On the Journey

Sunday, February 16, 2014

A Sweet Baby Quilt

A little over a year ago I was (im)patiently waiting the arrival of our 13th child. I had carpel tunnel, high blood pressure, my FIL had recently died and my MIL was terminally ill with cancer. I'd chosen an adorable baby quilt to make for a girl. Unfortunately, I hadn't paid attention to how much work it was going to be!! Also, I didn't have any pregnancy related problems at the time I chose it. This week when I finished it, I decided it truly was worth all my work. I'm just glad I had a boy and his quilt was already finished when he arrived almost 3 weeks early.

I found my pattern here, on the Riley Blake website. It was called Vintage Chic. If you haven't been there, you might want to check it out. They have tons of free patterns. I had to refigure everything so I could make it a baby quilt. When trying to decide what kind of fabric to use, Aimee found this line of fabric online . . . Aviary 2 in Lilac, by Joel Dewberry. I thought it was sooo cute . . . but wasn't really thinking about what small pieces I would be cutting and, for the most part, you can't see what most of these prints really look like. I still like the end result.

A few facts: This quilt is 37" X 40". It has 476 triangles of fabric in the chevron part of the quilt, making up 238 2" finished blocks. Um . . . yeah!!! So, with my sore wrists/arms, I had to square up each block to 2 1/2" after I sewed them all together. Like I said . . . totally worth it! But, I don't think I'll do it again:) And, it will only go to a daughter or granddaughter because I don't think anyone will pay me enough for it!!!

Aren't these little birdies just so adorable??

Here's a photo of the back of my quilt. I used minky. I'm not sure if I like the back or the front better!! I really do like the front better, but I really do like how the quilting shows up on the back!

A little closer up.

And the whole thing.

So there's my bragging for the day:)

Looking forward to a craft day on Monday . . . and lots of visiting!!

Thursday, February 13, 2014

"School"

I've been helping Hunter at home with learning his letters. Walker and Morgan want to do school, too! Walker now knows his alphabet and Morgan almost has it down. The other day Walker learned how to write "W", so today he got to do "a", the second letter in his name. First I printed out a big "a" for him to fill in with different objects.

He used Legos first.

Morgan wanted to do it, too, so I printed off an "M" for her. She knows "M" is for "me and Mom!" Here she is filling hers in with dominoes.

Lincoln logs were another thing they used.

Morgan really filled up her M! . . . and the rest of her paper :)

Hunter was done with his "school" so he played with Legos while they did their letters.

All 3 of them got to write their letters with their finger in flour on a plate. They thought that was fun! And then Walker finally got to write "a"s.

Then they all decided they were done and went off to play. I'll have to work more with Walker on his "a"s another day. He is a good student and always anxious to move on! When we did "W", I had him filling in a W with different objects and he told me he wants to write "W" today! So I let him be done doing that and he got to start writing it :) He did pretty good!

Rachel

*I've been getting lots of ideas and worksheets from themeasuredmom.com

***Mom's editing here . . . Rachel is an EXCELLENT teacher!!

Wednesday, February 5, 2014

Annual Stitch & Chatter Quilt Retreat

Our Stitch 'n Chatter group had our annual quilt retreat on Saturday. Everyone works on their own quilt. This year Marcella taught us the "Band Box" quilt. We're given a list of what is needed and buy our own fabric if we want to do the group project. These three quilts are done using the technique each a little differently. I'm working on a quilt that will be similar to the middle one, with the blocks "on point".

Since it was our 10th annual retreat, we displayed a quilt made from each year's group project (I didn't get a picture of all of them). I've been to each of the retreats and have done the group project every year except for one.

These quilts were made two years ago. I didn't work on the group project that year because I'd made this one, which was very similar, the fall before.

This was the quilt from our first retreat - Yellow Brick Road.

Wacky Stars

This is a quilt from several years ago that I made for Tara - Blooms for Annabelle.

Rachel came to the retreat this year. Many years ago she came to babysit for me, but has never been there quilting.

Jan, laying out her quilt blocks. She was making a bright children's quilt.

Jerrie Lynn showed off this pretty quilt that she was making.

It's so nice to get together with the ladies to quilt. I love having the whole day to work and visit. Of course, it even nicer on the years I don't have a baby along with me, but still fun even then! Tanner got to join us (with Aimee) for most of the day this year.

Very much looking forward to, and hoping I will be able to attend, the beach retreat in the fall!!!

Tuesday, February 4, 2014

Tanner's 1st Birthday

Yesterday Tanner turned 1! God sent him to us early so Grandma could meet him.

