On the 12th Day of Christmas - Sara Velder (aka MOM) inspired me!

Merry Christmas Eve and my 12th Day of Inspirational Women!

On the 12th Day of Christmas Sara Velder, aka, my Mom Inspired Me!

If any one person has inspired me the most to live a creative life it is my Mom.  Growing up we always had handmade items which I thought was completely the norm, now I know better.  We had soft flannel tied blankets, quilts, Raggedy Ann dolls, Cabbage Patch kid clothing, Barbie clothing and accessories, jean jackets and jeans with hand embroidered patches, and more.  Sewing was a pastime and a craft area was a given.

My Mom also was very well known around our grade school as a Homemade (from scratch) bread maker.  When Christmas rolled around there were days of kneading dough, letting it rise and baking.  There were also some teachers that were very happy to have my brother or I in their class to find themselves with a loaf of her bread!

In grade school I also remember that she made baby stuffed chicks and rabbits to sell at a local shop.  In 6th grade my class had an auction where the students got to bid on parent donated gifts with our points we'd earned during the semester.   My mom gave 6 or so stuffed baby geese on a stick holder.  I can vividly remember my classmates bidding on those geese like crazy, every kid wanted one.

My Mom inspired me to make my first quilt in high school when I found a stack of quilt blocks at an antique store and I decided to not to wait around for her project list to accommodate my request and made my own vintage feedback bow-tie patterned quilt.

Now she runs Acorn Ridge Quilting and does Long-Arm Quilting for many Quilters in the Lincoln/Omaha area.  If you have a quilt top that you've made, or find a neat old vintage Quilt top you need someone to finish call my mom.  She is not only reasonably priced, but she is FAST.  No waiting 2 or 3 months, she keeps on top of her stack of quilts and gets them done quickly.  She has also inspired me to work hard, sometimes probably too hard, but we like to keep busy.

My parents' home is full of her handmade work.  A sweet touch for Easter one year were these adorable bunny banners.



Also special occasions are always fun to have awesome handmade gifts.



My Mom is also a very big supporter and sponsor of Handmade U.



She has made endless goodie bags/totes, embroidered countless Handmade U logos, and sewn more pennant banners for our Barn than she'd like to count.


When she has made small mini quilts as raffle prizes - the lucky winners have loved them.

{Lucky Stephanie winning this Halloween Quilt!}

I'm the lucky daughter to have such a creative and loving Mom.  Thanks Mom for inspiring me!  I love you!

-Rachel

Fall Handmade U 2015 - Another Magical Weekend at the Barn

Happy Fall Ya'll,

I hope you've all had the chance to pick some apples, eat some crisp, maybe even pulled out the sweaters to get ready for the cooler weather!  We had a little bit of it all at our Fall semester of Handmade U last month.

We host Handmade U in our Big Red Barn that was built in 1900, so we are always hoping Mother Nature is smiling down on us for a great weekend of weather!

This fall, our first night was a really rainy one, but we stayed dry in the Barn for our Welcome Dinner - Grill Out night.


Our resident Grill Master - Jim McGough of Handmade Q BBQ did a great job with our Omaha Steak Burgers.  Add some Beans, Chips and Watermelon and you've got a tasty meal.  We served Freshly made Carmel Apples during our vendor night.  YUM....may need to go make one now....wait, sorry, back to the post!!

These last few might not look super pretty....but boy were they tasty ;)

Vendor night is always a fun time to see what our students and sometimes Sponsors are whipping up!

My mom of Acorn Ridge Quilting really outdid herself with needle keepers to sell at Vendor night!  Little kitties with mouse inside pages...  Apples with the core pages inside...Barns of course with barn gates inside!  She has a few left...visit her blog and contact her if you are interested!!

  

Friday is always our HU T-shirt day.



We are a laid back retreat.  Comfy and casual is the name of the game in the barn at the Homestead.  No stressing packing for our weekend....unless you spend a lot of time pouring over what art supplies you want to bring!

 These were our new Freshmen!  Always fun to have 1-peaters in the BARN!  Hope they all come back for more semesters!





Our Friday Class was the Quilted Uptake Journal that Rae and Lorraine created.  They cut up a big quilt to share with all of us!

