How do I get myself into these things?

CALLING ALL PILLOW MAKING EXPERTS! I NEED HELP!!!! A sweet lady came up to me at church about a month ago and said, "Sarah, I hear that you sew." This phrase has never led to anything good. It never turns out that someone wants to learn to quilt. It is usually that they need something mended. Anyway, Lisa says she has this needlepoint thing she made when her oldest daughter was just a baby (about 25 years ago) and it used to hang in her nursery. She wanted to turn it into a pillow. Lisa is the mom of Peter, who I gave this quilt to. Peter was diagnosed with cancer right after we moved to Auburn and I thought he needed a quilt to cuddle up under. From all reports, he loves it and won't let anyone else touch it! So this bag of stuff has been sitting here staring at me for over a month now. The pink plaid is for the back and the main ruffle and the green plaid is for an accent ruffle. My only question is how well the heavy fabric is going to make a ruffle or if it is going to have to be more like pleats. Does that make any sense? If anyone has any suggestions, I would be glad to hear them!

Today I did manage to finish quilting baby quilts #3 and #4. I am in love with the blue and white quilt. I see more two color quilts in my future. The white just makes the blues pop. Unfortunately the white was the only white in my whole stash.

Speaking of stash, today is day 16 of my no-buy resolution!

I am off to watch "The Wedding Date". I went on-line last night and reserved "Pride and Prejudice" (Colin Firth version) and "Sense and Sensibility" from our library. And "The Christmas Quilt" from the Elm Creek Quilts series. And a quilting book I hadn't seen before - I think a 2004 yearbook from American Quilting and Patchwork. Aren't libraries great?

Sunday night

Today I wanted to share this sweet baby quilt that Nina made for my baby #2. We didn't know it would be Ian when she started it, but I think the colors work for a boy or a girl. She will have to explain how this pattern worked. All I remember is that she told me that you don't cut the threads between the chain stitched pieces until the top is all done. Does that make any sense? Maybe she can explain it better than that. Anyway, this was before we had our long-arm machine - so she started to hand quilt it! Because she loves me so much! After Ian was born, Nina mentions how slow the quilting is going and I tell her that my mom was looking for something to work on during the three weeks they stayed with us to help out. So my mom volunteered to finish the quilting. So now I (or more properly, Ian) has a quilt made by Nina and his Grams! I treasure this quilt.

I didn't get as much done as I had hoped to yesterday. I got one baby quilt quilted and another one about half done. I finished the second one this afternoon and started piecing the backing for the third. There is no school tomorrow but we have a busy day planned. We are moving Stacy into his new office space. Yeah! Now he can't complain that he has no where to work. And then at lunch time we have a birthday party for a little girl from church. I am hoping to get some more quilting done in the afternoon.

Hope everyone had a great weekend. I am off to sew for a few minutes while the kids watch Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

Saturday morning

Ahhhh! Saturday morning! Too bad hubby can never seem to sleep later than 7 am. So he is dressed and waiting for our friend to show up to work on the spec house next door. Wandering aimlessly through the house. I tell him "You can hang up my little curtain rod in my sewing room, if you need something to do." So he does! Now I can hang some of my cute little quilts right over my sewing table.

The quilt there right now is actually more of a wall hanging - how appropriate! I started making these stars blocks out of Sally Schneider's Scrap Frenzy book. She calls these stars "Bard of Avon". I love the stars but they take FOREVER to piece - I would guess maybe an hour and a half each. Much too long for my taste! So the quilt ended after 4 blocks. It makes a cute little wall hanging or table topper. Each block is about 15 inches square. And of course, it is blue and yellow, so what is not to love? When I was quilting this piece, Nina and her mom both tried to convince me that I really DID want to make it into a bigger quilt - but neither one of them bothered to volunteer help piece the stars!

