artsy-crafty babe

my bloomers skirt

Yay!  It's finished!  I absolutely LOVE this skirt.  The two layers of jersey knit make it so, so comfortable and the many, many hours I spent on it make me so very proud.  Speaking of hours, yes, it took me many hours to complete.  I wasn't really keeping track, but I'd guess that it took me at least 12 hours, most probably more.

I was a woman possessed.  I worked on it at least a few hours a day.  To be honest, I was a little addicted.  I think this sort of project is one to be savored, but I devoured it.  I'll take my time on the next one.

Never in a million years did I think that I'd ever wear something sewed entirely by hand.  Never.  But you know what?  You can feel the effort that went into this.  I feel like this skirt has a soul.  Kind of kooky, huh?

When I started this skirt, I had it in my mind that I'd only do reverse applique along the bottom of the skirt, so that's what I did.  When I got it all stitched, cut, and sewed two two panels together, I didn't like it.  It wasn't enough.  So, I pulled the stencil back out and traced more leaves on the entire panel, but more sparse.  I also whacked 2" off the top because it looked too long to me.  I love how this turned out.

I must confess, I machine stitched the elastic to the waist.  I didn't have 1" fold over elastic and didn't want to order some when I already had plenty of 1/2" fold over elastic on hand.  The half inch wasn't wide enough to bind the top edge, so I sewed it flat to the inside of the waist.  I tried to sew a zig-zag stitch by hand, but I just couldn't get it.  I ended up with a tangled mess of thread.  The waist of my skirt isn't too pretty, but who's gonna see that?

Now comes the big question - what am I going to wear this with?  I don't want to be all matchy-matchy.  Black is a safe choice, but I want something more interesting.  I picture this with a t-shirt and a cardigan with maybe a scarf?  Or maybe a turtleneck with a belt?  I don't know.  I don't want to look like a box of crayolas, so maybe I will stick with black.  Either way, a shopping trip is definitely in order.

in good company

I always feel a little weird sharing this sort of thing, but if there's any place to talk about it, this is it.  I've recently had the honor to contribute to two publications - the current issues of  Stitch and Artful Blogging.  I don't think thrilled is a strong enough word.

Remember this bag?  I made a similar one for Stitch.  In the magazine you'll find the pattern along with directions.  Y'all know that I'm usually a big bag girl, but every once in a while a small bag is in order.  I think I'll keep this one on standby for just those occasions.  If you're in the mood to make some holiday gifts, I highly recommend this issue - it is packed with projects.  You'll probably recognize many of the other contributors, as there are quite a few craft bloggers (wa-hoo craft bloggers!!). 

If you're looking for inspiration, Artful Blogging is for you.  If you're ever in a blog slump, you can't help but be inspired by this magazine.  Yes, it is that beautiful (which made me wonder, why me?).  Oh my goodness, when I opened this issue and saw who was in it, I was floored.  As I flipped the pages I kept saying to myself "I read her!", "she's my flickr friend!".  There were also some beautiful blogs that were new to me, which I can't wait to catch up on.  I am so honored and humbled to be included among these talented bloggers.  It is a very surreal experience seeing your words and photographs in print.  I've had all weekend to pour over this magazine, and every time I get to my article, I kind of can't believe that it's me.  Pretty crazy!

weekending

I had a very lovely weekend, how about you?  Matt and I extended our anniversary celebration by escaping to New Orleans on Friday night.  We couldn't have asked for better weather.  It was glorious. We did lots of walking, looking, eating, and best of all, relaxing.  Well, about as much relaxing as you can do in a short 24 hours. 

We didn't check into our hotel until after we had spent the afternoon window shopping along Magazine Street.  My inclination was to throw our bags in the room, then head out for some more sight seeing, but then I realized that there was no rush, so, we took a nap.  I'm so used to going, going, going that as I laid there, I had to tell myself to relax, to take a deep breath and just let it go.  Ahhh, it was just what I needed.  I think that afternoon nap set the tone for the rest of the weekend.  New Orleans is such an inspiring place for me.  I love it.  Every time we visit I soak it all in and leave craving more.

