I-Spy Quilts

Over a year ago, I decided I wanted to make an I-Spy quilt for Cullen. Earlier this year, I participated in a swap for I-Spy quilt squares, which left me with 200 different squares! How awesome!
As I started sketching out ways to arrange them (with sashing or without? 9 patches based on background color?), I realized that I had enough to make TWO! So I began separating the definite boy squares and girl squares, then divided the gender neutral ones. Borders and appliqued names later, here are the finished quilt tops:
I have Aubree's quilted, straight lines on either side of the seams of the squares, but I still need to do the borders. I hope to get Cullen's basted and started on the quilting tonight. I somehow lost the FMQ foot for my machine, so I need to order another one, since I planned on doing FMQ on the borders. Unless any of you have other suggestions? I thought about just doing diagonal lines evenly spaced, but I don't really want to quilt THROUGH the names :-/

Still Alive!

I am definitely still here, and I am going to try to get back into blogging on a regular basis. I got extremely overwhelmed this summer and fall with school, the kids, work, and trying to keep up with the swaps I had signed up for before everything hit the fan! I also want to completely redo the look of the blog, but with my lack of know-how, time, and talent, it may be awhile.

I am still sewing and quilting, of course, with some great stuff to show coming soon, including I-Spy quilts for each of my kiddos.

And I can't believe how big they are getting! I came to the realization the other day that I no longer have babies anymore. Cullen is now 3, talking up a storm, counting to sixty by himself, and to ten in Chinese and Spanish, as well as many other words in Spanish. Aubree is walking, learning her body parts, and starting to talk. I want them to stay this size forever!

Stay tuned, though, I will have more coming!

Some swap updates :)

First, as I stated the other day, May was my month for the Let's Bee Together Bee... I was a little late getting my fabric out, so the blocks are still coming in. I am THRILLED at what I have received so far!

These are from (top L-R then bottom L-R) Charlene, Linda, Toni, Jadie, Erin, and Debra. Aren't they fantastic together?

I guess that means I need to decide what I am going to do for "my" block. I have already decided I will probably sash the blocks in a dark brown, and add a piano keys border with all the scraps I have gotten back. How does that sound?



Also, I have still been participating in the Inchy Hexagon Flower swap. These are the hexies I have received so far. I apologize that I don't have a list, some people didn't sign them and I didn't keep the envelopes (which I wish I had noticed they weren't signed so I could have written on the back of them :/ ) I still haven't decided what I want to do with them, but I think maybe a few throw pillows would be nice when I finally get my own place again!!


I do have some more stuff to share, but I will save some for Thursday! In the meantime, it has been awhile so I will share these two of the (not) babies!Aubree is now 9 months old, and walking short distances. She says "mama" "dada" and "cullen" (no, really, if she can't see or hear him, she stands up, looks around, and says "cuh-en! cuh! cuh-en!") She is such a happy and cuddly baby--way different than the colicky baby she was for the first two months!
And my handsome little man, Cullen, is now almost 3! He amazes me everyday with how much he learns. Oh what I wouldn't give to be 2 again, and amazed at everything I see! Everytime we go outside, he says "Look mom! A tree!" and when we get to my car he says "Jorie's car!" (Yes, we still haven't gotten over him using my first name). He can almost count to 20 (he does it perfect with help... on his own he gets to 13, and then says 12..13...12...13...12...13... TWENTY!!! hahaha), knows all his upper and lower case letters, and is learning how to write them and what sounds they make. Thanks to "Super Why", one of the only tv shows he gets to watch, he also can read/recognize quite a few short words. I am sure all moms do this, especially at this age, but I ask myself every day how I got so lucky to have such great babies. Cullen is (usually) such a great big brother, and while he is super rambunctious and likes to play fight, if he gets rough, he will stop and say "booboo!" and give me a kiss, a hug, and ask if its all better hahah! He barely sits still, and when he does, I usually get pictures like this:

Hehe! Hope everyone has a great week! I must get off and finish my homework, tomorrow is my long day (school AND work), so from 1130am when I leave to drop the kids off, until 3am Thurs morn I am out and about :( Boo!!

