We love Halloween!

Here we are. Our 12th Halloween together. Why would I know something random like that? Because we love Halloween. We have every Halloween picture on our wall- year round! So here we are; a gypsy, A vampire and a fairy princess.

We went trick or treating with our friends and their kids. My friend is a genius and lined her daughter's princess costume with fleece. Awesome! No coat required. We totally lucked out and a storm came through the night before and wiped all the clouds away. We had a clear sky and it was pretty warm. Yea, for Trick or treating. M got like 5 full size candy bars!

We are going to Great Wolf Lodge this week. We are really excited! A water park indoors, spas, games, food. It should be a blast! We haven't gone on a vacation well since I was preggers with M and really it didn't count. It was an overnight bus trip to Paris. Not much romance with a bus full of people. :) Then again, not much romance water sliding with a four year old. :) But we will LOVE it!

My New Bag and a Few complaints

Here is my new bag. I was making it for my brother to give as x-mas gifts but I decided to make myself one for Halloween since I had exactly enough fabric. I absolutely love this fabric. I'm not one to wear skeletons or skulls other than Halloween but my brother's friend is. The pattern is an old 1970's pattern I acquired from my mother a while back. It is a great way to display your favorite fabric. The handle is supposed to be tied but I find that it usually isn't that comfortable so I sewed them together and put some red buttons on. I wanted turquoise but I wasn't going to go to the store for buttons when I have like 5 billion at home. Red will do. The inside has one pocket that was fussy cut so that it had a little picture on it. So far I love it! Like my fancy pen with my name on it. I bought one for my niece for her 15th birthday. I think she was more excited over the pen than the 50 bucks we gave her. Kids. So weird. I also made a mini quilt for STUD but I can't show it yet. Soon. It is very cute.So here are my complaints. One, MY WASHER DIED MID CYCLE. So I have a washer full of wet cloths and water. So annoying. Second, I know I live in Washington and we are known for rain but oh my goodness, we have been getting so much! I can't believe it! I guess that is what happens when you have a virtually perfect summer with record heat. So, I guess I won't complain. :) Plus my grandma is in the hospital again. I hope your day is going better than mine. I pulled out the Mike's Hard Berry Drink. Yumm...

Bags Galore

I got very motivated this weekend and made some bags. Both of these are for ladies in my office. I just kind of well, hate this bag so I was lacking motivation to make it. Its my design - I really can't blame anyone. It might be that I have been carrying the same bag in different colors for months and I am sick of it. Why I didn't make myself a new one you ask? Well, I needed to make these first. :)
This second bag is for my friend Kris who is a sewer but you know, never any time, so she asked me to make it for her friend whose a sewer as well. It came as a kit so I just had to follow directions. It was supposed to have free motion quiting on it but I am not very good at that so I embellished the wand with shiny beads. Each sewn individually so they shouldn't fall off...I hope. My mom made the saying for me on her machine since mine isn't so high tech.



The Wicked Witch side I traced the hat and the band on the hat. If I knew how to do trapunto that would have been cool. I have the panels too so I may make myself one as well. Oh, I didn't take pictures of the inside but it is lined with yellow fabric with ruby slippers on it and has pockets made from stills of the film on the same panel. Its lined with eco-felt. I am not overly familiar with it but I really liked the stiffness of it. I wonder if it washes well. The handles are webbing.
So this last bag...I know...its not done yet, was made from scraps I had. I'm calling it my library bag. I need to go back to the fabric store and see if I can get more red to line it and make the handles. I seriously used every scrap. Look at the flower- scraps. The flower is removable. Its one of the Kanashi flowers from this book.
Scraps. See the line at the top. I didn't have enough to make it the whole size so I improvised. I actually like it. I would have made it a bigger strip but...scraps. That is all I had. :)

I should have been working on the bag my mom asked me to make or the four bags my brother commissioned for x-mas but oh well. The Library bag was way more fun and took me like a half hour.

Now I need to work on quilting bee blocks. :)

Baby Quilt and WIP

So here are the two quilts I mentioned earlier. This one is the baby quilt for my friend.

Here is a close up of the rainy day girls. I ordered it in purple or blue but they sent me the pink. I was sort of bummed but I guess it all worked out. They are super cute. Honestly, I bought it to make myself something.

This is the back. I didn't know the baby's name but it really needed something so I quickly hand embroidered a rainy day umbrella.

Here is my WIP. Its a lime green and yellow string quilt. I love it. My hubby even loved it. Too bad it doesn't match anything in our house. As you can see on the top is white. I still have to do a white border all around and then I will bind it in one of the lime green fabrics. Back, you ask, got me. Not that far. :) I'm really happy with how it is turning out. I was thinking about selling it on etsy. It would be my first quilt. It all depends, of course, on the final quality. I won't sell anything that I am not fully proud of. I am sure you all understand. :)

Dresses, dresses and a miniquilt

I can't believe it has been that long since I posted. I still haven't taken a picture of the two quilts I made. Okay one quilt, one top. The weather has turned so I don't have many options since my camera is dying and doesn't take indoor pictures very well. Any suggestions for a new camera? I keep reading reviews but then I read a bad one and decide to keep looking. But either way here are some pictures of other things I made. :)

I love this little dress. I saw it and had to make it and I am not someone who makes cloths for their child. Besides the one's I am showing you - I have only made one other dress for her and calling it make is a stretch since it was this funky wrap dress. I'm not even going to try to explain it - it was a weird, super simple design. Anyway, this dress is the Kyoko dress from Modkids. I got it at PinkChalkFabrics. Super fast delivery. M is going to wear it at her great grandma's 91st birthday party or maybe to meet my sister in law's soon to be in laws. She wants my hubby and me to come to be buffers for her parents. They can be odd as all parents can be.

