Baby quilt, paper pieced - first block

Here's a quick peek at the first completed block for the baby boy quilt that I started.

Last weekend my little sister and I spent pretty much an entire day working on them. We both made a lot of progress. We took this all day type class where you finish your own projects at Material Possessions in Orange County, Southern California.

Their web site is not the best, but the shop is really interesting, and has a great class space. They have some cool imported Japanese fabrics for sale as well as a limited selection of Japanese quilting books & magazines.

Tonight I also took my first pregnancy yoga class at this studio called Harmony, in Campbell, CA. I must say that for a person who doesn't know the first (or 2nd thing) about yoga, it was a cool new experience and I really enjoyed it. I'm already looking forward to the next class.

I finally sorta figured out what a downward dog is. My yoga-practicing mother will be proud of me.

Japanese quilt - for new baby girl cousin

Going through my fabric collection, I came across just a piece or two of fabric (ahem) that I am planning on working into the baby quilt that I just started.

The pieces above are going to be used in the girl baby quilt, the one for my sister's baby.

They all have 'warm' colors, like pinks, reds, oranges, and a few greens in there just to spice things up.

My son will get a very similar quilt, but with 'cool' colors - purples, blues, blacks...

Little sis and I are taking some time out to work on them during the day tomorrow, cannot wait!

These crib pictures are to die for. My quilt would not go with any of these decor themes, but gosh they are pretty. I'm a huge sucker for round cribs.

Our crib is a square one, though, and still has a naughty occupant that is not keen to move out anytime soon!

Two baby quilts for "Twin" cousins

First of all, thanks for the ideas of how to get rid of my little veggie box kitty pooper.

I think that last post scared it off, because it hasn't been back since. If I see any further deposits, I'll be sure to put some of your ideas into practice. Oh, and don't worry, I haven't gotten near the poops, since I know it's not a good idea being pregnant and all...My sweet husband has been the clean up crew.

The picture above is of a "Popcorn Hydrangea" that my grade school friend gave to me from her garden, but I could not resist and just ordered some plants for our house.

In case you have the time, you should know that the Doll Quilt Swap is on again and currently taking sign up's. They will cap it at 100 people, so sign up now if you want a spot. I participated in the past, and there are some amazing little quilts that get created here.

I am not signing up this time, however, because I have my hands full with the "Twin" baby quilts.

Probably haven't mentioned this before, but my little sister is pregnant as well and is due on the same day as me. I know, it's incredible, but yes, it is the same exact due date.

My sister decided that between her, my mom, and myself, we would each make 2 baby quilts - one for each of the cousins. They need to be the same pattern and size, but the colors and themes can be different since my baby will be a boy and her baby will be a little girl.

I've started cutting a few pieces, and getting really excited about it now. We are taking a class together this weekend to spend some time working on them. Once I have some finished blocks I'll post pictures for you to check out.

Cat-B-gone

Here's the full BabySchool quilt picture. It just came home for it's first weekly wash. With any luck it will be tough enough for many weekly runs through the machine.

Ok, so calling all cat-knowing folks: I have a problem.

My AMAZING veggie box (complete w/ herbs, tomato plants, squashes...etc) gets pooped in on a very regular basis by one very naughty and very orange fluffy cat.

Any ideas of how to get it to stop using my veggie box as it's litter box? Please don't tell me to get a dog...I'm sure it would work, but I'm allergic!

I am also obsessed with some online shopping items, that I just may have to order due to 'not being able to live without them'.

1) This top from anthropologie - the purple one is the one I'm after. I'm wondering if you can fit a belly the size of my belly under there...hm...think so?

2) This CD from Colon Meloy - front man for The Decemberists - oh, what an awesome band. I need to get this music!

3) This book: Friday Night Knitting Club - I need something light to kick off the summer reading .

4) This bike: (bad interface for this site, check out the "Classic 3") Ok, like I can ride a bike in my current state, I know, I can hardly waddle to the bathroom every 20 min....but Oh, I would love to ride this down to the farmer's market on Saturday mornings. It's begging for a Longaberger basket. PS, I'm probably the worst or least-talented bike rider you've met. Perhaps I could reconsider and get a trike. Harder to fall off of, right?

