Sew What?

Good morning, loved ones and friends. It's certainly good to be back in Internet Land. The day doesn't get off to a good start until I've had my little bloggy chat with y'all. There's just a little bit more I need to tell you to be caught up, and then we'll be ready for more sight-seeing. As I mentioned in yesterday's post, we took an extra day at our last location of Hillsville, Virginia. We'll be doing more of that...trying to take a day at least once per week where we just sit around like slugs. Lie like vegetables. Carry on like couch potatoes. Tuesday was such a day.

The first thing I did was to finish off the first block for the Snow Globes quilt. This one is called "Church on the Hill."

The floss for this piece is so interesting. There are five colors of metallic sparkle floss and several different variegated flosses in colors I can't even describe. One, for example, is blues and browns...and there are others that combine seemingly unrelated colors. There are 12 blocks to this quilt altogether, and so I have a long way to go.

With that one done, I was ready to make up the next. This one is another new project from Bird Brain Designs called "Heart and Home." Here's what the whole quilt will look like.

The first block is made up now, and it's called simply, "Home." These are all worked in black floss, but I'm going to do the little hearts in a burgundy floss. Probably, I'll add some more little bits of burgundy as well.

And then, it was time to set up the sewing machine. Yay!

Of course, everyone knows one cannot sew without one's helpers. They were in fine form.

You might recall from my last sewing day that I was working on 16 nine-patches for the Hocuspocusville quilt. I had 11 finished, and I needed 5 more. Those are finished now.

And here are all 16 of them.

Next, I needed to add corners to all four sides so they can be set on point.

Before I packed it all up for the day, I finished 8 of the 16. The corners are cut for the rest, but we'll need another day of sloth for that.

And that brings me to yesterday morning. I got a good start on the Home and Heart block. Robin Kingsley is the designer for Bird Brain Designs. I've worked some of her patterns before...Love Me, Love My Cat comes to mind.

Robin likes to work her embroidery with three strands of floss, instead of the usual two, and so I do what she does.

Eventually I tore myself away from the embroidery and made breakfast, and then we were on the road again. Within the hour, we'd passed into the great state of North Carolina. Hey there, North Carolinians! How are ya?

We were on our way to our final destination along the Blue Ridge Parkway, the Folk Art Center.

And I'm so terribly sorry I couldn't take pictures in here because it was such a wonderful place. It was chock-full of marvelous hand made items from local artists. There was jewelry, pottery, gorgeous wood furniture and wooden utensils, wooden cutting boards that were works of art, hand made dolls, quilts, framed art, glass work, Christmas ornaments...you name it, and it was probably represented here. Many items were on sale from the Southern Highland Craft Guild. Even though I wasn't able to take pictures, you can see much of it at their Online Store (and I encourage you to click on that link).

It would have been possible to spend our entire life's savings in there, but I walked away with just this one little corn husk doll for myself and a couple of gifts for the folks back home. Those are to be a surprise for their recipients, but I can show you my little corn husk doll. It was love at first sight. They came in several colors and doing different activities. Of course, I chose this little lady holding a quilt.

Here's how she looks from the back.

She was created by artist Anne Freels of Tennessee. You can see more of Anne's corn husk dolls at that link I've given you.

Today we'll be venturing into Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Since I lived in North Carolina and Virginia as a child, so many of the areas we are visiting now seem familiar on some level. I was young, between ages 4-7, when we lived on the East Coast. My memories are few, but I remember more as we come into contact with places I've visited before. Great Smoky Mountains is such a place. If I'm remembering right, I got lost in the campground here once. It was just for a few minutes before my mom found me and led me back to our little trailer.

This morning I'll be studying up on the tour book and planning our day. For sure, it will start with a stop off at the visitor center to pick up some information about hiking. We're signed up for two days of sight-seeing here, but we may stay longer if we want to.