Babies Everywhere

Lately it has seemed as if everyone I know is pregnant. This gives me lots of opportunities to crochet, which I love. I have four friends who were due within a month of each other, three of whom had their babies the same week. (Also born that same week were my new nephew and my husband's cousin's baby.) It has been a little crazy. I made these blankets for these four friends whose babies are now here and are all beautiful.

The green blanket went to the only boy born in the bunch.

A couple of years ago I figured out how to make a ruffly border, so the girls all got ruffles. What girl doesn't love ruffles? I especially like how the ruffles gave the gender-neutral yellow a feminine touch.

I'm sure there are many more of these coming, in the near future.

Hexagons

I found this tutorial about a year ago and have been wanting to try it out ever since. For some reason I have been intimidated by the whole process. So silly. My favorite jeans got a hole in the knee, so I figured it was time to face my fear and try it out.


It was so easy! It took me a couple of hours to get it all sewn together, and then another hour to get the patch sewn onto my pants (I used some wonder under to stick it to my pants first so it didn't shift while I was sewing). Voila! New life to my old jeans (these things are older than Skyler!).


I used all scraps for this project. It is the perfect project for scraps. I have seen lots of tutorials for hex paper piecing lately. Some of them say to baste your hexs before you sew them together and some don't. I didn't baste them this time around, but I think I will next time. I used a glue stick to stick the paper to the fabric since I knew I would be washing the patch and I didn't want to mess with pins.

I'm sure I have many more of these in my future. Perfect project for keeping my hands busy while watching movies at night.

Quilted cards

A few weeks ago Wes had his last physical therapy appointment. He has been seeing these PTs for almost 4 years now, so I wanted to give them a little gift to say "thanks". I thought and thought and had a hard time coming up with something. Then I remembered this tutorial.

I didn't come up with the idea until the night before the appointment, so I hurried and threw them together in the hour before we had to leave for the appointment. Luckily I bought some cards at JoAnns a couple of months ago when they were dirt cheap. It only took me an hour to find the fabric, cut everything, and sew twelve cards. I thought that was pretty good time.

Wes's therapist loved them. (I gave a set of 6 cards, three of each design, to two different therapists, but only one of them was at the office. I'm hoping the other therapist liked them, too.) I think they turned out pretty well. Want to see them?






What do you think? I especially love the orange one.

Thanks again, Dana, for another great tutorial.

Rainbow Afghan

About a month ago I got bored. Actually, I was practicing my knitting and my wrists started hurting and I was tired of getting frustrated. I guess I was bored of knitting. Wanting to un-frustrate myself and do something familiar, I decided I wanted to teach myself how to crochet granny squares. I found this tutorial, got out some left over yarn (Red Heart acrylic in six different colors, in case you were wondering) from an afghan I crocheted in college, and got started.


Once I got the hang of the granny squares pattern, they worked up really fast. I started out making six squares of each of my six colors, but decided I wanted my blanket a little bigger, so I made a few more until it was the size I wanted. Then I added a brown row around each of the squares, then attached them all together. Easy peasy!


I think I am going to call it my Kindermusik afghan. The majority of it was crocheted while the boys attended their summer session of Kindermusik. I love rainbows, so this blanket makes me smile.

Lucy Aprons

My boys' teachers were extra great this year, so I decided to make them some fun aprons. Once I decided that's what I wanted to make, I looked and looked for a fun patterns. I finally found this one. The Lucy Apron.

The pattern has instructions for lots of embellishments and appliques, but I ran out of time (especially since I had to make five of them). This apron is supposed to be reversible, but when I bought fabric (while on our trip to Minnesota), I didn't get enough coordinating fabric to be able to do that. So I modified the pattern, used my new serger for the first time, and made them one-sided. Each apron got a one pocket.

The pattern gave instructions for two different tie placements, at the hip and at the waist. I made the first one with the tie at the hip, but I didn't like how it fit me. So I made the other four with the tie at the waist. I liked those ones a whole bunch better.

Here are some pictures. I even got Brett to put one on for a picture (it took a lot of talking!), but I will refrain from posting it here.

The apron with the tie at the hips. See how it lays weird around the bust area? Not a fan.

The apron with the tie at the waist. Much better!


The five aprons together. I had a fun time with the fabric combinations. It was also fun trying to match the fabrics to the teachers.

The aprons were a huge success. I gave them to the teachers with a jar of homemade strawberry jam. I overheard a couple of the teachers talking about them. They both said that these were their first aprons. And they were excited to finally have an apron. I think I made a great choice with this gift.

