My second apology

I could sit here and make up excuses all day but the fact of the matter is I've been completely ignoring my blog!  It's been a mix of internet issues, not crafting, and making friends.  Now my issues are solved, I'm going to make an effort to craft more, and my friend is going to help me with it.  EW is my new best friend over here and she has introduced me to the world of cloth diapering!  It's sooooooo much to learn but I am learning and I am liking it.  I always thought of putting Munchkin in cloth diapers (G-diapers to be exact) but when I tried to jump into it I realized it was waaay over my head so I decided not to.  But now that EW has been able to sit down and show me I'm really starting to understand!  So one night we were talking and I told her that I really wanted to try and make a cloth diaper and she totally spurred me on telling me it was a great idea.  So I gave it some thought and went through a list of materials in my head: cotton print, check; flannel, check; elastic, check; left over all natural cotton quilt batting....check!  The only thing I was missing was some velcro but that was all to easy to fix. We went to the thrift shop on post and I found an item with some good ol' fashioned white velcro!  So the next day I did some cutting and sewing and some seam ripping and some more sewing and viola!

I made a diaper.  It totally needs some improvements, like different elastic and pattern tweaking, but still, pretty effin good for a first try from stuff that was lying around!  Not to mention it looks uber cute on Munchkin's little tushie!  I fully plan on making more and refining my technique.

I also finally got my Michael Miller fabric and I do have to say it's super fabulous!  I got it all washed and today so now I'm off to start clipping my tangled mess of fabric!  Wish me luck!

Drum roll please...

Finally!  Here are the pictures from the Summer Breeze quilt!  I'm quite happy with the way it came except for the boo boos here and there.  I also apologize for the low quality pictures.  This was the first sunny day in like 3 days.  It also happened to be the day I needed to send it out and because I have trudge to the laundry mat on foot I opted out of lugging my nice camera there.  Why not take it home and take pictures of it you ask?  Simple answer: our post office is literally right across the street from the laundry mat, so camera phone it is!

Front

Close up of quilting

Back

I've got a couple of projects lined up next, but I'm not sure what order I'm going to complete them.  I got one of the Moda Sudoku kits.  I've already completed the puzzle and I'm sorry to say it wildly unsatisfying.  I mean us quilters deal with these kinds of puzzles every time we try to figure a layout for the quilt.  There were at least 2 lines that were only missing 1 number.  This puzzle was way too easy, I spent maybe 2-2.5 minuets. It is nice that it does come with the pre-cuts though.  This might end up being my cats quilt she seems to like laying on them, or she just likes laying on whatever I'm doing.

These are a bunch of fabrics I got in a care package from my in-laws.  Specifically this is from my SIL stash that she had put in the craft room for anyone to use.  I'm delighted to say I'm going to use several of these fabrics!  The solid white is a nice flannel that I'm going to make receiving blankets that I'm going to trim in the green floral.  I'm also planning on using the Alexander Henry fabric along with a purple velvet in some turtle plushies.  The other fabrics will probably sit in my stash until I get a stroke of creativity.

AND THESE FABRICS..... I'm super excited about!  The prints are from the new Michael Miller collection Peacock Lane.  I paired them with coordinating solids from Kona Cotton and I plan on doing a gray fleece backing.  My plan for these is a hexagon quilt I'm not sure how large it's going to be but I will probably use 3 inch hexagons.  I'm pretty excited about this because hear hexi's are addictive!  Not to mention I'm super in love with these fabrics!

Finally!

I finally got the Summer Breeze quilt done!  Well pretty much done, the last thing I need to do is run it through the wash again to get rid of the blue lines from the quilting.  Unfortunately that's going to have to wait for tomorrow because it's raining in buckets outside!  But fear not!  I do have pictures to share with you today!

