MLE LN

Postage Stamp Quilt Top

2011-04-10T08:41:00.000-07:00

Hooray! I finally finished my postage stamp quilt top! It looks like it took forever, right? It did take awhile, but not as long as you might think, because I used Rachel Griffith's (of P.S. I Quilt) great tutorial. I've got a creamy yellow sheet for backing, and I know exactly how this baby is going to be quilted, so hopefully I'll have a finished picture to show soon.

Special thanks to Chelsea for her help with this picture. See her shadow there? Isn't she cute? :)

Cathedral Windows

2011-04-09T15:52:00.000-07:00

I finished this project months ago, but put off posting about it because I wasn't finished yet.

To make this Cathedral Window panel, I used Hyena In Petticoats' tutorial, although when I try this again I'll use The Sometimes Crafter's much easier-seeming method.

My initial thought was to make this panel part of a pillow, like this gorgeous pillow I found on flickr, which actually looks a lot like my panel - same blue buttons and similar colors.

The problem is, I can't find the perfect fabric to finish the pillow. In the flickr one, she uses a FFA print that I have too, but it just doesn't look right. Any ideas for what I can do with this? For now, it's just a mini-quilt on my wall, makin' me all happy. :)

Quilt-to-Be: Krista's Baby Quilt

2011-04-08T12:28:00.000-07:00

Tangerine + Lavender

My friend Krista, who is expecting a baby girl in September, told me that she likes "tangerine and lavender - no pink!" ...How do you think I did?

These are destined to be another rag quilt - my first for a baby girl!

Quilt-to-Be: Marine quilt

2011-04-07T12:08:00.000-07:00

Last winter when I saw this Marine line was coming out from Dan Stiles, I knew I had to grab some of it. I love it all so much! I picked up some coordinating Quilter's Linen and Bella Solids, and am planning to make a quilt from it soon.

These are my 3 favorite prints. I love those birds so much, and the sprocket print is just too cute.

I like how these two coordinate, but aren't quite the same. The red and orange is just a sunset over the water - no whales or birds.

Everytime I look at these, I start singing, "In the town where I was born, there lived a man who sailed the seas..."

Aw. Is there anything cuter than whales in love?

Amazing inspiration quilt by Oh! Fransson HERE.

Wordless Wednesday: What I'm Working On

2011-04-06T08:25:00.000-07:00

Central Park Doll Quilt

2011-04-05T12:06:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I finished this doll quilt. I didn't mean to make a doll quilt, but I've been working on a larger postage-stamp quilt Kate Spain's Central Park line, and I had extra blocks after I finished piecing the quilt top. ...Just enough for a doll-size quilt!

Actually, this was a good chance to try out my straight-line quilting idea... I like it a lot, and will definitely use it on the bigger quilt. I backed this with some Heather Bailey Nicey Jane, and bound it with some Kona Ash.

It's doing a great job of brightening up the walls in my sewing room!

I'll be posting on the larger quilt soon. :)

Flower Fairy Quilt

2011-03-26T19:00:00.000-07:00

Just wanted to share the quilt I just finished for my mom's birthday. She and I made a little field trip up to my favorite fabric store in the universe, where she picked out an alphabet panel from Michael Miller's Flower Fairy line, along with a pretty green swirly fabric to coordinate. At home, I added the blue flower fabric and a dusty blue print from the Metro Living line (love!) for the binding. It's so her- these colors are all over her house, and for as long as I can remember she's loved those flower fairy prints from the 1920s.

Happy Birthday, Mom!!

Kitty Cat Mini Quilt

2011-03-06T18:00:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I tried my first mini quilt. I needed a little mat I could put under my cats' food dish, and I figured I could do a whole lot better than the dishtowel that was doing the job up to that point. I dug in my scraps for some fun Heather Ross (see the kitty/seafood theme?), and accented with some orange Katie Jump Rope. I loved how quickly this project came together - very satisfying!

Hmm... what else in my house would look better sitting on a mat?

Last One for Awhile...

2011-03-06T14:41:00.000-08:00

My last block for the Freedom Swap! Well, technically I have one more to do, but the fabric hasn't even arrived yet, so I feel like I'm off the hook for that one for now. I mailed 15 happy little blocks off to various parts of the world yesterday afternoon. Now I get to sit back, relax, and wait for my blocks to find their way home to me!!

Nirvana

2011-02-27T16:00:00.000-08:00

Last night I dreamed about pecan pancakes. Although I did not want pancakes when I woke up this morning, the seed of breakfast foods was planted in my mind, and nothing short of a big fluffy omelet would satisfy.

After scratching my itch at the Denny's in Bothell, I remembered that I'd read in a couple of blogs that there was a great quilt store up in Bothell. iPhone let me know that Keepsake Cottage Fabrics was a mere 2 minutes away.

Holy. Fabric. Mecca. Batman.

From Keepsake Cottage Fabric's website

This place is insane. I almost don't want to tell you about it, but I will. Sadly, I wasn't brave enough to take pictures in the store, but I'll try to grab a few next time. Picture a weird, cutesy red barn. Now imagine that it's all divided up into a labyrinth of rooms, and every wall is stacked three layers deep in fabric.

Now imagine that every fabric you've ever wanted is here.

Including ones that were discontinued long ago.

Ones you thought were out of your reach.

Ones you've been kicking yourself for not buying more of when they first came out.

There was a whole section of both cotton and flannel Bliss. Two walls of Riley Blake (including the Tone on Tone Dot Blue - see it in the picture?). An entire ROOM full of vintage-inspired fabrics... I was in American Jane heaven. Nicey Jane, Farmer's Market, Erin McMorris' UH-dorable bicycle fabric, and that seed pod pattern (no idea what it's called), which I bought in two different colors. They had new fabric too - the entire Central Park by Kate Spain line (which I'm using for my Postage Stamp WIP, but I had to have more of that glorious orange).

Okay, I have to stop now. I'm worried the drool is going to short out my keyboard. But you can be sure there will be more fabric posts coming soon... I'll be back to Keepsake again soon, and next weekend is the Sew Expo!!

Nearing the Finish Line!

2011-02-24T10:23:00.000-08:00

I love the block pattern above - it's called "Flying Over Fields," and I think Ryan Walsh designed it. I think I'm going to do it again on one of my last fabric bundles.

This is a shoo-fly block. I thought these graphic prints kind of spoke for themselves, so I wanted to try something simple to showcase them.

14 down, 2 to go! Although I'm still waiting for the 16th bundle to arrive from Australia... so really only one more that I can do right now!

Two Holiday Blocks

2011-02-23T10:04:00.000-08:00

Two more blocks for the Freedom Block Swap! 12 down, 4 left to go!

Finally! Wee Play Wild Thing Quilt - Finished!

2011-02-20T17:08:00.000-08:00

Okay, it's taken me about a hundred years to photograph and post the finished quilt, but here it is: the Wild Thing quilt made with two charm packs of American Jane's Wee Play line. My free-motion quilting definitely improved on this one!

I love American Jane, and the Wee Play fabrics were so adorable. I found the cute orangey-red polka dot fabric to border, then bound with a navy-and-white star fabric to give it that Americana feel. Normally I'm not big on Americana, but on this quilt, it works. The backing is just a super-soft white cotton sheet. I'm thinking this quilt will move onto my couch this spring when I'm ready for a little more color... I'm feeling more and more ready every day!

WIP: Central Park Postage Stamp Quilt

2011-02-19T18:43:00.000-08:00

This week I got two lovely jelly rolls in the mail: a white Bella Solid, and one with the entire Central Park line by Kate Spain. I love this line - lots of vibrant blues, purples, oranges and yellows! I'm making a postage stamp quilt, using the quilt-along directions from p.s. i quilt.

First step: unroll those jelly rolls!

Next, I sorted the fabrics into color groups. I've been busy sewing the strips together, alternating the Central Park prints with the white solids. I'll post again when I get to the next step!

Rain, Rain, Go Away...

2011-02-18T18:22:00.000-08:00

This is my latest block for the Freedom Block Swap. These fabrics just felt like a rainy spring day to me, so I did a log cabin design and embroidered a little umbrella in the middle. I just love quilt blocks that have a little bit of embroidery in them! I'm not thrilled with the puckering, but I know that after the block is quilted and washed they won't be noticeable. 10 down, 6 left to go by March 15!

More Swap Blocks!

2011-02-12T17:12:00.000-08:00

...I feel like all I do anymore is sew blocks for the Freedom Block Swap! I do have a couple of other projects going, which I'll be posting about soon. But it's been so fun playing with fabric and block designs, that I've just been powering through the bundles I've received so far! We're almost halfway through our time frame now, and I've completed 9 of the 16 so far, so I'm feeling good about having enough time to finish them all. Here are the 4 latest:

Pinwheel and Zig-Zag

2011-01-28T16:13:00.000-08:00

Today I'm home sick in bed, so I thought it would be a good day to post a couple more pictures of quilt blocks I finished last weekend. Both new types of blocks for me - a pinwheel and a zig-zag block!

I still think that the string block and the wonky log cabin were the most fun to make, but I like how these turned out too. The person who sent the pinwheel fabric only sent these two fabrics. You know how I love color, so I was a little apprehensive about creating something in just a color plus black, but I like the graphic effect this block has!

More Swap Blocks

2011-01-22T18:17:00.000-08:00

It's been a really productive weekend so far... I caught up on my grading last night, caught up on my quilt swap today, and plan to catch up on National Boards tomorrow! Let's hope I can keep the momentum going.

I'm trying to make the swap blocks as I receive fabric packets, under the theory that this will help me not procrastinate until March!

Today I made my first string blocks, using paper piecing. They were so fun! I used this great tutorial over at P.S. I Quilt. I've always been a little intimidated by paper piecing, but it was really simple, and it created much neater quilt blocks.

The fun thing about doing this swap is playing with fabric I'd never choose on my own, like these batiks:

I honestly think that the batik section is probably the ONLY part of Pacific Fabrics that I don't know backwards and forwards. Nothing against batik - I just had a somewhat hippie childhood and it's given me an aversion to all things tie-died. :) I liked this color combo though - very tropical.

