a little bit of me.

{the princess & the pea}

meant to blog sooner than this.

ughhhhhhhhhhh.

(sidenote: evan loves when i say "ugggggggggggggghhhhh" >> he thinks it is "funnn-eeee" as he would say, and always answers back with his own little mimicking "uggggggggggghhhh")

but here i am today.

posting the princess and the pea.

just a fun little way for me to inject a bit more of both "pink" and "girly" into my projects...

the princess and the pea fabric is from Heather Ross's Far Far Away collection.  i adore it.  as i do ALL of her prints ;)

there is another small princess in the block on the back:

and if you'd like - you can see more of it in the etsy listing: HERE.  ETA> SOLD.  thanks sumi!  ;)

:)

evan and i are headed out for the afternoon to visit the turtles (i don't know if i've blogged this, but evan is obsessed, & they are so a part of our life these days!) and buy toby some treats...  a pic of evan splashing at the turtle park (its like a group of connected ponds outside maggiano's at our mall, with turtles, ducks, and fish - not REALLY a park...) this weekend...

:)

{Sea Glass}

i finished another quilt last weekend...

and just had time to photo it today.

the blue and green fabrics completely remind me of seaglass - hence the name - and so i stopped by the beach on the way to pick ev up from school today, and shot it there ;)

the backing is almost a solid turquoise print, with a touch of the apples and polkas mixed in...

It's made up of lots of strips of various prints - no real pattern, just strips > some pieced together with little blocks...

and just for fun, i thought it would be nice to do a random straight line grid type stitching/quilting pattern >> the result is lots of nice puffy squares & rectangles:

...the bamboo batting that i used gives it a really nice drape:

...and if interested, it's up on etsy >> you can see more details HERE. ETA: SOLD! :)

:)

{instead of cleaning...}

...the mess that is my desk:

...i just randomly started making layouts out of the pile of junk that was on it.

it's been a long long time since i made layouts this quick.

but it was fun.

and freeing to just make whatever i wanted.  :)

this was done based on kelly's 2peas sketch.  i never really scrapped any pregnancy pics - even tho i have so many, so it was nice to be able to group a bunch on this one page.

this was bc i thought it might be nice to add another page to evan's every month album.  (i swear one day the whole 24 months - 1 page for each month - will be finished!)

and this was just bc it made me happy.  the paper, colors, embellies, and most importantly the pic.

:)  >>  so glad i just said no to cleaning!

{it's friday!}

yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!

which means...

...my husband is home from being away for the whole week.  woot woot.

...my sister kimmie is here to spend some time with us.

...we're getting ready to have a "taco-off" where we let kimmie taste-test tacos in our 2 favorite local "beach-mexican" places - tacolu & yucatan - 'beach mexican' is my own little offical terminology ;) - they both specialize in yummy fish/seafood/other insteresting combo soft tacos.  kimmie will award one the 'winning taco' prize... :)  overall it will amuse me/us.

...i've loaded new bibs in the etsy store > here.

...i liked the color scheme of one of the sold bibs so much, that i've been working on a new 'peas and carrots' color-themed baby quilt:

...i LOVED the BB11 finale this week.  yay jordan.  kind of sad that natalie got to leave with $50K?!

...i'm counting down the hours till gossip girl on monday night.  ok not really but i'm psyched.

...and we are ready for some fun gator football tomorrow.  :)

{little lion}

just to 'keep it real' with all the quilting recently...

...a layout that i did for the fiskars crafts site, with the new fall punches.

i always love the Fiskars seasonal release squeeze punches - and these didnt disapoint.

the little pumpkin punch embellies are heat embossed with AC Zing! embossing powder to give them a subtle texture.

you can see the project and directions >> HERE.

:)

{my how-to quilt article}

Remember this post???

those super-yummy fabrics were turned into this quilt:

its part of a basic step-by-step article that I wrote for the Fiskars Crafts website.

you can see the article here:

HOW-TO QUILT article link

...I get lots of emails asking how to get started in sewing & quilting, and I think that this article really walks you through the basic steps of creating a first (smallish!) quilt!

I hope it helps some of you out, and I'm going to encourage you to post your questions about the steps - or the process - in the comments section of this blog post, where I will try my best to also answer them, if needed!

the backing on this quilt is one of heather bailey's prints - just a continuous piece of that print, nothing fancy, but i still love it!

*************************

& a few other questions about sewing/quilting that i get from time to time:

Q: Where do i buy my fabric?

A: EVERYWHERE.  ha!  etsy, ebay, local quilt shops, Joanns for Kona solids and also for the alexander henry prints that they carry and sometimes for the fat quarter (FQ) stacks of designer prints that they sneakily cut the selvedges off of, but i still know that they are high-quality fabrics, online stores like quilthome, etsy favorites are FabricWorm, DownShadowLane, and SewDeerlyLoved. 