♥ Jorie

Make a List Monday--On Tuesday

Surprise, Surprise, I know...
Yesterday I took a MUCH needed and well deserved "Girly Day" to pamper myself! A good friend of mine recently moved back to town (we went to high school together years ago in Missouri, and now both live here in Texas), and she is a licensed cosmetician--and great at it too! She really has a knack for style of any type. She offered to give me a makeover, and here's what happened.

Before:
Hair is long, but unhealthy (from bleaching the black and red I decided to put in it last year) and unevenly colored, as only the fresh, healthy hair at the top holds dye.

After:
About three inches off the bottom (should have taken off a bit more, but I was hesitant to lose too much overall length!), evened out the brown (a few shades lighter than my natural color), and added bright red lowlights. She even decided to curl it and do my makeup. I love it!

Amazing what a little change could do for a girl's self-esteem!

Then today, we got our family Christmas pictures taken! I won't post them all, but you can see them on Flickr if interested!

I made the mistake of scheduling the appointment for right after Shaine's workday ended. I thought it would be convenient to just go straight from work to the studio, but I didn't think about that it would run into dinnertime and Cullen would get fussy :( And of course, it was the one time I forgot to pack a snack while out and about.

So now that you know why my list is late, here is last week's:

1. Make progress on the quilt I was commissioned to make. 4/8 blocks done! I forgot to take a picture though, so I will share later this week!

2. Make my flower for Hanne in the Inchy Flower Swap Done! I need to get it in the mail ASAP though!

3. Finish the gifts for my sister Not done yet :(

4. Make some more self-binding receiving blankets/burp cloths Also haven't gotten to it!

5. Wrap up my package to my PTS4 partner and send it off (with lots of goodies!!) Done today! I know it wasn't done by Monday, but it was done before the list was updated, so I consider it a victory!

And so for this week:

1. Send off Hanne's flower!

2. {TRY TO} Finish my sister's gifts

3. Finish at least 2 more blocks for the quilt

4. Make Block 4 of the LCQA (I might attempt that one tonight)

And I think that's it for pressing stuff. I should be able to get it all done, as I have some extra days off this week! I hope everyone is making good progress on their Christmas projects! I have definitely learned why people start worrying about them in the Summer! Lesson learned!

2010 in Status

So, on Facebook there is an application that makes a collage out of your status updates from the last year. I remember for 2009 it was pictures, which I thought I still had but apparently don't. Here is my status collage:

I find it amusing that the majority of them are about food, being tired, or me being a smart aleck! It reminded me of some great stuff that happened throughout the year, like when I got Cullen to flush the toilet while Shaine was in the shower (it makes the water really hot, and no it isn't mean, he deserved it for dumping ICE WATER on me the day before!), funny things Shaine said ("When is cinco de Mayo?" or when asked what his middle initial is he said "M as in Mary" instead of "Micheal" or "Mark" or any GUY name ;) ), or when Shaine won the state NCO of the year competition! It has been a good year, and I am ready for the next one.

And in other good news, I think Cullen is finally potty trained, during the day anyway. Hopefully in the next week or so we will be sans diapers for him all the way! Woohoo!

How has 2010 been for you? Hopefully good. Favorite memories? I am thinking that maybe I will gather up some of the neat partial-FQs I have and get a scrap bundle going for an I-Spy Giveaway at the end of the year! It would be my first giveaway, so what do you think?

Make a List Monday #2

Wow, this past week has flown by! So much so that I haven't even been on to post since last Monday (although breaking my computer mouse had a little to do with that. I hate the touchpad of my laptop!)

Well, lets see where this last week has gotten me:

1. Stitch up some quick cake stand covers for my sister Still not done *sigh* I think this one irks me the most because I know it will be quick and easy, and I already have all the fabric, I just have to start. Have you ever postponed a project because it was TOO simple?

2. Finish the owl pillow she asked me to make for her (all that is left is to stitch up the opening from stuffing it) Also not done. Since they are being sent with the cake stand covers, though, I am not too worried about it yet.

3. Finish spraypainting Cullen's costume (I thought I had enough blue spray paint on hand, but fell just a bit short, so I have to get a new one) DONE! His little lego costume was so easy and fast--- and nearly free! He got compliments on it all day and evening.

4. Complete making Shaine's costume... I can't wait to share this one! Also DONE! This one won us some money. He's a kidnapped mermaid!

