Book Blog Tour Day 3

 It's day 3 of the book tour- I hope you are all having fun. Today's prize is a fabric and pattern kit for a table runner and set of 4 place mats for my Joy, Love, Peace, Noel fabric line. To enter, leave a comment on this post by midnight tonight (EDT). Good luck! Be sure to stop back tomorrow for a chance to win yet another prize.

I thought that today I would tell you a little about my inspiration for my book, Fruitful Hands.

The idea for this book started in my head about 4 years ago. I was thinking about a bunch of different projects that revolved around a fruit theme. I was also thinking about the Fruits of the Spirit as described in the Bible, in Galatians 5:22-23:
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.

I thought about the word longsuffering, in other words, patience; and by extension, perseverance. I thought about not expecting everything to come easily and with little effort. And I thought about the women who came before me, who were creative out of necessity. They couldn't just run to Wal-mart when Junior had outgrown his coat and winter was approaching. Maybe they'd have to sell some eggs to raise the funds, or maybe they'd have to patch something together from whatever they had around the house or cabin. I thought about pioneer women making do with whatever they could find. I thought about my own grandmother, making her own clothes, and my own mother, making dinner from whatever happened to be left in the refrigerator (and it was usually pretty good!) Generally, women in the past HAD to be creative to survive. Today, most of us can run to the store to pick up whatever we need. While our foremothers had to sew and quilt and cook out of necessity, we now get to do those things as enjoyable hobbies. We don't have to be creative to survive- but we can instead turn those creative urges into making things just for fun- what a blessing.

One of the projects in my book which is an homage to making do is actually called a make-do. The tag on mine says "patience" to remind me daily that I need to work on that attribute! In the book, you will also find patterns for other tags, such as love, joy, peace, kindness and faithfulness.

How about covering an old binder that you have lying around the house with some bits of fabric, and turning into a recipe binder for yourself, or as a perfect shower gift. In the book, I suggest collecting recipes from shower guests before the day of the party, and then assembling them into a keepsake recipe binder for the bride-to-be:

Do you like to do punchneedle? If so, maybe you would like to work on this Cheery Cherry Pillow:

And the recipe: Cherry Cheese Tart with Almond Oatmeal Crumble. Yum!

Today, stop by and say hi to Natalie of Cinderberry Stitches. Natalie lives in Australia and is mom to a beautiful little blond haired angel- I think we know where she gets some of her inspiration from! I "met" Natalie through blogging, and then got to meet her in person last fall in Houston at Quilt Market.

She has a new book out, also, called Cotton Floss. To see lots of images from Cotton Floss, click here.

Natalie's style is so cute- little fairy girls, owls, toadstools.... She does lots and lots of embroidery- she has such a unique and adorable style. I just want to make every single one of her projects!!

She also just started designing fabric, her first line will be called "Woodland" for Lecien, so be on the lookout for that!

Again, to get to Natalie's blog for the book tour, click here. 

There will be a giveaway on Natalie's blog to win a copy of my book!

Make sure you stop by these fun blogs this week....
Monday: Brenda Riddle of Acorn Quilt and Gift Company
              Jill Finley of Jillily Studio
Tuesday: Pat Sloan of, well, everything!
Wednesday: Natalie Lymer of Cinderberry Stitches
Thursday: Michele Foster of The Quilting Gallery
Friday: Sandi Andersen of A Legacy of Stitches