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Wow! I was nominated for a Liebster Award by Heather at Peachy Pages. Thanks Heather, I accept.

So what is the Liebster Award? The gist of the award is that you “accept’ with the intention of “paying it forward”.  Upon accepting the award, one chooses 11 blogs that you feel are deserving of more subscribers and “nominate” them for the award.  No one is obligated to accept the award (or even to pay it forward), but it does help to generate traffic and get the word out about some really great little blogs that can be crammed full of big punches of inspiration!  For now, let’s just say, it’s a fun and friendly award by bloggers, to bloggers, for bloggers!

To qualify the blog must have less than 200 followers or must be less than six months old. Once the award is received you are to write a post and in it

• List 11 random things about yourself.
• Answer the questions posed by the blogger who nominated you.
• Nominate 11 blogs for the Liebster Award and link to them.
• Leave a comment so the blogger’s know they’ve been nominated.
• Create 11 questions for your nominees to answer.

Let’s see, 11 random things about me:

1. When I’m not quilting, I love reading long running series, especially mysteries where the heroine is female. Think JD Robb, JA Jance, Michael Connelly’s Bosch series, Kathryn Hall Page and so on.
2. I’m a licensed, instrument-rated pilot although I haven’t flown in 10 years.
3. I have one son and two beautiful grandchildren, 11 and 13.
4. I’m the primary caretaker for my 98 y/o mother, although amazingly she really doesn’t need much care.
5. I’m majorly claustrophobic so don’t ask me to go spelunking with you.
6. I work for an Atlanta-based company though I’m based in California.
7. I really dislike exercising.
8. I’ve traveled to or through most of the 50 United States.
9. Purple, turquoise and orange seem to be my colors of choice lately.
10. I’m very content to spend my days in jeans and t-shirts. And, fortunately, my current job allows that (most of the time).
11. I hate crowds, so you’ll find me doing all my shopping early in the morning.

Here are the questions from Heather and my answers:

1. What’s your favorite LQS or crafty store? Honestly, I don’t have a local favorite. The LQS where I took classes tends to stock fabric in the Asian and modern styles. After seriously quilting for more than 8 years now, I find I like more traditional fabrics. So I tend to shop when I’m traveling or online. Though for notions, batting, etc., I always use my Jo-Ann’s % off coupons.
2. What types of things spark your creative inspiration? Looking at what others have done gives me all the inspiration I need. I can wastespend hours looking at blogs, Pinterest, etc. etc.
3. What are some of your favorite blogs any why? Of course, I love Bonnie Hunter. I’ve done all her mysteries but one and I look forward to her articles in Quiltmaker. She is just an amazing inspiration and I find I love scrap quilts the best. I also love reading Judy Laquidara‘s blog. I had the opportunity to share a table with her at a retreat in 2010. I’ve made some of her quilts as well, but they are a bit matchy for me. I need to try her patterns with a more scrappy look. But I have too many UFOs now as it is. I have a short list of about 30 other blogs that I follow daily that routinely give me inspiration. I could follow so many others but I would never get any work done.
4. What are the top 3 things on your creative to do list this year? 1. Finish, 2. Finish, 3. Finish. I’ve got to start using this early stash that I accumulated and now don’t particularly like. So the best way is to use it up or turn it into scraps. My 2013 Goal is to finish more of myUFOs than I start so that I can start on my inspiration list. So making backs out of that early stash is high on my list.
5. Where would you go on your dream vacation? Oh, my. I think I’ve been on a few already, England/Wales, Paris, Italy, Spain. But at this point, I would love to visit Germany, Austria, Switzerland and take one of those River Cruises advertised on Masterpiece.
6. What has been your favorite travel experience? I love cruises. You get to visit so many places and yet not have to unpack/repack. In fact, I’m taking my 13 y/o grandson on a cruise to Alaska in June.
7. What’s playing on your TV and iPod lately? Downton Abby of course, along with NCIS, Gray’s Anatomy, Blue Bloods and the list goes on. I don’t listen to music on my iPod, I listen to books. Right now I’m listening to Red Mist by Patricia Cornwell.
8. Do you feel you “give back” and how so? I am trying to do more giving back in recent years. In fact most of my quilting is now Charity Quilting. I have enough quilts of my own and I’ve given as many to family and friends as they can handle. So I’m concentrating on doing what I love and hoping to make a difference. I’ve sent quilts and pillow cases to Colorado, New Jersey, Quilts for Kids and my local quilt drives.  As long as I’m working full-time, that’s about as much giving back as I can handle at the moment.
9. What 5 sites do you like for shopping online? Amazon of course is my main go to site. Then there’s always Lands End and Zappos. Love the easy of returns at those two. For quilting, it’s Missouri Start Quilt Co. for pre-cuts and Connecting Threads, especially for their batiks. Otherwise, I tend to buy fabric in person when I’m traveling or at shows.
10. What was your favorite class/lecture you ever attended? The machine quilting class taught by Mary Mashuta at my LQS. She gave me so much inspiration for quilting on my DSM.
11. Why do you blog? I started blogging to keep a journal of what I’ve accomplished with my quilting.  But blogging has also allowed me to interact with quilters in places I would never have imagined. As I said before, I get so much inspiration from other bloggers that I couldn’t just lurk and read other blogs without contributing myself. If even one reader gets an idea or inspiration from my blog, it’s done it’s job.

