I have met my goal for the month!  I finished my table runners.  It was a busy month, and I was thrown off with my kids and husband all being home this week along with traveling and lots of cooking, but I did it!

I'm making progress on my ALYF goal for this month. I'm hoping to get all my blocks together this morning so I can hopefully get them quilted next week.

Here is a sneak peak of a couple of pieces.



I'm really loving these fabrics and I hope the persons they are going to like them as well.

If you have never checked the Fat Quarter Shop there is no better time than now to do that, all of their Layer Cakes (10"x10" square fabric) are 20% off!  They even have solids!


These are perfect for a quick Christmas gift because your fabric is already cut!  I made this quilt top below using layer cakes.

Whole quilt not shown.

  I will share more on this quilt pattern later. But be sure to check out the Fat Quarter shop, not only have they been a great sponsor for my blog, but they always have what I need and if I'm not sure if something matches I can contact them and they are very helpful in making sure something matches.

Happy Veteran's Day!  I have a  huge admiration for all who have served and are currently serving in the armed forces.  It doesn't matter what country you live in, you have a military family who serve to protect your country.   A huge Thank You from me to you or your family members.

My husband and I have gotten involved with a group of Indy car fans that call ourselves 'The Pit Crew'. Our goal is to serve veterans by helping them.



I spent many hours last week making curtains for an extreme makeover type event that took place on Friday and Saturday.   We had 2 Indy car teams join forces with us for the renovation, Panther Racing and their National Guard Crew worked many hours on Friday and Driver Charlie Kimball and his Novo Nordisk Chip Ganassi crew were there on Saturday.  Hearing stories of how different families have been affected by different aspects of war was very touching.   Here is the link to the article that Fox59 (one of the local news stations) did.

Me, Charlie Kimball, and my hubby

Like I mentioned, I made lined curtains from fabric that was donated. We picked up the fabric over the weekend, but I had to wait on the final dimensions.  I received those late on Tuesday evening.  Five windows with panel curtians and one very large window that was to be a pleated drape (oh boy) by noon on Wednesday and not having even one panel sewed for the curtains I thought I was doomed for failure.  I kept going though, Thursday evening the decision was made that I would stay home on Friday and continue sewing until they were done or the kids got home from school.  At 2:00 on Friday afternoon I was stumped on the pleats for the huge bohemith drape and called a friend for help/advice.  If it wasn't for her I think I may have jumped off a cliff since we have lots of rock quarries here where I live, she said there is a product called pleat tape that has pocket in which you can insert pins to make your pleats.  At that point the light-bulb came on.  I had bought pleat tape and sewed into the drape for 'stabilizer' for making my pleats,  all I had to do was go to the store and by the pleat pin things, so off to the store I went 30 pleat pins later the drapes were done. I packed my weekend bag and all my hard work (curtains) into the van, and waited on the kids to get home from school and off we went.  Ok, I know you want to see more pictures of things, so we are finally to that point.

Ready....


This is the living room before.

Look at those lovely sheers, so glad I didn't have to witness the gross carpet.

The giant pleated drapes.  The window opening was 105.5" tall by 122" wide.

Now for the side windows that you see in the middle picture above.

There are 2 of the 3 windows.  I just loved this fabric.

The next 2 pictures are the living room area completely done.




It was so beautiful.

Now the dining room and hall area off of the living room.

Hall area

Dining room.  No more nasty linoleum

And

Me and my hard work in the dining room.  Look at the pretty new floor.

These curtains are lined so hopefully the sun doesn't fade them

 The stairs you see in the above pictures come down into the dining room, which you see below.  At the landing there are more stairs that go up to the bedrooms.

Dining room all done with a nice area rug under the table.

I took last month off from the ALYF party.  I hated to miss it, but at the same time I am glad that I did because I had so many random projects going on topped with school parties and Halloween.

I have what seems like tons of things to do this month as well, but I have some projects with specific deadlines that I will be working on as well.

I have 2 different secret Santa Christmas swaps that I am participating in this year (yes, I think know I have totally lost my mind) so my goal for this month is to get them both done!  Specifically the one using the bottom set of the 2 sets of Christmas fabrics below.


Since the person's who will be receiving the items I make don't know they are coming from me I will be able to share my progress and the completed items with you all.  Bonus, I don't think either of them follow my blog!  That is kind of sad, but it is ok because it will be a super surprise to them as well.

Other things on my list of things to complete this month are:

Curtains for HVAF Jackson Street house renovation.  This a home for homeless veterans in the city of Indianapolis.  My husband and I volunteer with a group that does 1-2 renovations each year to help out a veteran.  I'm still not sure how I got the job of making curtains, but I have over 100 yards of fabric and lining in my sewing room to sewed up by the bedtime on Thursday.  I'm praying that Trevor gets me the window measurements early today so I can get started, I'm really starting to feel the stress.

My sister that lives out of state will be home at the end of next week and in town for a week. I really want to spend some time with her.  She has also commissioned me to make her a quilt from Batiks.  I can't wait to get started on that as well.

I still don't have the quilting done on the circles quilt that was my September goal. It is staring me in the face right now.

I also pieced together a quilt as a pattern test for Melissa from Sew Bittersweet Designs last month that is in the 'to be quilted' pile.  I see a huge need for a massage and some chiropractic work by the end of this year.

I hope to get a few minutes to show off some pictures of all the work I did last month and the extra projects from this month in the next few weeks.