I've been browsing around on the web and came across boatloads of embroidery things and it got me all excited!  I don't have much embroidery experience but I'm definatly gaining some.  A while ago I did some note cards for my SIL for her birthday.  The patterns I found were retro and I thought they fit her taste.  They mostly came out pretty cute, everyone enjoyed the cat clock one.  My down fall with this is I didn't take any pictures of the finished product.  :(  Anyway where this is all leading is I got both of the embroidery books that Aimee Ray put out.  I'm really in two minds about these books.  Yes they are very helpful, did I need both of them?  Absolutely not.  If there is anyone out there that's thinking about getting one of these books I would suggest going with Doodle Stitching the Motif Collection.  This book has pretty much exactly the same things as Doodle Stitching does only the projects are different and you get page after page of just designs, which is what I'm looking for in an embroidery book.  Doodle Stitching the Motif Collection also has the added bonus of coming with a CD that contains all the designs in convenient .tif files so you can size and edit to whatever your project calls for.  Although if I were putting books like these out I would make my second book for intermediate-advanced levels and show more intricate stitching rather than having the basics in both books.  One it sells more books and two those who would buy both books don't feel like they wasted money.

This is a design from the Motif Collection, it's a WIP

I made this card for a friend of mine.  She was in a car accident recently and is having a tough time with recovery.  I stuffed her box full of chocolate too!  I think the happy chocolate hippos were the perfect touch.  I can't take credit for the actual design, I Googled 'daisy bouquet' and 'bow' then used Photoshop to combine them.  I added a cute font to follow as well.  I decided to do this on fabric and then attach it to the card.  I haven't quite figured out how to do a proper satin stitch through paper.  I definatly really enjoyed making this.  I just hope she enjoys it as much as I do!

Just a random card I did a while back, can't remember where I found the design

Almost there

I feel terrible for not keeping up with my blog, maybe if I had more followers I'd be more inclined to update *hint hint wink wink*  No but really, I do feel bad specially because I have been working on things.  I'm nearly done with the Summer Breeze quilt although I guess I should call it the modified Summer Breeze.  I changed the layout of it and I think this way complements the fabric designs better.  I'm much happier with it now.  For the back I decided to piece the remaining cut pieces to form a long strip and then I put it off center.  I'm really happy with how the back came out.  The actual quilting, I took the star-burst design my SIL did on munchkin's quilt, I'd have to say it looks good and was much more fun than stitch in the ditch.  Also, to add a bit of interest to it I used a hot pink thread on the top and then just plain white on the bottom.  I made bias tape out of a coordinating green print with the same motif as the pink and white print.  I used my SIL tutorial for making bias tape to refresh my memory.  I attached the binding this morning thinking I got off scott free from any major mishaps.  Boy was I wrong.  I ended up being about 18 inches short of bias tape!!!!  This is when having a quilt shop with a decent  fabric selection would have been helpful.  I can't take the time to order more fabric and I didn't have enough of 1 print to make enough, so I ended up making some quick bias tape out of the pink and white with the same motif.  I think it gives my quilt erm.... character.  Yeah!  That's it, CHARACTER!  Well at least it's all the same pattern!  So now all I have left is hand sewing the bias tape and burying threads, I'll probably give it another wash too to get rid of the lines I used for quilting.  Hopefully I'll get a post up with some finished pictures tomorrow!

Ooo look a giveaway!

Hey guys AllFreeSewing.com is doing another one of their book giveaways.  This time it is Everything Alice by Hannah Read-Baldry and Christine Leech.  This book looks like a ton of fun.  It's perfect if you love whimsy and Alice in Wonderland related things.  It's also a great book for variety offering a bit of everything from sewing to baking in 50+ projects.  I think even if I don't win this I might buy it!  To enter this contest for yourself follow the white rabbit!  Ha ha I couldn't resist, just click here.

Also visit the website of the book EverythingAlice.co.uk.  They have a couple freebies on their site including some delicious looking red velvet cup cakes!

Picture courtesy of  EverythingAlice.co.uk

PS-  Tomorrow there will be a real post!

