Kids

Words cannot explain the amount of fussy cutting/placing that went into this quilt.  When I started to point some of it out to Sean I think he thought I had completely lost it.

And on her bed.

I think she likes it.

So in case you find this in a Google search or just perusing around and you think you may want a quilt like this, I am (shockingly) willing to make it again.  You might just have to take out a second mortgage to pay for it though.

I still need to make the pillows, curtains and wallhangings.  I’ll post a picture of the whole room when I’m done.

Now that I’m done with the big part of this project, Baby Jane Fridays returns! Yay!

And today at 8:24pm she turns four.  She is such an amazing little girl with an amazing love for life (and Curious George).

A quick little stroll down memory lane.

Fresh.

One.

Two.

Three.

And four.

Happy Birthday to my little girl.

Smiling, cooperating, looking at the camera, not pulling each other’s hair…  It was a good day.

We took advantage of Maeve’s week inbetween school and camp and the nice weather today and headed out to the beach again.

Pretty castles…

Until Liamzilla makes a visit.

This is definitely their favorite spot.

Back to quilts tomorrow.

One step back.

Two steps back.

Sniff.

Maeve (as usual) insisted on matching jammies. And look at how clean the playroom is!

I had a momentary lapse in sanity and decided to take the kids to the beach today.  Keep in mind we don’t really live anywhere near the beach.

But, it turned out being a great day with well behaved kids and no major disasters!

Wait for me!

Digging the big hole.

Lunch: Sand and Sweet Potatoes.

The good life.

It was beautiful this morning so we headed out.

And my little photographer in training.

My tiny love.

We spent this morning at a favorite spot of mine.

And had a very nice lunch followed by some fun at the mall with Miss Maeve.  The idea was for us to build a bear *together* but that quickly turned into Maeve’s bear.

Meet ‘Eye.’  Yes, Eye.  She insisted that she wanted a black bear that was a boy and was named Eye.

He had to have a hat (she wanted the straw hat with a pink bow but I nixed that one since it was supposed to be a boy bear).  He also had to have sunglasses like Daddy, a black shirt that matched his fur and black pants to match his black shirt and black shoes to complete the outfit.  Oh, and boy undies.  Rounding out the ensemble are the roller skates… just like (Curious) George.  Everyday she makes a pair of ’skates’ out of paper and then skate/ski poles out of her Tinker Toys and skates around upstairs like George.

So we headed out to pick up a new pair of shoes for her because she needed them and we were there so why not?

Of course Eye had to skate along.

And through Nordies too.

And eventually her arm got tired and I carried him and then he hitched a ride with Liam in the stroller.  Throw in some gelato and it was a fantabulous day.  Smooches to my babies ’cause I love you to pieces.

That phrase we hear a lot in the house. Maeve doesn’t nap or do quiet time anymore but she really needs to. Not for peace and quiet for me, but for her to just decompress because Maeve really, really needs to decompress sometimes.

She was playing with her Tinker Toys when she told me she was going to lay down in her red chair. A couple minutes later she fell asleep. And she just snored a little bit.

Her chair sits against the edge of my desk so I’m trying to type really, really quietly right now.

I feel like I’m incredibly behind in all the projects I’m working on. I had a root canal this morning so nothing has gotten done today. I hope to pin the rodeo quilt tonight. I need to make a to-do list but I’m scared of how long it will be.

At 5:11 pm on April 29, 2007 Liam Cormac came into this world 4 weeks early.

He has become such a wonderful little boy. Everyday I see his smile and my heart just melts. This morning he and I went to Duke Gardens for some relaxation and pictures. Ok, a LOT of pictures. Here are a couple of my favorites.

This is such a Liam face. I laughed out loud when I saw I had captured it.

I might add pictures later of our little party from tonight. He wasn’t too big on the idea of cake so there might just be a bunch of scrunchy faces spitting out food.

Edited to add a couple more…

Liam on his new quilt reading his new Very Hungry Caterpillar book.

His super cool alien cake.

And his thoughts on my baking skills.

