Playing catch-up

This is a quilt that my MIL requested for Christmas. She brought a fabric sample with colors to match and said that she wanted it as a wall hanging. Batiks I thought would be perfect for her. It is very different from the fabrics and patterns that I normally choose, but I really enjoyed making it. She says that she loves it and it is now hanging in the guest room. It is from this pattern Quilts by Berkshire. I adjusted the size so it is wall hanging size.

As I'm in catch up mode, I thought I'd throw in a few more things from earlier in the year. My daughter was having a pirate party at school. I thought, "Great!" We already have a pirate costume that I made for another party! " Then she informed me that she wanted to be a parrot for the party. Oh. So I came up with this costume after a quick trip to the fabric store to buy a bit of every color felt they had, cut some quick wing shapes and attached them to and old red turtle neck shirt. They had some feathery red cord that I hot glued to a headband. I wanted to attach a beak to the headband as well, but she vetoed the idea. She loved the finished costume though!

My daughter had a friend to play on a rainy day so I came up with a quick craft. I bought small canvases at the craft store and the girls decorated them with paint, fabric scraps, and sequins. EVERY craft in our house seems to need sequins.

Over Christmas the girls were at grandma's house and said they needed glitter for a project they were working on. They were shocked when she said she did not have any and that day was considered a challenging one as they had to craft with no sparkles! Oh, the hardship!

Anyway, the canvases are perfect to hang in our playroom - I was really pleased at how nice they looked when they were finished.

For a special baby girl

I made this blanket for my friend's new baby girl. My youngest has a special blankie with satin binding like this one and it has been loved to bits. I hope this one is loved too! It was my first time sewing with minkee or with satin binding and I was nervous about having the sewing on the binding look nice. I think it turned out great. I pinned like crazy and machine sewed the binding edges, the hand stitched the corners on place.

After a VERY long time...

I know I haven't posted in a very long time. We've moved to Versailles, outside of Paris. I always feel like I lose several months of my life during a move and this one is no exception. I've now got the kids settled into school and most of our boxes unpacked. I made these pillows based on the idea from Sew Katie Did. She does beautiful work and I was inspired to create my own version. It was also a good excuse to cut into my Joel Dewberry fabric.

My next task is to find some fabric store in the Paris area. I have a wonderful friend who is sending me some fabric to finish a couple more pillow covers to go with these, but eventually I'll have to find a source here. Any suggestions?

spring green finally finished!

I've finally finished my Spring Green quilt! I was stalled by three family birthdays and two sets of visitors, but was finally able to finish. I've been waiting for good weather to go outside for photos, but it has been hard to come by lately so I gave up. The colors look much duller in the photos than in real life.

I especially like the way the back turned out on this one. I learned that making wonky-ish squares is harder than it looks! I seem to naturally veer away from wonkyness.

Can't wait to curl up under it tonight!

oh the possibilities...

I won, I won! The quilt shop in Aberdeen, Seattle Quilt Company, had a raffle at their recent sale and I won this stack of 19 Belle Fleur fat quarters. My daughters are already planning the quilt they'd like me to make with it. I love the springy bright colors and patterns.

My 5 year old daughter just completed this pillow as her first ever sewing project! She did a great job hand stitching it and was up working on it at 6:15 this morning. I love that she is enjoying sewing! I can't wait until she is old enough to start on machine sewing too!

business card holder and twirly skirt

Here is a twirly skirt I finished for my oldest daughter from this super tutorial from house on hill road.

I also made this business card holder for my mom (I love how the head peeks out the top). Here photos are beautiful. Check out her website here. Not sure why these photos are upside down. Hmmm...I need some tech support! I didn't use a pattern--I was just playing around. I'd make a few changes if I made another one.

zig zag

I just finished my zig zag quilt. This one was a lot of fun to do. I really like how the quilting on the white turned out, but I found I missed doing stippling!

Here is the back--I used left over squares from the front for the pieced strip.

zig zag wip

I'm working on this quilt with the same fabrics as by Baby Blues (and Greens) quilt. I learned how to make the zig zags from this post. (Check out The Purl Bee for lots of great ideas!), but decided to use a bit less of the white between the zig zags and make the whole quilt bigger. The finished quilt will measure about 40 x 48".

Baby Blues (and Greens!)

Here is a baby quilt I just finished for a friend. This quilt was fun to make and went together really quickly. It is quilted with and all over stippling pattern.