weekend update

I was all set on Friday to start sewing up some jeans for my boy and count them in Jacquie's Spring to Finish UFO challenge. And my machine, pardon the french, kind of crapped out on me. I have 5 machines that sew in my house (OK one is an antique and doesn't actually sew, but it could if I took it in and got it tuned up) and I can't make a stinking pair of jeans. This led to me using my trusty pocket knife screwdriver, and undoing things, and removing globs of lint, and putting things back together, I thought the right way. (What a terrible sentence. Oh well.) Well, it wasn't the right way, so I undid it and found that I smashed a part. This was on my ca. 1980s machine, the heavy duty one. My newer machine is a lightweight and cannot topstitch on denim, no way.

Anyway this led to me going to the sewing machine store yesterday, and finding what I hope will be my new machine sometime in the next couple of months. Maybe for my birthday. It's the Janome 6260, and the saleswoman had it stitch through 9 layers of denim for me, which it did fearlessly. It's also a quilting machine and has lots of great features but mostly is a sturdy machine that can handle the dread denim.

I will still need to take in my old Viking and get it repaired. Ugh. It hasn't been in the shop for several years though (since we were in Oregon) so I guess that's ok.

Yesterday I worked on my blue/red scrap quilt some more and it has a layout planned and everything now. It's going to be similar to my lavender scrap quilt I made at the beginning of the year, only this one will have navy blue fabric and denim for the sashing. This week I'm planning on working on that some more, hopefully getting the top finished, making shorts for J, sewing up some more napkins, and something really fun--making L's first baby quilt. I'm going to use my Heather Ross Mendocino fabrics and hopefully add some hand dyes for a quick and cute strip quilt. We are going to do strip baby quilts for church sewing group starting in July so I will be getting yardage figured out for making a strip quilt in baby quilt size and lap size. I will also figure out how to use Moda honey buns to make a similar quilt. I'll post the yardage/instructions here when I get them figured out.

The Winner

Thanks everyone, for coming by and commenting on my drawing for Giveaway Day. I had a lot of fun browsing through the blogs and seeing all the cool stuff up for grabs. I hope I win something!

I did a random.org drawing (197 comments, wow, but too many to print out and draw out of a hat). And... you're going to have to take my word for it, the winner was #17. That is Barbara at WilliamGeorge! Congratulations, and send me your address soon so I can mail out the napkins!

May Giveaway Day

Hey there everyone--I made a set of 8 cloth napkins to give away this week, as part of the Sew, Mama, Sew May Giveaway Day. Make sure you visit their site to see lots and lots of other cool giveaways! I've been wanting to start using cloth napkins in my own home and decided to make some extras for the giveaway. Four of them are Katie Jump Rope prints and the rest are made from some vintage fabric my friend/neighbor got freecycling. These range from 10" square to 12" square (I'm trying to decide the size I like best).



If you'd like to win, all you have to do is comment here. Tell me your name, where you live, and a project you're working on these days. I'll have one of my vice presidents of fun (I totally stole that from CraftSanity) help me pick a random winner.

This drawing is open to anyone, U.S. or international. You have until 8 p.m. central on May 31 to enter, and I'll post the winner that night. Make sure I have a way to contact you!

Mother's Day sewing

I saw this on Craftzine.com back in December and decided I wanted to make something similar for my mom and mother-in-law for Mother's Day. My husband's folks have just 4 grandkids so I talked to my SIL about a collaboration and here's what we did:

I stitched the hands (my three kiddos plus little cousin Ryan) and Amy found a cute poem and then matted and framed it, and shipped it to Utah in time for Mother's Day.

My parents have 13 going on 14 grandkids so I opted to just stitch up my own babies' hands for Mom. And make it into a quilt. I was LATE getting it done and sent, but that's just how it goes sometimes.

mini-quilt monday

I just found out about mini-quilt Monday today on my google reader thru AmandaJean and Apple Cyder. And Jacquie mentioned it a while back too, when she posted her cute clothesline quilts.

