Life in the Studio This week

 I love fall with its brilliant colors.  The mountains around us have had their first snow.  We have harvested gallons of tomatoes, squash of all sorts, onions, carrots, potatoes...and 205 pumpkins!  The pumpkins we grew in the garden at church for the food bank so thankfully I do not have to figure out what to do with them all.  I did keep a couple of the less than perfet ones to put out by my front door.  I never would have imagined what happened this morning though.  I got up and heard a rather strange noise...like a gentle knocking on our front door.  We happen to have windows along the side of the door and when I went over to investigate there was a huge seven point buck standing there eating one of the pumpkins.  His antlers kept bumping the door!  This is an earlier photo I snapped of the culprit.  We do enjoy having them around despite the trouble they sometimes cause.  We have one who has such a sweet tooth I have to make sure the hummingbird feeders are well out of reach or he just tips it up and empties the whole thing.  

In between making the snowman blocks for my current BOM I have been busy creating other things, including the second in my Mug Rug series.  Did I mention I love this time of year?  One of my favorite sounds in the dark of the night are the hoots of a pair of Great Horned Owls that live nearby.  Soon they will be calling to one another as they get ready for their winter job of raising their young-yes they nest in the winter!  Pumpkins and owls seemed like a perfect combination for this Mug Rug.  Click on image for pattern information.

This one is a little more advanced as it has several layers and small pieces to put together, but I believe that with patience it would be a good skill builder if you want to work on improving your fusible machine applique skills.  I even broke out of my mold and used some straight stitching and featherstitches along with my usual buttonhole stitch.  

Remember, my patterns are also available on Craftsy now too.  Click here for my Craftsy Shop.

And I leave you for now with a view of our mountain with it's fresh snowfall while I head back to the studio to work on my next project.   Happy Quilting!