Another Blacksmith Association of Missouri conference is in the books!

Our Blacksmith Association of Missouri conference is always the first weekend in May. We look so forward to it!!

However this year we had to leave our new toy at home. It just had it two days before we had to leave. Our son got one identical to it.  Looking forward to lots of fun with the side by side!!

Thursday night at conference for the annual Phil Cox memorial pot luck dinner, bib overalls in honor of Phil was suggested.  Here is Margie Cox, Berni,e and myself in our attire!

We got as many as we could together for a group picture!

My favorite silverware maker Josh Rhodes was only there for one day!

Aaron, isn't he a cutie?? He and his mom were two of my great helpers in the BAM Boutique. It was able to use his math skills in making lots of change!

This is the Boutique. I am in charge of supplying it. However many wives help me run it. For all of them I say "thank you"!

Jymm Hoffman from Pennsylvania was one of two of our demonstrators. He worked the entire time in wooden shoes!

My quilt brought $525 at the auction on Saturday night. It now hangs in this beautiful log home!

My hubby purchased this for me at the auction. It's fused glass made by my sister by another mother Tami!

I've been busy as a bee

Slacker, that's what I am when it comes to blogging. But on the other hand, I've really been busy.

I made myself a back pack.  When we fly one particular airline, we only take a back pack. Yep, we are cheap and the back pack is free. So I wanted one with out all those compartments. 

I found the two fabrics at Hobby Lobby. I used Bosal In-R-Foam plus double sided fusible stabilizer. You iron the fabric to both side and then I quilted it. This was probably the funnest part of making the bag.

I used an imitation suede on the back of the straps (hobby lobby too). This keeps the straps from sliding off your shoulders.

It features a zip pocket all the way across the front. Two pull cord pockets on the sides. There is also a zip pocket inside.

I'd love to share the pattern with you, but it's only in my head. I just winged it. It turned out great.

I did make one major mistake.  Can you figure out what it is?

I flipped it the wrong way. So my back pack is wider than longer. But hey, whatever, it works, I just have to widen my shoulders!

This is a project I was asked to make for my great nephew. He will soon turn 5.  These are his super heroes t shirts. It is for a body pillow. It took longer to cut them up and position them, than it did to sew it. I used one of his daddy's t shirt for the cuff.

The blacksmith has been busy too, teaching the young. Ethan was so excited to get a personal lesson from the master.

Here is a quilt that we finished at St Margaret's church a couple of weeks ago. It was another fun one to quilt! Good job Judy and Elaine holding it up!

Ethan gifted me with this hand made split oak basket for the blacksmith giving him a lesson. I love it!

I finished (grandbaby #5), Logan's sock monkey quilt. I mailed it to arrive at his house, the day we arrived.

This is my donation for our blacksmith conference 2015. My friend Deanna took our program and digitized it into her computer embroidery machine. Enlarge the picture to see what a great job she did.

The colors from the bottom up, represents the color of the metal. It goes from black, red, orange, yellow and white as it heats up.

It is best seen on the back where flames are quilted.

I stitched our logo by machine.

I leave you with our newest grandson's Easter picture! Hopefully my next post will be our trip to Florida!

BAM quilt up for auction

Here's the latest quilt we have been working on.  Yes, "we". 

I had seen one similar to this a year ago and knew I wanted to make one as a fundraiser for our up coming blacksmith conference on

May 2 - 5. 

Several months ago, Hoffman Fabrics published a preview of their Bali Pops fabrics. The Red Hots line showed these yellow and red fabrics in Batiks. The only problem was, it wasn't coming out until March. 

I finally received it two weeks ago and immediately went to work. 

For you non-blacksmiths, you must understand that the cold iron starts out black and goes through various colors as the heat increases.  This piece represents these color changes. 

If you click on the picture it will enlarge. There you can see the Blacksmiths Association of Missouri (BAM) logo that my blacksmith cut out for me. I ironed Stitch Witchery on the back of the fabric. He did a reverse tracing of the logo and then cut it out with an Exacto knife. I carefully peeled the paper off and heat set the logo. 

I then even more carefully machine appliqued it. 

Below the anvil I embroidered Est. 1983. This is the 30th anniversary of the founding of the Blacksmith Association of Missouri group.

Together the blacksmith and I came up with the idea of a making a pair of forge tongs for the hanger.  The tongs are really neat, holding the hanger eye between the jaws with the reins of the tongs bent out to hold the quilt. 

This will be displayed in the gallery for the conference. We are then going to donate it to the auction on Saturday night. We are keeping our fingers crossed, that it will bring a tidy sum of money.