This block is going into a Halloween-themed quilt. It's hard to tell with the fabrics so broken up, but there are a few fabrics here from Moda's Haunted Mansion line. That green print is my favorite - it looks like creepy wallpaper (with dangling spiders!) and reminds me so much of the Haunted Mansion at Disneyland.

I'll post the other blocks I did today soon...

Freedom Swap Block #1

2011-01-15T16:13:00.000-08:00

Okay, I am such a dork. The Freedom Block Swap I joined didn't even officially begin until today, but I happened to get my first fabric bundle in the mail yesterday, and I simply couldn't wait to start sewing! One of my swap buddies from Las Vegas sent these adorable Dr. Seuss fabrics. She has twin boys and is hoping to put together a Seusstastic quilt for their bedroom. By 10:30 last night I'd finished this wonky log cabin block.

One block down, 15 to go by mid-March!

The Question of the Day

2011-01-14T17:25:00.000-08:00

Okay, here's the question.

White buttons?

Or orange buttons?

Freedom Block Swap

2011-01-14T13:43:00.000-08:00

So far this year, there's only one thing written on my calendar...

I joined the Freedom Block Swap on Flickr!! I'm so excited. Darci from Stitches and Scissors was my inspiration - she's a part of so many different types of swaps! The idea behind a swap is that crafters can join a group and make lots of little goodies for each other. In a quilt swap, each person chooses her own fabrics, then mails little fabric bundles out to all the other members:

In turn, I'll receive bundles from everyone else. So I mailed out 16 bundles:

And in the next week or so I'll receive 16 bundles from other members. I have until March 15 to turn each bundle into a fabulous quilt block and mail it back to the original sender. By March 15 I'll have all 16 of my bundles back, sewn into 16 unique quilt blocks. Each block will have a different design, but the common thread will be the fabric I chose, so they'll go together into a new quilt! In some swaps, you get to tell everyone what kind of block to make with your fabrics. The reason this is called the Freedom swap is that you pick the fabric, but then the design is a surprise. Go check out the Flickr pool if you want to see pics from previous rounds of this swap!

Quilts of 2010

2011-01-02T21:19:00.000-08:00

Since this seems to be the thing to do, here are my quilts from 2010.

The Wild Play quilt is finished and bound... I'm just waiting for a nice day to take it outside to photograph!

Today I started my next quilt - a cathedral windows quilt. It's a very new technique for me: lots of origami folding and ironing, which leads to a highly textured quilt. When it's done, it will look similar to this:

Happy New Year!!

Wild Play Quilt Top (Minus border)

2010-12-22T18:38:00.000-08:00

Chelsea took this beautiful photo!

This afternoon Chelsea and I got together for a busy day of last minute Christmas shopping, pho-slurping, and quilt... quilting.

I finally finished piecing together the main part of my latest quilt top. I'm using two charm packs of the Wee Play line from American Jane (which were not easy to track down, by the way!). I love this line so much, and am sad that it's going the way of the buffalo. I used the Wild Thing quilt pattern again. I like the movement of the blocks, and the way you can showcase lots of different prints. I also used some different whites from the Bella Solids line and Kona. I wanted the quilt to have a scrappy, vintage look - like the quilt you find in your grandma's atticf, which you find out used to sit on the foot of your mom's bed in kindergarten, which has been pieced and patched over the years. Or something.

I'm a little stumped about what to use for the border and binding. I'm thinking maybe some Kona Ash for the border:

Something fairly neutral, I think. And maybe a pretty red polka-dot for the binding. If anyone out there has any ideas, I'd love to hear them!!

2011 Owl Love Calendar

2010-12-20T17:10:00.000-08:00

I love buying new calendars for the new year, but I'm extremely picky about size/shape/theme/artwork for my calendars, so I always have a hard time finding just the right ones. Shivani, the author of the blog My Owl Barn, has put together the owl-inspired artwork of 30 different artists to create a customizable 2011 calendar. You go in and select the 12 pieces you love most, decide which picture you want for each month, then download the calendar as a free PDF. It will print as one of those small, desk-sizeish calendars. Perfect for my entryway!

Go HERE to make yours.

Wild Betty Quilt Finished!

2010-11-26T13:35:00.000-08:00

Last September I started a quilt top using a Hello Betty layer cake and the Wild Thing quilt pattern from Thimbleblossom. Remember?

Well, I finished it!! All these snow days gave me the perfect opportunity to put in the last few hours this quilt needed.

For this quilt, I used freemotion quilting... which is both very fun and takes a lot of shoulder muscle! The freemotion pattern is far from perfect, but I just love this quilt. The candy striped binding makes me smile every time I look at it. This quilt looks perfect draped over the end of our bed, but now I want to make some matching pillows...

Summer Love Quilt Top

2010-11-25T10:58:00.000-08:00

This is a quilt top I started last spring, using fabric from Amy Butler's Love line. At the time, I stalled out because, once the quilt top was finished, I had no idea how to go about turning it into an actual quilt. Now, my skillz are a little more developed and I know what to do... but since I will probably continue to procrastinate with this particular quilt, I thought I'd go ahead and take some pics to show you now.

This is my wonderful husband being a good sport and helping me hold the (very large) quilt up. He is sporting a look that I like to call, "The Handsome Hobo."

A little bit of summer on a wintry day!

Blue Owl Baby Quilt

2010-11-25T10:57:00.000-08:00

On Monday Seattle got its first snowstorm of the year, so I've had two snow days to quilt and sew to my heart's content! I finally finished the quilt that I bought fabric for back in September. When I finished the quilt, I still had blocks left over (although not enough to add a row and still keep the pattern of the quilt), so I made a little matching pillow.

I really do love these colors together!!

Jungle Baby Quilt

2010-11-23T13:23:00.000-08:00

My wonderful friend Rosann is having a baby boy in March, which was the perfect excuse for me to make another rag baby quilt! I tried, with increasing obviousness, to find out what colors/themes/whatever she was planning for her son, so that I could get started on a quilt.

Here's how the conversation went:

Me: So, have you started buying things for the baby?

Rosann: No, not really!

Me: Well, have you done any window shopping? Maybe you've seen some blankets or bumpers or something that you thought were cute?

Rosann: Not yet!

Me: Well, if you were to start thinking about it, what colors do you think you'd be drawn to?

Rosann: I don't really know... maybe nothing too bright?

Me: So like, pastels? Neutrals?

Rosann: Ha ha, I'm so not a visual person! I don't really know! I like monkeys!

Me: (giving up)

So I went to the fabric store with "nothing too bright, monkeys" as my criteria, and amazingly, I found the perfect fabric!

Not too bright! Monkeys! Hooray!!

From there, it was easy to find some coordinating fabric, and I love the way the quilt turned out:

Now the plan is to maybe make a pacifier clip or embellish a onesie with the same fabric to create a little gift set. I'm super inspired by the ones sold at The Red Pistachio:

I have several quilt projects nearing completion, so hopefully more posts very soon!

Hilarity...

2010-11-19T17:47:00.000-08:00

This has nothing to do with anything, but I just had to share this clip of some of SNL's more famous female alums, plus Andy Cohen, doing "The Real Housewives of SNL." I love all of the Housewives references... "We are fambily! And we will always be fambily!"

Enjoy!

Altered Art

2010-10-24T22:36:00.000-07:00

Yesterday Jonah and I visited a pumpkin patch, and we took some cute pictures of ourselves (with our iPhones... and yes, I did drop my iPhone while trying to take pics of myself, and yes, it did land directly in the mud, and yes, I did spend time today picking mud out of the headphone jack...).

I'm trying to get more familiar with PhotoShop Elements, so I played around with the stamp filter until I had this cool altered image. I like it when experimentation leads to things I actually like, as opposed to just frustration!

Pumpkin Carving

2010-10-22T21:38:00.000-07:00

Tonight my husband surprised me with a pumpkin-carving date... which was quite a surprise, since in nearly 10 years together he has NEVER carved a pumpkin with me (I do it alone in the kitchen every year... confessions of a lonely holiday nerd). To my delight, he decided that it was fun, so we're definitely headed to the pumpkin patch tomorrow to pick up a few more.

This picture cracks me up. I love how my little punkin is looking slyly at his... and his is sort of spazzing out. Kind of like their creators. :)

Cross your fingers for me that tomorrow's forecasted storm waits until after the pumpkin patch.

Little Punkin Cookies

2010-10-10T21:07:00.000-07:00

I have a new blog addiction... Bake at 350 has given me a new interest in cookie decorating! She makes the cutest little cookies, using royal icing and a technique called flooding.

I was inspired! Basically, you whip up a bunch of super firm, strong icing called royal icing. You use the royal icing to create an outline, and let it dry and harden. Then, you water down the icing a bit and use it to "flood" the inside of the outline. You end up with super smooth icing! Well, hypothetically. Maybe I'll get there in a few more tries. :)

This little guy was my favorite. I have a meeting after school tomorrow... I think these will be just the right treat to bring!

Apple Pie Filling

2010-10-10T08:00:00.000-07:00

After my day of apple picking yesterday, I found myself with a whole lot of apples! Duh, right? But seriously, we're talking A LOT of apples. Because my mom decided she didn't want all of hers, so we're talking probably 15 pounds of apples.

So here's apple project #1: Apple Pie Filling. I found a recipe that supposedly freezes really well, and spent my Saturday night peeling and slicing 15 freshly-picked Jonagolds. I'm hoping to make the first pie sometime this week, and will probably save the other jars for Thanksgiving and Christmas. We're not usually big pie people, but I have a feeling that these jars will prove quite tempting peeking out of the freezer!

This recipe should actually be packed into 5 containers, as it will make 5 nine-inch pies. I just had to make do with what I had on hand!

