A Special Quilt from Heaven

The story behind this quilt is a wonderful one, but I don't have time to write it tonight! I promise I will get some great pictures and tell this neat story by Saturday. My son arrives early in the morning from Honduras and I will not be thinking about my blog tomorrow. : )

***UPDATE*** The story is HERE!

The Manly Man Quilt is Done!!! Woohoo!!

Yay! The Manly Man quilt is done!!! With even a few days left before my son gets home!

It’s been raining today and I wish the sun was shining for some good pictures, but here’s some pictures anyway. It’s a twin-size bedspread so my kids are holding it sideways, trying to keep it off of the wet grass.

Since this is a manly quilt, I decided to quilt it with simple lines. I’ve heard the term ‘organic lines’ and if that means the lines are not necessarily straight, then these lines are definitely organic! : )

Aaahhh… soft yummy minky on the back. (This picture doesn’t show the true color of the brown minky. The one below is a more accurate color.)

I realize that the gift of a homemade bedspread for a 21 year old son may not be the most meaningful thing to him, but I sure had fun making it for him and it was meaningful to me!

Needing a miracle…

Aaaaack!!! How is a woman supposed to sew in a disaster like this???

Ugh. The work continues… That whole pile of stuff was in, under, and on a desk that was in the far left corner of the room, but the desk had to go to the garage to help make space in this room for a bed for my son! (Yes, I’ve asked my son who will be coming home from Honduras in 5 days to share his bedroom with my sewing machine, and hence –me- when I’m sewing. After 21 years of motherhood I finally have a sewing room and I’m not very willing to give it up! He was so sweet though and said he would sleep anywhere. After all, he’s just going to move out again in August.)

So, that pile is there - - staring at me - - glaring at me - - just daring me to figure out what to do with all that STUFF! Ugh. Not my favorite thing to do. So, in the next few days I hope to experience a miracle, similar to the parting of the Red Sea. Wherein the Stuff finds a home, my sewing machine/table/accoutrements migrate to the left side where the desk was, and a bed appears for my son to sleep on for the summer. All nice and clean and very usable, without stressing me out! Wish me luck!

I made enough room to actually quilt this puppy today. Do you like my ultra fancy quilting gloves? I found them at Walmart in the gardening department of all places. ; )

Reconstruction and a Play!

This last week my three youngest kids were in the play “Mulan Jr.” and they did such a great job! The whole cast really did well with it all. It was so fun to watch!

The costumes were absolutely amazing! They were so beautiful and well done. In a picture below you can see the amazing detailed embroidery on my daughter’s Cricket costume.

My oldest son was given a costume that was a little small for him. He struggled at every dress rehearsal to get the shirt on and off, and ended up ripping the seams under the arms with his efforts. I asked the costume lady if it would be alright if I put in some inserts under the arm and down the side seams and she said to go for it. The inserts increased the width of the shirt about 6” and it really helped him be able to make his scene changes more on time. : )

Here’s my cute actors! L-R Shang soldier (also a Mushu dancer), the Cricket (also a Mushu dancer and an Umbrella dancer), and a Hun soldier (also the Emporer and a Mushu dancer).

Bridesmaid Dress done and Manly Man topped!

I finally did it! I got the bridesmaid dress done and it looks really good, if I do say so myself! : ) Although I cut it out and started sewing a bit on it Saturday, I didn't have time to touch it again at all until Wednesday, and then only for an hour. So, Thursday came and I had a sewing marathon, in between other sundry things... Then finally, at 11:20 pm, I finished it! The wedding was today and so rather than take a picture of the finished dress on a hanger, I took the picture of it on the lovely bridesmaid! (BTW, the tall handsome fella in the back is my second oldest son : )

And then today I finished the Manly Man quilt top!

So now, somewhere in between the 2 trillion dress rehearsals for the play my three youngest kids are in, and their 3 performances next week, and all the other end-of-the-school-year stuff that happens all in May, I will go see if I can find some fabric to buy for the backing and get this done! I’m down to 1 week and 6 days before my oldest son comes home from his mission! Yay! Besides needing to get this quilt done before he gets home, I also have to get him a bed to put it on! Yikes! Yes, it will be a busy couple of weeks!

“We interrupt this program…”

Last night I had some time so I sewed on my Manly Man quilt for my soon-to-be-home son. (2 weeks and 5 days!!!) I was able to get the bricks sewn together and into their six rows and ironed.

I thought I might get the top all sewn today, but then I got a phone call from a dear friend of mine. Her daughter is getting married next Friday and there had been someone arranged to sew one of the bridesmaids dresses for the bride’s sister, but their availability fell through. So, my friend called me and asked if I might be able to sew the dress for her daughter. I went over to her house to look at the pattern and the fabric to see if it was something I felt I could do, and well, it is! So, I have taken a break from the Manly Man quilt and am now sewing a pretty bridesmaid dress out of beautiful pink satin!

