Saskirina's Etsy Shop

One of my blog friends, who is also in the sewconnected virtual quilting bee with me, has just opened up an etsy shop. She has some really cute hair clips and camera straps available, and there is no shipping charge until January 31st! Go check it out here!

Quilt Auction for Haiti

Beth is having a wonderful quilt auction to benefit Haiti using scrappy Christmas blocks from a swap she hosted and that I participated in a while ago. Go check it out here! Auction ends on Friday!

Superhero Cape

I made a superhero cape for my cousin-in-law for Christmas. This was such a fun project to make! I used this tutorial with a few changes and twists. (The larger text below designates the instructions I included in his gift.:))

Every superhero needs a bag to tote their supplies in, and this one has a buttonhole so that he can switch out the logos depending on his mood that day.

Arrgh matey! If you feel the need to plunder the seas, attach your pirate flag to the back of the cape using the buttonhole to warn everyone that the Mighty Pirate Seamus is approaching.

The cape is reversible with red on one side and black on the other side.

For days when you are feeling royal, don the king symbol so your parents can address you as “your royal highness” since you are now the King of the Household-or you could be little red riding hood without the crown.:) The red hood can also be detached…

He can also attach a hood that has a red side.

The other side of the hood has horns so he can be a monster or a dinosaur. Here is the black side of the cape without an emblem.

Roaaarrr! With your black cape and your horned hood, you are now a mighty dragon or monster! Watch out!

His name is Seamus, so when his switches into his alter ego-Super Seamus- he can attach the "S" on the back.

It’s a bird. No, it’s a plane. Wrong again! It’s Super Seamus to the rescue!

I also added arm ties that button on the bottom so he can attach the cape to his wrists to hold the cape up or twirl it around.

The hand straps can be used when the need to flap your wings arises or can be detached so they don’t sag sadly by your side.

Let's do lunch...

Hi everyone! It has been a while since I have been around here... I went to Alabama over the holidays to visit family for two weeks, and went back to work full time two weeks ago-my maternity leave is over :(.. So I haven't had a lot of time to read blogs or sew or be on the computer!

I have a few Christmas gifts to share that I made before Christmas. I didn't make as many presents this year as I usually try to do, maybe I should start now for next Christmas...

I made a sack lunch out of felt for my niece, Savannah for Christmas.

She now has a lunch she can have whenever gets the urge to have a ham, lettuce, tomato, and cheese sandwich with chips and a swiss roll on the side.

She may prefer peanut butter and jelly!

I also made her a sack of counting cookies.

There are ten cookies with chips to represent the numbers 1-10.

I stitched the corresponding number on the back of each cookie.

Hopefully she can learn to count or practice counting with her new cookies! When she saw the bite out of the number cookie, she pretending like she took a bite out of it-so cute!

I also made a set of placemats for my mother-in-law. They were fun to make, and now I think I need some too!:)

Happy Monday!

Sewconnected: My month!

I have been wanting to make an i-spy ABC quilt for my daughter, but I also wanted to make an ABC wonky word quilt, too.  Since December is my month for the sewconnected swap group I decided to combine those two ideas into one quilt for my month.  I have been collecting different fabrics for each letter for a while now so each letter will have fabric that corresponds with that letter.  For example, for A I have airplanes, apples, and Auburn University.

Here are the requests I am making for my month:

-Please make 15.5 inch square blocks
-The letter should take up most of the block using the white fabric I sent.  Try to make the letter strips between 2-3" wide.  If the are 1.5-3.5" that is okay, too.   This way the letters will all be cohesive throughout the quilt.
-Use only capital letters.
-Some letters have three fabrics and some have upwards of six.  Try to use at least some of every fabric that I sent.
-Some of the letters have applique animals that my mother made.  I would love it if you would incorporate those into the block as well.
-If you have novelty fabric that matches the letter you have and you would like to add it, that would be awesome.  Please only add novelty fabric that would match the letter.  If you would like to add a scrap of yellow (or any other color) fabric to a block to balance the colors, feel free to add from your stash.
-Feel free to add paper piecing of objects that would match the letter or add embroidery if you would like.  I think embroidery could look really cute in the letter or somewhere else on the block.

I was inspired by this quilt and this one.  This is a great tutorial for wonky letters.

I made a B to see how hard it would be and to get started on the letters.

This is the idea that I am going for with this project.  See, "B" is for books, butterflies, basketballs, baths, boots, bees, balloons, and bears.  The appliques are from my mom.  She sent me several appliques to use in this quilt.  Here are all the fabrics I sent out for M, U, E O, H, F, R, W, L, T, G, and S.

"G" fabric- golf, giraffe, guitar, grapes, grass

"E"-elephants, eggs, easter eggs

"F"-football, fire hydrant, firetruck, frogs, flamingo, and fish

"H"- horse, harp, hippo, harmonica and hockey

"L"-lions, lizards, lobster, leopard, and leaves

"M"-monkey, money, motorcycle, music and moose

"P"-pigs, popsicle, penguin, planets, piano,pirates and pumpkins

"R"-rhinocerous, rooster, rabbits, runner, robot, rainbow, and ruler

"S"- skier, sea lion, strawberries, sheep, sailboat, shells, snowman, stars and shoes

"W"-watermelon, whales, wedding ring, witches, and web

"U"-umbrella  and unicorns

(U is hard to find.)

"T"- tiger, turtle, tennis, train, truck, tractor, and triangle

I am really excited about how this quilt is going to turn out! 