Though I enjoyed our little get away, I was happy to get back home.  I enjoy relaxing in my own space much more than in a hotel room.  Maybe it was all the dreaming of what beautiful interiors migh be behind every colorful door, or the clean, uncluttered hotel room, but when I got home, my house looked different, and not in a good way.  Instead of seeing my home, all I saw were the imperfections...time for another self pep talk.

As the day went on and we got settled, I started to see my imperfect, full-of-half-finished-projects, often messy house as a home again.  My home.  This is the place where we live, really LIVE.  My home is not a hotel, nor a page out of a magazine and honestly, I would want to live in neither.  I stood there a the kitchen sink, took a deep breath, and let it go.

We spent the rest of the weekend as a family relaxing and lounging in our home.  I think our short time apart and away was just what we needed to remind us of what was truly important - us, being together as a couple and as a family, making memories, exploring, teaching, loving and just being...messy house and all ;-)

**all that relaxing resulted in few pictures and more stitching, but i'll save that for later...

stitching and stitching

...and stitching some more.  Yes, I've been stitching.  I finally got my hands on the Alabama Stitch book and immediately started the bloomers skirt.  It's been my obsession this week.  I initially resisted buying this book because I thought the projects were too fussy with all that hand sewing.  Like I have time for that?  Yeah, this is the same attitude that I used to have about knitting...and you know where I am on that subject!  It turns out that I really like hand sewing, which should be no surprise considering that hand sewing the binding on a quilt is one of my favorite parts of the process.

I'm really looking forward to finishing this skirt so that I can wear it.  I'm currently on my 4th panel, but I still need to cut out the top layer, then construct the skirt.  From what I've heard, this skirt is supposedly very comfortable.  I sure hope so because I already have another one planned, with my own stencil design.   Another crazy obsession had begun...

how about a bag?

When I came up with the Phoebe Bag, my intention was to create a simple, easy to construct bag, that was slightly more interesting than a square tote.  I wanted a blank canvas.  Something that I could use to exercise my creativity.  I envisioned translating photographs into handbags, embellishing, appliqueing, whatever.  Well, that was months ago and not much has happened.

So, I sketched out a bag and started playing with ideas on paper.  When I do this sort of thing, I always end up with flowers, or some variation.  It finally hit me that what I had come up with was my anthropologie inspired pillows on a purse.  Hmm, why not?  I still had a bunch of heat-n-bond lite fused fabrics, so that's what I went with.  I cut out a bunch of leaf shapes and layered them around.  I think it turned out pretty cute.

Because my exterior fabric was upholstery weight and had added quilting, I decided that a lightweight fabric for the interior would be okay.  A fun little surprise?  I love how well the lining coordinated with the different fabrics on the front and the lines of the quilting mimics the dark semi-circular lines on the lining.

This whole project was fun for me.  It wasn't too time consuming and was just what I was looking for, creativity-wise.  This bag is much too small for my use, so in the shop it'll go.  Speaking of which, I have a big update planned soon (well, big for me).  I cleaned out my bag stash and I'm listing most of the bags I've made over the past year or so that have been tests for designs/patterns.  Some are gently used (I never use a bag for long), but all are in good shape.  If I did use it, it has been washed and ironed, and the price will reflect that.  I'll let you know once I get it all in place. 

Knitting, quilting, home dec projects, no matter what tangent I veer off on, I always return to bags!

the girly room

The beautiful weather this weekend (and some time alone in the house) allowed me to finally get some photos of the pillows and curtains I made for the girls room last weekend.  This room is hard to photograph!  No matter what I do, the lighting is weird.  I was hoping that lightening the walls would help with this issue, but not so much.  The room is kind of longish with only one north facing window, but there's a house right there.  Oh well.  Even if the lighting in here was great, it's still hard to take a picture of a window.  Period.

The curtains are made from Alexander Henry's Birdsong.  My curtains ended up being a little bit longer than I wanted, but I still love them.  I went with the silver toned rod and hardware because of the gray in the fabric (and I had silver on the brain from my living room accents).  I think the silver makes it look a little more grown up.  I carried that theme to the dresser hardware and the mirror above the dresser.  I'd like to go back and antique the dresser hardware a little bit because it looks kind of shiny at the moment, but truthfully, I'll probably forget all about it.

