Starling Crib Bedding

When Doug and Vanessa found out they were having a little girl, I had asked Vanessa what colors her nursery were going to be and if she had any fabrics she liked.  She emailed me four or five fabrics, with Alexander Henry's "Starling" fabric being one of them.  She also had told me that of all of them, the "Starling" fabric was her favorite.  As you may remember, before I found out I was having Jack, this same fabric had been my favorite, but in a different colorway.  I couldn't believe that we had liked the same fabric and I was really excited to make a quilt using it.  I ordered the fabric right away, fearing it would be gone if I hesitated since it is an older print.  I started looking at quilt patterns, then thought, I wonder how Vanessa is going to incorporate this into her bedding?  I wondered if she was going to have someone make it for her, then I thought that I would offer to make the bedding for her.  I told her that if she bought the fabric, I would sew it for her.  She jumped at the offer.  I gulped and realized how many sewing hours I had agreed too, but was also excited because I was finally sewing for a GIRL.  When we went on our vacation together in June, we picked our fabrics.  I finally got down to sewing this week and I am thrilled with how the bedding turned out.  I can't wait to ship it to her.  

While I have been sewing this bedding, I have also been developing a pattern on how to make it.  It is in the early rough stages, but this was a good run through to make sure everything was accurate.  I have a page of scribbles, notes, and revisions, but hopefully I'll get it together soon.  If I ever sew another crib bedding set, I'll be really happy that I made this pattern.  Trying to discern my scribbles from last time was rather difficult.  

Renegade Craft Fair

This weekend, Kate and I went to the Renegade Craft Fair in L.A. We had so much fun together. As we rode the Metro Link to the Fair, we started noticing all the "crafty" looking people boarding the train.



Sure enough, when we got to our stop, all of "these" people got off along with us.



I saw a sea of TOMS clad people and handmade goodies. We were overwhelmed with how amazing each crafters' booth was. Some artisans also created there own pop up tent covers. Amazing.



We looked at several rows of goods before getting hungry and then decided to take a break and visit the food trucks and the beverage booth. We got potstickers and a Dos Equis and found a nice shade tree for lunch.



After lunch, we went back to shopping. I wish I had an unlimited budget, but alas, I did not. I bought the fat quarters in the picture.



I also got this super cute head band from a vendor named Bobby Soxie. They are on Etsy.



Last, I bought this print from an artist names Jen Skelley who also has an Etsy shop. I really liked her work. Another vendor I really liked was named Ilee Papergoods. I think they have a website too.

Kate and I had a great weekend together and have already been talking about going to the craft fair again in December. Let me know if you want to come along and Christmas shop!

Free Motion Quilting

This week I took a free motion quilting (FMQ) class at Strawberry Patches. I really like the teacher and I had very enthusiastic classmates. I really enjoyed spending an entire day on my hobby. I have to say that FMQ is a lot harder than I thought it would be. I thought that since it was with a machine, it would be easy like sewing lines. Wrong! Once the feed dogs on the machine were dropped, I was completely in charge of the stitch length and speed by how quickly I moved my hands and the speed of the machine. It was like rubbing my stomach and patting my head. I did improve as the day went on but it will take some time to build my confidence enough to FMQ an entire quilt.




This is the sampler square we started with. Each square was a different technique we were supposed to work on.


Next, we had to work on a cheater panel (I had to ask what that was and I found out it's a pre-printed panel that looks like a pieced quilt). I bought mine at Hancock and I chose something I didn't care about since it was practice.


My instructor helped me figure out different patterns to try. I was glad for the variety of technique practice this panel offered.



Here is the back where you can really see all the stitching. It was a lot of fun to learn and I would really recommend this class to anyone interested. I still feel like I have a long way to go, but I'll have a lot of fun practicing.

Finished Unfurnished Quilt

I finished my quilt and I love it! After I finished quilting it, I had to pick a fabric to bind it. After thinking about all the possibilities I settled on the black and white dot fabric. The problem was I bought the the dot fabric as a remnant and didn't save the selvedge so I no idea what it was. I went to Strawberry Patches and explained the situation. Amanda told me that they hadn't had that fabric in a long time but she thought it was Windham's American Vintage line. I went home and googled it only to discover that it was out of print. Finally I searched quiltshops.com and found it at a little shop in the midwest. I was so relieved. I'm so happy with that choice for the binding.




Lastly, I toyed around with the leftover fabrics for pillow shams and here is what I came up with.


Now on to the next project.

Sewing Lessons

We have been at the coast this week with Doug and Vanessa. When we made arrangements for our trip I told Vanessa that I would give her sewing lessons and that we would shop for fabrics for my future niece's bedding. Well, I think I've pushed Vanessa into Project Mode and she is hooked on sewing.




I taught her to make a Drag Around blanket. We had trouble finding any ric rac on the coast that matched the fabric that she had picked so I taught her to make a ruffle. It was time consuming but completely worth it.







We also found fabric for the crib bedding



And quilt.



I will be sewing A LOT this summer and I'm so excited about it.

Lest you think that all we did was sew, we also went to the beach










And the park



And the Children's Museum and Madonna Inn, but since our computer is not back yet I can't show you those pictures. Chef Doug also cooked some great meals for us and played a little guitar. All that to say, we had a great trip and I wish we had a teleporter so we could get together more often.

New blanket for a new cousin

My cousin Katie had her baby, Charlie Aaron, this Monday. He weighed 11 lbs., 6oz. and was 23.5 inches long. He is oh so cute. To celebrate his arrival, I made him a blanket using Moda's Hullabaloo line. I really love this fabric collection and had been waiting for someone to have a baby boy so I could sew
with it. Since Katie and John didn't find out ahead of time, I had to wait (something I'm not fond of or good at). Anyway I was thrilled to sew with these fabrics and am so happy with the end result. I hope Charlie likes it too. I can't wait to hold that little guy again. Check put his pictures on Katie's blog.





(Incidentally our computer is on the fritz and will be out for repair so I will be posting from my phone until the problem is fixed.)

Jack's Nemo Party

Jack is a fan of all things Pixar so when we were trying to pick a theme for his birthday party, we were trying to decide between his three favorites: Cars, Nemo, and Toy Story.  I had already done a Cars party for Ryan so I didn't want to do that again.  Jack seemed really happy whenever I showed him Toy Story or Nemo stuff, but it seemed really fun and fitting to do a fish/ ocean party in the month of June for my water lover.  I made a little invitation and emailed it out.  I also found some darling little cupcake picks on Etsy that had Nemo on them and I bought them.  What I should have done was checked at Party City or Target to see if anyone actually carried Nemo stuff in town.  Had I done that, I may have chosen a different theme because there it NOTHING in town that has to do with Nemo.  The only Nemo thing I found was a cute little candle from Vons and it was in the gift wrap section, not in the birthday cake decoration section.  Regardless of my decorating challenges,  I really like how everything came together.

 A 2 balloon instead of Nemo but we did have real goldfish in a bowl

 My patio

 Table decorations

 My little non-smiler

 Love this look

 Delicious cupcakes with my own version of rainbow chip frosting with Nemo colored chips

 What a look

Big brother Ryan "helping" Jack with every present

We all had a great time and the kids had a blast.  Thanks to everyone who came.  Jack loves all his gifts and Ryan is just waiting for him to loose interest so he can have a turn.