Freezer Apple Pie Filling

18 cups thinly sliced apples
3 tablespoons lemon juice
4 1/2 cups white sugar
1 cup cornstarch
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
10 cups water

Directions
In a large bowl, toss apples with lemon juice and set aside. Pour water into a Dutch oven over medium heat. Combine sugar, cornstarch, cinnamon, salt and nutmeg. Add to water, stir well, and bring to a boil. Boil for 2 minutes, stirring constantly.

Add apples and return to a boil. Reduce heat, cover and simmer until apples are tender, about 6 to 8 minutes. Cool for 30 minutes.

Ladle into 5 freezer containers, leaving 1/2 inch headspace. Cool at room temperature no longer than 1 1/2 hours.

Seal and freeze. Can be stored for up to 12 months.

Apple Pickin' With My Mom

2010-10-09T21:56:00.000-07:00

Despite the torrential downpour we got here, today was the perfect apple-picking day.

My mom and I drove a little over an hour north, to Merritt Orchards in Bow, Washington.

We each got a super special apple-holding bag (read: plastic grocery bag).

It took us awhile to pick our apples, because we're both super picky. No worms in these apples!!

This orchard would make an amazing photo shoot location.

Mom tried to just pick the high ones, leaving the lower ones for little kids. These little kids were purely hypothetical, as we were the only crazies picking apples in the rain.

Man, those were the wrong shoes to wear.

We found some nests too, but we left those alone!

The final count? Ten pounds of Jonagolds! Yes, it sounds like a lot, but I have big plans for these babies...

And naturally we couldn't leave without warm apple pie a la mode. We climbed back into the car, wet and cold. We cranked up the heat and took off our shoes and socks and agreed that it was, all in all, a perfect day.

Card-Making Party

2010-10-07T07:54:00.000-07:00

Last night one of my co-workers hosted a card-making party at work. I'd never been to one before, so I was excited.

Okay, I have to tell you - this is the way to craft! This brilliant, artistic woman showed up with all of the supplies to make 4 different card designs. She had examples made, plus all of the fancy papers, embellishments, stamps, inks, ribbons, tape, glue, foam tabs, and envelopes needed. She even brought her die-cutting machine! I got to make 8 really cute cards. It was cheap - $10 total - and I didn't have any pesky leftover supplies to figure out storage for.

I made this cute little kangaroo pocket-card.

You know I love all things owl-related!!

I would have never come up with this design on my own, but I think it's very fun.

How cute is this - 5 little mini cards inside a nifty little box that we made with the die-cut!

Too fun!

Fall Framed Art

2010-10-05T08:37:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I took the Martha Stewart "What's Your Halloween Crafting Personality?" quiz, and learned that I am a Seasonal Crafter.

Martha knows me so well. It's true - when the seasons change, I want everything about my environment to change too. I want to be surrounded by the colors and smells of the season in my home.

Following this whim, I took some pictures off of our balcony on Sunday. We are so lucky to have this beautiful tree right outside our apartment, which changes to the most vibrant, beautiful colors every fall. I snapped a bunch of pictures - some of the naked leaves, and others with props like mini pumpkins, and then picked my two favorites. After a quick visit to the Walgreen's photo website and a slightly longer visit to the store itself, I had two very seasonal photos to temporarily install in my living room:

Seasonal joy!!

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

2010-10-04T06:00:00.000-07:00

The pumpkin madness continues! Yesterday I also whipped up a double batch of Chelsea's awesome pumpkin chocolate-chip cookies. Here is her super-awesome recipe:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

In a small bowl, mix together:

1 c. sugar

1 c. pumpkin

1/2 c. oil

1 egg

In a large bowl, sift together:

2 c. flour

1/2 tsp. salt

1 tsp. cinnamon

2 tsp. baking powder

Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients and mix gently.

Dissolve together and add to rest of ingredients:

1 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. milk

1 tsp. vanilla

Fold in:

1 c. chocolate chips

1/2 c. nuts

Stir until combined - do not overmix.

Drop rounded tablespoons onto lightly greased cookie sheet. Bake approximately 10 to 12 minutes. NOTE: Careful not to overcook. Cookies will be soft and moist.

Pumpkin Hazelnut Muffins

2010-10-03T10:59:00.000-07:00

After three weeks of searching and waiting, I finally found canned pumpkin puree at the grocery store!! Until last year, I never realized how tough it can be to find canned pumpkin, even at this time of year.

Apparently, Morton, Illinois is the center of most pumpkin production for Nestle (who makes Libby's, the most widely-available canned pumpkin in the U.S.). Last year, Morton got twice as much rain as usual, which made most of the pumpkins rot in the fields.

People were selling cans of pumpkin for $7 on ebay!

This year, the pumpkin harvest is looking good, but they're still catching up from last year. So when I saw canned pumpkin at QFC on Friday, I bought 6 cans.

You might want to stock up too, if you can find these little cans of gold. Who knows, they might be an investment towards Christmas money!

October Treats

2010-10-02T21:44:00.000-07:00

Oh yum! A few treats I am hoping to try out at some point this month:

1. Candy Corn Cupcakes
2. Caramel Apple Cupcakes
3. Haystack Monsters
4. Nutter Butter Mummies
5. Oreo Mummy Pops
6. Owl S'mores
7. Chocolate Pretzel Candy Apple
8. Pumpkin Rice Pudding
9. Jack 'o Lantern Sandwiches

Click through the links for delicious ideas for festive feasts!

Decorating for Halloween

2010-10-01T20:10:00.000-07:00

I just couldn't wait one more minute. I love Halloween, and I really love decorating for Halloween. Putting Halloween stuff out on October 1st means at least 31 days to enjoy it!!

Happy Halloween-month!!

For All My Gleeks Out There...

2010-09-28T06:13:00.000-07:00

Photo courtesy of Diamonds for Dessert

OMG. I am so loving these Glee-themed cookies from Diamonds for Dessert. Look at those little details - the blue streaks in Tina's hair, Puck's fauxhawk, and Emma's little string of pearls!!! Perfect!

What do you think, Chelsea... will we ever reach this level in our baking adventures? :)

Halloween Envelope Bags

2010-09-27T06:00:00.000-07:00

Oh, I just can't help myself! I know that it is way too early to start spreading Halloween cheer, but this weekend I found an inspiring tutorial on how to turn an envelope into a little gift bag, and I couldn't resist. These ones are filled with sweets leftover from my Halloween Advent Calendar. I'm going to try to wait to deposit these on desks until at least October 1... but no promises. :)

Halloween Advent Calendar

2010-09-26T16:31:00.000-07:00

I just love the fall! It is easily my favorite time of year. And the best part of fall is this time we're in right now, where school has started, the leaves are turning red, and all of the stores are stocking a new year's worth of Halloween Decorations. Thanksgiving is on the horizon, and beyond that, Christmas. There is nothing but wonderful to look forward to.

Oopsey Daisy posted a tutorial for this SO cute Halloween advent calendar. I think that the magnetic cookie sheet I found at Dollar Tree was a little too small, and my glass marbles were a little too big. That led to less space for candy, so I had to get a bit creative when cramming all 31 pieces of chocolate on there. I kind of like the wonky, haphazard look though, don't you?

More Halloween projects coming soon!!

Colorful Boys Quilt

2010-09-26T16:19:00.001-07:00

Today is a rainy, gray day in Seattle, so Chelsea and I decided it was the perfect day for an outing to the fabric store. She was picking out fabrics for two adorable baby girl quilts, and I needed some border fabric for my Wild Thing/Hello Betty quilt (which I am finishing up now... pics to come!).

I was really only planning to buy the border fabric, but the striped fabric on the far right in the pic above just jumped off the shelf at me. I grabbed it on a whim, and almost immediately I spotted the owl fabric on another shelf. Those were quickly followed by the thicker stripe fabric, the plaid, and the stars. The chocolate brown solid finished off this happy little pile just perfectly!

I'm not exactly sure which pattern I want to use for this quilt. I've been looking at Cluck. Cluck. Sew. for inspiration, and I have a couple of good ideas: either this fun wonky block, or a more simple blocked quilt using her stack 'n whack tutorial.

Wild Thing/Hello Betty Quilt

2010-09-18T09:23:00.000-07:00

I am embarking on a new quilt! I am so inspired by Cluck. Cluck. Sew., and I decided to start imitating the master to learn her techniques. That's a legitimate art school technique, right? And not wholesale plagiarism, right? I mean, I am in no way planning to sell this quilt, so I think I'm ethically in the clear.

I'm using Thimble Blossom's Wild Thing quilt pattern, and a Hello Betty layer cake. I pulled all of the reds, aquas, and blues out of the layer cake, but as I look at the colors I think it might benefit from more gray. Oddly enough, the layer cake did not include the gray colorways of this line, so a-shopping I must go! The first pieces here to get the axe will be the ones with pink.

And Pacific Fabrics has now been open for 45 minutes, so more later. :)

Weird Seattle Part II

2010-08-04T09:54:00.000-07:00

On a walk this evening, I took a new route through my neighborhood. It brought me home a different way, so I passed a house I hadn't taken a good look at before, even though it's just around the corner from where I live.

How cool is this art installation in their fence? The rest of the house is also kind of hip and modern, but this mural is the stand-out feature.

It's entirely made up of those giant shooter marbles encased in a wire cage. Given that this house sits in a neighborhood slowly being taken over by beige townhouse developments, I love the rebellion of this weirdness.

Homemade Wrinkle Releaser

2010-08-03T08:39:00.000-07:00

During the school year, I am addicted to this stuff. It's perfect for mornings when I don't feel like getting out the iron. My routine is: I wake up, grab my outfit for the day (I hang all my clothes and our closet is packed, so clothes inevitably end up wrinkled in there), spray it down with Downy, then throw it in the dryer. By the time I get out of the shower everything is toasty warm and nice and flat.

So that's the upside. The downside is that a bottle of this stuff can cost as much as $8.99 a bottle, and a bottle only lasts me a month or so.