Sewconnected 2: August and October

I have been trying to fit some sewing time in between feedings with Zerah.  Early in the morning seems to be the best time to sew. Between 5 and 7 in the morning, right after she eats, she will lay down for a little while and nap.  I am trying to catch up on my blocks for my quilting bees that I got behind on, and I am almost caught up.

 This block is for Alissa who is making an orange and pink quilt.  I received the orange packet of fabric.  I love this tadpole print that runs vertically and horizontally through the block.  I was trying to bring it to the focus of the block.  I like how it has levels- the white appears behind the yellow horizontal stripe but floats above the orange solid. We could add coordinating fabric from our stash and I needed more fabric to make the outermost vertical bars, so I added the gold wavy fabric;  it coordinates better in person than in the picture, I believe.   It is 12.5" square.

The next block is for Sonja.  She is making a beach quilt and asked for blocks inspired by a beach house.  She set up a wonderful inspiration gallery on flickr for all of us to be inspired by which was a great idea.  I found many quilts that I want to make in the future as a result!

The block above is a glass of lemonade or some other frothy beachy beverage. I did some searching online and found this site which has free paper piecing patterns.  I changed the lemonade a little and added the borders.

I couldn't resist making a bikini!  The floral hawaiian print she sent just screamed bathing suit to me.  I then added a couple borders to make it bigger and add some wonkiness to the mix.

I hope everyone is doing well out there!  I am going to try to be on here more in the next couple of weeks, but we will see...  it only took me 3 1/2 hours to write this one post.  Zerah needed to eat, which took two hours today (I think she is going through a growth spurt:)), diaper change x3, and some smiling time.  Have a good weekend!

Queen of Hearts and Alice in Wonderland Costume Set GIVEAWAY!!!!

Definitely check out this giveaway! The costumes are amazing and would be wonderful for Halloween!

Queen of Hearts and Alice in Wonderland Costume Set GIVEAWAY!!!!

Sewconnected and Sewconnected 2: September

I finished up my blocks for the two swap groups I am in this past week. Both John and Amandajean requested houses inspired by this quilt. Isn't it beautiful? It makes me want a house quilt of my own!

The first block is for quiltdad. He sent a lovely gray Kona cotton and we added scraps from our collection for the houses. I couldn't resist making a dog house.:)

I used the leftover gray to make two additional bonus houses for him. I ran out of the gray, so he will have to add it to make it 12.5 inches square. I just couldn't resist! Once I finished, I realized that the light purple is really too close in tonal value to the gray;it doesn't show up as much as I had hoped, but it is bonus or lagniappe so he could not use it if it doesn't work!

My last house is for amandajean. Her block is 15.5" square. I learned from my experience with the lavendar to use really bright colors and I played with the roof detail. It reminds me of the eaves on 1920's mission style houses or victorian houses that I see when I take my dog out for walks around the neighborhood.

It feels good to finally have something quilty to share! I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!

Our new little girl...

I haven't been around much in this space recently, but there is a a very good reason! Please let me introduce our new little girl, Zerah Blythe. She was born on September 19th at 2:30 a.m. I have been spending all my time, it seems, just admiring this little one.

I worked up until the day she was born. I think I willed her to wait to come until I had finished up everything at work! My last scheduled day was Friday and I left work right before lunch because I was having contractions that were twenty minutes apart-they were 3 minutes apart by noon! She was due on Sunday, the 20th.

We went into the hospital at 1:30 that afternoon, but were sent home because the contractions were not intense enough, and I wasn't dilated at all. That was extremely frustrating. I was determined not to be sent home from the hospital again so I waited until I couldn't stand it anymore-so we left for the hospital at midnight. I still wasn't sure if we should leave or wait a little longer and told my husband and mom that I was sorry if we were sent home again.

When we arrived, the hospital was super busy with four people that came in at the same time as me with one girl's water breaking upon arrival. When they finally checked sometime after 1 am, I was dilated to 7 cm, and Zerah was born an hour an a half later. I had not fully decided if I wanted drugs or not, so when they asked me if I wanted an epidural at around 1:30 I decided I had come this far without it and could persevere without one. I was very freaked out about a shot in my spine and some of the side effects; I am glad I did not have one because it would have kicked in almost too late and lasted longer than I needed it. Since I did not have one, I was alert and Zerah was fully alert when she was born. It really happened just like I wanted it to; I was very blessed to have a really good experience. Most of the delivery doctors were out of town on a retreat that night so a midwife who works for the hospital was the one who delivered Zerah; I think this worked out for the best, too.

My mom lives out of town and was originally scheduled to arrive Saturday night. When I talked to my parents Thursday night, my dad decided Zerah was going to come early so he convinced her to fly out a day early. I don't know how he knew because I sure didn't! She arrived at our house at ten, just in time to go to the hospital with us at midnight and be there for her grand-daughter's birth.

She is named after my great-grandmother and my husband's grandmother. We wanted something unique that was also from our family.


We are all doing well and starting to catch up on everything. I actually have had a little bit of time to sew this past week.:)

Fall Quilt Festival 2009

I am so excited that it is time for Amy's Quilt Festival again! This is one of my favorite quilts that I finished this summer for my new little girl, Zerah.

I really like the modern simplicity of the boxes within boxes and the pieced border. It is made from a jellyroll of Hello Betty by chloe's closet for moda. I also like the quilting mimicing the same boxes. The quilting took forever! Silly me, I thought this type of quilting would go faster than all over stippling, but I am glad I went in this direction.

I also made a matching cushion for her rocking chair with a few other prints thrown in for good measure. More details about this quilt can be found on the original post here.

Check out the rest of the entries at Parkcitygirl!