Here is the second dress. I know, I was totally motivated. So weird. This one M really wanted a purple dress so I used all stash fabric. I was so proud of myself for not buying more. The kyoko dress I had to buy the turquoise but I had the black part. It is intended for a play dress. In fact, she already stained it the first day she wore it. It is really big and airy which I think she loves. She loves to be a naked baby. And she hates when I say naked baby since she is not a baby! This is the Syndey dress from Modkids as well. It has a pointed hood (or the option to make a rounded one) and you can have short sleeves or make it a shirt. My kid likes dresses. Oh and it is supposed to have a strip work bottom but I just did one fabric. The fabric was crazy enough.

Here is my mini quilt from Doll Quilt Swap 7. I was so excited to get it. I love the quilting and it smells really good. Her blog is at Craftalittle. I love it. My daughter ran around the house with it with a roll of tape trying to find a place to put it up. I think I am going to put it up in the hallway since I have nothing there yet. Don't worry - I'm not taping it. I think it is taped to my desk right now.

Here is the back.

A couple more projects

The beginnings of my string quilt. I had all these yellow and lime greens. Its almost all the way put together and it looks awesome. I just haven't gotten a photo yet.

A tutu for my little one. It turned out very cute. I looked for the photo of her last year that was adorable but I can't find it. Here's the tutorial for the tutu. it is super simple. You can make hundreds of them and charge like 40 bucks for them. That's about what they cost on etsy and the ballet supply store and they are made the exact same way - I kid you not. How annoying.

M is loving preschool .They already went on a field trip to Western Washington University to look at dinosaur poop. How cool. I wish I could have gone but nooo...I had to work. Stupid job keeping me from looking at dinosaur poop. :)

I also finished a quickie baby quilt. I was supposed to see my friend this weekend but she is the worst for keeping plans so it didn't happen. I still have to take a photo before i mail it.

Hope the new school year it going well for you!

Good Ol' Summertime Mini Quilt Swap

I got my first mini quilt. I am so excited. It went right on my wall. It was made by Kim at Sunshine Girl. She is new to the world of blogging. Its nice to see someone newer than me and she is opening an etsy shop. Keep checking for her great items. It looks like a ton of awesome buttercup bags will be there soon!

Isn't this the cutest fabric ever! I am jealous that I don't have any. Well, any uncut. At least I can enjoy it on my wall. Thank you Kim!!!

And of course a picture of my child on her first day of preschool. I know it is just like day care but she was so proud of herself and being a big kid. She picked out all her cloths and hair accessories for her first day. It actually brought a tear to my eye - my baby is growing up. I was also totally corny and made her cookies so she would have warm cookies on her first day of school. Don't worry- I am no June Cleaver. They were Tollhouse premade dough. :) She won't know the difference.

I have a ton of projects to show you but I am going to spread them out but as a hint - I have another quilt block done, two quilts, a tutu. I have been so busy and motivated!

Another One Bites the Dust

I finished another block. YEA! Now I have one that I am waiting for more fabric and one that I am avoiding. The one I am avoiding I am going to start. It is my goal to finish that one this weekend so I can do something for myself. I need to make a skirt for M, a couple of bags, and I want to make a string quilt. Wish me luck!

More Quilting Bee Blocks

Anna's Block, originally uploaded by samcrawley.
Another Quilting Bee block done. This one is for Anna. She wanted something scrappy so I made the Silent Star from Eleanor Burn's Victory Quilts book. I had to call my mom and tell her it was a bit odd I was confused by a beginners block. It was just figuring out what Eleanor Burns meant in her instructions. She has a different way of doing things. Quite simple once I figured it out and I think the block turned out nice so I am happy. I hope Anna likes it.

This block is for Amy. She wanted a square inside a square and only three fabrics. Seems simple enough except I don't think I had enough fabric. All I have left is some purple and nothing even usable of the others. I am not happy with this block. I emailed Amy to see if she liked it, otherwise I am taking it apart tonight and trying again. I want to carry the circles across although it will cut the tree and I will make the purple block bigger. Or I could raise the tree higher and cut off the top. I will have to get the ruler out and figure out if I have enough fabric. I hope it works if I do it or I am screwed. Hopefully, Amy doesn't like it so I can redo it.

After these I have two blocks left. One is do whatever and the other I have to make a basket on point. I'm kind of intimidated by that one which is why I got so far behind. I like to do things in order and I should have done that one a long time ago so I didn't do the others. Just stared at the envelopes. It will be done this weekend. Maybe even tonight. We will see. :)

Mini Quilt and Some Blocks

More pictures....

Here is my mini quilt for the Doll Quilt Swap 7. The change I made was added three dots to the center of the big tree. My Grandma suggested it and after I did it - I loved it. It filled in enough white space to make me happy.

Here is the back. I shrunk it down. Okay, not on purpose. I prefer the new look but I used chalk to make the quilting lines and the chalk would not come off! I washed it 6 times, I used Shout, OxiClean and Grandma's Secret Spot Remover. Finally, it came out enough but I got the shrunken worn look. Its okay. I think it looks better on the back than the front. It makes the quilting stand out on the back. By the way, the pattern is my dessert plate, 8.5 inches and I just traced it many times. No pattern. No rhyme or reason.

And a quilt block for one of the bees I am in. I figured I should really get them done. This is for Kathy in Pieced Together Quilting Bee. She wanted a log cabin block. I hope she likes it.

Here is Edith's in Pieced Together Quilting Bee. She wanted something that evoked circles. What's more circlee (is that a word?) than the drunkards path? I hope she likes it. Its really loud!

My goal is to finish the rest of the blocks this weekend. I'm sure everyone would like their blocks back. Fall is here so its time to buckle down. :)