Birthday Week!

At least that's what I keep telling Baby Girl - it's birthday week & everyone is ready/excited/dying to meet you so don't be late! Her due date is this coming Saturday, Oct. 8. Which also happens to be my sister's birthday. And as you can imagine, all she wants is a healthy new niece to share it with. However, I'm beginning to think she's going to be late. Hopefully Lindsay will like the necklace and bag I gave her instead.

So in honor of birthday week, and to help encourage her along her journey, I've decided to share pictures of the nursery! Since it's so cute - and I tell her this all the time - I thought you'd like to see them too!

This is a wall hanging my mom made. I picked out the pattern & fabric and totally love this!

This mobile is from a woman who sells them at the Portland Saturday Market. She also has an Etsy site (which for the life of me, I can't find right now.) I have to admit, it's one of my favorite things in this room!

A bookshelf that my dad made for the baby's room. As you can see, this was a family affair!

A trip to Fabric Crush

I've been wanting to get back into the sewing mode and just as luck would have it, I stumbled across a lovely new quilting blog Tallgrass Prairie Studio. Well, it's not new, but new to me. And the luck continued because as it turned out Jacquie was in town to visit a friend and do a little talk at Fabric Crush. The store had recently moved from Magnolia to the Wallingford Center and I had been wanting to check it out. It was as if the Sewing Gods were putting this out there in the universe for me. 

So of course, I had to appease them. And I went. And I loved it. Both the store and Jacquie and her fabulously beautiful, yet simple modern style quilts. Take a look.

Jacquie and her quilts. If I was a better blogger, I'd have the names of these patterns she designed, but alas, I am not. They sure are pretty though!

I especially loved this salavage quilt. These are the salvage edges of fabrics she's used over the years. Isn't this a great creative way to use all of the fabric?

Ohhh...ahh...it was like a fireworks show for the quilting fans in the room as we got to look up close and touch all the pretty fabrics. So fun and inspirational!

2009: Projects in Pictures

Here's a few of the projects I worked on in 2009. From baby hats to jam to baby dresses, quilts, sweaters and a few little projects for me (hat, started a sweater and made myself socks). Oh, and I learned how to make creme brule. A pretty productive year if I do say so!

Quilt #2: Done

It's finally finished! My second quilt! I have to say, I'm pretty proud of this one! I designed it myself. I really enjoy that aspect of sewing. The quilting, well, I'm still working on that whole "sew in a straight line" thing. I guess it'll come in time.

This quilt is for a dear friend who's going to have her first baby in early July. She's having a boy and as of yet, baby boy doesn't have a name.

(I picked out this cute yellow flannel farm animal print for the back! It's so cute!)

I can't wait to meet him and seeing laying, playing and sleeping on this blanket! It was made with lots of love!

Secret to a straight line?

Is there one? Because I've tried a few things and they don't seem to working out so well.

- Walking foot - done

- Marked out the line - done

- Sewn slower - done

These things all helped a bit but my lines, shall we say, wandered a bit. Still, I know the mama-to-be will love this quilt. She possesses the same kind of attitude I do about crafting: Life isn't perfect, we're not perfect, so why stress out when our crafting isn't perfect.

Besides, the Baby Boy who will get this quilt will love it so much he'll enevitably throw up on it. And I'm just fine with that.

Adventures in Lace Knitting: Part Three - The Distractions

While the STB shawl project is still in time out, I've found a few nicer things to occupy my time this spring weekend.

First, I started knitting the Amelie Dress from Natural Knits for Moms and Babies. I've been eyeing this pattern for a while now. And the perfect opportunity came up when my dear friend announced her new baby is a girl. Act surprised when you get this Jen!

My other distraction is this baby quilt for another friend (seriously...I think there's something in the water...). I'm especially excited about this quilt, because I designed it. I have to say, the thing I'm loving most about sewing is the designing process. It's no secret that following directions isn't my best feature, but I do love getting an idea, sketching it out in my book, then getting to work.

Santa wasn't the only one with goodies

Auntie Meg also came to town with gifts for the good little boys and girls!


(This picture was totally stolen from Shannon's blog! Thanks for the picture, I love it!)

Kellan finally got his birthday quilt (with a little finishing help from my mom - thanks mom!)

And I finally got to meet Jossy and give her her sweater which her mom promptly put on Jossy - despite the fact that it's a bit big for now. But since she's growing like a weed, she'll be wearing it in no time!

Project Update: Kellan's Quilt

After a day of trimming, pressing, sewing, a lot of ripping out, some minor swearing (surprising I know) and one broken sewing machine needle, the binding on Kellan's quilt is finally on. I see the light at the end of this long, fabric tunnel. And I'm happy to see it.
When the hubby came in and saw me working on the quilt, this is the conversation that we had:

Hubby: "Wow, what is that."

Me: "It's Kellan's quilt."

Hubby: "Isn't he like in junior high?"

Me: "Close, he's two and half."

Almost out of blankey time. I better get sewing.

Cute Baby Quilt Causes Guilt

I haven't worked on my friends baby quilt in a really long, long time. I used to think it was adorable and it made me happy to look at it. Now, it makes me feel guilty. Really, really guilty. The kid is going to be heading off to junior high before I get him his quilt at the rate I'm going. So this weekend, I took matters into my own hands. I set up my sewing machine (again) and got to work. Some serious headway was made and it's looking pretty cute once again if I do say so!

My first quilt

This is my first quilt. I'm making it for my friend's little boy. I'm not following a pattern, just making it up as I go along, which I'm really enjoying. I'm afraid that the actual quilting part may not be as much fun, but I'm excited to give it a try!

I'm using the Funky Monkey squares from Moda. And I've picked out this fun spaceship flannel fabric for the backing! It reminds me of the old Campbell kids ads.

This time the gauge will be juuusst right

A little over a year ago I started the Toe Jazz socks from Fiber Trends. I was using a size 0 needle and between the insy-bitsy needle and all the cables and ribbing, it was so damn tight. So I threw it into the craft closet to think about what it had done for a while. After finishing Matt's socks the other day, I decided it was time to pull them out and take another stab at them. So I ripped 'em out and started over on size two's. Those were way to loose. Ripped 'em out again. Last night I recast on with size ones. So far, so good. But it might be too early to tell. I'll have to keep pluggin' along and see where the yarn takes me.

I have no photos to accompany this as I'm blogging from Boise for an unexpected trip back home. However, I am getting lots of creative juices flowing as I'm checking out all the new fun quilting stuff my mother is working on. She's currently taken over the dinning room (much to my father's dismay) as yet the third room in the house with quilt projects. Stay tuned for pictures later.