So now, here are my questions for my nominees:

1. How do you usually quilt your quilts?
2. What size quilt do you normally make? or is your favorite to make?
3. How big is your fabric stash and where do you keep it?
4. Do you take quilting themed vacations/trips?
5. Do you quilt for charity and if so, what is your favorite organization?
6. What are you reading right now?
7. If I sent you a bag of 2.5″ scrappy strips, what pattern would you make with them?
8. What was the last vacation you took? (A get away from it all vacation… not a visit to family or other purpose driven trip)
9. What quilting goal do you have on your bucket list? (other than reducing stash and finishing UFOs)
10. What normally inspires you to start a new project?
11. Tell me one thing about you that not too many people know.

And now for my nominees. Not 11 but these blogs definitely worth checking out.

• Jennifer at Quilting Mom’s Blog
• Joan at Keeping You in Stiches
• Ruthie at Threads of Mine
• Teri at Patchwork Playground
• Cie at CieAngel

Hop on over and see what these very creative ladies have been up to.

Finally, I have something to report on my UFOs. My number 3 for this year is my Twister Christmas Wreath. I finished quilting and adding the binding this month. All that’s left is to sew the binding down. I’m saving that for a trip later this month when I’ll have lot’s of time for hand sewing.

I’m also excited that Judy chose number 7 for August. I finished that UFO in July. Yay!! I’ll report on that one at the end of August.

To see what everyone else has completed, go here.

Not much happening on my design wall these days. I’ve got a mini top from Bonnie’s Mini Marathon that I completed in Shipshewana on the wall just to look at.

This weekend, however, I dove into Orca Bay Part 1. I’ve got 180 of the QSTs made. Only 40 or so more to go. I think I’ll get them all sewn if not trimmed and pressed before the next part is released on Friday.

To see more design walls, click here.

To see everyone else’s Orca Bay Part One, click here.

I did it, I finished my February UFO. Tonight at 10:10 pm I put the last stitch in the binding.

At the beginning of February, this was just 9 12″ blocks that were part of the Quilts Your Way Squishie Swap in 2010. So I’m very happy to have this one done. It’s the first set of Squishie blocks that have made it to quilt status. I have three more years worth of blocks to go. 🙂

I ran out of the Ocean Blue Fusions for the binding so I had to use some of the gold along with the blue. Makes it a little interesting that way. It finishes at about 56″ square. Don’t know what I’ll do with this one, but it’s finished.

Judy has selected number 1 for our March project. I confess, I had to swap my original number 1, Darby’s quilt with number 3, Strip Twist. I will be gone most of March on vacation so there will be very little sewing happening for me. Since number 3 only needs binding at this point, I can actually have a completion for March this way.

Check out Judy’s UFO post to see what others have completed in February.

I couldn’t help myself. I had to post about this great give-away going on over at Stash Manicure.

Head on over here to get in on the fun for yourself. Oh but wait a minute. Never mind. I want to win this one. 😉

More later on what I was up to last night.