I don't want the room to be super matchy-matchy, so we used the butterfly print, Canyon Flutter, that coordinates with curtain fabric.  I only had 1 yard of that, so I cut two 22" squares (the largest I could cut with my yard), bordered them with the off-white fabric, then backed and bound the sham with lavender.  Oh, I also lightly quilted the front of the sham.  I thought the best option for these pillows would be shams so that we can take them off and wash them if need be (i'm sure there will be a need be at some point).  The girls and I decided on lavender as the accent color.  We're on the hunt for a lavender cotton blanket at the moment.

As you can see, my latest quilt has made its home at the foot of the bed.  I have plans of making a quilt for this bed using bits of the curtain and pillow fabric along with lots of off white, lavender, pinks, and aquas.  With that, I think the blue bed fits in just fine.

We still have plenty to do in here, including painting over this, finding art for the walls, assembling a bookcase and sprucing up an old lamp.  I was hoping to finish the lamp before this post, but well, you know how that is.

I'm so happy with how this room is turning out.  I set out to make this a room that both a 3 yr old and '8 going on 18' yr old would love, and I'm pretty sure I got it!

12 years

Wow, I find it hard to believe that Matt and I have been married 12 years.  12 years!  It seems like just yesterday I was walking down the aisle on a beautiful October day, a day much like today. 

When I woke up this morning, I didn't think that today would be all that special, but boy, was I wrong!  To start off, Lily, woke us up with a sweet homemade card.  Then, she made us breakfast in bed - not just cereal & toast, but eggs over easy, biscuits, and coffee.  I was stunned!  I had no idea she could do that.  She's 8!!!  And it was all good, even the coffee.  I think I need her to make coffee more often.   She even cooked Alex & Ava some scrambled eggs.  What a girl.

Matt then surprised me with flowers & gifts, which I did NOT expect.  We don't usually exchange gifts, so it was a total surprise.  One of the gifts I loved was a pumpkin spice candle.  We honeymooned in Colonial Williamsburg.  On the night we arrived the weather was terrible - cold & rainy, just yucky.  We drove up to the bed & breakfast not knowing what to expect, but when we went inside, it was the most charming place.  It was beautiful and cozy, and smelled of pumpkin spice.  The B&B owner had pumpkin spice candles burning all over the house.  Now, when I smell pumpkin spice, it takes me back to that place.

Now, the babysitter is on the way and  we're about to head out for dinner.  He won't tell me where we're going...

After all this time, almost 4 years of dating and 12 years of marriage, I can honestly say that these have been the best years of my life.  I am so, so blessed!

on my mind

Here it is, Friday again.  Am I the only one who feels like time is flying by at lightening speed?  Even Lily commented to me yesterday that this week has gone by fast.  I'm not sure why, there was nothing going on out of the ordinary, but I suppose quickly passing weeks is our ordinary.  As usual, there are plenty of crafty related things I'd like to accomplish over the course of the week that didn't get done.  I've pretty much come the conclusion that my crafting/sewing can only take place on the weekends, unless it is portable.  Thank goodness for knitting!  My down time has been filled with it.  I finally ordered the Alabama Stitch Book and have some knit fabric on hand.  I can't wait to get started on that reverse applique skirt - yet another portable project.  My wrists are getting a little sore from knitting, so I need a change.

Speaking of fashion, what kind of shoes look good with skirts and tights that aren't flats or boots?  Something kind of casual, not too dressy.  Also, I need some sort of heel.  Shoes that are too flat, like ballet flats hurt my feet.  I was thinking some kind of mary jane-ish low wedge, but not too clunky (am I too old for that?).  I don't like clunky shoes.  Now that the weather is FINALLY feeling like fall, I'd like to continue my dress and skirt wearing, which I usually don't do in the cooler months. 

Can I give a big AMEN for the cool front that has come through down here?  I'm so very tired of being hot and sticky!  This weekend is supposed to be beautiful. I am so thankful for it!

