Gavin's Quilt

Every baby should have a quilt.  If your baby doesn't have one, I highly recommend getting one.  My grandma's tradition was that all babies got one.  The baby quilt she made me was yellow and blue floral prints in the shape of butterflies.  It's bound and backed in a cute blue heart print.  It's so special to me, and now when Gavin spends the night at my parents' house, he sleeps with it.  The blue and yellow make it manly.  All that to say, I made my first quilt for my boy Gavin.  I bought a book and fabric at Hobby Lobby.  Then I came home and channeled my Grandma Dalene and made this little baby:

I'm in love with this collection of fabrics from Hobby Lobby.  I think it's their Brothers and Sisters line. The teal fabric and the sheep fabric were both additions from my grandma's collection.  I think it's always fun to have one fabric that doesn't quite fit.  Somehow it always makes the quilt look co-ordinated, and keeps it from looking too "matchy".  

It used to be on the wall above his bed, because I was worried that he would get baby stuff on it.  But I caved.

Now it fits perfectly on his crib.  The first thing he does when he's in his crib is pull it off the side.  He's rolled all over it, and I no longer care if anything gets on it.  It's beautiful, but it's his to use.

It matches his crib skirt perfectly!

Now my boy plays on that quilt.  It makes me so happy : )

Capturing even this was tricky.  He's a moving target.

Hello, Gorgeous

What is this new thing of wonder?  Why, it's my new sewing machine.  By new, I mean that I got it for Christmas from my in-laws, but have yet to post anything about it.  But all that has changed.  It quilts without those tiny little annoying snags!  It adjusts tension!  I can chose the needle down feature!  All of these things are things the other machine didn't do.  Plus, I read the entire manual from cover to cover, so now I know what everything does and how to use it.  Did I mention that it came with a zipper foot and a walking foot?  Oh the joys of this machine.  The only down side is you have to choose which speed you want on a dial for slow, med, and fast.  But the nice thing is that if you accidentally push the pedal too hard which I always never do, then you don't have any accidents.  I have already used it to alter our high school's tin man costume.  This brings me to my next point.  


Person who made the costume in the first place:

WHY ON GOD'S GREAN EARTH DID YOU USE SILVER TISSUE LAME'?  DO YOU HATE ME?  IT'S EXACTLY LIKE SEWING TWO TISSUES TOGETHER!  ONE SNEEZE AND THE COSTUME IS IN PIECES!

I'm sorry to type in that tone of voice, but I really do feel better now.  Phew!  But seriously...never again with the tissue lame'.  I hate that junk.  NEVER!

Pintrest To Do List

Gotta love Pintrest.  Here is my Pintrest to-do list.  Hopefully it will soon be a done list!

 

Chevron Quilt

I love this quilt.  Chevrons are so popular right now, and this tutorial makes it seem pretty easy.  Love to do this for the boy!

Baseball Quilt

I'm thinking that this would be really cute for Gavin's first birthday party...But it needs to be backed in a Cubs fabric.  

Baby Shadow Box

 I have baby boy's going home from the hospital all clean and ready to put in here.  It was a very cute outfit...which he HATED. 

Adorable and unique baby pants

I've made these rugs before.  My grandma used to make them all the time for us.  Now those rugs have all seen better days.  It's been a pseudo goal for me to try and replace some of them.  I can't replace the memories with them, but I can carry on the tradition.

But I CANNOT do anything until school is over.  Right now my plate is full.  Maybe I'll get some stuff on Etsy as well, who knows?

To be continued...

I've been featured!

I am honored to say that I have been featured on a blog of a dear ONU friend of mine, Valerie.  Here we are together...it's an oldie:

me, Valerie, and Emily

Now this was before we all got married and started having babies and stuff...you know, the good old days our college days before we were "grown ups".  Or as the Gilmore Girls say, "A-dults".  Any-who.  She has issued a challenge that struck home for me.  One Sassy Housewife's Pintrest Challenge.  Who doesn't spend HOURS and HOURS clipping things on Pintrest?  Valerie is challenging us to actually (gasp) DO the projects and TRY the recipes we've clipped!  So I had to show her one that I did.  Here is a little teaser about it:

 

To see my project featured click here!  I hope you do!

Love this.

I DESPERATELY want to make this!  Love it!  I want to make one for every season, maybe even a longer one to use on a dresser or kitchen buffet.  Stay tuned for me to make one million.

Table Runner Tutorial-Diary of a Quilter

Umm...Fail

So I was in the mood to make something small, useful, and cute.  Whenever I'm at Target (love), I always want to buy curling or straightening iron covers.  Let's face it, I'm not a neat organized person, much as I wish I were.  So when I found this pattern, I thought it was perfect!
Rubies and Pearls Flat Iron Cozy

So I grabbed my adorable purple material....

 

Love Hobby Lobby

 And I got to work.  Apparently you should follow the instructions and not make it using leftover yellow felt (I seriously have YARDS of it left after a HS Bowser costume project...ugh) as the batting instead of , well, batting.  My sewing machine and I had a fight.  I brought out the walking foot.  It gurlged at me.  I sewed by twisting the wheel on the side.  The case ended up looking a little strange....

Why does this look wrong?

 I mean, it does fit the curling iron, but I can't help feeling that it looks strange.  Not to self, don't substitute felt for batting again!!

THE Singer

Where did I get the name for this blog?
1.  I love pink sparkly things.
2.  My original pick was taken by some other selfish blogger.
3.  I am a singer (thanks ONU!), and choir teacher by trade.
4.  My sewing machine is a Singer.  I've had it since I was in middle school.  I have used it more in the last month than I have since I've owned it.

Ain't she pretty?