The Doodle-head:

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Saturday, February 06, 2010

Moving my blog after all

In preparation for moving my blog to a new location, I've turned off comments on what will become an archive of my blog posts to this point. Because my host doesn't support Wordpress, and because I've been with them for nearly 8 years and always had great support, I don't feel like going to another host at this time.

Over the last week, I've been playing with the Custom Domains option of Blogger, and I've decided to just go with that. It's a familiar interface, and I'll just get over not having the posts on my server with the rest of my site. You shouldn't notice much of a difference, other than the address and a slight layout change. The new address is http://blog.doodle-head.com/. Please update your bookmarks and links, thanks!

Tuesday, February 02, 2010

Sigh, I have some real work ahead of me

I just read that as of March 26 this year, Blogger will no longer be allowing / supporting publishing via FTP. They offer two options (Custom Domains like blog.doodle-head.com or Blogspot hosted like doodle-head.blogspot.com). I don't think I like either of these options (neither allows me to keep doodle-head.com/blog and neither allows me to keep everything on my server), so I have some research and work ahead.

For those of you who use your own hosted server, what do you use and why? Let me say in advance, I do not know PHP or JavaScript, but I'm well-versed in HTML, CSS, and know a little ASP. I would be willing to learn PHP if the learning curve isn't extreme, and obviously my timeframe is more limited than I'd like.

Oh, and I'm tech support for my quilt guild's and my father's blogs, so I'm going to have to figure out something there too - and I JUST got my father to start using his blog a little. He's not as computer-geeky as me, so I've got to make sure whatever I do for him is something I can support.

Monday, February 01, 2010

Snowed in again (yay!)

Friday morning it began snowing here in Nashville, and fortunately we were prepared (got milk and other sustenance Thursday evening with the rest of the crazy people at the grocery after work, LOL).

C and I took advantage of the time stuck inside with our favorite hobbies. Here's my stitching progress so far of Kitty Litter (now with a kitty).


I think I'm going to continue stitching down to the bottom of the design and work my way to the right so that I balance out background and design stitching.

Saturday I finally put away some of the fabric leftovers I've used in recent quilt projects and pulled out fabrics for my new block of the month for 2010. I can't remember if I mentioned it before, but when a guild member (and former guild president) brought her project in to share with us one meeting, I fell in love with it. Then I got a preview of my LQS' block of the month for 2010, and wasn't in love with that. So I decided to try and get the back issues of the magazine featuring this series (Quiltmaker, all of 2003 issues). I still have the Nov/Dec issue to find, but I also have several months before I get to it (fingers crossed). I plan to use my stash entirely for this wallhanging.

Here is the border piece, complete with flannel insert (though I still need to put the sleeve on - I did finish sewing on the binding late last night).


I got started on the January block and actually finished piecing it. I still need to appliqué the top part and then quilt it, but I'm really pleased with how it turned out. And I remembered how to paper piece! Sure, it took me a few minutes to figure out where to get started, but once I did, I didn't have any unsewing to do. :)


I think this will be a really fun block of the month, in that I'll actually have a finished product every month that I can enjoy immediately, not having to wait until the very end to put it all together.

We still have snow on the ground, but the roads should be cleared today (high of 44), so perhaps we will have our guild meeting tomorrow (we don't meet if schools are closed, and they are closed today). Looking forward to getting together with my bestest buds this week - at quilt guild, at dinner one evening, and at a lunch this weekend.

Update: no guild meeting tomorrow (schools closed again). And here is what I worked on after work today - still needs to be quilted, but the appliqué is done.

Sunday, January 24, 2010

Figgy Pudding Charm Bracelet Quilt

Friday after work I laid out all my charm squares on my design wall (have I mentioned how much I love having a design wall? It makes creating a quilt SO much easier)...


Yesterday and today I worked on piecing it all together, and here is the result!


My secret? Well, other than it being a REALLY simple quilt pattern, it was due to having very few other responsibilities this weekend and having a husband who wanted to play his favorite video games (Grid, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2).

And that's my secret for getting so much cross stitching done, too (though I know several people who will say that I'm kind of a fast stitcher too). I stitch while we watch tv, I quilt while I listen an audiobook or music, and we try to keep our responsibilities (other than the obligatory full-time jobs) to an absolute minimum - yep, we're basically both still kids ourselves. :)

Friday, January 22, 2010

Kitty Litter

I have quite a bit of the darkest green background to fill in, but I wanted to get some of the design stitched so the background stitching will be easier to do with less concentration. :)

Three quilts have been dropped off at my LQS so they can be quilted! Bamboo, Pinwheels, and the SSS 2009 are now waiting their turn in line, and I have their binding fabrics picked out. I'm so excited to have 3 quilts nearly finished!

And now it's the weekend, with no plans except to enjoy the time off and stitch or quilt to my heart's content. Happy weekend!