… on his birthday because he isn’t getting any embroidered pants. I have a love/hate relationship with my sewing/embroidering machine. It sews beautifully. But when it comes to embroidering, it has a mind of its own. So (finally) this morning I was going to make him his alien pants for his birthday. They were going to have a cute alien/space ship on the bum kind of like Hanna Andersson’s Soft Landings Pants. I did the design this morning and got everything ready.

The bodysuit he was going to wear with the pants had aliens all over it and looked like it was drawn with a crayon (it’s from Target so you might have seen it if you’ve been in the baby section lately). The design was supposed to mimic that with satin stitches.

Well, this is where the pants are now.

After several tries to get the machine to start and center the design, it would not stitch. It stitched, but not properly. So after multiple rethreads, cleaning out, trying again and again, they just got trashed. I can’t even rip out all the bad stitches in them because there are so many. Maybe I’ll dig out some jean shorts for him to wear with the bodysuit.

Today isn’t going to well. Hopefully his flying saucer birthday cake will come out ok.

And look!  He ate ice cream!  He ate something other than a Gerber product!

Nothing says yummy like fresh strawberries.  One in each hand and took another from any seller offering her one.

Poor Liam didn’t get any strawberries but he really enjoyed his stroller.

This is what I’m doing for Maeve’s new quilt only using the new Simplicity line from Moda/3 Sisters.

It’s put together using paper piecing which I’ve never done before but of course was willing to try.

So this is my paper. (I ended up not having Sanctuary scrap strips long enough for 8 and 9.)

Now, my understanding is that you set your machine to have really short stitches, sew on the front and have all the fabric on the back. When you’re done, the small stitch length has perforated the paper and you can just tear it off.

The finished back. This is way to messy for me. Perhaps I would get better at it but it seems like you can’t have perfect sized pieces and stitch with perfect 1/4″ seams using this method. Some seams are too short. Some are too wide.

And the front.

So my conclusion on paper piecing? It’s not for me. I guess I can see it working when working with curves or something, but not for simple straight lines. I think I’m just going to keep the pattern but make a cut list and piece it normally.

Unless… Did I do something really wrong? Is this not how you paper piece? Maybe I should just play it safe and piece it like I know how to.

I hope to get her quilt done sometime this summer.

As soon as I found out Liam was going to be a boy I started looking for fabric. Girl fabric is easy. Boy fabric is not so easy.

We finally found nursery fabric. I love it still. But it isn’t right for a little boy. Perfect for a baby boy.

And his quilt.

So at some point he has to leave his pretty little baby room and become a big boy.   Keep in mind that this isn’t going to happen for at least another year.  I’ve been trying to find fabric for it since the ultrasound.

This is kinda neat.  Rabbits and Racecars by Heather Ross.  But I think this is home dec weight.  Not really what I want for his quilt and there aren’t a ton of coordinating fabrics.

There is plaid.  But that sounds kind of boring.

There is always Pottery Barn Kids or Land of Nod.  But no way could I buy a quilt.  That would be just wrong.  Sean votes for this quilt from LON.

I think that would work great for a 5 year old.  Not a 2 year old.

So no fabric and nothing from a store.

Enter Spoonflower.  Custom fabric printing (and they’re local!).  Holy smokes.  I could design my own fabric, have it printed and then make Liam’s quilt, drapes and pillows from that.  Holy smokes.  Beta testing is supposed to start in May according to their blog.  Hopefully that  means things will be up and running in time for me to do Liam’s room.

So would it be way over the top to actually go through with this?  <blush>  Off to go design something in Illustrator.  Have I ever mentioned what I did in my former life here?  Eek!  I’m happy.

I try to be random in my quilts but sometimes (ok, most all the time) I just can’t do it. I have to lay it out first to make sure all the colors and patterns are evenly distributed. So this means all my quilts get laid out on the floor block by block (or in some cases piece by piece) and then stacked up to sew.

My sewing room is our bonus room. It measures about 20′ square and is supposed to by my room. My computer, my books, my lounging room and my space for me. The kids object to this. They have a playroom. Neither one of them plays in it. They play in my room.

So whenever I need to lay out a quilt or pin a quilt I need a shovel to clear all the toys out of the way.