My back burns like the fires of hell!

The munchkin and I spent the entire day outside today at a pool.  At the community pool.  I'm really glad I can adapt well to different cultures because WOW the pool experience alone is a huge culture shock!  I remembered to put sunscreen on which is a step in the right direction however I didn't get my entire back so now I have a nice large lobster red area.  One step forward, two steps back.....


Today I'm going to share some handy Android apps with you.  These are all free apps.

The first of these apps is the Robert Kaufman Quilting Calculator.  This can be found here or by entering the search terms "quilting calculator" into the search box in the Android Marketplace.  This is by far the best app I own and I use it so frequently when I'm picking fabrics for my next project.  I really like this calculator because it offers so much in just one app.  Here is a rundown of the different calculations it can do.

Taken from the app description

Fabric Measurement Conversion: Converts between measurement in decimals and fractions.
Backing and Batting Calculator: Determines how much yardage from a bolt of fabric is needed to make the backing for a quilt.
Piece Count Calculator: Shows the number of fixed-sized pieces of fabric that may be cut from a larger piece.
Pieces to Yardage Area Calculator: Indicates how much fabric is needed in order to cut a given number of fixed sized pieces.
Binding Calculator: Tells you the amount of fabric required to bind your quilt based on the quilt’s dimensions and the binding strip width.
Border Calculator: Shows the amount of fabric required to create borders, based on a quilt’s dimensions and the width of the borders.
Square in a Square Calculator: Works out all the key dimensions of a square in a square block.
Set-in and Corner Triangle Calculator: Determines the size of the square piece you’ll need to cut in order to create both unfinished set-in triangles and unfinished corner triangles.

 

The next app is the "How Much Thread Does it Take" app by Superior Threads.  This can be found here or by entering the search terms "Superior Threads" into the search box in the Android Marketplace.  This app is only semi useful as it can't tell exactly how much thread you're going to need but it can give you a ball park.  Just follow the prompts it gives you and it might save you an extra trip to the quilt shop for more thread.

The third app is a "Thread Selection Guide" again by Superior Threads.  This can be found here or by entering the search terms "Superior Threads" into the search box in the Android Marketplace.  This app I don't think I've ever used other than playing around but I think this is mostly because I've never used Superior Threads.  I assume this would be a perfect app for beginners and those who don't know one type of sewing thread from another (like me!). 


I also have a color wheel app but to be honest I'm not that impressed with it so I'm not going to take the time to write about it.  There are a ton of color wheel apps out there, I say find one that's the easiest for you to understand.




Are there any other to-die for apps out there on the market?

Where has all the thread gone?

After all the washing, clipping, ironing, cutting, more ironing I go to start piecing and I can't find my thread!  It's missing in action.  Oh well, I guess I'll just have to go to the local craft store and get a new spool! :-)  But the good news is that I did all the washing clipping etc...  The one thing I hate about shopping online for fabrics is that you can't see in large scale with true colors what everything is going to look like all together.  I'm struggling with colors/prints working together in this quilt.  If I had gotten the chance to see everything all together I probably would have swapped around a few of the fabrics.  I'm at a place now where I am OK with them and the layout but by no means am I in love with this quilt.  I'd replace the fabrics I'm not happy with but I'm not trying to wait another 2 weeks for fabric for a quilt that technically needs to be done by the 10th.  Maybe this just is not a good quilt for this fabric.  Maybe it's just going to look terrible until it's done.  We'll just have to wait and see!

Sew Excited

I got my Wrenly fabric and the fabric for the Summer Breeze quilt in the mail today.  They are beautiful!  I ended up having to change one of the fabrics.  The floral print on the light blue background was supposed to be on a white background, but the store didn't have anymore of it.  I'm really not disappointed though it's still really pretty and works very well with the other prints.

