Home....

First, I hope all of you had a beautiful Christmas! I was absent for a while and yes I owe you. I promised to keep you updated and here I go being quiet.
Today, in few hours, will be exactly two weeks since I left home to come home.
I have been spending time with my family, at least as much I could.
Those two weeks flew by and I don't even know how. I didn't even meet all of the people I promised I will visit, but I think I was a bit ambitious to think I will be able to do so.
I am full of happy and also weird feelings. I love being with my family, but I am missing someone who is a big part of my life too. I realized that I don't feel complete alone anymore.... and no Christmas will be truly Christmas without this person.
I know this should be craft blog, but as you can imagine I didn't have chance to do any of it lately.
What about my home?
While in US I couldn't even imagine how I would feel returning home after such a long time. Now, here in Slovakia with my family and places that are so familiar, I feel like I only left about a month ago.
On the other hand, I do miss an American Christmas magic that I grew to like as well.

I will have to share all of my feelings from this special trip slowly, just because I can't just spit it all out, but here are at least some images from my first days.



Walk through downtown on the way to the opera...



My youngest nephew with typical Slovak dish (Bryndzove halusky/ Sheep cheese potato noodles)...




My sister and me...



View from my room, but I wanted to show parking. I was shocked to see it... In the past years more people started to use cars for transportation and parking problem arose. As you can see...

From other side of the ocean...

I am here. After a very long flight and travel (6 hours delay), warm welcome and a first day spent surrounded with my closest family (is closest even a word?). It is amazing!
I will be back when a bit more rested and with some pictures.
Thanks for all good wishes!

Off I go...

OK, I did not sleep a bit (maybe 3 hours the most), but I calmed down.
This is definitely the last post before leaving. I just couldn't wait to share with you what I won in the recent giveaway at For the Journey .
Dallas was soo generous. Look at what she sent. I felt a need to place a thread there for the scale. I love all of those vintage sheets.



She split her collection of vintage sheets between four winners to see what everybody comes up with. I am so excited about this already. I will have something to think about while waiting on the airports.:)
It will definitely be a quilt, but I may add something since there is enough fabric for multiple projects.

Here are just a few favorites.



So long, talk to you from Slovakia.....

Oh, no....

I didn't have a good day.
Last night with the snow/wind storm we lost our internet connection. We don't have cable here, so it's working through the satelite and because of the weather, that obviously didn't work.
This morning we found out that the company the internet is coming from won't fix it unless we pay $160.00 dollars or sign another two year contract. So what do we do?
Send them .... you know where. We were in search for other company for awhile anyway since there were other issues.
We found a different company, but they won't be able to come and set it up until Dec. 18th.
So, I am posting this from school. Sorry, no pictures...
This wouldn't be the end of the world for us anyway because we can use internet at work or at school.
Well, another unfortunate thing that happened is that I am worried about my flight home.
My dad woke up us this morning calling from Slovakia. There has been strikes going on in Budapest airport (where I am supposed to arrive) since this morning and flights are being canceled. You can read about it more here, if you are interested.
I was nervous about the whole traveling part of my trip anyway. I am not much of a traveler, you may say.
I don't know how long this will be going on, but it sure makes me worried.

If I won't be able to post until I leave....
I will definately post from Slovakia. I should be able to get there sometime, right?
I just might be too worried about other things tomorrow.
I am leaving Chicago 5pm on Friday, wish me luck.

More handmade presents....

I refused to buy presents this year. I feel that we all have stuff we need and if we don't we buy it for ourselves anyway because it's needed or because we really want it. And who knows better what we need than we do.
With little ones it's different, I understand, but also only from certain age. Babies don't care if it's made or bought.
So I made almost all my presents this year. I said almost because there are certain people (two in my case )around us that just would benefit more out of something else.
My presents for family in Slovakia are all packed and will be revealed later (from Slovakia).
There were few more that I was missing for people here in U.S..
These are throw pillows that will go to a home where handmade is loved. There is going to be quilt coming later, but that would really have to wait until after my trip.





The last one still in works. Let's hope I'll make it. Not today though, spending all day in school - finals.



Also, dont't forget to Freda's Hive today! Don't know what I am talking about? Check this out!!!

Edit:
Another great 100th post giveaway is going on here!

I caught second breath.../ Tutorial for a super quick scarf.

I was certain that I won't be able to do any more sewing before my trip. I also got over the fact that some presents will be given after Christmas. And then, this weekend, I packed my suitcases (Yes, I am taking two, but one is straight Christmas presents - making me feel like Santa) and did loads and loads of laundry and ....

I went to pick up " My sister's quilt" from the quilt shop this weekend (I love it quilted, but will post about it from Slovakia, OK? )and stopped at Jo Ann's on the way back to search for binding fabric. I found three, so I need to make some decisions. But I also found very cool fabric in red tag fabric shelves. It's kind of silky, batik in green/ brown shades and turquoise/ browns. Front is a bit shinny and a bit fancy, back is just batik. Fabric is all crinkled too. I am sorry that I don't know the proper name of it.
Well, idea was born and I was working on the super quick shawl out of both (two for presents and one for me.
This is what I did:
I bought one yard of each. From the first one I cut it lengthwise (1 yard length)into 8 strips (width is approx. 44" divided by 8, since I made two out of this fabric). This fabric was crinkled, so it was hard to measure exact width. I sewed two of the together to make it long enough for shawl/ scarf.



Then, folded them over and sew one more time along the edge. Next, turned over and sewed the ends in. Super simple, but I am no tutorial writer, so please ask if you have questions.



I made the two bluish/brown scarfs thinner to wear with a nice dressy shirt or with a simple sweater to make it look more dressier.



I kept the green and brown combo for me. Well, I have a very cute hat that I need to wear more, but was missing a perfect scarf to match it. This way I satisfied my desperate need for more presents and also I had a nice scarf to wear in my hometown. I made mine a bit wider - I only cut it four times the width - 44". I also made mine reversible I may say. One side is more shinny to wear for fancy occasions and the other is simple batik to wear daily. That's on the picture.
Please, imagine that the splotches on the mirror are snowflakes. Thanks! :)

I made more presents, but I will leave this for tomorrow.

I am running out of time to sew, but that doesn't stop me from playing with ideas.... not mine!

I' ve been hiding behind books and computer (working on projects for school/ reading blogs...) for the past week and coming home in the evenings exhausted. I think I took two or three naps approximately from 6pm till 10pm and worked on my school stuff later those nights. I prefer to get up earlier in the morning and study before exams as oppose to late nights (I can't keep my eyes open and fall asleep anywhere - literary), but naps helped a bit with that.
I wanted to share with you something that was the closest I've got to any crating, sewing related activities this week.
Jacquie at Tallgrass Prarie Studio, have posted about the quilt she's been working on and asking for ideas for the layout of the blocks that she and her mom created. Playing with the ideas for quilts' layouts is by far my favorite part about quilting. I needed to work on the paper about soil requirements for septic systems in my county (you probably wonder what I study... haha..). What do you think I did first?
Yep, I sketched a layout for Jacquie's quilt and fought with our 100 year old scanner in order to send it to her. Then I started on the septic systems, but was too unpatient to see what she would think about it, since it was very different from what others suggested.



I waited and waited and today I got to see it. I love it! She altered a few blocks which made it totally Jacquie style. I think she is happy with it. I feel satisfied because I had something creative and beautiful to think about this week (think septics - eek),
Check out Jacquie's quilt here.
Thanks Jacquie! You made my day /week ! :)