That’s the Maypole quilt so far.

Progress on the other projects for this week:

The Cowboys got ironed, cut patterns, and started cutting fabrics.

The video game quilt fabric that I ordered last week just now shipped. Note to self: don’t shop there anymore.

Pants? Yeah, haven’t even started.

I’m a little sniffly as we get close to the little man’s first birthday.

This quilt is for Liam for his birthday. I love how it came out… exactly like I imagined. I designed it yesterday while vegging on the couch after a horrible, painful dental procedure (I’m not exactly sure what they did but it was a periodontist fixing some damage to a tooth from a wisdom tooth. Fun.). I hope my little caterpillar likes it.

5.06.08 edit: I’ve now made one for Etsy too! Blog Link. Shop Link.

6.16.08 edit: Another one!

6.24.08 edit — Another one completed.

(Hopefully the pictures look ok since I’m editing them on my laptop and it has a reputation when it comes to colors and Photoshop.)

It measures 52″ x 36″. I hope to make another one for my shop once I get my hands on some more of the fabric.

Sometimes I wonder about Liam.

We went to Maple View Farm a couple days ago and decided to let Liam have his first taste of ice cream. He’s having a lot of trouble eating anything with chunks or texture. I’m slightly worried that he’s going to have no interest in eating his birthday cake in a couple weeks so I figured an ice cream cake might be the way to go since in theory he shouldn’t have any problems eating the smooth ice cream. The rest of us love ice cream (who doesn’t? Well, besides Liam.). I honestly think that if it weren’t for ice cream and pizza I’d be a vegan.

His opinion of ice cream?

He refused to eat anymore.

Sigh.

So it was a really good thing that we finished all the gardening yesterday.  </sarcasm>

I gave the rosemary on the side of the house a haircut.  Maeve came and rescued a couple ‘trees’ from the clippings pile and went and planted them around the yard.

These are the trees in the ‘buildings’ of dirt.

These ‘trees’ didn’t get planted.  According to Maeve they were tired and were going to take their naps.

…work in the garden! The plan was to sew all week and then clean up the yard this weekend but it is supposed to rain… again… on Saturday. I love the rain. We need the rain. But why does it always have to rain on the weekends? Doesn’t the rain know how hard it is to do major yard work and mow with 2 small kids? Hrumph.

So here is the uglyness of the front of our house. We have boring holly shrubs from the builder, leaves that were blown in at some point, mess from the masons and lots of blah. It needs spring cleaning and some prettification.

I am waaaay limited in what I can plant here since we have the hugest herd of deer in existence. They eat EVERYTHING. The only things they don’t eat are boxwood, holly, herbs and ferns. I try and be positive and think about how aromatic my yard ends up because we have so many herbs it’s not even funny. When you turn on the side spigot you get this whoosh of rosemary. Yum.

So we did a trip to Lowes for some dirty stuff…

And a trip to the farmers market this morning for the herbs…

Maeve had a blast there as she always does. And in a couple weeks the strawberries start coming in. Drool. And then the peaches. Drool.

We have some rosemary, thyme, sage, curry plants (!), lavender, germander, peppermint (for the pots) and a lot more thyme. And as it turns out, I need 6 more thymes to finish up. Back to the farmers market! Darn. I just hate going there and oogling at all the plants.

So while we were outside a little froggie decided to join us. Maeve was in love. She was jumping around behind him like he was jumping, laying on the ground staring at him and just being a curious 3 year old.

We pulled up all the stones, filled in with some dirt and put the stones back. Maeve was in charge of putting all the little stones into the little holes.

I totally wore her out outside. She’s now playing quietly in her playroom. We should do this gardening thing more often! And because I know Sean will say something… I was in this picture too. I cropped myself out. I’m ok with being sweaty and dirty in the family picture album but not on my blog.

All done. I’m going to venture to say that it looks a wee bit better than before. Hopefully everything will fill out nicely this summer.

We didn’t get the other side done. It’s all cleaned up but we ran out of dirt, mulch and plants… oh and Liam woke up.