We learned how to create beautiful colored seam binding with Dylusions Ink Sprays.  - Amazing inks for sure!  I can't wait to use them in more of my projects!




We cut pages to get ready to bind into the quilted cover, and used Shout color catchers that we colored to use as the binding.  I LOVED this idea.  Now I am saving all my color catchers!!



Stitching all the elements together...





Mollie did a great job with her Quilted Journal and I loved the little flower she made for the front!  Speaking of Mollie, she is our biggest 'Peater....(that is repeater for those non-alum)  She is an 8-peater!  Thanks for being here so much Mollie!



All the journals were similar but unique to each student!  What a fun project!  Thanks Lorraine and Rae for sharing this project and cutting up a quilt for us all to use :)



After our morning class we all grabbed a vintage lunch box full of a croissant ham and cheese sandwich, chips, string cheese, cookies...each one of us picked our own favorite flavor of apple from the orchard behind the barn on our way over to the picnic tables.







The weather smiled on us Friday and Saturday.  Loved that we could enjoy the Fall air and share food and conversation with new and old friends....and in some instances sisters and sister in laws!



After lunch we all grabbed a banana and granola bar "to-go" to provide energy on our Antique Shopping adventure.  Many unique and vintage finds were found and purchased!!

Back at the Homestead before dinner we started some of our SWAPS!!

The swaps are always a fun part of the Handmade U weekend.  It helps build excitement for those that participate as they prepare and create goodies for their swap partners before the weekend.

This semester we did our favorite Color Box swap!  Each partner picks a color and then you gather and fill a box, or container with goodies of your partner's color.  Always unique containers from vintage jewelry boxes, to picnic baskets, to egg cartons and egg baskets!  FUN!

A new Swap this year was a Pocket Letter Pages swap!  

  

This was a fun one, and we've decided to have a monthly swap for all the Handmade U Alumni for those that want to create these for each other.  Thanks to Kim for organizing the ongoing swap, and Dawn for introducing this one to us.

We also had an Apron Swap hosted by Suzanne.  We had handmade aprons, vintage found aprons, and new fun aprons!!  

We also brought back the Mug Swap, always fun.

  

My Mug said "whatever happens in the barn STAYS in the barn!!"

The girls had a great idea for a massage chain as they lined up for dinner!!  ahhh....

 

Friday night was the special Cream Can Dinner!

Jim cooked up the food for our evening meal....

The cans are filled with sausages, potatoes, corn, cabbage and carrots.  They steam all together for a little bit of tasty heaven!

A Hot Homemade Apple Crisp, freshly picked from the Orchard capped off the evening!


Saturday we began our next project.  I can't say enough what thoughtful and wonderful projects Lorraine and Rae put together.  They brought such fun kits for us, and paint and ink sprays for us to share....and lucky for future semester they left all the ink sprays ;)  My mind is spinning with ideas to use it in an upcoming project.  So thanks to them again.



We have a convenient spigot out behind the barn for water, it's a fun way to fill your paint brush container!

Ready with all our supplies we were ready to get started with Day 2 of creating!

The blank canvas is something that can be intimidating and a little scary for some of us.  You may stare at it awhile and think, what in the world am I going to create, how do I begin, what if I don't like it?!?  Never fear, Lorraine started us off by demonstrating how to START.  She took her ink sprays and just laid some color down on the canvas...and just like that, it wasn't so scary anymore!

Rae and Lorraine worked perfectly in sync to share tips and tricks, from Rae's amazing mark-making, to Lorraine's lesson on creating beautiful flowers with paint, there was something to inspire us all....more than likely many things!


Lunch on Saturday was chicken salad made from the Chicken grilled by Handmade Q (aka Jim).  We added nuts and apples to the chicken salad, which was yummy.  That along with fresh fruit and chips and a cookie made for a light and filling lunch.

The rest of the day we were able to paint, use inks, pens, etc to create a beautiful canvas of meaningful art.

Everyone did an amazing job!

Painty fingers mean you're having fun!!

Our mid-day snack was a mix of Nebraska Popcorn, Candy Corn and Peanuts, a Fall Handmade U favorite.  There may have been some Halloween candy in the mix too.