Quilt binding - getting in a bind and getting out of it too

I really really wanted to bind that Japanese Kid's quilt in red, but I had a billion small pieces of red fabrics, and none of them had enough to make it around the outside by themselves.

How much binding does one need? Well, take all the sides of your quilt, add them up, and add 10 inches (or 25.4cm to be exact). That should buy you enough binding to get around the whole quilt.

So my nutty solution was to take 1 cut piece of each of the reds (2.5 inches wide), so the quilt has these 6 or so funky binding colors that travel around it.

Playful solution, but it got the quilt done on time for it to already have been enjoyed at nap time earlier today. Our son was super proud of it, and showed it to his favorite teacher as soon as he got to school.

I was catching up on my blog reading and this post by Oiyi almost laughed me out of my office chair. She made a katamari ball that not only looks like the one from the video game, but it actually works just like the game by being magnetic and picking up anything in it's path.

Wow, this was a bright spot in my day. Bravo Oiyi!! This is so rockin! I want to be cool enough to make one too!

Japanese Quilt for kids

It's a holiday weekend here in the US, so we have Monday off as well.

I'm taking advantage of it by finishing up this Japanese kid's quilt that I started for my son a couple of weeks ago.

All the fabrics are Japanese imports, mostly bought at Purl.

I cut very wide pieces of all the fabrics I love, and made a reversable quilt with an animal theme on the front side and a car theme on the back.

By quilting lines across it, I made sure it would come together fast, and hold up to washings.

It will be packed off to school and enjoyed for many many naps. I think life is a little extra good when you still get to have a regular nap every day.

Recently, I started to read and really enjoy Ravenhill blog. Emily writes this blog from Norway, and has some seriously inspirational crafty work going on here. There is a recent post there that talks about Liberty fabric, as well as a couple pictures of Japanese taupe fabric.

Her list of blogs she's reading is also very impressive, you may want to check out some of the links.

Something old...something new...

For the last week, we have been traveling like mad.

We visited the mid western United States for the wedding of some very good friends. While we were in that neck of the woods we also caught up with some of the family on my husband's side.

The trip was nuts, too short, and lovely all at the same time.

At the wedding, the bride really looked like a timeless beauty.

Speaking of timeless, I have run into a few blogs lately that are devoted to historic quilting. I think these adorable blocks from the civil war period as well as the colors and fabrics are as elegant as you can get.

If you know of others, please turn me on to them, but here's what I've been reading lately:

- Inspired by Antique quilts - check out this postage stamp quilt in progress - hello beautiful!

- Brown Quilts - some really cute civil war blocks being made here...

- Will work for Fabric - more civil war blocks, so pretty.

- Quilt in Me - some more antique-looking creations here, as well as a lot of beautiful hand work.

Fabric calligraphy tips

A few questions came in about the calligraphy so here's a couple more tips.

Yes, I do use freezer paper on the back for stability. I find that it keeps the fabric from moving around while you are writing, and I pretty much use it every time. I just rip off a piece, and iron it to the back.

I don't need to heat set it, because I use pigma pens, and they are forever without heat, so be careful, don't write on your white pants while using them! They come in all sorts of colors and thickness.

I get some inspiration from various books on the form of the letters as well as some of the fancy loops. My favorite book is called The Technique of Copperplate Calligraphy by Gordon Turner, ISBN 0-486-25512-3.

If you have some extra lunch money burning a hole in your pocket, perhaps you want to surf on over to Purl and pick up one of their Liberty of London fat quarter packs.

Liberty fabric (to those who are lucky/crazy enough to own some) is what fabric looks and feels like in heaven, I think.

Happy Mother's Day

Hope your Mother's day was as great as mine was.

I woke up this morning to our 2 yr old bouncing into my bed saying, "Get up Mommy! Open cards and presents! We bought you a new camera!"

I thought, wow, maybe they got me that Diana plastic camera I've been eyeing!

Well, they did, however...there was also a new very fancy DSLR in store for me as well.

