Cleaning up Pinterest

For those of you who follow me on Pinterest, you may have noticed I've been a pinning machine lately. Well, that's true and it's not. I have been cleaning up my Pinterest boards, deleting duplicate pins, making them easier to navigate and separating out the quilting pins into sections.

If you were only following one or two of my boards before, you may want to check out the changes to see if there are new boards you may also want to follow.

Happy Pinning!

Stitch Tease Blocks

I'm catching up on some bee blocks so I can start working on a yummy new Valentine's Day project. These are all for Stitch Tease, my international mystery quilt bee. I have been slacking on getting these finished but with the new price increase on international shipping, I felt more motivation. :)

I'm not allowed to show you the full blocks, but here are some sneaky peeks.



Hadley



Katy



Dianne



Annabella

ANNNNNDDD.... I totally forgot to take a teaser picture of Di's block, so she gets to be super teased with no image!! Bwahaha!

Scrap Flannel Baby Quilt

Once upon a time I bought a ridiculous amount of flannel from Jo-Anns and it sat, unused and unloved in a dusty old closet for years. Then, I took the doors off that closet and the flannel was seen with a new light! If only someone would have a baby, I could find a home where that flannel could be loved!!

Enter Reagan.



This little lady got the crib bedding I showed you the other day as well as a shnazzy new Christmas stocking, along with her brother.

At my baby shower I received a great baby quilt. It was blue because the lady who gave it to me thought I was having a boy, but I didn't mind. It was pieced together with scraps of novelty children's flannels and tied with the softest yarn you could ever imagine. Like a unicorn's mane, I'm pretty certain. It was, and is, a great source of warmth and comfort for Mazer and I, especially during those late night feedings when we would cuddle together in the plush glider in her darkened room.

As you can imagine, I am someone who understands the intrinsic value of the handmade. This little blue baby quilt is among my most valued possessions.



So how could I not make a scrappy flannel baby quilt for my friend? I hope it brings her just as much joy as ours has for us.

I tied it using some pearl cotton I had on hand and filled it with Warm and Natural I also had on hand. I had just taken it from the wash and just barely remembered to snap a couple pictures before I ran off to meet Reagan's mama and another friend for coffee. It isn't fancy. There's no crazy stitching or piecing. No real reason to take a billion fantastic and artistic shots. I just wanted to show you all something small that means a whole awful lot.

This Year and What I Hope It Brings

I've joined the Lovely Year of Finishes over on Flickr. It's not anything I have to make for, or even keep a schedule for. It's just a place for people to hold each other accountable for finishing their projects. I'm not really looking for accountability and I certainly wasn't looking to "join" ANYTHING new, but this feels right. A place to share stuff I've made. A place where people will look at it and maybe feel just a twinge of excitement over my finishes, as I will feel glad for theirs.


We were asked to introduce ourselves and I felt I was able to nicely sum up where I am now and what I hope for this year:

Oh dang. This feels like an AA meeting!

Hi. My name is Danny and I have a problem with finishing quilts.

I am a 25 year old SAHM. I am the director of a small, local quilting group making quilts for people with cancer. I am also the Bee Mama for Stash Bee and the chair for the Phoenix Modern Quilt Guild Bees. I participate in Stitch Tease - An International Mystery Quilt Bee, although if I'm being totally honest, I'm REALLY far behind on that one! I love fabric and color and seem to sew a little bit every day. I like diet coke and tea and a slab of tiramisu every now and then, although I do eat healthy most of the time. Being mommy is my highest priority so I spend lots of time playing "The Lion Eats the Princess" and "Hide and Seek" and memorizing sing song books about furry animals.

This year I would like to make more for my family. Last year was quite ridiculous. I had NOTHING to share at my guild's end of year show-and-tell because nothing I made stayed with me. I plan to join less and sew more. I plan to complete projects I've started for me and my family and not start lofty projects for other people that will cut into my precious family time. I guess I just want to have fun this year and have something to show for it!! I'm sure we are all in the same boat!