I picked up some Orla Kiely fabric, I mean tablecloths and napkins, at Target on Saturday and am planning on finally opening up my etsy shop. Today I made some mini-mini quilts aka coasters:

These will be for sale later in the week along with some other things, maybe a tote bag, maybe a baby dress, maybe a cute little girl skirt or something. I have a funny idea for part of the huge pear fabric I got.

Just for fun, here's a list of some of the in process projects I've got going on here:
Project Improv quilt bindings (I was given 3 to do and have one left)
blue/red scrap quilt
hourglass quilt
pillows
jeans (darn those jeans, I really need to just buckle down and make them)

and in my mind but not yet started:
baby gifts for 3 different friends
all manner of cute baby clothes for my sweetie
cloth kitchen napkins
shorts for the boys
pin cushion for example for church sewing group

I did finish some things last week and today so I think I'm doing well!

new pants for baby

I feel like I have been working on things so much and not finishing, so I decided to make these pants for the baby. Finishing a project is a good feeling. I actually decided I didn't like the floppiness of the ruffle on these purple pants after I took the picture and ended up cutting some of it off and then sewing a decorative stitch about 1/4" in... going to try the raw edge look and see how it goes. I will post a picture of it after they are washed.


This pair is made from a vintage pillowcase I got at Goodwill and the trim is also vintage... bias tape my mom gave me a while back. I don't even know where she got it or if she just had it forever. I wanted to put some blue bias tape instead but didn't have the right color of thread. There are little side vents at the hem but they don't show up in this picture.

My mother's day gifts are both received now so I'm going to post pictures of those too after I upload them.


Also! I am going to participate in the Sew, Mama, Sew! giveaway on May 27. I will be giving away something made by me, to a random someone. I don't know what it will be yet. Am open to suggestions. Have a good weekend!

Happy Mother's Day

Thanks for teaching me how to sew, Mom. Do you remember helping me make a little teddy bear from a kit when I was 6 and we lived in Granger?

Thanks for letting me use your industrial sewing machine when you traded your old Bernina in for it.

Thanks for signing me up for sewing 4-H and supporting me through 4 summers of it. I didn't like modeling in the county fair, though.

Thanks for the Barbie clothes pattern I got for Christmas when I was 10. I had a lot of fun making Barbie clothes.

Thanks for supporting me when I decided to forgo extra years of math in high school and took two whole years of sewing classes instead. I had a lot of fun! And I still don't regret missing those math classes.

Thanks for paying for my fabric so I could do the wool contest both those years.

Thanks for buying me the fabric I really, really wanted to make my wedding dress.

I love sewing, and I love you!

new dress for baby

I finished up this little dress for Lauren on Saturday night. I started it two or three weeks ago. The skirt is made from a Moda Soiree charm pack--20 squares of it for this size dress. It's just sewn to a purchased t-shirt.

I really, really like these fabrics. I'm hoping to get some more of my favorites to make another dress or something for Lauren when she's bigger.

4-patch baby quilt

This is my 7-year old niece's baby quilt. I actually haven't seen this quilt for years. I'm sure it has faded a bit as my sister says her daughter still uses this quilt. At any rate, the colors are not quite the same as I remembered. This was probably the 4th baby quilt I made; my oldest son has two baby quilts and my oldest niece has one that I hand quilted. I was going to say she got the only one I hand quilted but Natalie's quilt has quite a bit of hand quilting.

There were some fun fabrics in this quilt. I really liked the Pooh bear honey bee fabric. The mottled pink, I believe, is the same lacy pink print from JoAnn's that I used in the birthday calendar quilt I made for my mom (hey Mom, would you mind emailing me a picture of that quilt? It's another one I don't have a picture of.) The cute, bold pink plaid and the purple hearts fabrics were bought by Mom for this quilt specifically. I didn't have much of a fabric budget in those days. The border and some of the blocks have a cute, tiny lavender gingham in them. I made my first scrappy binding for this quilt. I really like the sole blue and green four-patch--that blue is also in the scrappy quilt I made at the beginning of this year and is scrap from the dresses Mom made us girls for Jim and Marilyn's wedding reception.

I have been looking at more of the quilts in Park City Girl's blog quilt festival today. And napping. Have a good week!