RJ Ward Design

I'm MIA but for a good reason. Sewing is a hobby for me. Something that makes my days go faster and keeps me away from - cleaning.  Lately though I've been doing what I thought 20 years ago I'd never do - subbing in my local school district as a teacher's aide helping physically impaired children. If you're a mother you know the routine of what you have to do when your children are young. You are their sole provider to getting them fed, bathed, clean and the obvious happy and safe. As a teacher's aide I don't bathe children but the other 3 are up there in the to do list, besides helping them get the best education that they can. Thank God my children went to a school where children of all disabilities are a regular site. Their elementary housed a program in our district with special needs children. I've noticed when my children were young and we would go out to dinner and their was a handicapped person there that people stare - my family and most impor...

Sara at Sew Sweetness is hosting a New York Beauty Quilt Along on her blog that I have happened to join along in. These blocks are all paper pieced and I have found a new love for this art. This quilt was at the quilt show I went to a month ago and when I looked at this quilt I then wondered what I had signed up for. All those pieces should have made me run as fast as I could but it didn't. I was scared with all the colors so I was still undecided on what fabrics I was going to use. So the 5th of March was the day that the tutorial for Block 0 came out over at My Go-Go Life  hosted by Kim. As I read over the directions I decided that the curved seams were going to be my hardest part. The more I read the directions, the more I told myself I could do this. I continued to watch the Flickr group to get inspiration on colors. One particular square kept catching my eye and I knew what I was going to do. I decided 2 colors were going to be my desti...

I cannot begin to write about how much I have learned from doing Sew Happy Geek's QAL this past month. When I found Jenna's blog over a month ago I really had no clue what I was doing.  To get you caught up you can find the first blocks here , here , and finally here . This block was called the Quatra Star. Jenna has a video up on her site on how to do this block. It could have been done 2 ways - paper or foundation pieced. After watching the video I decided I'd rather screw up on a piece of paper than a piece of fabric, no matter how scrappy it is. Call me scared but what little fabric I have I need to make the most of it. I've done a few paper pieced blocks from participating in the Solstice Star  blocks by Fresh Lemons Quilts so I felt more comfortable in this technique. Good thing is because my handy, dandy seam ripper came through again for me. When you paper piece you really have to make sure that you have enough fabric to cover the area that it ...

I've been on a table runner kick lately. I had bought three 8 ft. white table runners for only $9.99 from Pottery Barn's outlet awhile ago. They've been sitting just waiting for the perfect project. One of them is a birthday table runner for my buffett. Below is my inspiration that I had pinned on Pinterest . RSH Catalog First things first though I didn't want an 8 ft. table runner, I wanted a 4 ft. one for my buffett, so I cut it in half.  The table runners have mitered corners so I had to finish up the end that I cut off before I could even get to the applique. The original table runner had a 2" hem plus another 1/2" so I had to rip the seam down 10" to give me room to miter the end. I did this on both sides. I ironed the runner really good and then folded in a 1/2" for the first hem. I folded again another 2" to match the hem for the whole table runner. As you can see from the picture above I also made sure that I ...

Since I knew the New York Beauty Quilt Along  was starting very soon I dreaded having to get up after every strip to iron. My husband always teases me that I need to have "time management", so I decided I needed something right next to me to iron. So I set out to our local craft store over the weekend. Have you seen how much money they want for a small portable ironing board? Seriously I looked and the cheapest I found was $27 and it had to be less than a 12x12. I couldn't justify spending that much money on something that I knew I had all the tools to do at home. So off to work I went the other night.I found a piece of board in the garage that I swiped asked if I could have. Couldn't tell you what kind of board it is but I knew it was thick enough to get the stapler through without going all the way through to the other side. It looks big in this picture but it is actually 12x30 inches. I debated on having my husband trim it down for me but decided against it. ...

I'm so excited! I was picked by  Angela Yosten to win 2 books - 2! She's even going to sign them! Thank you Angela! The first book "Fresh Fabric Treats" is by lots of Moda Bake Shop designers. The cover is beautiful! The next one is "Modern Blocks" and this has 99 (wow that's alot) of Quilt Blocks from different designers. I'm beyond thrilled to be able to finally feel and look through the pages of these beautiful books that I've had my eye on. Someone needs to pinch me! Have a Great Day!

Thought I'd finally try my hand at what the quilting world calls a Dresden Plate with scraps of fabric. I also had an 8ft. white table runner I had purchased from Pottery Barn years ago from a girls weekend at the outlet mall for real cheap. I cut the table runner in half and made two out of the one. I even mitered the corners to match all the way around. I used 5" blades (that's what they call the individual pieces) to make my Dresden. I then used a trick I had seen on the Internet to make my circle. I actually sewed two pieces together, cut a slit in one of the pieces and turned it inside out. This worked so much better than folding in the edge to make the applique. I then straight stitched all around the edge onto my table runner and blanket stitched the center. I ended up making two plates for each end of my table runner. I'm using it for St. Patrick's Day but my daughter informed me we can use it at Christmas too. I've made a couple of ta...