So now comes the time when I share what January will look like:

- Flannel baby quilt for a friend. The top is completed on this one. Just need to stitch in some batting, back, and tie.
- Flannel Plus Quilt for my best friend in the whole wide world who has NEVER received ANYTHING handmade from me. Yeah, and it was supposed to be a wedding gift a year ago. Shame. I feel shame. But the top is put together on that one too.
- Flannel Diagonal Quilt (?? The name needs work) for me. Something warm and cozy I can snuggle with my man under while we watch Psych this winter! It's back on in February. Oh, and I've almost finished the top. It will be the first quilt I will have made for me.
- Scrappy Trip Around the World quilt. Top is finished. This was a REFRESHING quilt, to say the least!
- I Spy quilt. Top is complete. Just need to quilt it.
- Beatles Quilt. Top is complete. Just need to quilt it.

And on that note, the reason all these quilts have been piling up?? The no good, terrible, dirty, jerk of a Viking doesn't quilt. Long story. I promise it's coming soon. Anyway, I bought a new Juki to take her snotty little place. More on that one later too.

So, there's January. There's what I've done so far. I promise there will be more pictures once the baby is back to 100% and I can take her outside.

Custom Crib Bedding

I have a very dear friend who asked me to make custom crib bedding for her soon-to-be-born daughter. I explained how I'd never made anything like that before, but she didn't mind and I said "yes". I've been putting off sharing this post until after her baby was born. I wanted to share pictures of the little lady enjoying her new digs, but I've been sick and decided not to infect their sweet family with my phlegm and Maze's snot.

It's been a couple weeks and we are still fighting this monster of a cold, so I've decided to share the pictures with you now. Who knows?! Their new little lady could be ten years old before I'm well enough to visit again!! Sheesh!





My friend chose these sunny prints from Michael Miller Citron/Gray. I LOVE that daisy print. She has such fabulous taste.



I made piping to make the tops of the bumpers look more clean and neat. I measured the crib before installing the ties to make sure they would end up in the perfect spot. I have store bought (clearance, no less) bumpers and they are AWEFUL. None of the ties line up with the bars on the crib and there are about a million of them on each piece of the bumper. Such a pain when I have to change the sheets!


The bumpers are made with 2" foam I bought at Jo-Ann. I used the Crib Bedding 101 tutorial from Elle Apparel. I had the pleasure of meeting LeAnne at Sewing Summit this year, and yes: she is just as BEAUTIFUL and even more kind than she seems on her blog. Such a wonderful person.

The only problem I ran into with the tutorial was that the foam measurement was incorrect. Make sure you do the math before buying/cutting the foam. I had to go back to the store to purchase more!!

I loved the foam bumpers because they fit together in the crib like puzzle pieces. Very snug and padded so there will be no dents in her little baby's head!



The sheets were a little baggy, I felt like. My friend thought they were fine. I used a tutorial I found over at Prudent Baby. If I ever make crib sheets again, I will use extra-wide fabric and sew in an elastic casing all the way around the hem, not just in the corners, like I had to do for these sheets.

It took me a total of 14 hours to make the bedding, though I suspect with time and practice that time could be diminished a bit. It was a great experience and a very rewarding project.

Already hitting 2013 hard

Along with the Scrappy Trip Along quilt, I've been bustin out my Folksy Flannel stash.



This one will be for my BFF. It's a wedding gift even though she got married February 2012. It's the thought that counts, right?! Anyway, this is a real quick, IG peek at the progress.



AND, the REAL motivation behind getting her quilt together: MY QUILT! I've been dying to make this quilt forever, and while it's still just sitting, waiting to be pieced, at least I have finally cut it up and gotten myself organized. I'm sewing this weekend with friends and hoping I will get to sewing this bad boy together then. I keep telling myself: The sooner these get finished, the sooner I will have a toasty-night's sleep instead of waking up freezing every night!

So that's what I'm working on. Not bad for only a week into the year, amirite?

Scrappy Trip Around the World... Along

A new quilt has taken Instagram by storm and I have joined in! You can see my progress on my IG name dheyen.



Check out all the cool blocks being made at #scrappytripalong.







And if you are interested in joining, head over here to see how the blocks are made. They go together fairly quickly and work well in an assembly line.







This last block is my favorite so far.

I got a little scrap-happy so mine will be 42 blocks total, but I know there are quite a few people making theirs smaller.

This has been a great project to kick off 2013. Hope to see your progress on IG soon!