Solution? Make my own! Here are the ingredients:

-water
-fabric softener

I got my fabric softener at Dollar Tree. You only need a couple of teaspoons of fabric softener for the whole bottle. I'm pretty sure that works out to like, 2 cents a bottle.

Have I mentioned how much I love Dollar Tree?

Weird Seattle

2010-08-02T16:13:00.000-07:00

Friday evening I took the wrong exit to Chelsea's house, and found myself in a part of Seattle I'm not familiar with. Taking it as a chance to explore a new area, I meandered up and down streets, until something caught my eye.

In a fairly industrial part of Seattle, I spotted a green city park.

Seeing such a green space in all that brown was surprising enough.

But that wasn't what caught my eye.

Yup, you read that sign right...

Apparently these gigantic boots and hat used to be a bit of a roadside attraction, bringing in business for a gas station. When the gas station closed down, this whimsical western-wear became part of Oxbow park. If you live in Seattle, you must drive down and check this out. I'm sure any child would love the novelty of this playground.

I also think this would make a really cool site for wedding photos. I'm sure I'm not the first person to have that idea, but I can totally see some fun, funky couple posing right between those cowboy boots.

After living almost my whole life here, I love that Seattle can still surprise me.

4 Years...

2010-08-01T16:00:00.000-07:00

This past week my husband and I celebrated our fourth anniversary.

...All true. I always thought turkey was gross and dry growing up, and his delicious roast turkey changed all that. He does a fabulous waltz with the cats, but I think they prefer the cha cha. And he is indeed my very best friend in the world. Happy Anniversary, honey. Here's to at least four more years. ;)

Peel-and-stick chalkboard came from HERE. We love it and I recommend you get one.

Late September Quilt

2010-07-31T15:50:00.000-07:00

I just finished my first traditional quilt this week. I wanted to try out the Disappearing 9-Patch block I spotted on Cluck. Cluck. Sew. I started making the blocks last April, and just used some fabric I had on hand, never meaning to actually make a whole quilt. As things started to come together, I realized that I was liking this quilt more and more, and eventually it got finished!

Because I tried to use up fabrics I had laying around, the back ended up being pieced together. I actually really like the way it looks though.

I stitched in the ditch to hold the layers together, and added the binding using Gratz Industries' fantastic tutorial.

I'm calling this my Late September quilt because that's what the colors remind me of. We have a big maple outside our living room that turns many of these colors that time of year, and the blue birds on the brown field make me think of geese moving through foggy skies on autumn mornings. This is just a small quilt - perfect for a baby play mat someday. :)

I Felt Like a Sandwich...

2010-07-18T19:47:00.000-07:00

Heh... get it?

My mom is switching to teaching kindergarten this fall, so I've been busily making felt food for her imaginative play center as a classroom-warming gift.

Mmm, open-faced sammich.

I think the pickle slice is a nice touch. I never feel like a sandwich is a sandwich without a pickle on the side, do you?

Urban Craft Uprising

2010-07-11T16:39:00.000-07:00

This morning Chelsea and I headed down to the Seattle Center for Urban Craft Uprising, a craft show that features independent crafters and small businesses. It was kind of like stepping inside Etsy! We saw lots of really amazing stuff, and although we didn't drop any cash (aside from the donation at the door), we agreed that we both felt inspired to get our own crafty hands active again!

This picture doesn't do justice to this dress. The lace applique work was just amazing.

Deviled eggs! Complete with paprika sprinkles! How cute are these??

We saw TONS of letterpress. I just love letterpress - something about the simplicity of the designs, combined with the richness of the texture. I'd love to learn more about this process.

How cool is this lampshade? This booth had lots of upcycled crafts, like bowls and bracelets made from old vinyl records, jewelry made from soda can tabs, and more lampshades made from safety pins and forks.

I loooooove kokka fabric, and these bears strike me as the perfect use for such whimsical, hip designs.

Again, this photo doesn't do justice. This is a photo of an old abandoned room, which the artist has overlaid with drawings of a mother and her two little boys. Look at how the little boy on the right is peering out through the hole in the wall. I love how reality and fantasy interact here.

This coat has three great things going for it: it's a wool coat, it's orange, and it features poppies. Love!

Finally, here was my favorite seller. This man also specializes in letterpress, but he then mounts the letterpress art onto wood blocks to create wall art pieces.

My very favorite item of the whole show:

While at UCU today, we saw lots of signs for another craft show, to be held in December in Portland:

Crafty Wonderland Super Colossal Holiday Sale!

December 11th + 12th

times TBA

at the Oregon Convention Center

777 NE MLK Jr. Blvd, Exhibit Hall D

See you there! :)

Edmonds 4th of July Parade

2010-07-05T12:35:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I went to a 4th of July parade with my mom, aunt and uncle, and cousins. Is there anything better than a small-town parade? I think not! Edmonds did not disappoint.

My cousin Rory, who is going into 6th grade and is sassy and fabulous, sat with me on an ivy wall to watch. Which was great, because she's just hitting that age where it's way more fun to make funny comments about the parade than to run around collecting the candy that gets thrown.

Of course the parade had to include clowns:

Next came those most patriotic of all creatures, Stormtroopers from Star Wars:

Followed by Uncle Sam's cousin, Darth Vader:

Rory goes, "Why isn't Darth Vader throwing candy? Is he too good for that?"

...And rounding out the unholy trifecta, there were pirates.

This is their ship. They may have plundered and pillaged their way around the Carribean, but that doesn't mean they don't love America, gosh darn it.

And last of all, a whole backhoe full of candy. Woot!

For me, the highlight of the parade was when I was accosted by a crazy lady who didn't like where we were sitting. Here's the conversation we had:

Crazy Lady: You know, you're sitting in my ivy. (please note that the ivy in question was on the sidewalk, not in a yard or anything like that. I would never be rude enough to plop myself down in a stranger's front yard)

Me: Oh... um?

Crazy Lady: That's my ground cover.

Me: Well, ivy is pretty hardy. I doubt that we're doing any damage to it.

Crazy Lady: Oh no, you won't do any damage. The ivy will be just fine.

Me: Okay... good...

Crazy Lady: But it's mine. (drifts off, never to be seen again)

I'm still not sure what that was all about, although I guess there's nothing more patriotic than declaring posession! So maybe she was just celebrating in her own way. Although I wanted to go find her and invite her to sit with us, which in my thinking would have been way more fun.

Happy belated 4th!

The Phinney Farmer's Market

2010-07-04T10:13:00.000-07:00

Friday I went to the neighborhood farmer's market in Phinney Ridge with my mom. I saw a lot of the same vendors as at the Lake City farmer's market, including the makers of the delicious hard cider. There were some new vendors in Phinney though, like the hazelnut stand. Here's what we got:

-Bottle of hard apple cider
-Bottle of hard berry cider
-Market bouquet
-Sweet pea bouquet
-Tayberries (a cross between blackberries and raspberries - yum!)
-Raspberries
-Honey-orange coated hazelnuts
-Yukon gold potatoes
-Bing cherries
-Peaches
-Pluots

...and, of course, we got more ice cream. :)

I also managed to find a schedule of when the neighborhood markets are this summer. Seattle neighborhood markets are in blue. Eastside and outside-of-Seattle markets are in orange:

Monday: no markets (sad!)
Tuesday: Crossroads, Renton
Wednesday: Columbia City, Kirkland
Thursday: Lake City, Bellevue
Friday: Phinney Ridge, Juanita
Saturday: University District, Magnolia, Bellevue, Issaquah, Redmond
Sunday: West Seattle, Broadway, Mercer Island

FYI Seattleites - yes, the West Seattle and Broadway markets will be open today (even though it's the 4th of July)!

Next week: Columbia City

Beautiful Crime

2010-07-03T05:26:00.000-07:00

I realize that the common (common sense) consensus is that graffiti is bad, because it is illegal and ugly and disrespectful. However, I am occasionally struck by Seattle grafitti that transcends the tags and throw-ups you see on bus stations to become a piece of art that actually adds to a neighborhood's appeal.

Stencil grafitti especially appeals to me. Most grafitti seems to have little to no planning behind it - it's almost like improv, with the tagger painting what seems right in the moment, or what fits with the surroundings. Stencil grafitti is the opposite. The creator has to put all of the planning into pre-production, creating the stencil at home. That level of pre-planning appeals to me.

Anyway, this lovely silhouette was in the Phinney Ridge neighborhood, right outside the 74th Street Alehouse. The texture of the wood siding and the blurriness of the lines create depth in her face that I find so intriguing. So I put it to you: is this art, or crime?

Also, try saying "common sense common consensus" three times fast. Fun, huh?

A Blog With Substance

2010-07-02T10:18:00.000-07:00

Thank you to Becoming Homegrown for the blog award! I've gotten awards before but never had any idea what to do to get them on my site... this time I decided it was time to figure it out.

So google tells me that now I need to pass this award along! I usually see people pass to 10 blogs, but I'm going to be a little more exclusive than that. :) I'm passing it along to 3 of my faves:

1. The Perrys of West Seattle

2. Snip Snap Happy

3. In a Yellow House

Go check them out - they are amazing!

$40 at the Lake City Farmer's Market

2010-07-01T16:46:00.000-07:00

I'll be honest - I don't love summer as much as most people. My favorite time of year is September to December, because I love cold, windy days and watching the leaves turn. But there are a few things that I really look forward to every summer, and neighborhood Farmer's Markets are at the top of that list.

In Seattle we of course have the world famous Pike Place Market, but the neighborhood markets are really where it's at. The neighborhoods take turns, so that almost every day of the week there's a market going on somewhere.

I'm going to try to see if I can hit every one of them at least once this summer. Today I visited the one closest to me, in the Lake City neighborhood. I brought $40 in cash, just to see how far it would take me. Here's what I got:

-Market bouquet
-Small sweet pea bouquet (I always forget how good these smell!!)
-Bottle of hard cider
-2 lbs. of heirloom tomatoes (so good in a Greek salad)
-1 scoop of vanilla-lemon swirl ice cream

Next week I'd like to try to get to the market down in Columbia City...

