Autumn is Here

I finally have gotten most of my autumn decoration out and my patriotic things put away.  My grand-daughter, Kate Anne was a great help with that the other day.  She liked putting all my vintage candle figures out on my dining room table and hanging ornaments on the tree.  Then we put the "little people" autumn play sets under the tree.  She had to stop and play with them after we got them out.  :)  I gave away all my Halloween decorations to my girls a couple years ago.  I decided I didn't want to take the time to change my decorations from October to November.  So I just kept my general "fall" things and let my girls and grand-kids enjoy the Halloween things.

The squirrel is from my Grandma Kullmer.  There is a pair of them and she had them out every fall.  The wax turkey was either from one of my grandmothers or my mother-in-law.  They all seemed to collect these wax candles for various holidays.  I went to a friend's garage sale yesterday and she had several of these for $20-40 each.  I have a whole table full of these things.  :)  The ceramic turkey was made by my Grandma Thedens.  The brown toile tablecloth & table runner I made several years ago.

Looking down the table.....it seats 14.  BTW, that is just enough room for the grand-kids minus one.  At family celebrations we feed the kids first, clear the table, then the adults eat while the kids play or watch a movie.

These turkey trays were found in my Grandma Kullmer's house.  I had never seen them before and I loved them immediately.  There are 8 of them and I lay them out on the table to enjoy.  I am sure either she or her mother used them when they had their lady's circles and club meetings.

My friend, Mary had her annual garage sale yesterday.  It is not like any garage sale I have ever been to before.  It is pretty much like going to an antique store.  EVERYTHING she has I love.  The trouble is I have so much of my own....I need NOTHING.  But I did come home with a hand full of vintage postcards.  I bought all the thanksgiving postcards she had.  I have a vintage postcard display book and I try and fill the two page spreads with postcards from similar themes and then display it open in a stand.  You can see I NEED a couple more to fill this page.  :)  Thanks, Mary for letting me paw through your stuff....you truly are a kindred spirit.

Little Quilts In My Mailbox

I belong to the Carol Doak list on Yahoo and we are in the midst of a postcard swap. I love doing foundation piecing and have used Carol's method for a long time.  Our only requirement was to use one of Carol's designs.  Carol is a great teacher and if you have the chance to take a workshop from her, do it.  You will have a great time and learn a valuable quilt technique.  I have always wanted to do one of these swaps. 

I used Timtex to give the cards body and stitched a heavy satin stitch around the outside edge to finish it.  We were divided into groups of 4 and we each made 3 postcards and mail them out to the other 3 in our group.  Here are the 3 cards that I mailed out.

A little ray of sunshine.

Just had to make one with a patriotic theme and then added a little machine embroidery bling!



A little Iowa scene.....represents what is outside my window.

And of course you want the back to look as good as the front and I wanted a vintage feel to my card.  I used a Tim Holtz stamp set for the "postcard" and star design.  The lines were from a journaling stamp from Close To My Heart.

I got my first "little quilt" in my mailbox yesterday.....how fun...... a sweet little butterfly.  Who wouldn't want one of these pieces of pure joy when you pop open that mailbox?  I wonder when the next one will come and what will it be.......