My sewing machine will be humming today.

 My January Dining Room Table Centerpiece

     This centerpiece is made up from a few things I bought from a favorite country store. 


    They have a small shop at my favorite flea market in Leesport, PA
   The small tray they are sitting on was bought for just 50 cents from an outdoor vendor there, and I painted it to go with....

TIME TO GET BACK TO QUILTING

Over the past couple of weeks I have been working on getting some projects ready for machine quilting.  The two that I will be starting on today and for over the weekend are fairly simple ones.
One is a small table cover, the other a runner.

Here are pictures of the finished piecing part.

This first one is made using fabric from a collection from Connecting Threads.   (A great online quilting shop.) Just click on the name to go to their website.  The name of this collection was Circle of Friends.
I checked there today and they are already pretty much sold out of alot  of the fabric.  It really is beautful stuff though the camera doesn't do it full justice.
  

 

 This second one also suffers in looks from my camera.  Don't know why.  The four larger corner squares will have flowers, leaves and stems appliqued on as part of the quilting process.

It is a pattern from "This n That" pattern company called Prairie Star.  I was using what I had in my various collections of "charm" pieces and didn't have any gold like the pattern showed so used lighter colors instead.  In case you don't know "charms" are 5 inch squares often cold in coordinated groups.

I admit to using this pattern to "use up" some of my stash.  Although it doesn't show well here for some reason in person it is great.  (sigh.....)

 

You can see that I have the pieces pinned with my fancy topped pins.  That is why there are little specks of color all over that don't really look like they belong on the items.

By next weekend I hope they are done and the binding will be ready to go on.

Think I can do it?

Flower Fabric Friday with some Flea Market Fun thrown in!

 Welcome to another Fabric Flower Friday.  This week will be a bit different.  I will show a couple of fabric flowers but mostly I wanted to show some pictures from our favorite flea market in Leesport, PA.  It may be our last visit for the season... or not.... with weather here you just never know.  And the indoor part is always open.

Before I do that, here is what I did with one of the flowers I made last week.  I made this journal, used the word journal from the fabric which I used to make the flower, added some brown felt behind it and then added the flower from the French fabric.  Don't know what I will do with it yet.  But it is ready!

While at the flea market I came upon a couple of fabric flowers which I decided will be featured this week.  It is my blog, I can do that, right?..  LOL

The flowers were probably sold retail somewhere. No telling where they were made but they look to be a quick and easy project if you want to make them.  They are made of painted canvas, glued together with some puffiness under the center and placed on a stick. Each of those petals are separate so you can adjust them.   I then put them in bottles I keep in my kitchen window that also have primitive stars hanging around their necks.  (They also came from the Leesport Flea Market a while ago.) 

These might be cute if you put little faces on them.

And now to the flea market itself.  We went later in the day than normal because the weather was not too great early.  But it got better and better.  

One of the first places I always head at the flea market is to the Old Glory Coffee and Bagle Co.  They have the best coffee and because I go so often they even know some of my favorite mixed coffees.  I buy coffee beans there too.  And my husband and I have been know to share one of her dessert goodies, like the yummy carrot cake. Their other speciality is Bagels!

                               We usually look for items to sell in our shop at this market but this visit was mostly for all the great Veggies and I bought some plants as well.   This first picture shows a couple of new, or fairly new hybrid echinacea.  I bought one of each!

 This next picture was at the same vendor.  I thought everything he has was great looking.  I did buy a Sedum plant that is shown in the lower left hand corner.  It will go up in my rust garden I imagine.

 We enjoyed seeing all the fruit and vegetables in the produce section.  

We bought so much the fridge is now overflowing,  

 So many choices!

 Aren't the cauliflowers pretty.

And there were a LOT of gourds and pumpkins.

These last two pictures were taken at a primitive decor vendor I like to visit at this flea market.

Don't you love the look of dried flowers and baskets. 

So that is the end of this weeks sort of different fabric flower Friday.  I have two flower projects in the works so check back next week.

AND......  while at the flea market I did buy two teacups and saucers that I will be featuring on Tea Cup Tuesday over the next two weeks.  See you then.

Fall means farmer's markets

This past week we managed to get to our favorite flea market in Leesport, Pennsylvania.  We didn't get much for the shop but boy did we have a GOOD time at the farmer's part of the market!  My vegetable bin is full!  We have been having veggies every night and more ahead.

We managed to pick up a few flowers for the garden as well.

Here are some of the pictures I took just to get you in the mood.  If you have a farmer's market in your area and you don't have your own garden, you should make sure you go at least once this fall.  I bet we go again in a week or two.  Pumpkins and squash should be next on our list.

This is one of the plants that came home to our house!

 And when you visit a market where a lot of Mennonite and Amish are vendors you are bound to find some yummy you eat.

After reviewing these pictures, I can't wait to go back again.