5. Sketch up an idea for a new baby quilt for a good friend, and for my brown bag quilt Not done, but I did take this picture of a walkway while leaving Sea World last night:Seems like a cute idea for some quilt blocks! (Or at least I think so anyway!)

So 2 out of 5 done. Not very good for my first "Make a List Monday" :( However, the entire month of October has been nonstop busy! All the birthdays, visiting family, helping a friend move last minute, Halloween, and the festivities that go along with all of the above has been tons of fun, but I'm ready for life to settle back down a bit! Yesterday all the couples got together and had a cookout for lunch, took the kiddos to Sea World for their Halloween bash, then came home for some trick or treating before bed.

Hopefully I will be able to get some more done this week, but I have to start looking for part time work! I am looking forward to getting out of the house a bit, meeting new people, and bringing home a little bit of money for myself. :)

This week's list:
1. Stitch up some quick cake stand covers for my sister
2. Finish the owl pillow she asked me to make for her (all that is left is to stitch up the opening from stuffing it)
3. Sketch up an idea for a new baby quilt for a good friend, and for my brown bag quilt
4. Make a bag with one of the patterns I have and have not tried yet
5. RELAX!

Looks much easier this week! What's on your to do list?

Fall fun!

You know you have quilting on your mind when normal things remind you of something you want to try. Although I have been walking into this kitchen more times a day than I can count for almost a year, I never really noticed the tile...

Snowball blocks!
Also, Cullen has these super neat alphabet flashcards, and he likes to bring them to me so I can tell him what letter it is. This one made me giggle:

I shouldn't be surprised. After all, I can't think of THAT many words that begin with the letter Q and could be used in a flashcard like this. Either way, it made me smile!

It has been a busy weekend, but I am hoping to escape for a few hours tonight to get some sewing done. Shouldn't be a problem, since I took the kids out of the house to let Shaine have some uninterrupted guy time on our big screen for the football game. I did do two new applique shirts this weekend for our family trip to the pumpkin patch. I am horrible at remembering to take pictures BEFORE I put them on my kids, but you can sort of see them in this horrible iPhone picture.


Also, here are a few more pictures from the pumpkin patch

Hope everyone else is enjoying this season as much as we are!

Cullen's Birthday!

I have some new things I have been working on, but have had no time to finish any, so unfortunately I have no crafty pictures to share right now!

What has kept me so busy? Well, my sister came to visit all last week, and Cullen's second birthday was on Friday. All week was spent going to the zoo, and getting stuff ready for his big party we had on Saturday. The party was a huge success, and he had a blast! I used raw edge applique to make him a cool birthday shirt: It had a 2 on the front and his name on the back!

My sister made him a cool Halloween themed "cupcake cake":

And he had lots of fun with all of his buddies:

Poor guy still got a bit of sunburn, even with SPF 50 slathered on! (And Nevaeh is wearing the pillowcase dress I made for her a few months ago!)

I still can't believe my little man is two! Shaine and I were looking at pictures from his first birthday, and just marveled at how much he has grown, and learned, since then.
He knows all of his shapes, colors, most of the animals and the sounds they make, and we are working on numbers and letters. He says "please" and "thankyou", gives his baby sister hugs and kisses all the time, and helps mommy every chance he gets. He is easily the best little boy I could have asked for. While I can't wait to see him grow and learn more, this is such a fun age that I just want him to stay where he's at for awhile longer!

Hopefully, now that things are settling down and returning to normal, I will be able to get some things done. I have a few WIPs, and lots of pretty new fabric I haven't even played with yet!

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 ;)

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 :)

Trick or Treat Bag! (and in just one naptime!)

So I finally got around to making the trick or treat bag I said I was going to! Here it is all finished:
(I know I still gotta work on finding some beautiful background spot for showcasing my finished projects!)

There are TWO great things about this bag.... 1- I made it with the Halloween Night fabric I won in a giveaway at 44th Street Fabric and some leftover black linen I had from the laptop bag I made my sister (which means I didn't SPEND anything!)... and 2- I finished it all except the top stitching around the top during one naptime!