The Last Day of School

2010-06-17T13:16:00.000-07:00

Whenever I tell people that we're near the end of another school year, their response is usually something like, "Oh you must be so happy!" Although I sometimes pretend to be, just to seem normal, the truth is that I am a mess this time of year. Many of us are. We work in such a strange field, where every year we have to say goodbye to all of our students (who are essentially our co-workers, children, friends, and family all rolled into one) and start fresh in the fall. This is far from easy.

I cry every year on the last day of school. It's usually the moment when the last photo from our class slideshow fades, when I look at the clock and realize it's about to be all over. Sometimes kids are already crying by that point, which just sets me off worse. We have a tradition where all of the teachers line up in front of the school to wave the buses off with colorful scarves. I'm one of the ones waving a Kleenex and bawling.

This year my class made me a beautiful book full of letters and sweet drawings. They've been working on it in secret, during recesses, lunches, or when they could get permission to go into the hallway during silent reading. They presented it to me this morning as school started, and I completely lost it. It's clear that they had minimal (if any) parent help on the book, which makes it all the sweeter. Getting 24 third graders on the same page about anything takes a lot of work, so what really touched me was that they organized themselves and cooperated on this incredible gift for me.

So if you know a teacher, give him or her a hug this time of year. As Mr. Rogers once said,

"Transitions are almost always signs of growth, but they can bring feelings of loss. To get somewhere new, we may have to leave somewhere else behind."

Happy summer. :)

Last Day of Staff Room Duty: Camping Theme

2010-06-17T13:06:00.000-07:00

In keeping with our summer theme, for our last big day of staff room duty, Chelsea and I did a camping subtheme. We started with these delicious s'more pops:

These were a huge hit. They're just marshmallows on wooden skewers. Then we melted a couple of giant bars of Hershey's chocolate in the microwave to dip them in, then rolled them in crushed graham crackers. They taste just like s'mores! I think it's pretty key to use Hershey's chocolate though... just any old chocolate wouldn't have that same effect.

We also made these little campfire cupcakes. They're just frosted with green "grass," then we broke pretzel sticks to make the logs and added a squirt of orange frosting with a star tip. Easy peasy!

Day Two of Staff Room Duty: Beach Theme!

2010-06-15T05:17:00.000-07:00

Today is day 2 of Chelsea and me on staff room duty at our school. Of course we have a theme (isn't life always better when you have a theme?): Summer. Yesterday we filled the lounge with rainbows, and today the subtheme is the beach. The idea for the beach and shark cupcakes comes from Martha Stewart. The beaches are just orange frosting coated in graham cracker crumbs and topped with a paper parasol.

The sharks are blue frosting with a shark fin cut out of a plastic pocket folder.

I also made these watermelon-slice sugar cookies:

My frosting skills leave a lot to be desired.

And finally, for no good reason, we are putting out this jar of Starburst.

Come back tomorrow to see Day Three: Camping!

Day One of Staff Room Duty: Rainbows!

2010-06-14T05:06:00.000-07:00

For the last week of school, Chelsea and I signed up for Staff Room Duty. This usually entails loading the dishwasher, wiping down the countertops, and maybe bringing in a treat one day. Most teachers might do chips and salsa on one of their days.

Well, naturally Chelsea and I always go way overboard. For Halloween week we decked out the lounge in orange and black, made a different creepy treat for each day of the week, and hid plastic hearts in the refrigerator.

So for this week we knew we had set a bar for ourselves. We decided to go with a summer theme. Here's what we did for Monday (subtheme: rainbows):

1. Make a batch of cake batter. Divide into 6 bowls, and use food coloring to dye each bowl a different color.

2. Pour batter into 6 separate cake pans and bake.

3. Layer the cakes, frosting between layers.

4. Make Dr. Seuss proud with a wonky, wobbly, colorful rainbow cake.

5. Frost the whole thing white, so that when it's cut into it's a surprise! I'll post an update picture when this sucker gets cut into. :)

6. Decide that a rainbow cake isn't quite enough. Make rainbow cupcakes too.

7. Admire their beauty. High five each other.

8. Frost and sprinkle. I just love how the white cupcake cups turned semi-transparent, so that you can see the color swirls!

Come back tomorrow for Day Two: Beach Theme!

UPDATE:
Here's a picture of the rainbow cake, when cut into. It turned out even better than we thought!

Ye Olde Pioneer Craft: Clothespin Dolls

2010-06-13T16:37:00.000-07:00

In third grade we are studying pioneers right now. One fun thing I love to do with the kids is to make old-fashioned clothespin dolls.

I explain that on the frontier, bored kids had to make their own fun out of whatever was at hand. Old-fashioned clothespins (which I find at Dollar Tree, btw) look so similar to little armless people that they were a natural choice for making toys!

I think my favorite thing about making these every year is watching kids who are used to their Xboxes and Wiis have a fantastic time with such low-tech materials. It's always kind of an "aha" moment for the parents who come in to help too... give kids some time to imagine, explore, and create, and some friends to do it with, and that's really all they need.

Some of the dolls reflect what students have learned about pioneer clothing:

...and some are less than traditional:

Who is that Man of Steel, and why is he so angry?

These are great for scrap-busting too!

Cheese!

2010-05-30T17:57:00.000-07:00

Today DH and I took a trip down to Tillamook, home of the world-famous Tillamook Cheese Factory. I love the cheese factory - I've been going there since I was a kid. There's something so endlessly fun about watching those be-hairnetted cheese mongers cutting, weighing, and packaging loaves of cheese. It kind of makes you feel like you're in an episode of Sesame Street.

Needless to say, we bought a lot of cheese. Yum. Here's hoping this doesn't make us both lactose-intolerant.

More after the jump (yay, I learned how to use jumps!)

What do you think we did after the cheese factory?

If you guessed, "went to another cheese factory," then you know me well. Our next stop was the Blue Heron French Cheese Company:

Look at this beautiful mosaic just inside the entrance. Gorgeous.

I also got to say hello to the lovely ladies responsible for all this cheese:

On the way home to Cannon Beach, we went through many cute little coastal towns. This store name cracked me up:

"Stuff and Things." Brilliant.

This was a little shop in Rockaway Beach that I've always noticed, and never stopped in. The owner creates these little hanging "dewdrops." He uses recycled light bulbs, rainwater, and temple bells from India. You can buy dewdrops with rainwater from specific months, or even days, and they etch the month/year on the bottom of the bulb. I bought one from May 2010 as a memento of our trip. They have a website HERE, with much more beautiful photos!

Our last stop before home was at the Nehalem Bay Winery, the creators of possibly the sweetest, fruitiest wine in the world. Normally we both prefer very dry wines, but this winery is just so odd and charming that we usually can't resist stopping in for a tasting and a bottle.

...I mean, could you?

Cannon Beach, Oregon

2010-05-29T21:53:00.000-07:00

Thanks to some wonderful friends, DH and I are spending a long weekend at Cannon Beach, Oregon. It has been an amazing vacation so far.

Things started out a little bit familiar. DH was on his laptop, trying to work. Andrew and Buster had no patience for this!

We spent the afternoon in Seaside, spending a silly amount of money at the arcade.

This was my pitiful Skee-Ball score.

When we got home, we headed to the beach and built a bonfire. Amazingly, a sea lion was giving birth right nearby. We never actually saw the pup come, but there was a lot of agitation and protective barking happening!

DH got to cross something off his bucket list - roasting a steak on a stick over an open fire, then eating said steak directly off said stick. Yes ladies and gentlemen - I married King Cave Man. :)

Today, we went to Astoria and visited the Fort George Brew House. I loved the building it was housed in - look at those windows. Drool. I also loved the glasses that the beer was served in. Everything is so much cuter in a jelly jar. I'm drinking everything out of them from now on.

While the men folk enjoyed some quality time at the brewery, I managed to track down a fabric store. I found some seriously good deals!

This rainbow seer-sucker transports me straight back to my childhood.

I also love the print on this toille I found. How cute would this be on a baby blanket?

All told, I got roughly 11 yards of fabric for around $25. Oregon, I love you and your lack of sales tax!

From My Inspiration Bookmarks

2010-05-27T11:52:00.000-07:00

It's really bugging me that I haven't been posting much lately. The truth is that I've gotten into quilting, and those projects take much longer than my usual ones! Right now, I have two in progress, so hopefully I'll be getting some finished photos of those up soon.

In the meantime, I cleaned out my inspiration bookmarks, and came across some forgotten treasures. They aren't necessarily of crafts, but my hope is that they will lead to making beautiful things with my hands. Maybe these will get my rear in gear!

A Fabulous Saturday

2010-05-22T15:39:00.000-07:00

Just a little sneak peek into my day so far. A quiet sewing room, some trash tv on the laptop, and my quilt top coming together faster than I could believe.

How's your Saturday so far?

More Felt Food!

2010-05-21T07:39:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I was in Spokane for a teacher's conference, and although the conference was riveting and required most of my attention (ahem), I brought along some felt and thread to sew while I sat.

I made this banana while listening to the governor speak about Race to the Top.

I made this corn while listening to Bill Gates, Sr. talk about income-tax reform.

And I made this very healthful donut while listening to delegates debate a boycott on Arizona.

P.S. Did you know that you can carry scissors onto an airplane? The blades can be up to four inches!! Who knew?

Tutorial: Spoon Garden Stakes

2010-05-11T18:58:00.000-07:00

My little antique spoon garden stakes turned out so cute, I thought I'd give more info about how to make your own! Here's what you need:

-Antique spoons. See if you can find the real silver ones - you may have to do some digging at Value Village.

-Mod Podge

-Paper

-Colored Pencils

-A very fine point, archival-quality pen

-Paintbrush

Start by using the pen and pencils to create your art. I like the simple look of the herbs. I "repurposed" some junk mail for this project.

Tear out your pictures.

I used some antiquing medium and acrylic paint to give the pictures a very subtle aging. Then I used Mod Podge to glue the pictures to the bowls of the spoons and the bottom of the fork.

