Bags and Birds

Well, I have made a lot of these Market Bags in the past following the pattern.  However, my oldest daughter says they are just too small so I decided to measure the bags she had and make some more to her liking.  Of course the original bag nicely fits on a yard of fabric without any messing around.  Needless to say, adding two inches to each dimension takes a bit more fabric!  Of course, all I had were assorted half yard pieces that I had grabbed to bring down to the beach with me so I did my best and did by a little fabric for the lining of two of the four bags I cut out.  These don't stand up quite as well as the original bags.  I had to use two different fabrics as they really take about 1 1/4 yards with the new measurements for each bag.  These two are flying as I write out to Seattle for my younger daughter (no, my kids don't ever read my blog so it is safe!)  I do like the new size (14 inches x 16 inches x 8 inches).  The only measurement that stayed the same was the 8 inches!  I also changed the handles to come out of the top between the lining and bag rather than attached to the sides as they are in the original.  Really, the only thing left of the original pattern is the reverse French seams, a treatment I really like!

I also made a "Potato Chip Bag" (Pattern name) making the straps much, much shorter for my 3 1/2 year old granddaughter -- I thought it looked about the right size for her.  Hopefully she will like it.

I finally finished all the quilting and the binding on the fourth of the "serendipity" quilts I have made.  This is one of my favorites and has been claimed by my oldest daughter but first I think I will enter it into our quilt show next spring.  I am very happy with how it turned out even though you really can't see the quilting (and there is a lot of it).  It is about 76 inches by 56 inches.

Hopefully you can see some of the quilting in this closeup of one of the center blocks.

I have started the long process of hand quilting the background of the Baltimore Album style quilt.  I am doing the classic mattress padding in 1" grid.  Hopefully, I will get this done.  It is fairly easy quilting and sateen is very nice to quilt through so maybe....    

 There haven't been any new birds at Carolina Beach Lake (well, the weather has been a bit nasty until today) but this is a female Scaup and there seem to be quite a few of both males and females, Greater and Lesser there each day.

This is the male scaup and you can see a little of the irridescence on his head here.  The Ruddy Ducks, Long Tailed Duck, Grebes,  Buffleheads, Cormorants and Coots are all there as well as the mallards.  I am missing seeing the Northern Shovelers though!

I am looking forward to my new camera for Christmas though -- just a slight upgrade with a few more megapixels to crop down!  These pictures have all been taken with my little Canon point and shoot with the 35x optical zoom recommended by Lillian Stokes!  It's ability to get some of the longer range pictures does  compensate for being so much slower than the SLR!