This is what I've been up to lately...plus a quilting/sewing question

To start with here are some photo's of the Lizzie Kate and HOE's Summer House exchanges that I made. I stitched part of LHN's Traveling Stitcher for my partner and decided to turn it into a stitching bag [summer house]. For the LK exchange I did Stitching Friends and made it into a pillow. In the following photos you can see the close ups and back of the pillow.

Next, I have been blog hopping lately and have found a bunch of wonderful blogs about quilting. First I found Moda Bake Shop and they have a bunch of projects that are so easy to understand that I figure ok I can do this and here is my 1st attempt. This is my version the grocery bag dispenser by Rachel at p.s. i quilt I had to shorten it by a row since I had problems trying to quilt it with my sewing machine, but I'm happy with my 1st attempt[ I used some fabric I got at AC Moore since I didn't want to mess up any good fabric]LOL.

Now you need to understand that I have ALWAYS wanted to quilt I even made 1 small blanket for my DD when she was a toddler, but ever since I just didn't feel I could "do it". But with Rachel's help[ she kindly answered my questions about what I needed to get started] and Moda Bake Shop tutorials...not to mention their already cut fabrics I finally feel like I can give it a go. So, I went ahead and ordered some charm packs and am awaiting their arrival so I can

begin a larger project. Now for those of you out there who read this I would love your opinion on a quilting/sewing machine. Right now I have an older Euro-Pro machine which does not have a darning foot. I checked into it and my model doesn't offer one and am still checking to see if I can find a univeral darning foot that'll work on my machine. In the mean time I'm making do...my machine sews fine, so any quilting will have to wait unless I just want to quilt in the ditch or quilt straight lines. I have been checking online for different machines and have come across 2 that have quilting capabilites. They are the Brother XL-3750 and the Singer Confidence Quilter 7469Q. The Brother is less than $150.00 and the Singer around $400.00 . I would love everyone's opinion as my DH has suggested this would be an easy XMAS present for me. I know there are lots of machines out there and I would appreciate all comments. I just don't want to spend too much, so $400.00 would probably be my limit. Thanks for all your help.

And finally here's Anna's RR. I actually did her RR agead of schedule, since it's so small. She just asked us to complete a small section of her wreath. I stitched from the yellow flower on the left hand side down to the blue[next to the empty space]. That way Georgena who stitches on this next only has a small section to stitch since she's been asked to do all the backstitching. So, now I'm back on track and am steadily working on Jackie's RR, which has more details to stitch.

Till next time...

Susan