Throughout the day we had many raffle drawings, thanks to all our Sponsors!  They are the best!  We also scattered more swaps throughout the day.



One of the other fun challenges of the weekend was the Handmade U Apron design contest!  Some of the students took it on and created some amazing aprons!

Mary won a HU Hat for her amazing Red Barn Apron!  Special mention to Carol, Tammy and Charity for their beautiful aprons.  I especially am partial to Charity's - she doodled a highlights of the whole weekend, including a little Cora McGough and chickens!



With so many alumni that come back semester after semester, matching outfits are bound to happen!!



For the Saturday Goodbye dinner this semester we had Handmade Q - Pulled Pork sandwiches, Sweet Potatoes, and Coleslaw.

The meal on the Homestead created a more laid back day, some relaxing once projects were complete, and no need to rush around.

Thanks to Jim for getting up at 2AM to start and cook the Pork on the smoker!  It was a long Cook for him, little sleep and it turned out amazing.

To end our weekend after dinner we made S'mores!  YUM!  So excited we finally had perfect weather for a campfire and s'more making!



Thanks for all those who joined us this semester at Handmade U on the McGough Homestead!  We loved having you and look forward to meeting the next semester of students May 12-14!  We are over half full already!!  Please visit www.handmade.com for details and contact me ASAP to save your spot!  Sign up before Nov 1 for the Early Bird Special!




Yay!

-Rach

  

Handmade U - Semester 8 - Day 3 - Class Time, Wood Fire Oven Pizza and a Fond Farewell Dinner

Hi All -

I'm loving remembering this joy filled weekend!!  Even though I might have been a little crazy busy during the weekend, I enjoyed every moment with these students!!

Saturday morning we started by finishing the little birdies and plaque with Melody.  The painting and collaging really added to the personality of each little birdie.


All the beautiful work from the students!



I hope they grace a special place in each of your homes!!

While everyone worked to finish their projects in the morning we had an Oven Fire Pizza making machine come set-up for lunch!




















Even in the brisk weather and drizzle they braved the elements to FEED us!  So grateful!

Thanks to Rolling Fire Company for bringing in lunch and cranking out those pizzas!  Did you know those ovens get to over 800 degrees??  After a day of cooling off they can still cook a chicken in it??  Wow, HOT!

The pizzas were super tasty!  They were also very accommodating for our gals who were gluten free, even egg and corn free along with a few other things....


Judy was able to eat pizza after not having it for years!!  Yay!

After having our fill of pizzas that kept being delivered into the barn, we finished up Melody's fun project and I provided my Handmade U Barn stitching project to everyone that was ready...

I gave a few stitching lessons to those who were embroidering for their FIRST time!! How exciting!

Though this project wasn't going to be completed in an afternoon, I was so excited to see everyone get started with a stitch or two!  We have been sharing on our FB group and instagram the progress.  I'll do an update blog post when I get more finished project photos to share.  I love seeing how differently all the gals are choosing to stitch their project!

I put together a little "self-published" {aka copied and sewn} book together of my favorite basic stitches.  I hope it helped the newbies!!

One of the gals favorite gifts of the weekend was the amazing Quilted Red Barn needle keeper that my Mom created for each student, personalized and all!

After everyone finished their projects and started wrapping up the gals either went back to freshen up at their hotel, or even snuck in some extra shopping....

Dinner was at Lazlo's in downtown Lincoln in an area called the Haymarket.  I had chosen kebabs, steak or chicken, and salads.  Such good food, and great service.



We had our own special room which was away from the crowded restaurant, so it was relaxing and private to share one last meal together and my thanks to the group!!



We even had an impromptu photo shoot at the end of the evening...



Thanks to Melody Ross for being such a wonderful teacher, and impromptu helper - given I was a little behind due to being under the weather the few days before HU.  She was a trooper and I can't thank her enough!



Thanks too to all the Sponsors, I will be doing a special blog post coming up on the Sponsors, they make HU even more FUN!!  Who doesn't love a goodie bag?!

Thanks to all the 'peaters this semester!!  The 1-peaters or the 2, 3, 4 or 5-peaters!!  I loved having you at the Homestead, I hope you enjoyed it!!

Ya'll come back now ya hear?

-Rach