Dream a Little Dream With Me for Summer Breeze Quilt

Valori Wells- Wrenly

I also placed some orders for some new things today!  I started with Amazon and got a couple new books including both of Aimee Ray's books Doodle Stitching and Doodle Stitching the Motif Collection.  I then went over to Pinkchalkfabrics.com (who is having a summer sale!) and picked up a couple patterns, some fabric, and a fabulous magazine I can't wait to get!  Any other books I should look into getting?

Inspiration

The munchkin and his Grand

So this past weekend I got to visit Venice again, only this time I did more looking with my eyes than my camera. The first time I went we walked around the city and along the water front and didn't really go inside anywhere, this time we went and visited the Doge's Palace and the Peggy Guggenheim Collection.  Walking through the Doge's Palace it's hard to believe that someone actually lived there and it functioned as a government center.  From floor to ceiling this place is filled with beautiful paintings of the Old World.  The armoury and the prisons were quite a site to see too!

View from the top floor of the Doge's Palace looking into the courtyard

View of Venice's outlying islands from the armoury at the Doge's Palace

Inside the courtyard at the Doge's Palace

Did I mention I got to go see the Guggenheim Collection??  It amazed me to see so many of the big names in art in one place.  I mean there was Salvador  Dalí, Pablo Picasso, Jackson Pollock, and so many more.  The inspiration that came pouring from these great works of art was immense!  I decided Theo van Doesburg would be my place to start.  His work Composition in Gray (Rag-time) translated really well into the quilting world.  This ended up being a very clean-lined, modern quilt and I cannot wait to make this.  This one is designed as a lap quilt, the center of it mimicking Doesburg's piece with a 3" black border all the way around to represent a frame.  I also think Robert Delaunay's Windows Open Simultaneously 1st Part, 3rd Motif would make a lovely pinwheel quilt.

My first apology

So this is my first apology to all of you.  I'm sorry I haven't been keeping up with posting but I've had a great couple of days!

I decided to simplify my blogs appearance, I enjoy this new look, it looks a lot less busy so I think it will be easier to focus on the crafts.  I got to spend a couple days with TH after he got back from a training rotation in Germany.  I got to go get furniture from IKEA (and I get to go back and get more!!) which was an adventure and a half.  My mother-in-law arrived in town (which is a good thing because my in-laws rock).  We celebrated my sons 1st birthday!

Let's see..... we'll start with my loot from IKEA.  I got some safety things to keep the munchkin from opening drawers he shouldn't and sticking fingers in sockets.  I got a tub mat that is shaped like an alligator.  I got 2 bedside lamps (I've already broken one :( ).  I got kitchen storage containers.  I got a pull out chair bed for the munchkin's room.  I got a dresser for mine and TH room.  I got a small book case for the entry way.  And last but certainly the best I got a work station for the craft room/guest room/ office/(no longer) room of despair!  The car we took was JAM PACKED.  Like you could not have gotten anything else in that car, I rode with my knees in my chest!  When we go back we're getting the bedside tables I forgot (which ended up being a good thing), a wardrobe, a replacement lamp, and another surface for the kitchen.  It was a pretty good haul overall.  I <3 IKEA.

The munchkin's birthday was a blasty!  I made and decorated the best boxed carrot cake ever!  It looked like a clown full of ninja turtles busted all over it.  We had a couple of TH friends over and had some delicious pasta he made along with some finger foods.

Here's a sneak peak of what's coming tomorrow!

Tutorial: Reusable Tissues

I know what most people are thinking "ew yucky!" but since I've been here in Italy it has really made me aware of how much waste my family and I create.  The biggest culprit is of course diapers, but I do not have access to a decent washer to take on something like this.  But as I was cleaning the past week I disturbed A LOT of dust and I got to sneezing.  I must have blown my nose about a dozen times throughout the day and that's when I realized how much tissue/toilet paper/paper towels I alone go through just blowing my nose!  So I've decided to make some tissues out of fabric and I created a very easy to follow tutorial to go along with them.  I did mine out of a fat quarter and got 3 that came out to be 4 1/2" x 8 1/2" and 1 that came out to 5 1/2" x 8 1/2".  So from 1 fat quarter you can get 4 tissues.  This is also a great project to use up scraps.  OH one more thing, while these are great for day to day use and using with allergies I do not recommend using these while you have the flu or any other highly contagious sickness.