Give each piece 1-2 coats of Mod Podge to seal.

Use Outdoor Mod Podge for a waterproof garden stake!

I Love Sushi

2010-05-10T18:51:00.000-07:00

Some felt sushi. I'm passing this along to Chelsea's niece, Mya, who is 3 and apparently very cute. :)

I'm all about indoctrinating the younguns with a love of sushi.

Does anyone out there remember the "I love sushi!" sketch from Upright Citizen's Brigade? I wish I could find you the video on YouTube, but it looks like you're just going to have to Netflix it.

What I'm Working On...

2010-05-08T17:56:00.000-07:00

Here's a sneak peek at what I'm working on this weekend! The fabric all comes from Amy Butler's Love collection, and the quilt pattern is the same one Chelsea used back in March.

I'm not quite happy with the layout yet, but I'm very excited that all the cutting is done!!

2010-05-07T06:15:00.000-07:00

Here in Seattle, we'll take any sun we can get. These little jars will allow me to capture the sun and save it up for the night time!

To make them, I just followed Not Martha's tutorial.

I got my jars from various Goodwills and Value Villages, and used spray glass frost to turn them translucent.

I found solar yard stakes at Walgreen's for $3.50. The ones I found had a detachable head, so all I had to do was pop the head off the stake and glue it to the underside of the jar lid!

I kind of wish my lights were more of a golden yellow like Not Martha's, but the white has it's own eerie beauty too. I'm going to keep my eyes peeled for more jars, and keep making these all summer.

Another Mother's Day Idea

2010-05-06T07:34:00.000-07:00

Here's another cute idea for mom... a little herb garden with handmade antique silverware garden signs.

Full disclosure: the garden signs are not my idea! I must have seen them somewhere, somehow online, but I don't have a link for you. I'll show you how I made mine, but if you know who should get credit for this great idea, let me know so I can provide a link!

These are so simple. All you need is white paper, antique spoons (check your thrift store), colored pencils, a black pen, and Mod Podge. Create a simple little sketch on the white paper, using the black pen. Color it in with the colored pencils. Tear the sketch all the way around. Use Mod Podge to glue it to the spoon, then add two more coats of Mod Podge to seal. If you use the outdoor Mod Podge, it will even be waterproof in your garden!

I used the same technique on an antique fork, then bent the tines to create a card holder. This could also be used for photos.

Happy Mother's Day!

From My Classroom: Mother's Day Gifts

2010-05-01T08:10:00.000-07:00

Last week my class made our Mother's Day gifts - little personalized paperclips. I thought I'd share with you, because they were easy, inexpensive, and they turned out darn cute!

All you need is polymer clay (Fimo) and large paperclips. Start by rolling out two small balls of clay, then squish them flat to make two little fat coins. Sandwich the top of your paperclip between these coins. This makes your base.

Then, decorate and personalize to your heart's content! Here are a few ideas my students came up with:

For the mom who loves frying eggs.

Can you guess what this mom does for a living?

If you guessed works for a pharmaceutical company, you were right! ...Yes, that is a little blue pill.

This mom is a dentist. Look at all those bleeding cavities! (Yes, they are supposed to be bleeding cavities, I was assured by the artist)

For the mom who loves to travel the world.

This family has pet rabbits.

Apparently this child's mom is Donnie Darko.

I asked this boy what the little fellow on the right was supposed to be. He just giggled and said, "I have no clue!" Fair enough.

To package our creations, we used cardstock with slits cut in it to create little cards to slip our clips into.

Quick, easy and absolutely adorable. This is a project I highly recommend!!

Quick Project: Ironing Board Cover

2010-04-26T07:00:00.000-07:00

Oh how I love it when I finish a project that is both useful and beautiful! There really wasn't much to making this new cover for my ironing board. Last winter I accidentally ironed some Wonder Under onto the board, so every time I tried to iron something over that spot it got glued down.

Which didn't work too well.

This Alexander Henry print just makes me smile and smile and smile, so it was a natural choice to replace the old cover! I just pulled off the old fabric cover and used it as a pattern to cut my new piece. I even reused the drawstring cord that holds the cover tight.

Love it!

Spring Purse

2010-04-25T18:57:00.001-07:00

I found my holy grail! ...And then turned it into a purse!

Turns out that amazing fabric I saw but couldn't find at the Sewing Expo was from a Kokka line called Echino... the design is called Birdsong. It's a railroaded print, which means that the design runs the width of the fabric:

I treated this amazing fabric like four different fabrics. The birds became the centerpiece of each side of the bag, framed by the dark green variegated leaves on either side. The aqua birds rose above it all at the top of the bag, and the lime green leaves provided the straps. I was able to make the bag with a yard of fabric, and some very careful, fussy cutting.

For the lining, I used another Echino fabric, called Tiger on the Flower. I like the little tiger hidden inside my purse - he looks up at me every time I dig for my keys.

The bag pattern is Sherbet, a Melly & Me design. Because the fabric I used was so stiff, and I was using it both inside and outside the bag, I skipped the fusible interfacing. I also haven't installed a magnetic closure yet, although I plan to.

Oh how I love it when a dream is fulfilled!!

Happy Birthday to Me!

2010-04-24T15:27:00.001-07:00

Holy mackerel, look at this haul! I'm 28 today, and I got to wake up early to go to a class. Boo.

But! I came home and my DH had cleaned the house and the sun was shining and I had a stack of presents on the table!

My MIL gave me this so cute vintage sewing shelf. See the cute little pegs for spools??

My sweetie pie gave me the little snippers (yay, no more fumbling for scissors when I'm sewing!) and the Regretsy book.

My dad and stepmom Janice (hi Janice!) gave me the 2 sewing books and the button book. Have I mentioned that for the last 6 months I've almost bought this button book every time I went to Pacific Fabrics? Yahoo for fulfilled wishes!!

Of course, I got lots of other exciting presents too, but these are the ones that pertain to making stuff (since this blog pertains to making stuff).

Now I'm going to watch Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, all of the Anne of Green Gables movies (hi again, Janice!), and then go stuff myself silly with sushi with some of my favorite people in the world.

Love you all!

An Earth Week Project (Sort Of)

2010-04-23T07:37:00.000-07:00

In my classroom we play a lot of math games. One of the current favorites is a probability game called the Block-Drawing Game. The kids just love it - they play it every day, and they could play for hours. The only problem is that the Block-Drawing Game calls for a bag, and the paper bags we've been using are getting pretty trashed:

Since this week is Earth Week, I decided to make up some cloth bags to replace our sad, worn-out bags. They're a lot more durable, and will last a lot longer before needing replacement!

These are just simple bags, sewn from two 11" by 9" rectangles. Then I added quarter-inch-wide elastic in the mouths, to hold the bags closed and keep the kids from peeking in.

Do you want to play the Block-Drawing Game? Here are the rules!

You will need:

-Your beautiful new bag

-Small objects that are the same size and shape, but different colors. In my room we use Unifix cubes, but you could use superballs, beans, slips of paper, or whatever you've got laying around.

This is a 2-person game.

Person 1 chooses 5 objects, and notes their colors. For example, I picked 3 blues, 1 green, and 1 yellow.

Without looking into the bag, Person 2 draws one cube out of the bag, records the color on a piece of paper, puts a tally mark next to it, and replaces the cube. Person 2 continues drawing blocks and tallying the colors drawn, until he or she is ready to guess the contents of the bag. If the guess is right, then Person 2's score is the number of draws (so if she drew 6 times before guessing right, her score is 6).

Then switch jobs! Lowest score wins.

Have fun!

A Gift from Across the Pond

2010-04-21T07:59:00.001-07:00

Look what I got in the mail yesterday!!

...All the way from the U.K...

An adorable little present from Ali, of snipsnaphappy (go check it out, for photos that will make you drool!). A few weeks ago I sent Ali one of my fabric cocktail rings, and she sent me this!

Clearly, I got the better deal. :)

Just look at the adorable details on the back of this darling little doll!

She looks right at home to me. Ali, THANK YOU!!

...And what's her name? :)

Pattern Holder

2010-04-11T16:07:00.000-07:00

I just wanted to show you the cute new pattern holder I just finished for my sewing room. It's a vintage mail sorter that was in pretty rough shape- the paint was unsalvageable, so I got it for relatively cheap.

I gave it a new coat of spray paint, then hot-glued pom-pom trim onto it to add a little pizzazz.

Aaahh... is there anything better than a project that turns out just right on a sunny spring day??

A Lovely Little Fruit Bowl

2010-04-06T08:04:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I am just amazed at what you can find in thrift stores. Several months back I came across Vanessa Christenson's blog, V and Co. One of my favorite posts on her site was one where she made this adorable fruit bowl out of a couple of items she had around her house.

From then on, I kept my eyes peeled for pieces I could glue together to make something similar. Imagine my surprise Sunday when I found both exact items she used - the silver basket and the glass candle holder - at the same thrift store!! Seriously, go look at her version, then look at mine. They're the exact same! How weird is that?

So all I can guess is that either she lives near me and made a donation, or the thrift store fairies were on my side. Should you wish to make your own, it couldn't be easier. Here's how:

All you need is something that can work as a stand, something that can work as a bowl, and crazy glue. It's really fun going to Value Village and stacking various bowls and wine glasses, looking for that perfect combination.

I like this crazy glue that goes on like nail polish - so easy to use!

Press together to bond.

Voila!

Button Tack Tutorial

2010-04-04T22:48:00.000-07:00

Well, my fancy new bulletin board is looking so pretty that I just couldn't use plain old thumbtacks on it! So tonight I got crafty and made these button tacks to use, and they really add a nice touch! Here's a tutorial if you want to make your own. Look at me! I'm tutorial cuh-raazy!

To start, you'll need:

-thumb tacks

-buttons

-hot glue gun

-embroidery thread

-needle

-ribbons, rick-rack, other embellishments (optional)

This is a nice way to showcase your fanciest buttons!