I pretty much have collected my stash over the past 5 years or so - even before i sewed regularly, i LOVED fabric, and would just buy small amounts - which is how i've accumulated some of my out of print amy butler & others stash.  My fabric is stored unwashed, in plastic bins according to my own little sorting strategy - i have all amy butler together, all denyse schmidt together, all heather ross together, a retro bin with lots of moda, and scrap boxes, and then mixed bins, etc etc.

Q: How did I learn how to sew?

A: I almost completely taught myself.  When we lived in Philly, I started out with a $99 Singer machine from walmart, bc i wanted to stitch on my scrapbook pages, and then over time started sewing little projects.  I made my first few quilts on that machine.  I learned to quilt from reading blogs and tutorials online, and i learned how to bind a quilt from a single class at my local quilting shop.

Q: What type of machine do you have?

A: An elna 6600 Quilting Machine.  Eric gave it to me for mother's day and i LOOOOVE it.  LOOVE it.  :)  one of the best gifts ever.

*************************

i hope this article/info helps a bit...

(one more pic:)

:)

{3 things}

3 things today...

*************************

#1 - evan busted out with the CUTEST commentary during yesterday's Jacksonville Jags football game...

while eric was watching the game he off-handedly said: "Go Jaguars!"

...to which evan replied:

"GO Giraffes!"

"GO Monkeys!"

"GO Gorillas!"

(the boy LOVES the zoo! ;)  >> and i do NOT want to forget this.  it was hilarious to us.

*************************

#2 - i got out a bib pattern to make my niece ellie's first birthday bib, and then had fun making a few extra patchwork quilted bibs - with some of my favorite fabrics - this weekend....

i had a fabulous quilted bib for evan that i bought before he was born - and used for all the fun first food & eating photo-op pics that i took...  very similar to these!

i've loaded the etsy shop with a few of the bibs that i crafted this weekend >> ETSY LINK

*************************

and #3 - my card that i created over the weekend for the 'cards for kate' drive...

i hope some of you had time to make one too!

:)

{Goldfish Mini}

the fun little goldfish mini is done...

...it measures 17x23 & i had fun using up scrappy pieces of one of my favorite designers fabrics on this one >> the gnome, goldfish in bags, and swimming goldfish are all out of print fabrics from Heather Ross's Lightning Bugs and Other Mysteries line.

no real pattern - i just pieced stuff and trimmed and sewed until i liked the look of it!

the back has a few more fishies-in-bags on it...

and i couldn't resist throwing a little gnome into the mix ;)

it's now listed on ETSY >> LINK HERE.

ETA >>>  SOLD!!! :)

& thank you all so much for the sweet comments on the amy butler baby stripes :)

****************

and on another note, i'd like to take a chance to mention a really great card drive that is going on right now >> Cards for Kate.  you can read about it HERE.  the fabulous jennifer mcguire is organizing the efforts :)

Kristina told me about this, and I think it's an amazing thing that is being done, and i plan on making a card to send this weekend...

i'll share my card next week, and really encourage all of my super-crafty bloggie-readers to take just a few minutes to make one too.

:)

{Amy Butler Baby Stripes!}

another quilt was finished yesterday...

& i pretty much just LOVE the way it turned out...

it's a combo of ALL of my FAVORITE Amy Butler prints - so many of which i've been hoarding in my stash for a while, and are now out of print...!

the backing could really be the front-ing i think ;)

i had fun just using up lots of scrappy pieces...

& i used a stippling, free-motion stitch to quilt this one, and am now addicted to free-motion quilting...  it creates the yummiest little puckers and makes the quilt look all vintage-perfect once washed & dried...

...one more pic:

i've decided to list it on etsy - if interested, you can see it here: ETSY LINK

ETA >> SOLD!!!  thanks so much Lynnette!!! :)

my empty little etsy shop...!  hopefully there will be more to add soon ;0) >> the s.e.w. in the shop name represents my initials - kinda fun, i thought?!

i loved the color combo so much for this one that i am finishing up another with the scraps from this - it may be done next week?!

:)

{craft crafty!}

just wanted to start the week out with a bit of craftiness ;)

posted last friday >> this layout on the American Crafts blog:

with FAVORITE photos taken in a super-fun photobooth at CHA last month...

see it all HERE!

and you have until thursday to enter the weekly contest with the post to win a fabulous AC prize...

and ALSO...

let the september sewing fiesta on the Fiskars Crafts site begin!

my first project - a jewelry travel case,

is posted HERE.

enjoy ;)