Materials:
1 fat quarter or 5" x 18" piece of fabric
thread
sewing machine (you have one of those right?)

Step 1

Begin with your favorite pre-project fabric treatment (wash, press, etc.)

 Step 2

Fold in half with the right sides of the fabric facing each other.

Step 3

Cut 5" wide strips

Step 4

Sew with a 1/4" seam allowance on all 3 open sides, leave about 1 1/2" hole to use to turn it

Step 5

Turn and press

Step 6

Top stich and you're done!

What I would do for some anti-itch cream!

My knees are sooo incredibly itchy, just my knees though!



So after getting the Tinkerbell quilt done I decided to take a week and off and focus on the house.  Here is what I accomplished:

Cleaned and rearranged Munchkin's room
Cleaned and rearranged mine/TH room
Cleaned and rearranged "the room of despair" aka my craft room aka army gear storage room aka GUEST BEDROOM
Cleaned the living room and kitchen, both several times due to the Munchkin tornado

And that's about it.  It's a lot accomplished for me since I'm not really into this whole housewife thing yet.  It's a work in progress, I'll get there eventually.

So I just made my first online fabric purchase through FabricShack.com.  I like them well enough, their website is a bit awkward to manage at first but I found the best thing to do was let go of order and just browse till I find something I like.  And that's exactly what I did.  I found fabric for my next project, Summer Breeze from Last Minuet Patchwork and Quilted Gifts by Joelle Hoverson, and it's called Dream a Little Dream With Me by In The Beginning.

I also came by Valori Wells' new line Wrenly and OMG IM ABSOLUTELY IN LOVE!!  So I got a bit of Wren- Cobalt and Rosette- Citrus.  I can't wait to get them!  I'm so excited!  I plan on using them in a queen size bed quilt that I designed last night.  I have a feeling though that this is going to take me a while.  I do not plan on quilting this myself so if you know of any really good long arm quilters that are reasonable in price please send me their info so I can take a look at them!

There is no "I give up!" in "DONE"

So I finished the Tinkerbell quilt!  Yay!  I really like the end product and I hope the receiver of this quilt also enjoys it!  This is only my second quilt ever and compared to my first quilt this is a giant leap forward.  I completely couldn't have gotten this done if it weren't for my sister-in-law over at Make It Modern, she really has been an awesome resource throughout this.

Chain piecing the first white strip

 I really don't know right now how to put into words my experience with this quilt, it was more of feelings.  Sometimes I hated it and sometimes I loved it, but I was always very excited about it!  Putting it all together really wasn't as frustrating as I thought it was going be, most of my seams came out straight.  There were a couple that were just waaay too crooked for me to be happy with, but my seam ripper definantly did not get  as much love as it was expecting.  My biggest mistake was not enough fabric.  When I was first designing it I didn't have in mind the purple border.  Without the border, though, it would have just come out too small so I ended up having to get new fabric for the back.

Chain piecing the second purple strip

I was going back and forth trying to decided to do flannel or a lightweight cotton but flannel won out when I found the perfect shade of purple gingham.  I really like the contrast of the geometric on the back with all the prints on the front, I think it is exactly what this quilt was missing.  My dimensions were a perfect fit for this flannel so I thought I'd only need one cut of this fabric.  Oh how I was wrong.  I could have done with a few more inches width wise and I completely didn't take into consideration the selvage!  They were really sneaky with the selvage though, it wasn't a solid white at the bottom so I didn't notice it like I should have.  In the end I made it work.

The top all pieced together!