Wow is all I can say. I guess I need to step up the blog photography to the next level!

Hope all you mom's out there got to have a very nice and relaxing day.

I'm thankful for my own mom (my quilting mentor) and all the love she constantly showers on not only me, but my husband and son as well.

Babyschool quilt

Our 2 yr old son drags a tiny little infant blanket to school with him, which is way too small, so I decided to quickly put together this little quilt for him.

Luckily, I picked up this farm house fabric when I was at the Purl Soho warehouse in S. California some time ago. I got this green and red color as well as pink.

I couldn't find it on their web site anymore, but I did find it on Superbuzzy, and wow, it's even on sale. There used to be some there in taupe brown colors, but (ahem) somebody just bought the rest of that bolt.

Different topic: Are you hooked on Woot yet? Do you Woot? Have you gotten something cool from this month's Woot-off?

Apparently, all the dude-geeks (yes Carlos, that means you) already know about this, and I'm the last to visit this incredibly cool, super clearance, electronics web site.

And I promise to say more to answer your fabric calligraphy questions next post, I swear.

FMLA, CA PDL, CFRA, and other such evils

Oh, if you know what any of the above acronyms stand for, God bless you, as you have been through the hoops to take a maternity leave from your job.

Trying to figure out what all these overlapping leaves mean to me personally has been our project for the evening. I feel like I now have a PhD in the subject.

Above is another of the world's tiniest pin cushions, this time w/ a pin for scale. It's a strawberry with a little flower on top, in case you didn't guess that.

On a lighter note, I went to the coolest nursery today with my friend Sharon, and we scored some seriously cool veggies for the upcoming season.

Think I'm most excited about the 4th of July tomato that is supposed to be at least 10 days earlier than Early Girl, and will actually give you fruit for the 4th of July picnic!

Now THAT would be something!

What's going in your planter box this year?

World's tiniest pincushion

I have developed a fetish for making the worlds tiniest pincushions.

They are so addictive, and I'm started to make them in all sorts of fruit shapes. This little tomato was shipped off to Zegi inside the little bag, to kick off her collection of sewing goodies in there.

I used wool roving from Bird Brain Designs along with some other wool fabrics for the top leaf that I've collected over the years.

Being tempted to make billions of these in every fruit flavor, and opening an Etsy shop....perhaps I should be restrained before I give up my day job to create these all day long.

Permanent ink on quilts

Writing on your quilt is like giving it a tattoo.

Traditional Baltimore Album quilts had copper plate calligraphy on them. There is a cool video on you tube (short clip) that gives you an idea of how the real artists make these beautiful letters.

I did a pseudo-wanna-be version of this that works on fabric w/ an example of how to do calligraphy on fabric in an earlier post.

The above is a little bag I made for Zegi who won the give away contest.

First, I took some fabric and wrote a letter to my coming-soon baby boy on it, using my own 'copperplate calligraphy' and a pigma pen.

Then I made it into a little bag, place some adorable taupe-blue dots on there, and used a clover zipper (the ONLY kind of zipper to use on bags!!).

The letter says:


May you have health and love in your life; true friends, and passion. Take comfort in the blessing of family. Find joy in every day and appreciate the beauty of nature. Work hard and find pleasure in learning. You are an amazing gift to the world.



So this is my wish, for my yet to be born son, and to all of you as well since these are the things I find to be the most rewarding in my own life.

This technique of writing not only makes for a very interesting treatment on fabric in general, but is perfect for making quilt labels too. (Label example from earlier post).

It's a Boy!!

Well, with twice as many girl guessers as boy guessers...I have to admit the odds of winning the give away were slighly in favor of those rooting for the blue side.

The lucky winner of the give away is Zegi of Quilt Bug Blog - congrats to you Zegi!!

Thanks to everybody for the well wishes and comments.

Truthfully, I'm thrilled that we'll have a matching set of little boys, and I really cannot wait to meet this tiny one.

He's certainly a lively baby, kicking around quite a lot!

Above is a quick shot of the almost-done item for the give away....final picture next post.

