Granny Square Quilt

I finished it!  I finally finished it!

This is fabric I received at Christmas (Amy Butler's "Glamour" from the "Lark" line).  I had the blocks put together by March (Quilty Post) and just finally got around to quilting it.  My mother-in-law showed me how to properly pin a quilt for quilting while she was here last week, so that was fun (I had always used sticky spray stuff to keep my quilt sandwich together).

The pattern/tutorial can be found here: Granny Square Quilt Block Tutorial

I plan on keeping this quilt for myself...which really excites me because most of the stuff I make I give away! Thinking of maybe turning it in to display in the Ohio Outdoor Quilt Festival in August.

This is my third lap-sized quilt, so while my MIL was here, she also showed me how to properly roll a quilt to get it to fit on your machine for quilting.  I like learning from someone who knows!  Ha.  Mostly, I've just been on my own with this sewing thing...

Here is the back:

The pic is a little off since I was attempting to take pictures in the glaring afternoon sun...on the day that the sun is the highest in the sky. Ha.

What is better to do on a 92° day than wrap yourself in a blanket?  :-)  (I told him to do this)

Looks like the perfect blanket for kitty!

I guess I already knew she liked it.

I see you!

I'm so happy it's done!  Now on to the next project. :-P

This Took Forever

Maybe these place mats took forever because we have been loving our life outside in the beautiful sunny weather.  Oh wait a minute...I only sew at night...sooooo...

These took forever because they are done with strip piecing....slow progress and lots of ironing!  They are a gift for my mother-in-law whose birthday was ummmm...almost a month ago. 0:-)  She sent me all sorts of long strips of her scrap fabric in varying widths and lengths with the thought, "You'll think of something to do with them!"  

My mother-in-law recently acquired a dining room table from her neighbor through a trade (kind of a neat way to do it!), so I thought it would nice to use the scraps, that she has used to make quilts for so many people, for place mats for her new table.  I can identify the fabric she used in *my* bedroom in Arizona :-) and fabric she used in Marin's princess quilt. 

So yeah...I started this project wayyyyyy too late to get it to her in time.  The good news is, she is visiting us next week and I can give them to her in person.

After sewing all of the strips together and painstakingly ironing each and every seam (well, by the end I kind of fudged it), I cut 5" blocks on a 45 degree angle and then assembled them so that they would form diamonds.  The free-motion pattern is Elizabeth Hartman's dogwood pattern.  The finished place mats are 18" x 13.75". 

It's safe to say that these place mats deserve this label...

This Took Forever Labels

...but like all projects that seem to take forever, they were...

Made With Love Labels

The Kid Wash

I saw this in Family Fun magazine last year and wanted to make one for the kids ever since: The Deluxe Kid Wash

Actually...I didn't make this at all---Nick did this for us. :-) And if you're Nick...you don't follow recipes, so consider the link above just a guide.

If you're making instant mashed potatoes, please follow the recipe. :-)

The 1/2", 5 ft. long PVC pipes were $1.38 each at Lowe's.  The various fittings were maybe 75 cents a piece?  I'm not certain because I had to leave that aisle of the store...mostly to find the proper size fitting for the hose to attach to the pipes...but partly just to leave that aisle. ;-)

Anyhoo...great fun and a great way to cool off on Memorial Day weekend!  The kids needed a wash after camping at a campground with no showers this weekend...yikes!  :-)

Marin *has* to take her shirt off like the boys...

...but then she took everything off, so we got her swimsuit on. :-)

Fun for our neighbor friends, too!

Smorga-what-a?

Mother's Day makes people feel weird.

I say that because I just know so many people are hurting and this day adds to that hurt. My heart is sad for those who are longing to be a mother but have been unable to conceive, for those who have lost a child, and for those who have lost their mother, or who have not had any sort of mother at all.

My children are still quite young, so this is the first year that they were excited to give me something.  The boys both did special projects at school, and a special project at Lowe's with my dad, who also took them to the store to get me cards and some other goodies.  When they brought the bags in the house, they insisted that I not look and hid the stuff under their beds. They were so cute...but I wondered...if I didn't encourage them to fill out the cards...would the cards even get filled out?

Yesterday when we got home for church, the boys were in their bedroom.  I looked in on them and surprised them and they told me not to look!  They were filling out the cards. :-) The looks of excitement and joy on their faces was priceless.  So cute and so simple and so perfect to receive such genuine love and effort from my children.  The goodies they picked out included Reese's Cups (which they allowed me to eat allllll by myself!), sour candy and chips. :-)

Instead of expecting a big stink about me on Mother's (ha), I decided to throw a tea party for my mom, aunt and grandma...without tea. Lame, no tea, I know...but my family knows my home is a bring-your-own-caffeinated beverage home.  :-)  I do have a coffee maker, though, that mostly gets used when my mom makes coffee!

Nick took the kids to the car wash and to the park so that us ladies could talk in quiet.  That was very nice.

We used my Grandma O.'s really pretty dishes.

And the star of the meal was the smorgastarta (there should be some dots and circles above some of those letters).  The smorga-what-a?  :-P  It is a Swedish sandwich cake, although I don't think my sandwich fillings were very sweedish.