Wow. This is a really long post that really has nothing to do with quilts except for the fact that it demonstrates that I didn’t work on any today (so far… it’s only 5!)

Dirt may not hurt but apparently grass does.

I’m having writers block so here are a couple pictures from today.  I wanted to go through more but Windows isn’t cooperating (shocking I know).  I had wanted to get a nice picture of the kids together.  We all know how well that goes.

Courtesy of Miss Maeve.

“Mama!  Don’t vacuum up Liam!”

Maeve is going to FLIP out when she sees these new fabrics from Moda.  I mean FLIP out.

Now to wait very impatiently until next month when the collection is released.

Says the little boy wearing white pants.

The two are inseparable.

And on a quilting note, I finished an Amy Butler Lotus quilt today.

I got an email from my local quilt shop saying that Moda’s Simplicity had shipped and it will be here in a couple days! I’ve been waiting impatiently for this line since Maeve’s room is getting a makeover with it.

Her quilt is going to be a Kaffe Fassett pattern. It’s amazing. I can’t wait. I get warm fuzzies just thinking about it.

Started this one on Sunday. It’s a pretty complex pattern to piece… not hard, just a lot of steps. Mark, sew, flip, sew, cut, sew, cut, sew. Repeat 255 more times. And then sew those 256 blocks together.

A pile of about 130 unironed blocks.

And the pieces waiting to be sewn.

We celebrated Valentine’s Day this evening with a dinner at The Melting Pot… with both kids. Yes, apparently we’ve gone crazy. They (thankfully) behaved very well. Maeve went a little berserk after the chocolate (can you say sugar high?).

Liam slid over and just continued munching on his toys like nothing happened.

Maeve slid over and said, “I love you Daddy.”

I’m sure Liam would say the same if he could talk. Instead he just drooled on me and blew raspberries.

It’s hard to get good pictures of quilts.  There are angles, lighting and the fact that sometimes they are just huge.

Today’s project was to get pictures of 3 small quilts and Maeve wanted to help.  See?

Sean is my trusty quilt stand with legs.

Just like Daddy.

She insisted on holding the small Dick and Jane quilt so I could take pictures of it.  She was so proud of herself.

And then like most every other 3 year old, she got bored and wanted to go play.

Both Dick and Jane quilts should be up on Etsy next week.

So it all started about a week and a half ago. My mouth hurt and I knew it was my wisdom teeth but I was in denial. When the pain didn’t go away I finally made an appointment with a dentist. After going to the appointment I realized she was a DMD and not a DDS and couldn’t take out the teeth herself. We called the DDS that she referred us to and learned that our lovely insurance company didn’t have any in-network oral surgeons within 45 miles of Raleigh. Lovely. So I go to that appointment and the DDS says that all 4 need to come out. Three were impacted and there was an infection around the fourth. The only good news is that it was bad enough that I would get to go to sleep for the surgery. I go to make the appointment for the surgery only to find out that the lovely insurance company, let’s call them Fetna, refused to pay for the $1700+ procedure because we hadn’t had the policy long enough. Keep in mind that on the medical side of our policy they had already paid for 2 surgeries, a baby in the NICU, and 3.5 hospital admissions. I couldn’t chew on one side of my mouth, had an infection and was in constant pain but couldn’t get the insurance that we pay for to pay for the teeth to come out. We decided to just pay for it so I could be pain-free. Stupid Fetna. I also learned that I need about $1200+ of work done at the DMD (that’s after insurance pays their part). Stupid Fetna. So by the end of the month I’ll have racked up almost $3000 in dental bills. Anyone want to buy a quilt?

So the teeth came out this past Friday. I am feeling better than expected but seemed to have come down with a nasty cough. Not good with heeling gums. At least the husband has dealt with the kids so I could rest… and sew. Sewing is resting right? I didn’t get to go to yoga this morning which I am not happy about. Hopefully I can get back to the gym soon. I’d actually be happy if I could just eat more than just mush.

I finished the quilt for the living room as well as the pillows and tiny table runners for the guest room.

So now the sewing is all done for the room!

And of course we had to watch the commercials tonight. Who is playing by the way?