Denim Quilt

When I was a teenager, my mom made some denim blankets for my cousins for Christmas. She spent hours on them (she one for each of the 4 kids in my aunt's family). She would work on them at night after we went to bed. When Christmas Eve rolled around, my parents handed us each a huge box and told us we could open them before we went to bed. They all sounded a little different when we shook them. We had no idea what they were. We were pleasantly surprised when we opened them to find that she had also made the 4 of us denim quilts. (My mom had put baby food jars of buttons in a couple of the boxes so that the presents all sounded different.) She made 8 quilts! Her poor fingers! Two of them looked exactly like two of the quilts she made for my cousins, and the other two were different. She told me that she had to work on the 2 different ones after we went to sleep, so she had lots of late nights. She even took them to my grandma's house to tie them so we wouldn't see them. Very sneaky!

That quilt has been very loved. It was used as my bed spread from that time until I got married. It was used for picnics and other outings. It was made using some acid wash jeans. (Just for future reference, don't make a denim quilt out of acid wash jeans. They don't last.) Lately it has been used on my sons' beds when their bed spreads were in the wash. It is falling apart. All of the squares made of acid wash jeans are shredded. Some of the cotton fabric squares have completely torn off. The binding is worn all the way through the top layer. It was in dire need of being replaced.

Last fall I started checking out our local thrift stores, looking for fabric to make mats for nursery singing time. I found a sheet set that was ugly/cool, and I think I ended up paying $1.50 because the store was having a half off sale. I was going to use it for the mats, but I decided it would make a better quilt. So I pulled out our old worn out jeans, bought some denim skirts (which happened to be Ralph Lauren and Girbaud brands) and a HUGE pair of woman's jeans (I have seriously never seen a pair that big in my life), and my new denim blanket was born.

I started cutting it out over General Conference weekend last October. I got it all cut out, but for some reason I never sewed it together. I made a goal to have it finished for our trip to DC in March, but it didn't happen. I finally got the motivation to sew it so we could use it during our trip to Minnesota over Memorial Day, and I finally got it finished just as we drove up to my sister-in-law's house in Minnesota. I mean I literally sewed the last stitch on the binding as we got to her house. Talk about perfect timing!

The decided to have a little bit of fun with this quilt. I cut lots of pockets out of the denim I used (at least 2 front pockets and 6 back pockets). I added lots of seams, a hammer loop from some carpenter jeans, and even managed to get a square with the tiny Ralph Lauren tag still attached to the pocket (I am adding a picture of that below). I wanted this to be a fun and interesting quilt.

I bought some batting at JoAnns when it was on sale, but when I got it laid on the quilt back, I found that it was thin and wimpy. I didn't have time to get new stuff, so I used it anyway. I'm really disappointed with that part. My old denim quilt is a nice, heavy weight. This one feels paper thin. I wish I would have had a better bat to put in it. Oh well. I think for my next quilt I am going to try a bamboo or cotton bat. I have never used anything but polyester batting, so I am interested to see what the other stuff is like.

I usually use quilt frames to tie my quilts, but I don't have any, and I didn't really have time or space to do it that way, anyway. I laid the back on my kitchen floor (it barely fit!) and taped it down, then laid the batting on top of that, then put on the top. I pin basted it with almost 100 safety pins. To tie it, I just laid it on my living room floor and went to work. It was actually kind of nice to not have to stop to roll the quilt when I got too far in.

Over all I am really happy with this quilt. I think it has the best binding I have ever done (and I have done a lot of them). It is a good neutral color, so my boys don't have to feel like they have a girly quilt on their bed. And it is big enough that it could almost cover our queen size bed. (I think the sheet set was a double.) Ready for some pictures?


I hope this quilt gets used and loved as much as my last one.

Twisted Fabric Flower Pins

At the end of the school year I like to give teachers and therapists a little "Thank You" gift. I had a hard time deciding what to make Wes's therapists. I finally decided to make them flower pins. I ended up making flower pins that are made with twisted strips of fabric.












I ripped strips of fabric about and inch wide and the whole length of the fabric from selvage to selvage. Then I cut a piece of felt and glued one end of the fabric in the center and started twisting from there. I would twist, then glue, then twist, then glue. When I got to the end of my fabric strip, I cut off the selvage and tucked the end under the flower. I then trimmed the felt, glued a button/bead in the middle of the flower, and glued the pin to the back.












They were actually really easy and only took me about an hour to do all four pins. I'm not sure what Wes's therapists thought of them, but I think they turned out pretty good. Brett even liked them.



What do you think?