My Fabric Art Journal is Home!!!

Well I'm finally home after a long 3 week road trip and can't tell you how nice it is to finally sleep in my own bed. My trip to NC for the 5th Annual COF Quilting Retreat was a blast and I truly enjoyed my visit to Florida with my friends Shey and Carolyn. Visting my parents in VA was sweet especially taking my mother to her birthplace on Mother's Day. I think I'll try and stay home for a bit so I can rest up for my next trip in July to CA to visit my grandbabies.

In late 2009 a group of 4 of my crazy friends got together and formed the "Artsy Farty" group. Journal Project We decided we would make an Art journal using any meduim we wanted to create with and send our journals around to each other - somewhat like a Round Robin. We'd each create a page for each others journal.

While in NC a few weeks ago at the COF Quilting Retreat, all of us met up and exchanged our finished journals - a year and a half in the making! I can't even begin to tell you how excited we all were and how very thrilling it was for me to have such talented ladies work on my journal. Every one did a fabulous job on their pages. Funny thing... before I even read whose page was whose, I knew - just by the artistic expression.

My journal was called "Real Name". I wrote the story of my names and each girl was then to express in their own way the story or meaning of their name(s).

This little story, "Real Name" was written by Brian Andreas of Story People. I remember when I first read it I immediately thought "WOW! he captured just what I was thinking about my Real Name"

I'd like to share with you my journal with pages created by my friends - Jody, Denise, Colleen and Kathi. Thank you ladies - I LOVE it!

This is the front cover of my Journal - My birth name: Nicki Lee Chantiles

Inside cover with my written story:

Each girl was given a piece of double sided peltex 8.5 x 11 and asked to create a front and back page depicting their name(s). This first page was created by Jody using stamps, paper fabric, beads, lace and sequins. You can see that she spelled out her name "JODY"
Jody created a pocket on the backside and inserted her story of her names.

The second page was created by Denise. Denise did a beautiful job of crazy quilting a beautiful frame around her picture - Simply gorgeous!

The backside of Denise' page is a fabulous zipper pocket - just big enough to hold her story. How cool!!

Page 3 was created by Colleen. This Journal project was Colleen's brainy idea and I for one am so very grateful that she put it together. Colleen's fabulous page was hand stitched using various threads, lace, beads and charms.

The backside of Colleen's page was also made into a pocket which holds the story of her names and her picture. I love the handstitched fabric she used and am sure it was something special that she shared with me.
The last entry was that of Kathi. Kathi used tiles to write out her maiden name "Darcy". Kathi framed out the month of March and circled the 18th - Kathy - I promise, I'll never forget your birthday again!

Kathi's back page included a copy of her birth certificate which she downloaded onto fabric - great idea!! Tucked inside a little pocket was her story.

The last page is the inside of my back page... a picture of my eyes looking over everyone. Finally, the back cover of my journal.... me, Barbara Nicki Lee Seavey -

2 years old and now wondering... where did all the years go?

Thank you Jody, Denise, Colleen and Kathi for sharing your personal stories with me. For me to trust you with my story was liberating and a bit of self discovery..... I thank you sharing your creative talents with me and also your friendship - looking forward to ourt next great project together!

A Little Bit of Craziness

Remember that song "Leaving on a jet plane"? Well in just about 4 hours I will be headed to the airport boarding a plane to North Carolina for the 5th Annual COF Quilting Retreat. COF (Circle of Friends) Retreat began in MN in 2007 when about 40 ladies from the HGTV Quilting Forum decided to get together for 4 days of fun. We have been doing it ever since. Golly, I'm not even sure I've recuperated from the CQ Adventure in CT !

I know I promised pictures of the Crazy Quilting Adventure and I will post some as soon as my new cable cord comes in. Seems "someone" lost it and now is unable to use the camera she used at the Retreat. As soon as I am able I will give you a complete rundown of the fabulous 4 day adventure. Let me just tell you - we had the time of our lives - a whole bunch of crazy ladies all together in one building - what a blast! Our host, Maureen Greeson, with her side kick Susan Elliott, did a fabulous job! Our teachers, Allie Aller, Betty Pillsbury and Sharon Boggins were absolutely incredible. More to come later.