Boy or Girl? You guess....you win!

Today was a HUGE day in our household, we had our big ultrasound, and we found out the sex of our newly expected arrival.

I wanted to do a little give-away for all you rockin' blog readers, so here's the deal:

Make a comment, take a guess - is it a boy or a girl? - sometime before midnight PST on 4/26.

To all those who guess right (and no cheating, my sister cannot play since she already knows) I'll pick a lucky name out of the hat and send a little surprise gift your way.

Thanks for sharing in our joy....oh, babies....I honestly don't know of anything better in the universe.

ps - do NOT click on this link if you are trying not to buy more fabric. I just broke down and bought a yard! Cuteness alert!!

Chevron scarf

Joelle Hoverson's book (owner of Purl Soho) Last Minute Knitted Gifts really lit a fire under me to put some effort into learning how to knit.

So...I took some lessons, and classes, and as a quilter that is terrified of knitting, very timidly started this Chevron Scarf from her book.

I'm using red and green Koigu yarn, and these are as pretty as any yarn I've ever seen.

Unclear if I will ever finish this, even though finishing by next winter would be a stretch goal for me. It seems that many others coming before me have actually finished one of these - wow, some cool inspiration here - Chevron Scarf flickr group

I got my poor friend Sharon to make one too, because I'm too scared to make one alone. Thanks for the knitted moral support, my dear.

And if you don't have the energy to start one yourself, and are looking to somehow occupy your time, I would recommend this URL: Paper Throw - beware, addictive!

Papa visit

This weekend my husband is off at a photo workshop, getting inspiration in Big Sur, California and getting inspiration from his instructor, Eddie Soloway (amazing photos here).

My dad, affectionately known around here as Papa, flew in to give me a hand and serve as 2-yr-old entertainment. He's amazing, and the two of them are like peas and carrots.

I'm sure it will be a fun weekend, but will include a little visit to the photo school to see Daddy for dinner, so likely not to get much quilting in.

Some of you out there are still getting a lot of sewing done. Alex, of Moonstitches just made this to-die-for Mexican Pinwheel quilt block. The beauty does sometimes lie in the details, in small tiny pieces fitting together, just so.

You know you're crazy when...

...you try to make ketchup from scratch.

I have this cookbook that has a recipe for turkey meatloaf that I wanted to try, but in order to make that, you first must make your own ketchup.

This was no small endeavor, and I ended up with no small amount of it either. (live in the California bay area, and want some?)

Is this because I'm pregnant and am predisposed to do, make, eat odd things? Perhaps, I'm trying to keep an open mind here.

In any case, the ketchup is awesome, though not sweet, and is being well-received by all. Even non-ketchup eaters have turned over a new leaf.

Lastly, the above picture is of the hair decoration that I got from Atelier Kanawa's Etsy shop. Wow, pretty pretty, and even has bells.

Doll quilts

The Doll Quilt Swap is on again, after taking some time out for maybe about half a year.

Looks like there is a new host, and lots of folks signed up to eagerly create those tiny quilts to warm the laps of teddy bears and curly-haired dolls around the globe.

I'm not in the swap this time because I was afraid I wouldn't have the energy to finish it on time. I am not sure how you ladies bust through your pregnancy and continue to turn out amazing crafty works....if you have any tips on where to find some extra energy, please send them my way!

The quilt squares above were a gift from my mom, when she visited last week. Not sure where I will use them yet, but they are all from Japan, and each is so very pretty.

It's twins!

Oh my goodness, we're expecting twin babies! Isn't it amazing!

I had an appointment w/ my OB this afternoon, and she was looking at the ultrasound and found that we will be having twins!

She really wants us to come back in another 2 weeks to verify that it isn't actually triplets.

Oh, and my friend forward me this link to a USB-based pregnancy test that plugs directly into your computer. Is this too geeky or what? Ah, and I used to think she was so "cool" - just kidding Sharon.

Ok seriously, I'M NOT HAVING TWINS, it's just April Fools' day (this lovely thing we celebrate here in the US).

Have you been fooled today? (probably not by little old me!) Tee hee....