For the actual quilting I just did straight lines since my machine isn't quite big enough to do anything fancy, not to mention my lack of skill.  I did lines 1/4" from the seams going both horizontal and vertical so the pattern that emerged mimicked the gingham but more on a plaid scale, it is quite fitting (I REALLY LOVE IT).  OH! btw if you're ever lacking in quilt clips or find that you go through them like candy (breaking, loosing, etc.) try using plastic link toys.  I took a couple from son that had some nice teething/grippy stuff on them and they worked perfect for this size quilt.  These are also very convenient if you're a night quilter, it's too easy to dash out to your nearest 24 hour mega store and visit the baby section!

Benvenuti in Italia!

Welcome to Italy!  Yay!  I'm finally here!  So I got my big move out of the way thank goodness!  There was only a little bit of stressing out (that's the truth) and the plane ride wasn't too bad (that's a lie).  It was actually pretty terrible and I will probably not be traveling with this particular airline ever again if I can help it.  On my first plane from RIC to ATL we were packed in there like sardines, just one on top of each other.  It was a full flight that was overbooked, so I guess I should feel lucky I even got my seat.  I would of flipped if they didn't give me my seat.  Hell hath no fury like a stressed mommy.  My layover was nice, munchkin and I shared a taco salad and he made friends!  My plane from ATL to VCE, oh goodness where should I start.  Once again packed on top of each other and the plane was rather small the seats went 2 3 2 instead of the traditional 3 5 3 on international flights.  I think the thing that bothered me the most was the distance between the seats,  there wasn't enough space between me and the seat in front of me to hold the munchkin while he slept and have my tray table down.  The one redeeming factor was the passengers around me.  In front of me was a soldier just getting into base where I was going, to the right of me was some random Italian who was a good sport for having a small child around him, to the left of me was a cranky couple, and sitting behind me was the self proclaimed on board grandpa (he reminded me of the dad from the movie Easy A).  He was super nice and walked the munchkin around for me a couple times so I could eat or use the restroom.

I got to know a bit about him from what I saw waiting in ATL and from talking to his family.  He was on board with his wife, 2 sons, daughter in law, and grandson (around munchkin's age).  The first thing I noticed was that all the males were bald.  Instantly I knew I could bond with this family right away.  I was talking to the older son and found out that his brother does in fact have cancer.  His brother couldn't have been more than 20.  But I shared munchkin's story with cancer so we both know how each other felt.  Going to Italy was on his brother's list and wow did he get to go in style to!  His father bumped both him and his mother up to first class!   But truly this family was one of the nicest ones I've met in a while so please keep them in your thoughts.  I only wish I could have gotten a way to stay in touch with them.

Once we touched down in VCE I got very antsy.  I mean now my husband was only a matter of feet from me!  I was abruptly brought down from my high when my luggage took an obscenely long time to appear!  I had to get the soldier that was sitting in front of me to help out with my bags, I needed one more arm to manage the bags and the stroller.  Then FINALLY I saw him in the crowd waiting to find their loved ones.  Wow!  I can't even express the emotions (all good ones) that were pouring from when I finally got to him.  I saw fireworks yes I did, right there in the airport!  It's those fireworks you see when you get to greet the person you love after months of not seeing them.

Munchkin had fun with the French MRE!

Then after several more hours of waiting around for the shuttle bus to post we finally get home.  Boy does it feel good to be home, in my home!  The hubby says he has a surprise for me also!  Turns out they are MREs!  For those who aren't savvy in Army lingo MREs are Meals Ready to Eat also known as rations.  Annnnd you're probably thinking "Wow, she's excited over that?!" well I am only because 3 of my 4 MREs were from different countries!  He recently was a part of the D-Day reenactment in Normandy, France where he was able to get French, British, and German MREs.  It was really exciting getting to unpack them and see all the different things that come in each.  I tell ya what though, these foreign guys get much more than our soldiers.

French MRE

French MRE

French MRE

German MRE

German MRE

British MRE

British MRE

United States MRE

United States MRE