I got it all cut out today and a good chunk of the bodice done tonight. I hope to get it done by Wednesday. We'll see how it goes!

Proud Mama!!!

I started my daughter in sewing lessons in March. She is 6 1/2 years old and for a few months prior to March I had been having her sit on my lap occasionally to do some simple sewing with me. Then I heard from a friend of mine that her daughter, who is about the same age as mine, was taking sewing lessons. I thought to myself, "I know how to sew, I can teach my daughter." But as I thought more about it, I just couldn't get past the idea of letting her sew at the sewing machine by herself, controlling the foot peddle herself. So, I decided to sign her up for sewing lessons and let another lady who was braver than me get her started on her own.

She has done so well! She just took to the sewing machine like she belonged there and has been very careful and attentive. In just a few weeks she's made her own pillow case and a skirt! She's learned how to use a serger, too! These pictures are her with her sewing teacher, who is AMAZING!

At her last lesson on Tuesday, she got her skirt almost finished. All she had left to do was make the casing and insert the elastic. So today we sat down to do that. I was so brave! I let her sit at the sewing machine by herself! I showed her how to make a casing and how to insert the elastic and she sewed it all together! She's so awesome!

Now of course I had to take some pictures of her modeling her very first skirt and laying on her very first pillow case! : )

And yes, pink is her favorite color. : )

An Award! : )

So I guess I've been out of the loop for a while! In coming back into the loop, I find that my dear friend Marion of MyQuiltDiet.blogspot.com has awarded me the Liebster Award! Wow! Thanks Marion! What a kind thing to do!

"The Liebster award (German for favourite/dearest) is to showcase bloggers with fewer than 200 followers. Upon accepting the award the recipient must then pass it on to five more blogs of note. A way of introducing other bloggers to the blogs they enjoy."

The acceptance conditions are :
1. Thank your award presenter on your blog and link back to him/her
2. Copy and paste the award to your blog
3. Present the Liebster Award to 5 blogs that you think deserve to be recognized.
4. Let them know by leaving a comment on their blog.
5. Have faith that your followers will spread the love too!

So, my next job is to pass this awesome award on to others! So here's where I feel very sheepish... See, I haven't been in blogland for very long so I don't have five blogs to pass this award on to! However, I know of two awesome blogs that deserve this award...
(Drum Roll Please!)

~April at http://april-makingendsmeet.blogspot.com

~Shauna at http://bookdivabooks.blogspot.com

These are great blogs! Go over and see for yourself! : )

Back Atcha Marion!

So Marion has been so kind with her words today on her awesome blog MyQuiltDiet.blogspot.com, that I thought it only fair to tell everyone a few neat things about her!

Besides being an amazing, energetic, wonderful person, she is also the one who first inspired me to start quilting! Yup, just over 21 years ago, about the time when she was expecting her first baby and I had just had my first baby (I think the timing is right, Marion?) anyway, she was trying real hard to not go nuts during the last couple of weeks before her baby was due and she needed something to do. So, she made me a patchwork quilt for my new baby boy! It was so cute! I wish so badly I still had it, I have no idea where it's gone to! But it was made out of cute blue fabric and she made it in a snap (as you can imagine if you follow her blog!)

I was so intrigued by it and she told me all about how to do it, so later on I made one for that same son's 1st birthday.

And so it started.... I was hooked! : )

I do have this beautiful cross-stitch sampler that Marion made for me years ago and it still hangs on my bedroom wall. It's so pretty, I love it!

Marion is amazing and she has always held a special place in my heart!

Oh Baby!

I made this baby quilt a couple of weeks ago during Spring Break - it was the first quilt I made with my renewed determination to be a quilter (again) and not let life get so busy that it gets pushed out of my life again!

And, this was the first quilt I did free-motion quilting on! Yikes! That was kinda scarey doing that for the first time. It doesn't look tooooo bad, but don't look too close! : )

And this was my first time doing a tumbler pattern. So cute! I was pleased that it was pretty simple to do, yet it gives a new and interesting look to regular patchwork.

 I don't know that I really care for the yellow on the back, it's just that I happened to have Lots of that yellow and figured I'd better use it!.

 

I FMQ using the stippling design, but as I got to the end I got brave and did a heart design on this purple square. Wow I was so brave! : )

And, my daughter saw that I had some leftover squares so she asked if I'd make her doll a little blanket. Of course! She moved the squares around on the carpet until she found a design that she liked. She chose the "bows" look. She loves it. : )