Before I head out on another adventure I thought I would post a few things. First, I was surprised to learn last month that I actually won a Blog Give Away! Judy sent me my prize, one of her GORGEOUS CQ hearts, along with tons of pretties just for me. Thank you again Judy, I love everything!

Beautiful dyed laces, adorable little seahorse, fabulous fabrics and a pretty little face pin.

When not dyeing laces, I actually have been catching up on a lot of CQ RR's. I completed the final two blocks I have to work on for the Birds DYOB RR and will truly miss working on this theme. I really enjoyed working on the bird blocks and can't wait to get mine home.

This one is for Cathy L:

This one is for Cathy L:

Well I'm off to try and get a couple hours sleep. Good thing I'm all packed and ready to go ... hopefully I can sleep on the plane. Thearica - here I come with plenty of laces in tow !!

A Crazy Quilt Adventure - Here I come!

The day is finally here! I've been waiting a year for April 8th to come and now that it is here, I'm beside byself with excitement! In a matter of a couple hours I will be headed to Connecticut with my friend Ely to attend my first Crazy Quilt Adventure. Thanks to my wonderful hubby Rob for giving me this trip - I love you Babe! The thought of being able to take classes with teachers like Sharon Boggins, Allie Aller and Betty Pillsbury is just .... WOW! To be in one room with all that incredible talent is going to be soooo enlightening and so much fun. I am going to be like a sponge soaking up every bit of CQ I can and I've got my tinted glasses ready to help my eyes with all the beautiful eye candy I know I will be seeing. Not to mention being able to meet so many of the ladies I've have met over the past years who love CQ as much as I do. One lady in particular is my friend Lil who will be driving in from New York. We have been cyber friends for 4 years now and have never met - being roommates for the next 4 days - bets are that there won't be much time to sleep. When my invitation to the Crazy Quilt Adventure arrived a blank CQ name tag was enclosed. We were all to embellish our own tag. Well... here's mine. The beautiful invitation - Maureen Greeson and her committee did a fabulous job in putting them together. Thank you thank you all for all your hard work!

My next post will certainly be about the wonderful time I had - with tons of pictures too!

Pretties to show off

Ohhhhhhh have I got pretties to show you today! Whenever I mail out a lace order I ask my customers to please sends me a couple pictures to let me see what they are creating with the laces. Two of my favorite customers have bought the Mini/Middie Packs of lace and have sent me pictures showing me how they were used. Here are few pictures of some of the beautiful creations made by two very talented ladies.

These gorgeous hearts were created by Diane Knotts . Be sure to check Diane's Etsy shop out : Cottage by the Pond as she has tons of beautiful items for sale. Diane dabbles in all kinds of pretties so be prepared to see lots of eye candy.

Another of my customers is Jackie who has her shop Catangel on Ebay. Jackie makes the most gorgeous beaded ornaments and right now she is making egg shaped ornaments for Easter using lace and beads. Simply beautiful!

This pretty purple Easter Egg is one that I bought from Jackie's collection.

Winner of CQ Give Away!!!

It's amazing what one week can do for your life. Like the quote that I have on my header says "All in a matter of time..." Life is sorta getting back to normal (whatever that is LOL!) for me and I'm starting to feel human again. Never ever think "that can't happen to me" as just last Sunday I found myself in a health scare that rocked me. Thank God that he was watching over me as today I'm feeling great and just want to put the drama behind me, grab the bull by the horns and do what I have to do to make this 58 year old body the best it can be. Thank you everyone who sent well wishes and prayers... they are working!

So... a week later and I bet you are all waiting to hear who won the Give Away. All day long I tried to get that dang Random.org site to work for me but to no avail... this is actually how I was starting to feel before I realized it might be easier if I just wrote down everyones name and had hubby pull a winner. Don't laugh - I'm sure you have all been this aggrevated with your computer at one time or another!

Wrote down, numbered (in case of duplicate names) and cut up the strips - mixed up the names and had hubby draw one

and... the winner of this adorable little glass bird jar full of lace is SHARON!!! She was the 28th person to comment. Congratulations Sharon. Please send me your address so I can get these pretties to you this week. You can send your address to me at bnickilee@aol.com

Hmmmmmm, I feel bad that I had ya'll wait so long so how about I pull another name out for a sweet little package of some of my recently dyed laces.... be back in a minute.

