TUMMY TIME IN CENTRAL PARK

At least, I hope that's what will happen with this blankie.  I made my second and probably last Ribbon Blankie for my friend Deana and her soon-to-be-born son, Eli.  Her baby shower was yesterday, and she absolutely loved the blankie.

It turned out really cute, but I have to say that although the minky on the back is cute and soft and fluffy, I really don't ever want to work with it ever again.  It stretches way too much for my patience, which I must say is lacking.

I said on Piece N Quilt the other day that even though it was a pain, I didn't mind working with it because of the result.  I take it back!

I used a multi-shade teal thread for the top-stitching and a loop-de-loop stitch.  I will definitely use both the thread and the stitch again.  Forgive the pictures -- it's a bit fuzzy!

THE SOLIDS HAVE LANDED

Check out the P2 page for a picture of the Moda Bella Solids that I bought for the quilt along!  They are gorgeous, and while I've never worked with solids before, I can't wait!  Woo-hoo!

If you visit my blog, I would also really appreciate it if you click the Follow button on the sidebar.  It feels a little lonely here right now.  Thanks!

OUT OF MY COMFORT ZONE

So, I've decided to move out of my comfort zone, which is well-coordinated collections in pre-cuts for small quilts.  I'm going to join the guys at Patchwork Squared for their Modern Solids Quilt-Along.  I have a sister who loves neutrals and the like, and I picked a green, a yellow, and Bella Solids Stone to work around.  Ordered my fabric today from Fat Quarter Shop.  Thanks for the discount, Kim!

I'm looking forward to this personal design challenge.  Solids are not really my thing, but I think my sister will love it, and so will her baby!

WIPs, WIPs, AND MORE WIPs

Actually, it's just two WIPs.  Two I've discussed before.  And to announce that only one person signed up for my giveaway, and that was my friend Nicki from work.  You've bummed me out, people!

Anyway, here's the first WIP.  It's the Vintage Ribbons Table Runner from Moda Bake Shop that I've been trying to complete for a while now.  Pretty much almost finished other than sandwiching, quilting, and binding.  I have a three-day weekend coming up, so I'm going to do a lot of sewing!

My camera still sucks right now.  I need a new one.  I'm hoping I can talk my sister into upgrading and giving me her old one!  Anyway, I tried a few "high-in-the-air-directly-overhead" shots of my WIPs.  Seemed to work okay.

The above shot is a little wonky, but I think it shows the colors really well.  The pattern called for solids, and I just don't care for them.  At least not right now.  But the binding will be solid red.  I think that will provide some nice contrast.  I added the aqua because my living room colors are red and aqua.  Works really well, I think!

And now to more baby stuff.  I got the top sewn for Eli's ribbon blankie.  It's looks so cute that I turned it into my work computer's desktop background!

How fun is that?!  I used my favorite prints and tried to be as random as I could.  I'm very visual, and therefore I have a really hard time with random patterns.  I can't do it.  I had to throw them all in a bag and pick them.  And I still rearranged quite a few!

NAP TIME IN CENTRAL PARK

One of my dear college friends is having a baby boy in May.  Eli has been wanted for years, and we're all so very excited for his arrival.  His mother LOVES green and she's decorating his room with grass painted on the walls, frogs, turtles, etc.  Sounds like a perfect match for Kate Spain's Central Park!

I'm a HUGE Kate Spain fan.  I love her collections.  I'm so excited to play with this one.  Last summer, I made the cutest baby blankie and squishy block for a friend.  I'm going to make an even bigger blankie and a squeaker, squishier block for Eli!  Excitement!  Can I just say that I love the Moda Bake Shop?!

MORE DETAILS ON THE LAP QUILT

I'm still using my cellphone to take pictures, but I set up the fabrics in a nice bright spot and I've edited them to look a little more lovely and bright than they usually come out.

Here are the charms that will become the coins.  A ConnectingThreads.com charm pack only has 20-ish charms, so I bought four.  They're only about two dollars a piece, so it's not bad.

My sister LOVES pink, and this collection, called Antoinette, is very pink.  It's darling, in fact.  I picked pink fabrics for the sashing and binding because Mary will love that.  Here's a shot of the sashing fabric.  It's a pale pink on white design.

So lovely!  I do my bindings on the bias, and I love using stripes for the binding fabric.  It just comes out fun and funky.  So here's the binding fabric.  It's a medium pink background with darker pink printing.  Very cute.

That will make some fun binding strips, won't it?!  And for the back, I decided to use the focal fabric from the collection.  It's background is white, which is kind of a bummer.  It'll probably get dirty fast if Mary uses it for a lap quilt on the plane.  But the pattern is so pretty, I couldn't not use it!

I'd say these came out pretty good for cellphone pictures!  As for the pattern, it's a Stacked Coins Baby Quilt from Moda Bake Shop.  Mary's only about five-foot-four, so I'm not worried.  And then she can either hang it up or use for when she has kids!

BUNGLE IN THE JUNGLE

I had a baby shower to go to today, and the theme was "jungle." The parents, M and T, decided not to find out what the sex is. Therefore, green, yellow, and brown were the colors of the day. My god-daughter and her mom helped me pick out fabrics last night. We found eight REALLY cute fat quarters. I used a pattern I saw on the Moda Bake Shop -- Ribbon Blanket and Block. Very cute. The pattern called for using Minkee, which I've never sewed before. It wasn't fun -- lots of fuzzy stuff all over my sewing room. But the color was fun -- the Minkee we found is a cheetah pattern with a green background.