To start, sew a few stitches of embroidery thread through your buttons. To do this, thread a needle, but don't tie a knot. Start stitching back-to-front, but don't pull your thread all the way through - leave a tail hanging off the back of the button. Sew a few Xs through the button, then finish up with the needle on the back. Use the tail you left in the beginning to tie off the loose ends, then trim.

Hot-glue a thumb tack to the back of each button. Press the tack down hard, and watch it to make sure it dries flat - the tacks kind of wanted to tip sideways, which would have made my finished tacks look wonky.

While gluing, you can also add snippets of ribbon, rick-rack, or whatever to make even fancier button tacks!

Let cool and dry, and you're all done!

Fabric Covers for Your Easter Baskets

2010-04-03T19:13:00.000-07:00

I realize this tutorial is a bit last-minute, but I only finished this project myself moments ago! I like making Easter baskets for my family, but I only made it to the store this afternoon. Not surprisingly, the baskets were pretty picked over, and all that was left were the scraggly, el cheapo baskets.

Not to worry though! Here's a quick and super easy way to turn flimsy $1.99 baskets into personalized, homemade-ish baskets of goodness.

Here's what I started with:

My inspiration came from the fact that one of the baskets had this corny fabric cover on it, that was easily removed:

Take a moment to notice the seam allowance. On mine, it was 1/4" - you'll need to know this when you're sewing.

Once the cover was off, I picked apart all the seams:

So that I had three pieces, like this:

These pieces became my pattern pieces. Next, I pinned them to my fabric and cut new pieces:

I treated the lace on the originals like they were just part of the fabric, since I didn't want to add embellishments on my version (but wanted to keep the length).

I then sewed the pieces together exactly as they had been on the original, using that 1/4" seam allowance I noted earlier. I was happy to see that it fit my basket just right!

The last step was to sew on ribbons that I could use to tie the cover in place.

(You can see in this picture that I didn't exactly use my best sewing skills on this project. The point is QUICK though, right?? :) )

Now your basket is ready to fill with Easter goodies!

Baby Kitty just couldn't stay away from all those rolly eggs.

I made a second cover exactly as shown above, and used it to cover the outside of the other, smaller basket on the right (refer to the photo at the beginning of the tutorial to see the "before"). All you do is turn the cover right side out, set the basket inside, tuck the edges into the basket, and cover with Easter grass and goodies!

Happy Easter everybody!

A Pretty Little Bulletin Board

2010-04-03T07:00:00.000-07:00

My first project for my sewing room is done! I wanted a bulletin board where I could tack up the patterns I'm working on, color swatches, inspiration photos, etc. Naturally, I couldn't use any old bulletin board, so I whipped this up using some of Amy Butler's Love collection I got at the Sewing Expo.

I started with a bulletin board I found at Goodwill. I think it's this one from Storables, although I paid much less for mine!

I sanded up the black frame, since it was pretty shiny and I wasn't sure the paint would stick to it. Then I put on several coats of ivory-colored acrylic paint. I didn't have to worry about keeping this neat, since I knew I'd be covering the cork part.

Next, I carefully measured the cork part. I cut a piece of my fabric to the exact size (or so I thought... more on that in a minute). I made sure to iron my fabric really really well before going any further!

Then, I masked off the wooden frame with blue tape and sprayed all of the cork with a good coat of spray adhesive. I laid my fabric down and smoothed out all the bubbles.

At this point, my plan needed some readjustment. I thought I'd be done after this step, but I should have known better. Despite my careful measurement, there were still weird gaps along the border of the fabric where the cork showed through. So I went to my handy-dandy ribbon jar (I don't have any photos of these last steps because I was kind of improvising).

I found a pink grosgrain that matched pretty well, and used fabric glue to glue the ribbon all along the inside of the frame. This covered the gaps up nicely.

Last, I glued 4 little green buttons in the corners, to cover up the places where I joined pieces of ribbon.

This board looks so great against my freshly-painted white walls. It's the focal point of the room at the moment, because it's so colorful. I'm planning to give it some little wall friends soon though!

Sewing Room Finished

2010-04-02T16:25:00.000-07:00

Hooray! The sewing room is functional (if not completely done). I still have a few more projects to go - a bulletin board for my inspiration wall, a fabric cover for the chair, curtains... but my Singer is plugged in and ready to go. Remember, I started with this:

Here are a few more images from my new favorite room in the house:

The perfect spot for a stormy day like today.

What I've Been Working On

2010-04-01T20:44:00.000-07:00

I'm not quite ready for the big reveal yet, but here are some sneak peeks into my big project this Spring Break:

I should be done in the next day or two, and DH has even offered to let me use his work DSLR to take the final pics, so stay tuned...

A Day Amongst the Daffodils

2010-03-30T17:56:00.001-07:00

Today I went to the Tulip Festival! I wore my daffodil headband, and I made my mom this little daffodil pin to wear. Needless to say, we were very well dressed for the occasion.

A few of the beautiful bouquets I brought home.

Pretty much anywhere I go in my house right now there's a little tulip or daffodil bouquet. I love this time of year!

Sunny Daffodil Headband Fascinator

2010-03-29T18:14:00.000-07:00

It's Spring Break, which means one very important thing to me: it's Tulip Festival time! Despite my decidedly brown thumb, I love going to the Tulip Festival every year and coming home with buckets full of cut and potted daffodils and tulips. The potted ones don't last long, but they're pretty while they do!

Anyway, tomorrow is the big day, and I just happened to have seen this fabulous tutorial on A Hoot and a Holler* for felt daffodils. I turned mine into a headband fascinator. Here's how you can make your own!

First, use the tutorial to make three daffodils. Mine are about 2.5" wide. I used three different color-combos, representing my favorite Washington varieties!

Next, use a store-bought headband for a base. I had one that had a strip of black velvet on the underside to create a no-slip zone. I peeled this off before I started and set it aside:

Working a few inches at a time, hot-glue a strip of green fabric to your headband. You want to center the fabric strip on the top side.

I used a strip of fabric that was a little more than twice the width of the headband, and about 2 inches longer.

Fold each fabric end up and glue to the underside of the headband:

Fold the fabric under on both edges. Work one side at a time, a few inches at a time. Don't go overboard on the hot glue, or you'll get unsightly lumps. Try to keep everything smooth like Shaft.

Once everything is glued down nice and smooth, glue the velvet strip you set aside earlier back onto the underside of the headband. It'll cover up the seams and make this a no-slip headband:

Last, hot glue the three daffodils into position. I had to keep checking the position in the mirror to get them just right.

Hooray! Daffodils I can't kill!

*By the way, I have a couple of shout-outs for A Hoot and A Holler. First, can I just say that the owl on your blog banner is killing me?? It's so cute I want to get it tattooed on my hand so I can look at it all day. Second, I always admire a fellow blurry-photo blogger. Even your blurry pics are infinitely prettier than mine, but nonetheless I like seeing the blur boldly posted! I think we should start a blurry photo movement... they're artsy! Yeah, that's the ticket...

Crafty Cocktail Rings

2010-03-26T08:21:00.000-07:00

Here's a quick and silly project that I had lots of fun with last night!

These are just fabric-covered buttons I made with some of my favorite fabric prints. If you've never made fabric-covered buttons before, go out and do it now. You can find all the supplies you need for cheap at a fabric store. It is so fun and easy and addictive.

After I made the buttons, I pulled off the little loop at the back of the button where you would normally sew the button on. This is just a bent piece of wire that is easily popped out with pliers.

Last, I hot-glued the buttons onto some adjustable ring blanks I bought on Etsy. Finding the ring blanks was the hardest part - Michaels totally let me down. Thank goodness for Etsy.

So I went a little crazy and made 10 of these happy little cocktail rings. My favorite is the pirate cat - it's from the Tokidoki-esque fabric I used on my sleep shorts last winter.

I have no idea what to do with these now. If you're a friend who reads my blog and you want one, just let me know and it's yours! :)

Sewing Table Reclamation (part two)

2010-03-21T11:37:00.001-07:00

When we last saw our brave-but-clueless heroine, she had just purchased a ganky old desk from Goodwill on a whim. She decided not to let her lack of experience or general know-how stop her from transforming the desk into the perfect sewing table. In our last installment, she had just finished priming the table.

Next went on two coats of a beautiful, creamy gray paint.

I wanted the inside of the drawer to be a little pop of color, so I gave it a couple of coats of the same orange-sherbet that I painted my bedroom.

My last step was to toss the ugly old wooden drawer pulls it came with and replace them with these gorgeous glass ones from Anthropologie:

And... voila! My perfect new sewing table. Now we can have our dining room table back!

What's my next step you ask? Repainting and repurposing our office to become a sewing room befitting this sewing table. Here's my inspiration, the gorgeous sewing room of Laura Gunn of Paint in My Hair:

...drool...

...Aaaaand here's what I'm starting with (sorry for the blur... maybe you're better off not being able to see this room clearly):

Don't judge me.

Sewing Table Reclamation! (part one)

2010-03-21T10:29:00.000-07:00

Oh man... the dangers of being impulsive and having no concept of my own limits...

Sunday morning I got a wild hair and headed out to Value Village early. I was kind of tickled that because of daylight savings they were opening (what felt to me like) a hour early. Turns out that opening time is also when all the oddballs show up... like the creepy old man buying three music boxes and a volleyball, "for his girlfriend."

Anyway, I almost overlooked this desk, hiding as it was behind two metal filing cabinets and a cd tower:

Now, this photo actually camouflages the damage done to the desk, but wow - look at that potential! I just loved the shape and size. The finish was shot, and there were some beautifully tragic painted flowers that someone had apparently tried to gouge out with a butter knife, but there were no major knicks and the whole thing was sturdy.

It was $20 (pretty steep for a Value Village!), but I had a 20% off coupon from donating items that I used, and the cashier let me layer that on top of the 40% off yellow tag sale they were doing.

