Bite your tongue

Our little 1 yr old was running and bit his tongue yesterday. I hope it recovers soon as it is making him one grumpy little guy. He's not digging the nursing sessions as a result so I will confess to also being one unhappy camper.

I was reading some back posts over at Hand Quilting Stitches blog by Sara. Her bag in the style of Yoko Saito is in progress and oh so beautiful.

In order to cheer up a bit, a stopped over at superbuzzy and picked up some cute fabric to possibly whip up some curtains for my kitchen. I will come clean and also admit that I got some yarn too.

Oh, and a quick question for you - does anybody out there have this book: Patchwork Style by Suzuko Koseki? It seems like it's in English from the cover. I'm very intrigued.

Apple Picking and The Winner Is...

Thanks for entering Annie Smith's awesome online, global quilt class give away.

The random number generator picked out comment #9, so it looks like the happy winner Cheryl! Send me your email address - note: mine is quilt(dot)baby(at)hotmail (dot) com and I'll pass it along to Annie so she can enroll you.

I'm sure you'll find Annie's class pretty awesome.

We went apple picking yesterday and had a blast although it was super hot and towards the end we were ready to drink our fresh pressed juice and head home.

Ages ago I made a little apple quilt for a fellow blogger, and I've always toyed around with making another one. Guess I'll be adding that to my ever-growing-to-do-list. It certainly is growing much faster than I can mark things off.

Making a pie is starting to bubble up on that list.

And getting one of these split ring keys is on my list now too.

Quilt Class Give Away: from Annie Smith

My friend Annie Smith is not only an amazing woman, a famous podcaster, and an incredible quilter, but she also teaches classes in her global online classroom over at Quilting Stash Classroom.

She is offering a free seat (!!!) in her awesome online class "Quilting 101" as a give away to some of her favorite bloggers and it looks like you'll be the one to benefit from this contest.

Annie has an intro video posted here talking about why this class is good for beginning, intermediate, and advanced quilters alike.

Want to take quilt classes in your jammies? Well, now's your chance.

In order to win, submit a comment here and I'll pick a winner by random on this coming Saturday night. Polls close at 10pm Pacific time.

I'll pass your name along to Annie, and she'll hook you up.

Each lesson she does includes video instruction. How killer to take time to watch your class 'whenever' instead of having to show up in person? Sweeeeet.

Oh, and the above block is of course another Liberty of London birthday signature block I did for my niece. I'm ahead of the game, this one is for next year.

Falling into the iFold

I've finally done it. Taken the plunge. I'm the proud (and maybe terrified) owner of a new iPhone.

I originally thought, wow, this thing could really distract me from my quilting. That was only until I downloaded two new apps for it - QuiltFab and QuiltRef. They are really cute little iPhone applications that allow you to calculate how much fabric you need for the backing of your quilt or the binding you need to put on. Gee, handy.

Got a fav iPhone app? Please pass it along to me, the new kid on the iBlock. Meanwhile, I'll be here playing Stairway to Heaven on my ocarina.

The quilt block above is the 1st birthday signature block for our baby boy. He's a sweet and adorable little 1.

4 + 1 Kid party

Our kid party was a big hit according to the kid crowd. Our older son turned 4 and the baby turned 1 .

We had this awesome puppeteer, Peter, come, from PT Puppets. He was super entertaining, super professional, and the show was so great that most of the photos I took of the kids watching it include several mouths hanging open. Highly recommend him if you are in the bay area.

It was our first real 'kid' party, as all the other parties we have really thrown have pretty much been for the adults. Kids had a good time, so I guess I was worried over nothing.

Above is another 'in progress' photo I took of the party favor gift. Any more guesses?

When I read this post by Orange Flower Sketchbook I ran to my knitting needles and tried to finish the scarf I am making for my mom. I of course did not finish it today, but I am so so so tempted to try knitting lace after seeing that post.

And for those of you who are fans of the TV show Project Runway, did you know that Jay McCarroll (season 1 winner) has now designed a line of quilt fabric for Free Spirit? How cool is that!

Birthday Party: Party On!

Our boys birthdays are over and I must say that I'm a little sad since the preparations for the kid party and all the hoopla of the fiesta itself was such a huge blast.

I will have to give you a party brain dump in my next post.

Some of you asked a couple of questions about the birthday crowns.

I used Timtex or Peltex inside the two layers of felt in order to give the crown a lot of body and stand up to the battering it usually takes from my kids.

C&T publishing has everything you could want to know about Timtex in this blog post. Peltex seems to be another version of the same material - which is just thick interfacing.

I don't really prefer one or the other, I've used both in different crown's I've made and they both work well.

And to answer your other question, yes, I did make the crown adjustable by putting some simple ties in the back. Thought it would be more comfie than elastic, and with the size of my kids' heads...you never know how big they will actually get!

My mom was here last weekend and brought some goodies from Purl Soho for me. You gotta love these Lorna's Laces Shepherd Striping Sock Yarns for 40% off. Score! Thanks Mom.

Princess 1st Birthday

Today was the first birthday of my darling niece.

I made her a birthday crown (similar to the one I made for my husband and other family members).

She was amazing, adorable, and perhaps the sweetest 1 yr old baby girl on earth.

The crown pattern is from Amanda Soule's book "The Creative Family". A really excellent book, if you don't have a copy yet, it really is time to get one.

What Could I Be Making?

Is the suspense killing you?

Could this be a gift for the kids that are coming to our birthday party?

Might it be the coolest thing ever?

May it cause you to want to come to our party?

Would you like a clue? Ah, I guess you'll have to wait...

I had dinner last night with my friend and film maker Kathleen. After eating already way too much we decided to go totally nuts and visit the candy store. Oh such a bad idea, but oh so much fun.

The film she made called Discmen made me laugh so hard I almost fell out of my chair. Her adorable husband is one of the star actors. It's rare to see grown men take their spandex so seriously.