Kids Quilt!

 I used to dream of all the little things my daughter and I would to together as she grew up. I think it's a secret desire of all women who have little girls that they will lovingly follow in their mother's footsteps and instantly love all the delicious and sweet traditions that we loved, too. Not so in my case.

My daughter and I are polar opposites. How things like this happen are beyond me, but she's ultra girly, speaks in an octave only heard by dogs, and loves pretty dresses and skirts. I am in essence, a tom boy. Granted, if I was the kind of seamstress that loved to sew pretty dresses and skirts, she'd be decorated from head to toe, but I like quick little projects that award a relatively fast sense of accomplishment. This makes me happy! It makes me feel like I'm getting somewhere!

So, imagine my shock when she announced that she wanted to make a quilt for her half sister Sophie! At first I was skeptical.... can a 7 yr old REALLY quilt?? Then I thought why not, the local fabric store was having a sale and I had some gems tucked away so we decided to go for it.

SIX DAYS later, in the middle of all kinds of chaos and happenings, with a visitor from Canada in our home and various goings on, I present the finished product...

 The striped fabric and the colorful blocks with the turquoise on them are Michael Miller's Happy Hills and I always buy my designer fabrics from the fabulous Amy Dunn over at Pinked Fabrics!! She's kept her prices at the $8.50 mark so it's keeping designer fabrics easier to afford these days!

I then paired them with the fabrics Emma (my daughter) wanted from my local fabric store. We are in the middle of getting her store on ETSY so you can all enjoy the same super low prices I get to, because when I bough those fabrics up there she had them on sale for 50% and I didn't pay more then $1.50 PER YARD. Over the course of the next 2 weeks I think it will be up and fully running with little tidbits!!

Anyway the entire quilt maybe set me back around the $20 mark.... maybe. It's crazy how cost effective they can be when you pair some really splashy fabrics with happy little blenders that are dirt cheap!!

We are pretty happy with the way it turned out....

 Have a funtastic 4th weekend to my American peeps, and a wonderful Canada Day to my Canadian peeps!!!

xox

Lonestar!

 Thanks for your comments about my previous battle with the sewing machine! It's still an ongoing battle and it now has an appointment at the sewing machine doctor. Little nightmare.

So, what a better way to celebrate my 'machine is making me batty' then with a new, really hard project! Yeah! *sigh* Someone come kick me in the rear end.

My little local fabric hole-in-the-wall hosts a quilty gathering of ladies on Thursday nights. I've always wanted to get in there so I decided to partake on their journey with them... and promptly bit off more then I can chew. Meet, the Lonestar:

I forget where I stole this from but it's not MINE!!!! I stole it. It's pretty though, right?

Well, thats the Lonestar done right. It's a really pretty quilt in person and since I'm not one to do traditional quilts I thought yanno, I should probably do one for fun.

Ha.

Fun.

More like giving myself a bald patch.

Here are the colors I chose:

What does that translate to?

Where am I currently? I'll tell you where I am. I'm in the corner rocking back and forth real slow like. Things I've learned about myself:

1. 45 degree angles and me are a bad combination.
2. I think it is possible to wear out a stitch ripper.
3. I need a money tree.

This quilt is amazing when it's done and that is what I keep telling myself after day three of sewing, ripping and re-sewing. The diamonds have to be pieced together with perfection ... all the seams have to look like they flawlessly run together. Right.

Currently, I have two whole diamonds pieced and sewn. I have the other 6 sewn together in the first 3 rows only. Why? Because I discovered row 4 was cut to the wrong strip size!!! I cut my fabrics at 3" instead of 3.5" and they pieced wrong so today I have to cut, strip sew and 45degree cut row 4 again... and then sew it to the 6 remaining points so I can finish the star in this quilt.

What happens tonight at quilt class? I'm not sure. they are going to analyze my sewing and let me tell you something. The back of this quilt looks like a spiders web that was caught in a tornado. I hack sewed this puppy together like a true hack-pro.

Lesson learned: I love my squares.

Stay tuned for the anti-climatic unveiling of the Lonestar in it's wonderul mis-shapen glory. LOL.

One of THOSE Days

 Typically people comment on how patient I am when it comes to doing the things I want to do. If you know me outside of this blog, you know that the moment someone says that to me (which is a lot!) I promptly laugh for a good ten minutes. I am not a patient person. I am a busy person. Busy people are either terribly efficient, or incredibly inefficient, I'm actually not too sure what it is. Regardless, I'm just really busy. I'm a mother, teacher, entrepreneur and part time seamstress. I enjoy what I do until I run into days like THIS. Today. Day # I'm-too-hot-to-count of the heat, and behind in sewing like you would not believe.

I'm in the quilting stage for my sweet little baby quilt.

 I backed it with the sweetest buttery yellow cotton from my favorite hole-in-the-wall fabric store. (Mimi's Treasures in Rock Spring, GA if you are down here!) It was on sale for $1.50 a yard! I bought double what I needed just because I have a horrible fabric hoarding problem! Eek! Anyway, I sandwiched it with it's organic cotton batting, perfect for little sensitive bundles, and then pinned it to the backing and went to quilt it thinking I'd just do a simple little square stitch quilt job when all of a sudden.....

Urgh.

Ripped out the stitches.

I adjusted my tension, and tried it out on a scrap fabric sandwich.... all good.

Attempt #2 at quilting baby blanket, and what do you think happened? Yes, refer to the above picture.

Ripped out more stitches.

I'm feeling a little bitter at this ripping thing. This thread is Orange so it's not like it's blended in and I can just hide the stitch with a hand-over job.

Adjust the tension, sew a bit to make sure and .... all good! Just to be sure I clean out the bobbin house, check my thread, make sure my needle is sharp. Yes, all seems okay.

I'm feeling confident now because I've just tested the heck out of this tension and so in goes the baby quilt and 3/4 of the way down the quilt... SKIP.

($)*#(*$)@*$#%$

x 10.

So now I've ripped the threads out and I've folded up the baby quilt and I'm blogging! I hope you're all having a wonderful Friday and not wanting to throw your beloved machines out the window along with me!

xox