I'm also thankful for Matt's win yesterday.  He works so hard with those boys and so often they're very close, but don't get that win.  They've won for two weeks in a row now.  He's not in it for the win, but when they do, it sure feels good.  It was a muddy, icky game yesterday, but worth being there.  Honestly, I don't know a thing about football and could really care less, but my kids enjoy being there.  And I know Matt likes when we go.  I got to spend some quality time with Alex & Ava sitting all over me (too muddy for a quilt on the ground) - kisses, giggles, and just plain silliness.

One more thing, I don't get all this "following" stuff that I see on blogs.  Huh?  Every so often I get an email from Typepad saying that so-and-so is following my blog.  What does that mean?  The weirdest part is that this so-and-so is usually someone that I assume would have no interest in a craft blog  why are they following me??  Is this 'following' stuff supposed to take the place of feed readers?  I finally switched from bloglines to google reader, and that's about as much following as I need.  So, if your are legit and follow my blog, please don't be offended if I don't follow back.  As you can see, I'm confused!

I didn't mean to write a novel, but I guess I had a bunch of random stuff on my mind.  *sigh*  So yes, here we are at Friday again.  My favorite night of the week.  I plan to spend it like most of my Friday nights - on the sofa with Matt watching the Soprano's (we've been watching the series on DVD), sipping some wine, with knitting in my hands.  It may go by way too quickly, but life is good.

on the needles

Of course there's something new on my needles - there's always something on the needles!  I must confess, I made an effort to finish some sleeves, but then I got bored.  Come on - SLEEVES!  I finished one set and almost finished another, leaving me about 1.75 sets to go, I think.

To ease my sleeve boredom, I case on the Featherweight Cardigan.  So far, so good.  I wanted a real sweater, but nothing too heavy.  It's still in the 90's here (what's up with that?).  We have very mild winters, so I thought this would be perfect.  Layering pieces are good.  The pattern calls for lace weight yarn, but I'm using a fingering weight.  The bright red isn't my ideal color choice, but it's what was at my LYS, and I wanted to cast on NOW.  I have some dark purple alpaca silk that I really wanted to use, but I didn't have enough.  Oh well, I'll have to save that for something else.

I am modifying this a bit, making more of a v-neck, but that's about it.  I wanted to add some waist shaping, but I forgot.  When I start knitting, I go....again with the boring stockinette that doesn't require much thinking, just the way I like it!  Hopefully I won't stall out on these sleeves.  I really want to wear this one, so I think I'll make it to the finish line.

my new favorite

Sorry about the wait.  I had every intention of photographing this quilt to have a post ready by Tuesday morning, but I had a laundry delay.  Due to a load of damp towels in the dryer (hate when that happens), I wasn't able to dry the quilt as soon as I wanted, and by the time the quilt was dry, I was too pooped.

What took me so long to finish this thing?  I pieced the top in December, bought the backing fabric in January, but then didn't touch it again until a few weeks ago.  I had to look back at my blog archives to figure out which fabrics I had wanted to use for the back.  I don't think I planned on using the yellow fabric for the binding, but I like it.  I'd have to refer to my archives again, but I'm pretty sure I pieced the top by just sewing fabric scraps together until I had a "block", then I sewed the blocks together without using any sashing.  I love improvisational piecing.  It has totally spoiled me on traditional piecing.

I quilted this using only horizontal straight lines.  I love it.  I'd sew one direction, turn it around, then sew the other way.  When I finished it looked like waves.  I was very curious to see how it would turn out after washing & drying.  I'm so happy the waves are still there.  I did a much better job making my "quilt sandwich" this time, so there were very few puckers during my quilting.  In case you were wondering, I don't use a walking foot.  I just speed through a straight stitch on my industrial sewing machine.  That thing sews so fast!  One day I'd like to try stippling or some type of free motion quilting, but this machine doesn't have the ability to drop the feed dogs and I don't have a darning foot.  One day maybe, but for now I'm happy with my straight lines.

I know when I pulled this back out to work on I said that this would be our soccer game quilt, but I'm not so sure about that.  I love it too much to lay on the ground!  Yep, it's my new favorite.

**it is impossible to take a photo of a quilt on the floor without Ruby laying on it.  I was able to get her off for one photo, but she left her pig ear right in the middle of the quilt.  Silly dog!