Usually everyone likes to give the birthday person a present, but I finally learned that isn't really necessary for a 1 year old:) We got enough (small) things for the younger kids to give him. Here's he's showing off a shirt and baby food. And, yes, he loved getting the baby food. He kept on saying num-num and picking it back up off the floor!!

Daddy had seen this Ford ride-on toy awhile back and has been knowing that Tanner "needed" to have it for his birthday. He was very excited about it.

Grandma's last words to Tanner (as a one month old baby) were something to the effect that there was a Tonka truck downstairs that he would get to play with when he got bigger. After her death, we took it home for him and it has been stored to give him on his birthday. I was looking for a simple cake and remembered this kind . . . a load of "dirt".

Dirt . . . or mud . . . kind of makes a mess:)

Getting a ride in his new truck . . . "Look, Mom, no hands"!!

And a picture of Morgan since she's so cute and said "Mom, take a picture of me":)

Thursday, January 9, 2014

Sewing Garments . . .

. . . and a couple other odds and ends:)

Last year David remodeled a house for a woman who worked at Pendleton Woolen Mills. She was really nice and gave him some very heavy wool fabric since she knew I sewed. It kind of got stashed on the back of a shelf, probably hoping no one would remember it!! I sure didn't! Unfortunately, when my brother was visiting, he was talking about buying some fabric and it triggered David's memory. I found the fabric and showed it, and he figured I probably should do something about making it into something. And, since I love him so much, I did.

The night before Christmas Eve I cut it out. It was so hard to cut out two layers of that fabric; it left my hand sore. I hate cutting out pieces for clothes. I just want to get to the real part of making it into something. I figured I'd got past the hard part and sewing it up would be a breeze. Ha-ha!! Little did I know.

First of all I used a bigger pattern than the last time I sewed him a shirt (something like 10-15 years ago). I really can't remember the last time I made one, so I know it was a long time ago. I had two sizes of the pattern I'd used for him. The lady had also given him a premade Pendleton shirt, so I measured the pattern pieces to it. The size large pattern I'd used before was smaller, so I decided to go with x-large, which seemed reasonable since I always buy XL for him in the store. Big mistake!!

I sewed the front and back together and draped it over him. It was like a huge cape! After much trimming and re-trying it on, I finally decided it would be fine, and finished it. I thought I'd use snaps on it because they're always easier for me to put on and for him to take it off. I put all the snaps on (and it was hard work because the fabric was soooo thick). Then I closed up all the snaps and it looked great. I pulled them open and half of the snaps came apart. The fabric was just too thick to use the snaps I had. So, I took all of them off and did buttons and buttonholes.

I really still need to buy more buttons for it and replace what I have on there. They were just some buttons I had on hand and they're too small since the fabric is so thick.

Here he is, loving his shirt/jacket. It's still plenty big, but he's recalling from when I made him some before that they do shrink. He gets it wet outside and dries it by the fire and I think that's how it will shrink.

Unfortunately, I have more of the fabric left:( My boys are begging for one, but at this point I can't think of making another one! It really wouldn't be so bad if I knew I could just sew it up and it would fit. Anyway, I don't have a pattern for them right now, so I have an excuse to put it off!!!

In other news . . . Tanner is 11 months old. I couldn't get a happy picture because he had an ear infection and is teething. His favorite place to race off to is my bathroom. He hasn't dug in any toilets (yet!!). I'm not sure what's so great about my bathroom . . . maybe he likes to go stand at the tub?? He has to scoot right past the hall bathroom to get to mine and that door can be open and he'll ignore it. Therefore, I'm always having to remember to close my bathroom door . . . and telling others who don't close it that they may have to clean up after him if he makes a mess:)

He doesn't crawl . . . he scoots on his behind. His right hand moves him pretty fast.

David and the boys have been trapping. The boys built their own cage traps and have them out at their uncle and aunt's house. The first day they checked them, Clayton, Forrest and Christopher all had muskrats. Since then, Forrest (the smallest) has gotten two more!! I'm not keeping too good of track, but I know David has gotten an otter and bobcat in the past week.

My nephew got married in December. Reid (on the right) and his cousin (who was the bride's cousin) were ushers. I managed to get them to stand still long enough to let me get one picture:)

I made this cake for the wedding.

By the way, it's a pet peeve of mine, how the spacing is above this cake picture. There are no spaces in the draft and I don't know how they suddenly decided to be here in the final product!!

And, as usual, I should probably turn in for the night . . . or morning, as the case may be:)