Ok... times up - the winner of the lace pack is #96 LifemyWay - again, please send me your address so I can mail them to you.

Have a great week everyone and remember... be kind to your body - it's the only one you have.

My apologies on Announcing Give Away Winner

Sometimes life gets in the way ... sometimes the unexpected happens in life.

I would like to apologize to all of you who left such nice comments on my blog and entered my Lace Give Away. I'm so sorry that I have yet to announce the winner. I promise to announce the winner this coming Saturday.

Since last Sunday life has been a blur. I've spent the last 3 days in the hospital being poked and prodded by numerous Doctors and having every test known... and way too many needles to count. I'm not going to elaborate on the details but would like to share with you all a piece of advice....

Please, Please, listen to your body. If you feel that that something just isn't "right", that something is out of the "normal" for you, be sure to do everything to be heard by your Dr. Don't let anyone let you think you are imagining a hurt or an ailment. You and only you know your body.... it is a temple so take care of it. Sometimes we all need to take a step back and remember that we are human and are given only one body to take care of. I don't want to get into preaching just want it to be said that we all need to be the keepers of our own beautiful bodies.

For those of you who have a lace order in, please know I will be filling them this week and will have them all out in the mail by the weekend. I'm sorry you have had to wait a few days. Hopefully, once I get my feet back under me, I'll be back in the swing of adding new goodies to RavioLee Dreams and happily stitching some new CQ pretties.

CQ Lace Give Away & Bird Blocks

A little birdie told me the other day that spring is on the way. I sure hope so! The first sign that this might be so is that the snow has finally melted. It's not a pretty sight but I can close my eyes and just imagine in about a month that the earth will start to turn that beautiful shade of spring green and soon after, the flowers will start popping.


When not dyeing lace, I have been trying to get caught up on my CQing swaps. I'm currently in a Bird Themed CQ RR and just finished this cute little block for Connie (6") - don't you just love the bird theme?


Another bird block - embellished for Janet:



I am hosting a CQ One on One Block Swap over ont he HGTV Quitling Forum and pulled Rose's name to make a 12.5" block . Rose wanted a garden theme for her block so I began by cross stitching a little bird house to use as the focal for her block. I've been working on it off and on and will have it done in time for the March 26th due date. Sorry, I can only show you a peek as it is a surprise.




With spring coming and birds being the theme I've been working with, I thought I would use them as a theme for my CQ Give Away.

Ok, so I fibbed a little. In my last post, I promised a Give Away to celebrate my 300th Sale on Etsy. Well... here I am a little late BUT I can now say I am 1 sale away from my 400th Sale! I am so excited and want to thank all of you for supporting RavioLee Dreams. The past two weeks have absolutely insane! I've been working nonstop at keeping up with the orders and am having so much fun meeting so many wonderful ladies with so many talents. I have tons of pretties to upload this week and have scheduled another 4 day dyeing marathon for mid week so please stop by when you have the urge for a lace fix.

For the Give Away I thought I would combine a bird theme with the laces.... something "spring", something colorful. I've put together a cute little glass jar with a bird top and embellished a piece of lace as a little wrap for the jar just for you. The jar is filled with 11 pieces of dyed lace, 5 purple vintage glass buttons, a pretty vintage rhinestone button, and 3 adorable bird charms.

As my way of saying thank you, all you need to do to enter is leave a comment. If you would like two chances , become a follower. (post a second time that you did). That's it. I will announce the winner (pulled by random number) on Sunday evening March 20th. Please be sure to leave me a way to contact you should you be the winner.

Sorry about the picture quality - I think its time for a new camera. Any suggestions?

Help! I'm drowning in Lace!

Can you feel it? Maybe if you pretend hard enough you will feel the warmth, the sun... you can almost hear the robins chirping that spring is just around the corner. Well, we can dream can't we? This winter has been a tough one for all of us and I for one, want out of this cold, snowy hibernation.