It was super fun to decorate!  I felt like my Grandma Kay because she always adorned food with garnishes and such.

I made bread dough in my bread machine and baked it in a round cake pan.  I then cut the bread into three layers.

Filling for layer one was a spinach/cheese mixture and filling for layer two was ham salad.  The frosting was made with cream cheese and sour cream, white pepper, dill and garlic.

The cake and my pretty momma.

I also served cheesecake stuffed strawberries, cream of asparagus soup, blueberry dump cake and lemonade. Yum!  Mom served the coffee. :-P

This recipe was quite difficult. ;-)

It is really a blessing to get your eyes off of yourself and to do something with others' in mind. I love you, Mom, Grandma and Aunt Elaine!

Malani's Baby Quilt

This baby quilt is on its way to California for my cousin's new baby. 

I couldn't get the colors hot pink and navy out of my head, so I rolled with it.  I also included black and pale yellow. 

I noticed on my cousin's family website that there were polka dot curtains in the baby's room, so I incorporated some dots into this quilt!  :-) 

I saw the quilt on Pinterest and took some wild guesses as to what sizes to cut the fabric.  Once I did all of that and pieced it together, I got the novel idea to follow the pin's link...which led to a Flickr page...which led to another page...which finally led to Elizabeth Hartman's Charm Squares baby quilt pdf pattern.  :-P 

Turns out, I nailed it!  Although, I added another row of color. I followed Elizabeth Hartman's dogwood pattern for free-motion quilting.  I just love this free-motion pattern.  If I kept this blankie, I think I would run my fingers all over it all day long. :-)

Momma, can I?

Yes, Sweetie, you may.

Marin tested...

...and Marin approved!

Like all of the marker on Marin's face? :-)

I just *know* this quilt is for me. I'm way over due for a quilt.

Our New Bathroom

Back when I made my new shower curtain...I said I wasn't going to get new paint for the bathroom.  But, after we discovered a leaky toilet and a bit of rotten flooring underneath of it...wellllllll....you get new paint.  And a new toilet.  And a new floor!

View from the hallway.  Eeeeep!

The tile, vanity cabinet and counter top, and wall cabinet are from Home Depot.  The paint is Behr Premium Plus Ultra from Home Depot in the color of Grass Cloth.  Must be some pretty sweet paint to have that many awesome words in its title.  Actually...it is!  I don't think I will ever use paint for walls again that doesn't have the primer in it.  And, bonus, Home Depot's paint + primer was significantly less smelly than Lowe's.

The toilet is from our local hardware store.  Get out!  A special order toilet (no one seems to stock the color biscuit in a round toilet!) for $150 CHEAPER than what Home Depot or Lowe's offered. Awesome.  I've asked Nick several times, "What's your favorite thing about the bathroom?" and as any guy would respond, he answers me, "The toilet."

I keep hoping he will say, "The peacock!" because that is my favorite new thing. :-)

View from inside the shower...hopefully not too creepy that the bird is looking at me!

Here's looking at you, Kid.

Anyways, the peacock is from Old Time Pottery along with the mirror and other bathroom accessories.  My friend Heather and I went to OTP and somehow survived a home goods store with Emory and Marin.  :-) And then she had her baby the next day!  I like to think that I can take credit for that somehow...but I still haven't figured out how. Bumpy car ride on the interstate?  The Arby's we ate because *I* wanted mozzarella sticks?

Kudos to Heather for saying, "You could put a candle on that!" when I was about to put the bar soap dish back on the shelf.  We don't do bar soap at the sink, but I can certainly do pumpkin-scented candle on top of the toilet!

I wasn't sure which towel colors to go with, but since the peacock had orange and blue in his feathers, in addition to green, I tried that.  I'm taking the blue towels back to the store. Ha!

But, the bright blue towels would have matched this feathered friend tea light/ring holder...

I knew as soon as Nick put his wedding ring in there he'd forget to put it on the next day. He did. :-P

Evander installed these little cup jobbies himself.  They are something I bought at IKEA a year and a half ago, but hadn't put on the walls, yet, thinking I was going to paint soon. Actually, I was just waiting for my six-year-old to install them for me.  I'm thinking we'll put the kids' toothpaste in them?  As soon as the cups get glued down so they don't shatter everywhere when the kids inevitably pull them off the wall and drop them on the floor...

We are loving the new tile Nick put in.  And look!  That extra toilet paper roll holder thingy already came in handy.

The wall cabinet is deeper than the medicine cabinet we had before...so I am digging that.

I used Heat N' Bond to iron on this pretty fabric to the back of the cabinet:

Many many hearts of love to Heat N' Bond!  I was a little scared the hot iron would do something bad to the cabinet...but it did not.

Another special touch is this old step stool of ours that I painted:

Just a little reminder...

Nick did a wonderful job on the whole thing.  He definitely gets it done.

Although, his style of completing projects will forever conflict with my style of completing projects. Ha.

And who can resist a mirror?  Really.  You know you cannot.

Forgive me.

Oh, and in case you wanted to look at some eh and blah:

Before.  It was good for a while...but it was time for change!