And I’m still not used to seeing this.  And the little guy isn’t so little anymore. He weighed in at 20lbs10oz this past week.

And BTW, stupid Fetna. Stupid Fetna. Stupid Fetna.

I love you, my little monkey.

He wants to add some words of his own:

vx , mmmmmxccchbvvvvvvbmdsz

Beautifully said Liam. Beautiful.

We have a silly little tradition of matching family PJs on Christmas morning. In previous years we’ve gone with Gymboree but they look exactly the same year after year. We needed something different this year.

Being a Hanna (Andersson) addict, I naturally turned to them. The boys were going to wear blue snowflakes and the girls got pink snowflakes. So I ordered them, tried them on and promptly returned them. I’m ok with the kids looking like little snausages, but Sean and I? Uh, no thanks.

Old Navy had a cute pair of snowman PJ pants but I guess they don’t do the cutesy family matching since they didn’t sell coordinating pairs for the kiddos. So I decided to make some myself! I ordered us all white tops, 2 pairs of pants for Sean and I and the largest size ON carries, Triple-XL.

Through the magic of scissors and a sewing machine we went from pants to this …

to this …

Christmas is saved! We can all match!

Big week here at Carolina Patchworks. Our CEO Liam has been hard at work.

On Sunday, December 9 he got his first tooth!

On Tuesday, December 11 he decided to sit up by himself!

On Thursday, December 13 he got that last bit of umph and rolled from his back to his belly!

I hope he isn’t crawling by Saturday.

From a beautiful little butterfly and the most adorable caterpillar ever.

It was on the schedule to be finished tomorrow along with some shoes for Jeri (hi Jeri!).  CEO Liam Cier has vetoed that idea.

“I don’t think so Mom.  We’re playing with rattles tomorrow.”

Black elephants? Why, yes, a black elephant.

Yesterday was our anniversary, not a business one, but a marriage one. After a wonderful dinner at Angus Barn we headed over to Barnes & Noble and dragged Sean into the crafts sections. I found a book on making sock animals and of course had to pick it up since Maeve is in love with her sock monkey.

So I tried on and I think it turned out really well for a first try. Much better than the first pair of shoes I made. I’m looking forward to using socks other than Sean’s so they don’t leave black fuzz balls all over me.

The fuzz balls are usually all over my carpet.

I hate black fuzz balls.

The all-powerful Dyson can’t even get black fuzz balls off the carpet.

Anyways, back to elephants. Here she is. I look forward to making another one and plan on looking for cool socks at Target tomorrow. I need to try another one. Maybe a monkey… or sheep… or bird… or mouse… or…

Carolina Patchworks announced today that they will be bought out by a fierce competitor. The new CEO demands perfection, great designs, lots of kisses and hugs, milk and lots of burp cloths to spit up said milk. Here is our new leader lounging around.

At least he’s cute.

We hope this transition to the new management is smooth for everyone.

I must show Liam off too.  He’s an amazing little guy.  He apparently inherited the snarky gene from Sean and I.

It will be in the low 60s tomorrow morning when Maeve goes to school. Not quite warm enough for shorts but she has no cheap-enough-for-preschool pants. Most parents would just go to Old Navy or Target and pick something up. I have to make everything more difficult of course. And didn’t remember she had no pants until after dinner tonight.

Sean had rejected a couple of knit shirts that I had bought him and I never got around to returning them. They were sitting on the floor of my room because as a sew-er, I couldn’t throw away what was essentially good fabric. Any guesses what I did? Well, I didn’t have a pants pattern, so I pretty much made her a really long pair of shorts.

So Maeve now has a pair of pants made out of a Hanes Mens T-Shirt. At least I sewed some ribbon on the sides to make them look slightly girly. And the best part? The ribbon matches her uniform t-shirt. Excellent.

Or maybe I should have gone to Target this weekend.

The first beautiful day in months. Cool, crisp air. No humidity. Are you sure we’re still in NC? Maeve and I went off to enjoy the morning at the Duke Gardens.

My little photographer in training.

Cue Little House on the Prairie music.