Baby Zig Zag Quilt

My husband has been to Mexico a few times for business and has become friends with Carlos, one of his company's clients. They have been super nice and welcoming. Carlos and his wife even helped Brian recover from an illness while he was down there. The couple is about to have their second baby, a girl, and we wanted to celebrate with them! We thought it would be a great idea to send them a baby quilt. I wanted to do something a little modern and non-traditional baby, so I opted for a rainbow colored zig zag. (It also doesn't hurt that I've been wanting to make a zig zag quilt and do something with ROYGBIV.) Luckily Pezzy Print by American Jane came out in a variety of colors.

I picked up the pattern Ziggy Baby from Cluck, Cluck, Sew a few months ago. It was great and had very clear directions. The only thing I had to watch out for was the direction of the pezzies. I wanted them to all go the same direction so I had to pay attention to which direction I was sewing. I did have one mishap, but it was easily fixed. For the back I used Sweet in Strawberry Power Pop by Jenean Morrison. It had most of the colors on the front and added a touch of baby girl to the quilt. For the binding I used Stripes in Pink, Sunny Happy Skies by Bella Blvd.

I followed the zig zag lines to quilt the top and really liked how it turned out. I finished it off with a simple label. Now everyone cross your fingers and pray it makes it to Mexico safely!

Stick Horse

The youth at my church are putting on a short skit this weekend. One of the scenes has a few cowboys. Well what's a cowboy without his horse? I looked around online and found a great source. Over at ikat bag, there is a great tutorial on how to make a horse. I whipped it up one night and had one of our YW make the other. They are really cute and super easy to put together. I used felt for the body, nose, and ears, buttons for eyes, yarn for the hair, rope for the bridle, and then stuffed that puppy (er, horse) with polyfill. I got the stick from Home Depot.

The kids even like it too! I'll have to cut the stick shorter for them, but at least they'll have a fun toy when this play business is over.

Kindle Case

Our first guild challenge was issued a month or so ago. We were each given 3 prints of Echo by Lotta Jansdotter to make something for ourselves. You could add more fabric if you wanted, but you had to use the fabric given. My wonderful hubby got us matching kindles for Christmas, so I made a case for mine. 

Kindle Case

I really love the spring buds in grey and the small spring buds in mustard. I knew these two would be my focus fabrics. I also wanted to add a little more something-something to the front, so I quilted around the buds. I quilted the top first before assembling the cover. This way the stitching doesn't show on the inside. I LOVE how it turned out.

Inside of Case

I used the scattered pods to make the kindle pocket. There's also room for a pen or stylus. I used some fabric I had for the binding and put a nice button on the front for the closure. It's a very fun case and I like carrying my kindle in style :)

Have you made any accessories for your toys? I'd love to see them.

flower hair pins

Have you heard of Pick Your Plum? It's a site that sells a different crafty item daily for super cheap. The only catch is you have to get to it before it's sold out. A few months ago I came across a listing for hair pins with flowers. All I had to do was glue the flowers on to the hair pin. Perfect! These are super cute and were super cheap. I gave some of them to "my" YW for helping with a service activity. They were thrilled. I have a few left and am just needing an occasion to hand them out.

Flower Hair Pins

These beauties arrived in the mail after winning a giveaway. Yes, I enter giveaways all the time. You should too. I win some and it's sooo much fun getting stuff in the mail.

These are Circa 52 in organic cotton by Birch Fabrics. Super cute. Any ideas what to do with them?

And here's my son with a little craftiness of his own. He had to make a poster or display using 100 items for the celebration of being in school 100 days. He made a temple using legos and I used my new Silhouette to make the sign in the back. He picked the font, but I glued and cut. He was very proud of his project.

New Goodies

I recently bought a few things for my sewing room that I love!  I saw these fabric organizers months ago and have had my eye on them since. I had some Christmas money to spend and jumped on the Internet to order them. I love them! I can see my fabric and don't have to pull out bins to look through each pile.

Fabric Organizers

I also pulled all of my fat quarters and precuts out of the boxes and set them on the other side of the shelf.

I highly recommend these fabric organizers. I couldn't afford to buy too many so I doubled and tripled the fabric I put on them.

A few patterns came in the mail recently. You'll see one is Swoon by Camille Roskelley. I just need to figure out which fabrics I want to use and I'll be on my way.  The other patterns are from Allison Harris of Cluck, Cluck, Sew.

I recently found a post on Elizabeth Hartman's blog Oh, Frannson! about how to make a design board. I loved how simple this was and took the hubby to Home Depot to get the supplies. He cut the board down so I would have a small one and a larger one. The small one is propped on the dresser and the larger one is currently behind the door. We just need to hang them up and we'll be done.

On the small design board is a quilt top for a baby doll quilt and two blocks for a charity quilt I made for the guild I'm a member of.

I hope you enjoyed a look at my new goodies. Did you get anything fun for Christmas?

Where have YOU been???

Right there? Waiting for me to come back from the void? Oh, okay. I'm back. So let me tell you what's been going on. My last post was about Halloween, so November is next. Not really sure what happened in November except Turkey Day. We went to the in-laws and had a blast.

Next up, Christmas.

My parents came for the holidays and we had tons of fun hanging out, shopping, and sight seeing. I made a couple of crayon rolls (like this) for gifts, but that was pretty much it. Santa did make a grand appearance at our house and I got a Silhouette Cameo and a Blendtec. Whaaatt!? (And ignore that price, we got a hook up at Costco.) I know, too much goodness. Guess I was really good this past year.

Now on to January and some new additions to the sewing room. I've started a few projects and joined a guild and signed up for my first race ever, a 10K. I'm ready for the new year and looking forward to trying new things. Like Swooning.

Jennifer at Twin Fibers

 

See ya soon, hopefully ;)

Halloween

I hope everyone had a fun, candy filled night! We had a fantastic time trick or treating and stayed out until 8:45! I'm sure some people were wondering why my kids were not in bed.

This year I was able to make costumes for my kiddos. My son wanted to be a ghost. I browsed the internet to find ideas for a ghost costume besides the sheet over the head deal. I used this spooky ghost costume as my inspiration and set out to make it awesome. Instead of using a sheet, I used two old white dress shirts. For the base layer I cut down the arms, cut out the neck, and seam ripped off the pocket. I ripped off the buttons and sewed the shirt closed, leaving a V opening at the top to make it easier getting on and off. I added a button and elastic to hold it closed.  I also cut off the bottom hem and made a few slits around the bottom. Next I cut strips of the second shirt and cheesecloth. I zigzag stitched two pieces of cheesecloth to one piece of shirt. I zigzagged each of the strips to the shirt until I was satisfied it was ghostly enough. I didn't want his dark shoes showing, so I made him some shoe covers out of white fleece. I got the idea from Tara.

My daughter said she wanted to be a butterfly and I thought, perfect! I'd saved some wings from a birthday party and had been meaning to make the tutu from Oliver + S: Little Things to Sew. I used pink, blue, 2 yellows, and purple tulle for the tutu and loved the way the colors played off each other. All I need to pick up was a white shirt to go with it. For the antenna, I glued a little ball to one end of a pipe cleaner. I then twisted the pipe cleaner around a head band.

I think their costumes were cute and they looked super cute in them!