Today I am trying to get as many of the baby quilts quilted as I can. Stacy (DH) made me stop the machine while he was hanging up the curtain rod. He thinks it is way too noisy. I think it just drowns out the rest of the ruckus going on in our house! Kind of peaceful! The kids are going to a b-day party this afternoon so I will have a couple hours of uninterrupted quilting time!

Hope everyone has a great weekend!

The fabric that wouldn't end

Yes, I have already made two baby quilts out of these same fabrics, but I had leftovers...still. The fabric would not be used up. It kept growing and growing. I think the little 4 inch squares were reproducing at night. This top finally used up the last of the bright yellow print. It has no rhyme or reason but it is bright and I think some kid will like it. I hope!

Now I have four baby quilt tops sitting here, taunting me. They are saying "Where did all your good intentions go?" They know I have to clean up my end-of-the-year paperwork mess before I can get around to quilting them. My sewing room/office is tiny. The huge Hinterberg quilting machine with its ten foot table takes up over half the room. And then there's the sewing table and my desk and the computer. You get the picture. I started to organize all of our 2005 paperwork to make room for the 2006 stuff. But I didn't quite get it all put away. So - I guess I know what I should be doing this afternoon!

What's everyone else up to?

The Giant quilt that ate my bed

Here is the promised picture of my huge quilt! At the foot of the bed it hangs to the bottom side of the mattress where the side rails of the bed frame are. At the head of the bed it is folded back about 18 inches. On BOTH sides, it hangs all the way to the floor. And we have a pillow top mattress - padding on both sides - so it is extra, extra thick. My husband is beginning to wonder if I am capable of making a quilt that actually fits our bed. They are usually about 6 inches too short in width. Or like this one, way too huge. This would be the perfect quilt to have to share with someone who hogs the covers! No way they could steal this whole thing away from you!

Never a dull moment!

Last night Ian had a run-in (literally) with another little boy at church. The other boy ended up with a big knot on his forehead. Ian's lip started bleeding again - which freaked the other little boy out! I had to assure him and his mom that Ian has been previously wounded! Later last night I was talking to Ian, when I noticed his front tooth is suddenly back where it belongs, instead of pointed backwards. I made him let me feel it and it was loose! UGH! So I spent the whole night tossing and turning, worried that he was going to have that tooth pulled. Back we went to the dentist office this morning. He took another x-ray and said that everything still looked o.k. He said he would not be surprised if the tooth turned dark. The tooth seemed a little more stable this morning so he said we should just watch it for a few weeks. I am thinking about buying Ian a football helmet with one of those mouth guard things! Do you think he would wear it 24 hours a day to make me happy?

I managed to make another baby quilt yesterday. Nice and bright! I have enough of the four-patches made to make another one the same size.

I am going to make myself work on rescuing my bedroom from the piles of laundry which seem to be multiplying daily. If I can get it all cleaned up, I will take a picture of the huge quilt on my bed. It is quite comical!

Update on Ian

We took Ian back to see the dentist this morning. The swelling on his lip is down from yesterday but still looks bad. The dentist did an x-ray of the tooth roots that got knocked out of place. He said he did not see anything broken! Yeah! He also said they seemed to still be firmly attached so they probably won't fall out on their own. If the pain lasts for more than a couple (!) of weeks, he said to come back and he would check Ian out again. He also put him on some antibiotics just to be safe.

Poor Ian hasn't been willing to eat much of anything. He ate some ice cream Monday night. Yesterday he ate a snack bag of Doritoes, broken into TINY little bites. And he ate several bowls of Jello. Last night he ate a huge serving of mac-n-cheese. This morning we went to the store and stocked up on ice cream, mac-n-cheese, yogurt, and noodles. Ian doesn't have any body fat he can spare so I hope the pain subsides quickly so he will start eating more.



I got the borders put on the four patch baby quilt. The blue isn't exactly the right color - but it is close enough! And I didn't have to go buy anything for this quilt! YEAH! Hey - I have made it 11 whole days with no buying! And I haven't had any withdrawl symptoms!