In my last post I mentioned that Pat Winter's was coming out with a new CQ Magazine Crazy Quilt Gatherings . If you haven't bought your copy you MUST! It is full of introductions of some very talented ladies, beautiful eye candy and lots of CQ tips and treats. A couple days before I received my copy I all of a sudden started getting tons of orders for my hand dyed laces. RavioLee Dreams was on a roll! It took me a day or so to remember that I had an add in Pat's new magazine and that must be why all the orders. Well after 3-4 days of filling orders I figured I better get myself in the dyeing mode. I put away my needles, stopped working on my sewing room, totally said goodbye to any household chores and went on a 5 day nonstop lace dyeing marathon (poor Rob thought he was living in a factory LOL!). I think I hand painted at least 600-700 pieces and have to say I enjoyed every piece.

A peek at a CQ kitty that I am making using mostly dyed laces. ... in honor of my Brat who I miss so much.

So... if you are someone who doesn't like color... you might as well stop right where you are. Here are just a few pictures of some of the laces I have dyed and am now in the process of uploading into my Etsy shop. For those of you who have recently bought some of my laces - a big THANK YOU - I sincerely appreciate your support.

Surrounded by all this beautiful color you might now understand why I'm so looking for spring to come... I see my gardens blooming and the sky and ocean showing off their summertime blues.

I promised to have a Blog Giveaway when I hit my 300th Sale and I have definitely surpassed it so stay tuned... I'll be putting together a pretty Give Away in the very near future.

Double the CQ Fun! Pat Winter's and Kathy Shaw!

After a long winter, and more snowy days to come I'm sure, us Crazy Quilters have something too look forward to that will help fill our CQ addiction. I'm sooo excited! A new CQ Magazine and a new Crazy Quilt book out at the same time!


For years I have dreamed that someday, someone would come out with a Crazy Quilt magazine that featured all things beautiful. Well, it has happened! Head on over to Pat Winter's blog to order the first edition of her new Crazy Quilt magazine, Crazy Quilt Gatherings. Filled with so much eye candy you won't need any Valentine candy to feed you sweet cravings. You will love all the fabulous Artists who are featured and the beautiful projects they create. Congratulations to each one of them.




I haven't posted much about my Etsy shop, RavioLee Dreams, as I tend to have a problem putting myself out there when it comes to marketing. I am now proud to say my first bit of advertising now appears in Pat's magazine on page 14. I am closing in on 300 Sales so be sure to check back now and then as I will be having a celebration with a Big Blog Give Away.

Kathy Shaw has just announce the release of her new book Embellishing Crazy Quilts which you can order directly from her blog. Full of CQ stitches and motifs to embellish, you are sure to have tons of fun letting your creativity flow.

My Pretty Brat Button & A surprise CQ

Don't you just love surprises? I do and boy was I certainly surprised by an unexpected package I just received in the mail. I received a little white package postmarked from Washington - Hmmm??? Who could be sending me something from there? It was a tiny little package, barely weighing anything so I wasn't even sure there was something in it. OMG! Look what my friend Gerry made for me!

It's a cute little hand painted button of my darlin' Brat. You MUST check out Gerry's beautiful work - everything she touches turns to gold. You can see some of her other gorgeous button creations in her Etsy shop Olderrose .


Needless to say my heart skipped a beat and the tears started to flow - I miss her so much. She's been gone 4 months yesterday and I still cry when I think of her. Thank you Gerry, I love it!

Of course Brat had some company. Gerry also created these buttons for a few of my other CQ friends ... the top picture is of Pat's cutie pie Angell and the middle picture is of Cathy's adorable Boomer.

I've been busy working on finishing up some of my CQ projects. One in particular was just mailed today. Since I wanted mine to be a surprise with it's arrival, I am only going to post a few sneak peeks of the block and not the whole block.


A few months ago my friend Alice and I decided that we would like to do a One on One block swap. We both created a naked block and sent it to each other with the idea that there was no time frame. Alice told be she was of Dutch heritage and wanted hers to reflect a Dutch theme. Hopefully I've done her block justice.

The doily was made by my Greek grandmother many years ago. I found a cute little Dutch girl and used some Transfer Eze to stitch her to the middle of the doily. If you've never used Transfer Eze before - it is the best for transferring any design you want to fabric.

I want to give a shout out to a couple of CA chicks who work with my son Jason - I understand you two have been reading my blog instead of working LOL! Thank you Judy and Doreen for following along with me. Next time I'm in CA we'll have to set up a date to meet so you can learn how to Crazy Quilt! Can you do me a favor? Please go give Jason a hug for me and tell him his mommy loves and misses him.