I am going to make two more, each using a different print of the Halloween Night fabric, one for each of Cullen's little friends, since we are planning on taking them all trick or treating together.
Cullen likes it (sorry the picture is so dark! Probably better that way, since as you can see the room is still "under construction" and getting ready for the new baby, so its a bit of a mess!) It's the perfect size for him to be able to carry around, especially since there's still another three months to go :)

Here is an in progress picture that I took, you can sort of see the angled wavy lines I did for the quilting. I used flannel in place of batting, simply because the only batting I had on hand was super puffy extra loft, and I like how flannel still allows the bags I make to be "quilted" and flexible, without being TOO flimsy (like the first pieced bag I did, with only super light interfacing).The "C" is raw edge applique, and was supposed to be "drippy" (think the old titles of the Goosebumps books), but I am not 100% pleased with how it turned out, but after fusing it on, and stitching it, I decided to stick with it. Anyway, as always, the first one is a "test run", and I made a few mistakes while "flattening" the bottom, but it still works, and only other "crafters" would ever notice. I know what I did wrong, though, so the next two will be perfect. I am really pleased all my measurements worked out, since I sketched it all up this morning on the sketch pad I FINALLY bought myself. I also sketched out the layout and measurements for the I Spy quilt I want to make. Who knew it would be so hard finding diverse scraps worthy of an I Spy Quilt??

I'm still around!

It's been awhile since I posted! Things have been hectic lately: out of town visitors, doctor's appointments, playdates, and now Shaine is getting his wisdom teeth pulled today! Poor baby... I know he is not going to take it well. I tell him it's a good thing he only gets sick once or twice a year, because the moment he experiences the slightest pain, sickness, or discomfort he turns into a big baby!

I have managed to get a few things done in the last 11 days:

A purse for my stepmother. This one is SO much better than my last one! I also used a thicker interfacing so it's still a "fabric" purse, but alot less flimsy! I even tried my hand with a zipper for the first time, and I made this:












Then, I decided to finally try something I had been eyeing over at Moda Bake shop, and I made these using this tutorial:The first picture is brighter because we finally got a new digital camera, so I don't have to take all the pictures with my phone! Anyway, Aubree's was the first time I tried free motion quilting, and I did just wavy lines. Aniya's I tried a wandering "pattern". I didn't draw it out first either time, and I'm sure some of you more experienced quilters can tell, but I still absolutely love both, and am really proud of them for a "first try". I can't wait to keep making stuff to get better at it! I still have to work on seam allowances, apparently, because it ended up being a bit smaller than it was supposed to be :/ I am hoping to have them finished up in the next week or so, but I have lots of other stuff going on.

I also won another giveaway at 44th Street Fabric! Great Halloween Night fabric (and Bev is doing another AMAZING giveaway right now, too!):

I think I may just have to make some cute "trick or treat" tote bags for Cullen and his friends, since this year he will be able to get into it alot more! He was a zebra for Halloween last year, but we didn't go trick or treating, he just helped pass out candy to the kids that came by... At 12 months old, he didn't need the candy, and neither did mommie!

Pillowcase dresses

I have been scouring various patterns and tutorials for weeks of little girl clothes and dresses, trying to find something rather easy and simple to get myself started. Here is the first one I did:
And it was so fast to put together that I was hooked! I then used this tutorial from The Polka Dot Chair (tons of amazing tutorials for all kinds of things on her blog!) and made a few small changes and came up with this:
It was a bit harder than the first one, but I absolutely LOVE how it turned out! I loved the middle fabric SO much, that I went on and made another simple one out of it:This one I am going to hang onto for my little girl. Of course it will be awhile before she can fit into it (It is probably about a 24m-2T in size, although with the ribbon for straps it could last longer. I used a 24m tank top of Cullen's to kind of get a size idea.) I used double fold bias tape (store bought... I just didn't feel like making it!) for the arm holes and the bottom trim, and used an orange thread to do a decorative stitch on top of it, rather than the typical matching straight stitching. I absolutely love it!

I also finished compiling the fabrics for my sisters rag quilt, and cut out a TON of squares. Hopefully I will make a dent in some of the sandwiches I need to make today!

And today is day 2 without my little man! I am enjoying the peace and quiet, but its so weird. I have never spent more than a night away from him at one time. He is having a blast though! Went to see fireworks last night, played on a trampoline, and just been hanging out with TONS of family :) I will end the post with this great picture Shaine sent me yesterday :)