Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Binding trick!

Now, I am sure I am not the first to think of this and do it, I have seen pictures of people using the leg of their extension table to do essentially the same thing... However, my extension table doesn't have a leg on the front right side, and I never thought of another way to do it. When dealing with a larger quilt, my binding tends to sort of pile up and as a result the nice fold I ironed into it gets messed up and its hard to keep it straight and even while sewing. So, while ironing the binding I prepared for this quilt, a light bulb went off! I had an empty spool that I saved for some reason... I grabbed it and started wrapping it and secured it with a pin as I continued to iron, and roll... iron, and roll.

Then, when I started sewing, I took the pin out, and slowly started to unroll it. Maybe the heat from the iron helped it, but it stayed nice and pressed, and was much easier to handle!

Plus, I even knocked it off the table a few times, and it barely unrolled at all. This will help immensely, because now I can prepare my binding when I prepare and press everything else, and keep it nice and rolled while I do the quilt top and quilting and it will still be pressed and ready when I need it!

Friday, September 24, 2010

New goodies and giveaways!

Yesterday the mailman left these in the box for me:

I ordered them from Green Fairy Quilts, on Monday NIGHT, and they were in my mailbox on Thursday! The shop has GREAT prices and even better sales (the layer cake, charm pack, and shipping was less than 25$!), and the fact that it got here so fast makes it even better! I am not sure what I will do with them yet, but I love the charm pack colors and flowers, and may use them in a baby quilt. The colors in the layer cake match the living room decor quite well, also!

We are also sort of last minute planning Cullen's upcoming 2nd birthday party. It is in two weeks, which may not be THAT last minute, but I feel like invitations should have been sent out two weeks ago! It won't be too fancy, pizza and cake here at the house, but we are renting an inflatable jump house (40$ a day through the MWR!) and we have lots of water balloons that we never used this summer, so it should be a fun day. I am even thinking of maybe finding a little pinata ;)

Here are two more Accuquilt Go! giveaways, also:

Jane's Fabrics and Quilts (ending Friday!)

Millie's Quilting (ending Saturday!)

OH how I would LOVE LOVE LOVE to get my hands on one :) I keep crossing my fingers that one day that lovely random generator site will favor ME ;)

Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Chaos!

It has been so long since I have been able to even SIT at my sewing machine, let alone actually ACCOMPLISH anything.... All I know is that it has been at least a week, and I can actually FEEL the difference :( I am not sure how other moms find the time! Of course, I am sure it gets easier as they get older and a bit more independent, but as it is they are both on completely different schedules, Cullen goes down for his nap and little miss Aubree decides thats a perfect time to be awake and trying out her lungs. And, of course, Shaine is able to do all his usual activities, and still find time to go out once or twice a week. It's hard not to get agitated! Even when he tries to be helpful, and offers to keep them occupied, it doesn't work because within 15 minutes, he is upstairs handing me the little one because she is hungry. *sigh* Oh, and my BM isn't regulated completely yet, so any time I miss a feeding it hurts. Ah well, I can't complain too much, I have already shed the baby weight and then some.

The irony of this, though is that Cullen JUST fell asleep, and Aubree is still sleeping in her swing. Hmmm time to go play with fabric until she wakes up!

And, since this post has been more of just a rant, I'll close it with some pictures that made me laugh this week:

Cullen trying on some snowboots!

And poor Aubree, this is how they fell asleep, her face in daddy's armpit after a day at work, and an evening cooking dinner on the grill!

Saturday, September 18, 2010

A little preoccupied...

It is so hard to believe that it has already been TWO WEEKS since our little Aubree arrived.

Cullen has adapted quite well, and asks to hold her alot. I have to take lots of little "Mommy and Cullen" breaks throughout the day or he gets a little rambunctious, but I like that he now wants to be held and cuddled again!

I haven't gotten a whole lot of sewing done (obviously!), but I have ALMOST finished a quilt top for a Christmas lap quilt I am making, and a little dress for a friend's daughter who will be two in two weeks. Pictures will come soon!

Meanwhile, I am participating in the Brown Bag Quilt Contest, and I finally settled on my fabric choices to send off, so Monday I will be heading to the post office to mail it off to Canada :) How exciting :)

Sunday, September 5, 2010

Welcome Aubree!

Well, Aubree Cadence is finally here, and although we have been home since yesterday afternoon I just haven't felt like being on the computer much. It was a rather quick and uneventful labor (in fact, I slept through most of it once they gave me some IV meds!) and she was born at 12:40pm on Friday.

Cullen didn't quite know what to think of her at first, resorting instead to being loud and rambunctious... He's still in a show-off mood most of the time, but he's very gentle and caring. If she fusses he goes over and says "Hey! Hey Baby! Shhh!" and pats her belly.

Although Shaine shrugged it off when I told him the other day she would have him wrapped around her finger, he is completely enamored with her.

She looks so much like Cullen did (only a bit chubbier) that all I can think of is how fast she is going to grow!

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

T-shirt Memory Quilt

This is the top I pieced together out of Shaine's old army t-shirts (and one of mine that snuck in there!), and some old uniforms that were torn:


When I first asked him for the shirts to make him a memory quilt, he said "What would we do with it?" And when I explained that it would be around the house and he could take it with him for training, and that it also serves as a show-off piece (the desert camouflage, for example, hasn't been issued for a long time, and shows that he deployed in the first waves, the jungle camouflage started getting phased out in 2005, and he has the digital ACUs as well), and then he really started getting into it! When I sketched it out as far as which squares would go where, he actually had input, and the uniforms were his idea and he chose where each one would go. I am going to applique a few of his more important patches onto it, and back it with some simple black flannel, and do some straight-line in the ditch quilting lines. Shouldn't take too long to finish! I love that he likes it so much!