The front of the blankie has two each of the eight prints. The block has my six favorite. I picked out nine ribbons. I tried to vary them enough around the blankie.

I enjoyed making this little set. I don't have any ribbon other than this stuff, but I definitely want to make more of these. Too cute!

DISTRACTED BY BABIES AGAIN

I had so much to do this weekend, that I got absolutely no sewing done. Not even any designing. Why? I was distracted by kids again, George especially, which I'm sure is not a surprise. My friends and I took their babies to Boo at the Zoo Saturday. It was a lot of fun, but we all decided that we were never going to do it again. There were WAY too many people!

But here are some pics of the cuteness that was the group of kids we went with.

This is my friend Elena, her husband, and their two children, Thomas and MaryKate.

Zoo Boise's brand new, juvenile giraffes. I think the younger one was a little cold!

My favorites were the tigers. I love big cats!

George as Tigger and his mom, Jami!

George and his Auntie Hattie (me!).

SDC

This is totally off-topic -- it has nothing to do with quilting or anything of that sort. However, I just have to share it because it's so damn cute!

Yesterday was my birthday, and my friends and their babies were going to come to my work and take me to lunch. Unfortunately, plans changed and they couldn't make it. So Jami, who has a little boy, George, sent me a birthday pix message last night. Here's the pic:

How cute is he? Don't you just want to pinch one cheek and kiss the other? And how about those eyes? They are totally taking in the entire world, aren't they? My Georgie Porgie is just so cute. I had to share!

An update, October 21, 2008:

I plastered this photo all over my work computer's desktop. It makes me so happy to close my programs and see Georgie's adorable face looking back at me. How can I not smile?

And he was "Idaho Correctional Facility Inmate No. 467915" at my costume party this past weekend. How appropriate for a five month old is that?

MAMA'S MAGIC

I recently was accepted into the Etsy Bloggers Street Team, for which I'm quite excited. Hopefully, that will get me some more readers. And it gives me the chance to check out other people on Etsy whom I might miss otherwise. One of them is Mama's Magic. Her name is Jen and she has a couple Etsy shops, one of which I find really interesting, although the majority of what she has on there isn't for me -- I'm not a nursing mother. Heck, I'm not even a mother!

But her nursing beads for mom and baby are really cool! They give the child something to focus on so that the nursing goes smoother for everyone involved. It totally made me think of my friend and her baby, George. George has a hard time focusing on nursing -- he tends to think it's "play-with-Mommy's-booby" time rather than breakfast, lunch or dinner time. It makes me wonder if Jen's really fun beaded necklaces would help my friend get George to focus on nursing and not goofing around. However, he is a boy, after all! ;-)

Jen's blog, which you can check out by clicking the title of this post, has some pictures of her baby beads and stories about her life, including the latest story, wherein her son BJ wanted to know if the vice-presidential candidates were still going to love each other once the debate was over. How cute is that? As a former teacher, I love reading about what kids have to say and ask regarding the world. Makes us rethink our own perspectives. Thanks, Jen, for sharing BJ's insight!

AN UPDATE ON THE CHASE RACE

So I've come up with a better design, one that I like better and is a bit more quilt-square-y, if that makes sense! It's not as full of large pieces of fabric but of quilt blocks. Whew! I like the idea. It'll be fun to work with.

This is what the design will look like. I turned the panel on its end so that it is more in line with the size of the quilt. This will be a twin-size so it can grow with him. And the panel will afford him the opportunity to have a racetrack on which to drive his matchbox cars.

And this is what the blocks will look like. Sorta. They are half-square triangles, not strips with set-in squares or whatever. I don't do that set-in stuff. Too complicated. I like my quilt blocks simple. Not too simple, but simple. And the extra space between the blocks on the sides and the panel will be taken up by strips of checkered flag fabric. Not the real thing -- I wish. That would be totally awesome! But fabric from this Vroom! collection.

THE CHASE RACE

So my friend Tisha from work is having her first baby at the end of October. She's been HUGE since July, poor thing, so he's probably going to be a honker! His name is Chase Allen Gallop. So cute. And his nursery theme is cars and trucks. I pledged a baby quilt for Chase at her baby shower Saturday. And I found the cutest race car fabric collection. It's brand new, thank God, so I'll be able to find some while I have money! I have mapped out a preliminary design. Tell me what you think!

TONIGHT, TONIGHT!

I celebrate tonight -- because I'm going to sew. I was busy last night -- I had a volunteer orientation and then I hung out with my friends and their son and ended up babysitting for about 45 minutes.

He's really cute. I've included a picture just because George is cute, and now it is known why I get so distracted at their house. He's attempting to crawl, and he's talking, and he likes to stand up. He's 4-and-a-half months old going on 25 years, y'know? The picture is from when he was just a month old.


But he will not deter me from sewing tonight. I'm going to clean off my dining table and sew in there -- that table is higher than the piece of crap plastic one I sew on in my spare room. Plus, it's cooler -- thank God for eves on apartments. I have two more placemats to quilt, and I will finish them tonight. There's no more Psych on -- I'll watch it online when I go to bed. So I have plenty of time. I'm determined to finish them tonight and then prepare the bindings on Sunday -- busy Saturday! Mom's going to help me with sewing on the bindings. I'm not so hot at the hand-sewing. Oh well! Wish me luck!