! You can see my pattern below the ironing sheet that I am assembling the first horse head on. It begins to come to life. It is amazing. Anyways, I will continue working on it and share as I move along. It is time consuming, but I enjoy the process very much. It is peaceful and artful and time spent sort of becoming a part of the creation. Neat right? Enjoy the pictures! Have a great day!

I am doing a fabulous puzzle swap with two good friends of mine! :) The pieces are about 4-5 inches from end to end.The top pictures are of the puzzle piece (each side) that I have altered to send off to the recipient and the bottom is a Valentine Card that I created for a stamping friend that is always sending me hand stamped cards to brighten my mailbox. The envelope is next to the card. The stamped image is from PaperBag Studios and I stamped her on some card stock that I bleached.I kept with the heart and love theme since we are so close to Valentine's Day! I hope that everyone had a wonderful weekend!

http://www.historicthirdward.org/events/sculpturesonice.php
Earl and I decided to take a drive down to the historical third ward in Milwaukee today and see the ICE Sculptures from a contest that took place yesterday! The theme was "Summertime and Livin it Easy". At 10 a.m. on Friday they began sculpting and then at 6 p.m. they had to stop and were judged.
There were not that many participants, but we took a drive to go see the completed pieces in person.

We were able to walk around them. I made Earl get int he shot with the lobster so you could see the size of them. It was dusk and the lights were not on yet.....and to be honest, the ice on the backdrop of our freshly fallen snow makes the pictures less desirable! :( But you will get the idea, as I will try and describe what they are!
Top to Bottom:
1. Flip Flop (tong) heel at bottom with a guy with sombrero kicked back on top.
2. Guy on top of tong, close up.
3. Bear laying back on a like a floaty with a drink on his tummy.
4. Artist drawing laying in snow of dog, who will be naughty are get someones bikini top.
5. Dog holding bikini top in mouth.
6. Palm trees, with a boat pulled up to island and hammock set up between trees!
7. Beautiful sun wearing sunglasses and woman kneeling and reaching an arm up sort of hugging sun rays.
8. Earl and lobster.
9. Lobster with tail at bottom and holding a nice drink in his claw.
10. Lobster
11. Lobster
12. Not sure what this is, even seeing it in person. I saw a face in it.
13. This is my favorite if I were judging. It is a boy fishing, leaning against a tree, with a bird at the top and a dog next to him and a distance away there is a fishing line and he is catching a boot......heheheh.
14. More of boy fishing, great detail.
15. Boy fishing
16. Lastly, our city tree is still up, so I snapped a shot, and there is an ice sculpture there with two random people looking at it. :)
This was fun to do, but it was COLD out. Brrrrrrrr! And I wish that I had seen it when the sun was out.....we were too cold to stay until the lights came on. I bet they look beautiful with a light shining.
They are supposed to reveal the winners on Monday at the link above this post. Click on the pictures to enlarge and see them better.
They were all really neat and I teased Earl that him and I should do one next year! Haaaaaahehehe!

You know, art is not just for the walls any more!
A friend of mine,
Nina Owens, is going to be doing her FLOOR with tons of vintage papers.
You heard me right, vintage papers, ledger sheets, music sheets, foreign text.......and she is adding some collaged papers to it as well! Is that not the coolest thing?? It was a neat project to join in on. Obviously, I did not put anything dimensional or 3d on it at all, as it will be walked on! :) I wanted you to see the sheet close up though, really fun I think!

Imagine an art room with a floor like that! Sounds like heaven to me! Maybe I will do my DOOR that way, she is getting my mind rolling!
Anyways, here are some sheets I am sending her along with the one vintage doctor ledger paper that I collaged for her! I cannot wait to see how her floor comes out!

Rufio says "Hello" to start the New Year (and wonders if you would give him a treat if he gave you this face?)! His hair is longer because we want him to be warm enough in winter with his own winter coat, so he is a bit shaggy, but none the less..........cute cute cute! :)

Merry Christmas!
This is Earl and Rufio and me wearing our festive hats for you! haaaaahehehe! Rufio is none to happy about it. I am taking the picture too, so over all, this came out pretty well. Earl's hat is a Star Trek hat with Spock Ears, mine is Tinkerbelle (you really cannot see it) and Rufio's, well is like an elf and includes a collar too! He was happy when we were done! Haaaaaaahehehe!

This sweet Reindeer card was made by Marcy Hudziak! I just love it! You can also see it on my Christmas card tree below! :)

Don't you love it when you have talented artsy friends?  These beautiful pieces(card and wall hanging) were created by Barb Head, she is always thinking of me and sends me beautiful one of a kind pieces to make my day!

 This beautiful ornament below was made by Marcy! My tree is filled with handmade artful ornaments this year and it brings such a fun tone to the tree and my heart!!!!!!

 The Holidays are Happier with Art from Friends!!!!!