The weird thing was, I knew right away what I would do with it. After a quick stop at the hardware store, I got busy. First, two coats of primer. Can I just say that I love primer with stainblockers? It meant that I didn't need to sand or strip or do a darn thing before priming! Woot!

To be continued...

Yum Yum Spring Sprout Cake

2010-03-18T08:25:00.001-07:00

Yesterday was my Mom's birthday (Happy Birthday Mom!). She's about the most passionate gardener I know, so I just knew I wanted to throw her a spring/garden party. The centerpiece were these potted chocolate cakes. Yes, those are cakes! If you want to make your own, here's the how-to:

Here's what you'll need:

-Boxed chocolate cake mix (or you could be fancy and make from scratch)

-Chocolate frosting

-Chocolate dirt (I got mine from a cake supply store), or crushed oreos

-Chocolate rocks (again, cake supply store)

-Mint sprigs

-4 new terra-cotta pots, washed thoroughly

-aluminum foil

Start by making your cake batter:

To prepare the pots, first line each one carefully with aluminum foil. You want to press the foil all the way down into the pot, and make sure it comes all the way up the sides. This is kind of tricky, because the foil wants to rip. I discovered it worked best to make a sort of foil torpedo, then shove that down into the pot and smooth up the sides.

You don't want any foil showing, so now tear off the extra foil that hangs out the top:

Fill the pots about 2/3 of the way full with chocolate cake batter. You won't use all the batter, so I guess I could have made 5 cakes.

Put the pots onto a cookie sheet and bake according to your box directions (or recipe, whatever). Keep an eye on the time though - mine took about 35 minutes, but I kept checking because I wasn't sure what the terra cotta pots would do to the bake time.

While I waited, I decorated the table all spring-like:

When the cakes come out of the oven, let them cool thoroughly.

To decorate, first frost with the chocolate frosting, then sprinkle with your chocolate/Oreo "dirt." Adorn with chocolate rocks, and stick a healthy-looking mint sprig in the top.

Dig in! The best part is, there's a built-in party favor here: your guests get to take home terra cotta pots ready for spring planting when they finish their cake! By the way, the portions are kind of huge, so you could also plan to share each sprout cake.

This recipe compliments a glass of champagne nicely. Happy Spring!

Baby Quilt Completed

2010-03-14T22:08:00.001-07:00

Sunday I finished the baby quilt I've been working on. Remember all my little sandwiches? Well, the next step was to stitch an X through each one, like so:

Now all my little sandwiches would hold together!

Then, I stitched all the sandwiches into strips, then stitched the strips together. I used a half-inch seam allowance, and just let the seams stick out on the back. Here's what the front looked like:

Here's the back:

After topstitching a half-inch border around the whole thing, I started to fringe all of those seams sticking out:

I fringed all the seams in the quilt as well. My hand is so mad at me after all those little cuts! I found hand muscles I didn't know I had.

The last step was to throw the quilt in the wash on a gentle cycle with Woolite, then put it in the dryer. The idea here was to fluff up all of those seams that I fringed. I pulled this little friend out of the lint tray when I was done:

Here's what it looked like when it was all done!

Here's a weird aside:

I started this quilt on a total impulse. I have no kids, and I didn't have anyone in mind to give this to. I just really liked the fabrics and the idea of making a quilt. This alone was strange, because I have had exactly zero interest in quilting my whole life, and now suddenly I must make this quilt?

Anyway, I started it on March 7th. March 10th I learned that a teacher at my school had adopted a baby - she and her husband had been trying to adopt, and the whole thing came together in three days. The baby was a little boy, and he was born on March 7th - the day I started the quilt.

Maybe I'm reading too much into this, but I just feel so strongly that this quilt was meant for this little baby, and it is en route to him as we speak. Obviously, no one threw the parents a baby shower before his arrival, so I don't know how many items like this the baby has right now. The fact that I started a baby boy's quilt with no idea why and then this all just sort of fell into place... well. I happen to think that's pretty darn cool!

Why Should Girl Scouts Have All the Fun?

2010-03-14T07:24:00.000-07:00

I had so much fun making my Lucky Merit Badges last week that I decided to go ahead and make some non-holiday-related merit badges for a friend. Let's see if anyone can guess who these are for!

This is the DSLR Merit Badge, awarded to her because she has totally taught herself to take beautiful photos in only a few months! It is also, incidentally, a persistence award. You see, every time she goes anywhere, she takes her camera and shoots pictures. Her husband finds this very annoying and tries to stop her. But she doesn't, and I'm glad! I like seeing her pics.

This is the Creepy Halloween Cupcakes award. Last Halloween this friend and I made goodies for our staff lounge at work. She found so many cute and creepy ideas for baked goods, and we had a blast! The most memorable were some eyeball cupcakes we made. They looked like this:

These are not our cupcakes, although ours did look just like these. Photo courtesy of Samantha's Sweet Treats.

Finally, here is the Yellow House Merit Badge. Given not only to a person who has worked tirelessly to turn a charming house into a ridiculously-charming house, but also to the person who writes one of my favorite blogs, In a Yellow House.

Okay, have you guessed yet?

If you want to make your own merit badges, just follow the tutorial linked in my Lucky Merit Badges post, but instead of stitching on the clover use fabric glue to attach whatever you want. I used fabric glue instead of stitching on these because I had so many very small pieces I wanted to add in felt, like the chimney on the yellow house.

New Daylight Savings Time... New Blog Look!

2010-03-13T21:31:00.000-08:00

I didn't really change my blog look because of daylight savings. I just was tired of the buttons on the old format getting in the way of the posts, so I was ready for a change!

It's been quite a process today. I got up early this morning with a bee in my bonnet about my blog layout. I started out by using Kevin and Amanda's very clear tutorial on creating your own scrapbook layout. I just never really like the pre-made freebie layouts... lots of shabby chic and distressed ribbon. Which is fine, but not my style. I made this:

Which I still like okay, but when I went to apply it to the blog the owls lost a lot of resolution and the yellow field wasn't quite the right size. Oh well, back to the drawing board!

I spent another couple of hours flipping through more free sites, and saw a lot of shabby chic spring-themed options.

Finally, I headed to trusty old Etsy, and found Keshia of Urban Design Studio 1, who set me up with the super cute Anthropologie-inspired theme you now see here.

Ahhh... the satisfaction of getting what you wanted after a long day of frustration!

Behind the Blog: The Making of the 3 Bears

2010-03-13T08:02:00.000-08:00

Last weekend I dropped all 3 of my lovely little bears. Now, you should know that the idea and directions for these adorable bears came from the wonderful book, Sew Darn Cute:

You should go out and buy this book, right now! It is full of adorable, crafty inspiration. The first project I did was the Square Bear. I modified the cut measurements a little because I wanted to use up some felt scraps. Because I was using scraps, I made the back of each bear a complimenting color, and the front a color that a real bear could reasonably be. For example, Mama Bear is brown on front, and pink on back.

I also had to make my bears legless, because I didn't have enough felt.

Here are the bears starting to take shape. You can see that I needed to trim the bodies down, or these would have been some big fat bears!

I also loved getting to pick out buttons for the faces and bodies. I might have bought slightly more than I really needed for this project. Oh well, there will be other projects...

Toy Drop: Mama Bear

2010-03-12T06:47:00.000-08:00

I dropped Mama Bear last weekend, at the Pinehurst Playfield in North Seattle. I got a kick out of dropping her there, because this playground was a huge part of my childhood. It's about 3 blocks from my elementary/middle school, so we went on walking field trips there all the time.

There's this apple tree in the playfield that I used to just love. I'd lay under it and stare up at the branches and pretend that I was Anne of Green Gables on a school picnic with Gilbert Blythe. I wanted to put Mama Bear under that tree, since it's all blooming and pretty right now. There were a lot of people there though, and I lost my nerve. As you can see, I just kind of snuck up and stuck her at the entrance to the park, then ran back to my car and made my getaway. :)

Well that's it- the three bears are all dropped! I'll be posting a tutorial-ish thing soon if you want to make your own happy little square bears.

Lucky Merit Badges

2010-03-11T07:18:00.000-08:00

Just in time for St. Patrick's Day, I finished these little clover pins from the tutorial at Stitcher Scribbler. They turned out so cute, and they were really simple to make. I think my favorite part is that I learned how to do a good blanket stitch using Futuregirl's wonderful how-to.

Maybe I just have Girl Scouts on my mind because it's cookie season, but these really remind me of merit badges. They were so fun to make that I was thinking it would be fun to make more little felt pins for friends and family, celebrating the things that make them awesome. How cute would one if these pins be with a camera on it, or a Mr. Sketch marker (I'm looking at you, Chels)? A gardening trowel or frisbee for my mom? A reporter's notebook for my husband? The possibilities are endless!

Toy Drop: Baby Bear

2010-03-10T07:20:00.000-08:00

I dropped Baby Bear off at Maple Leaf Park last weekend. I love the little guy, but I will say this...

...I hope his new family has a soft spot for wall-eyed bears.

Quilt in Progress

2010-03-09T06:30:00.000-08:00

This is nothing I can take credit for - I just wanted to share a few photos of Chelsea's beautiful quilt-in-progress.

Please note that this is her first quilt. Way to go, you quilting kidney work wife!

Sandwich Day

2010-03-08T07:00:00.000-08:00

Saturday Chelsea and I got together for another craft day. Both of us got quilt fixins' at the sewing expo, and we were eager to get together for our first ever quilting bee.

For Chelsea, the theme of the day ended up being "I can do it!" - more on her amazing quilt later!

For me, the theme was "sandwiches." Less inspiring.

My quilt is kind of unique. Instead of piecing together the front, then layering it with batting and a backing, each square is layered with all three pieces like a sandwich, then the sandwiches are stitched together.

Step one: cut a whole busload of 7" squares.

108, to be exact.

Step two: cut half a busload of 6" batting squares:

Step three: make little sandwiches. The fabric is the bread. The batting is the meat.

Make 54 of those little suckers:

Step 4: eat a sandwich and call it a day.

Stay tuned for more on this exciting project.